In the middle of the night on dangerous, unfamiliar streets ...
Margo shot out of the sick room as though the villa had caught fire. She jumped over the sleeping Achilles and hit the atrium running. The door was barred. The night watchman had dozed off. Margo flung aside the heavy wooden beam which held the door closed and heard the watchman's startled cry. She jerked open the door and pelted into the street. Panic gave her speed she hadn't thought herself capable of. She remembered the way to the Circus. And from the Circus, she could find the Time Tours wine shop where the gate would be cycling any minute. In the darkness she took several wrong turns and backtracked frantically.
A distant cry caused her to glance back. A bobbing light followed several blocks back. Margo swore under her breath and kept running. She took another wrong turn and sped back the way she'd come. The light had drawn closer: Achilles, carrying a lantern. He called out, "Domine! Domine!"
She didn't have time ...
The boy caught up to her, gasping for breath, and followed when she homed in on the hulling silhouette of the Circus. The glances he shot her told Margo he thought his young master had completely flipped, but he was sticking by her. Damn, damn, damn... She finally found the Via Appia. Margo raced around the end of the Circus and skidded around the corner. There ...
What time is it?
She didn't have time to check her log. She just ran for the counter and hoped for the best. Too late, she saw a familiar figure detach itself from the counter and move toward her in the darkness.
Malcolm.
Guilt and fear and relief hit her simultaneously.
As she closed the distance between them, Margo found that she had no idea what to say to him. Hi, I really screwed up, aren't you happy you went to bed with a dolt and by the way, how do I get rid of this poor slave I seem to have acquired? stuck somehow in her throat. So she screwed her courage to the sticking place and decided to brazen it out.
She would apologize and eat crow once they were through the gate.
Malcolm hadn't slept in days. Time Tours employees had begun steering clear of him whenever he returned to the inn. He functioned on adrenaline and hope and the hope was waning fast. He'd never lost a customer. Never mind someone as precious as Margo. What Kit would say, what Kit would do ...
He'd already decided to remain behind when the tour left Rome. He had to find her. Or find out how she'd died. One or the other. Night closed in on their final few hours. Nine days ... He'd searched from dawn until well past dark every day, asking strangers if they'd seen a young man in Palmyrene dress, searching the slave markets with sinking horror in his gut, losing hope with every additional hour that passed.
The agony of guilt was very nearly more than he could endure.
As the chronometer on his personal log ticked past eleven-thirty and crept toward midnight, Malcolm found a corner behind the deserted wine shop's front counter and waited. He had given up hope; but he would wait, anyway, until the last possible moment Then he'd tell the Time Tours guides to return without him. The big touring company had lost tourists on occasion-it was an industry secret closely guarded with massive bribes to grieving families-but the harsh reality of a tourist's disappearance shook everyone.
The guides and even the other tourists were subdued as they made their way into the wine shop for the return trip. Malcolm huddled in his corner, refusing to meet anyone's gaze. Ten minutes until midnight Five minutes. A ghost of white appeared in his peripheral vision. He jerked around
And swore under his breath. Just a white carthorse pulling a load of hay. The familiar ache of a gate preparing to open thrummed against the bones of his skull. The cart rumbled past. The placid carthorse tossed its head and squealed a complaint its driver echoed. The man held his ears, muttered loudly enough for Malcolm to hear, "Absit omen..." and shook out his whip. The carthorse broke into a shambling run.
Inside the wine shop, the Porta Romae had dilated open. A Time Tours guide stepped outside.
"Malcolm? Departures are through. Newcomers are arriving. You don't have any more time."
"I'm---"
A figure in white ran into view down the block. Malcolm's heart leaped into his mouth. Then he noticed the slave following behind with a lamp. Crushing disappointment blasted brief hope. Then Malcolm did a double-take. The running figure was wearing a Parthian style tunic and trousers. Slender, just about the right height, same fragile, heart-shaped face ...
He came out of his corner like a gunshot and shoved the Time Tours guide aside. Please ...
When Margo ran up to the wine counter, bedraggled as a street rat and glaring defiance, he wanted to grab her by both arms and shake her until something snapped A bewildered boy of about thirteen skidded to a halt behind her, gasping for breath.
"Hi! Did I make it in time? Malcolm, I've got this little problem, how do I free this kid? I, uh, sort of acquired a slave..."
Malcolm couldn't speak. Terror had transmuted into a rage so deep he was afraid to touch her. He held her gaze for another agonizing moment, then turned on his heel and strode through the rapidly shrinking Porta Romae. He didn't even look back to see if she'd followed Nine days he had burned out his guts worrying, and she'd been running around Rome buying slaves ....
His sandals slapped against the grid of the platform. Malcolm shoved aside Time Tours employees and left old friends gaping in his wake. When he hit the gym, he accomplished a lifetime first.
Malcolm Moore laid Sven Bailey flat in a sparring match.
Afterward, he took a cold shower that lasted forty solid minutes. The phone was ringing when he emerged.
He jerked it out of the wall and hurled it across the room. Then, very quietly, Malcolm got drunker than he'd ever been in his life.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Kit Carson was waiting in the crowd when the Porta Romae opened. Neither Malcolm nor Margo put in appearances. He started to grow seriously alarmed when the Time Tours guides who emerged wouldn't look at him. The whole contingent of tourists, guides, and baggage handlers waiting in the Commons climbed the ramp and vanished through the portal and still there was no sign of his granddaughter or the man he'd trusted with her safety. Then, just as the portal began to shrink toward closure, Malcolm shot through. One look at his face sent Kit's viscera into a tailspin.
The normally unflappable time guide burst past Kit like a damned soul pursued by gleeful demons. He didn't even glance in Kit's direction. Kit shut his eyes, convinced of the worst Then he risked another look just as the gate shrank closed. Margo had come through. He started breathing again. But she hung back on the platform, looking defiant and sullen and scared all at the same time. She, too, watched Malcolm's stormy retreat down the Commons. Then she saw Kit standing in the crowd below.
She lifted her chin and descended the ramp
"Want to tell me what's going on?" he asked, falling into step.
"No," she said icily. "I don't."
With that, she, too, stormed off. Kit allowed his footsteps to slow to a halt. Just what had transpired between those two? Given Margo's temper, he was afraid of the answer. But he had to know. Kit highsigned one of the returning Time Tours guides.
"What gives?"
The woman gave him a guarded look. -Uh ... Hi, Kit. I think, maybe Malcolm ought to be the one to explain." She hurried away before he could ask another question.
Kit muttered under his breath and called Malcolm's number. The answering machine picked up. He swore and headed for the Down Time, but Malcolm hadn't put in an appearance. Then Robert Li, the station's antiquarian, skidded into the bar. He announced to the room at large, "You ain't gonna believe it! Malcolm Moore just wiped up the mat with Sven Bailey. I mean put him on the ground out cold. What's going on? I've never seen an expression like that on Malcolm's face."