Rosemary Rowe: A Roman Ransom

I had been ill. That was the only thing I knew — and it was the first real thing I’d been aware of for a long, long time.

There had been fevered dreams. A slave-ship. Beatings. Thirst. I was tossing, chained and shivering, in that filthy hold again, hearing my young wife calling out my name as the pirates tore us from our home and carried us apart. Then these tortured images of my past would pass and instead I was sweltering and helpless in a fiery cave; or my mosaic workshop was consumed in flames, while mocking demons forced hot liquids down my throat.

Now, though, as I forced open an exploratory eye, those nightmare visions seemed to have dispersed. I appeared to be lying in a sort of bed of reeds in a little roundhouse which I vaguely recognised as mine — although I could not for the moment make any sense of this. Yet the place was so familiar: the central fire, the wooden stools, the cooking pots — even the Celtic weaving loom set up against the wall. If this was a dream, I thought, I was content with it. I could almost feel the warm glow from the fire, and feel the smart of wood-smoke in my eyes.

I almost feared to blink in case this cheerful scene proved to be a mere illusion too and — like the rest — would shimmer and vanish into mist. I closed my eyes experimentally but, though I did so several times, my surroundings remained as solid as before. For a moment it was too much for my addled brain to solve.

Then I heard a voice from somewhere near at hand and I was aware of someone bending over me. I smiled, expecting it to be my wife, but as I came to fuller consciousness I saw that it was not Gwellia at all. It was an old, skinny, wrinkled man with a bony nose and pointed chin, dressed in a tattered toga with wine stains on the front and a circlet of fresh flowers on his balding head. I shut my eyes again. This was obviously another nightmare.

But he didn’t go away.

‘He was ill for almost a whole moon, of course, before you sent for me.’ He had a high cracked voice, and spoke Latin with the careful diction of the Greek. ‘It would have been much better if I’d seen him earlier, so I could have contrived to have him purged. But I have done a great deal in the last two days. Obviously recovery will not be swift, but I believe he is past the crisis now. Drinking bad water, that is my surmise. Vomiting, fever and delusive dreams — this is the course of the disease and there have been other cases in the town. And the insides of his lids are red. I have seen this kind of thing before.’ He moved the oil light closer to my face, until I could almost feel my lashes singe.

I flinched.

He was not apologetic. Quite the contrary — although he did withdraw the light and I realised that he’d sat back on his heels. ‘He feels the heat. That’s good!’ There was evident satisfaction in his tone. ‘That shows that he is partly conscious now, and that is promising. I doubted for a long time that he would survive, even with all the herbs and potions I prepared. But at least that dreadful raging fever has gone.’

A second shadow loomed up on the wall and I was aware of another figure by the bed. However, the medicus clearly disapproved. He stood up suddenly and there was a warning in his voice. ‘Forgive me, honoured citizen, for instructing you, but perhaps you should not approach him any closer. I believe this is the foul-water sickness, as I said before, but I cannot be quite certain. It may yet be the plague. We can only watch the pattern of disease. You know that there is a murrain raging presently in Rome and it is not impossible that it might travel here — these things spread with fearful rapidness. I would not have you catch the seeds of pestilence. They rise in the miasma of the patient’s breath, and can take root in your own. Remember, Excellence, I did advise you not to come at all.’

Excellence? I was so startled that I almost raised my head. Marcus Aurelius Septimus, my patron, here?

This dwelling might be built on his estate — indeed he’d granted it to me as a reward for work I’d done for him — but it was the first time to my knowledge that he had ever crossed the door. Patrician citizens of his exalted rank do not often come visiting in lowly roundhouses. But one glimpse of that patrician form — tousled blond curls around the still-youthful face, the broad purple band along the toga edge, and the heavy seal ring on the hand — was enough to convince me that he was truly here. The personal representative of the outgoing governor and the most important man in all Britannia — at the bedside of a humble one-time slave? No matter that I was a freeman now, his client and a Roman citizen — it was incredible that he should visit me like this.

Perhaps I was still dreaming after all.

Another figure loomed up with a lamp, and this time it really was my wife. ‘Believe me, medicus,’ she began. Her tone was courteous but firm. I smiled a little to myself. We had been torn apart when we were first enslaved and reunited only recently, but, though the years of slavery had aged us both, in many ways she remains unchanged. My Gwellia could always be forceful when she chose. ‘It was not my wish to put His Excellence in danger of the plague. I did not for a moment think that he would come himself. I should not have sent to him tonight at all, if he had not specifically commanded it. “If your Libertus starts to come to consciousness, you are to send up to the villa instantly — no matter whether it is day or night.” That’s what he said — and praise be to all the gods, it’s happening at last, thanks to the potion you mixed for him. I’m only sorry that my messenger seems to have disturbed you at your meal.’

Of course, when I turned my mind to think of it, I realised she was right. Marcus was not in formal banquet wear, but he too had a wreath round his head. The two men had obviously been interrupted at some private dinner. Certainly this place was only minutes, on a horse, from the door of Marcus’s country house, but of all the improbable things which greeted me, the fact that my patron and his guest had left their meal to come to me was the most surprising of all. Marcus was a stickler for social niceties, and was famously devoted to his food.

I began to wonder just how ill I’d been.

Ill enough to warrant a physician, it appeared. It was a luxury I’d rarely known and certainly would never have dreamed of for myself.

I might possibly have called in the state physician, once, if things were desperate. There had been a well-trained medicus in Glevum at one time, working on a licence from the town council, which also provided him with premises and paid him a retainer for his services. Such men are not permitted to demand a fee, but if they treat you successfully it costs you all the same, as you are naturally expected to ‘show your gratitude’. However, he was dead, and now his two ex-slaves, who had been bequeathed their freedom on his death, had applied for licences themselves and set up in his place, though their only training was assisting him. I knew them well: a pair of cheerful rogues, chiefly famed for drinking too much wine and prescribing cabbage diets as a cure for everything. In general I preferred to heal myself.

This medicus was obviously a different breed of man. He was wearing a toga, for one thing, which meant that he was a full Roman citizen, and he was clearly educated and successful, since he was sufficiently eminent to be invited to Marcus’s country house to dine. A high-paid private medicus, perhaps, retained by some wealthy family in the town? Probably. The best physicians in the world are Greek. There is a proper training school for them and they have been feted by high society ever since the late emperor received Galen at his court. By his diction this man was clearly Greek. His fees would be enormous.