Enemies of the Empire

by Rosemary Rowe

  ‘They’ll send for her when they have finished with their meal,’ the boy replied. ‘I am to escort her to the guardroom now to wait. His Excellence suggests that, when you’ve had your food, you should go and start the preliminary questioning. You know what you need to ask, he says.’

  It should have been the confirmation that I sought, but there was something in his manner which conveyed the opposite. Something was clearly troubling him and though Lyra had risen to her feet and moved obediently to his side, he didn’t move. He simply stood there, hovering, and looking so furtive that, far from helping to allay my wife’s suspicions, he was making matters worse.

  ‘Very well, then, go!’ I urged impatiently. ‘Take the woman now, and leave me to my meal.’

  ‘At once, citizen,’ but still he did not move. Instead he starting sending signals with his eyes, as though we were partners in some conspiracy.

  Gwellia noticed it at once. Before I did, in fact, because I had turned away to eat my stew. ‘Husband,’ she said, with heavy irony, ‘I think the slave has something he wants to say. Something that he would prefer I didn’t hear, perhaps.’

  ‘Nonsense,’ I protested. ‘There is nothing he could have to say to me which I would not be happy for you to overhear. But obviously he can’t talk freely with Lyra in the room. There have been investigations into her affairs, and no doubt information about her has come to light.’ It was an explanation which had just occurred to me and – judging by the look of horror which crossed Lyra’s face – it was at least a reasonable one. Gwellia had the grace to look abashed, and the optio’s slave was so visibly relieved that I was persuaded that I’d hit upon the truth. ‘Does it concern Lyra?’ I enquired.

  He nodded passionately.

  ‘In that case, you can tell me when I come to question her. Then it will be fresh in my mind, and there is no chance of her overhearing what you have to say, and changing her testimony to fit.’ She was clearly uncomfortable by now, and I thought it would do her good to wait.

  It was obviously not the response that the page had hoped to get. He gave me another anguished look. ‘But citizen . . .’ he began and then, whatever he was going say, abandoned it. ‘You know best, citizen. It shall be as you command. Come!’ he said to Lyra, and she followed him from the room. She was still looking shaken but she had collected herself a little more by now, and even contrived to sway her hips at me, and give me a would-be-seductive smile as she went.

  Gwellia watched all this in stony silence. But after they had gone she sat down on the bed, deliberately avoiding the place where the previous occupant had been, and burst out furiously, ‘And you expect me to believe that she’s a prisoner in this place, when he lets her walk about without restraint. No chains, no ropes, no guards at all – not even a baton to keep her under check!’ She sounded angry, but she was close to tears, and she folded her arms across her chest, tightly, as though to keep her feelings locked inside.

  ‘Gwellia . . .’ I said gently.

  ‘Don’t try to Gwellia me. Eat your stew before it all goes cold.’

  I sighed. It was clear that explanation was no use. However, she was right. I was hungry and my food was getting cold. I offered again to share my meal, but she simply shook her head in an impatient way.

  I decided it was best to give her time, and turned my attention to the waiting stew. It was thick and stodgy, full of oatmeal and beans, as tasteless army rations very often are, but it was warm and filling and I ate it gratefully, while Junio stood beside me with the jug of mead. If it was not for my affronted, glowering wife, I could have persuaded myself that I was safe at home and everything was well.

  I pushed back my empty plate and smiled up at Junio. He leaned forward, and refilled my cup with mead, murmuring as he did so, ‘With your permission, master, I will find a cloth. I see that there is wine spilt on the floor.’

  I stared at him and started to my feet. ‘Great gods,’ I cried. The appearance of my wife had driven all memory of the spillage from my mind, and all rational thought as well, it seemed. But I now remembered what I’d thought before. ‘That wine was meant for me.’

  Junio looked at me, aghast. ‘You think that there was something wrong with it?’

  ‘I don’t know. Lyra was already feeling ill – that’s why I gave it her – but once she’d taken just a sip, she half collapsed on me.’ I turned to Gwellia. ‘That’s how you came to find us as you did.’

  Gwellia got slowly to her feet. Even as I watched her, I could see the change in her, and the look of real concern that crossed her face. ‘You think somebody meant to poison you?’

  I shook my head. ‘I don’t know. I suppose it’s possible, but I can’t see who it could have been – unless it was the optio himself. He was the one who sent the food for me.’ I glanced nervously at my empty plate and at the jug of mead which I had half consumed. ‘Yet I’ve just eaten this, and I am perfectly all right. Perhaps he realised I had witnesses, and changed his mind.’

  Gwellia frowned. ‘But I still can’t work out how he knew that we were here.’

  I shrugged. ‘He must have done. A message from the sentry, I suppose. After all, he offered you a meal.’

  She shook her head. ‘We saw no one but the guard on duty at the gate, and there was no way of sending in a messenger. He actually said as much himself. He was grumbling that the mansio was overstretched – there was only a handful of men stationed here, he said, and half of them had been out on escort duty all day, so he was on his own. He didn’t even have a message-boy. That’s what he said to Junio. I heard.’

  Junio nodded. ‘He wanted us to wait there in the guardroom at the gate till he could find someone to send to the officer in charge, and get the go-ahead to let us in. He was perfectly polite and apologetic, but he told us he couldn’t allow a woman through the gate without personal permission from the optio in command. More than his very skin was worth, he said. It was only the letter with the official seal that changed his mind.’

  I glanced at Gwellia. ‘So you were right, my dear,’ I said. ‘Of course you were. I should have paid attention to your words before. You said it was extraordinary that Lyra should come in here and wander round without a proper guard – but it is even more peculiar than I thought. But I think I might know why. Go into the kitchen, Junio – you’ll find it on your right as you go out of here – and ask them for a cloth to clean the floor. Try to get chatting to the kitchen-boys. Tell them that Lyra was here with me. See what their reaction is to that. Find out if she’s ever been before.’

  Junio’s face lit up in a delighted grin. He has always loved assisting me in my enquiries and it was clear that he was relishing this opportunity. He asked no further questions, but disappeared at once.

  I rose and went over to my wife. She looked up at me, and I saw with distress that there were tears brimming in her eyes. I took her elbows, raised her to her feet, and held her in my arms. ‘Gwellia,’ I murmured, pressing her against me and fondling her hair, ‘did you doubt me so?’

  She drew back her head and looked at me. ‘What was I to think? I have been concerned about you ever since you sent asking Junio to go to Plautus’s house and try to find out exactly what happened when he died. I know you, Libertus. You have got some theory that you want to prove. Plautus was a wealthy citizen, and owed his rise to Rome. No doubt he made enemies on the way – any man who makes a personal fortune always does. If you suspected that someone murdered him, I didn’t know what danger you were in, or what kind of people you were dealing with.’

  ‘So you came to rescue me?’

  ‘I came to keep an eye on you. We two have been parted long enough.’ Her voice broke, and she murmured with a sob, ‘Libertus, husband, I have missed you so much since you have been gone, and when I saw that woman in your arms I thought . . . I feared . . . perhaps you’d missed me too. That’s how these people make their living, after all. Can you forgive me for suspecting you?’

  ‘And can you forgive me for unintentio
nally causing you such grief?’

  She might have answered, but her lips were otherwise engaged.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  It was some time before I let her go.

  When I did, she drew back her head and looked up at me with a quizzical expression in her eyes. ‘I should have realised that if you were investigating some affair on Marcus’s behalf, you would have time for very little else. So that woman from the wolf-house is connected with this Plautus business, then? What happened? Did he make an enemy of her pimp or patron in some way?’ She scanned my face. ‘Cross him in business and get murdered for his pains? I hope you’re being careful, husband, if that is the case. These brothel-keepers can be very dangerous. But it must be something of the kind. Plautus can’t have been a customer of hers; he lived too far away.’

  ‘I’m sure there’s some connection, but I don’t know what it is. I’m positive she was following him round Venta the first day I arrived.’

  ‘Perhaps . . .’ my wife began, and then – as she took in the force of what I’d said – ‘Round Venta? What do you mean, “round Venta”? The man’s been dead for more than half a moon.’

  ‘Not nearly as dead as you suppose,’ I said, and I found myself pouring out the story of all that had occurred. It was the first time that I’d had the chance to tell a wholly sympathetic listener. She didn’t pour scorn on anything I said, or interrupt, but heard me out in silence – although, since she looked dismayed to hear of my ordeals, I spared her the worst details of the horrors of yesterday. ‘So much has happened in the last few days,’ I finished, ‘it seems a lifetime since I got here.’

  Gwellia was frowning, but the frown was not for me. ‘And you saw Gaius Plautus in the street? After that great funeral he had? No wonder you sent Junio to his house.’ She gave me a sideways little glance. ‘I went up there with him myself, you know. I’d met the widow once or twice before – Sabrina, she’s called – and it seemed not unreasonable to call and offer my sympathy on her husband’s death. If you were up to something, then I wanted to help. I could talk to her more freely than young Junio could – though he did talk to her about the pavement, as you suggested – and chatted to the servants too.’

  My wife is a resourceful woman, but I chided her. ‘You might have put yourself in danger, doing things like that.’

  ‘Don’t you think I feel the same way about you? Anyway, that’s what I did – and she was glad to see me, I believe. Of course she’s still in mourning and she has done it properly – torn clothes, scratched cheeks and ashes in her hair – and since the funeral she hasn’t left the house. Full of how it’s her fault that he met his death. If he’s alive, I’m sure she doesn’t know.’

  ‘Oh, he’s alive, all right,’ I said. ‘I saw him in Venta with my own two eyes, and he’s not a man you’d easily mistake.’

  She shook her head. ‘That poor woman. I was going to say “his widow” but of course she’s not. I don’t think she liked her husband much but she seemed genuinely in a state of shock – kept saying that if she had gone out to their country house with him that night, the accident would never have occurred. She’s spent a fortune on sacrifices to the gods to make propitiation for her guilt – and all for nothing, if he isn’t dead.’ Suddenly she paused and looked appalled.

  I knew what she was thinking before she spoke the words.

  ‘So who was on that pyre if it wasn’t him?’ she said, asking the same question I’d asked myself. ‘There must have been a corpse. Sabrina was telling me that she’d spent a fortune on embalming oils and herbs, and hiring the best funeral arrangers in town – she was terrified her husband’s spirit would return to haunt her if she didn’t do it right. Anointing women, professional mourners and musicians, litters, everything: even a priest to see the body was ritually washed and dressed while the whole household kept up the lament. She had them coach her eldest son to lead the eulogies, although he’s barely old enough to be a man.’ She broke off. ‘Oh, I forgot. You know all that, of course. You were at the funeral yourself. You must have seen him. He was laid in state.’

  ‘And what I saw was a dead man decorously draped in linen cloths, because his head was crushed,’ I said. ‘I assumed that it was Plautus, because they said it was – and so, I suppose, did everybody else. If you attend a funeral, you don’t expect the corpse to be a fraud. The funeral arrangers wouldn’t know the difference. But you’d think his wife would notice, wouldn’t you?’

  Gwellia shook her head. ‘I’m not so sure she would,’ she said. ‘If they called me to your workshop in the town one day and the servants brought out a body of your height and build – your age, your colouring and with your clothes and shoes – and said that they had found you crushed to death, I think I would assume that it was you.’

  ‘Even if you didn’t recognise my face?’

  ‘Because the skull was crushed to fragments and the features gone?’ She had turned comfortingly pale at the very thought of it. ‘I wouldn’t want to dwell on that for long. I’d look to see the scar of the slave-brand on your back, but apart from that why should I question it? Who could think clearly after they’d had a shock like that? And who would suspect it was a hoax? Or imagine that their husband would connive at it? I’m sure Sabrina didn’t. And he didn’t have a slave-brand she could know him by. She was shocked. She just went through the motions in a kind of daze.’

  I nodded. ‘You may be right. Maybe Plautus had no special identifying marks, apart from that scar across his face. No moles on his shoulders or anything like that.’

  My wife gave me a little wistful smile. ‘Even if he did, I don’t believe Sabrina would have known. She told me once their marriage was arranged – as rich girls’ matches very often are – but that she’d never liked him very much, and he wasn’t really interested in her. He fathered his two sons on her and after that he left her more or less alone – having done his duty by the state. Visited the wolf-houses, perhaps. She wasn’t sorry, either, from what she said to me. He was no gentle husband. I doubt if she could identify his moles.’

  It was so different from the intimacy of our own marriage bed that I was moved to take her in my arms again, but at that moment Junio came in carrying a wet cloth in his hand. He looked from me to Gwellia and grinned. ‘Sorry to interrupt you, master, but I’ve got the cloth. I couldn’t get much information from the kitchen staff, but I promised to play the cook at twelve-stones later on. Perhaps I can learn something from him then.’ He winked. ‘Do you want me to clean up that wine?’

  He did not wait for a reply, but dived under the table to retrieve the drinking cup, which had rolled there when Lyra let it fall. Gwellia sat down upon the bed to let him pass.

  I watched his retreating posterior and smiled. The poor cook had a surprise in store. Junio had been born a slave into a Roman home, where he learned to gamble almost as soon as he could breathe. It was a rare man who could beat him at any game of chance, despite his air of youthful innocence. ‘I only hope the cook won’t stake more than he can afford to lose,’ I teased, as he came back into view. ‘What do you propose to do with all your— What is it, Junio?’

  He was sitting on his haunches, with the recovered goblet in his hand, and he was looking doubtfully from me to it. All trace of laughter had vanished from his face. ‘You did say, master, that the prostitute was ill before she drank the wine you gave to her? You are sure it wasn’t that which made her faint?’

  ‘I’m absolutely sure,’ I said. ‘I did suspect it for a moment, but when I thought it through, I realised she was feeling ill before. Why, what’s the matter? Why did you ask that?’

  ‘It is just that when I was wiping the splashes behind the table leg, I found some bits of glass. It looks like part of a little phial to me – the sort they use for poisons – though it is hard to know. It has been broken into tiny fragments, see, as if someone had deliberately crushed it underfoot. The pieces were sticking to my cloth – I almost cut my hand. I’ve shaken them into the cup, so y
ou can see.’

  He held out the goblet in which he had collected the tiny shards of broken coloured glass. The largest of them was no bigger than the nail on my little finger. It was circular, with a small loop attached, and had obviously once contained a cork. Exactly like the neck of a small phial of the kind used for potions and decoctions, just as Junio had said. It was an alarming find.

  Most of the contents of these things are curative, of course – or are alleged to be. However, in any street market or town it is possible to find someone skilled with herbs who will supply you with some lethal draught, provided that you pay them handsomely and swear that you intend to poison rats. Just as they will sell you love-philtres, baldness cures and sleeping draughts – though these are less effective on the whole.

  From the shattered fragments in the cup it was impossible to tell what this little phial had once contained, or even how long it had been there – the rooms in a busy mansio are not always scrupulously swept. However, it would be foolish to deny the possibility that Junio was right, and that whatever had been in that phial was added to my wine.

  I leaned forward gingerly and sniffed at them and then at the water in the washing bowl, in which Junio had been rinsing out the cloth. I fancied I detected a slightly almond scent. It was so faint that I could not be sure at first, and it was in any case obscured by the wine, but all the same I felt my skin go cold. If I was not imagining the smell – and a second sniff persuaded me that I was not – then someone had intended me to die.

  It must have been a hefty dose, as well. Lyra had scarcely tasted it, and it had made her faint. Had she taken a little of my wine to dye her lips, while I was talking to the optio’s slave outside? Could that be what had made her feel unwell? After all, most drugs take a little while to work. But who would have put it there, and why?

  The optio had ordered me the wine, but why should he want to kill me? I had done nothing to offend or startle him. And anyway why bother with a phial? Why not just put poison in the goblet?