The turnip-seller looked reproachfully at me. ‘Anything is better than being picked up in a cart and flung into a pit with no rites performed at all. Call his name, pavement-maker. It falls to you, if anyone. It should be done by the senior person in the house. Well, you’re the senior here. I am just a freeman, and you’re a citizen. Besides, this is your workshop, and it will be you he haunts if you don’t do it right.’
Perhaps it was this last thought that made up my mind for me. I am not an adherent of Roman rites myself — I make the required sacrifices on holy days, of course, to Jupiter and the pantheon, and the Emperor as well (it is never wise to alienate a deity, just in case), but I am more inclined to venerate the older gods of tree and stone. However, I have witnessed the ritual enough to know what I should do.
The window space was already open — as the rite demands — so I took a deep breath and stood beside the corpse and cried in a loud voice, ‘Lucius!’ It occurred to me that I didn’t know if he had another name, so I added ‘The pie-seller’ to be doubly sure. There was — mercifully — no answer, so I repeated it twice more.
‘There now, citizen. We have done all we could,’ the turnip-vendor said in a prosaic tone, though I noticed that he’d flattened himself against the wall as I called on Lucius’s name — presumably lest he should impede the spirit’s path. Now, though, he was smiling cheerfully. ‘You go and get the embers and I’ll stand watch outside.’
I picked up an oil lamp and a copper bowl. ‘I will go to the tanner’s and see if they will let me light the lamp, as well as have some embers to start the fire again. Then we can set some tapers round the corpse. Besides, I can ask the tanner some questions while I’m there, in case he noticed anything unusual this afternoon. I’ve already asked the candle-maker on the other side.’ The tanner might be less churlish with his answer too, I thought.
Radixrapum nodded. ‘It would be a good idea. When I was here before, I saw someone with a donkey at the tanner’s gate, unloading hides. They might have noticed if anyone else was in the street.’
‘I’ll ask them,’ I agreed, though I would scarcely have much time for questioning if I wanted to reach the pie-house before the soldiers came. I turned to Radixrapum to say as much to him, but he was already on his way outside and there was nothing for me to do but follow him.
Four
The tanner was a small, squat, swarthy man, with bandy legs and eyes that were noticeably crossed. His face was lined and so raddled with the fumes that it had become the colour of his hides, and he rejoiced in the possession of a single tooth. It was impossible to guess what sort of age he was — he looked fully fifty or sixty years of age, but he had looked much the same when I first moved into the shop and that was now some fifteen years ago. Perhaps his tanning had preserved him too.
I could see him through the open gate as I pulled the rope to ring the bell. He was arranging finished skins into a pile and selecting the best ones to hang up on display in a dingy little area which served as a front court. He came towards me, grinning — if, with one tooth, it could be called a grin.
We knew each other slightly. In the days when, like him, I had lived above the shop, he had called round several times seeking an arrangement to collect my urine pots, so he could mix the contents with various leaves and herbs for a concoction which helped loosen the hair from stubborn hides. However, I already had a contract with the fullers-shop nearby, and nothing came of it. This was the first time that I had called on him.
He was still baring his gums at me, in what was obviously intended to be a friendly smile. ‘Citizen Libertus.’ His voice was mumbling and cracked, though I have heard him raise it in anger many times when one of his workers’ efforts failed to please. ‘To what do we owe the honour of a visit? Do you wish to purchase hides? Or a piece of goatskin — I’ve got some nice ones here. For a blanket, or a pair of shoes for your good wife, perhaps?’ He gestured to the hides that he’d been stacking earlier.
I was tempted to tell him the whole story but rejected the idea. Unlike the turnip-seller, my neighbour loved to talk, and I knew he had dealings with the wealthy in the town, including the customer for the Apollo piece. I thought of asking if I could borrow a handcart for an hour but rejected that as well — he would be bound to ask questions as to why I wanted it. So I simply shook my head and jerked my chin towards the oil lamp and the bowl. ‘I am not bringing business, neighbour, I’m afraid. I come requesting coals. A flame for the oil lamp and some glowing embers to get the fire alight. There’s nothing in the workshop that I can light them with.’
He focused both eyes vaguely on my face. ‘Not even your Vestal flame alight? And you a Roman citizen?’ he said.
It was true that there was a little altar-niche on my premises, dedicated to the goddess of the hearth — no doubt he had seen it when he came to call — but it dated from the time the little shop was built, in the previous owner’s time. Even when the upper storey had been a sleeping space, I never lit a sacrificial flame on it except on occasions like public holy days or the feast day of the Emperor, when such observances were generally required.
I had made no answer, and he took that as assent. ‘That was careless, neighbour.’ He raised his thinning eyebrows in a knowing arch. ‘Too busy talking to that fine customer of yours? I saw the expensive-looking litter at your door. And wasn’t it the chief decurion getting out of it? I sold him an ox-skin once. I hope he gave you a nice contract and made it all worthwhile?’
‘I lost the work, in fact.’
He made a little grimace of sympathy. ‘I’m sorry to hear that, citizen. Someone came in with a lower estimate, I suppose. They’re all the same, these very wealthy men. Quibble about a quadrans with the likes of us, then spend a fortune on public works and games to woo the populace, especially when they want to win a vote. Like that Gaius Greybeard or whatever he is called, who’s been trying unsuccessfully to get an ordo seat for years, putting up that fountain at the crossroads recently. And your decurion’s the same — promised new hangings for the ordo room, they say, simply to impress the other councillors. Put extra on the taxes, I shouldn’t be surprised, so we shall pay for it.’
I muttered something indeterminate. The tanner loved to gossip and was enjoying this, but I did not wish to be lured into something indiscreet, which might reach the ears of Quintus Severus later on. I tried to change the subject, hoping that I might learn something about Minimus’s fate. ‘You didn’t see anyone else outside my shop, I suppose, talking to my slave this afternoon?’
He shook his head at me. ‘Too busy looking after my own affairs. But if it was a time-waster, I more than sympathize. I had just the same thing happen earlier today. Fellow came in here and asked to look at hides, and when I’d spent half an hour showing off my wares, he suddenly decided it was all too dear. Though judging by the jewelled cloak-clasp that he wore, he could have afforded anything I had.’
I listened with appropriate noises of concern, but inwardly I was impatient to get my embers and be off. I was about to offer money, but all at once he said, ‘Well, we humble tradesmen had better stick together, hadn’t we? You come this way and we’ll see what we can do. You’ll have to come right through to the workshop, I’m afraid.’
He led the way along the narrow path beside the house, to the large rear courtyard where hides which had been preliminarily soaked were hung out on racks to dry. ‘Come in to the tannage room and get the coals. You’ve timed it very well. I’m boiling up a batch of tanning agent now — alder bark and acorn cups with alum in the blend — the fire’s very hot. Mind that horse hide, it’s still full of stripping mix.’
I stepped back in time to miss the skin that he had gestured to, which was hanging dripping on a rack. It still looked disturbingly and recognizably like a horse, and as I looked about I could identify several sheep- and ox-skins drying off, and there was a group of smaller pelts as well, which I could not identify. The smell was terrible.