“I am the investigating officer,” I said, addressing the man with the white band. “I need to speak with the prisoners.”
“We were told you are to have access,” the decurion said. He turned to the man next to him. “Silva, run the ladder down for the captain.”
“While I confer with them, I’d appreciate it if you and your men would step back from the edge here. I need to speak in private.”
He shook his head. “Not a chance, sir. If one of them contrives to commit suicide, one of us takes his place. If they harm you, we all go in there. Just keep your voice down and we promise not to eavesdrop.”
I went down the ladder and Burrus jumped up to greet me. The rest sat disconsolately on the muddy ground, their anklerings fastened to a single chain like a slave work gang. Men in their predicament could be forgiven for a lack of enthusiasm.
“Patron!” Burrus said. “What is happening? The guards are forbidden to speak to us.”
“First off, I’ve been assigned to investigate the murder of Vinius.”
He turned to the others. “You see? I told you my patron would get us out of this. He is famous for rooting out traitors and murderers. We are as good as free!”
I was touched by his faith in me, although I feared it might be exaggerated. I looked at the rest of the contubernium and they seemed to share my skepticism. Quadratus gave me a sour smile and nod. The rest looked me over warily. They were typical soldiers, most of them older than Burrus, a couple of them silver-stubbled veterans. It was the sort of balance considered ideal in the legions, with the veterans providing steadiness and the recruits the youthful boldness necessary to aggressive operations. A unit made up entirely of veterans is likely to be too cautious; one of recruits too reckless and easily panicked in adversity. It was a combination that had won us an empire.
“I am the only man in Gaul who can save you,” I told them bluntly. “I do not believe that you killed Titus Vinius, but even I must acknowledge that you look as guilty as Oedipus.”
“Who’s Oedipus?” one of them asked.
“He was that Greek who put it to his mother,” said a veteran.
“Well,” said another, “that’s Greeks for you. What do you expect?”
We were getting off the subject and I made a mental vow to avoid metaphors. “Listen here. If I am to prove that you men did not kill Vinius, I need to know everything you know about him. You don’t need to tell me how vicious he was, I know all about that. But did he have, let us say, extralegionary dealings?”
“What senior centurion doesn’t?” Quadratus said. “Naturally, he was dealing with the local merchants and suppliers. The First Spear and the Prefect of the Camp always live in each other’s purses. It’s always been that way with the legions.”
“I’m looking for something more serious than the usual, petty institutionalized corruption. How was Vinius making himself rich?”
A veteran scratched his chin. “I never knew that Vinius was any richer than other men of his rank. We paid him what we could to get out of shit fatigues and punishments, but that’s not going to make anyone rich. We used to figure most of his bribes went to buy him new vinestocks.” At this the others laughed, showing a commendable resiliency of spirit.
“I’ve learned something about Vinius,” I said, lowering my voice, “and I want you to keep this among yourselves.”
Quadratus gestured toward the surrounding guards. “You think we’re going to blab it all over camp?”
“In the last year,” I continued, “Titus Vinius was investing heavily in estates in Italy. He spent or pledged in excess of a million denarii and I am curious as to just how he came by such a sum.”
“It’s news to me,” Quadratus said. The others looked similarly dumbfounded. “Of course, he didn’t consult with us about his financial dealings.”
“I’ll wager that he didn’t confide in anybody,” I said. “Not in this legion, at any rate. That’s why I want to know what he was doing outside the legion. Molon tells me that he was on at least one or two embassies to the Gauls and Germans.”
“Watch out what that ugly bugger tells you,” said one of the older men. “A slave will never tell the truth when he can get away with a lie. But that much is true. Vinius went out just about every time the Proconsul here had to treat with the barbarians. He was in charge of the honor guard and the First Spear’s advice was always sought in military matters. It’s custom.”
“Did Vinius ever consult with the Gauls or the Germans here?”
At that they all laughed. “Barbarians in this camp? Not likely, except for those praetorian auxilia.”
This was getting like those dreams I sometimes had, where I was always running through the strangely deserted streets of Rome, trying to get home or to the Forum, and somehow never making it there, instead running into a succession of blind alleys.
“All right, then, tell me about what you were doing the night he was killed.”
“Quadratus and I were on the same station on the north wall where you found us before,” Burrus said. “We always had the same guard posts on our duty nights, which, as you know, was every night recently.” He named the other six by pairs. He and Quadratus had manned the easternmost post, and the rest had the three successive posts to the west.
“When did you last see him?” I asked.
“At evening parade before guard mount,” Burrus told me. “He was on the reviewing stand with the legatus, like most evenings.”
“Caesar wasn’t there?”
“The Proconsul usually appears only at formal parades,” said a veteran. “Often as not, morning and evening parades are reviewed by a tribune.”
“You didn’t see him on the wall that night?”
“We rarely do,” Quadratus said. “Why work your way up to senior centurion if you’re just going to tramp around the wall all night like a common boot?”
“Spoken like a true career soldier,” I told him. “He was found dressed in a coarse, dark-colored tunic, like a slave’s. Did any of you ever see him dressed like that?”
They looked at one another with embarrassed expressions, an odd sight on such hard-bitten countenances.
“Well, sir,” a veteran began, “we all knew that Vinius and that German woman got up to some pretty strange games, but they kept it behind the tent flap. He never let anyone see him looking like anything but a centurion.”
“Dressed like that, in public,” Quadratus elaborated, “well, he’d’ve been a laughingstock, worse than when you showed up in that full-dress rig.” They all had a good chuckle at my expense. “He would’ve lost respect, and a centurion can’t afford that. A First Spear least of all.”
“He was killed a few hundred yards from where you were standing guard,” I said. “Did you hear anything?”
“Just the barbarians raising their usual racket,” Burrus said. “Just like that night you were guard officer. They could’ve slaughtered a dozen Romans out there and we probably wouldn’t have noticed. On top of that, we were all half dead from lack of sleep.”
“That’s one thing being shut up here is good for,” Quadratus commented. “Mud and all, last night was the first decent sleep we’ve had in weeks.”
I looked up. There was nothing above the tent except the cloud-scattered blue sky. “I’ll see if I can persuade Labienus to put an awning over this hole.”
“It’s not too bad as it is,” said one of the veterans. “Not like it was Libya.”
I left them with further assurances that I would extricate them from what looked like certain doom. The younger men seemed eager to believe me. The rest had long ago learned the folly of expecting anything except the worst.