Ruth Downie - Caveat emptor

Albanus caught him musing over a bag from the theater fund, a deposit that spread to three heavy boxes. “Tempting, isn’t it, sir?”

“Let’s not think about it,” said Ruso hastily. “The sooner we get out of here, the happier I shall be.”

Before long all the boxes and bags had been moved from left to right and had proved to contain more or less what Albanus had been expecting. “That’s rather pleasing, isn’t it, sir?”

“I’m glad you think so,” said Ruso. “I was hoping for an extra seven thousand.”

“You think Nico signed the tax money out and then brought it back?”

“Put that way,” admitted Ruso, “it doesn’t seem very likely.”

Albanus was leaning around the door again. “I can see Gavo up there, sir. He’s talking to the other guard.”

“Right. We need to do this quickly.” Ruso chose the position where the light was best, crouched to check that he could not be seen from outside, and sat with his legs stretched out on the cold floor and his back against the shelving. He unsheathed his knife. “Throw me over a bag from the ‘Orphans.’ ”

The heavy little bag landed in his palm with a chink. “Sir, are you sure you can see what you’re doing?”

“No,” said Ruso, prizing open the lid of the seal box, “but I’m going to give it a try.” The coins that cascaded into his lap glistened like a shoal of silver fish.

“It’s true what they say about metal, sir, isn’t it?”

“What?”

“That it reflects its own color. Whereas everything else shiny just looks white. If we got some gold out-”

“I’m not checking the bloody gold as well.” Ruso grunted, placing a coin on his palm and rocking it from side to side so the light caught the edges of the design. After the tenth coin he scooped them all up in his hand, tipped them back into the bag, and retied the cord. “I haven’t got time to do them all. That one can go back.”

Albanus picked up the wax candle. Meanwhile Ruso removed his left boot and took the seal ring from his middle toe.

Albanus glanced out the door before whispering, “It’s as well the guards didn’t search us properly, sir.”

“They’re worried about us taking things out,” said Ruso, reaching for the candle. “Not bringing them in. I just hope I’ll know what I’m looking for when I see it.”

Albanus cleared his throat. “Do you mind me asking exactly what you are looking for, sir? I mean, there wouldn’t be much point in them hiding the forged money down here, would there? They’d want to take it somewhere they could spend it.”

Ruso, busy resealing the bag, did not reply.

Albanus reached behind him and lifted the lid of the box labeled, “Road and Building Maintenance.” He was working the knot open from beneath the seal on the first bag when Albanus observed, “You know, sir, this is very odd.”

Another shower of silver fell into Ruso’s lap. “I’ll say.”

Albanus squinted at the holes in the seal box of the first bag and threaded one end of the cord through. “I don’t mean the being down here, sir. I mean keeping the money separate like this.”

“Really? It seems quite sensible to me.”

“But it’s completely unnecessary. It’s just a lot of extra work. If you know how much is in here, you just leave it all together and keep some working cash and separate records upstairs in the warm. That way you don’t have to come trotting down here in the dark every time the Council decides to give two sesterces to the orphans.”

Ruso stared at him. Then he abandoned the knot and tossed the bag across. “Seal that one up, Albanus. We’ve been looking in the wrong place.”

He found it in the theater fund: the oldest bags, faintly damp and dated from before Asper had even arrived in town. At least half the coins in the first bag he checked seemed to have blurring around the s of “Hadrianus.” The second seemed so full of forgeries that he began to wonder if his eyesight was failing in the poor light. “That’ll do,” he said, handing the bag across to Albanus for resealing. “Let’s get out of here. I’m-” He stopped. Someone was coming down the steps.

Albanus gave a squeak of panic and dropped the candle, which went out. The door hinges shrieked and Albanus cried out as the heavy oak door crashed into his arm.

A hefty figure in chain mail filled the doorway. “Sorry, sirs,” it said. “But I’ve been told to come and get you. Something’s happened.”

Ruso recognized Gallonius ’ S slaves among the men gathered outside Nico’s lodgings. Inside, the landlady looked at him and Albanus through eyes that were red and swollen. Ruso said, “What happened?”

She shook her head as if she could not bear to speak and blew her nose on a scrap of soggy linen.

“Are you all right? You’re not hurt?”

Another shake of the head. She pointed to the stairs. “Everyone’s up there, sir.”

It was not a big room and Gallonius and the doctor had already occupied what space there was beside the bed. Between them, Ruso glimpsed Nico looking more peaceful than he had ever known him to look. The doctor was busy explaining Nico’s mysterious illness to Gallonius, concluding, “So I gave him something to help him sleep.”

Gallonius’s deep voice lent just the right tone of gloom to, “A tragedy.”

Ruso stepped across to the empty brazier in the corner. The metal was still warm. He said, “He’s been murdered.”

The doctor groaned. “You again.”

“We’ve had a tragedy, Investigator,” Gallonius explained. “The quaestor was ill, took a sleeping potion, and was overcome by fumes from the brazier.”

Ruso squeezed past him to get to the window. “He must have come in this way,” he said, examining the edge of the shutters. The dog that had been indoors last night was back on its chain in the yard. It gave a hoarse bark, as if it had worn itself out already. The ground was too hard to betray any footprint of a ladder, but, “You can see where he’s forced the latch.”

The doctor said, “Magistrate, please have this man removed. He does nothing but interfere.”

Ruso said, “He wouldn’t have gotten past the dog if he’d come through the house.”

The doctor said, “As I was saying, sir-”

“Somebody tried to kill me the same way last night.”

“What?” Gallonius turned around as fast as a man his size could manage.

Ruso explained. “The guards are over there now questioning the staff.”

Gallonius looked shaken. The doctor looked sorry that the attempt had not succeeded. “You’re suggesting somebody climbed in through the window here carrying a brazier full of hot coals? You don’t think the dog and half the neighbors would have noticed?”

“The brazier was already in here. All the killer had to do was bring up a few lit coals and arrange the others round them. Nico was doped, so he wouldn’t have woken up.”

The doctor squared his shoulders. “Are you saying this was my fault?”

“No,” said Ruso. “He wasn’t ill, but he was very anxious. I’d have prescribed some light reading and given him a sleeping potion myself.”

The doctor gave a sigh of exasperation. “If you hadn’t interfered, he would have been less anxious.”

“Yes,” said Ruso. “I know.”

“The investigator was just doing his job,” insisted Albanus.

“Quite,” put in Gallonius. “I have no words left to express how appalled I am by this latest news, Investigator. But there’s no need to jump to conclusions here.” He moved a little sideways to allow Ruso a better view of the bed. “Look underneath.”

Anticipating nothing more than a brush and a chamber pot, Ruso crouched. Brush and chamber pot were still in place, but in front of them was a familiar-looking linen bag filled with something that made it bulge in odd places. He dragged it out, blowing off the dust that had accumulated under the bed. The seal had been broken but a small bone tag was still threaded on the cord. It bore the message: “Satto, the kalends of July.”