The Iron Hand of Mars Page 12

  “Sextus Juvenalis? I’m Didius Falco. The envoy from Vespasian.”

  “Oh I heard some worm had poked its head out of a hole on the Palatine!” He wrote with a quill. He would.

  Setting down the quill, meticulously balanced on the inkpot in a way that prevented drips, he bounced at me: “What’s your background?”

  I assumed he didn’t want to hear about my aunties in the Campagna. “National service in the usual stinking province, then five years as a scout.”

  “Still in uniform?” Army life was his only social yardstick. I could imagine him boring everyone rigid with his stubborn theories that traditional values, antique equipment, and dreadful old commanders whose names no one had heard of were unsurpassed by their modern equivalents.

  “Self-employed now.”

  “I don’t approve of men who leave the legions before time.”

  “I never supposed you would.”

  “National service lost its glint?”

  “I copped a tricky spearhead wound.” Not as tricky as all that, but it got me out.

  “Out of where?” he persisted. He should have been an informer.

  “Out of Britain,” I admitted.

  “Oh we know Britain!” He was eyeing me narrowly.

  I braced myself. There was no escape. If I dodged any more he would guess anyway. “You know the Second Augusta then.”

  Sextus Juvenalis barely moved, but contempt seemed to flood his features like new colour in a chameleon. “Well! You were unlucky!” he sneered.

  “The whole Second were unlucky—in a certain camp prefect called Poenius Postumus!” Poenius Postumus was the imbecile who had ignored orders to join battle against the Iceni. Even we never really knew what his motives were. “He betrayed the Second just as much as the rest of you.”

  “I heard he paid for it.” Juvenalis lowered his voice a semitone, overcome by horrified curiosity. “The word was, Postumus fell on his sword afterwards. Did he fall—or was he dropped?”

  “What do you think?”

  “Do you know?”

  “I know.” I was present. We all were. But what happened on that angry night is the II Augusta’s secret.

  Juvenalis stared at me as if I were a guardian at the gates of Hades with a downturned torch. He rallied soon enough, however. “If you were with the Second, you’ll need to tread carefully here. Especially,” he added heavily, “if you are Vespasian’s private agent!” I put up no attempt to quibble. “Or is it your fancy companion?”

  “So people have noticed Xanthus?” I smiled quietly. “I honestly don’t know his role. I prefer not to.”

  “Where did you acquire him?”

  “An unsolicited gift from Titus Caesar.”

  “Reward for past services?” the prefect sneered.

  “I suppose it could be for future ones.” I was ready to tighten the ligature: “You’re the best man to make excuses for the Fourteenth. Let’s talk about Gracilis.”

  “What’s to say?” Juvenalis queried in a light tone. He appeared to be taking the reasonable line. I was not fooled.

  “I need to see him.”

  “It can be arranged.”

  “When?”

  “Soon.”

  “Now?”

  “Not immediately.”

  I shifted restlessly. “October in Upper Germany is hardly the time or place for legates to be snatching unofficial holidays.”

  “He doesn’t ask advice from me.”

  “Perhaps he should!” Blatant flattery was also a failure. Camp prefect is an immodest rank; he thought it was his due. “Maybe taking advice is not your legate’s strong point. I hear he’s been making himself unpopular.”

  “Gracilis has his methods.” He defended his commander loyally. Nevertheless, I saw the flicker behind the prefect’s eyes—annoyance at the legate’s abrasive attitude.

  “So is he off with a woman, or moonlighting from the bailiffs?”

  “Official business.”

  “Tell me. I’m official too.”

  “It’s officially secret,” he jeered. He knew I had no comeback. Men like that can judge your status from the way you lace your boot-thongs. Mine must have been twisted the wrong way.

  “I have my orders, Prefect. If I can’t carry them out, I may have to send a query back to Rome.”

  Juvenalis let a thin smile play on his lips. “Your messenger won’t leave the fort.” I was wondering how much I could remember of the smoke-and-bonfire semaphore code when he forestalled me contemptuously: “You’ll find the signal station out of bounds.”

  “And I don’t suppose Moguntiacum keeps carrier pigeons?” I gave way with an air of grace I didn’t feel. But I preferred not to find myself in the tiny cells beside the main gate, rationed to one bowl of barley gruel a day. I changed tack. “I was sent here to take political soundings. If I can’t get a briefing from Gracilis, I’ll have to pick your brains instead. What’s the mood among the local tribes?”

  “The Treveri were roundly beaten by Petilius Cerialis.” Juvenalis ground it out in a tone which implied he was too long in the tooth to be openly obstructive, though he could easily spoil my mission if he decided to.

  “At Rigodulum? The Twenty-first Rapax did well for Cerialis there!” I replied, jibing at the XIV’s less notable contribution.

  Juvenalis ignored it. “The tribes have gone back to earning their living and keeping their nasty heads down.” This was unexpectedly helpful. No doubt he was hoping I would go out into the local community and offend someone there, to save him the trouble of smacking me senseless.

  “What are the staple industries hereabouts?”

  “Wool, shipping on the river—and ceramics,” Juvenalis informed me, striking a chord with that last one.

  “Cloaks, boats, and pots! Didn’t the rebel leader Civilis have family contacts in this area?” I asked. “I’m told his wife and sister stayed at Colonia Agrippinensium during the revolt.”

  His face set. “The Batavians come from the north coast.”

  “Spare me the geography lesson, Prefect. I know their habitat. But Civilis has made himself scarce from The Island and that whole region. I have to find him—I wonder if he’s been back south?”

  “Funnily enough,” Juvenalis replied, with some sarcasm, “we do hear of him being sighted from time to time.”

  “Really?”

  “It’s just rumour. He had a certain mystique among his people. When men like that die or disappear, you’ll always find fake versions.”

  He was right, up to a point. In the early days of the Empire, impersonators of tyrants were a constant phenomenon: Caligula, for instance, was continually being reborn among crazy supporters in exotic eastern states.

  “So you reckon these rumours of local sightings are all moonshine?”

  “He’s a fool if he comes anywhere near the Fourteenth!” The defection of their Batavian cohorts obviously rankled sorely.

  “Do you send out patrols to investigate?”

  “They find nothing.”

  I thought that did not necessarily mean there was nothing to find. “What are the chances rebellion will flare again among the tribes?” Juvenalis did not regard it as a function of his appointment to give political briefings, so I let myself speculate: “It’s the old joke still. If a Greek, a Roman, and a Celt are shipwrecked on a desert island, the Greek will start a philosophy school, the Roman will nail up a rota—and the Celt will start a fight.” He glared at me suspiciously; even as a joke it was too metaphysical. “Well, thanks—” I never finished, for the door opened.

  I should have expected it.

  Whether by coincidence, or, more likely, in response to a conspiratorial grapevine, several of the XIV’s men of influence were joining us. As I skewed round to inspect them, my heart sank. They all had a grim air of purpose. Among them I recognised Macrinus, the gilded senior tribune I had seen arguing yesterday with Justinus, my antagonist the primipilus, at least three other dour-faced centurions, and a
sturdy, silent man whom I guessed was their specularius, a post I had held once myself, when I had first carried out undercover assignments and studied interrogation—along with all the unkind techniques that speed it along.

  I knew what the presence of this sinister individual would have meant in my day. Still, perhaps things had changed.

  XXIII

  I was seated on a stool. They gathered round. The space became too cramped for me to rise. The small room grew warmer and darker. I heard a soft chink of bronzes on a groin-protector, too close for comfort behind my left ear. It was impossible for me to turn and see what movement had caused the noise. The tribune and the centurions stood with their hands resting on their sword pommels.

  I could feel the power that formed within a long-established legion. Messages passed with no visible effort. Councils of war almost summoned themselves. Internal conspiracies would be unbreakable by an outsider, and the men came equipped with menace like bear cubs—murderous from birth.

  Since it was his office we occupied, the prefect retained the initiative. None of the other centurions spoke.

  It was the tribune who started, however. The gilded Macrinus ran his free hand through his hair in a habitual gesture that emphasised the natural glints. “We have had a complaint from the legate’s wife about an intruder.” His cultured tones expelled the syllables as distinctly as if he had been spitting out seeds. He was a handsome, lazy-eyed, conceited hunk. I could imagine Maenia Priscilla scuttling with her troubles to this one. He was her own generation, her own rank. If she wasn’t already going to bed with him, I bet she wanted to.

  “A most gracious lady,” I murmured. He was daring me to call their legate’s wife a spoiled little cat. They all were. I could see the prefect’s fingers twitching for his quill, longing to write out a charge for disrespect.

  “Dogs like you call our tribune ‘Sir!’” Juvenalis spat.

  “Sorry, sir! I did apologise for intruding. I had thought the noble Florius Gracilis might be at home with a cold.”

  “The residence is out of bounds.” Camp prefects adore drawing demarcation lines. “Use the proper sources!”

  “The proper sources had proved unforthcoming, and I have duties for the Emperor.” Once again I was aware of a worrying movement behind me.

  The tribune burst out irritably, “Who is this inquisitive slob?”

  “A pest called Didius Falco,” the prefect announced. “He’s an ex-ranker from the Second Augusta. We ought to pass that news along the lines with the watchword.” I suppressed a groan. He had ensured that not a man in the legion would talk to me—and was probably preparing for me a worse fate than that. By curfew tonight I would be a soft target for every drunken muscleman who wanted to show off to the boys. “Now he works for Vespasian—as you would expect.” The allusion to the Emperor’s former command of the II in Britain sounded as caustic as Juvenalis could make it without disloyalty to his service oath. “But that’s all right,” he assured the gathering. “He’s not here to bother us. This idiot is going to annoy the locals searching for their rebel chief. He thinks he’s going to tame Civilis!”

  No one laughed at the joke.

  I sighed quietly. “I am, as it happens, charged to find a missing legate, but it’s Munius Lupercus, so the trail’s cold … Lads, I read your message. Members of the Second are persona non grata with your notable selves. I’ll go.”

  There was silence, but a shift in the light and colder air behind my shoulders told me the armed wall had parted. I stood up. They continued to crowd me, so I blundered against the stool as I turned. I felt surprised that no one jumped me. They meant me to be. They all enjoyed my nervousness, but they let me leave. Someone kicked the door shut. I expected to hear laughter, and when none came that was worse. I walked out on to the parade-ground, where bright autumn sunshine from low on the horizon streamed uncomfortably in my eyes.

  No one had touched me. But I felt as if I had been thrashed with knotted ropes by the entire legion at a ceremonial punishment parade.

  XXIV

  These cheerful events had taken up enough of the morning for me to stroll back to the tribune’s house, where we had agreed to meet for lunch. “I’m taking you out—I owe you a drink. There’s a tavern called the Medusa that’s been recommended to me…”

  Justinus looked alarmed. “Nobody I know drinks there!”

  I admitted that that was probably because his friends were much too cultivated types, then explained my reason for going. Justinus enjoyed being part of the investigation, so overcame his qualms. As we walked he enquired after progress.

  “I just had another encounter with the Fourteenth. They claim their man is away on official business, which is hard to disprove. But something is up. They overreact preposterously.”

  I warned him about the XIV’s ominous attitude towards me. Justinus was too young to remember detailed events of the British Rebellion, so I had to relate the whole sorry tale of how the II Augusta had been deprived of glory. His face fell. Apart from having a marked man for a house guest, he was probably as unimpressed as most people were by my legion’s contribution to history.

  * * *

  The Medusa was less attractive than I had hoped, though not so fusty as I had feared. It had the air of an all-night establishment that by day was only half awake. In fact, nowhere in Moguntiacum was open all night; the Medusa’s sleepy atmosphere at lunch-time was simply the result of being slackly run. The tables lolled against peeling walls like fungi clinging to ancient trees, and the winejars were grotesque misshapes from an inefficient pottery. It was full of boorish soldiers and their shifty hangers-on. We ordered the meal of the day, on the premise that it might be prepared freshly—a vain hope.

  It was just about warm enough to take a table outside in the fresh air.

  “Ah, meatballs!” exclaimed Justinus politely when the food came. I could see him fast losing interest. “Looks like rabbit…” In fact, the eats seemed to be the crudely minced remains of a worked-out, broken-down pack-mule that had died of grief and mange.

  “No need to worry what they may have used for flavour, as there doesn’t appear to be any…” The thought crossed my mind that my companion’s noble mother, Julia Justa, who already had a low opinion of what I had done to her beautiful daughter, was unlikely to form a kinder view of me if I finished off her son in a dive like this.

  “You all right, Falco?”

  “Oh, I’m fine!”

  Tribunes were a rarity here. The landlord had served us himself. He probably thought we were inspecting him—a task neither of us liked to face too closely. After a while he sent a barmaid to ask whether we needed anything. It was a question which had nothing to do with food or wine.

  “What’s your name?” I asked, pretending to go along with it.

  “Regina.” At this Justinus twitched excitedly, though not for the reasons she thought. (He knew from me that Regina was the name of the girlfriend of the missing legate’s missing slave.)

  “A queen!” I exclaimed to Justinus, so archly it was unbelievable. She loved it. I ordered another half-flagon, and told her to bring an extra beaker for herself.

  “She doesn’t seem to mind entertaining us,” Justinus murmured while she was fetching them. He seemed anxious that we might be treading on dubious moral ground by seeming to encourage her. My scruples about the Medusa were purely practical. I was only afraid we had risked eating those sordid rissoles while following a false lead.

  “Entertaining us is her job, and it doesn’t rule out a pretty complicated private life off duty. I’ll talk to her,” I added, switching into Greek as the girl came back with our wine. “Let me tell you some rules for living, lad: never play board games for money with strangers; never vote for the favourite candidate; and never trust a woman who wears an ankle chain…”

  “You’re the expert on women!” he replied wryly, in Greek that was more confident than mine. He had, at any rate, enough fluency to be rude without much effort.


  “I’ve been fended off by a fair number of barmaids, certainly…” Switching back to Latin, I joked with Regina; “Men’s talk! His Honour was complaining about me ruining his sister.” The dozy girl had forgotten a beaker for herself; she flashed a meaningless smile and trotted off again.

  Justinus kept his eyes on his bowl of rissoles (which certainly looked as if they needed cautious reconnaissance) as he continued in that lightly inflected, challenging Greek of his. “As a matter of fact, Falco, I would like to ask if this business of yours with my sister is serious?”

  My jaw set. “It’s as serious as I can make it.”

  He looked up. “That says nothing.”

  “Wrong, tribune. It says what you really want to know: no harm will ever come to Helena from me.”

  Our barmaid returned again.

  * * *

  Regina sat down, allowing us to go on talking among ourselves. She was used to men of commerce who finished their own business before trading with her. She seemed amenable to anything, in fact.

  Justinus and I both let our previous conversation drop.

  I ate as much as I could tolerate of the tasteless stew, then rinsed my mouth with wine. I smiled at the girl. She was a squat, flat-chested moppet with short red hair. Her shorn bob had curls of the “assisted” type much favoured by girls who serve up drink with less useful commodities. She wore a fairly clean white tunic and the usual glass-bead necklace and cheap serpentine rings, as well as the inevitable ankle chain I had referred to earlier. Her attitude seemed servile, but with suggestions of a defiant streak. Back in Rome I had a bunch of hard, contemptuous sisters. Regina reminded me of them. “Regina, do you know a bedchamber boy called Rusticus?”