Black eyes flashed sideways. 'Eef you grow garlick beside rosses, eet enhances their scent. The rosses, of course. Not the garlick.'
'Why white wine and not red?'
'And eef you grow mint underneath, you will not see a single greenfly all season? Ah, but look. My gracious hostess iss beckoning me.'
Strange, but Claudia hadn't seen Marcia snap her manicured fingers. But off he oiled, Semir and his beads and his bangles, leaving her alone with Piso, who, praise be to Juno, had fallen into a snorting, open-mouthed sleep.
'My dear, you mustn't be alone at a party, I absolutely forbid it.' Stella's hand reached across the divide. 'Come and join us. There's just Marcus and I on this couch, and — ' She leaned over and whispered — 'he's divorced, you know.'
Claudia smiled prettily at Orbilio. 'I'm not surprised.'
'I think you're missing the point, dear,' Stella continued under her breath. 'I mean, here's you. A widow… young… pretty. And here's Marcus!'
'I'm not his type, Stella. He likes girls with big chests and small drawers, don't you, Marcus, and, besides, we're just about to move round for the pears stewed in wine and the almond-stuffed dates that Marcia tells me comprise her dessert course.'
She fluttered her fingers, but Fortune, the bitch, had it in for her. (Dammit, that was the last time she'd leave that goddess a bracelet!)
'Glad you could join me, after all,' a rich baritone murmured, as the usher escorted her to her new seat. Orbilio's eyes danced as he raised his glass in a toast. 'Did you find what you were looking for, by the way?'
'Yes, I did, as a matter of fact.'
'I knew the lock on my satchel wouldn't deter you.'
'Lock? Satchel? Orbilio, what on earth are you wittering about?' The lock was no problem, it was his notes written in Greek that she'd had trouble with. 'I thought we were talking about seating plans? And, dear me, if that isn't the couch I was looking for. That one over there by the fountain.'
Sweeping over, she leaned down and hissed in the occupant's ear that this was her bloody seat and would he kindly sod off, she was sitting here for dessert and that was final. Too late, she realized who the occupant was. Under the floral crown that each diner wore, she hadn't noticed that the hair was long, or that it was neither red nor brown, but some point in between, like the colour of a kestrel's flight feathers.
'Well, well. Claudia Seferius,' drawled the most powerful Gaul in Aquitaine. 'If we're not back on your favourite subject of hospitality.'
Eleven
In Rome, the lull between harvest and vintage was filled by sixteen days of Games featuring feasts and processions, horse races and athletics, theatrical productions and gladiatorial combat. Unfortunately for the Gauls, there was no such lull in their farming calendar. The instant the harvest was home, it was time to pick apples, pasture out the swine among the oakwoods and crop this year's yield of horse beans. Stone slabs from the quarries still needed to be brought in by river and piled along the quay, ditto timbers, and, since there was nothing to compare to Gaulish leather when it came to army tents, stock breeders busily prepared their hides for export as well. There was a sense of urgency about the work, too, because in less than a month the seas would be closed until spring. Shipments had to be despatched for fear of storms sweeping in from the ocean and upsetting an already precarious sailing schedule, so for the people of Santonum it was more important than ever that the Hammer God should be appeased.
A vulnerability the wily Emperor seized upon by playing up the Vulcanalia and declaring two days of markets and fairs followed by a public holiday funded entirely by the state!
It didn't matter that Vulcan was nothing like the Gaulish Hammer God. History proved that local customs were quickly absorbed into Roman religion, it was a simple matter of building marble temples in place of wooden shrines then endowing them with glorious statues. A generation on, who remembered that the local deity had been cast in Minerva's image? Or that their sun god bore a striking resemblance to Apollo? Gradually, the differences would blur and in Santonum Vulcan the Olympian Smith had been selected to take over.
The Emperor could easily have chosen Jupiter, who also sent thunderbolts and storms. But from the production of charcoals to the making of wheels, from the rings around barrels to the manufacture of ploughshares and from the forging of gelding knives to the forging of swords, furnaces and fire lay at the heart of Gaulish society. As did trade. Two days of profiteering would soften the buggers up, the Emperor argued. By the time the Vulcanalia dawned, all but the most bigoted would be receptive to compromise. The Druids were losing ground fast.
'Lord, how I loathe drinking companions who remember in the morning what happened the night before,' a rich, fruity voice groaned in Claudia's ear. Despite the bleary eyes and stubbled chin, his purple striped tunic was clean and uncreased, and the feathers in his cloakpin looked positively perky. 'Luckily, madam, your servant was spared such company, though he wishes the pounding in his head would dissipate the merest of fractions. Or I have missed two whole days and the Vulcanalia is starting already?'
'No, Hannibal, that's workmen you hear.'
As the Emperor's expansion plans took shape, so the whole perimeter of Santonum became one huge building site of baths, aqueducts, temples and shops. There was almost as much dust in the air here as in Rome.
'I am heartily relieved to hear you say that, madam.' Hannibal wiped his brow in mock relief. 'For years, these cunning Gauls have been advocating their barley beer as a cure for midriff expansion. But alas! The only thing I have lost in that time is a fortune — oh, and perhaps three or four days in the winter.'
Claudia glanced at his tight waistline, remembered that he'd hardly spent any time here in Gaul, and saw that the eyes were red rimmed, rather than bloodshot. 'You don't drink anywhere near as much as you make you out, you old fake.'
'Absolutely right, madam. I can go for hours without touching a drop.'
Around them, the run up to the Vulcanalia was being celebrated with singing and dancing along the main streets, with jugglers and acrobats capering between the stalls in the Forum. To add to the festive atmosphere, practically every threshold, hall, atrium and altar in Santonum had been decked with garlands of blue borage, as well. Since Vulcan and the Hammer God were both patrons of fire, borage wasn't merely decorative, it emitted sparks and explosions when burned, and, to complete the imperial jigsaw, the Emperor had shipped in fire-eaters, fire-walkers, fire-dancers and fire-throwers. The city was hopping.
'The man whom you seek,' Hannibal murmured, drawing Claudia into the doorway of a man selling harnesses.
Her heart leaped. 'You have news?'
'None whatsoever, madam, much to my regret. However,' he lowered his voice as the harness-maker moved forward, sensing a sale, 'last night I made the acquaintance of a fellow who indicated that he might be prepared to talk for a small fee-'
Here we go! 'How small a fee?'
Hannibal's expression was wry as he waved the harness-maker away. 'Thirty gold pieces.'
'What did you drive him down to?'
'Drive him down?' He seemed horrified by her reaction. 'Madam, I told the scoundrel to crawl back into the woodwork where he belongs.'
Give me strength!
'Come, come, madam. Surely you would not trust the word of a man who is prepared to sell his fellow countrymen for a few coppers?'
'Hardly a few, or even coppers,' she snapped. 'Look, if this man has information-'
'They all have information, dear lady. They are just not imparting it. If we have any chance of finding your father-'
'I never said it was my father!'
'Perhaps not, though you have, I fear, just confirmed it, and, since you are too young to be seeking a missing swain, having been a mere child fifteen years ago, you leave precious few options available.'