There was a handmade carpet on the floor and a wooden chair nearby, with a large pot under it, complete with lid and fresh water in a jug, Whatever the dining arrangements downstairs, this was luxury. No wonder that Cyra and Lavinius had thought it suitable.
Trullius had joined me at the window-space and seemed about to pull the rope inside, but the nursemaid stopped him. ‘Tie my feet again — do anything you like — but let me pull the rope in, so I can see the knots.’
He looked at me. I nodded and we two stepped aside. The slave-boy set the taper down and drew the knife again, cutting the rope-bonds which still bound her wrists. She flexed her hands a moment, and then came across and pulled in the twisted cloth, lingering over every knot as it appeared. As she undid the last of them she shook her head at me. ‘Nothing of interest in that, citizen. I’ll have to look elsewhere. But I’ll see better when the daylight comes.’ She turned to Trullius. ‘If I may use the far bed, you can tie my legs again and seal the shutters if you wish. Not that I could climb out of the window in the dark.’
‘I’ll tie you up all right!’ It was Trullius’s wife appearing in the doorway with the lighted lamp, a hunk of dry bread and a heavy length of chain. ‘You think I’m going to leave you virtually free, after what has happened in this house?’ She thumped the bread down on the chair-seat as she spoke. She turned towards the slave and motioned to the chain. ‘The nursemaid wears a slave-collar with her name on it. Attach this to the back of it and chain her to the bed. Make sure that the screw-link at the end is out of reach. Give her enough slack to reach the pot, of course — I don’t want staining on my mattresses — and she can eat and drink this if she can find it in the dark. If that arrangement meets with your approval, citizen?’ she added in my direction with a sneer.
It was hardly what I would have chosen, but I did not object. Far better to be chained up in a comfortable dry room, with food and drink — however minimal — than to spend a freezing night starving in a draughty ruined kiln. ‘I’ll come back in the morning, then,’ I murmured to the nurse. ‘And hope that you have something to report.’
The slave-woman, who was submitting to the chain, gave me a rueful smile. ‘If I have nothing to tell you in the morning, citizen, do as you wish with me. I will have nothing left to live for, anyway, if my darling’s lost. But I swear by all the gods that I’ll do all I can.’
I nodded. ‘Goodnight then.’ I followed Trullius. He led me into the other attic-room, as the stable-slave spread out his sleeping-mat outside the nursemaid’s door.
I looked around my attic. So this was where Secunda and her husband slept. Priscilla had said that this was her room as a rule, and certainly the accommodation was much less lavish than next door. There was no chair or table, no covering on the floor, and only a crude bolt to latch the door. The bed provided was far more primitive, simple wooden slats and a stuffed straw palliasse, but it was still much more luxurious than my pile of reeds at home. Besides, I was so tired I would have slept on cobblestones. I paused just long enough to unwind my travel-stained toga and pull my sandals off, then — without even waiting to crawl beneath the woven covers on the bed — I lay down on the pillows and was instantly asleep.
EIGHTEEN
I woke from a confused dream in which a man in Druid robes was cooking headless corpses in a kiln, while a giant in yellow wedding slippers kicked the chimney down.
I forced my eyes open, uncertain for a moment as to where I was, and peered around until I recognized the room. Dawn light was streaming through the shuttered window-space, my shoes and toga were where I’d put them down and I was still lying on the covers. It was obvious that I had hardly stirred all night. But the noisy kicking of my nightmare seemed still to be going on.
I struggled to sit up but the banging didn’t stop. Sleepily I realized that it was not a dream at all, but somebody knocking loudly on the door. And the landlord’s voice was hollering my name. ‘Citizen Libertus, I can’t unlatch the door. Are you all right in there?’
I swung my feet down, shambled to the door and pulled back the bolt. I had scarcely time to do so before Trullius burst in. He was still in his under-tunic, without even a blanket to hide his ruined arm, but he made no excuse. ‘Oh, citizen! Thank Mars you are all right. I had begun to worry when you didn’t answer me. I suppose you were asleep. I’m sorry to wake you but you’d better come at once.’
I grovelled for my sandals, but he shook his head.
‘There isn’t time to dress. I don’t know what to do. My wife went in there when she first got up and…’ He shook his head. ‘You’d better come and see.’ He was already hustling out of the door again.
I followed stupidly, still more than half-asleep. What was the panic? Surely Lavinia had not unexpectedly returned? I shook my head. That was unlikely. If that had happened Trullius would have told me so at once. More probable that the nursemaid had found her promised secret sign. I was encouraged in this hope when I saw where Trullius was leading me.
He kicked aside the sleeping-mat which still lay outside the nursemaid’s door, though there was no sign of the servant who’d been left on guard, and motioned me to go inside the room. ‘There!’ he said, and gestured.
The slave-woman was slumped half-lying on the floor, held to the bed-frame only by the chain — in a way which would have choked her if she had not already been so evidently dead. She had arched against her collar in some final spasm: there were cruel marks visible on her neck and chin even from this distance, and her bloodless face was tinged with purpish-blue as though she had found it difficult to breath. Death had not been painless. I prayed it had been quick.
‘That’s how we found her,’ Trullius went on. He would have wrung his hands if he’d been able to. ‘It must have been those dreadful Druids at their work again. Though how they got in unobserved I cannot think. My wife is right, it must be sorcery. Oh, dear Mercury, what will Lavinius say?’ He shook his head, from side to side, like a wet dog in despair.
I could think of nothing intelligent to say, so I simply moved past him to look more closely at the corpse. She had not been dead for long. The body had not begun to stiffen very much. There was no wound or sign of other damage to the corpse, except the bruising round her neck and that — though quite extensive — seemed more the result of violent movement than the cause of death: there was none of the protruding tongue that is produced by strangling. This looked more like a poisoning to me.
But what had done it? There was no cup or phial in evidence. I glanced around the room. The dried morsel of loaf had not been touched at all, but some of the water in the jug had disappeared. Could that have been the source? I dipped a little finger into the liquid in the jug and — daringly but idiotically — placed it on my tongue. To my relief there was none of the burning or numbness which I half-feared to feel, only the faint stale taste of water from a city well. (My wife Gwellia was furious with me later, when she learned of this, and I admit that she was right. It was a particularly foolish thing to do — perhaps the product of not being properly awake — but I reasoned that my tiny sample was too small to cause me harm.)
So, if it was not the water, what had killed the nurse? Was it possible that, despite the guard, someone had come in during the night and forced some potion down her throat? I am not generally a believer in sorcery, but even I was beginning to wonder if there was something supernatural and sinister afoot.
Trullius had more practical concerns and was wittering in distress. ‘We shall be ruined, citizen. Who else will come here now? Even supposing that Lavinius does not have us dragged before the courts and sent into exile with nothing to our names.’ He stopped and looked at me. ‘My wife has taken the stable-slave and locked him in the kiln. He swears that he heard nothing except a muffled thud. But something must have happened. You think he was the one who was working with the Druids? Perhaps he heard us talking yesterday and — once he heard that Lavinia might have left a sign — he feared the nurse was going to discover that he was involved.’