Enemies of the Empire (27 page)

He nodded and pulled out the stool for me. I looked at my congealing stew. ‘And you can take this plate away,’ I said. ‘It’s cold. Get them to send me down some fresh. In the meantime, I’ll just eat the bread and cheese.’ Of course, it did not really matter to me that the stew was cool. I was sincerely hungry, by this time, and would have eaten anything, but the cook-house was closer than the optio’s offices, and I hoped that by doing this I could ensure that a slave from the kitchen would be coming in and out. Lyra’s presence disconcerted me. I would not put it past her to make some advance and I did not wish to be in the room with her for long without somebody else there.

‘And while you are about it,’ I went on, ‘you can have them send out for some Celtic mead for me. I am not a great enthusiast for wine.’ The servant nodded and took away the goblet at my side. I saw his longing gaze, and added with a smile, ‘But don’t throw that away. It’s probably one of the optio’s wines – he keeps some first-class ones, I understand. Perhaps you’d better take it back to him – or drink it up yourself.’

‘Your pardon, citizen!’ Behind me Lyra sounded seriously distressed. ‘Surely . . .’ I turned round. She was sitting on the palliasse which was provided as a bed and was holding her head in both her hands. ‘Forgive me, citizen, but if you do not want that glass yourself, perhaps you’d allow me to have it, instead of that water you were promising? I do not know what has come over me. I am feeling suddenly unwell.’

And indeed she did look extraordinarily pale – even underneath the powder she was chalky white, except for two high spots in her cheeks which were redder than any wine-lees could have rendered them. Her voice, which had been so husky just a moment earlier, was now almost squeaky with distress: there were beads of sweat upon her brow and she was breathing heavily.

I nodded to the servant. ‘Let her have the wine.’ I wondered for a moment if, given the rivalries that existed in the town, someone had contrived to poison her. But she took the goblet from the boy and raised it to her lips, and immediately I could see the colour flowing back into her cheeks.

‘Stupid of me, citizen,’ she said, hugging the goblet to her and not moving from the bed. ‘Women’s problems, possibly. I’m better now. Please, do not let me keep you from your meal.’

I grunted something and sat down to my food, meanwhile sending the slave-boy to fulfil his tasks and hoping that he wouldn’t be too long. I was extremely hungry, and even the frugal bread and cheese tasted ambrosial to me. All I needed was a drink to wash it down. I could hear distant footsteps in the corridor, and was beginning to hope that it might be the kitchen-slave when Lyra spoke to me again.

‘If you could perhaps assist me, citizen? I am feeling well enough to rise.’ She stretched out a hand towards me. ‘Better, perhaps, if I am not sitting on your bed when His Excellence and the optio arrive.’

She had a point. I was still apprehensive about touching her, but she had been in distress. I got up, took the proffered arm and raised her to her feet. As I did so she appeared to sway, the goblet which she was still holding tumbled to the floor, spilling its contents everywhere, and she fell against me with a little cry.

Almost instinctively I caught her in my arms to stop her tumbling to the floor. She made no effort to support herself but flopped on me so that I bore all her weight. She was not a large person but she was surprisingly heavy all the same, and I staggered a little as I took the shock.

‘Master?’ A voice from the open doorway startled me.

I looked over the shoulder of my burden. My apprentice-cum-slave-boy, Junio, was standing in the shadows of the corridor outside. He had obviously arrived from Glevum in answer to my note and was carrying the spare toga I had asked him for. A great feeling of relief swept over me. It had been an extremely awkward moment, having Lyra swooning semi-conscious in my arms, but now I wouldn’t have to be alone with her again.

I found myself grinning like an idiot. ‘Junio! Thank all the gods you’ve come! I hope your foot’s completely better now?’

He nodded. ‘Thank you, master.’ But he didn’t move.

‘Well, in that case,’ I said impatiently, ‘don’t stand there staring at me like that. You can see I’ve got a problem – come and lend a hand. I’ll explain later – it’s too complicated now.’

He continued to look hesitant, but he put down his bundle by the door and took an unwilling step into the room.

‘Come on,’ I said, still struggling with her weight. ‘Just help me to lie this woman on the bed. I don’t know what’s the matter with her all at once – she was perfectly all right a little while ago. I’m afraid it might be something in the wine I gave her.’ In which case, I thought suddenly, it was meant for me.

I was about to share this disturbing notion with my serving-boy, when I looked up and realised that he was not alone. As Junio stepped uneasily into the room, I saw who was behind him in the shadowed passageway.

It was my wife Gwellia, and she was very far from pleased.

‘Libertus, what exactly is the meaning of this?’ She was furiously angry and upset – as I suppose any wife would be who found her husband in a situation of this kind. ‘I have travelled non-stop since I got your note, longing to be here at your side, and when I get here, what do I find? You with a painted woman in your arms – and I heard you say you have been plying her with wine.’

I guiltily withdrew my arms from Lyra’s waist, where I had reached out instinctively to steady her, but she did not collapse senseless to the floor, as I had half expected that she would when I deprived her of support. Instead she took a step backwards and sank down gracefully onto the mattress. The sudden appearance of my wife seemed to have restored her more or less to health.

She hardly mattered now. I turned towards the woman I loved. All my delight at seeing her had evaporated in embarrassment. ‘Gwellia,’ I said urgently, ‘this isn’t what it seems. The lady was brought in to me for questioning – and she was taken suddenly unwell.’

‘Lady?’ Gwellia is a devoted and loving wife, who is often unwilling to express herself – the long years of servitude after she was wrested from me have cowed her painfully – but she is a woman of some spirit when aroused. She was roused now, and there was such scorn and venom in her voice that if Lyra had not been already in a faint, I thought, she would be reeling now. ‘What lady?’ Gwellia demanded. ‘I see no lady here. A lady-wolf, perhaps. They told me at the guardhouse that you were otherwise engaged, but I insisted that they let me in. I see now what they meant. Your business was clearly of a very personal kind.’

‘I assure you, Gwellia, it was nothing of the sort,’ I answered patiently. ‘This woman, Lyra, was summoned to the mansio two days ago to answer some enquiries about her property. Marcus even sent a messenger to bring her in but she was not at home, so he left instructions that she was to report here as soon as possible. Which is exactly what she did. She was waiting for me here when I returned.’

Gwellia snorted. ‘Having somehow talked her way past the guards and being permitted to wander unescorted to your room? I wonder how? I had the greatest difficulty getting in myself, and I had your letter with Marcus’s seal on it – obviously they could not argue with that for very long. However,’ she glanced at Lyra with ill-disguised contempt, much as I have seen her look at a scrawny chicken in the marketplace before refusing it, ‘doubtless your visitor has other methods of persuading them, which are not open to a mere wife.’

‘Be silent! I have told you why she’s here.’ I am by nature quite a patient man, especially where my beloved Gwellia is concerned, and I actively encourage her at home to speak her mind – but there are limits to what any self-respecting husband can tolerate in a public place. And we had an audience. The optio’s private slave had reappeared – sent in person from the kitchens, evidently, since he was bearing a stool for Lyra and a wooden tray on which was a copper beaker, a jug of what looked and smelled like mead and a large bowl of freshly steaming stew. It must have been quite heavy, but he stood there holding it. He had been listening, open-mouthed, to every word.

He saw me looking at him and composed his face. ‘My master sent me back with this for you. I’m to ask if your visitor wants refreshment too.’

I looked enquiringly at Gwellia, but she shook her head. ‘Junio and I brought our own supplies,’ she said, with cool disdain. ‘We have already eaten on the road. Anyway, how would the optio know that we are here? There was no one but the sentry at the gate. More likely he meant your other visitor.’ She went back to glowering at the prostitute, who was still sitting on my bed and appeared to have recovered totally. If anything it was my wife who now looked pale and ill.

‘Citizen, what shall I do with this?’ The pageboy was still carrying the tray, and I gestured to him to come and put it down.

‘My own slave will attend me now,’ I said, seating myself at the table while Junio took up his familiar position at my side.

The page nodded. ‘And about the . . . uh . . . lady, citizen?’ he said.

I saw a way to exculpate myself. ‘Are His Excellence and the optio coming here? I presume they will interrogate her later on?’ I glanced sideways at Gwellia as I spoke, hoping to prove the point to her, but she refused to meet my eyes.

‘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.’