Gordianus The Finder Omnibus (Books 1-4) (95 page)

‘Nonsense,’ said Bethesda. ‘You are wise in the ways of the world, Master, but you can never know the secret workings of a slave’s mind, for you have never been one.’ She shrugged. ‘When you told me the story, I saw the truth at once. I did not have to know Stephanos to know how his mind worked; there is a way of looking at the world common to all slaves, I think.’

I nodded and then stiffened a bit. ‘Does this mean that sometimes, when I can’t find something, or when I distinctly remember giving you an order but you convince me that it slipped my mind . . .’

Bethesda smiled ever so slightly, as the goddess of wisdom might smile when contemplating a secret joke too rich for mere mortals.

Later that night we joined the throng in the Forum, holding up our wax tapers so that the great public squares and the looming facades of the temples were illuminated by thousands and thousands of flickering lights. Lucius came with us, and joined in the joyful chanting of ‘Yo, yo, Saturnalia!’ which echoed and boomed about the Forum. From the giddy smile on his face, I could see that he had regained his good humour. Bethesda smiled, too, and why not? On her wrist, glittering like a circle of liquid fire beneath the flicker of her taper, was a bracelet of silver and ebony, the Saturnalia gift of a grateful admirer.

KING BEE AND HONEY

‘Gordianus! And Eco! How was your journey?’

‘I’ll tell you as soon as I get off this horse and discover whether I still have two legs.’

Lucius Claudius let out a good-natured laugh. ‘Why, the ride from Rome is only a few hours! And a fine paved road all the way. And glorious weather!’

That was true enough. It was a day in late Aprilis, one of those golden spring days that one might wish could last forever. Sol himself seemed to think so; the sun stood still in the sky, as if enraptured by the beauty of the earth below and unwilling to move on.

And the earth was indeed beautiful, especially this little corner of it, tucked amid the rolling Etruscan countryside north of Rome. The hills were studded with oaks and spangled with yellow and purple flowers. Here in the valley, groves of olive trees shimmered silver and green in the faint breeze. The orchards of fig trees and lime trees were in fall leaf. Bees hummed and flitted among the long rows of grape leaves. There was bird song on the air, mingled with a tune being sung by a group of slaves striding through a nearby field and swinging their scythes in unison. I breathed deeply the sweet odour of tall grass drying in the sun. Even my good friend Lucius looked unusually robust, like a plump-cheeked Silenus with frizzled red hair; all he needed to complete the image was a pitcher of wine and a few attendant wood nymphs.

I slipped off my horse and discovered I still had legs after all. Eco sprang from his mount and leaped into the air. Oh, to be a fourteen-year-old boy, and never to know a stiff muscle! A slave led our horses towards the stable.

Lucius gave me a hearty slap across the shoulders and walked me towards the villa. Eco ran in circles around us, like an excited pup. It was a charming house, low and rambling with many windows, their shutters all thrown open to let in the sunlight and fresh air. I thought of houses in the city, all narrow and crammed together and windowless for fear of robbers climbing in from the street. Here, even the house seemed to have sighed with relief and allowed itself to relax.

‘You see, I told you,’ said Lucius. ‘Look at that smile on your face! The last time I saw you in the city, you looked like a man wearing shoes too small for his feet. I knew this was what you needed – an escape to the countryside for a few days. It always works for me. When all the politicking and litigation in the Forum becomes too much, I flee to my farm. You’ll see. A few days and you’ll be a reborn man. And Eco will have a splendid time, climbing the hills, swimming in the stream. But you didn’t bring Bethesda?’

‘No. She – ’ I began to say
she refused to come
, which was the exact truth, but I feared that my highborn friend would smirk at the idea of a slave refusing to accompany her master on a trip. ‘Bethesda is a creature of the city, you know. Hardly suited for the countryside, so I left her at home, with Belbo to look after her. She’d have been useless to me here.’

‘Oh, I see.’ Lucius nodded. ‘She refused to come?’

‘Well. . .’ I began to shake my head, then gave it up and laughed out loud. Of what use were citified pretensions here, where Sol stood still and cast his golden light over a perfect world? Lucius was right. Best to leave such nonsense back in Rome. On an impulse I reached for Eco, and when he made a game of slipping from my grasp I gave chase. The two of us ran in circles around Lucius Claudius, who threw back his head and laughed.

That night we dined on asparagus and goose liver, followed by mushrooms sautéed in goose fat and a guinea hen in a honey-vinegar sauce sprinkled with pine nuts. The fare was simply but superbly prepared. I praised the meal so profusely that Lucius called in the cook to take a bow.

I was surprised to see that the cook was a woman, and still in her twenties. Her dark hair was pulled back in a tight bun, no doubt to keep it out of her way in the kitchen. Her plump cheeks were all the plumper for the beaming smile on her face; she appreciated praise. Her face was pleasant, if not beautiful, and her figure, even in her loose clothing, appeared to be quite voluptuous.

‘Davia started as an assistant to my head cook at my house in Rome,’ Lucius explained. ‘She helped him shop, measured out ingredients, that sort of thing. But when he fell ill last winter and she had to take his place, she showed such a knack that I decided to give her the run of the kitchen here at the farm. So you approve, Gordianus?’

‘Indeed. Everything was splendid, Davia.’

Eco added his praise but his applause was interrupted by a profound yawn. Too much good food and fresh air, he explained, gesturing to the table and sucking in a deep breath. He excused himself and went straight to bed.

Lucius and I took chairs down to the stream and sipped his finest vintage while we listened to the gurgling of the water and the chirring of the crickets and watched thin clouds pass like shredded veils across the face of the moon.

‘Ten days of this, and I think I might forget the way back to Rome.’

‘Ah, but not the way back to Bethesda, I’ll wager,’ said Lucius. ‘I was hoping to see her. She’s a city flower, yes, but put her in the country and she might put out some fresh blossoms that would surprise you. Ah well, it will be just us three fellows, then.’

‘No other guests?’

‘No, no, no! I specifically waited until I had no pending social obligations, so that we should have the place all to ourselves.’ He smiled at me under the moonlight, then turned down his lips in a mock frown. ‘It’s not what you’re thinking, Gordianus.’

‘And what am I thinking?’

‘That for all his homely virtues, your friend Lucius Claudius is still a patrician and subject to the snobbery of his class; that I chose a time to invite you here when there’d be no one else around so as to avoid having you seen by my more elevated friends. But that’s not the point at all. I wanted you to have the place to yourself so that you wouldn’t have to put up with them! Oh, if you only knew the sort of people I’m talking about.’

I smiled at his discomfort. ‘My work does occasionally bring me into contact with the highborn and wealthy, you know.’

‘Ah, but it’s a different matter, socializing with them. I won’t even mention my own family, though they’re the worst. Oh, there are the fortune-hunters, the ones on the fringes of society who think they can scrape and claw their way to respectability like a ferret. And the grandpas, the boring, self-important old farts who never let anyone forget that some ancestor of theirs served two terms as consul or sacked a Greek temple or slaughtered a shipload of Carthaginians back in the golden age. And the crackpots who claim they’re descended from Hercules or Venus – more likely Medusa, judging from their table manners. And the too rich, spoiled young men who can’t think of anything but gambling and horse racing, and the too pretty girls who can’t think of anything but new gowns and jewels, and the parents who can’t think of anything but matching up the boys and girls so that they can breed more of the same.

‘You see, Gordianus,
you
meet these people at their worst, when there’s been a dreadful murder or some other crime, and they’re all anxious and confused and need your help, but I see them at their best, when they’re preening themselves like African birds and oozing charm all over each other like honey, and believe me, at their best they’re a thousand times worse! Oh, you can’t imagine some of the dreadful gatherings I’ve had to put up with here at the villa. No, no, nothing like that for the next ten days. This shall be a respite for you and me alike – for you from the city, and for me from my so-called circle of friends.’

But it was not to be.

The next three days were like a foretaste of Elysium. Eco explored every corner of the farm, as fascinated by butterflies and ant beds as he was by the arcane mechanics of the olive oil press and the wine press. He had always been a city boy – he was an abandoned child of the streets before I adopted him – but it was clear he could develop a taste for the country.

As for me, I treated myself to Davia’s cooking at least three times a day, toured the farm with Lucius and his foreman, and spent restful hours lying in the shade of the willows along the stream, scrolling through trashy Greek novels from Lucius’ small library. The plots all seemed to be the same – humble boy meets noble girl, girl is abducted by pirates/giants/soldiers, boy rescues girl and turns out to be of noble birth himself – but such nonsense seemed to fit my mood perfectly. I allowed myself to become pampered and relaxed and thoroughly lazy in body, mind and spirit, and I enjoyed every moment.

Then came the fourth day, and the visitors.

They arrived just as twilight was falling, in an open travelling coach drawn by four white horses and followed by a small retinue of slaves. She was dressed in green and wore her auburn curls pinned in the peculiar upright fan shape that happened to be stylish in the city that spring; it made a suitable frame for the striking beauty of her face. He wore a dark blue tunic that was sleeveless and cut above the knees to show off his athletic arms and legs, and an oddly trimmed little beard that seemed designed to flout convention. They looked to be about my age, midway between thirty and forty.

I happened to be walking back to the villa from the stream. Lucius stepped out of the house to greet me, looked past me and saw the new arrivals.

‘Numa’s balls!’ he exclaimed under his breath, borrowing my own favourite epithet.

‘Friends of yours?’ I said.

‘Yes!’ He could not have sounded more dismayed if he was being paid a visit by Hannibal’s ghost.

He, it turned out, was a fellow named Titus Didius. She was Antonia, his second wife. (They had both divorced their first spouses in order to marry each other, generating enormous scandal and no small amount of envy among their unhappily married peers.) According to Lucius, who took me aside while the couple settled into the room next to mine, they drank like fish, fought like jackals, and stole like magpies. (I noticed that the slaves discreetly put away the costliest wines, the best silver, and the most fragile Arretine vases shortly after they arrived.)

‘It seems they were planning to spend a few days up at my cousin Manius’ place,’ explained Lucius, ‘but when they arrived, no one was there. Well, I know what happened – Manius went down to Rome just to avoid them.’

‘Surely not.’

‘Surely yes. I wonder that they didn’t pass him on the way! So now they’ve come here, asking to stay a while. “Just a day or two, before we head back to the city. We were so looking forward to some time in the country. You will be a dear, won’t you, Lucius, and let us stay, just for a bit?” More likely ten days than two!’

I shrugged. ‘They don’t look so awful to me.’

‘Oh, wait. Just wait.’

‘Well, if they’re really as terrible as that, why don’t you let them stay the night and then turn them away?’

‘Turn them away?’ He repeated the phrase as if I’d stopped speaking Latin. ‘Turn them
away
? You mean, send away Titus Didius, old Marcus Didius’ boy? Refuse my hospitality to Antonia? But Gordianus, I’ve known these people since I was a child. I mean, to avoid them, like cousin Manius has done, well, that’s one thing. But to say to them, to their faces – ’