Time to Depart (3 page)

V

Always the same shock: you come face to face with a murderous master criminal, and he looks like a ribbon-seller.

Balbinus Pius was five feet three digits - definitely not tall. He was looking me in the windpipe, and appeared not to notice that most of the officers present overstripped him by almost a foot. He had an oval head; an expressionless face; wavering eyes; an anxious expression that verged nicely on bewilderment. His manner was quiet; no more threatening than a ladybird.

His hunched shoulders held up a dapper white tunic and short grey cloak. The cloak was pinned extremely neatly on the left shoulder by a round gold brooch set with five garnets. He had healthy pink skin. On the top of his head it was visible through the short, thinning down of near-baldness; the bushier stuff above his ears had been lathered with some discreetly piquant lotion. He wore dark grey leather travelling boots. His seal ring was gold, a Greek design of a winged female driving a four-horse chariot. He wore two others for ornament, one set with sapphires and ovals, the other openwork, cut from sheet gold with added granulation. He wore the plain wide gold band of the middle rank. He carried no weapons.

I was annoyed, and so was Petro, that Tibullinus, Mica and some of the other men of the Sixth stepped forwards and shook hands with him, bidding farewell. Words were exchanged. Unable to tolerate it, the rest of us looked away and breathed disapproval. We were reluctant to become part of the conversation. We were resisting being coerced. We had glimpsed the complacency amidst which corruption flowers.

'How can you do that?' Martinus spluttered at Arica; Arica had actually slapped Balbinus on the back, as if he were seeing off his own cousin to the army. Martinus always spoke his mind.

'No harm being polite.' The Sixth had been supervising Balbinus' movements ever since he went to trial. Contact would have been unavoidable.

The whole group of the Sixth began standing back now that they had delivered the package to us. As soon as he saw them shaking hands with the criminal, Petronius Longus had abandoned any pretence that this was a joint mission. His normal easy-going manner had vanished; I had never seen him so serious. The rest of the climax belonged to him and to the Fourth. Once the Sixth had formally taken their leave, they slunk from the scene.

I said nothing, but I had a sense that Petro's night of triumph had just been spoiled.

The freedmen had taken all the luggage on to the ship. They stayed aboard. We could see sailors assuming their places at the mooring ropes. The captain hovered at the head of the gangplank, impatient to sail now he had the breeze and approaching light. None of us made any attempt to look for Linus. It was best to forget he was there.

The vessel was a roomy merchantman called the Aphrodite. Balbinus would be well set up; there was a cabin for the captain and favoured passengers, a latrine hanging over the stern, even a galley where food could be prepared. The Aphrodite was half as big again as the ship on which Helena and I had returned from Syria. She needed to be strongly built to make such a long voyage so late in the year.

Now the criminal stood looking hesitant; he seemed uncertain what was expected of him. 'Am I to board?'

His doubt did not last. Petronius Longus appeared in front of him, flanked by Martinus and me. The other squad members clustered close, in a tight circle.

'Just a few formalities.' It was clear that now Balbinus was in the care of the Fourth Cohort there would be no hail-fellow handshaking. 'I've waited a long time, Balbinus,' Petro said.

'No doubt you have done your duty, officer.' The man spoke with reproach. He still seemed like a tunic-braid salesman - one who had just been told to his amazement that his embroidered Egyptian fancies had leaked crimson dye all over ten togas at some swanky laundry. 'I am innocent of the crimes of which I have been accused.'

'They all say that,' Petronius complained, addressing the sky in despair. 'Gods, I hate this hypocrisy! A straight villain always respects a straight arrest. He'll shrug and accept that he's caught. But all you self-justifying types have to make out that you cannot believe anyone could so terribly misjudge you. You convince yourselves all that matters in a civilised society is for men like you to continue your businesses without interference from officious sods like us. Sods who don't understand.' Petronius set his jaw so hard I thought I heard his molars crunch. 'Only I do understand!' he sneered. 'I understand what you are all too well.'

This rant had had no effect. Balbinus' eyes, some colour you wouldn't bother to notice, wandered to me. He seemed to realise I was an outsider, and was hoping for some sympathy. 'You had your chance,' I told him, before he could start whining. 'The benefit of a jury trial, in the calm of the Basilica. Six lawyers. A jury of your equals, who heard about your activities without allowing themselves to be sickened. A judge who, even while passing sentence, was polite. Meanwhile outside, market traders still had their takings grabbed by your rampaging street gangs. Near-destitute old women were being tricked out of their savings. Men who dared to resist your hold-up thieves spilled their lifeblood into the gutter. Female slaves were sold into prostitution by angry mistresses after your footpads snatched the shopping money - ' Petronius moved slightly. I fell silent.

'Is there anything further you wish to tell me about your business?' Petro's request was formal; a vain hope.

'I am innocent,' Balbinus intoned solemnly.

Petro's sarcasm was milder than I expected: 'Oh, for a moment I thought you were going to surprise me and admit something.'

His men were on edge, wanting to retaliate, wanting something to make them feel good.

Petronius held out his hand, palm upwards. 'You can keep what you stand up in. I need your equestrian ring.'

With automatic obedience, the big rissole pulled off the badge of his lost social status, struggling to wrench it over his first knuckle bone. He looked puzzled again. 'May I have a receipt?'

'No need.' Petro took the small band of gold between finger and thumb as if it offended him. He set it edge up on the top of a bollard, then raised one boot. A full inch of layered oxhide stamped down, studded with iron and moulded by hard usage to intractable curves that echoed the shape of Petro's foot. I knew, through having stumbled over it on many occasions when drunk, that my old tentmate's massive trotter deserved respect.

Petro crushed the ring into a useless twist. Sneering, he handed it back. The state would forego that gold.

'You're enjoying this,' Fusculus tutted, pretending to admonish his chief. Fitted out with a sense of irony, Fusculus must be the sensitive one.

'I enjoy knowing that I'm never going to see this bastard again.'

'Strip him of his rights!' That was Martinus, ever eager for drama and about as sensitive as a dead newt.

Petronius Longus folded his arms. Enjoying this he might be, but he sounded tired: 'Tiberius Balbinus Pius, you stand condemned of capital crimes. The laws of Rome grant you time to depart. That is your only prerogative. You are no longer a citizen. You no longer possess equestrian rank, nor the honours attached to that rank. Your property is forfeit to the Treasury and your accusers. Your wife, children and heirs have no future claims upon it. You shall depart beyond the Empire. You shall never return. If you set foot in any territoty governed by Rome, the penalty is death.'

'I am innocent!' Balbinus whined.

'You're grime!' roared Petronius. 'Get on the boat before I forget myself!'

Balbinus shot him a vindictive look, then walked straight to the ship.

VI

Petro and I regained the quay later that morning. We had snatched a few hours' snoring on a bench in a wine bar that was fractionally more friendly than our previous foray. While we were relaxing the scene had changed completely. It was light. The quays were full of people. After a long, nerve- racking night, the hubbub was a shock.

As we hunted for the Providentia, which had brought me home from Syria, we could now make out fully the great man-made harbour basin. This was Portus. Claudius had first enclosed the spectacular new mooring that had replaced the old silted-up basin two miles away at Ostia. Nowadays only shallow-draught barges could use the old port. Portus had taken several decades of construction since Claudius sank the first breakwater - a massive ship once used to carry an obelisk for Caligula. That was now the base of a two-hundred-foot mole holding back the weather and carrying the three-storeyed lighthouse whose constant beacon announced from the harbour mouth that this was the centre of world navigation: one hundred and sixty acres of quiet mooring, to which all the Empire's trade came, eager to cough up harbour tax. I had paid my tax like a good citizen, one whose brother-in-law was a customs officer who liked asking unwanted questions. I was now trying to reclaim my goods.

There was more noise than earlier. Workers were already pouring in from Ostia along the rout through the market and flower gardens, or via the Claudian canal (which badly needed widening and dredging): clerks, customs inspectors, owners of vessels and goods, all jostling on the jetties with passengers and porters. We were tired, and the scene was unfamilar. Somehow the waterfront turmoil stripped us of our normal authority. Petronius and I were battered and cursed along with every other stranger.

'Sorry for getting you into this,' I told him ruefully. He was taking it well, however. This was by no means the wont pickle we had been in. Balbinus had put us in a gloomy mood; we were glad to forget him. We applied ourselves to commerce like heroes on behalf of my auctioneer father. He irritated all Hades out of me - but he had at least given us a chance to skive at the seaside for a time.

My father's general habit was to cause me trouble. From the day he had run away from home when I was still in the tunic of childhood I had despised pretty well everything he did. I never dealt with him if I could help it, but he had a way of winding himself into my life however hard I tried to avoid it.

He had known better than to ask me to help him make money from my trip to Syria. On hearing of our exotic destination he had commissioned Helena instead. Helena Justina, my girlfriend who had been brought up a senator's daughter, thought Pa was just a likeable scamp. She said I was too hard on him. She wanted us all to be friends; this gave Pa a chance to inveigle her into any devious scheme, especially if he could do it behind my back.

Though he claimed to be destitute (a piteous but fake complaint), my father had managed to dispatch Helena with instructions to get me to Tyre if she could - and with a two hundred-thousand-sesterces banker's draft. She had a free hand to spend this exorbitant sum. He must have trusted her taste. In thirty years he had never given me such leeway with his private funds.

We had naturally been investing for ourselves as well; no point travelling to one of the Empire's richest markets unless you buy cheap from the caravans. Using Helena's money mainly, plus my own meagre savings, we had laden ourselves with enough bales of silk to dress our entire families like Parthian dancing girls and still have some over to sell. Helena's ex-husband had imported peppers, so we shied off those, but that left plenty of other spices-to bring home in casks that hummed with addictive scents. We had purchased Arabian incense and other perfumes. I had acquired a few extras at markets when Helena was not looking. Then finally, just when I believed we were coming home, Helena Justine had coerced me into buying glassware for Papa.

She had made me do the bargaining, though she herself handled a portable abacus with a verve that made the traders sweat. She chose the stock. Helena had a good eye for a flask. Grumbling aside, glass was the desirable commodity. My father knew what he was doing. There were bowls and bottles, jugs and beakers in delicate pinks, metallic greens, sulphurous blues; vases with snakes of molten glass trailing around their elegant throats; tiny perfume flagons like little doves; jugs with furled spouts and fine etching. There was cameo glass, at a price that rivalled the incense. There were even spectacular funeral jars.

All this glass was a serious burden. We had crept home, trembling for the safety of Pa's fragile water sets and dinner bowls. As far as I knew, it was all in one piece when we sailed into Portus on the Providentia. All I had to do now was transport it upriver to Rome. If I wanted to remain Helena's private demigod, I had to make sure I did not slip with the bales.

All our own packages had already been taken over to Ostia on mules. I had booked a passage up the Tiber on a barge that was leaving today. Now I was on edge about Pa's damned glass. I did not intend to endure the rest of his lifetime being derided as the son who smashed the equivalent of two hundred thousand pieces of silver. This had to be done right.

Petronius had some sympathy; he was a loyal friend. But he lacked the direct interest I had myself, and I didn't blame him for that. It was hard enough for me to interest myself in another man's profit margins. Only Helena's pride in her commission kept me going.

We were having trouble finding transport. We wanted to take the glass to the old harbour using the canal. Some idiot (me) had declared this the best way. No one would hire us a boat, though. After a couple of houts of fruitless begging Petro left me on the jetty, saying I was to keep looking out for a skiff while he approached the harbour staff and mentioned his official position in a casual manner, hoping to get us fixed up with reliable rowers that way.

He was gone so long I reckoned he must have slipped off for breakfast without me. If I was lucky he might bring me back a squashed roll with a sliver of limp cheese and a quarter of an olive. More likely the rascal would saunter back whistling and say nothing. Great. The glass had been unloaded from the Providentia and left on the quay, so I had to stay with it.

I had had enough. I tried to sit on a bollard, but they're never designed to let a backside rest there. While seagulls squawked scornfully I cursed my father to Hades and back, and even muttered about Petronius. I was wasting time here when I had yet to spend a full day back in Rome. Petro's caper with the criminal had robbed Helena and me of a much longed-for first night together in our own bed. Pa, lounging with his boots on a lamp table, had told me that he was 'a bit too busy' to visit Ostia. So he had left me to reclaim his goods, which had already cost me enough trouble, and of which, if I knew him, he would deny Helena her agent's percentage. Assuming the daft girl had even thought of asking for a percentage in the first place.

I was all set to kick the glass into the harbour when Destiny took pity. A couple of men in a sturdy boat actually hailed me and asked if I wanted my goods ferrying. I was delighted, though after six years as an informer, I naturally viewed the offer with caution.

Adopting a suave manner, I made some enquiries. Luckily they had the right answers: they were members of the rowers' guild, and owned their own craft. They looked like lads who knew their business. Their names, which I insisted on knowing, were Gaius and Phlosis. We agreed a price, and they began loading my precious crates, taking all the care I asked for. There were a lot of crates. When they finished, they had to tell me apologetically that the boat could not take me as well. It did seem pretty low in the water.

Time was running out if I was to catch the barge. Gaius and Phlosis seemed so concerned that I might think they were stealing my collateral, I reluctantly, agreed to let them row to Ostia without me while I took one of the regular hired carts. We would meet at the barge; they themselves suggested I didn't pay them until then. This evidence of their honesty clinched the deal.

Tired, and pleased to have sorted myself out without aid from Petro, who could be supercilious about commerce, I was ready to agree to anything sensible. I waved them off.

I was still on the quay, looking around for my friend, when I spotted another skiff. In it I could see Petro, who must have picked up his man Fusculus from somewhere. I waved impatiently. I would now have to explain to the second crew that their services were no longer needed - and if I knew the rules of the Ostian rowers' guild, they would probably demand a disappointment fee.

As I was tapping my toe, Petronius' two rowers suddenly began shouting. Then Petro himself joined in. His boatmen began to row very fast towards Gaius and Phlosis. They tried to speed up. Then, to my amazement, my two handy lads jumped over the side, swam rapidly to the jetty some distance from me, and made off down the quay.

The realisation that I had been caught by a swindle fell on me like a carload of wet sand.

Next moment I was screaming with anxiety over Pa's cargo of glass. Fortunately the inner harbour was sheltered, so there was rarely a swell, and no large ships were manoeuvring at that moment. The abandoned skiff had rocked wildly when Gaius and Phlosis dived over the gunnels, but it had stayed afloat. It was collected by Petronius, who had stepped across from his own boat, then held the two craft close together so that Fusculus could scramble across too. Petronius could row; he brought my goods slowly back to me while his own boatmen raced to shore. Still yelling, they jumped out and ran after Gaius and Phlosis.

I didn't care about those thieves; I just wanted Pa's treasure. Petronius threw a rope to me, while Fusculus shook his head over my narrow escape. 'You were certainly conned there! A lovely example of the craft-rig,' he informed me knowingly.

'Oh yes?'

'They steal a boat, then prowl the wharves looking for a sucker who has just arrived at the harbour and needs some goods transferred somewhere. Luckily our own two honest fellows recognised the boat. It belongs to a friend of theirs, so they knew your heroes must have pinched it'

I did not want to hear the depressing details, but I gave him a hand to jump back to dry land. 'You're the expert on low tricks are you, Fusculus?'

'Fusculus is a fervent scholar of the underworld,' grinned Petro. Thankfully, he was too good a friend to jeer directly at my mistake.

'Balbinus used to run a gang who specialised in this dodge along the wharves by the Emporium,' Fusculus said. 'You'd be surprised, Falco, how easily tired travellers can be taken in.'

'I'm not surprised at all,' I growled.

The two rowers who had exposed the near-disaster came back, having failed to catch my lads. We unloaded half the glass from the first boat, then got hot and fractious transferring it to the second one so we could spread the weight between the two and hitch a ride ourselves. Petronius, Fusculus and I all stuck with the precious cargo right to the barge at Ostia. Not until I had seen every crate transferred did I feel able to relax again.

Exhausted by our adventures, we lay on deck in the autumn sunlight as slowly the barge started to navigate the shoals, creeping up the muddy Tiber into Rome.