I turned to look, and saw what he had meant. This was indeed no ordinary slave.
The man who filled the doorway was an impressive sight. He was half the age that I am, but almost twice as tall — and broad to match, though there was not an uncia of fat on any part of him. His skin was the colour of burnished bronze and the muscles and sinews in his legs stood out like knotted rope. He wore a striking ochre-coloured slave-tunic and cloak, and a pair of high-laced sandals dyed to match. It was a uniform designed to emphasise his master’s wealth and rank, but actually the short garments merely served to accentuate his size and draw attention to the colour of his skin.
‘Come!’ his master ordered, and the apparition came into the room, though he was so tall he had to duck his head to get in through the door. He strode across to us, his arms and shoulders rippling as he moved. There was none of the usual clumsiness that accompanies great size: if this was a giant, it was a most athletic one. As he came forward into the light of the candle I got a clear look at his face.
It was like one of the beaten masks the cavalry sometimes wear — handsome, hardened and expressionless, and the same gold-brown as all the rest of him. I could see why his master took him everywhere. This was no mere slave, this was a bodyguard. And his presence answered a question I had not thought to ask myself, why a patrician of such noble rank was travelling without an armed and mounted escort at his side. This man would have seen off any hungry wolf or bear, and the sight of the cudgel stuffed carelessly into his belt as if it were a trifling thing and not a heavy club, would have dissuaded bandits very fast indeed. But today he was acting as messenger as well. In one gigantic hand he held the promised scroll.
Pimply-Face was right — that was an imperial seal-box, by the look of it.
The giant did not even glance at me. He threw himself upon his knees before his owner, bowed his head and held the scroll out, saying urgently, ‘Your pardon, citizen-’
‘Thank you, Cacus,’ his master interrupted impatiently. ‘You can give that to me. I’ll put it where it’s safe.’ He lifted his toga folds and put it carefully into a long, deep leather pouch that was dangling from a belt around his waist — obviously designed for carrying the document. He carefully concealed it beneath his drapes before he spoke again. ‘Rise, man, rise. I have a task for you!’
Cacus — it occurred to me that he’d been appropriately named after the monstrous son of Vulcan — scrambled to his feet. He towered over us. ‘Master, I fear that I could not finish what you asked. Your brother-’
‘Never mind that now. This is the citizen, Libertus,’ his master interrupted with that chilly smile of his, gesturing to me with one pudgy hand. His fingers were covered in ostentatious jewellery, one ring at least on each — I noted two fine seal-rings and a mourning ring in jet — and underneath the cloak I saw that he wore a stack of thick gold bracelets on each upper arm. I mentally applauded his sagacity — it’s a safer way of carrying your wealth than as gold pieces in a luggage cart, since any market will exchange a given weight of precious metal for its worth in coins. And there was clearly lots of weight. He must have been carrying a small fortune on his arms.
Cacus inclined his head a moment in a bow, then looked at me with that impassive, mask-like face. More than looked, in fact. He examined me so fixedly — studying my features as though he were trying to learn a task by heart — that he could almost have gone away and painted a likeness of me from memory alone. ‘This is the citizen that you were speaking of?’ he said. The Latin had a faintly foreign ring to it.
The purple-striper nodded. ‘There’ll be need for you to call in at his workshop now. By great good fortune, I encountered him myself. But I’d like you to listen to what he has to say.’
‘You planned to call on me?’ I was so astonished that I interrupted him. ‘It wasn’t you who came into my workshop earlier today wanting mosaics for a country house?’ It seemed so likely when I thought of it, that I wondered why this had not occurred to me before. ‘If so …’
But the patrician shook his head. ‘I have no need of pavements, citizen. I have no home in Glevum nowadays. Revisiting the place, I’m rather glad I don’t. The town is nothing but a trading post and a retirement colonia for the soldiery, and a remote and backward one at that. I have spent a fruitless morning in the town attempting to find a senior member of the curia. But it seems that none of them is willing to be found.’ He gave me that peculiar bleak and twisted smile again. ‘I take it that not all of them have followed your patron’s example and gone away to Rome?’
It was intended as a challenge, but I answered peaceably. ‘As it happens, citizen, I can help you there. There’s been an extraordinary meeting of the curia today,’ I said. ‘They were summoned to the garrison. The commander wanted their advice on making that proclamation that was just announced outside.’
The sudden change in his demeanour startled me. Within an instant he was furious again. The florid face grew redder than before and the small eyes glittered angrily. ‘How do you come to know that, pavement-maker? You visited the garrison? You must have done. Of course, you were with those soldiers when the trumpet call was made! They accompanied you here. I saw you with them when Vesperion so rudely left me and hurried off to talk to you instead — though of course I did not realise at that point who you were! What were you doing at the garrison?’ He was so incensed that he was in danger of turning more purple than his stripes. I saw him look at Cacus, who shook a warning head.
‘Master, he must have met the soldiers on the way. At the garrison everyone was being turned away — I told you that.’
So he’d been refused entry to the garrison himself! No wonder Fancy-Cloak had been so furious, I thought. I had been afforded more preference than his representative. I shook my head. I had no wish to offend a powerful man like this. ‘I was turned away as well,’ I said, with truth, if not with total honesty. ‘But I would have supposed that the imperial seal … Ah, I see!’
The exclamation escaped me before I could control my tongue. A piece of the mosaic had just tumbled into place.
EIGHTEEN
I had not managed to keep the triumph from my voice, or the smile of satisfaction from my lips. That was not wise of me.
‘Something is causing you amusement, citizen?’ The patrician’s voice was dangerous.
‘Only that I think I’ve come to understand.’ I was only too eager to explain. ‘Apart from the property that you were mentioning, you have some other legal interest to register, I suppose. I presume your scroll relates to something of the kind?’
He looked astonished, then bewildered, but to my delight he nodded.
So I had been right. Why had I not thought of it before? Obviously the treasured scroll was an official document emanating from the now-dead Emperor. That was not required for mere sale of property, even of the formal variety, so the document which bore the seal must relate to something else. Probably a travel permit or an imperial judgement on some disputed will.
Perhaps I could even guess which will it was, given what was happening in the forum at that very moment! And it was obvious why the citizen was so urgently seeking to register his scroll with a senior magistrate, or some other member of the local curia. ‘That’s why you were looking for my patron, yesterday?’ I said.
‘You are as perceptive as they say you are, citizen!’ he said. Was I imagining it, or was there a tone of genuine astonishment? ‘It was indeed in connection with the scroll that I was attempting to call at the villa yesterday.’
And was probably why he had called in here today, I realised — in the hope of finding the town councillor who had bought the warehouse recently. In which case, his lofty remark to Vesperion had not merely been a snub, he genuinely could not deal with an underling. Only a member of the curia would suffice. But the old steward had been right in one respect at least: there was never any interest at all in buying wine. The poor old fellow was going to be disappointed of his sale.