Ruth Downie - Caveat emptor

Ruso strode back across the ruined garden and under the walkway. Swinging into the corridor, he almost collided with the expenditure clerk and barely stopped to wait for “Come in!” before bursting into Firmus’s office.

“You can’t arrest those three for forgery or murder,” he said, “but you’re responsible for inspecting milestones and tightening up on travel and transport, right?”

Firmus blinked. “Yes.”

“Does that include the Imperial post?”

“I suppose so.”

“And interfering with the Imperial post is a serious offense, yes?”

“Of course.”

“That’s how we nail Rogatus. Talk to Publius up at the mansio. Say you had an anonymous tip-off about people abusing the system and you want to help him clean it up. Dias is probably involved too, but if you can’t get him that way, have somebody check all the records of the Third Brittones. You may be able to get him for faking a medical discharge.”

Firmus’s eyes were bright. “And the magistrate-Gallonius?”

“I don’t know,” confessed Ruso. “He’s overcharging the mansio for supplies, but that’s not illegal. Maybe Metellus can come up with something.”

“It’s worth a try.” Firmus got to his feet. “Stay around in case my uncle wants to talk to you.”

Ruso doubted that the procurator would want to talk to him ever again, but he supposed he should comply. Thus he was standing on the edge of the governor’s landing stage and wondering whether any of the ships moored farther down the glistening Tamesis would take him back to Gaul when a figure materialized beside him. Metellus wanted a quiet word.

There was only one word Ruso wanted to hear from Metellus. “Is my wife’s name off that list?”

“I can’t forget what I know, Ruso.”

“Then I’m not interested in anything else you have to say.”

“I’m sorry you see it that way,” said Metellus. “I wanted to thank you. And to explain one or two things.”

On the way back to Valens’s house, Ruso passed the chamber where he had promised Mithras a lamb in exchange for a baby. Had that brief guardianship of another man’s child been a cruel joke? Some kind of retaliation for his neglect of the correct rituals? He didn’t know. Perhaps he should have prayed to a god who was more interested in women. And if Tilla was praying to Christos and he was praying to somebody else, would the great ones work together, or cancel each other out in a fit of jealousy? He didn’t know that, either.

What he did know now, but was still finding hard to believe, was that Metellus had been involved with the whole Asper/Camma mess from the beginning. Metellus had tried to excuse himself, of course. It had been “only prudent” to install an agent in Verulamium with orders to investigate the alarming rumor of some agreement between the Iceni and the Catuvellauni. It was not Metellus’s fault that Asper had chosen to flirt with Camma on the pretext of seeking information. It was certainly not Metellus’s fault that Asper had lost sight of his orders and instigated a full-blown affair.

“I broke off all contact with him as soon as I found out,” Metellus explained. “It was clear that the man had no idea where his loyalties lay. So when he sent the first message saying he was investigating something of interest, I didn’t reply.”

“You told me you didn’t know anything about an investigation.”

“I lied,” said Metellus smoothly. “I was hoping you would find out what it was, and you have. I suppose he was planning to expose the forgery in an attempt to redeem himself. It’s a pity we can’t execute the forgers, but it would be politically inconvenient.”

“So why are you telling me this?”

Metellus’s sigh sounded genuinely regretful. “Because you seem to think I’m some kind of magician, Ruso. You seem to think that I know everything and I’m in control of everything. And I want you to understand that I’m not. Frankly, sending in Asper was a bad decision, and I’m grateful to you for sorting out what was going on up there. So I promise to do my best to have your wife’s name taken off the lists, but you must realize these things are widely circulated and copied and to be honest, I can’t guarantee to catch every-what are you- Ruso!”

It was too late: Neither the arms milling in the air nor the shriek of “No!” could halt his fall from the edge of the landing stage. Ruso was only sorry the tide was in.

Back at the house, Valens was working his way through a queue of patients while Serena was scolding the nursemaid and the cook for letting a sticky twin hide under the couch with the honey jar. He found Tilla upstairs clearing out the box of baby clothes. Leaning casually against the doorpost, he said, “I’ve just thrown Metellus in the river.”

For a moment there was no reaction. Then she put the little pair of sheepskin boots down on the bed and stared at him. “What did you say?”

“I’m sure I’ll regret it, but not yet. How did he know you’d been given stolen money last autumn?”

He was not fooled by the blank look.

“I told you to get rid of it,” he said. “What did you do with it?”

She picked up one of the boots and slid a couple of fingers inside. “We needed food for the journey.”

“But I specifically told you-”

“Yes. But we were leaving, and it was a waste to throw money away.”

He bent and snatched the boot away from her. “Listen to me! This is important. Somebody must have reported you. Now he’s put your name on one of his bloody security lists and he doesn’t seem to know how to take you off it.”

There were tears welling up in her eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he said, thrusting the boot clumsily back into her hand. “I didn’t mean-it’s just that if I don’t frighten you, you don’t take me seriously.”

She picked up both boots and a soft woolen tunic and placed them back in the box. “I have let you down.”

He pushed the door shut behind him. “I asked you to do something, Tilla, and as usual you did the opposite.”

She did not answer.

“I’ve been trying to buy off Metellus by sorting out this mess in Verulamium, only that didn’t work, either, because when I asked you to stay at the mansio, you went off with the guards. Why do you do this to me?”

“Did he drown?”

“I doubt it. It wasn’t deep enough, unfortunately.” He slumped down on the bed beside her. “I can’t go on like this.”

She said, “There is something else I must tell you. Then we will decide about going on.”

He closed his eyes and lay back on the bed. He was not sure he wanted to hear anything else, but she began to speak anyway.

“After my family died and I went to live with the Northerners,” she said, “there was a man who would not leave me alone even though he had a wife already.”

“I know.”

“You do not know all of it. I found out I was with child. I told his wife. She brought a woman to help me.”

Help. A small word with a world of meanings.

“Afterward I was very ill. I think this is why you and I have no baby, and perhaps we never will, and I should have told you this before.”

He was conscious of his own breathing. It was almost hesitant, as if any sudden movement would shatter the fragile bond between them. He knew what she must be hoping to hear: something like, It doesn’t matter, or I don’t mind, or You are still a good wife to me. But it did matter, and he did mind, and he wished she had not told him. Metellus’s words came back to him: I can’t forget what I know.

“The Iceni said if I want to look after the baby I must go to live with them,” she said. “So now I am asking what you want. Because if you want a child of your own, and somebody who does what she is told, you must find a new wife.”