‘Whoever told you that?” I exclaimed in surprise. “I’ve more than enough slaves. They make my life intolerable and deprive me of my own freedom, not to mention real wealth, which is solitude.”
“A certain Petro, an Iceni physician in the service of Rome, recognized the boy in London,” said the slave dealer. “He gave me your name and assured me you would pay me the highest price for the boy. But who can trust a Briton? Show your book, boy.”
He cuffed the boy over the head. The boy rummaged in his belt and drew out the remains of a torn and dirty Chaldaean-Egyptian book of dreams. I recognized it as soon as I touched it, and my limbs and joints dissolved into water.
“Is your mother’s name Lugunda?” I asked the boy, although I knew the answer. Petro’s name alone confirmed that the boy was my own son whom I had never seen. I wanted to take him in my arms and acknowledge him as my son, although there were no witnesses available, but the boy hit me in the face with his fist and bit my cheek. The slave dealer’s face darkened with rage and he fumbled for his whip.
“Don’t hit him,” I said. “I’ll buy the boy. What’s your price?”
The slave dealer looked at me appraisingly and again spoke of his outlays and losses.
“To be rid of him,” he said finally, “I’ll sell him at the lowest price. A hundred gold pieces. The boy is still untamed.”
Ten thousand sesterces was an insane price to pay for a half-grown boy when bedworthy young women were on offer in the market for a few gold pieces. It was not just the price, for naturally I should have paid an even higher one if necessary, but I had to sit down and think hard as I looked at the boy. The slave dealer misunderstood my silence and began to speak for his goods, explaining that there were several rich men in Rome who had acquired eastern habits and for whom the boy was of a choice age. But he lowered his price, first to ninety and then to eighty gold pieces.
In fact I was only wondering how I could make the purchase without my son becoming a slave. A formal purchase would have to be made at the tabellarium, where the contract would be confirmed and the boy would have to be branded with my own symbol of ownership, MM, after which he would never again be able to gain Roman citizenship, even if he were freed.
“Perhaps I could have him trained as a charioteer,” I said at last. “The Petro you mention was in fact a friend of mine when I was serving in Britain. I trust his recommendation. Couldn’t we arrange it so that you give me a written certificate to say that Petro, as the boy’s guardian, has assigned to you the task of bringing him here for me to look after him?”
The slave dealer gave me a sly look.
“I am the one who has to pay the purchase tax on him, not you,” he said. “I can’t really knock off any more from the price.”
I scratched my head. The matter was very involved and could easily have appeared to be an attempt to circumvent the high tax on slaves. But I might as well benefit in some way from my position as son-in-law to the City Prefect.
I put on my toga and the three of us set off for the temple of Mercury. Among the people there, I soon found a citizen who had lost his rank of knight and who, for a reasonable sum, agreed to stand as the other necessary witness to the oath. Thus a document could be drawn up and confirmed with a double oath.
According to this, the boy was a freeborn Briton whose parents, Ituna and Lugunda, had been killed in the war because of their friendship for Rome. Through the mediation of the physician Petro, they had sent their son to the security of Rome in good time, to have him brought up by their guest and friend, the knight Minutus Lausus Manilianus.
In a special clause it was stipulated that I, as his guardian, should hold a watching brief for his inheritance in the Iceni country when peace was finally declared in Britain. This strengthened my case to some extent, for the Mercury priests took it that I had something to gain from the boy at the distribution of war spoils.
‘What shall we put down as his name?” asked the notary.
“Jucundus,” I said. It was the first name that came into my head.
They all burst into relieved laughter, for the sullen boy was anything but a picture of sweetness. The priest said that I was going to be hard put to make a good Roman of him.
The drawing up and sealing of the deeds and the customary gift to the Mercury priests came to a considerably larger sum than the purchase tax would have done. The slave dealer began to regret the deal and took me for a cleverer purchaser than I in fact was. He had already taken his oath, however, but in the end I paid him the hundred gold pieces he had at first asked, just to be rid of him without further ado.
When we finally left the temple of Mercury, the boy unexpectedly thrust his hand into mine as if he felt lonely in the everyday noise and bustle of the street. I was seized with a strange feeling as I held his small hand and led him home through the josding city of Rome. I thought of the possibility of acquiring Roman citizenship for him when he was older, and then adopting him if I could persuade Sabina to agree. But those problems would come later.
Nevertheless, I had more trouble than joy from my son Jucundus. At first he would not even speak and I thought the horrors of war had turned him dumb. He smashed many objects in the house and refused to wear the clothes of a Roman boy. Claudia made no headway with him at all. The first time Jucundus saw a Roman boy of his own age outside the house, he rushed at him and beat him over the head with a stone until Barbus managed to intervene. Barbus suggested a severe beating, but I thought one should try more gende methods first and spoke to the boy myself.
“I’m sure you are mourning your mother’s death,” I said. “You were dragged here with a rope around your neck like a dog. But you aren’t a dog. You must grow up and become a man. We all wish the best for you. Tell us what you would like to do most?”
“Kill Romans!” cried Jucundus.
I sighed with relief, for at least the boy could speak after all.
“You can’t do that here in Rome,” I said. “But you can learn Roman customs and habits and one day perhaps I can make you into a Roman knight. If you stick to your plans, you can return to Britain when you are older and kill Romans in the Roman way. The Roman art of war is better than the British, as you yourself have seen.”
Jucundus sulked, but my words had perhaps some effect on him.
“Barbus is an old veteran,” I went on craftily, “even if his head does shake. Ask him. He can tell you about batdes and warfare much better than I can.”
So, Barbus once again had the opportunity to tell the story of the time when he had swum fully equipped across the Danube between the ice floes with a wounded centurion on his back. He could show his scars and explain why unconditional obedience and a hardened body were the inescapable foundations for efficiency as a warrior. He acquired a taste for wine again and he wandered about Rome with the boy, taking him to bathe in the Tiber and teaching him to express himself pungently in the Latin of the people.
But Barbus was also troubled by his wild temper and one day took me to one side.
“Jucundus is a bright boy,” he said, “but even I, hardened old man that I am, am horrified by his descriptions of what he is going to do to both Roman men and women one day. I’m afraid he witnessed terrible things when the Britons’ rebellion was crushed. The worst of it is, he keeps rushing up the slopes to shout curses over Rome in his barbaric language. In secret he worships gods of the underworld and sacrifices mice to them. It’s quite obvious that he is possessed by evil powers. Nothing will come of his upbringing until he is freed of his demons.”