“But they do not date from the time of my ancestor. Of what use are they to us?”
Fidelma was spreading one before her on the table.
“The writing mentions that his house stands near a tower; Tower Eight. Also that the house is situated at the northeast corner of a building which some Christians had erected in honor of one of their leaders, Martin of Gaul.”
Deacon Lepidus was perplexed.
“Does that help us? It is so many years ago.”
“The ten towers built by the Romans along the ancient walls of the town can still be recognized, although they are crumbling away. The Jutes do not like occupying the old buildings of the Britons or Romans and prefer to build their own. However, there is still the chapel dedicated to Martin of Gaul, who is more popularly known as Martin of Tours. The chapel is still standing. People still go there to worship.”
A warm smile spread across the deacon’s face.
“By all that is a miracle! What the Venerable Gelasius said about you was an underestimate, Sister Fidelma. You have, in a few moments, cleared away the misty paths and pointed to . . .”
Fidelma held up a hand to silence him.
“Are you truly convinced that if we can locate the precise spot that you will find this eagle?”
“You have demonstrated that the writer of the vellum has provided clues enough that lead us not only to the town but the location of where his house might have stood.”
The corners of Fidelma’s mouth turned down momentarily. Then she exhaled slowly.
“Let us observe, then, where else the writer of the vellum will lead us.”
Deacon Lepidus rose to his feet with a smile that was almost a grin of triumph, and clapped his hands together.
“Just so! Just so! Where shall we go?”
Fidelma tapped the map with a slim forefinger.
“First, let us see what these charts of the town tell us. To the east of the township we have the River Stur. Since you are interested in these old names, Deacon Lepidus, you might like to know that it is a name given by the Britons, which means a strong or powerful river. Now these buildings here are the main part of the old town. As you observe they stand beyond the west bank of the river and beyond the alder swamp. The walls were built by the Romans and then later fortified by the Britons, after the Roman withdrawal, to keep out the Angles, Saxons and Jutish raiders.”
Deacon Lepidus peered down and his excitement returned.
“I see. Around the walls are ten towers. Each tower is numbered on the chart.”
It was true that each tower had a Roman numeral—I, II, III, IV, V—and among them was VIII, upon which Fidelma tapped lightly with her forefinger.
“And to the west, we have the church of Martin and buildings around it. What buildings would be at the northwest corner?”
“Northeast,” corrected the deacon hurriedly.
“Exactly so,” agreed Fidelma, unperturbed. “That’s what I meant.”
“Why,” cried the deacon, jabbing at the chart, “this building here is on the northeast corner of the church. It is marked as some sort of villa.”
“So it is. But is it still standing after all those centuries?”
“Perhaps a building is standing there,” Deacon Lepidus replied enthusiastically. “Maybe the original foundations are still intact.”
“And would that help us?” queried Fidelma. Her voice was gently probing, like a teacher trying to help a pupil with a lesson.
“Surely,” the deacon said confidently. “Cingetorix wrote that he would hide the eagle in the hypocaust. If so, if the building was destroyed, whatever was hidden in the foundations, where the hypocaust is, might have survived. You see, a hypocaust is . . .”
“It is a system for heating rooms with warm air,” intervened Fidelma. “I am afraid that you Romans did not exactly invent the idea, although you claim as much. However, I have seen other ancient examples of the basic system. The floors are raised on pillars and the air underneath is heated by a furnace and piped through the flues.”
Deacon Lepidus’s face struggled to control a patriotic irritation at Fidelma’s words. He finally produced a strained smile.
“I will not argue with you on who or what invented the hypocaustrum, which is a Latin word.”
“Hypokauston is a Greek word,” pointed out Fidelma calmly. “Clearly, we all borrow from one another and perhaps that is as it should be? Let us return to the problem in hand. We will have to walk to this spot and see what remains of any building. Only once we have surveyed this area will we see what our next step can be.”
Fidelma had only been in the town a week but it was so small that she had already explored the location around the abbey. It was sad that during the two centuries since the Britons had been driven from the city by Hengist and his son Aesc, the Jutes and their Angle and Saxon comrades had let much of it fall into disuse and disrepair, preferring to build their own crude constructions of timber outside the old city walls. A few buildings had been erected in spaces where the older buildings had decayed. Only recently, since the coming of Augustine from Rome and his successors, had a new dynamism seized the city, and buildings were being renovated and repaired. Even so, it was a haphazard process.
Fidelma led the way with confidence to the crumbling towers that had once guarded the partially destroyed city walls.
“That is Tower Eight,” she said, pointing to what had once been a square tower now standing no more than a single story high.
“How do you know? Just from the map?” demanded the deacon.
She shook her head irritably.
“It bears the number on the lintel above the door.”
She pointed to where “VIII” could clearly be seen before turning to survey the piles of stone and brickwork that lay about. Her eyes widened suddenly.
“That wooden granary and its outbuilding appear to stand in the position that is indicated. See, there is the church dedicated to the Blessed Martin of Tours. Curious. They are the only buildings near here, as well.”
Deacon Lepidus followed her gaze and nodded.
“God is smiling on us.”
Fidelma was already making her way toward the buildings.
“There are two possibilities,” she mused. “The granary has been built over the villa so that the hypocaust is under there. Or, that smaller stone building next to the granary may have been part of original villa and we will find the hypocaust there.” She hesitated a moment. “Let us try the stone building first. It is clearly older than the granary.”
While they were standing there, a thickset man, dressed in Saxon workman’s clothing, stepped out of the shadow of the granary.
“Good day, reverend sir. Good day, lady. What do you seek here?”
He smiled too easily for Fidelma’s taste, giving her the impression of a fox assessing his prey. His Jutish accent was hard to understand although he was speaking in a low Latin. It was the deacon who explained their purpose, playing down the value of the eagle but offering a silver coin if the man could help them locate what they were looking for.
“This is my granary. I built it.” The man replied. “My name is Wulfred.”
“If you built it, did you observe whether it had holes in the ground or tunnels underneath it?” Fidelma inquired.
The man rubbed his jaw, thoughtfully.
“There were places we had to fill in with rubble to give us a foundation.”
Deacon Lepidus’s face fell.
“The hypocaust was filled in?”
Wulfred shrugged. “I can show you the type of holes we filled in, if you are interested. The little stone building has such holes under the floor. Come, I have a lantern. I’ll show you.”
They were following the man through the doorway when Fidelma suddenly caught sight of something scratched on one of the side pillars supporting the frame of the door. She called Deacon Lepidus’s attention to it, simply pointing. It was a scratch mark. It looked like an “IX.” There was something b
efore it, which neither of them could make out.
“Nine?” whispered Lepidus, with sudden excitement. “The ninth legion?”
Fidelma made no reply.
It was cold and dirty inside. Dirt covered the floor. Wulfred held his polished horn lantern high. It revealed a room of about four meters square. It was totally empty. In one corner was a hole in the floor.
“Down there is where you can see the tunnels under the floor,” volunteered Wulfred.
Fidelma went across and knelt down. The smell of decay was quite prevalent. She asked for the lantern and peered down. A space of about seventy millimeters lay underneath the floor. Little brick piers supported the timbers at intervals of a meter from one another forming little squares.
“A hypocaust,” she said, raising herself and handing the lantern back. “But now what?”
Deacon Lepidus made no reply.
“Perhaps some sign was left . . .?” he ventured.
Fidelma glanced on the floor. What she saw made her frown, and she began to scrape at the floor with the point of her shoe. The earth came away to reveal a tiny patch of mosaic. These were the type of floors that she had seen in Rome. She asked Wulfred if he had a broom of twigs. It took a half an hour to clear a section of the floor. The mosaic revealed a figure clad in a Roman senatorial toga; one hand was held up with a finger extended. Fidelma frowned. Something made her follow the pointing finger. She suddenly noticed a scratch mark on the wall. There was no doubt about it this time. The figure “IX” had been scratched into the stonework and a tiny arrow pointed downwards beneath it.
“We’ll break into the hypocaust here,” she announced. “With the permission of Wulfred, of course,” she added.
The Jute readily agreed when Deacon Lepidus held out another coin.
Lepidus himself took charge of making the hole. It was the work of another half an hour to create a space through which a small person could pass into the hypocaust below. Fidelma volunteered. Her face was screwed into an expression of distaste as she squeezed into the confined darkness, having to lie full length on her stomach. It was not merely damp but the walls below were bathed in water. It was musty and reminded Fidelma of a cemetery vault. She ran her hand in darkness over the wet brickwork.
“Pass me down the lantern,” she called up.
It was Lepidus who leaned down and handed her the polished horn lantern, giving its opaque glow to the darkness.
Fidelma breathed out softly.
By its light she could see the brickwork and almost immediately she saw scratch marks. “IX Hispana.” She put the lantern down and began to tug at the first brick. It was loose and gave way with surprising ease, swinging a little so that she could remove it. The other long, thin bricks were removed with the same ease. A large aperture was soon opened. She peered into the darkness. Something flickered back in the lantern light. She reached forth a hand. It was metal, cold and wet.
She knew what it was before her exploring hand encompassed the lines of the object. She knew it was a bronze eagle.
“What is it?” called Deacon Lepidus above her, sensing her discovery.
“Wait,” she instructed sharply.
Her exploring hand felt around the interior of the alcove. Water was seeping in, damp and dark. Obviously the alcove was not waterproof.
Then her exploring hand felt a piece of material. It, too, was wet from the seepage. She drew it forth. It was a piece of vellum. She could not make out the writing by the limited light of the lantern, so she turned and handed it upwards. It was only about a meter in length for it was lacking its wooden haft. She handed it up, ignoring the gasps and sounds from the Deacon Lepidus. Then she passed up the lantern to Wulfred before she twisted on her back and scrambled back into the room above.
A moment or so later she was able to see the fruits of her sojourn in the dank darkness below. Wulfred was holding the lantern high while Deacon Lepidus was almost dancing as he clutched the bronze eagle.
“The eagle! The eagle!” he cried delightedly.
A dark bronze eagle was surrounded by laurel wreaths, its claws apparently clutching a branch. Then, below the circle of laurel leaves, hung a scroll on which the letters “SPQR” were engraved. Senatus Populusque Romanus. Lepidus tapped the letters with his forefinger. “The ultimate authority for any Roman legion. The Senate and People of Rome.”
“Let us not forget this find has been made on Wulfred’s property,” she pointed out, as Lepidus seemed to have forgotten the presence of the Jutish granary owner.
“I will come to an accommodation with Wulfred. A third silver coin should suffice for he has no use for these relics. Is that not so?”
The Jutish granary owner bowed his head.
“I am sure that the reverend sir is generous in rewarding me for my services,” he replied.
“My ancestor’s eagle has induced such generosity,” Lepidus smiled.
“What of the vellum that was with it?” Fidelma asked.
Lepidus handed it to her.
She took it, carefully unrolling it. She examined the handwriting carefully and then the text.
“At least it is short,” Deacon Lepidus smiled.
“Indeed,” she agreed. “It simply says, “I, Cingetorix of the Cantiaci and mathematicus of Darovernum, place the eagle of the Ninth Hispana Legion, for safe keeping, in this place. My son is dead without issue. So should a younger hand find it, I entreat whoever you are, take the eagle to Rome and hand it to the emperor and tell him that the Legate Platonius Lepidus gave his life in its defense, having exhorted me to make the journey to Rome so that the legion might be raised again under this divine standard. I failed but I hope the words I have written will be testament to the honor and glory of the Ninth and to its commander, Platonius Lepidus, may the gods give him eternal rest.”
Fidelma sighed deeply.
“Then there is no more to be said. You have what you wanted, deacon. Let us return to the abbey.”
Deacon Lepidus smiled appreciatively.
“I have what I want thanks to you, Sister Fidelma. You are witness to these events, which will ensure no one questions them. I shall go to the Archbishop Theodore and tell him what has transpired and that you may confirm my testimony.”
Fidelma grimaced.
“Immediately, I need to bathe after crawling around in that hypocaust. I will join you and the archbishop later.”
Archbishop Theodore sat in his chair of office and was smiling.
“Well, Fidelma of Cashel, the Deacon Lepidus has much to say in praise of you.”
Fidelma had entered the archbishop’s chamber with Eadulf at her side. Deacon Lepidus was standing to one side nodding happily.
“It seems that you have done a singular service by solving an ancient riddle for him and his family.”
“Not so, my lord,” replied Fidelma quietly.
“Come, Sister Fidelma, no undue modesty,” intervened Deacon Lepidus. “You have discovered the truth of what happened to my ancestor and to the fate of six thousand soldiers of Rome, the fate of the Ninth Hispana.”
“The truth?” Fidelma glanced toward him, suddenly scornful. Her voice was sharp. “The truth is that Deacon Lepidus wished to perpetrate a hoax, a fraud, an untruth, in order to give himself and his family prestige. He sought to write a fabricated history, which would elevate him in society in Rome where his ambitions might know no bounds.”
“I don’t understand,” frowned Archbishop Theodore.
“Simple to understand, once told,” replied Fidelma. “Deacon Lepidus faked an eagle which he claimed was the five-hundred-year-old regimental emblem of the Ninth Hispana Legion which disappeared in Britain at a time when his ancestor was supposed to be its legate or commanding officer. He wrote two accounts on vellum which explained what supposedly happened to the legion and how the eagle could be found.”
“This is nonsense!” snapped Lepidus. “I will not stay here to be insulted.”
“Wait!” Archbishop Theodore sa
id quietly as Lepidus turned to go. “You will stay until I give you leave to go.”
“And you will stay to hear the truth,” added Fidelma. “Do you think I am a simpleton that you could fool me? Your complicated plot merely needed me, my reputation, to confirm the veracity of your claim. You came with a vellum, pretending that you needed my help to solve the clues given in it. There were enough clues for an idiot to follow. It was to lead me to a house in this town and to the old hypocaust where I would find another vellum and the bronze eagle.”
“This is an insult to me, an insult to Rome,” spluttered the deacon.
Archbishop Theodore raised a hand.
“I will judge what insults Rome, Deacon Lepidus. Sister Fidelma, have you some evidence behind this accusation?”
Fidelma nodded.
“Firstly, I demand Lepidus produce the two pieces of vellum. The first is a text said to be written five hundred years ago . . .”
“I never said that!” snapped Lepidus triumphantly. “I said it was my copy from the original which resides in my family library in Rome.”
“So you did. And I asked you very clearly whether you had altered the text in any way or whether it was a clear copy of the original. True or false?”
He nodded reluctantly.
“What you neglected to take into account is that language changes over the centuries. In my own land, we have our modern speech, but we have the language that has been used in the inscriptions which we put up in the alphabet we called Ogham, named after Ogma, the old god of literacy. That language is called the Bérla Féine, which many of our professional scribes cannot understand even today. I have seen Latin texts of ancient times, having read Tacitus and Caesar and others. This text of five hundred years ago is the Latin that is used today, called vulgar or popular Latin.”
“Next, I found it strange that Cingetorix, who is supposed to have written this, is a mathematicus, an accountant employed by the legion, yet bearing a kingly name which Romans might have found an objection to in one so lowly in their eyes. Cingetorix is a name well known to those who read Caesar. This same Cingetorix is a Cantii but he calls himself a Cantiaci, which is the Roman form, just as he describes his native town as Darovernum in the form recorded by Ptolemy, as I recall. Had he been a native he would have recorded it as Duroverno. Both these things were strange to me but not conclusive of fraud as Cingetorix is writing in Latin.”
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