We also had with us my brother-in-law Famia. Normally I would have run the lengths of several stadia wearing full army kit before agreeing to share weeks at sea with him, but if all worked out, it was Famia who would be paying for our transport home: somehow he had persuaded the Greens that since their chariot horses had been performing so abysmally, it was in their interests to send him out here to buy fine new Libyan stock direct from the stud farms. Well, the Greens certainly needed to beef up their teams, as I kept pointedly reminding him.
For the voyage out we had acquired paying-passenger places on a ship bound for Apollonia. This enabled Famia to economize, or to put it another way, he was defrauding his faction of the full ship-hire costs for the journey out. They had told him to select a decent Italian vessel at Ostia for a two-way trip. Instead, he was just going to pick up a one-way packet home. Maia's husband was not essentially dishonest-but Maia had made sure he had no spending money, and he needed it for drink. She herself had declined to accompany us. My mother had told me on the sly that Maia was worn out by trying to hold the family together and had had enough. Taking her husband out of the country was the best service I could offer my sister.
It quickly became obvious that the whole reason for this trip as far as Famia was concerned was getting away from his worried wife so he could booze himself senseless at every opportunity. Well, every holiday party has one tiresome bore; it gives everyone else somebody to avoid.
Landing at this harbor was more in hope than earnest. We were trying to catch up with Camillus Justinus and Claudia Rufina. There had been a vague arrangement that we might be coming out to see them. Extremely vague. Back in the winter when I let Helena first mention the possibility in a letter to them at Carthage, I had been assuming my work for the Censors would prevent me indulging in this treat. Now we were here-but we had no real idea where along the north shore of this huge continent the two fugitives might have ended up.
The last we had heard from them was two months earlier, saying that they were intending to set off from Oea for Cyrenaïca and would be heading here first, because Claudia wanted to see the fabled Gardens of the Hesperides. Very romantic. Various letters which Helena was bringing them from their abandoned relations were likely to shake the dim-witted elopers out of that. The rich seemed to lose their tempers with their heirs in a formidable style. I did not blame Justinus and Claudia for lying low.
Since I was the informer, whenever we arrived at a strange town that might be unfriendly, it fell to me to scout it out. I was used to being pelted with eggs.
I enquired at the local temple. Rather to my surprise, Helena 's brother had actually left a message that he had been here, and that he had gone on to Tocra; his note was dated about a month ago. His military efficiency did not quite dispel my fears that we were about to start on a pointless chase all around the Pentapolis. Once they left Berenice, our chances of making a connection with the flitting pair became much more slim. I foresaw handing over frequent emoluments to temple priests.
Our ship was still in harbor. The master had very generously put in here specially to allow us to make enquiries, and after he took on water and supplies he reloaded all our gear while we rounded up Famia (who was already trying to find a cheap drinking house), then we reboarded.
The vessel was virtually empty. In fact the whole situation was curious. Most ships carry cargos in both directions for economic reasons, so whatever this one was supposed to be fetching from Cyrenaïca must be extremely lucrative if there was no need to trade both ways.
The ship's owner had been on board from Rome. He was a large, curly-haired, black-skinned man, well dressed and of handsome bearing. If he could speak Latin or even Greek he never obliged us with so much as a good morning; when he conversed with the crew it was in an exotic tongue which Helena eventually guessed must be Punic. He kept himself to himself. Neither the captain nor his crew seemed disposed to discuss the owner or his business. That suited us. The man had done us a favor taking us on board at reasonable rates, and even before the kindness of putting in at Berenice we had no wish to cause ructions.
Basically that meant one thing: we had to conceal from Famia that our host was even slightly tinged with a Carthaginian flavor. Romans are in general tolerant of other races-but some harbor one deeply embedded prejudice and it goes back to Hannibal. Famia had the poison in a double dose. There was no reason for it; his family were Aventine lowlifes who had never been in the army or come within smelling range of elephants, but Famia was convinced all Carthaginians were gloomy child-eating monsters whose one aim in life was still the destruction of Rome itself, Roman trade, and all Romans, including Famia. My inebriated brother-in-law was likely to be racially abusive at the top of his voice if anything obviously Punic crossed his wavering path.
Well, keeping him away from our ship's owner took my mind off my seasickness.
Tocra was about forty Roman miles further east. By this time I was beginning to regret not taking the advice my father had boomed at me: to travel on a fast transport right out to Egypt, maybe on one of the giant corn vessels, then to work back from Alexandria. Pottering east in little stages was becoming a trial. In fact I decided the whole trip was pointless.
"No, it's not. Even if we never manage to find my brother and Claudia, it's served a purpose," Helena tried to comfort me. "Everyone at home will be grateful we tried. Anyway, we are supposed to be enjoying ourselves."
I pointed out that nothing which involved me and the ocean would ever be real enjoyment.
"You'll be on land soon. Quintus and Claudia probably do need us to find them; their money must be running out. But so long as they are happy, I don't think it matters if we can't bring them home."
"What does matter is that your father has contributed to our trip-and if he loses his son, his other son's betrothed bride, and then what it costs to fund us on an abortive mission, my name will be so black in the household of the illustrious Camilli at the Capena Gate, that even I won't ever be going home again."
"Maybe Quintas will have found the silphium."
"That's a charming thought."
At Tocra the sea became much rougher; I decided that whether or not we encountered the fugitives, it was as far as I could bring myself to sail. This time when we disembarked, we said good-bye. The silent owner of the ship surprised us by coming to shake hands.
Tocra nestled between the sea and the mountains, where the coastal plain narrowed significantly so the inland escarpment-previously out of sight-appeared distantly as rolling hills. The city was not only Greek, but huge and hideously prosperous. Its urban elite lived in palatial peristyle homes built of a very soft local limestone, which quickly weathered in the brisk sea breeze. The lively wind whipped the white horses on the bay; it tossed the flowers and the fig trees behind the high walls of the gardens and caused sheep and goats to bleat in alarm.
Once again there was a message. This time it led us to the bad end of town, for even flourishing Greek-founded seaports have their low dives for visiting sailors and the slappers who attend them. In a seedy back room in a raucous area, we discovered Claudia Rufina, all alone.
"I stayed behind in case you came."
Since we had never said definitely that we were coming, that did seem odd.
Claudia was a tall girl in her early twenties, looking much slimmer and even more solemn than I remembered; she had acquired a rather vivid suntan which would have been out of place in good society. She greeted us quietly, seeming sad and introspective. When we knew her in her home province of Baetica and in Rome she had been a walking fortune, well dressed, manicured, always expensively coiffured, and wearing ranks of bangles and necklaces. Now she was robed in a simple brown tunic and stole, with her hair loosely tied at the nape of her neck. There was little of either the nervous, rather humorless creature who had come to Rome to marry Aelianus, or the minx who had quickly discovered how to giggle with his more outgoing younger brother, then kicked up her heels and ran off on an adventure. That now seemed to have paled.