Requiem for a Slave Read online

  However, I was disabused of that. The tanner looked abashed. ‘My wife had left him out there as a punishment. She was so angry with him for staying out so long when he was supposed to be with you yesterday that she put him on short rations and shut him out all night. Gave him a pallet in the courtyard and told him to keep watch – that’s how he came to hear the noise, or he says he did. He only half-hears things at the best of times.’

  ‘What noise was this?’ I was more and more intrigued. Was this the famous green man come again?

  My neighbour shook his head. ‘Pay no attention, pavement-maker. I should have known that it was just his foolishness. You are clearly fit and well, so what does it matter what he thinks he heard? Very likely it was fancy, and there was no one here at all.’

  ‘All the same, I’d like to talk to him,’ I said. ‘I believe he sometimes sees more things than you suppose.’

  A strange expression crossed the tanner’s face. ‘For instance, he insists that he saw the army calling here and taking a body from your workshop, just after he came back from giving you the coals.’ He looked at me slyly. ‘In fact, I thought I saw the cart myself and the soldiers putting something into it, though I could not be certain that it was a corpse. After all, as I said to my wife, surely you would have mentioned it to us if you had a dead man on the premises – especially since you came to borrow light and coals from us.’

  I wondered how best to answer that without insulting him. ‘But if there was a body, you knew it wasn’t me,’ I said, evading his unspoken question by asking one myself. ‘Because you saw me leaving later on? So when my family arrived, convinced that I was hurt, naturally you were very curious?’

  He seemed oblivious of any suggestion that he might have been deliberately spying on my shop. ‘Exactly,’ he went on in his curious cracked tone, ‘and when I visited the shop – only to reassure your wife, of course – there was no sign that there had been any death at all, and your family clearly had no idea of one.’ He sighed and made a small dismissive gesture with his hands. ‘So I decided that Glypto was at his tricks again – which only goes to prove it’s no good asking him. So I shouldn’t bother, citizen.’ He paused. ‘Unless, of course, there’s something which I don’t know about?’

  So that was it. He knew about the cart and he was offering to trade: information about the identity of the corpse in exchange for a chance to ask Glypto what he’d heard.

  I abandoned all pretence at sorting stones and sighed. This tale would be all over Glevum before dusk. ‘Well, it is a little difficult . . .’ I began, thinking uncomfortably of Pedronius. ‘It’s a delicate matter and not wholly mine to share.’

  He interrupted me. ‘It concerns that decurion who came here yesterday, I suppose. People in high places – is that it, citizen?’ He tapped his nose as if to indicate that he could keep a secret if he chose.

  I clutched at the straw that he was offering. ‘Well, in a fashion, I suppose it is.’ It was not entirely a lie. Quintus could certainly be said to be involved. If the tanner chose to think there was something more to this and that I was somehow acting on the decurion’s behalf, that was hardly my responsibility – or so I told myself.

  My neighbour was looking expectantly at me. ‘The body of one of the rebels from the wood, perhaps? I wondered if it was, and that’s what Glypto saw. I heard a rumour that the ordo was resolved to sort them out before His Excellence returned, even if it led to executions without trial.’

  ‘The dead man was not a rebel,’ I said heatedly.

  ‘So there was a dead man?’ His tone was so knowing that I realized – too late – that I had made things worse and he was now convinced that I was conspiring with Quintus to conceal a death which might cause the councillor some embarrassment. There were obvious dangers in having that story circulate.

  I made a swift decision. ‘I’m afraid there was, though it wasn’t a criminal, or any of my household or family. It was not even a customer, in fact. It was Lucius the pie-seller, who happened by chance to be calling at the shop because I’d given him a few things recently.’

  ‘Great Mars! What happened?’

  ‘He was overcome quite unexpectedly, it seems, and died. And when you saw me with the turnips, I was on my way to tell his mother. She was happy that the army was going to bury him because she didn’t have the means of doing so herself.’ I was folding my cloak into a parcel as I spoke and putting it into a space below the counter-top (no doubt where Minimus had kept his knuckle-bones), so that I did not have to look the tanner in the face – although there was nothing actually false in this account. I simply hadn’t mentioned the most essential bits – murder, robbery and the disappearance of my slave.

  He looked rather disappointed. ‘Just a pie-seller? A man who might as easily have dropped dead in the street? And what has your wealthy customer to do with that?’

  He was too insistent – and too intelligent. I decided that the truth was now my best defence. I leaned a little closer, as though the paving-stones had ears, and murmured, ‘I wasn’t anxious for the news to get about, because I was working on a commission at the time and I was afraid the customer would cancel. It is Pedronius, and you know what he’s like. He might imagine that the work was cursed, because I’d come across the corpse right in the middle of constructing it. I was halfway through preparing the site to put it in when I came back and found the body in my shop.’

  He evidently revelled in the confidence. He nodded sagely. ‘I can see how Pedronius might worry about that. Just as well the mosaic wasn’t in your workshop at the time – but I can vouch that it wasn’t, if you ever should need me to. Might be worth a few sesterces to you some time, citizen.’

  I was on my guard. Was he attempting a spot of blackmail? ‘What do you mean by that?’

  ‘I would have seen it when I called in to see your wife last night, of course.’ He gave me a peculiarly furtive cross-eyed grin. ‘Funny a pie-seller should choose your workshop as a place to die. And to think that I was in there shortly afterwards and never knew.’ He tapped his nose again. ‘Well, I can see that you don’t want the story spread around, but – considering that I lent you light and embers yesterday – you might satisfy my curiosity at least. Where exactly did you find the corpse?’

  It was a kind of blackmail – of a moral sort. I tried to deflect it. ‘You could come in and I’d show you if I’d had the workshop cleansed, but, of course, I haven’t, and we don’t want to court ill luck.’

  It would take more than bad omens to put the tanner off. ‘I was in there with your family, so it makes no difference. I’ll make sure I ritually wash my hands and face and make an extra sacrifice to the household gods tonight.’ He gave me that one-toothed grin of his again. ‘Some of us are very careful about that sort of thing.’

  I knew when I was beaten. I could see what he would do if I refused to let him in – spread the story that my shop was cursed because I didn’t pay proper homage to the gods. ‘There is nothing particular to mark the spot,’ I said forlornly, but it didn’t help. He was already waiting at the door. I led the way into the inner room, crossed to the window space and took the shutter down.

  ‘Over there—’ I was about to gesture vaguely at the place when I stopped abruptly short.

  The tanner beside me caught his breath. ‘Great Mars and all the gods!’

  For there was something on the floor, almost exactly where Lucius had been. Something in a tunic and horribly inert. I had been right in my suspicion of a smell. There was a body lying sprawled out on its front and it was very clearly dead.

  The tanner turned to me. His eyes were strangely bright. ‘Is that the pie-seller? The army brought him back?’

  I shook my head, too full of shock and grief to speak, for I recognized the lifeless object on the floor. The last time I had seen it, it was a living man and he was shouting ‘Turnips!’ in the street.

  Seventeen

  I turned Radixrapum gently over, but I knew what I would find. The sa
me cruel biting mark of rope around the neck, the bruise where the ligature had been savagely pulled tight, the same protruding tongue and purpled face. But where Lucius had still been pliant and, if not actually warm, at least no more than cool, my poor turnip-selling friend was as cold and rigid as a stone image of himself. Already, over the scent of sweat and turnips, the distinctive sick-sweet smell of death was beginning to appear. He had been dead for hours – if I had not seen him myself the previous afternoon, I might have wondered if he’d been killed with Lucius.

  There were other signs as well that this was not a recent death. Blood was already pooling in his arms and thighs, as I could see where his tunic had ridden up them to reveal the flesh. I am no medicus, but I know that this occurs when the body has been lying in one place for several hours. But not this place, necessarily, I thought.

  I looked again. There was evidence of abrasion all across the skin, from his ankles to his armpits, as I soon ascertained, and on both front and back, though worse across his chest and around the tattered modesty binding that he wore round his loins. There was no doubt that the scuffing had happened after death. And the toes of the sandals had scraped fresh tracks on the floor, right across the area where the Apollo piece had been. Like the pie-seller, this man had been killed elsewhere and dragged in here afterwards.

  I let him roll back on to his front again, so that I was not obliged to look at his distended face, and stepped back abruptly. I was upset and furious. The death of Lucius had been a shock, but somehow this one upset me even more. I had not known the turnip-man very long or very well, but he had proved himself to be intelligent, and when I was in trouble, he’d set out to help: that was almost a definition of a friend.

  ‘Citizen!’ The agitated exclamation brought me to myself. The tanner was tugging at my toga in dismay. ‘This man did not just die. Somebody killed him! Strangled, I would say. Look at that red mark around his neck.’

  I had forgotten that he did not know the details of the earlier death. I nodded wearily.

  ‘Robbed him of his purse too, by the look of it,’ the tanner pointed out. ‘It has been chopped through at the cord where it was hanging at his belt.’

  I hadn’t noticed that, but it was significant. If Radixrapum had been killed and robbed last night, then Minimus was already locked up in a cell and could not have taken any part in it. I looked at the severed loop that the tanner was pointing at. ‘You are right, of course.’

  The tanner was delighted by his own cleverness. ‘So, pavement-maker, you are not the only one to notice things, you see,’ he said with glee. ‘Though you have a reputation for solving mysteries.’ Then he saw my face and asked more soberly, ‘But I see this person was a friend. Do you know who did this?’

  I shook my head. ‘I only wish I—’ I was interrupted by a noise outside. Almost without thinking, I picked up a heavy hammer from the table-top, ready, if necessary, to defend myself. ‘Who is it?’ I said loudly. ‘Come in and show yourself.’

  There was a moment’s silence and then the door was pushed ajar – and there was Junio, my adopted son. I dropped my makeshift club.

  ‘What is the matter, Father?’ Junio began. ‘You sounded quite alarmed. Were you expecting trouble? It is only me. Maximus is following. We have found the boy who . . .’ He caught sight of the body. ‘Dear Jove! Another one?’ He came over and peered more closely at the corpse. ‘And the same killer, by the look of it. The method seems to be exactly what you had described from yesterday.’

  The tanner looked from my adopted son to me with an expression of astonishment. ‘You mean the pie-seller was murdered too?’

  It was no good blaming Junio – he didn’t know my neighbour as I did – but I felt my heart sink to my sandal-straps. It would be extremely difficult to hush the tanner now – this story would be all over Glevum by tonight. Any chance of quietly locating Minimus and solving this before my patron came would almost certainly have disappeared – along with most of my likely customers.

  Junio looked apologetic, but it was too late. The tanner was already saying in his cracked and mumbling voice, ‘And you kept the knowledge from me?’ He was obviously aggrieved.

  This was going from bad to worse. He would spread rumours that I knew more about these murders than I wanted to reveal. I could imagine what my fellow citizens would make of that.

  There was no help for it. I seized him by the arm. ‘Of course I kept it from you.’ I almost hissed the words. ‘Be thankful that I did. It was obviously safer for you if you didn’t know. Look at the turnip-vendor. He knew that Lucius was murdered yesterday, and now see what’s become of him. Would you want to end like that? Can’t you see that we are dealing with a ruthless killer here?’

  The tanner had turned pale, even under the dark colour of his trade. ‘You mean he only died because he saw the other corpse? I knew that he was round here yesterday, but I didn’t realize . . .’ He tailed off. The morbid, gleeful interest was gone, and he was staring at Radixrapum now, his boss-eyes glazed with fear. ‘You think that he was killed so that he couldn’t talk?’

  I shrugged. ‘What other explanation can there be? He knew about the other body and what was done to it. That’s the only connection I can see between the two.’ In fact, I realized, this was no more than the truth, and it was disturbing. It did seem that Radixrapum’s death had been to silence him. And warn me to silence too. Why else choose my workshop as the place to leave the corpse? Or was there some other connection that I couldn’t see?

  ‘I suppose it’s possible the two of them were friends,’ Junio ventured in a doubtful voice. As usual, he had been following my thoughts.

  I shook my head. ‘I don’t believe so, from what Radixrapum said to me. He only knew Lucius distantly by sight – and that would accord with his reaction when he saw the corpse: shocked and appalled, but not personally upset. In fact, his chief response was curiosity, I think.’

  ‘And now he’s died for it,’ the tanner said, obviously beginning to apply this to himself.

  I nodded grimly. ‘It rather looks that way. Which means that all of us may be in danger too.’ I was increasingly aware that this was very likely true. ‘You, for instance, tanner. The fewer people who know that you’ve been here, the better for us all.’

  The tanner stared at Radixrapum. It was not a happy sight. ‘You’ll have to tell somebody about the corpse,’ he said. ‘You can’t just leave it here. Has he got family who’d come and bury him?’

  I realized that I did not have the least idea, or any real notion where Radixrapum lived beyond the fact that it was out of town. But it was likely that he had a wife and family, and possibly a plot of land where they could bury him – in that respect at least, he was distinct from Lucius.

  ‘I’ll report this to the garrison,’ I said. ‘They’ll have to sort it out. Radixrapum was a farmer so he probably paid tax. If so, the authorities will have a note of it. If not, no doubt they’ll send the army cart to move the corpse again.’ Thank heaven I had spent today in front of witnesses, I thought, and had a driver who could swear he drove me home the night before. I might have found it difficult to explain the presence of a second dead body in my workshop otherwise.

  The tanner had another unhappy problem on his mind. ‘Burial or carnal pit, it makes no difference. In either case, the killer will know that you were here.’

  I looked at him, surprised. ‘He’d know that anyway.’

  ‘Not necessarily,’ Junio put in. ‘If he was a comparative stranger to the town, he might have thought that no one was using the workshop currently – when Lucius was killed, it was mid-afternoon and there was nobody in sight. Though he knows by now the shop is occupied, since the first body has been moved away.’

  I was about to point out that he knew that anyway, because there had been work in progress on the floor, but I remembered the tanner’s wagging tongue and held my peace.

  ‘That’s right,’ the tanner said, referring to what Junio had said. ‘You go to the
army and you make it clear you’ve seen the corpse. If you are right about his motive for strangling this man, then you . . .’

  ‘Must be in danger too.’ I was ahead of him. ‘Exactly so. He must expect that I would come back to this room again – if only to arrange a ritual cleansing of the place – but he need not know that I had company. So, tanner, be careful that you don’t reveal the fact. If you value your own safety, and your family’s, it is essential that the killer doesn’t know that you were here.’

  My warning was hardly needed, it appeared. The tanner gulped. ‘You can rely on me. I shan’t say a word to anyone at all. Not even to my wife. In fact, if you’ll excuse me, I must get back to her.’ He made as if to move towards the outer shop and street, but as he reached the entrance he stopped and turned to me. ‘Though I shall have to think of something to tell Glypto, I suppose. Do you think that this strangling’ – he gestured to the corpse – ‘was what he heard last night? There was likely to have been a struggle, don’t you think?’

  I shot a warning glance at Junio, who seemed about to speak. ‘I’d like to talk to Glypto, as I said before,’ I answered. ‘He may yet know something that may be of help. If you could send him to me, I will deal with him – or, better still, allow him to go out to the midden-pile a little later on and I’ll keep a watch for him and try to meet him there.’ I didn’t mention that Glypto was expecting that.

  The tanner sighed. ‘Safer than having him come into your shop and see the corpse and put himself in danger as a consequence? That is sensible. I suppose the killer must be watching quite nearby, or he would not know that the turnip-man was here. Oh, great Jupiter!’ His cracked voice was getting higher and higher in distress. ‘In that case, he’ll see me leaving, as sure as Greeks are Greek. There’s no back entrance to your workshop as there is in mine. Oh dear Mars, I wish I’d never come.’

  I glanced at Junio. This was an outcome I had not foreseen. I had hoped that the tanner would make haste to leave, but, instead, it seemed I’d frightened him too much to go at all. ‘I’m sure the killer isn’t watching now,’ I said. ‘I was sitting for a long time on my own outside the shop, and there was absolutely nobody suspicious in the street. I would have noticed it.’