“At least I’ve breakfasted as if I’m at home.” John spoke first, breaking the uncomfortable silence they had maintained since their meal. “If only court ceremonial wasn’t always accompanied by such rich repasts.” He was thinking of the endless banquets he had not only to plan as part of his official duties, but also to attend. The recollection reminded him of those strange festivities in Poppaea’s room that had apparently been visible only to her and to Sunilda.
His half-jocular comment, however, did not seem to thaw the frost in his friend’s demeanor.
Felix sat heavily down on a low bronze stool behind Zeno’s desk, almost vanishing behind a mountain of half unrolled scrolls. “A crust of bread and some watered vinegar can be a veritable feast when you’re out on campaign,” he complained, “but if I have to be nothing more than a child’s bodyguard I’d just as soon eat better than that. Besides, you can poison a cup or a jug or a plate of food wherever it might be sitting. You don’t need to skulk about in the kitchen to do it.”
John agreed his statement was certainly true.
“We were wasting our time looking for Barnabas, just as I said,” Felix continued. “He’s long since run away. Did you suppose he might have contrived to be carted back into the villa concealed at the bottom of a basket of loaves? Or disguised as a large duckling? Not that anything that happens in this house would surprise me, I must say. But we’ve already got the two bastards responsible in custody, thank Mithra, so perhaps now my men and I can take them and return to the city.”
“Not until they tell us what we need to know,” John said quietly.
“Leave that to Justinian’s torturers!”
John pushed the scene in Poppaea’s room out of his mind. Turning his gaze to the study walls, where painted philosophers strolled along paths that appeared so realistic he might have walked down them directly into Zeno’s untidy garden, he said, “I’m not certain it would be wise to take Briarus and Hero to Constantinople yet, Felix. We both know what fate awaits them in Justinian’s dungeons.”
Felix grumbled an unintelligible reply and yawned mightily.
“You need more rest, Felix,” John said. “I’m beginning to wonder if your obvious exhaustion springs from something other than staying up all night patrolling over-zealously.”
The captain muttered a ripe curse and hastily changed the subject. “You’ve already talked to the prisoners more than once, John. Of course they’ll both claim to know nothing about murders or poisons, but surely you can’t believe that Briarus knows nothing of his master’s whereabouts? What’s to be gained by keeping them locked up here? Once they’re gone, Zeno will stop asking me about Hero and complaining about his wretched automatons not being ready for the festival every time I see him.”
“I don’t intend to question them further right now,” John replied. “I want to give them another day in isolation to give them ample opportunity to contemplate what fate awaits them in Constantinople. By tomorrow morning, they’ll doubtless be happy to reveal everything they know.”
“You’re too kind-hearted, John,” Felix said without a trace of irony in his tone.
John allowed his gaze to wander the walls along the shaded paths as he contemplated the arrangements needed to transport the unlikely accomplices safely to the palace grounds.
A light step sounded in the corridor and he turned to see Bertrada peering around the ivy tendrils painted on the doorframe.
“Lord Chamberlain,” the nursemaid whispered. “I’m happy I found you alone. I have a terrible confession to make. It’s very embarrassing. Something I wouldn’t want certain parties to hear.”
Scrolls toppled off the desk and rattled to the tiles as Felix was suddenly on his feet and in full view. “It isn’t necessary to be afraid, Bertrada.”
The girl gave a tiny squeak of shock, and turned away to flee back down the corridor.
“Please,” John told her, “come in, Bertrada. As the captain says, you have nothing to fear.”
She bit her lip as she took a reluctant step into the room, glanced at Felix and then averted her eyes. “Lord Chamberlain, if I could speak with you alone…” she began hesitantly.
“If it is anything that concerns the safety of the household, then Felix will have to hear it,” John said quietly.
Bertrada, who had been looking at the floor, pushed her hair back and looked up at John. “It’s about Hero, Lord Chamberlain. He’s innocent, I swear it.”
“You have some proof of this?” John thought it was doubtful. “And if you do, why have you suddenly decided to come forward now?”
Bertrada looked toward Felix again, then quickly away. “Well, it was seeing him brought into the villa under guard, with half of the household gawking at him, just like Briarus. I thought surely someone would soon realize it was all a terrible mistake and he would be freed, but he’s still locked up.”
“I see,” John said. “And why do you insist that Hero was not responsible for Gadaric’s murder?”
The girl’s eyes filled with tears. “It’s shameful to admit, Lord Chamberlain, but I was with Hero at the time.”
She stole a swift look at Felix. He said nothing but simply walked to the study door, moving as slowly as a condemned criminal going to his death.
As he passed by Bertrada she caught at his sleeve and looked at him silently.
John was struck by the incongruity. Felix, a big scarred veteran with a few streaks of white in his beard, Bertrada a young girl. It could almost have been a parting between father and daughter.
“Felix, don’t be angry,” Bertrada begged. “That’s all over now, I swear it. Please…”
The excubitor captain shrugged her small hand off his arm and vanished down the corridor.
“I will order Hero released immediately, but he must not leave the estate,” John finally said. “You were right to tell us, Bertrada, and I realize to do so has cost you greatly.”
***
Briarus yanked harder at the ornamental hanging. One of the nails attaching it to the wall popped loose and skittered across the tile floor but no sound came from the corridor. Evidently the excubitor had heard nothing or, more likely, his patrolling had taken him to the other end of the long hallway running the length of this wing of the villa.
Briarus smiled grimly. His temporary lodging was nothing more than a windowless room that had been decorated with a few wall hangings of little artistic merit in order to hastily convert it into a bedroom for one of Zeno’s numerous summer guests. The dense, leafy vegetation depicted on the fabric was crudely sewn, neither natural in appearance nor pleasingly ornamental. Castor would never have allowed it to be hung in his house, Briarus thought, but much could be forgiven for the unpleasing decoration had provided him with a weapon.
He got down on his hands and knees to find the nail, which had bounced off the tiles onto the woven carpet stretched between bed and door. To his disappointment, the small length of metal was not only bent but also much shorter than he had hoped. At first glance it suggested no way it could be used to his advantage. It might inflict some damage thrust into an eye, perhaps, but he was unlikely to be able to get close enough to an excubitor to accomplish that. He stuck it into his belt anyway, just in case. Then he sat down on the edge of the bed and waited.
Briarus had not always labored as an estate manager. He had risen to that position largely by waiting. It had occurred to him early in life that although each day contained only so many hours, each one of those hours contained Fortuna’s handiwork. Whole days of hours, even weeks or months of them, might stream by, all useless in accomplishing an individual purpose. But there were so very many hours and their flow so unceasing, that if one waited watchfully, eventually some opportunity would present itself. So, over the years, he had seized this chance and that, and then another.