He said as much now, with a laugh. ‘You Celts are too indulgent with your womenfolk. Too indulgent by half. If a woman won’t come to your bed willingly, beat her till she does — that’s what my father used to say.’ He spoke with cheerful confidence. Marcus was young, handsome and powerful, and until his recent marriage the most beautiful women in Glevum had queued up to offer him favours. ‘Though goodness knows what she expects in that department, Libertus — you’re not young. Still, you’re not bad-looking and you’re in fair shape for your age.’
I smiled. It was certainly not a question of unwillingness. It was true, there had been some reticence at first — on both our parts — but reconciliation had been all the sweeter for the wait. But now. . ‘Excellence, it is more a matter-’
I was going to say ‘of the dignity that she deserves’, but the words were never uttered. A young man had burst into the steam room and flung himself to the tiled floor at Marcus’s feet. He was — remarkably — still half dressed, in the distinctive tunic of a temple slave, and the steam was already dampening the cloth and settling in little droplets on the metal of his clasp.
‘What is the meaning of this intrusion!’ Marcus was angry. He got to his feet and so — rather groggily — did I, to the anguish of my feet and the great relief of my posterior.
‘Most honoured Excellence! A thousand thousand apologies. I bring important news.’ The man had not moved from his position, and already the moisture was beginning to course down his face and drip from his nose and chin.
‘Very well,’ Marcus said, and the man struggled to his feet.
‘I come from the senior Sevir Augustalis,’ he blurted, ‘Meritus, high priest of the Imperial cult in Glevum. He sends his humble greetings to your Excellence. .’
‘Never mind all that,’ Marcus said testily. ‘What’s the news?’
‘Citizen, there was dreadful moaning in the temple earlier — not even the High Priest of Jupiter knew what was causing it. Then Sevir Meritus went into the inner sanctum of the shrine at noon, to read the auguries.’ The messenger looked at us wildly. Suddenly he blurted, as though he had forgotten his carefully prepared text, ‘The long and short of it is, there was a body in there on the floor. A body in rich civilian clothing. And oh, Excellence. .’ he threw himself back on the floor as if by humbling himself he could somehow undo the horror of his words, ‘judging by the documents that the priest found in his belt, it seems to be the body of an imperial embassy.’
Chapter Two
An imperial ambassador! I caught my breath.
‘Dear Jupiter!’ Marcus was visibly shocked. ‘The last time anything happened to an imperial legate to Britannia. .’
He did not finish, but we all knew what he meant. It was a story to frighten children with. The legate and his two bodyguards had been set upon and brutally murdered, apparently by marauding wayside thieves. All three had been hacked into pieces and left for the wolves — all for the sake of the bag of silver they were carrying. Parts of the bodies had never been recovered and there were terrible reprisals in the town concerned. So much so, legend said, that one tribal elder who witnessed the slaughter called down the vengeance of the gods on all things Roman — and instead brought a dreadful vengeance on himself. They’d half flayed him, bound him to a stake, and wheeled him in — still breathing — to the arena beasts, for daring to defy the word of Rome.
And all this was under the previous emperor, Marcus Aurelius, who was famously just! What his unpredictable son might do to Glevum in the same circumstances was too horrible to contemplate.
I glanced at Marcus. He had turned pale. ‘Of course, Excellence,’ I said nervously, ‘that earlier incident was further south, and put down to displaced Iceni. The Romans have never trusted the Iceni, ever since the revolt of Boudicca.’ It was a forlorn attempt at comfort. Marcus knew the likely consequences as well as I did.
He shook his head, and then moved with a sudden alacrity which would have made a battle-charger look sluggish. ‘Come on,’ he said, jumping up from his bench, and leading the way out of the room. ‘There is no time to be lost.’
I followed him — there was nothing else to do — and the temple slave trotted obediently after us.
Marcus was in a hurry. He ignored the tepid pools in the adjoining room and made his way directly to the frigidarium, where he launched himself instantly into the cold plunge. The temple slave glanced at me uncertainly.
Desperate times call for desperate measures, and I could hardly back out of this without looking foolish. I handed the slave my towel and, closing my eyes, followed Marcus into the pool as boldly as I could. The shock of that sudden immersion would have made a statue squeal, but the temple slave was watching me and I controlled myself, only emitting the faintest of gasps.
The cold water was reviving, however, once I caught my breath again. Marcus was soon out of the pool, waving aside the proffered massage (to the chagrin of the massage-slave, who’d been hoping for a tip), and a moment later we were all striding back to the changing room. Marcus’s attendant was still patiently sitting guard over my patron’s clothes. There was no sign of the boy I had paid to look after mine.
‘Quickly!’ Marcus barked to his slave, and allowed himself to be swiftly dried and draped elegantly in his toga while I dabbed at myself ineffectively with my damp towel. I was still trying to come to terms with what I’d heard.
‘An imperial legate,’ I ventured at last, pulling my patched tunic over my head and wrapping myself in my cloak. ‘Not. .’ I hardly dared to form the words, ‘. . this Fabius Marcellus that you mentioned earlier?’
To my astonishment my patron shook his head. ‘I thought of that at first, but on reflection I don’t see how it can be,’ he said thoughtfully, holding his hands out of the way while his slave twisted one end of the toga-cloth into a belt, in the latest fashion. ‘In fact the whole thing is a puzzle. I received that communication from the Emperor only yesterday, and that was brought directly to me by the fastest messengers. Even if Fabius had left Rome at the same instant, he would still be several days away — and according to the letter he was not due to leave until the Ides.’
I looked up from lacing my sandals. ‘But if it isn’t Fabius. .?’
Marcus’s slave was fitting elegant red shoes to his master’s feet. ‘That is the problem, Libertus. Of course the Emperor has a thousand messengers, and he can send them anywhere he chooses — but I can’t believe that there has been an imperial legation anywhere near Glevum without my hearing of it. If there was any formal embassy in Britannia I should have had word of his arrival as soon as he set foot on these shores.’
He was right, of course. The Emperor is not the only man with spies. If this corpse was only impersonating a legatus, that altered everything. That act in itself would have merited the death penalty, and there would be no danger to the city. I breathed again.
‘So, Excellence,’ I said. ‘What do you propose?’
‘I must see this Sevir Augustalis,’ Marcus said. He turned to the temple slave. ‘Remind me, who was the priest exactly, before he took the wreath?’
‘He was a wealthy freedman, Excellence,’ the slave recited dutifully.
Marcus snorted with impatience. ‘Obviously — since members of the Board of Augustales always are! I meant, how did this one come to be elected priest? Presumably the man had wealth, to join the Augustales in the first place. So where did the money come from? Always assuming he has any left, by this time.’
Now that the immediate danger seemed to have receded, I could not resist a grin. The expense of being a priest of the Imperial cult is legendary. The provision of games, festivals and votive offerings to mark the year of office have become obligatory, a kind of involuntary tax on the freedman chosen, so election to the post is a very dubious blessing. However, it is a certain route to civic distinction, and nomination — since the priest directly serves the Emperor — is not an honour that a man can easily refuse.