The more I turned it over in my head the more tangled the problem became, and the more the danger seemed to grow, until I began to wonder if Bethesda was safe where I had left her. Having no idea where the threat came from, how could I protect her against it? I pushed the doubt from my mind and stared at the road ahead. Fear was useless. Only the truth could bring me safety.
At the second crossing of the Tiber I stopped for a while beneath the shade of a massive oak beside the riverbank. While I rested, a grey-haired farmer and three overseers came riding down from the north with a train of thirty slaves in tow. The farmer and two of his men dismounted and sat cross-legged in the shade, while the third led the slaves, who were chained neck to neck, down to the river to drink. The farmer and his men kept to themselves. After a few suspicious glances they ignored me completely. From overhearing bits of his conversation I gathered he was a Narnian who had recendy come into a property near Falerii; the slaves were being led to reinforce the workers there.
I took a bite of bread and sipped at my wineskin and gently waved aside a bee that circled my head. The slaves lined up at the riverbank and dropped to their knees, splashing the dust from their faces and bending down to drink like animals. Most were middle-aged; a few were older, some much younger. All of them wore a sort of sandal for protection, a scrap of leather strapped to each foot. Otherwise they were naked, except for two or three who wore a thin rag tied about the waist. Many had fresh scars and welts across their buttocks and backs. Even the sturdiest among them looked haggard and unhealthy. The youngest, or at least the smallest, was a thin, naked boy at the end of the train. He sobbed continually and kept muttering incoherently about his hand, which he held in the air at a crooked angle. The overseer shouted at him, stamped his foot, and finally snapped his whip, but the boy would not stop complaining.
I finished my bread, drank a mouthful of wine, and leaned back against the tree. I tried to rest, but the constant whimpering of the slave punctuated by the slashing of the whip set my nerves on edge. To a rich farmer, slaves are cheaper than cattle. When they die they are effortlessly replaced; the influx of slaves into Rome is endless, like crashing waves upon a beach. I mounted Vespa and rode on.
The day grew hotter and hotter. Throughout the afternoon I saw hardly another person. The fields had been abandoned until a cooler hour, and the road was empty; I might have been the only traveller in the world. By the time I reached Narnia the fields began to stir again and the traffic slowly increased. Narnia itself is a busy market town. Gravestones and small temples line its outer streets. At the centre I came upon a wide square shaded by trees and ringed by shops and animal pens. The sweet smell of straw and the strong odours of oxen, cows, and sheep were heavy in the heated air.
There was a small tavern at one corner of the square. Set into the open wooden door was a clay tile that showed a young shepherd with a lamb slung over his shoulders; a wooden sign above the lintel bade welcome to the Bleating Lamb. The place was dim and gloomy within, but cool. The only other customer was an emaciated old man who sat at a table in the corner, staring rigidly at nothing. My host was an enormously fat Etruscan with dark yellow teeth; he was so huge he almost filled the tiny room. He was happy to bring me a cup of the local wine.
'How far to Ameria?' I asked him.
He shrugged. 'How fresh is your horse?'
I looked about and caught my reflection in a plated ewer on the counter. My face was red and sweaty, my hair tangled and powdered with dust. 'No fresher than I am.'
He shrugged again. 'An hour if you pressed it. Longer if you care to keep the animal's heart from bursting. Where have you come from?'
'Rome.' The word was out before I could call it back. All day I had been reminding myself of the dangers of the countryside, yet a few moments inside a quaint tavern had already loosened my lips.
'Rome? All this way in a single day? You must have had an early start. Have another cup. Don't worry, I'll cut it with plenty of water. Rome, you say. I have a son there, or used to. Fought for Sulla in the wars. Supposed to get a piece of land out of it. Maybe he did. I haven't had a word from him in months. All this way since this morning? You have family in Ameria?'
It is easier to trust a fat face than a gaunt one. Treachery shows itself like a scar on a haggard face but hides well behind a plump, infantile blandness. But the eyes do not lie, and his were completely without guile. My host was merely curious, talkative, bored.
'No,' I said. 'Not family. Business.'
'Ah. It must be important for you to ride so long and so hard’
Guileless or not, I decided to trust him with no more of the truth than I had to. 'My patron is an impatient man,' I said. 'As impatient as he is rich. There's a parcel of farmland up near Anieria in which he's taken an interest. I've come to check it out for him.'
'Ah, happens all the time these days. When I was a boy it was all small farmers hereabout, local people who passed their land from father to son. Now strangers come up from Rome, buying it all up. Nobody knows who owns half the land any more. Never your neighbours; instead it's some rich man down in Rome who comes up twice a year to play farmer.' He laughed, then his face darkened. 'And the larger the farms the more slaves they bring in. They used to march them right through the square here, or cart them through in wagons, until we put a stop to that and routed them off the main way. It doesn't do for men in chains to come through here and get a sniff of freedom. Too many unhappy slaves about make a man like me uneasy.'
Still staring at nothing, the old man in the corner banged his cup against the table. The taverner waddled across the room. The least exertion made him wheeze and gasp for air.
'So you worry about runaway slaves?' I said.
'Things happen. Oh, not so much in the town, but I have a sister who married a farmer up north. Lives in the middle of nowhere. Of course they have their own household slaves and a few freedmen for protection. Even so, only a fool would leave his doors unlocked at night. I tell you, one of these days it's going to be more than just two or three runaway slaves. Imagine if it were twenty — or a hundred, and some of them professional killers. There's an estate not thirty miles up the way where they send slaves to be trained as gladiators. Imagine a hundred of those beasts escaped from their cages with nothing to lose.'
'Ah, you're a fool!' barked the old man. He raised his cup and emptied it in a single draught. The red wine spilled from the corners of his grey mouth and dribbled down his grizzled neck. He slammed the cup down and stared rigidly ahead. 'Fool!' he said again. 'Nothing to lose, you say? They'd be crucified and disembowelled! Do you think Sulla and the Senate would let a hundred gladiators go about killing landholders and raping their wives? Even a slave doesn't want to have his hands nailed to a tree. Don't worry, misery won't object so long as there's plenty of fear to keep it in line.'
The old man thrust out his chin and made a ghastly smile. I finally realized he was blind.
'Of course, Father.' The fat Etruscan simpered and made a bow that the old man could not possibly have seen.
I leaned forwards and turned the cup in my hand. 'Afraid of the slaves or not, sometimes it seems a man is not safe even in his own household. A father may not be safe even from his son. Only water this time.' I held up my cup. The taverner bustled over.
'Whatever do you mean?' His hands were unsteady as he poured from the jug. He glanced uneasily over his shoulder at the old man.
'I was only thinking of some gossip I heard yesterday in Rome. I mentioned my trip to some of my associates in the Forum and asked if they happened to know anything about Ameria. Well, most of them had never heard of it.'