A Whispering of Spies (8 page)

The forum, when we reached it, was filling up again after the passing storm – customers and people with business with the council or the courts were emerging from their shelter under temple porticos. Here, too, it had clearly been raining heavily: there were muddy puddles on the paving-stones outside the shops, and most of the bedraggled stalls now stood in little pools, although the live fish-market (a building with an open pond which did not mind the rain) seemed to be doing a substantial trade. The stone steps of the basilica were still slippery with wet, but there were already clusters of councillors and clerks standing in earnest conclave here and there, and an excited crowd was gathering below to hear the reading of a will. We wove our way amongst their babbling, up the flight of steps, and into the basilica itself.

Though I had often been to the basilica before, I had never seen the inner council room where committees of the curia – or town council – met. Like every other citizen, I knew exactly where it was: not in the main section of the building, which was given over to the great public assembly area, with its towering pillars, fine floors and enormous vaulted aisle, but in the centre of the range of rooms across the rear. All the same, I had never been inside, so I was curious to see it when my escort led me in.

It was a chamber between the central
aedes
, where the imperial shrine was set, and the smaller offices of clerks and copy-scribes, and despite the musty smell of damp and candle-wax, it was much more spacious than I had supposed. It had a row of window-spaces high up on the wall, three tiers of wooden benches set on either side, and an imposing dais for the presiding magistrate. There was a large mosaic in the centre of the floor: an ambitious design of flowers and deities, though there was evidence – in places – of indifferent workmanship.

But there was no time for professional assessments of that kind. There were people in the room. Three members of the curia were sitting in a row beside the wall – all purple-stripers, naturally, indicating that they were men of rank – while Florens, whose toga bore the widest stripe of all, was standing on the dais, resting his elbows on a fine carved speaker’s stand, with the expression of a man who has been kept waiting far too long.

He looked up and saw me. He said, without a smile, ‘Ah, citizen Libertus, there you are at last. Thank you, Servilis, you may leave us now.’ There was a moment while the messenger bowed himself away, then Florens turned to me. He was a plump and portly little man, with a fringe of wispy hair and faded pink-rimmed eyes. ‘We’ve been expecting you.’ He raised a podgy hand to indicate the other councillors. I was not sure if he intended me to sit as well – and to do so uninvited would be worse than impolite – so I bowed in their direction and remained standing where I was.

‘Sit down, sit down, citizen,’ the youngest of them said. ‘This is just a friendly meeting, not a formal trial.’

Until that moment I had not imagined that it was, but suddenly I began to have real feelings of unease. This was constituted rather like a court, and it did not look friendly – despite what had been said. Florens was forbidding and his tone severe, and the other magistrates were looking just as grim. However, as I walked across to take my place – painfully aware of my heavy sandal-nails on that expensive floor – I noticed with relief that two of the others were people I had met: the tall, thin man was Gaius Flavius, while the fatter one with acne was Porteus Tertius, both occasional dinner guests at my patron’s house.

I essayed a timid smile. Porteus ignored it and Gaius looked the other way. Nothing to be hoped for in that direction, it was clear. Matters were swiftly going from bad to worse. As a known protégé of Marcus’s, I had expected a measure of respect – from them, in any case. I felt my hands going clammy with anxiety.

I edged myself on to the lowest bench. It would not do to rank myself beside the magistrates. In fact, I was so concerned with avoiding such a thing that I made my first mistake. Instead of sitting on the form in front of them, I sat down opposite, like a scholar taking a test in rhetoric – so I found myself facing a panel of judges, as it were.

‘Well,’ Florens linked his short, fat fingers on the desk in front of him, ‘I’m sure you know why we have summoned you.’

‘Something to do with my visit to Voluus, I understand from what your servant said – Servilis, as I now understand that he is called.’ Despite my nervousness – or perhaps because of it – I was privately amused to learn the servant’s name: it means ‘lowly and submissive’, despite that crimson cloak. No wonder he hadn’t chosen to introduce himself.

‘You regard that as amusing for some reason, citizen?’ Florens’s voice was icy.

Another error. I had not realized that I had smiled at all. Certainly I had not intended to. But all the councillors were scowling at me now, visibly disapproving of my apparent levity. I said quickly, ‘Not amusing, councillor. I’m surprised, that’s all. I do not understand why you have called me here. I am just a humble tradesman seeking work and I called at the apartment – as I told your slave – to see if Voluus required to have a pavement made.’

Porteus gave a disbelieving sneer and scrambled to his feet. ‘And you expect us to believe that, citizen? In an apartment of that quality? You must have known it would have splendid floors!’ He looked around as if for approbation from his peers.

I had begun to realize that I was genuinely pleading for my liberty, and I saw a chance to win a point or two. ‘Of course I hadn’t seen the inside of the flat; otherwise I would never have presumed. The floors, as you say, are already excellent.’ I paused a moment to achieve the full effect before I added, in a puzzled tone, ‘But I understood from Servilis that no one but myself had been allowed inside? Yet it seems that you have seen it, Porteus?’

Porteus turned pink beneath the acne on his cheeks, while the youngest councillor – the same one who had instructed me to sit – looked at him quizzically. ‘He is quite right, Porteus. Unless he had visited he couldn’t know about the floors. And nor could you. So how is that you speak about them with such confidence?’

I sensed a potential ally here and I looked at him with more interest than before. He was a youngish, untidy-looking man – in his thirties if I am any judge – with an energetic manner and a tow-coloured mop of tousled hair. His face was moody but intelligent and he wore his toga rather as I wore my own, as though it were a slight encumbrance. I noticed, for instance, that several times he hitched his shoulder-folds, as though they were in danger of cascading down in coils.

‘I visited when the tax-collector owned the place,’ Porteus mumbled rather sullenly. He was clearly embarrassed at admitting this to his associates (as I said before, tax-collectors are not usually accepted in good society). There was a murmur among the other councillors.

‘Just a business matter,’ he went on, reddening. ‘Nothing of importance, but he invited me to dine . . .’ He tailed off.

He must have known, as I did, what the others thought: that he had been prepared to feast with the taxman and to drink his wine, against the generally accepted rules of what was socially acceptable. Was this just greed for expensive food and wine, or had he been seeking favours when it came to paying dues?

Titus Flavius voiced the feeling in the room. ‘Seeking a contribution, were you, Porteus? Still eager to be selected as Imperial priest and hoping to impress the people by funding public works?’

Porteus sat down, saying testily, ‘Well, if I am, what has that to do with anything? We are not here to talk about my presence at a feast, we are here to ask this pavement-maker to explain himself – and I, for one, am not convinced by what he says. Of course he claims he’s never visited the flat before today, but that is no proof that he hasn’t. In fact, it is just what you’d expect a guilty man to say.’

‘Guilty man?’ I blurted out the words. This was sounding more and more as if I were on trial – and since this was a convocation of town magistrates, I might as well have been. ‘But surely this was simply banditry!’

There was another little murmur in the room. Florens appeared to feel the need to exercise control. He rapped the dais sharply, so that all eyes turned to him, then he hooked his pudgy thumbs into his toga folds and looked around the room – exactly as though he were an advocate – seeking the gaze of every councillor in turn.

When he was assured that attention was on him, he said portentously, ‘Banditry, citizen? That’s what it was meant to look like, I am sure. But we are not convinced. I am inclined to concur with Porteus’s view of this. Remember, fellow councillors, what the witnesses declared. When this pavement-maker visited the lictor’s flat, he didn’t even reach the door before Calvinus came out to greet him. It’s obvious he was expected before he even knocked.’

My heart sank further at this talk of ‘witnesses’. This was more indication (if I needed it) that spies had been watching me throughout. I had entirely forgotten that the steward had not waited for my knock. That could look suspicious to unfriendly eyes. I said, ‘Calvinus was awaiting someone, but it wasn’t me. He told me he was expecting a messenger from the garrison.’

‘And yet he immediately welcomed you inside?’ Florens looked pityingly at me. ‘Do you think perhaps you looked like such a messenger yourself? That Calvinus mistook you for a member of the guard, and that’s why he let you in?’

That caused a titter among the councillors. It was a jibe, of course. Naturally I could never be mistaken for a member of the guard.

Porteus stood up to press the joke a little more. ‘Of course, councillor Florens, one can see how the steward was confused. Our pavement-maker here looks much like a soldier to the casual eye – apart from the fact that he is far too old and wears a faded tunic and a workman’s cloak, instead of an armoured breastplate, helmet, greaves and sword! Obviously an error that anyone could make.’ He sat down again and looked around triumphantly, delighted to make me look ridiculous.

I said, with an attempt at dignity, ‘Anyone can bring a message, councillor. And Calvinus was entitled to suppose that I’d brought an answer from the garrison, telling him what support he could expect from them, since he had sent requesting help.’ I paused. ‘I assume that such a message was eventually sent?’ It had occurred to me, while I was speaking, that I hadn’t heard of it.

It was obvious from the whispering that my words had touched a nerve. Even Florens looked discomfited. However, he was not nonplussed for long. After an instant he tapped the desk again and said in a peremptory, dismissive tone, ‘What message the garrison commander may have sent is none of our affair. Our concern is you and what your business was with Calvinus today. You say you called to offer him a floor. I presume that he did not engage your services?’

I shook my head. ‘Indeed not, councillor. He was so disturbed about the theft of the dowry treasures from his master’s cart that I doubt he would have felt able to order pavements then, even if the household had needed such a thing . . .’

Porteus was on his feet again, seizing on my words before I’d finished them. ‘So he did speak to you about what was on the cart? You admit as much? And yet you say you were a perfect stranger to the man?’ He gazed around the room triumphantly. ‘Florens, fellow councillors, I call on your good sense. Do you think it likely that Calvinus would confide his master’s business to a man he’d never met? Isn’t discretion the first duty of a steward anywhere?’

This was going badly. There were murmurs of assent.

‘Well, citizen?’ Florens indicated that it was my turn to speak.

I could hardly believe what was happening to me. Accused of arranging a violent robbery, and effectively found guilty before a trial was held! And all because of simple circumstance! I felt like shouting that they were a bunch of fools, but it was essential that I defend myself as much as possible and not inflame the councillors more than I could help.

So I controlled myself and simply pointed out that it was natural – since he thought that I’d come in answer to his request for help – for the steward to suppose that I already knew about the theft. I was about to add that he had been a good deal more discreet in front of the other servants in the house, when some god of self-preservation whispered in my ear that this would only make things worse. I stopped, aware that there were already mutterings.

Florens held up his hand for silence in the room and, gesturing to a reluctant Porteus to resume his seat, he said, ‘Which brings us to another matter, citizen. You were not engaged to lay this pavement, you have told us that. Thus, by your own admission, you should have had no further business with the lictor’s house. So why did Calvinus send his servant after you, as soon as he had the message that Voluus had reached Britannia and was already on his way? What possible concern can that have been of yours?’

Clever trap on clever trap! I shook my head despairingly. ‘I’d promised him that I would get my patron to investigate the theft. Calvinus just sent to tell me that there was not much time to find the answer before the lictor came. Obviously he’ll be here in just a day or two.’ It did not sound persuasive, even to myself.

Even tow-headed Titus Flavius was looking unconvinced. ‘Oh, come, Libertus,’ he said, with the heartiness of a nursemaid chivvying her charge. ‘You would do better to admit the truth. You told Calvinus he’d be lucky to escape detection as one of the plotters. Don’t bother to deny it – you were overheard.’

For a moment I was genuinely mystified. Then I remembered that I had indeed said something about his being ‘one of them’ – deliberately loudly, too, on purpose so that the people on the stairs would hear – when I wanted to stop Calvinus from sending me away. Another of this day’s terrible mistakes! However, I knew it would be hopeless to explain.

Titus Flavius was already speaking anyway. ‘I see that you do not deny it, citizen. So what was that about, if not the robbery? And if it was about the robbery, how did you know of it?’ He paused, but I was still silent – at a loss for words – and after a moment he added urgently, ‘Libertus, I am trying to do my best for you, but I cannot save you if you will not save yourself. This is no moment for keeping silent for your patron’s sake. I know you have a reputation for unmasking criminals. I am myself inclined to think that there was indeed a plot, and you and Marcus had discovered it and were trying to extort money from Calvinus because you knew he was involved. If so, you would do better to admit it to this company. Blackmail is a dishonourable thing, but at least it would absolve you from complicity in this crime.’