David Wishart - Foreign Bodies

‘Yeah, thanks.’ I was frowning. ‘Florus was planning to massacre the merchant community here, yes?’

‘Probably only the actual Roman, or at least non-Gaulish, part of it – remember that Augusta is a colony – but yes, that’s right. Presumably, though, that would include any Gaulish merchants who were considered too hand-in-glove with the Roman authorities.’

‘Such as the Cabiri, for example? Who owed their citizenship directly to the imperial family and had their explicit patronage?’

‘Ah … yes. Yes, I suppose so. If you put it like that. You think it’s relevant?’

‘I don’t know. Maybe. It’s an angle to think about, anyway. And if you-’

‘Oh, hello, Marcus. You’re back too, then?’

I turned; Perilla was coming in from the lobby, still in her outdoor things. She looked bright, breezy and definitely chipper.

‘Yeah, so it would seem,’ I said a bit stiffly. ‘Have a good time?’

‘Marvellous, thank you.’ Bathyllus, as usual, had materialized out of the ether to take her cloak. ‘A barley water and honey, Bathyllus, if you will. I’m parched. Saenius Balbinus. Lovely to see you again.’

‘And you, Lady Rufia.’ He finished the last of his wine and stood up. ‘I was just about to go, actually. We’d done, I think, Corvinus, hadn’t we?’

‘More or less,’ I said: I wondered if, being the diplomat he was, Balbinus had sensed a slight Atmosphere and was making himself scarce before the crockery started flying. ‘Let me know, though, if you find anyone who can help.’

‘I’ll do that. And, of course, you will keep me abreast of the Drutus side of things? I’m not forgetting the coin, naturally.’

‘Sure. No problem.’ Not that I’d got any more leads there, either. Still. ‘I’ll see you around.’

He left.

‘Well, dear,’ Perilla said. ‘How was your day? Profitable?’

‘Frustrating, if anything. Unlike yours, from what I can see.’

‘Hmm.’ She gave me a long, slow look. ‘Still sulking, are we?’

‘I haven’t the slightest idea what you mean.’

‘Very well. Never mind.’ She sat down on the couch Balbinus had vacated. ‘No, my day was far from frustrating. The sanctuary of Lenus Mars was fascinating. An interesting mixture of the primitive and the civilized. And of course there were the healing springs. Crinas was especially interested in those, naturally.’

‘So he turned up, then?’

‘Yes, he did. As promised, and only shortly after I got there, so you can’t have kept him long.’

‘He probably ran all the way. Jogged.’

‘Perhaps he did. I didn’t ask.’ Bathyllus came in with the barley water and honey. ‘Thank you, Bathyllus.’ She glanced at the table in front of her, where Balbinus had set down his empty cup. It was the only one there, of course. ‘Oh, go on, Marcus, for heaven’s sake, don’t be silly! Have a cup of wine, if you want it.’

‘Yeah, but-’

‘I’m not completely heartless. I only thought it would be good for you to cut down a little in your own interests, which you seem to have done. Particularly on the way here from Lugdunum; you always seem to view a long coach journey simply as an opportunity to get drunk.’

‘I don’t get drunk. At least, not very often.’

‘You do; you just don’t show it. It doesn’t mean you have to abstain altogether or even keep to the four-cup rule, provided that you’re sensible. I never for a moment imagined you’d manage that as long as you have, anyway. Well done. Well done, indeed.’

I didn’t believe this; I just did not believe it! ‘Jupiter bloody God Almighty, woman! You mean I’ve been-?’

‘You feel all the better for it, don’t you? Admit it.’

Yeah, well, I supposed she had a point; maybe I should cut down a little in future. I got up, went over to the wine flask, poured myself a whopper, and carried it back to the couch, stopping to kiss her on the way.

‘That’s more like it,’ she said. ‘Now. Tell me about your day.’

I told her.

‘So the Cabirus side of things is definitely hanging fire for the present,’ I finished. ‘Although there may be some mileage in what Balbinus was just telling me when you arrived, about Florus planning to massacre Augusta’s mercantile community. At least, the Roman part of it plus the obvious sympathizers.’

‘How so?’ Perilla said. ‘I could see that there might be if the family had got wind of the revolt in advance and fled to Lugdunum beforehand for safety, but that’s not right; at least from what you’ve already told me I don’t think it can be. They left Augusta after the revolt, not before, and, unless I’ve misunderstood completely there wasn’t anything particularly fly-by-night about the move. While if everything was forgive-and-forget after the crisis was over it wouldn’t have mattered which side they were on. If any.’

‘Yeah.’ I frowned; she was right, of course, but there was something there that was important. ‘Don’t forget, though, that Diligenta’s – and Quadrunia’s – brother supported the rebels.’

‘The same argument applies, surely. He may have done, but that was water under the bridge.’

‘Agreed. Still, I’d like to know what happened to the guy. At present all we have is that he disappeared into the sunset and none of the family know where to. Or say they don’t, rather, which is a different thing entirely.’ I took a morose swallow of wine. ‘Hell. Leave it. It’ll come, with luck, if it’s important.’

‘How about the other thing? Balbinus’s two murders?’

‘Yeah; that’s a real poser. Drutus had to be crooked in some way for the whole assignation scenario to fit, only from all accounts – and accounts by people who knew him well, including his lady friend – he wasn’t. He didn’t seem to have any enemies, either; he was just an ordinary merchant. So why the hell should he end up with his throat slit at an ungodly hour in the middle of nowhere? And presumably have arranged to go there off his own bat? It just doesn’t make sense.’

‘What about the coin?’

‘Perilla, I don’t know, right? Balbinus was pretty definite about it not being Gaulish. He did think it might be British, sure, but that doesn’t mean much: Drutus was a merchant, and gold’s gold, whatever the markings. It travels, changes hands. He could’ve got it as part of a payment, from anyone, at any time.’

‘So why should he give it to his woman friend for safe keeping?’ She was twisting her lock of hair. ‘Of course, it could have had some significance apart from its monetary value.’

‘I thought of that.’ I took another sip of the wine: gods, but that was good! ‘Of course I did. Still, what sort of significance could it have?’

‘A token? Like the half coins that are passed down families as proof of inherited guest-friendship?’

I could see what she was getting at: splitting a coin is a good old Roman custom whereby someone on a journey can turn up at a stranger’s door, show his half of the coin as proof of his bona fides , and claim a night’s board and lodging: useful if you don’t want to pick up a cargo of fleas or a dose of gut-rot by spending the night at a roadside inn. And there isn’t any time limit on the deal either: some of those coins are passed down the generations, and the deal is still valid even if neither party has claimed their right in living memory.

‘It’s a possibility,’ I said. ‘But you hit the same problem: the guy was no one special, a merchant from Durocortorum, less than two hundred miles from here. Say for the sake of argument the coin was British, and by extension, if it was a token, there was a British connection. If we’d been on the other side of the country, near the Gallic Strait, and Drutus had trading interests with the tribes on the British side, then I could understand it. But as far as I know his trade was all with the legionary bases on the Rhine. He was a local, more or less. He didn’t go anywhere near Britain.’