Marilyn Todd - Virgin Territory

Diomedes grinned. ‘Probably not. As I say, I’ll clean him up and see what he looks like, but basically those are superficial wounds he’s carrying. The main problem area is the chest. I’m afraid his lungs will need the cautery.’

Claudia winced. What drugs cannot cure, the knife can. What the knife cannot cure, the cautery can. And what the cautery cannot cure, cannot be cured…

Leaving him at it, she made her way round the walls of the villa. A window had been broken, it looked like the glass of the newly decorated banqueting hall. From inside, harsh words were being addressed to a very quiet individual. She listened.

‘Your impertinence, I assure you, will be reported to your father.’

‘It wasn’t me!’

Claudia heard the swish of the cane, grimaced as it connected with tender young flesh.

‘Children who tell lies have to be punished. What is this?’

‘A stone, sir.’

‘A very small stone, and see that trajectory? This is the work of a catapult.’

‘I don’t-’

Swish, thwack. ‘Less of your backchat, young man!’ Young man ? Claudia’s eyebrows arched involuntarily and when she turned round, Popillia was standing beside her, mischievously swinging the device in question. Claudia threw back her head and laughed aloud.

‘You are one quick learner, young lady.’

‘Marius is a pig,’ Popillia said haughtily. ‘I’m just getting my own back. What were you doing in the clipshed with Diomedes?’

‘Not what you think, madam.’ Precocious brat.

‘He’s taught me my Greek.’ She swung into step alongside Claudia. ‘That apple had a maggot in it and Boys are sillies, because they’ve got willies’

I’ll go along with that, thought Claudia.

Popillia broke into a skip. ‘You like him, don’t you?’

‘Who?’

‘Diomedes.’

‘Of course. Doesn’t everyone?’

The child screwed up her nose. ‘I don’t.’ She jumped round 180° and began to skip back up the path. ‘He tells lies.’

*

Marius was out of breath by the time he reached his favourite perch. He liked climbing trees. Oaks and cedars were best, and the stone pines down by the beach. They had broad boughs close to the ground, you could swing like a monkey, balance like a rope walker, sit astride and pretend you were on a horse. He liked this tree best, though. It was a walnut with really thick branches and plenty of cover to hide. His favourite branch overhung Great-Grandpapa’s room and sometimes Marius could watch him put his horrid old hand down Acte’s tunic. Once he saw a nipple.

Normally he could clamber around for ages without puffing, but then normally he didn’t get punished for things he hadn’t done. Small hands reached up and grasped the rough bark. Who was firing from a catapult, that’s what he wanted to know? He’d find the boy and thrash him like Piso had thrashed him. Marius tenderly probed his sore stripes. He’d knock that boy’s teeth down his throat, he would too. He’d rub his face in a cowpat and then he’d hold his head under the sheepdip and then…

The flash of gold made him lose his grip and he’d slithered two handspans, grazing his elbow, before he could steady himself. He was right. It was gold! Marius licked his little pink lips. Treasure! He’d found treasure! He remembered Jason and his Argonauts on their quest for the Golden Fleece. They found it, after all those adventures, in the Garden of the Hesperides and now here, in his very own garden, was another golden treasure swinging gently back and forth, catching the dazzling rays of the setting sun.

Flash.

And flash.

And flash.

Mesmerized and excited, his eyes followed it. He came here so often, how come he’d not seen it before? Had it been here all along, hidden among the gold autumn leaves? He reached out. Nearly… Nearly… He stretched his arm to its limit, his cheeks puffed out like round, shiny apples in a monumental effort of concentration. Then he saw what it was. A small globe on a chain, spinning, spinning. Just as his fist made to close over it, his treasure shot up in the air.

‘Hallo, Marius.’

Claudia, lying along the length of the branch above, dangled his Spanish gold bulla from one fingertip.

His eyes were as wide as colanders. ‘You can climb trees?’ It was a whisper of awe.

‘Oh, yes, Marius. I can climb trees.’ The amulet continued to oscillate, small eyes riveted to its arc. ‘I presume you’d like your bulla back?’

He nodded silently. On finding Marius had lost this valuable and essential asset, Piso had caned him and then reported the matter to his father, who promptly caned him again. One thing Fabius had taught the boy, though. Never snitch. Claudia admired the lad for holding out.

She lowered the chain and Marius reached up. Again it was whisked away.

‘It’s yours,’ she said, ‘for a price.’

Marius thought long and hard, and eventually pulled his wooden sword from his belt. ‘This is my most favourite thing,’ he said, twisting his lip. ‘You can have it, if you like.’

Claudia forced herself not to laugh. ‘No, Marius, you keep that. I just want a little chat.’

‘What about?’ he asked warily.

She released the chain. Marius caught the bulla in midair. It was carefully examined before being slipped round his neck.

‘Just things,’ she said casually. ‘Like what you saw at the birch grove yesterday.’

*

Marcus Cornelius Orbilio was frustrated. In fact, he was frustrated on so many counts, he had actually lost count. Taking them point by point, and not necessarily in order of priority, they looked grim. Put them together, and the outlook was bleaker than a Gaulish winter.

He could kiss his career goodbye. This evening he’d called on the local magistrate, a redneck equestrian called Ennius, and the meeting got off on completely on the wrong footing.

‘You’re interrupting my devotions,’ the man had said irritably.

Orbilio had difficulty in controlling his runaway eyebrows. Whatever goddess Ennius was worshipping, she wore cheap scent and left long, dark hairs on his tunic, which he hadn’t had time to belt properly. Orbilio apologized and offered to call back when it was convenient, but Ennius took this as a slight, the nobility patronizing the lower classes as usual, and insisted he conduct his business on the spot. To emphasize both point and authority, he meant it literally and Orbilio was faced with the embarrassing position of outlining the facts on the magistrate’s doorstep.

Ennius already had strong views regarding the Security Police stomping over his territory and showed Orbilio the letter of complaint he’d sent to the Head of Security Police in Rome. When asked politely what he, as magistrate, proposed to do about Utti’s illegal execution, Ennius lost no time in telling Orbilio that he backed Collatinus to the hilt-clearly the fellow was guilty as hell.

‘This is nothing short of cold-blooded murder,’ Orbilio pointed out reasonably.

Ennius jabbed his neatly manicured finger into the younger man’s chest. ‘Don’t lecture me on the law, you insolent puppy. In Sullium I am the law-and the law backs Collatinus. Now get the hell off my doorstep.’

Orbilio found himself raising the subject of Tanaquil’s illegal imprisonment to a bronze door-knocker.

So! Ennius had put in a less than favourable report and his boss, ever the wily politician, was unlikely to consider the subtler aspects of a matter which fell outside his jurisdiction. It would have been different (oh, how it would have been different!) had Sabina genuinely served as a Vestal Virgin, but of course she hadn’t. Instead, an innocent man had been executed and the whole affair had turned into nothing short of a fiasco.