Priscus's gaze met his own. "You sound a little dissatisfied, Doctor."
"It's none of my business."
"But are you suggesting the officer in charge could have done more?"
Ruso was not going to be led into criticizing the second spear. "He couldn't find any witnesses," he said. "What more could he do?"
"What indeed?" Priscus made a note. "So, the name will appear in the mortuary list instead of the discharge log."
"Exactly," said Ruso, with more confidence than he felt.
"Excellent. So there only remains the female with the broken arm. I am sorry to trouble you with all this, Doctor, but the discharge log has no record of her either, and without the proper records for civilians we are unable to bill the correct fees."
"Are you?" Ruso scratched his ear and wondered whether that should be, aren't you?
He looked the man in the eye. "All this will be very much easier when I have a scribe who knows how the system works, Priscus."
The smile reappeared. "I'm sure it will, Doctor. I'm sure it will."
On his way back to the surgery Ruso walked past the entrance to the linen closet. A carpenter was sweeping up wood shavings. The door had been mended.
17
The lamplight picked out the white sling resting on top of the gray army blanket. Beneath it, the girl lay asleep on Ruso's borrowed bed. He watched the sling lift softly with each breath. Four days ago, this sight had been cause for celebration. Now it was cause for concern. By now she should either have died or perked up. Instead, apart from the brief revival sparked by his attempt to chop her hair off and the smile wheedled out of her by Valens's bedside charm, the girl had shown little interest in anything. Not even her own recovery.
He had not been entirely sorry to see Valens proved wrong about the comb ("Ruso, all women are interested in their hair!"), but his own tactics had been no more successful. His inquiries about native cuisine had reassured him that she would be no stranger to gruel. Yet despite his carefully prescribed convalescent diet-following which his notes recorded disappointingly scant use of the bedside bucket-the girl was recovering neither strength nor spirit. Nor was she putting on weight. Ruso frowned. Tomorrow, he would repeat the worm treatment. Tonight, he had other things to think about.
He leaned back, relishing the familiar creak of his favorite chair as the front two legs lifted off the ground. He banished a fleeting regret. Claudia would never find out that he had now been sitting on this chair exactly how he liked for the past two years, and he still hadn't broken it.
He stared at the box he had just collected from the porter's desk at the hospital, trying to guess what might be inside. Figs? Olives? Not peaches. Peaches would still be in season, but they wouldn't travel. If he'd had any money, he would have paid well for the simple pleasure of a tray of peaches. To feel the flesh pop between his teeth
… the rich flavor flood onto his tongue… the sticky juice run down his chin…
He cleared his throat and reminded himself that if he had been born this far north he would never have tasted a peach. A peach was one of those things he didn't need.
What else would he find? A letter. There would definitely be a letter. And some gloves. His sister-in-law had promised gloves for the British winter, and his nieces a picture for him to hang on his wall. Since his nieces were only four and five, that should be interesting.
He expected nothing from his stepmother, a woman whose interests were restricted to personal grooming and home improvements, about which she knew everything except how they were paid for. Publius dealt with all that, dear. Nor was he expecting a greeting from either of his half sisters, since he was not in a position to buy them anything they were likely to want.
Ruso had already missed his father's funeral when the news of the death came. The sea passage from Africa was a tricky one and it had taken him almost a month by ship via Athens, Syracuse, Ostia… Under different circumstances, it would have been an interesting sight-seeing cruise. As it was, by the time he reached Gaul, Lucius had started to unravel their father's affairs-or, more accurately, their father's affairs had begun to unravel around him.
According to their stepmother, Publius had "investments." The family had always assumed these investments were funding the very grand-and currently half-built-shrine to Diana the Huntress, which Publius had commissioned for the center of the town. "Investments," however, turned out to mean "loans." Examining the documents stored in the trunk to which he had kept the only key, Publius Petreius's sons soon discovered that everything their father did had been done on an elaborate system of credit.
Initially the brothers tried to keep their dreadful discovery secret while they quietly shored up the loans. But they found themselves in the position of the children Ruso had seen playing on a British beach on the day he arrived, building dams against the incoming tide: Every time they secured one area, chaos broke out in another.
Valens's letter telling him about the vacancy with the Twentieth at Deva had come as a gift from the gods. It was all arranged by post with surprising speed. Using the excuse of the move, Ruso sent instructions to have all his surplus belongings sold. A suitable buyer was found for both his housekeeper and his valet. When the deals were complete Ruso withdrew as much money from his account as the army would allow (they insisted on keeping enough to bury him, just in case) and used it to pay off one of the few creditors who genuinely needed the money.
While he was making these arrangements Lucius paid all the small-but-irritating debts. Then the brothers visited each of the large creditors individually, pointing out that slow payment was better than no payment, that the farm would produce a steady income, and that Ruso was earning a good salary. If they wanted their money back they must keep quiet, keep faith and keep funding the building of the shrine to Diana, which the brothers were obliged to finish as it was their father's dying wish.
This last was a lie. The truth was that six different lenders thought they were funding the building of a shrine, when in fact most of them had been funding personal grooming and home improvements. No wonder Publius Petreius's heart had given out under the strain. Within days of his return home, Ruso was glad he had missed the funeral. His grief was frozen beneath a hard layer of anger.
He clunked the chair back onto all four legs, cracked the seal on the box, and prized it open with his knife.
Over on the bed, the girl stirred, sighed, and settled back into sleep.
Ruso groped in the rustling straw. His fingers closed over a jar. He drew it out. OUR OLIVES was chalked on the side in Lucius's hand.
The next find was a rolled piece of white fabric showing a smeared charcoal sketch. It was a wobbly oval topped with a pile of sticks-or perhaps a range of mountains, or a storm at sea. The center of the oval contained an arrangement of blobs and in one corner of the fabric were two outlines of small hands. Ruso turned the picture to several different angles and could make no sense of any of them.
Next out: a pair of thick brown lambskin gloves. He brushed the straw off them and slid his right hand into the soft embrace of the fleece. Cassia had measured well.
Finally, the expected letter. Despite being sealed into the box, the writing tablet had also been closed and sealed individually.
"Greetings, brother," announced black letters so closely crammed onto the thin wood that Ruso had to lean toward the lamp to make them out. "I hope this finds you well. Cassia and the children send their good wishes and our stepmother… " Ruso ran his forefinger hastily along the formalities and slowed down for, "On the subject which concerns us all, you will be pleased to hear that there are no further adverse developments." So, no more debts had come crawling out from dark corners. "The girls have drawn a picture of you, which I trust you will enjoy." That was him? Heavens. He must get his hair cut. "The harvest has been as good as we hoped," continued the letter, "and you will be as delighted as I am to know that Cassia is expecting another child in the spring."