Ruth Downie - Ruso and the Root of All Evils

‘What meeting?’

‘Of the Christians, my lord.’

‘What’s Tilla been doing meeting with Christians? Where?’

Galla lifted a hand and pointed towards the window. ‘Next door.’

‘And this was the so-called family you took her to visit last night?’

‘Yes, my lord.’

‘I see.’

She stood motionless, staring at her feet.

‘How far has this superstitious nonsense spread? What about the rest of the staff?’

‘There is only me, my lord.’ He could barely catch her words. ‘I have not been very brave at sharing the good news.’

‘But you have been sharing it with Tilla.’

Galla lifted her chin. ‘She is alone in a foreign country, my lord. I — it is a comfort to her.’

‘Alone in a foreign country.’ Ruso felt his fists clench. ‘She was vulnerable! You had no right to prey on her like that. These Christos people are …’ He broke off. ‘The business about orgies and sacrificing babies isn’t true, is it?’

‘They are kind to each other, my lord. They share what they have and feed the poor. They nurse the sick and wait for Christos to return.’

‘And while they’re waiting, they break up marriages and run off with young women who don’t know any better.’

Galla’s eyes drifted shut and her lips moved as if she was muttering to herself.

‘You’d better not be praying to your god in here.’

The eyes opened again.

‘You know the sort of good news I want?’ demanded Ruso. ‘I want to hear that the people I’m responsible for are safely back home. And then I want to hear about a religion that doesn’t cost a fortune, doesn’t take up too much time and expects its followers to do what they’re bloody well told.’

Galla swallowed. ‘My lord, in one of the letters from the saints it says — ’

‘I don’t want to know,’ he said, ‘and if you want to remain part of this household, neither should you.’ He paused. ‘You haven’t got any religious stuff around the house, have you?’

When she did not reply he repeated the question. After another silence he lowered his head into his hands. ‘Get rid of it, whatever it is. No, on second thoughts — bring it to me and I’ll get rid of it. I never thought I’d have to say this, Galla, but I don’t trust you.’

Ruso did not normally waylay his dinner guests before they arrived, but he needed a private word with Lollia Saturnina. So private that she asked the slave who was carrying her indoor shoes to walk twenty paces behind them through the olive grove.

‘We’ve had a slight problem at home,’ he said, noting with approval the simple elegance of her dress and the absence of flashy jewellery.

She said, ‘Severus, or another one?’

‘Another one,’ Ruso confessed. ‘In the course of sorting it out, I’ve been warned that you have an infestation of Christians.’

‘Really? Are you sure?’

‘A couple of our people went to a meeting on your property two nights ago.’

‘A meeting?’

Ruso hoped the feeling of light-headedness was the result of rushing to intercept Lollia after hasty bathing on a very empty stomach, and not something to do with the contents of the water bottle. He said, ‘Apparently they came across some chap there, and he’s enticed them away with him.’

‘Are you quite sure? We haven’t got anybody missing.’

‘We’ve lost two,’ said Ruso. ‘Four now, because Lucius has taken our stable lad and gone to look for them.’

‘I’ll have a word with the staff,’ she promised. ‘I’ve never heard of Christians stealing people before. Aren’t they supposed to look after one another and feed the poor?’

‘I don’t mind them feeding the poor,’ said Ruso, annoyed that she was failing to see the point. ‘Even if it does encourage scrounging. And I don’t mind what rubbish they believe. I can even put up with them being a secret society and thinking their god is better than everybody else’s. But they can’t go running off with other people’s …’ He paused. ‘With other people’s people.’

‘No, that’s quite unacceptable,’ agreed Lollia.

‘They’ve been hiding things in the house here as well. You might want to have a look around your own place in case there’s another crack-down.’

‘I will.’ Lollia paused to inspect the olives forming amongst the slender leaves. ‘I’ve never understood why people make a fuss about the Christians,’ she said. ‘Surely nobody really believes they burned down Rome?’

Ruso shrugged. ‘Who knows? If they steal people’s … people, who knows what they’ll do next?’

Brother Solemnis’ mules clopped over the long wooden bridge into Arelate as if they had not noticed that it was only held up by a row of boats moored to two posts. His passengers were wide-eyed: Cass staring at the gleaming expanse of river flowing beneath them, and Tilla wondering what would happen if the mooring-ropes broke.

‘Everything’s bigger than I thought,’ whispered Cass. ‘We should never have come.’

Tilla, who was feeling the same way, was not going to admit it. ‘If we had never come,’ she said, ‘we would not know about the beautiful wide river and the strange bridge that will still live in our minds when we are old and grey and our teeth fall out.’

As she spoke the cart lurched over a bump, and she grabbed at the side to steady herself.

Relieved to be safely across, she shook the dust of the journey off her borrowed straw hat, scowled at the sight of yet another amphitheatre rising above the red roofs of the town and observed, ‘My friend and I need beds for the night.’

She saw a blush spread up the back of Brother Solemnis’ neck. He only just halted the mules in time to avoid ploughing into four slaves carrying a litter out of a side street. She tried again. ‘Brother, we need beds.’

Brother Solemnis seemed to be having trouble speaking. Finally he blurted, ‘But what will Mother say?’

Cass leaned forward and explained gently, ‘My friend is hoping you can recommend an inn where we will be safe.’

The blush grew deeper. Finally the lad managed to stammer out a name. ‘Run by a woman,’ he added, as if this might make it safe for them, although not for a defenceless young man. As if to make sure he was rid of them, he said, ‘I’ll take you.’

The woman at the Silver Star Inn seemed delighted to welcome them. She was probably bored with only a sleeping cat and cobwebs for company.

Tilla had long since discovered that the price and quality varied in a place like this, but the basic offering did not. During the journey through Gaul, she had once sighed over yet another insipid cup of watered wine and asked whether there wasn’t something else. The owner, who seemed pleased to be asked, took so long to list the wonders of all the other wines on offer that she wished she had kept quiet. Even the water had to be praised. It was from his own spring, fit for the gods themselves, with the very taste of ambrosia. Realizing he had not understood the question, she had asked if there might be beer, or mead? How about sweetened milk?

The bartender had looked at her as if she had just insulted his children, and said, ‘This is Gallia Narbonensis, madam. We are not in the north now.’

This rejection of beer seemed a peculiar form of obstinacy, especially now that Tilla had found out how wine was produced. But even Cass, to whom she had confided her quiet longing for a long draught of barley beer, had reacted as though her boredom with the subtle and complicated tastes of Gaul were something about which she would do well to keep quiet. So when the usual watery offering turned up in cups that were none too clean, Tilla accepted it with a smile. Then she admired the cat, kicked Cass to stop her staring apprehensively at the cobwebs and began to ask questions.