He stood above me, swallowing his mead. ‘A wealthy widower, with land and cattle of his own. No other living heirs, so it would all have come to us — especially if he’d managed to get a child by her, though I don’t suppose there was much chance of that. The man is fifty if he is a day.’ (I bridled slightly, being more than that myself, but the farmer seemed oblivious of any possible offence.) He waved his beaker at me. ‘All right, she didn’t like him — I don’t care for him myself, but he only wanted someone to warm his bed and cook and clean for him. He wasn’t particular, he said — it’s cheaper than a slave. If she’d done as she was told she’d have inherited the lot. And he won’t survive much longer — he’s already getting frail. Stupid creature. All she had to do was wait. But would she? Not Morella. She hasn’t got the sense!’ He emptied his beaker, wiped his mouth and glared at me again.
He sounded more belligerent than ever now he’d drunk the mead, and I decided that it was time for us to go. I had learned all that I was likely to in any case, I thought. I finished the water — it wasn’t very nice — and put the cup down on the floor beside my feet.
‘Thank you for your help,’ I said politely as I rose. ‘It has given us something to go on, anyway. If we find your daughter, I will see that you’re informed.’
He made a noise that might have been a ‘Huh!’ but he led the way outside the house again and I followed him, accompanied by Caper and my slave. As we passed the dye-house I saw the woman there, with two young children tugging at her skirts. I gave them a little smile and she returned it timidly, but she saw her husband looking and she turned away again, frantically stirring something in a metal pot above the fire. I thought of my own dear Gwellia, and I could easily have wept.
The dog had stopped barking and was whining now, though it aimed a snapping yowl at me as I passed. The farmer let us through the gate, and without a word closed it after us and turned away again, striding towards the dye-house with a determined air.
We had not gone twenty steps, however, before we heard a cry. Not a child’s sob of protest, as I had vaguely feared, but a roaring bellow. ‘Citizen?’
I whirled round. The farmer was leaning on the gate. ‘I’ve been thinking about what you told us. I suppose the girl is dead?’ He was speaking Latin and I realised that he could have done so all along, though it was likely that his wife was not so fluent. From the way he glanced behind him, I guessed that she was not meant to understand this interchange.
I replied in the same language. ‘We don’t know for certain. We haven’t found the corpse.’ It wasn’t tactful, but it wasn’t meant to be. I hoped that I was right in my surmise about his wife, and that my bluntness would shock some reaction out of him.
It did. ‘You said that she had some money — quite a lot of it, in fact. In her clothing, was it? So you’ve found it, haven’t you? How else would you have known?’
So that was it. I nodded.
‘Well, if Morella’s dead, that money’s mine now, isn’t it? As the father of her family, it ought to come to me.’
Legally, I suppose that he was right, but I could not bring myself to say so. I looked him in the eye. ‘Someone else was wearing that dress when it was found. Someone who had been murdered and horribly butchered. So it may not have been Morella’s money at all. And if there is any doubt, it will be forfeit anyway — the state will claim it, if no owner can be proved.’
I am no expert in the law, but it sounded plausible and clearly the farmer was convinced. I saw the sullen look come down again. ‘You mind you bring it here if it was hers,’ he said. ‘Farathetos my name is. See you remember it. Or by the gods. .’ He said no more, but let the dog loose from its leash again. It was the other side of the enclosure but it barked and growled, and almost looked as if it was about to jump the fence.
‘Home!’ I said to Caper, and he led the way.
Chapter Fifteen
Colaphus was still on duty at the gate when we returned. He looked bored and unwilling but he came out to open up.
I went in, taking Minimus, while Caper set off down the track round the side to report back to Stygius and join the land slaves on the farm.
‘No sign of Aulus?’ I enquired in surprise, as Colaphus shut the gate behind us, and went to retire into his cell again.
He shook his battering-ram head in mock despair. ‘They’ve searched the house and grounds for him, and looked up and down the lane. But nobody has found him, or any trace of him.’ He gave an evil grin. ‘I hope he has a good excuse when he turns up again. His master isn’t very pleased with him, I can tell you, citizen.’
‘This is not like Aulus. I begin to wonder if Lucius is right,’ I began, and then I saw the implication of what Colaphus had said. ‘My patron has returned from Glevum, then?’
He looked up to judge the position of the sun. ‘Came back about an hour ago, I’d calculate,’ he said. ‘Brought the high priest of Jupiter with him. And your son and Mistress Julia. They are all talking in the atrium; I’m told to send you in. But I’m to remind you to perform the special cleansing ritual, since you have been in the presence of a corpse today. You’ll find a bowl of water and a special pot of altar ashes in the servants’ ante-room. You are to rinse your hands and face and mark your forehead before you join the family. This is formally a house of mourning now. Do you require a slave to show you in?’ He made towards the metal gong that hung beside the wall, and would have struck it if I’d not prevented him.
‘I have got Minimus,’ I said, and we went into the house, calling in to the ante-room beside the entranceway to make the required ablutions in honour of the dead. A young slave in a dark black-edged tunic hurried in to us, and handed me a linen towel with which to wipe my hands.
‘Citizen, I put some bread and cheese aside for you a little earlier. I thought you would be glad of it when you came home again. But they’re waiting for you in the atrium. You’d better go there first,’ piped a familiar voice, and I looked again and realised the page was Niveus. I had not recognised him without his scarlet finery, and with dust and ashes rubbed into his hair.
Food would have been welcome since it was well past noon and I had eaten nothing since my yeast cakes earlier, but obviously I would have to wait a little longer. Minimus might be luckier. He was formally directed to the servants’ room to wait, like the slave of any other visitor to the house, just as if he had never worked here in his life. He stumped off disconsolately — his pale blue tunic looking strangely gaudy and inappropriate — but at least, I thought, he would given some refreshment there. I sighed, dipped my finger in the ashes and smeared them on my brow, and — duly purified — followed Niveus into the atrium.
The room was heavy with sacrificial smoke, and it was clear that more offerings had recently been made — this time by the high priest of Jupiter, I guessed, since there was a smell of burning feathers which suggested doves. A pair of oil lamps had been lit on each side of the room — obviously a gesture, since it was broad daylight still — while rose petals and sweet basil were scattered on the ground and a great bowl of sweet-smelling herbs was standing by the door. Servants, all silent and in dark tunics now, were moving furniture, and seemed to be bringing a large stone plinth into the room, while Marcus and Julia, also in dark clothes, were sitting with Lucius on folding stools nearby.
‘Ah, Libertus!’ Marcus offered me his ring. ‘You find us all in mourning — much sooner than I thought. However, my cousin warned me as soon as he arrived that my father was desperately ill, so I had the servant’s tunics dyed in readiness.’ It occurred to me to wonder why Lucius had not made arrangements too. His sparkling white toga, even with its wide aristocratic purple bands, managed to look disrespectful and rather out of place.