Tabula Rasa: A Crime Novel of the Roman Empire

by Ruth Downie

  “Let me know when he turns up.” Accius flung his cloak around his shoulders. A pile of writing tablets cascaded off the cupboard and clattered across the floorboards.

  Ruso lunged across the room to stop a second landslide. Accius glared at the cupboard and then at Ruso, who seized the opportunity to say, “We need someone to sort this out, sir.”

  “At least you could put things away,” Accius observed. “This is sheer laziness. You can’t even get in there with all this rubbish cluttering the place up. You shouldn’t have kit stored in here.” He shoved Candidus’s bag aside with one foot and reached for the twine holding the cupboard handles together. “What’s in—”

  “Sir, no!”

  But it was too late. The doors swung wide, and the tribune’s feet were buried in an avalanche of wooden writing tablets, crushed scrolls, old inkpots, and tangles of twine.

  Chapter 17

  Ruso was barely aware of his steady pace along the road or of the cold rain trickling down his neck. He was concentrating on rehearsing what to say. Every time he came up with a sentence that was not an apology, he heard the voice of Senecio dismissing it.

  “We had to treat everyone the same.”

  You ate at our hearth.

  “If word gets around that we didn’t search you, you could have trouble with your own people.”

  It is not up to a Roman to save us from our own people. And besides, it was a lie. He had not considered them at all.

  “I am sorry you feel insulted.”

  But you are not sorry for the insult itself?

  “I cannot apologize for the Legion. I apologize for my judgment.”

  So you think you should not have sent those men?

  “I should have come with them. I should have explained. But I was on duty at the hospital.”

  The reply to that came in his own voice: “You were only discharging Regulus for transfer and talking to Pertinax. Things that could have waited. You should have thought to go with them.”

  And then there was You have come wearing armor and a helmet this time, to which he would reply, “We’ve been ordered to wear it when not on army property.” But of course Senecio would not comment: He would merely observe this further insult, and Ruso would have no chance to explain.

  Nor would he be able to ask the question the Legion would like answered, which was: Why are people saying there is a body in the wall?

  Approaching the turn to the farm track, he pushed distracting thoughts aside and took stock of his surroundings. A carriage approaching from the east: a squad of infantry marching off toward the brighter sky in the west.

  The russet shape of a squirrel ran out into the middle of the track. It caught sight of him, and scampered off into the woodland on the other side. Probably nobody lurking in the trees, then, but the danger would not lie here, in sight of the main road. If Conn and his friends wanted some fun, they would be waiting farther along, where the track disappeared around a bend to the right. There, they could be seen from neither road nor farm.

  He moved ahead steadily, alert to the sound of water dripping off leaves and the squelch and crunch of his own boots, and pushing aside the voice in his mind that said, You should never have come alone.

  Rounding the corner, he thought he glimpsed the figure of a legionary amongst the trees on his left, but then it was gone. Wishful thinking. He moved faster. Another forty paces. Thirty. Almost there . . .

  As he approached the gate, Conn and the one-eyed man stepped out from behind the main house. The big black dog trotted along behind them. They ignored Ruso’s greeting and marched up to block the gate, farm implements casually laid over their shoulders. Conn might conceivably have been working under shelter with that pitchfork, but there was no call for a scythe in weather like this.

  Ruso was wondering whether Branan would appear when the boy dropped out of the tree by the gate and ran across to join his older brother. He was not looking friendly now. He had picked up an axe that was half as tall as he was.

  When the boy had taken his place, Conn said, “There is nothing for you in this place, soldier.”

  The other man’s one eye and empty socket glared at Ruso. “Perhaps he’s come to see for himself.”

  “I would like to speak with your father.”

  Conn said, “My father does not want to hear you.”

  “That is for him to decide. My wife promised him I would come.”

  They stood facing each other. Rain trickled down Conn’s face and dripped off the end of his nose. Ruso knew that if he flinched now, he had lost.

  Branan looked from one to the other of them. “Shall I ask Da, Conn?”

  “I’ll do it. You watch him.” Conn strode away into the house. Branan shifted his grip on the axe handle and lifted his chin, then spoiled the effect by taking one hand off the axe to wipe the rain off his nose and shove his wet curls out of his eyes.

  Ruso, still behind the flimsy protection of the gate, glanced around the yard. He had barely noticed when he was here before, but he saw now that the main house, the biggest of the buildings, had so many logs stacked under the broad eaves that the walls were almost hidden. A fat hayrick sat on a raised platform under its own thatched roof. He remembered the apples on the shelf indoors. This was what the family had worked through the summer and autumn to build up: the supplies that would, if their gods were kind, keep them and their animals from freezing and starving through the long, barren months of winter. This would be what the army had destroyed over at the house of Senecio’s sister.

  A few hens and a cockerel with a shimmering blue-green tail were pecking amongst the cobbles. Ruso guessed that the sister’s livestock had made some very tasty suppers in military quarters last night.

  Conn reappeared. “Let him in.”

  The one-eyed man gestured toward Ruso’s sword and held out a hand to receive it across the top of the gate. His other hand retained its grasp on the scythe.

  Ruso would have felt more at ease if he had been allowed to keep the sword and walk in naked.

  After the daylight the house seemed even gloomier than it had at night. Senecio was seated in his carved chair again. As far as Ruso could make out, there was nobody else there. But he knew now about all those dark sleeping spaces hidden away behind the wicker partitions.

  He bowed his head. Senecio made no attempt to rise or to acknowledge him. Ruso thought he heard movement somewhere behind one of the screens.

  Finally he heard, “Are you aware of what has happened here, and at the house of my sister?”

  “I am, sir.”

  “I am told that this began when one of your men mistreated my niece.”

  “He should not have done that, sir.”

  “True.”

  From somewhere in the darkness came a thud, then a whisper and “Sh!”

  If he heard, Senecio ignored it. “Your people need to learn a little respect.”

  “Yes, sir.” They needed to learn a great deal of respect, but since they were usually the ones with the swords, it wasn’t likely.

  “It seems you learned nothing from the falling of the rocks.”

  Ruso did not reply. He was not going to get into a debate about whose gods were the more powerful.

  “The man you have lost is not here, and we know nothing about him.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “If you had asked, we would have told you. We would also have asked our neighbors.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I had hoped,” the old man continued, “that we could work together.”

  “I would have liked that,” said Ruso truthfully.

  “It is a pity you did not trust us.”

  On the far side of the hearth, where orange glowed through ash, the sky-blue eyes were gazing into his own. This time it was harder to fight the urge to look away. Two nights ago Ruso had been offered the kind of tentative friendship that might have helped in the search for Candidus. But the moment there was a dispute, he had forgotten all about
Senecio’s We must find ways of working together and lapsed into the old suspicions. He had, in short, acted like a fool.

  Searching for some sort of concession if he could not offer apology, he said, “Sir, if anything was broken or stolen here by the soldiers, I will personally make compensation.” He could probably get a loan against his pay to cover what they had lost. There was no point in pretending he would go to the Legion. The army always assumed compensation claims were exaggerated—which they probably were, since the victims expected to be shortchanged—so that even if money was paid, it was rare for both sides to be satisfied.

  “Will you be compensating my neighbors?”

  “I can’t do it for everyone.”

  “Then you will do it for no one.”

  He was not going to insult the man by trying to change his mind. “I respect your decision, sir.”

  Senecio inclined his head.

  Ruso bowed. “Sir, my wife is very embarrassed. She had nothing to do with what happened.”

  “She is your wife. She has made her choice. Do you have anything else to say?”

  “No, sir.”

  “We will see that you are safe as far as the road. Do not come back.”

  Chapter 18

  Somebody had gathered up the mess of records and writing materials and crammed most of them back into the cupboard. The surplus was piled into a wooden crate that had been shoved under the desk so there was no room for anyone’s knees underneath. This hardly mattered, since there was still no sign of the man whose job it was to sit there.

  Ruso had removed Candidus’s kit to his own lodgings, but the chaos, like a fungus, now seemed to have spread to the stores. Gallus was standing in front of the shelves, pulling down a succession of boxes and rooting through them in search of linen suture thread. He interrupted the hunt to draw Ruso’s attention to an unopened message addressed candidus, clerk.

  It was from Supplies. They could not understand why the hospital had sent urgent requests for buckets and blankets and bedstead repairs when the repairs were already in hand, six buckets had been delivered only last week, and all orders for woven materials had to be submitted a month in advance of the delivery date, by which time the Legion would be back in winter quarters at Deva. The orders had therefore been cancelled.

  Ruso dropped the missive into the crate. “The idiots over in Supplies have thrown out all our orders. They say we’ve got buckets already.”

  Gallus glanced up from the latest box. “Somebody did find some buckets at the gatehouse this morning, sir. But there were only two left by the time he tracked them down.”

  “And has anyone come to start on the repairs?”

  “Not yet, sir.”

  Ruso sighed. “Tell me some good news.”

  “The legate’s physician was here to see Prefect Pertinax earlier. He seemed quite satisfied.”

  “Good,” said Ruso, not sorry he had missed the legate’s physician, a haughty Greek with a reputation for seeing his colleagues as competitors.

  “He said no bathing until the stitches are out, only gentle massage, and don’t let him get up.”

  “I’ll cancel the dancing lessons, then. Did you tell him we’ve no bath suite and the masseur only comes twice a week if we’re lucky?”

  Gallus’s baby face looked even younger when he smiled. “No, sir. There were some instructions about diet that I’ve written down for you—ah!” He retrieved a spool of thread. “And Doctor Valens is here, sir. And, er . . .” He hesitated, passing the spool from one hand to the other. “Sir, I’ve been wondering whether I should mention something. It’s about the clerk. I hope I’m not wasting your time.”

  Ruso waited.

  “I wasn’t trying to listen, sir.”

  “I see.”

  “I’m sure it’s nothing, but I couldn’t help overhearing.”

  “Now you are wasting my time.”

  “Sorry, sir.” Gallus’s neck was turning pink to match his cheeks. “Sir, when the new clerk was here, I heard a conversation he had with Nisus.”

  Nisus was the pharmacist who usually sat opposite the clerk’s desk. “And?”

  “Candidus was rattling on about something—about freed slaves being allowed to join the army or something—and Nisus interrupted and said, ‘If you don’t stop talking, somebody around here is going to get killed.’ ”

  Ruso stared at him. “Nisus?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And did Candidus stop talking?”

  “I think he went to chat to somebody else, sir.”

  Ruso scratched one ear with his forefinger.

  “I’d have mentioned it before, sir, but you had men searching houses for Candidus, so I thought you must have had word that he was out there with the natives.”

  “I see,” Ruso said, not wanting to dwell on the embarrassment of his mistake. “Well, I’m glad you’ve told me now. Don’t tell anyone else.” Conscious of the irony, he added, “We don’t want people jumping to wild conclusions.”

  “I’ll keep it quiet, sir. I just thought you should know.”

  “Do you think it was a serious threat?”

  Gallus clutched the thread to his chest. “Honestly, sir?”

  “Preferably.”

  “Candidus was annoying, but I don’t really think anybody would kill him for talking too much.”

  “Hm,” said Ruso, who had known men to be gravely injured in fights over a borrowed spoon, a habit of cracking the knuckles, and a stolen coin that had later turned up in the owner’s own pack. “I have to admit,” he said, “it’s hard to imagine Nisus getting seriously worked up over anything.” The pharmacist, a legionary of mature years and few words, seemed to have no ambition beyond weighing and measuring, drying and distilling.

  “Perhaps I misheard, sir.”

  “I think it’s more likely Nisus was telling him to shut up in words that he couldn’t fail to understand. When’s he due back from leave? I can’t remember how long I signed for.”

  Gallus cast a glance at Pandora’s cupboard. “I could ask someone to look for it, sir.”

  Ruso shook his head. “Don’t bother. He’ll be back before they—”

  He broke off as the door opened. Valens strolled in, nodded to Gallus, and seated himself on the table of the absent pharmacist before announcing, “Prefect Pertinax is feeling very much better this morning.”

  “He is?” Ruso asked.

  “Oh, yes. He managed quite a long string of invective before he told me to get out.”

  Gallus, stifling a grin, retreated.

  Ruso said, “How long until Serena gets here?”

  “Anytime from tomorrow.” Valens sighed. “You really know how to cheer a man up, Ruso.”

  “I practice on my patients.” Ruso gestured toward the crate under the desk. “Supplies have just thrown out all our orders. How am I supposed to run a hospital when I end up chasing around for blankets and buckets?”

  “Surely it can’t be that difficult?”

  “You’d be amazed. We order basic items from the stores two hours away and they take a week to turn up. If they get here at all.”

  “Well, it’s no good complaining to me,” said Valens. “I’m on your side. I don’t have the faintest idea how these things work. But good luck sorting it out.”

  “I need a clerk.”

  “That reminds me,” said Valens. “I had a chat with your man’s centurion. That chap called Silvanus.”

  “The one who wrote and told me Candidus was here.”

  “Yes. Before he would say anything else, he wanted to know if Candidus was dead.”

  Ruso looked up in alarm. “Why would he think that?”

  “Because if he is, he was a bright, friendly lad and a sad loss.”

  “Ah,” said Ruso, guessing what was coming.

  “Otherwise he’s lazy, he talks too much, he’s fond of gambling, and he thinks he’s a comedian. Probably why the lads at Magnis called him Perky.”

  “I see.”
Ruso pulled open his purse and tipped the contents into his palm. Half a dozen small coins, a boot stud, a scattering of fluff, and two identical dice with the numbers carved as concentric rings in the bone.

  “Silvanus said he couldn’t see why he would desert. As he put it, it’s not as if you were asking the lad to do any work. All he had to do was park his arse behind a desk all day.”

  Ruso rolled the dice across the worn surface of Candidus’s desk. He rolled them a second time. Then he picked them up, examined each of them, and rolled them one by one before handing them to Valens. “You try.”

  The legs of the table creaked as Valens shifted sideways to make space. The dice rattled across the ink-stained wood several times. Finally he selected one and tipped it back and forth in his palm. “This one’s weighted,” he said. “Six nearly every time.”

  Ruso said, “He could have made enemies.”

  “Silvanus says he was in debt to couple of people. Nothing major, but they didn’t expect to see their money back.”

  “Anyone who owed money to him?”

  “Nobody who would admit to it.”

  Which was not the same thing at all. “Thanks anyway. You’d better get back to Magnis.”

  “I’ll keep my ears open. Oh, and I’d steer clear of Pertinax for a while. He’s not impressed with having visits from three doctors in one morning. Especially when none of them will give him any crutches. And now somebody’s told him there’s a dead body in the emperor’s wall.”

  “Oh, gods above. Who told him that?”

  “I’ve no idea. You’ve heard it too?”

  Ruso shook his head. “Unbelievable,” he said. The tale had reached a patient who had not left his bed for days. If this was sabotage, it was even more effective than its perpetrator could have hoped.

  “You don’t think it might belong to your clerk?”

  “I don’t think it exists,” said Ruso. He had once been in trouble for failing to obey Accius’s orders back in Eboracum and he was not going to make the same mistake again. Especially after the fiasco of the search. “I’m going to write to Albanus today and tell him his nephew’s deserted.”