Junio was led off to the slaves’ waiting room, where doubtless he would win himself a few quadrantes playing at dice with the others. My servant has an innocent face and an uncanny talent for gambling. I don’t know how he contrives it, but the fall of tile and dice seem to favour him much more than chance alone allows. I left him to make his fortune while I was taken to the gatekeeper.
I found the man in one of the cell-like rooms which were reserved as sleeping spaces for the servants. He was a large, brawny man with huge hands and even bigger feet — as befits a gatekeeper. I had seen him before at Corinium, and I smiled encouragingly, but if he felt any pleasure at seeing me he was quick to disguise it.
‘Oh, you’ve come at last, have you?’ he grumbled. ‘They said you were sent for. Why, is what I want to know. I’ve told them everything I can, a dozen times over.’
‘And what exactly could you tell them?’ I said affably, squatting beside him on the bundle of reeds which was provided as a bed. The room was small, but otherwise it was no more humble than my own.
He looked at me savagely for a moment, then fetched a great sigh. ‘Oh, very well. If I must go through it all again, I suppose I must. He came to the house early this morning. I hadn’t seen him before that I remember. He brought a parcel of silk and some bracelets, and said they were a gift for Julia Delicta, on the occasion of her marriage. Then he left. I paid no great attention to his face. That is all I know.’ He produced it all in the fashion of a recitation.
‘I see.’ I thought about this for a moment. ‘How early did he come?’
He frowned. ‘I don’t know. Do you think I am a councillor to have water-candles by me? Very early. The sun was hardly risen in the sky and I could hear the schoolmaster scolding in his pupils.’
‘And it did not surprise you that he brought a gift?’
The man shrugged. ‘I suppose a little, since he was a stranger to me. But there have been gifts arriving ever since Delicta arrived home from the forum yesterday.’
Of course, once the marriage was solemnised it was no secret. ‘No doubt the witnesses had spread the news,’ I said.
For the first time the gateman almost smiled. ‘More than that,’ he said. ‘The old auspex was delighted by being asked to perform the ceremony — he must have told half the town. And since it was Marcus that she married, everyone was anxious to come and make a gift — and be seen to do it.’ He paused. ‘I suppose that is why I remembered the man. There was nothing with the gift to say who the giver was.’
‘Did you ask him?’
The man grimaced. ‘I did. He said it was from an old friend of Marcus’s. I could hardly argue. I know who calls on my mistress, but His Excellence has a dozen friends in Corinium that I have never seen.’
It was hard to argue with that. I changed the subject. ‘So what made you suspicious of the man?’
He shrugged. ‘I would not have suspected him at all, if there had not been this stabbing of slaves from our household in the town. Of course, when I heard of that, I began to wonder about the stranger who had called. But truly, citizen, I can remember nothing else. He was wearing a dark cape and hood, but I thought nothing of that. It had been raining and the man was very wet. He came to the gate and asked to be presented to Delicta. I had to tell him that she was in the town.’
‘Surely the shops were barely open?’
That brought a reluctant smile to his face. ‘Delicta is a wealthy woman, citizen. The shops would open for her.’
I nodded. Delicta was unusual in doing her own shopping. Wealthy Roman women are not like Celts, they prefer to send their husbands or their slaves, even for cloth and jewels. But Julia Delicta was accustomed to having her own way. No doubt the shopkeepers of Corinium would hurry bleary-eyed down the stairs at midnight to open their shuttered stalls if they had found her on their doorsteps. I said, ‘So the caller left the parcel. Did you get a look at him?’
‘Youngish, and dark, and he had a strange, clipped sort of accent — or at least he seemed to have. I have wondered since if he adopted it on purpose. He had a fine horse, I remember.’
I nodded. That at least was new information.
He said, after a short pause, ‘My mistress thinks there was a company of thieves in the town. It has happened once before. Men calling with messages when the house-owners were out and — when they were admitted to wait — sending the slaves away on fruitless errands while they looked around for something to steal. Nothing large, of course, only a golden statue or two, which they would hide under their clothes, and walk out later as calmly as you please. The thefts were not noticed until afterwards.’
‘That hardly seems the case in this matter.’
‘Fortunately for me, since it would have been on my head if I had let him in. But there are always other thieves, attacking helpless people in the street and stripping them of their purses — as I hear they stripped you, citizen.’
I could hardly deny this, but he said it with a grin which was almost insolent. I did not care for the turn the conversation was taking, and having learned — as I supposed — all there was to learn, I took my leave of him and returned to Marcus.
My patron had a string of clientes waiting for his attention by this time, but he had lingered to speak to me.
‘So, my brave pavement-maker, did you learn anything new?’
‘No real facts, Excellence, since that is what you required.’
‘Well, I have facts for you. You heard that my poor herald’s body has been found?’
I nodded. ‘Junio told me so.’
Marcus sighed. ‘I have had him collected. It is vexatious. Worse than I thought. Deliberately insulting. Not only did Felix have him tied to a stake for the birds to pick at, as if he were a common criminal, he also had a notice nailed up above him: “Here is a nameless, insolent slave who insulted the great Perennis Felix.” Who did Felix think he was? A Roman governor?’
I made a sympathetic noise. I knew what he was referring to. Some senior magistrates and provincial governors routinely labelled criminals in this way before their executions, and sometimes made them parade the streets wearing their placards of indictment, as a humiliation to them and a warning to the rest of the populace. I have known Marcus himself have a notice nailed over a crucified criminal, but Marcus was a senior magistrate. Felix had had no such authority.
‘Insulted the great Perennis Felix, indeed!’ Marcus fumed. ‘It is I who am insulted, if anyone.’
It passed through my mind that perhaps the herald himself had a certain claim to having been insulted, but naturally that was not a thought that I could voice. I said, ‘But you have had the body moved, Excellence?’
‘Of course. We cannot have his spirit unquiet and haunting the town. I intend to have him disposed of decently. But therein lies the problem, old friend. I should have had them bring him here, to be properly bathed and anointed, since this is where he lived and worked, but I am in official mourning for Felix. It would be disrespectful to host another funeral, especially of someone whom Felix himself put to death.’
‘But surely, Excellence,’ I ventured, ‘the slaves’ guild would bury him? I know you normally make provision for your slaves, like a thoughtful master, but in the circumstances surely you could have them cremate him? It would be all over before Felix’s funeral. They could do it at once. He was only a herald. There is no need for a mourning period.’
‘There will be no problem with that,’ Marcus said. ‘The herald is a guild member — I have always paid his dues. I have done it for all my servants. I never can be certain that I will not be recalled to Rome and be unable to provide a proper funeral when they die. No.’ He furrowed his brow. ‘The difficulty is where to take the body now.’ He looked at me speculatively.