Ruth Downie - Tabula Rasa

One account of a boy walking east along the road at about the time Branan vanished sounded promising, but the observer, a thatcher, could not remember whether there was one soldier with him or two. It was supported by a woman who had recognized Branan hurrying along in the company of a single legionary. Since the boy seemed to be going quite willingly, she had assumed it was the Medicus and that “things had been patched up.” Closing her eyes, she added, “He might have had . . .” Ruso did not understand the word. Something to do with his legs. “Stocky,” translated someone who was listening from the next table in these less-than ideal conditions. “Muscular.” That might point to the thickset quarryman, whose name was Festus, but they had confirmed his alibi, and besides, after all the training runs, there were very few men in the Legion who did not have noticeably muscular legs. Ruso wrote it down, took her details, and said someone might be in touch.

“But I’ve told you everything I know. I don’t want you people coming round pestering. I haven’t got him, poor lad.”

“I know,” said Ruso. “Neither have we.”

The next report came from north of the wall and might be something, or it might be a man quarreling with his son. The boy had not been restrained in any way and had stayed to argue.

To the woman who complained that this was a waste of time if he wasn’t going to do anything about it, he explained again that search parties were already out there and every sighting would be followed up. Finally he confided that he was as frustrated as she was, and moments later heard her telling someone that the Roman was useless. He had no more idea of what to do than anybody else did.

To the man who told him that Branan was on a wagon headed for Pons Aelius and now had dyed red hair and new trousers, while the soldier had changed into civilian clothes, he said, “Did the boy have a gap between his teeth?”

“I couldn’t see his teeth.”

“How did you know it was him?”

“There was something about the man. I didn’t like the look of him.”

Ruso hoped Tilla was making better progress than this. He wrote it all down, because these people had had the decency to give up part of their morning to try and help. At least it was better than the last time he had helped to find a missing person. The man had been not only an adult but a tax collector, and he and Albanus had been reduced to knocking on doors and promising rewards to persuade anyone but the man’s wife to care.

While Ria served pastries that were still warm from the oven, the witness who had seen someone he didn’t like the look of was followed by a woman with a sagging face and burrs stuck in her hair. These were presumably there by accident rather than design. A smell of stale sweat wafted across the counter as she whispered in Latin with the accent of somewhere warmer, “It is not me, Doctor. It is a friend.”

“That’s fine,” he assured her. “Thank you for coming. Just tell me your friend’s name and what she saw.”

“No names.”

“Just what she saw, then.”

“It is the spirits,” the woman whispered. “They speak to her.”

“Spirits?”

“Of the departed.”

No wonder there were no names. She was not going to risk an accusation of illegally summoning the dead. “What do-what did they say?”

“They see a boy like him you seek. He is lost.”

He supposed even spirits sometimes stated the obvious. “Do they know where he is?”

“Ah, not in this world.”

He made a shooing motion to Virana, who had edged toward him clutching a carrot she was supposed to be scraping and was pretending not to listen. When she was gone he said softly, “The spirits think he is dead?”

“He is all alone.” The woman clutched at her chest and put her head on one side. “He cries out, ‘Mother! Mother!’ ”

Conversation around them had stilled. People were turning round to watch. It was hard to know what to say next, except to tell her to go away and stop wasting his time with frightening nonsense. “How did he get to the next world?”

The woman placed her forefinger at an angle across her left eyebrow. “A terrible blow, Doctor. Even you could not save him. He fell crying out, ‘Mother! Mother!’ ”

“And when you heard him cry out-”

“My friend heard it,” she corrected him. “A friend who does not want to call up spirits. But for the sake of this boy and to help the Legion, she has bravely sacrificed a good black lamb and opened herself to their presence.”

“That’s very decent of her,” said Ruso. “Is there anything else she can tell you? Where the body is? Who did it?”

“Why do you not write this down?”

“I’ll remember it,” he promised.

The woman informed him very seriously that the culprit was a gray-haired centurion with the Sixth Legion and that the body lay under some trees on a hillside overlooking a beautiful river. No, the spirits knew neither what sort of trees nor which river. But the sun was shining.

He thanked her and proffered a final question. “When the spirits heard the boy calling out,” he said, “what were his exact words?”

The woman frowned. “ ‘Mother! Mother!’ ”

“I see. Thank you very much. That’s been very . . . interesting.” Especially the part about a native boy calling for his mother in Latin.

“The lamb was very costly.”

“Then it’s especially generous of your friend,” he said, drawing back and slapping his writing tablet shut. “Give her our thanks.”

“She has no money left.”

“She has our gratitude.”

“Hah!” The woman withdrew and spat on the floor. Someone at the next table called, “Never mind, missus. At least you got a free drink.”

The show was over. People were standing now, gathering up coats and bags and beginning to make their way out. Ria was grinning at him from the far corner. It was a grin that said she would not be asking for compensation, because if he wished to retain his wife’s lodgings, he would be paying for all the drinks and pastries.

He did not have long to dwell on this. On turning to pick up his notes, he was greeted by the sight of a large hand covering them. “My brother is still missing,” said Conn in his own tongue. He leaned across the counter, picked up Ruso’s cup, and sniffed the dregs.

Ruso felt his fists tighten.

“Are you going to look for him or sit here drinking fancy wine all day?”

He fought down the temptation to rearrange Conn’s nose. As calmly as he could manage, he said, “I have a list of ideas to follow up. Can your people deal with some of them?”

“We can deal with all of them.”

“I’ll pass them on in just a moment,” he said. “First we need to talk about my wife’s friend. The girl from Eboracum who works here.”

“What about her?”

“She’s been insulted.”

“Not by me.”

“You were there.”

Conn shrugged. “She’s a whore. We need to talk about my brother.”

“She’s been doing her best to help find your brother. You should go and thank her.”

Conn opened his mouth, failed to think of a response, and gave a derisive bark of laughter. It was not very convincing.

“When you’ve thanked her, we’ll talk about where he might be.”

The Briton’s eyes narrowed. “Your fancy officer said you had to help us.”

“She’s in the back room. Make it sincere.”

Conn lifted his hand and glanced down at the notes he could not read. Then he turned on his heel and strode toward the back of the bar.

Tilla wished she had brought a second writing tablet. Her letters were always larger than she would like, and she struggled to keep them in line at the best of times. Now the wax of the tablet that had caused such amazement at the farm-a local-born woman who could write!-was scarred with stabs at names that she would have trouble reading back later. There were large smoothed patches too. One had been the name of the man who passed the rumor on to Virana, but who turned out to have heard it from his wife, who had already been named as a source by two of Enica’s friends-and so it went on, the story of the story looping round and tailing back and blundering into dead ends where the person they needed to see was somewhere else: visiting relatives, trading, or out helping with the search.