Ruth Downie - Caveat emptor

“Oh, I wasn’t on my own, sir,” the lad assured him. “Dias showed me round.”

Ruso felt his whole body tense. As casually as he could he said, “So your captain was in Londinium as well?”

The youth looked uncomfortable. “It was a personal matter, sir. Nothing to do with the magistrate. You won’t mention it to him tonight, will you, sir?”

They turned in at the stable gate. Ruso glimpsed another chain-mailed figure bending to tighten a girth as he chatted to the stable overseer. He said, “Is there a reason you don’t want me to mention it to Caratius?”

“Not to Caratius, sir-”

The other guard straightened up and Ruso saw who it was.

“I’d rather you didn’t say anything to Dias, sir. He’s the other half of your escort tonight.”

They rode out beneath the arch of the south gate, Ruso automatically returning the gatekeeper’s salute as they passed. It was a scene that, captured in a painting, would have said all the right things about the benevolent rule of Rome. The procurator’s man on a gleaming bay gelding, accompanied by his smart native escort, all riding out of town on a spring evening to enjoy dinner with an influential Briton in his country house.

The painter could not have depicted the thud of Ruso’s heart as they left the safety of the town and headed out past the cemetery that would soon hold the remains of the murdered Julius Asper. Dias had been in Londinium all along. No picture could have captured the turmoil in his mind as he eyed the lithe form on the horse beside him and tried to recall the shape he had grabbed in Valens’s hallway. Was that a bruise just visible under the scarlet sleeve? Had that hood been hiding not a mangled ear but a flamboyant hairstyle shot through with red threads?

Dias was about the right height and build. There was no evidence now of any back problem that might prevent him from climbing in through the kitchen window. Either he had met a good doctor, or he had made one of the miraculous recoveries that disaffected soldiers sometimes enjoyed after medical discharge.

If Dias had been secretly working for the magistrate in Londinium it was not clear why he had bothered to take Gavo out drinking, but perhaps he was genuinely concerned to keep his protege out of trouble. In any case, the youth’s presence might not have restricted him for long. Already flattered at being chosen for the Londinium trip, Gavo must have been thrilled to be offered a tour of the town in the company of his hero. He could have been too drunk to know when the evening ended or what either of them had been up to.

They were topping the gentle rise beyond the cemetery now. The spring sun was still above the trees but he was glad of his cloak: The sky was clear and it would be cold later. Apart from a donkey cart and a shawled woman hurrying along behind it, all of the traffic was heading the other way. Sensible travelers would be settled safely in town before nightfall. Ruso, on the other hand, was following the road out across open fields to visit a suspect who had a motive for murdering Julius Asper. He was in the company of an armed man he could no longer trust and a junior guard who, if the choice came, would follow his leader.

If I were you, I’d watch my back. Publius had warned him. Tilla had warned him. He was an official employee and several people knew where he was going, but none of those things had saved Julius Asper.

He sneaked another glance at Dias, riding easily beside him. Now they were out on the open road, the man had added a long sword to his personal armory, dwarfing the wicked-looking knife he always wore on his belt. Why was the captain of the town guard bothering to perform a simple escort duty? He recalled the confused fight in Valens’s hallway, and the crater left in the plaster that might easily have been in his own head. If Dias realized he was under suspicion, then Ruso was in trouble. Besides, with Dias watching his every move, how the hell was he supposed to investigate anything? On the other hand, if he investigated nothing, that would look suspicious too.

He nudged the borrowed gelding over toward Dias’s mount. Above the gentle jingling of the fancy bridle trappings, he said, “I’m told Asper owed you money?”

“Not me. The lads. Wages for guard duty. I went to the house to find something to pay them with.”

“Any luck?”

“Didn’t have time. Some woman thought I was a burglar and went for me with a knife.”

Ruso could guess which woman that had been.

Dias carried on scanning the surrounding fields for the trouble that Ruso now suspected he was more likely to cause than to prevent. They were passing an overgrown track that led off to the left when he said, “That’s where the carriage was picked up. Stuck on a branch about twenty yards down.”

“Where does it lead?”

“A couple of farms. We asked around but nobody saw anything.”

Ruso walked his horse slowly forward between the lush grasses bowing in from either side. He stopped where the branch of an oak overhung the track. He could see no evidence of any attack that might have taken place here. The carriage could have been deliberately driven along the track to get it off the road-or the horses, with all night to wander about, could have meandered down here in search of a roadside snack.

Returning to the others he said, “While we’re out here, let’s see if we can see how Asper ended up on the river.”

Dias turned. The dark eyes seemed to be scrutinizing him, as if trying to assess how much he knew. Ruso forced himself to stay relaxed, knowing the horse might react to any tension, and Dias was not a fool.

Finally Dias said, “And what will that tell us, sir?”

Was there a whisper of insolence in the “sir”? Dias had had five years in the auxiliaries to practice being just the right side of insubordination. “Probably not a lot,” Ruso admitted. “But it’s your money, and you never know.”

Dias looked him up and down. “You haven’t got a bloody clue where the money is, have you?”

“Neither have you,” said Ruso, returning the candor, “or we wouldn’t be standing here.”

Dias’s face relaxed. “Move on!” he called over his shoulder to Gavo, the harness jingling louder as he urged his horse into a trot. “The investigator wants to look at the river.”

As the road approached the meandering river, it had been raised to cross flat watermeadows where the lowest patches were dotted with tufts of reed. Apart from the cover of the occasional willow tree, Ruso had to concede that it was a poor site for an ambush. The road was straight in both directions. The drivers of a couple of vehicles in the distance must have a clear and puzzling view of him and his escort, halting on each of the three bridges in turn. They could also be seen from the native farmsteads on the low hills around, most of which had been cleared of trees. There was a villa beyond a wood on one side of the road and, on the other, a grand stone memorial reminding travelers of some deceased landowner with plenty of money.

On the last bridge he stared into the dark water and watched long green fingers of weeds waving downstream. The river was no more revealing now than it had been when he had paused to inspect it on the way here. Still, on Asper’s last journey, it had been raining heavily. The traffic would have been lighter than usual and the visibility poor. If Asper had been attacked by men he recognized, they might have been able to get alongside before he realized he was in danger. There would have been no pursuit or ambush to alert his fellow travelers.

The water would have been higher with the rain too. High enough, perhaps, for a man to float downstream, abandoned for dead by assailants who needed to get away before someone else came along and saw what was happening. Farther along, Asper could have crawled out of the water. By morning he had gathered enough strength to frighten Lund’s children and steal his boat.