John Roberts - Oracle of the Dead

“But who could have shot you?” he asked.

“It might have been Cupid, but I doubt it. No women around, for one thing.”

“What?” Sometimes I waste my best wit on such people.

Shortly thereafter, Hermes and the others returned without any trophies. “Let him get away, did you?” I said bitterly. “I’m going to die without the satisfaction of knowing that I’m at least avenged.”

Hermes knelt, took out his knife, and cut my tunic away from the wound. He punched me rudely on the chest.

“Ow! What are you doing, wretch?”

“I’m seeing how bad it is. Asklepiodes taught me this.” He took the arrow by the shaft and wiggled it. The world turned red before my eyes. He punched me lightly in the stomach and I began to vomit.

“No blood in your puke. Good.”

“Good?” I raged in a very weak, strangled voice. “That’s good? I’ll have you crucified, you monster! I knew I never should have given you your freedom.”

“Oh, be quiet. It missed your lung and your heart and your major pipes. We’ll get the arrow out, and if you don’t bleed to death inside and the infection doesn’t kill you, you’ll be fine. Just another scar to impress the voters at election time.”

Somehow, I almost took comfort in this. “You’re going to yank out that arrow, aren’t you?”

“Unless you’d rather keep it,” he said. Snide little bastard.

“Give me a gallon or two of wine and go ahead.” Something occurred to me. “You know what? My hangover is gone.” And that was the last I remembered for a while.

Sometime later I awoke and wished I hadn’t. My chest and shoulders felt like molten lead. It hurt to breathe. I tried turning my head and my neck hurt; so did my head. I had the feeling that someone had just rushed from the room. At least that meant that I was in a room. I was in a bed, for that matter. I tried to look around, moving nothing but my eyes. They hurt, too. I recognized the wall paintings. I was in the villa Hortalus had lent us.

Julia came in. “You see what comes of talking about someone trying to kill you? Now they’ve tried and came within an inch of succeeding.”

“So this is my fault, is it? How long have I been unconscious?”

“Three days. The physician had your wound treated and bandaged and he forced some drugged wine into you. That’s why you’ve slept so long.”

I had a horrible thought. “You didn’t let him run a hot iron through the wound, did you?” I’d seen that done before and it’s far worse than getting skewered in the first place.

“No, this physician doesn’t favor such drastic methods; just drugs and poultices for wounds like yours.”

“Better than some army surgeon, anyway. How is it healing?”

“It wasn’t as red and swollen this morning as when you were brought in. But you won’t be going anywhere for a while. Hermes has canceled all your court appearances and sent word to Rome that you’ve been attacked and wounded. Pompey sent his personal physician, but I wouldn’t let him treat you. He’s one of those who favor hot iron.”

“That was good of Pompey and better of you. I want to sit up.”

“You’d better stay as you are until the wound has healed a bit more.”

“No, I’m not looking forward to it, but I’d better sit up. I’ve seen a lot of wounded men die from lying flat too long. Even if the wounds are healing, they get fluid in their lungs and soon they can’t breathe.”

“Very well, but it’s going to hurt.”

“I hurt anyway.” She left and moments later was back with Hermes, a burly house slave, and one of her slave girls. Hermes and the man took me by the arms and hauled me up while Julia and the girl piled cushions behind my back. A great wave of red washed over me and I clenched my teeth to keep from crying out. I settled back against the cushions and the agony began to fade, but the sweat rolled down my face in torrents. Julia gave me a cup of heavily watered wine with ice in it (the Villa of Hortalus lacked no amenities) and soon I felt able to talk again.

“Have you learned anything?” I asked Hermes.

“I took the arrow to a fletcher and he said that it was locally made, but it’s a common type used for hunting. I borrowed some huntsmen and their dogs and took them back to where you were shot, but you’ll recall that it was raining that day and it rained hard that night. They were able to find where he crouched in the brush to shoot, but that was all.”

“He must have followed us. Do you remember who was near us on the road?”

“There was a good deal of traffic but most was on foot. Whoever followed us must have been on horseback.”

“He might have been in front of us and doubled back when we stopped.”

“If it was a huntsman hired for the job,” Hermes said, “he could have been keeping up with us on foot but off in the fields somewhere. We were just ambling along at no great speed.”

“As usual,” Julia said, “there are too many possibilities.”

“This has not been a case distinguished by good luck,” I noted.

When word got around that I had returned to the land of the living, I got a lot of visitors. All the head men of the towns showed up, as did the major landholders. Pompey dropped by to see how I was getting along and told me I should have taken the hot iron treatment, that it would make me heal faster. I didn’t ask him if he’d ever tried it personally. Sabinilla visited, this time wearing a black wig. Porcia showed up with an armload of medicinal herbs from her own garden and she gave Julia careful instructions on how to prepare and administer them. I thanked her for her thoughtfulness, but I seemed to be healing well enough and didn’t take them. Medical concoctions always taste vile.

Within ten days I was up and walking around and could breathe almost normally. By great good fortune the infection had been mild and had cleared up early. I had feared that infection would bring on months of convalescence. Not to mention death.

As soon as my chest and shoulder could bear the weight, I took to wearing armor beneath my clothes when I went out. It was a reasonable precaution and Julia insisted on it. My men now accompanied me armed at all times. I was nervous any time I walked past a clump of bushes. Indeed, I was as jumpy as a dog with piles. I had been attacked many times, but I’d always felt that I was a match for the situation, blade to blade. Yet there is something profoundly unsettling about being shot from a distance, by an enemy you don’t even see.

Once I was well enough recovered, the physician prescribed a regimen of exercise. The villa had every sort of facility, and a gymnasium was among them, but I was a serving praetor and a man in public life is not supposed to shut himself away from the people, so I elected to use a public facility. Near Baiae there was a large, Greek-style palaestra that was used by the inhabitants of several neighboring towns. It had all the usual provisions for running, wrestling, boxing, and so forth, and this being Italy it had a field for arms training complete with practice weapons and shields, and targets for javelins and arrows. I vowed to keep an eye on those people with bows.

Since exercise was the order of the day, we did not ride there but walked and ran alternately. Some of my men insisted on carrying shields to either side of me. I thought this was a bit excessive and lacking in dignity, but then I thought of how that arrow had felt and indulged them. As we drew near the gymnasium, though, I had them fall in behind me. Couldn’t have the people thinking the Roman praetor was scared, after all.

Because of the Greek influence, the Campanians are passionately fond of athletics, and the place was well attended with men and boys sweating mightily as they heaved balls, lifted stone or bronze weights, swung wooden clubs, jumped, sprinted, and otherwise exerted themselves. They went silent at sight of my heavily armed little troupe. “Hey!” some local wag shouted. “This is the palaestra. The ludus is down the road there!” This sally raised a general laugh and I acknowledged it with a wave.