Death at Pompeia's Wedding (13 page)

‘Leave the household? What will he do then? He doesn’t have a trade.’ I meant it. It’s no light matter for a man to live without the certainty of food and shelter every night.

The pageboy grinned. ‘Oh, he has money. Quite a lot of it – I saw him counting it the other night. He’s been saving for his slave price for a long time now, and wears it in a little leather bag around his neck.’ He gave a giggle, like the little boy he was. ‘The other servants joke that that’s what makes him stoop! He’ll have enough to rent a room and perhaps set up a stall. Isn’t that what every slave aspires to do?’

I nodded. That was exactly what I’d done myself. I slipped the pageboy a small coin (he looked grateful, too!) and hurried off to join Minimus in the street.

My slave looked at me sideways. ‘What was that about, master? It took you quite a time. I thought we were hurrying to visit Redux now? There is some way to walk and it is already long past noon.’ It was obvious that his enthusiasm hadn’t dimmed.

I nodded. ‘Then we must set off at once. Though it is not certain that Redux will be there – after all, he was expecting to be at a wedding feast all day.’ I saw the young face fall. ‘But we might learn something. You can lead the way.’

It was indeed a long way to the dock, especially as Minimus confined us to the streets. There was – as I knew – a much quicker route than this, through the putrid alleys and byways of the town, in the marshy area where the floods had been and where ruined buildings lay abandoned in damp, dismal courts. But that was the domain of the outcast underworld, the thieves and maimed and homeless, the ‘ghosts’ who haunted the night-time streets and lived on what more fortunate people threw away. I knew this, because I had briefly lived among them once, but today I was happy to walk the broader streets, though from this direction even those were not as wide and clean as in other, more salubrious parts of town. Figures lurked in doorways, watching us, and I had to tell Minimus to take my cloak from me, wrap the silver salver in it and at least hide it from view. Carrying it openly in this area was asking to be set upon and robbed – though a bulky parcel might well have the same effect, I thought.

We hurried on past greasy hot-soup kitchens and public wine shops – all open and busy with jostling customers, even at this time of day, with more people swaying and vomiting in the street outside. Girls in scanty costumes and in various poses smiled at us from lurid pictures painted on a pair of doors nearby, advertising the delights which might be had within, and as we passed an archway an actual girl appeared, lifting her tunic up to flaunt her scrawny knees and giving us suggestive gestures with her eyes. I hurried Minimus past before she spoke to us, and almost stepped into a pile of stinking muck, washed up in the last flood and simply left to rot.

I was much relieved to reach the busy dockside on the riverbank. There was more activity than a beehive here, and with a louder buzz of noise. A large ship from somewhere was unloading goods – its sail furled and its owner supervising the gang of dockyard slaves carrying the heavy sacks down creaking, wobbling planks on to the shore, while their overseer shouted at them that they were too slow and threatened to encourage them with lashes from his whip. From the safer streets at the other corner of the dock, donkeys and handcarts were appearing to take away the goods. The air was full of oaths and curses and the sound of bartering.

It was a world where Roman law and order ruled again, and when a surly soldier asked where we were going, I told him and he pointed out the place.

‘Redux’s warehouse? It’s right over there. And that’s his foreman steward with the handcart and the slave. After a bit of this cargo, I expect. Salt, for the most part, from the salt pans further south – so it’s to be hoped his warehouse is still dry. Hey!’ He thumped his baton on a cask near by. ‘You! The fat one with the cart! You’ve got a visitor. This citizen would like to have a word with you.’ He looked at the parcel wrapped up in the cloak. ‘Are you returning goods?’

I shook my head. ‘I want to talk to Redux, that is all. Something that happened at a wedding feast.’

‘You won’t be the first that wants to talk to him. There has been a bit of trouble down here, once or twice.’ He cleared his throat, importantly. ‘So, if you have any difficulty, you get back to me. We don’t want the kind of problem we had here yesterday – people trying to knock down the door, and fighting in the street. Very nearly had someone in the dock – and it interrupted trade. One of the captains nearly missed the tide. We had complaints from several quarters at the time. That’s why they’re posting one of us down here, to see that nothing of the kind occurs again. Now here’s the foreman – but remember what I said.’ He tapped his nose, to signal secrecy, and turned away to watch the docks again.

The fat foreman had left his cart and slave beside the gangplank on the dock and was trundling up to us. ‘What is it, citizen? You want something with me? I can’t spare many moments. I got work to do. My master wants me bidding for any extra salt – the last few sacks they fill are sometimes tinged with sand, but they bring them up to see what they can get for them.’ He was a big man, more fat than muscular, but bulging in his orange tunic – and he did not look pleased to see us. I have seen battering-rams that looked more welcoming.

‘It was your master that I was looking for.’ I tried to summon a disarming grin. ‘Is he in the warehouse?’

‘I couldn’t tell you that.’ There was no answering smile. ‘Who is looking for him, citizen?’ he said.

So Redux was there, I thought privately. Aloud, I said, ‘I am a citizen – as you can see, my friend. I was a guest with him at a wedding feast today – but there was an unfortunate incident and the ceremony had to be postponed. I hoped to speak to Redux at the time, but he left before I could have a word with him. He will know me, I am sure of that.’ Of course he would, he had seen me standing on that table in the hall. I did not mention that I’d never met the man.

The fat man put both thumbs underneath the belt that tied his tunic in, hitched it upwards over his ample stomach, and sniffed impressively. ‘I don’t know if the master is here or not, citizen. Give me your name and I will go and see.’

‘I am the citizen Libertus,’ I replied. ‘The representative of His Excellence Marcus Septimus. This is his slave who is accompanying me. Perhaps you would care to tell your master that.’ That was a formula that ought to do the trick.

He had small, greedy, beady eyes with fleshy eyelids, like a pig, and he was squinting suspiciously at the pair of us. But his tone became decidedly more civil as he said, ‘Your pardon, citizen.’ He ran a hand across his jowly chin. ‘Of course I’ll tell the master – when I get a chance. I’ll go and look for him. Though of course I can’t answer for whether he’ll be there.’

‘Master?’ Minimus whispered urgently to me. ‘If we can’t see Redux, perhaps we should move on. It must be almost the ninth hour by now.’

I glanced at what I could make out of the sun. It was clearly nearing the last quarter to the west. ‘Perhaps you’re right,’ I told him. ‘We are not succeeding here. I’ll leave a message for Redux and come back another day. Antoninus will be expecting us.’

That name had a charm which my patron’s name had lacked. The beady eyes looked furtively at me. ‘Did you say Antoninus, citizen?’

I nodded. ‘I have business with him at his apartment later on.’

‘Then I’m sorry to keep you waiting out here, citizen. Though perhaps you wouldn’t mind explaining what you’ve got in there?’ He gestured towards the parcel that Minimus still held, and from which the corner of the salver was now peeping through.

‘It is a piece of silver, fashioned as a tray,’ I said, ‘though I don’t understand what business that might be of yours.’ Then, conscious of the soldier still on guard nearby, and fearing that I should be accused of stealing it, I added hastily, ‘It was to be my patron’s wedding gift at that marriage earlier.’

‘I see.’ He nodded. ‘Well, I’ll go in and see what I can do for you. But I can’t make promises. You’ll have to wait and see.’ And with that he lumbered off towards the warehouse door, leaving the handcart in the charge of his sleepy-looking slave.

I gave that individual a tentative grin, but he looked away and pretended to be engrossed in the unloading of the salt, so there was nothing we could do but wait and hope the fat foreman had helpful news for us.

Twelve

We did not have long to wait. A moment or two later our fat friend appeared again, puffing and panting, and gestured us to come.

‘Come with me, citizen, if you would be so good.’ He led the way towards the warehouse door, and as we stepped inside I realized for the first time what a huge place it was – it looked big enough to put an entire ship inside. It was built entirely of stone, though there were rough wooden partitions dividing it inside, and the place seemed half-empty, vast and echoing.

The foreman paused beside a pile of bulging sacks inside the door. ‘The master said I was to show you in. He’s in his office, at the other end, but he wants me to go back and see about the salt. So, citizen, if you could find your way down there yourself?’ He spoke as if Minimus was invisible.

He hovered a moment, as if he were expecting a tip for this, but I had none to give him so I turned and walked purposefully down the centre aisle. What Minimus had told me earlier was correct, I saw: Redux obviously traded in all sorts of things. As we passed the different partitioned areas I noticed crates which had been opened and were half-unpacked: salt fish, potted dormice, Samian ware – and they were only the goods that I could see. And on the far side of the aisle there was a pile of British capes obviously waiting to be traded on. It was impressive. Most importers deal in one commodity alone.

Redux’s office was behind the partition at the end. He had abandoned the toga he had been wearing at the wedding feast – it was neatly folded and lying on a stool – and he was sitting at a wooden desk in his tunic-sleeves, surrounded by wooden writing tablets and bark-paper scrolls. But he still looked every inch the councillor he was – the under-tunic was wine-red and of elaborate design, with fine embroidery at the neck and hems, and the shoes that he was wearing were of softest red leather, with little silver tassels on the toes.

He rose to greet us as we came into the room. He was every bit as large and rounded as his foreman was, and one might have thought it was the pattern of the house, if it were not for the skinny slave that leapt up from the floor, where he had been mixing ingredients for ink, and hustled to bring a folding stool for me.

Redux extended a fat hand, with a heavy ring on every finger, and motioned me to sit. ‘Citizen! Of course I recognize the face. I saw you at that ill-fated wedding earlier. What a dreadful business for poor Honorius. You were the one who made the announcement, I believe.’

I sat down gingerly. It was a flimsy stool. ‘I was asked to do so by the family,’ I said, anxious not to sound as if I were too involved. ‘Though I do not know them well. I happened to be in the passage when the news arrived, that’s all – and it was easy for me to gain the attention of the guests.’ This did not sound convincing even to myself.

It did not convince him either. ‘And to ask questions of people afterwards?’ he said.

I had forgotten that he had shown himself to be sharp-witted then, and able to make deductions other people missed. ‘At the time I was looking for an explanation,’ I replied. ‘But . . .’

He looked at me wryly. ‘Ah, of course. And then the girl confessed.’ I was sure from his ironic tone of voice that he didn’t believe it any more than I had done, but he rubbed his hands together and went on affably: ‘Well, citizen, what is it that I can do for you? My foreman tells me you may have something that you wish to sell.’

‘Sell?’ I was astounded, and then I saw the direction of his glance. ‘Oh, the silver salver. That is not for sale. It was to be my patron’s present at the wedding feast. He is Marcus Septimus, whom I expect you know. I was only there because he couldn’t come. I shall have to return it to his house as soon as possible.’

‘I see.’ He gave a peculiar little smile. ‘Would you permit me to have a look, at least?’

‘By all means.’ I was a bit surprised, but I could see no reason to deny him the request. ‘Show it to him, Minimus.’

The boy stepped forward and unwrapped the tray. Redux took it from him and examined it. He then took it to the lighter area by the window space and scrutinized its every detail, turning it over and rapping it, then weighing it thoughtfully in his hand. ‘A fine piece,’ he said, after a little pause. ‘I could give you a handsome price for this.’ He named a sum which made my eyeballs bulge. I had not supposed it to be worth so much. Marcus had simply picked up the nearest tray to give to me – a minute earlier he had been eating figs off it.

But there was only one answer I could make, of course. ‘I have told you, it is not mine to sell.’

He smiled. ‘And yet you bring it into this part of the town – where it could so easily have been stolen in the street. Who is to know it wasn’t? Or that it won’t be, as you are walking back? That would be a dreadful pity, wouldn’t it?’

He was still smiling blandly, but it could have been a threat. I thought quickly. ‘I shall ask that soldier on the dock to look after it for me, and deliver it to the guardhouse when he is relieved. My patron is friendly with the commander there, and, of course, I will ask for a receipt, and hand it over in front of witnesses. Perhaps you would care to be one of them?’ I said.

‘Ah.’ He walked over and handed the salver back to me. ‘An honest man, I see. A pity – it is a handsome thing, though I don’t quite know where I’d have found a customer just now. I know who would have been very interested but – unfortunately – he is dead.’

‘Your friend Zythos, I suppose?’ I said, secretly pleased to have recalled the name.

He frowned at me. ‘I was speaking about Honorius, of course. He had a weakness for all works of art. He spent a fortune on them – that whole house is full of lovely things. I delivered him a new one, just a month or two ago – a statue of Minerva, very finely done. You must have noticed it if you were in the house – even if you don’t know the family very well. Though, frankly, I don’t know that I’m convinced of that. Who told you about Zythos otherwise? Someone must have done! You have never been a customer of ours that I’m aware.’