There was a silence. Plautus! Could it be? I looked at Marcus and he looked at me: obviously the same thought had occurred to him. He raised an enquiring eyebrow but I tried to signal caution with a quick shake of my head. The fewer people who knew of our suspicions, the better.
Marcus gave me a swift, comprehending nod and raised his hand, preventing the optio from saying anything. ‘Enough of this discussion. We are wasting time. Let’s get moving as soon as possible.’ He turned to Regulus. ‘You march in the front. We’d better find this pig-keeper of yours. I rather think Libertus wants to talk to him.’
Chapter Thirteen
It is an eerie feeling travelling through empty countryside, escorted by half a century of soldiers on the march — eight rows of five abreast. (There are eighty soldiers in a century, of course, despite the name!) There were a dozen mounted outriders as well, hastily co-opted from the nearest marching-camp in case we encountered trouble on the way. The optio, still anxious to give a good impression, took care with posting them: six of them well out in front as scouts, and the other six just as far behind to guard the rear. The cavalrymen from Isca might have helped with the task but following what Marcus had ordained they were simply re-equipped with spears and thus obliged to march.
It was a military operation and an air of businesslike precision reigned. Marcus’s private mounted bodyguard, which had accompanied us all the way from Glevum, was not now deemed sufficient to protect us, so instead of cantering up and down alongside our carriage they were obliged to fall in behind the two domestic carts which carried all Marcus’s serving retinue and other equipment for the trip. There was none of the cheerful jingle of their harness and shouted banter now, and the whole atmosphere was much more tense.
There was only the measured ring of hobnailed sandals on the road, the creak of armour and the groan of carts and an occasional snort from one of the horses. The lack of any human voice was almost sinister: the rhythmic pounding of the feet so perfectly in time that it seemed that the whole column was a single animal. And quite a swiftly moving animal. If you have ever seen a phalanx of advancing Roman troops, you will know that they can move with startling speed. It is said that a legionary can march twenty miles a day fully armed, and with his entire equipment on his back. Our escort were not carrying their packs today, only their fighting weapons and their shields, and although obviously our progress was not as quick as it had been when we were unaccompanied by men on foot, we were still jolting through the countryside at surprising speed.
We passed through the cultivated area which surrounds the town, where a few Roman-style villas could be seen, each with its contributory farm and all much like similar homesteads I was used to further east — except that here the houses were built, not in sheltered places, but on the tops of hills where they were exposed to wind and weather but had commanding views of the countryside about. They were surrounded by high protective walls, and there were similar defensive enclosures round many of the fields. We even saw a small party of slaves, armed with pointed staves and clubs, patrolling the borders of one villa-farm.
As we moved further from the town the substantial dwellings gave way to humbler ones: first Silurian roundhouses in cosy villages and then — as we travelled increasingly through woods — more isolated huts. In one dank clearing by the road we saw a wretched cluster of miserable shacks, where scrawny chickens mixed with scraggy goats and naked children ran about unchecked, while skinny women with suspicious eyes stopped their work and put down their querns and hoes to watch us pass. I thought about the butcher peddling bones and scraps of fly-blown meat — these people were among his customers, no doubt.
The road got hillier and more wooded as we went along, until we reached the outskirts of unbroken forest, stretching in all directions as far as we could see. There we found a wretched hovel, masquerading as a civilian inn. It was little more than a filthy staging-post, where a few flea-bitten horses could be had for hire, but at the sight of Marcus’s insignia on the coach the landlord came bustling out with gifts of cheese and some of the foulest wine I had ever tasted. Nothing would have persuaded me to go inside, but we did consent to water our own animals at his trough and listen to his whining voice complain of how even his mangy steeds had been attacked, and how he kept a dagger ready, just in case.
The forest looked forbidding but the front outriders had scouted on ahead and, having found nothing untoward, had galloped back and were waiting for us at the inn. The optio came back to tell us that — to all appearances at least — the way was clear, and asked for permission to proceed. Marcus gave it with a silent nod and our procession jolted off again, with the riders now formed up close in front of us to afford us extra protection from surprise attack.
Then we were in the forest. It was far more disturbing than the open road. Here the feeble sunshine could not penetrate the trees, and after the heavy rainfall of a day or two before even the military road was dank and treacherous with mud and fallen leaves. We jolted forward into shadowed gloom where grey light filtered only patchily through the tangle of naked branches overhead, and then through a dense, forbidding stand of evergreen, which created a dim green half-light that was even worse. The clanking of our marching passage stilled the winter birds, but there was a wind and the woods were full of rustling movement. It was easy to imagine that each falling leaf or stirring branch was set in motion, not by a freak of breeze, but by some hiding enemy. And there were always wolves and bears to think about.
I was glad of our elaborate escort now. The thought of travelling through these threatening woods without our armed protection was an alarming one. As it was my heart was thumping uncomfortably in my chest, and beside me Marcus began to fidget too, though he did not say anything to me. The purposeful silence of the marching men outside had somehow communicated itself to him, and he had not addressed a word to me for miles.
Of course I could not start to talk to him, unasked, so I turned my attention to the last few days — anything to take my mind off bears and bandits. In any case, something was obscurely troubling me.
I had not killed Lupus, but somebody had done. Up until this morning I had more or less concluded that it was Plautus, however unlikely that appeared. Paulinus, whom I had taken for his spy, had followed me almost to the door, and it had seemed logical that — since I’d clearly recognised his face — Plautus might have wanted to silence me, and anyone I might have spoken to. But now I was wondering if I was right.
If the swineherd with the scarred face was really Plautus in disguise, as seemed highly probable, then — according to what Regulus had said — he had been in this forest all night with his pigs. In that case he could hardly have killed Lupus after dark, much less followed me around the town. The civitas was simply much too far away. Nor could he have done it and walked here overnight. Apart from all the normal dangers of night-time travel, the town gates were always closed at dusk and anyone going through them after that would be noted by the guard, yet we knew that no one of Plautus’s description had been seen to leave — the optio had made particular enquiries on the point.