The heating system!
Rufinus took one more quick look at the former gladiator who had walked past him less than ten paces away, entirely unaware of his presence. As soon as the gladiator had moved on sufficiently, Rufinus ran from his cover and along the side of the great supporting wall until he reached the nondescript entrance to the heating system. The heavy door stood open and unlocked. It would not have been hard for Galla to acquire a key to this service area.
The tunnel led some twenty paces into the darkness and to the furnace. Here, logs were burned almost continuously to provide the flow of hot air that passed beneath the floors of the some of the residential areas. An oil lamp cast a faint glow at the far end of the corridor, and the light bobbed and then vanished.
Rufinus frowned and moved as fast as he dared toward the last known position of that light, hands stretched out forward and to the sides to prevent stumbling straight into the rock wall. The light from behind cast a faint glow but it wasn’t enough to see anything other than the faintest changes in shade. His hands brushed the wall to his right and he felt the tell-tale shower of soot. He had reached the furnace.
Taking a deeply unpleasant sooty breath, he leaned to one side to allow what little light shone from the tunnel entrance to illuminate the area before him. Though the light was extremely dim, given the previous total darkness it allowed him to see the two channels before him. The heated current of air from the furnace would be sucked along those tunnels to warm floors. They were barely wide enough for a human to move through, but just wide enough, for the rare occasions when they required maintenance, when thin slave boys would be sent down there.
Not muscly ex-boxer guards.
He ducked low and looked back and forth between the two tunnels. Sure enough, a distant faint orange glow identified the route Galla had taken. For a moment, he wondered whether he could safely wait here for her to reappear with the stolen goods, but quickly dismissed the idea. What if this tunnel connected to another exit? He would lose her then, for sure.
With a quiet sigh of dismay, Rufinus dropped to his haunches and began to move into the narrow, claustrophobic tunnel. He was immediately both grateful and sorry that he was in a simple tunic without his mail shirt. The armour would have made noise that he could certainly do without, but it would also have protected his skin.
As he moved along the passage, his shoulders scraped unpleasantly on the sooty wall and he felt the cramps beginning in his leg muscles as he shuffled in a permanent crouch.
It seemed like half a year of crawling through darkness and scratching rock, but finally, he saw the glow brighten. As he neared the end of the passage where it opened out to a chamber, he could see the orange flicker of the oil lamp off to the left of the tunnel entrance. The dancing light reflected off the dozens of brick columns supporting the floor above and which formed the hypocaust chamber where the hot air warmed the tiles of the room that stood atop them.
Instinct saved him.
As he reached the entrance and poked his head out into the chamber to look at the lamp, lying untended on the floor, he was already continuing forward into a roll as the log swung at where his head would have been. Instinct born of years in the ring took over. Galla’s swing had put her off balance as her target disappeared in a tight roll beneath the blow. Still soundlessly teetering, she tried to bring herself back round, but Rufinus was already up and facing her as she turned. Her eyes widened and the last thing she would remember would be the sight of Rufinus’ scuffed knuckles thundering towards the bridge of her nose.
The young guard rose to a crouch: all the low hypocaust chamber would allow. Galla crumpled to the floor with a thud that raised soot and dust which billowed in clouds, obscuring the light cast by the lamp.
He peered down at her, shaking his head. He had been struggling, somewhere deep down, with the knowledge that turning her in would effectively condemn her to death, and possibly torture first. But the catalogue of her sins was building up. She had thieved from Lucilla, apparently on more than one occasion. She was planning on running away, becoming a fugitivus, with an accomplice from the villa. And now she had tried to smash his head in with a seasoned length of ash, his sympathy was waning with every breath.
Ignoring her, sure that she would be out for at least an hour, with at least a broken nose, if not a broken cheek bone, he turned instead to examining the room they were in. The columns of neatly cemented bricks stood in ordered rows, fifteen deep and more than twenty long. The room above must be sizeable, though here, below the floor, Rufinus could move only with a strange crab-like crouched shuffle, almost double at the waist.
There were small niches where workmen could rest lamps or tools while carrying out maintenance, and his eyes were drawn almost immediately to the soot-stained draw-string bag that rested on one of them.
Shuffling across the chamber, he retrieved the bag and returned to the brighter glow of the oil lamp, still alone and guttering on the dusty floor. Carefully, he opened the drawstring and tipped the container so that the flickering orange glow danced upon the glittering, shining metalwork and precious stones within.
Rufinus drew in a deep breath and his eyes widened. The brooch was there at the top of the bag and unmistakable, partly due to its quality and partly the distinctive black and white cameo of Venus. But it was far from the only expensive item in the bag. There were perhaps eight or nine pieces in there, presumably stolen over the year that Galla had served at the villa With another deep breath, he drew the string closed again. A quick glance at the body led him to wonder how he would get the slave girl back out through the narrow passage. He would have to drag her back along the passage by the arms. Unceremonious and quite painful for her, but that would be the least of her worries in the coming days.
He suddenly became aware that voices were echoing through the hollow box-flue tiles around him and cocked his head to one side.
Lucilla’s voice!
The realisation surprised him. Where was he?
A second voice cut in and Rufinus recognised the faintly effeminate, lisping tone of the chamberlain, Menander.
‘Perhaps you should select another brooch for the occasion?’
‘No, Menander, it has to be the Livia brooch. Symbols are important to the people. I will wear the Livia brooch and the coronet and sceptre that Verus accepted when he was raised to rule with my father. I will be the living embodiment of Roma. The brooch must be found. I will skin every living thing in the villa’s grounds if I have to.’
Rufinus, his breath held, listened with widening eyes. He was beneath the triclinium: the dining room where Lucilla’s secret gatherings were held! All this time at the villa trying to get closer and closer to the centre of power, and even the lowliest slave feeding the furnace or repairing the brick stacks had access to what he’d sought so desperately.
He almost laughed at the simplicity of it as he tied the bag of stolen jewellery to his belt. The conversation above seemed to have ended. He heard Menander making conciliatory and supportive noises that faded as the two of them moved away and out into a corridor.
Rufinus’ face split into a wide grin as he crossed the room and grasped Galla’s wrists. Unable to stop smiling, he began to drag her along the passage and back out into the damp winter air.
The world was about to become very unpleasant for the thief and her accomplice, but all thoughts of the grisly fate that awaited them could not shift the grin from his face.
Next time those secretive guests came for their private, conspiratorial meeting, Rufinus would learn everything he needed to know.