Ruth Downie - Ruso and the Root of All Evils

He had expected Fuscus to ask for some kind of private favour. Something medical and embarrassing and strictly confidential. The last thing he had anticipated was being held up in front of the whole town as some kind of military hero. The thought of any genuinely invalided veteran seeing him showing off up on the grand balcony at the public games made him shudder.

He was not a hero. He had chosen to rush home and desert his remaining patients in the Legion. He had wriggled out of his sworn loyalty to his Emperor with a half-truth. He should never have listened to Valens. He should have gone to his superior officer, explained the situation, and …

… and been told to leave his domestic affairs outside the gate and get back on duty.

Sometimes, no matter how hard a man tried, it was impossible to do the right thing.

He swilled the remainder of the wine around the cup. In Britannia, the work had been gruelling, but at least his duty was clear. Here, he was expected to stave off bankruptcy and ruin while helping with a political campaign and taking an interest in dowries, drains and dinner parties. In the midst of it he had foolishly promised to help find out about Cass’s missing brother.

He glanced out into the street in the faint hope that Tilla might be passing with the girls. Tilla, the barbarian woman who consorted with rebels and thieves, believed in ridiculous gods and cheated at board games. She had no clue about elections or dinner parties and was unlikely to know much about drains, but he drew some comfort from the thought that he could talk to her about them later in the privacy of a shared bed. In the meantime, he hoped her morning was turning out to be more enjoyable than his own.

The barman raised his eyebrows, offering a refill. Ruso shook his head and paid up. He would go and do now what he should have done in the first place. He would bypass Fuscus and all his slippery promises and machinations. He would go and announce his return to Severus and deal with him, man to man.

‘Not that one. The big one on the left — no, not that big! — down a bit.’

Tilla marvelled at the patience of shopkeepers. At first she had feared the girls were about to spend money the Medicus did not have. But by the time they had left a second salesman to reconstruct his disrupted display, she began to understand the game. In the faint hope of a sale, the shop staff would be obliged to pass over shoes and hairpins and earrings and necklaces and wait while the girls tried them on, craned their necks to see the effect in mirrors, giggled and then declared that this wasn’t quite what they were looking for: how about that one just above it?

‘This would suit you, Tilla,’ suggested Marcia, holding up a delicate gold chain with blue and green stones.

Tilla shook her head. ‘I am not buying today.’ Or any other day.

‘Try it on,’ urged Marcia, reaching across to drape it around her neck. ‘It’s just right with your hair. Go and look in the mirror and tell me that isn’t made for you.’

Tilla took off her hat and picked up the shop mirror. She was conscious of the salesman’s cynical gaze from behind the counter. They both knew she was only being allowed to sample the goods because he did not want to offend the young ladies. Still, it was not every day she had a chance to wear costly jewellery. She straightened her shoulders and eased down the neck of the dreadful yellow outfit with her forefinger so the stones would lie flat against her skin.

It was not a good mirror. Careless customers had damaged the polished brass surface, and the serious young woman staring back at her was softened around the edges by a thousand tiny scratches.

‘So,’ she said, watching herself frown and trying to repress the smile that followed, ‘you think a barbarian should wear one of these?’

‘Very nice, miss,’ offered the salesman. The girls said nothing. She wondered if she had offended them with the ‘barbarian’ remark. She put the mirror back on its ledge and glanced around, seeking their opinion.

They were not there. She blinked and looked around again. It was a small shop — just a lock-up booth built into the front of a house — and there was nowhere to get lost. Apart from the man behind the counter, she was quite alone. It seemed the girls had grown tired of waiting for her and moved on.

She stepped out into the street to look for them. A heavy hand landed on her shoulder. ‘Forgot something, miss?’

She had not noticed the guard outside the door. His grip tightened as she squirmed, trying to catch sight of Marcia’s green stole. To her surprise there seemed to be hardly anybody about. A rattle of shutters told her that the coppersmith’s shop opposite was closing. ‘I must go,’ she said, reaching behind her neck to grope for the fastening of the necklace.

‘Cash only,’ said the voice behind her. ‘No credit, and our master don’t take offers.’

‘I don’t want to buy it,’ she explained, struggling to find the fastening.

Behind her was a shuffle of leather soles on flagstones. ‘Let me help, miss.’

She felt a hand lift one of her plaits. ‘That’s a very expensive item, miss,’ said the salesman. ‘You don’t look to me like you could afford to buy it.’

‘I am not stealing,’ she insisted loudly, wondering where the sisters had gone. How long would it be before they realized she was missing? ‘I don’t want to steal. I forget I am wearing it. I have to go with those girls.’

‘Third one this week,’ said the doorman.

‘A lot of ladies forget to take off expensive items and wander out by mistake. That’s what we keep the door staff for, see?’

‘Well, now I am remember,’ said Tilla, her frustration spilling over into a struggle with the Latin. Arguing was so much easier in British, when she did not have to think about the words. In British, she would be able to tell this man what she thought of him. But there was nobody for hundreds of miles who could translate. ‘Keep your necklace,’ she said. ‘Let me go.’

‘Funny accent,’ said the salesman. ‘Can you understand what she’s saying?’

‘Nah,’ observed the doorman. ‘We don’t talk like that round here, miss.’

‘We’re about to put the shutters up for lunch,’ said the shopkeeper. ‘You can stay and explain it to us.’

Tilla took a long, slow breath. They were probably just teasing her, but in a strange land she had no way of guessing from their tone. Keeping her voice as steady as she could manage, she said, ‘Let me go. My friends will vouch for me. Their family is very important.’

‘Really?’

Was that a note of doubt in his voice? ‘Their father is Publius Petreius who built a big temple with an inscription. When everyone hear that you make one of their guests prisoner alone in this shop, how many rich ladies will want to come here and buy things?’

She hoped the fumbling at the back of her neck was undoing the fastener and not a prelude to something worse. Moments later she felt the stones slither across her throat as the necklace was removed. ‘There you go, miss,’ said the salesman, as cheerfully as if he had been trying to help her from the start. ‘Try and remember next time. If your friends come back we’ll tell them you were looking.’

Tilla stood on tiptoe at the crossroads. There was no green stole in sight. Neither of the women she stopped to ask had seen two girls answering the right description.

She turned right by the shrine on the corner, hurried on to the next crossroads and then right again. She thanked whatever gods might be listening that the Romans were so fond of squares and rectangles. If she kept choosing the same direction in this ants’ nest of narrow lanes, she would find herself at the other end of the jewellers’ street, and perhaps meet the girls coming back to find her.