The Ides of June

by Rosemary Rowe

  Tenuis, however, looked a little shocked. Eating in the street was a thing that poorer people did.

  ‘We can sit there on the stone trough to eat our food and get a drink of water in our hands to wash it down,’ I told him heartily. ‘I’ll lead the way, since you are not familiar with the town.’

  Tenuis, needing no further encouragement, urged Arlina into a walk again.

  Our fountain was down a little alley to our right, where four streets met to make a little square. The shops which lined the route were shut and shuttered now, so it took no time at all – none of the usual hawkers and traders plucking at your sleeves, trying to tempt you with the piles of goods heaped up on the pavements, or laid out on tabletops outside the shop. One hot-soup shop was open and full of customers while, from the crowded flats above, a smell of smoke and burned meat seeped down into the street. (People were obviously cooking in their homes – at some risk of conflagration and against the law, since none of these premises had provision for a fire!)

  At the public fountain we found a little queue of slaves and a few free-women with their water jugs – people need water, even on the Ides – but there was none of the usual jostling, and no one hindered us. We tied Arlina up and found a space, sat down on the stone edge of the drinking-trough, and ate our oatcakes there. It did not take us long.

  I had just finished, and was stooping to scoop some water up – intending to drink it out of my cupped hands – when Tenuis leaned over and tugged my tunic sleeve.

  ‘There’s the litter, master! It’s that rich man again.’

  I looked up. It did appear to be the carrying chair I’d seen before; I thought I recognized the bearer at the front. However, most of these hired devices look very much the same, especially with the green-brown curtains drawn, and this one was coming from the direction of the fort and travelling at a run, so I dismissed the notion and prepared to go back to my drink.

  However, as they approached the fountain the carriers slowed down, and someone began twitching the curtains from within – presumably so the occupant could take a quick peek out. There was a high, barked order – which might have been ‘That’s him!’ – and the litter ambled to a stop.

  I frowned. Had Porteus changed his mind and followed me? Had he discovered some news of Varius? Or was it simply that he’d been disappointed of his hoped-for lunch – as I’d predicted – and happened to be passing on the way to somewhere else? It couldn’t be his own apartment, because that didn’t lie this way. So what had made him go back to the gate? Whatever the reason, it seemed he wanted me. All things considered, this was disquieting.

  I let the water run out through my fingers and got slowly to my feet, ready to confront Porteus when he emerged. But to my surprise, as I approached, the curtains were pulled back and revealed the occupant to be a female form – and a very diminuitive female form, at that. Ancient too, from the aged hand which now appeared from beneath the woollen cape. ‘You there, in the cloak and tunic – the one without a jug!’ The voice was weak and quavering but still somehow contrived to sound imperious. ‘Is that your animal?’ She waved one skinny arm to indicate the mule.

  She was making no attempt to get down from the chair, so I went across to her, drawing curious glances from the watchers at the trough. ‘Madam?’ I murmured, trying to peer through the veil without success.

  This was a wealthy Roman by the look of it, though she seemed to be travelling without an attendant slave of any kind. The hands, weighed down with jewels and jet, were wrinkled and shrunken as an old dried pea – giving the impression of a living skeleton – though of course the face and hair were covered by that veil, as appropriate for an honourable matron in the street. Otherwise she was rather unbecomingly attired, in a hooded palla of pale violet hue, which hung half-opened on her skinny form, revealing a dark-blue grecian robe underneath and exposing a surprising length of scraggy neck. These garments had clearly been expensive once, but now they showed signs of fading, stains and wear.

  ‘Young man, I asked a question! Is that your animal?’

  I was so bemused at the description – I am nearing sixty years of age and nobody has called me ‘young’ for many years – that I could only nod.

  ‘Then you must be Libertus, the man I’m looking for.’

  It was a question. I could only nod again.

  She made a tutting sound. ‘Then I was misinformed. I was told that you were heading out of town, so I’ve made a wasted journey to the gate. But the sentry advised me that he’d seen you come this way – he said you had the mule and little slave with you. Mercifully I have found you now. I have an errand for you. Though I can’t instruct you here—’ she gestured contemptuously at the queue for water – ‘too many idle servants and plebians listening in. This is a private matter, not for general ears. Follow the litter. I will see you at the gate. See to it, bearers!’

  And without another word she pulled the curtains to, and the conveyance went lurching off again, round the little square and back in the direction from which it had just come.

  SIX

  I was still staring after the departing litter, marvelling at its unlikely occupant, when I felt a timid tug on the corner of my cloak. I turned to find Tenuis looking up at me, with a bemused expression on his little face.

  ‘Who was that, master?’

  ‘I’ve no idea,’ I told him, truthfully.

  ‘Yet she seemed to know your name?’

  ‘I can’t imagine how. I haven’t glimpsed her face, of course, but I’m perfectly certain that I’ve not seen her before.’

  ‘You wouldn’t forget her in a hurry, would you master? I’ve never seen a woman with a neck so long and thin. She looked like a goose – and she snapped like one, as well.’

  I grinned, despite myself, then carefully composed my face again. Gwellia was always telling me that I encouraged the slave-boys to make irreverent remarks. ‘A forceful lady, certainly, and clearly of some rank. So one must be respectful.’ I tried to sound severe.

  ‘So are you going to do this errand for her, master?’ he enquired. ‘She obviously expects you to leap to her command. But you are not a slave!’ He glanced at me doubtfully. ‘Or were you hoping it was something I could do?’

  I shook my head. Such a thought had not occurred to me – and after what I’d learned at Marcus’s I certainly did not want to be without my servant-boy today. ‘We’ll do it together, if we do it at all,’ I said, and saw that he was genuinely reassured. Obviously her manner had alarmed him – it had almost frightened me! ‘But that depends on what the errand is,’ I added. ‘I confess that I am tempted to find out – if only because she’s made me curious. How could she know me? Or know that I was here?’

  ‘And I expect you’d like to discover who she is, as well?’

  ‘Of course!’ I raised a brow at him. ‘Well, there is only one way to discover that! We’ve got to go back through the southern gate in any case. No doubt she is waiting there impatiently by now – though she can wait a little longer while I have my little drink.’ I cupped my hands and scooped up the water that I’d failed to have before, then shook the excess from my fingers and gestured to the mule. ‘You untie Arlina and bring her along. We’ll go and see if we can find the litter at the gate.’

  It would have been hard to miss it – as we saw when we arrived. It was drawn up immediately inside the central arch, blocking the roadway and forcing the few pedestrians to skirt it as they passed. The guard on duty was observing this, but had not interfered, so it simply stood there with the curtains firmly drawn and the bearers standing nervously nearby.

  This was perhaps because the chair was now accompanied, too, by a tall, thin, balding manservant of advancing age, who had obviously just got there at a run, since he was red-faced, out of breath, and perspiring visibly. He was dressed in an elaborate ochre tunic which marked him as the slave of somebody of rank, though it was now damp with sweat and clinging to his chest, revealing the slave-disc that he wore around hi
s neck. His whole form was heaving and his lined face was puce, but when he saw us he stepped up to the chair and tapped twice on the frame.

  ‘Mis-mis-mistress. The pa-pa-pavement-maker with the mule is here.’

  ‘Very well, Hebestus,’ said the thin voice from within. ‘Pull the curtains back and stand aside so I can talk to him.’

  Hebestus did as he was bidden and the woman turned to me, thrusting back the palla-hood impatiently. She had already pushed her travelling veil aside in a way most Roman matrons would have shuddered at – showing her hair and face in public to a man to whom she’d not been introduced! And it was such a face! I had not met her anywhere before, of that I was now sure.

  She was quite the oldest woman that I had ever seen, beady-eyed and pale as wood-ash but sharp-beaked as a bird. Once she had probably been beautiful, but now her skin was stretched like fragile parchment over bony cheeks and her brow was crisscrossed with a thousand little lines; though perhaps the most striking thing about her was her hair. It was thin and patchy, with the pink scalp showing through, but far from being decorously white, it was dyed to a conspicuously vivid henna hue, and arranged in meagre ringlets and a fringe of wispy curls.

  I found that I was staring; the effect was so bizarre.

  ‘Ah, pavement-maker, there you are at last!’ The crone – that was the only word for her – gave me a thin smile. (The wrinkled lips were grotesquely touched with red – doubtless the same ochre and alkanet paste used by my patron’s lovely wife, though here the result was wholly different!) Mercifully, she appeared to have a few remaining teeth. ‘You have been so long, I feared that you’d gone home another way – though your roundhouse lies in this direction, I believe?’

  I did not return the smile. ‘Lady citizen, you have the advantage over me. You clearly know my name and trade – and even where I live. Whom do I have the honour of addressing in my turn?’

  She looked affronted, as if I had been impudent, but after a moment she did deign to reply. ‘Since it bears upon your errand, I suppose there is no harm in telling you. My name is Eliana Tertia and I am a relative of Varius Quintus – the sister of his grandmother, in fact. You’ve heard of Varius Quintus, I suppose?’

  I had more than heard of him, I thought, but all I did was bow. ‘Indeed! He is to dine with my patron, Marcus Septimus, this very night, in fact.’

  She shook her head. ‘I fear that’s not to be. My great-nephew has been taken ill again – and this time his whole household have succumbed to it.’

  ‘Ill?’ Whatever I expected, it had not been this. Could it be genuine, or was it just a ruse – a way of worrying my patron a little more, perhaps. ‘Are you quite sure?’ I said.

  One claw hand made an impatient gesture in the air. ‘Are you hard of hearing? Ill is what I said. It happened overnight. By this morning it was clear that I – and this fool Hebestus who is attending me – were the only healthy people remaining in the house. That’s why I was forced to come out after you: we had no slave to send.’

  It seemed my doubts of Varius had been unjustified. ‘But how did you know who I was? Or that I was in town? I don’t believe we’ve ever met before?’

  She gave a cackling laugh, more like a goose than ever. ‘Oh, we had a visitor, a frightful man who had been half-invited to come for prandium, or so at least he claims – though he was impolitely late, in any case. One of Varius’s councillor acquaintances, I think. Naturally I had to send him home unfed, but he told us that he’d seen you in the town and said you’d be the perfect person to take a message back, as you lived not far from Marcus. My plan had been to find an urchin in the town, and send him with a letter, but this man was quite insistent that I sent you instead. Seemed particularly smug at having thought of it and being able to advise me what to do.’

  ‘Councillor Porteus?’ I enquired, although I was in little doubt – the picture that she painted could only be of him.

  She made a dismissive gesture with her skinny jewelled hand. ‘I believe that was the name. I didn’t know the man – I have not been long in town. But his arrival was quite fortuitous. I don’t know Glevum well, and neither does my slave – I have only been here half a moon – so I had no idea where this Marcus person lives.’

  ‘So how were you going to send a messenger?’

  She looked at me as if I were an irritating child. ‘I understand that Marcus is an important man, so I was relying on his villa being well-known hereabouts. What worried me far more was where I’d find a messenger, but the arrival of the litter solved all that for me. I was watching from the window-space as it drew up outside and I knew the bearers would have some idea where urchins congregate. So I went out to greet the visitor at once, and made sure that he did not dismiss the carriers. And then, of course, he said that you were here, so I came to look for you instead.’

  ‘But how did Porteus come to mention me? Or Marcus, come to that?’ I seemed to be asking questions endlessly, but this was getting odder all the time. ‘Obviously he did not know about the prospective feast tonight, or he would not have called on Varius expecting prandium.’ I certainly hadn’t mentioned it to Porteus, and it seemed that Varius hadn’t spoken to the visitor at all.

  She shook her head impatiently. ‘I told him, naturally, when I explained what I wanted to use the litter for.’

  ‘And commandeered his bearers and his chair?’ I tried not to sound amused.

  ‘Obviously, pavement-maker! What would you expect? It’s perfectly proper for a man to walk about the town – but it would not be appropriate for me, a Roman matron of advancing years. Any honourable citizen would have thought of it himself! And so I told him, when he did not offer me the chair. I had to be quite sharp with him before he would dismount, but when he learned my errand he changed his attitude and told me you were here. He even mentioned that you had a mule with you.’ She waved a lofty hand at Arlina. ‘So – since it could hardly incommode you to do this little task on our behalf – I set off after you. I assume that your Porteus – is that his name? – went home.’

  So the portly, self-important councillor had been shamed into a walk by this formidable lady! The image made me smile. I was beginning to warm to Eliana Tertia and her eccentric ways. ‘Then I am glad that he agreed to yield the chair to you. And I will take your message, gladly.’

  She did not seem particularly gratified. ‘Good. That frightful man was certain that you would. In fact, he seemed to think you’d find the news significant – though I can’t imagine what he meant by that. You can’t be an associate of my great-nephew, I’m sure. He does not socialize with tradesmen – and I’m told that’s what you are.’

  ‘A craftsman and a citizen,’ I said. ‘And I have met Varius Quintus once or twice, though mostly at my patron’s villa, certainly. But I think I understand what Porteus had in mind – he wished me to warn Marcus that there’s sickness in the town.’ I spoke with care, but it occurred to me suddenly that it might be more than that. Did Porteus think that there was something sinister afoot?

  Perhaps, in fact, I should have thought of that myself. Here was another magistrate at risk, and one who’d worked with Marcus several times. Far from Varius being the author of the note, had he been the recipient of one? Porteus had clearly not had the chance to ask him earlier, when he was making those covert enquiries about ‘unusual events’! So was it possible this ‘illness’ was really poisoning? Had the threatener struck? That prompted my next question. ‘Is Varius very sick?’

  ‘Bad enough, and so are all the others in the house. It was violent and sudden, though doubtless it will pass – as it did the last time. Most likely simply something that he ate or drank – again. Young people have no stamina these days. Infected meat, I expect. Or perhaps it was the water. I don’t trust these city wells.’ She gave a cackling laugh. ‘If, like me, you live on bread and cheese you don’t tend to suffer from such maladies. But your patron lives a long way outside the walls, I hear. I don’t think he needs to be concerned that he’ll
succumb to anything similar himself.’

  I thanked her and nodded, though I was not so sure. From the description, this could indeed be poisoning and it had extended to the whole of Varius’s house – just as the threatening letters had foretold. I could see exactly why Porteus was alarmed – and why he had consented to give up his litter and send word to me.

  ‘And how will you manage, lady, with this sickness in the house?’ I asked. ‘From what you say there are no staff to help.’

  ‘Concerned about my welfare? That’s very kind of you! I’m not accustomed to such civility. Especially from strangers in the street.’ The beady eyes looked sharply up at me, convincing me – if I had needed further proof – that this was a lady of some intelligence. ‘Though you are a Roman citizen, you say? I had not realized that – and you can hardly blame me for not guessing from your dress. So I apologize if I have been abrupt. But there’s no need for your anxiety – I don’t eat the fancy food that’s served to Varius. It’s much too rich for me. I brought my own provisions with me when I came.’

  I must have looked astonished – which in fact I was. It is not usual for a visitor to bring supplies with them. ‘But surely—’

  Eliana Tertia interrupted me. ‘I am old and not accustomed to such luxuries – and, in any case, since I was forced to close up my own house at last, and throw myself upon my great-nephew, I was hardly likely to leave things there to rot!’ She saw my startled look. ‘I am a recent widow, citizen – my husband was crippled in a fire and I lost both my sons – and now the whole estate will pass to different heirs.’

  ‘I should have thought you capable of running it yourself,’ I said. ‘You seem a woman of some character.’

  The pale cheeks flushed and the eyes grew very bright. ‘There speaks a man who does not understand the world. There was no provision entitling me to stay, indeed there was no will at all, so custom passed me to my great-nephew’s potestas – as my nearest living male relative – and Varius decided I should leave the farm. At first I was grieving so much that I did not care, and by the time I took an interest there was no way that I could even sue to rent the place. And no money to do so, if I did.’