I was so astonished at this unexpected news, that I called out to Gwellia in delight. ‘The Fates have spun a lucky thread for us. Esa can guide us to the property. He knows where to find it.’
I had spoken in Celtic, and the man’s wife heard me too. ‘You’ll take him on the ox-cart?’ she said, delightedly. ‘He can go on to Aquae Sulis and buy supplies for us – that would be wonderful. Things like flour are so much cheaper in the town. And perhaps he could bring back a pair of live hens, too? We used to have some until quite recently, but we were forced to eat them when times got very bad – and ever since we’ve sorely missed the eggs.’
‘And how would you have me bring them back again?’ Esa was clearly unimpressed with this idea. ‘Bad enough to manage what we bought with Caeder’s sale – cooking pots and turnips – but live poultry and a sack of flour? On my back for twenty miles, like some beast of burden, I suppose? Or give half the money to some farmer on the road, for the privilege of riding in his cart?’
‘It might be worth the outlay, given such a chance,’ she said, stoutly. ‘When will you next get free transport halfway to the town? And you’ll have to make your annual visit sometime, anyway. Make a day of it, and get everything we need.’
‘And where do you suggest I spend the night? The slave-trader gave me floor-space, last time, but only because I had a boy to sell. There’s a room at the temple, where travellers can go, but that’s reserved for pilgrims to the shrine and one would be expected to provide an offering. I always could sleep beside a hedge, of course, I’ve done so many times, but you don’t want your provisions spoiling in the dew – or worse still, in the rain.’ He shook his head. ‘Better for me to simply guide our visitors and then come straight back here, while you bargain at the crossroads as you always do. I’ll go to Aquae Sulis when we’ve been paid the rest for fostering the children for a half a moon. Then, perhaps, we can afford these little luxuries.’
His wife was disappointed and she shook her head. Kennis saw the gesture, and came hurrying across. ‘They won’t agree to have the children?’ she enquired. I had forgotten that she would not have understood a word.
‘Not at all,’ I reassured her. ‘That is now agreed.’ I explained the source of the discussion and she made a face at me.
‘Couldn’t Esa use the mule to take his purchases? Minimus could go with him and bring it back to us.’ She glanced towards our hosts. ‘I suppose it’s always possible that something unfortunate will happen to the beast – or even to the slave – but it seems a tiny price to pay to have a guide. Otherwise we will be forced to ask someone locally, possibly revealing who we are. Besides—’ she gave me her most charming smile – ‘it’s not only Esa’s family who will benefit if Esa gets to town. Marcellinus will flourish better on rye flour and fresh eggs.’
Put like that, I could hardly disagree, though I was reluctant to part with Arlina, even for the necessary day or two. I had been planning to use her to ride into town myself, mostly to make enquiries about Eliana’s husband and her farm, but also partly out of curiosity. I had never been to Aquae Sulis in my life, though I knew its reputation, naturally. It is famous as a place of religious pilgrimage, with a temple and bath complex at the heart of it – and an associated market settlement has become a busy town, straggling towards the fortified river-crossing further north.
But it was not the thriving market which attracted me. I’d been hoping to visit the fabled spring myself and see if it was true that Minerva Sulis really sent hot water bubbling directly from the earth. If so, no wonder people come from miles around to offer sacrifice and pray at the shrine for justice or good luck; such a marvel would be proof of supernatural hands at work. It’s probably just rumour, but I would like to know for sure. I’m not a follower of Roman goddesses, but I’d be tempted to purchase a curse-tablet of my own, directed at whoever had caused my patron’s death, once I was certain that a deity was there!
Such plans, however, would clearly have to wait. My most important task was to get my party safely to the farm and this was too good an opportunity to miss. Kennis was looking expectantly at me, so I turned to Esa and his wife. ‘It has been suggested that Esa might travel down with us, and then use the mule to go to town and bring back purchases. We do have panniers for her, as you see – and once we’re at the farm, we can unload, of course. Would that be satisfactory? We can collect the animal when we return – provided that you feed and water her meanwhile. It would be a great deal easier than your journeying on foot.’ I did not suggest involving Minimus. There were too many hazards on the road – and once we’d found the farm we’d need our slaves in any case.
For a moment I thought the trapper was ready to refuse – or perhaps to haggle, in the hope that I would pay him extra for his time – but his wife was already nodding eagerly. ‘So you get transport both ways, husband, and they get you as a guide. What could be better? Now, joint that hare for me and I will put it in the pot, and the stew will be ready by the time that you return. If you set off quickly you will be back by dark, now that you have an animal to ride.’ She turned to me. ‘And tell your Kennis that I’ll go down to the stream and cut some fresh new rushes for her children’s beds and Esa will find some skins to cover them – they’ll be as comfortable as little emperors.’
I doubted that, in fact. Marcellinus was accustomed to a frame-bed, with a pillow and cover stuffed with down from ducks – though he’d slept well enough last night on nothing more than straw. But looking at him now, chasing the little wooden image of a pig which one of the other boys had tied onto a string and, when it was jerked away from him, toddling laughing after it with his unsteady run, I could see that he would be healthily tired long before tonight. So I nodded and translated, not quite word for word.
Gwellia had been listening to all this, of course, and she sprang to her feet. ‘Then if that is decided, let us call the slaves and depart as soon as possible. The earlier Esa reaches town, the more chance he can get home before it’s dark. The first part will be slowest, I’m afraid. The ox will not be hurried – so the sooner that we get him yoked onto the cart, the better for us all.’
Esa nodded and whistled to his sons. Our slave-boys came running too – they’d been at the spring, watering our animals – and a whirlwind of activity ensued. Everybody helped and by some miracle – perhaps Minerva Sulis was active here as well – within a half an hour we were ready to depart. Caeder’s mother stood beside the cart, cradling the infant in her arms, and Gwellia handed her the roll of rags and the single change of clothing that we’d contrived to bring – much needed by both children by this time, of course. They were received with so much pleasure that you would have thought that we’d provided new garments for the whole household here.
‘I had wondered how I’d manage to keep them dry and clean,’ the woman said. ‘But I’ll rinse their old clothes in the stream this very day. And Esa, see if you can bring me a bronze needle from the town, so I can mend the boy’s tunic where he tore it earlier. The bone one that you fashioned me has broken at the eye.’
Esa, who had hauled himself up beside me in the cart, muttered that he would, but he hoped that there was nothing else she wanted in the town, otherwise four silver pieces would not stretch to everything.
‘Then take some skins with you,’ she said. ‘There will be lots of room, now that the children are no longer on the cart. You might find someone who wants to buy direct – I’m sure the trader that you deal with now only gives you half of what he gets for them.’
‘If the citizen is willing?’ he murmured doubtfully. But she had already unhooked the pelts of an otter and a squirrel that were nailed to the wall, and passed them up to him.
Gwellia and Kennis were in their place by now – no longer sitting on the wooden form but stretched out in more comfort on the straw mattress (or what remained of it), under the protection of the wicker frame. I signalled to my slaves. Minimus tethered Arlina to the cart again, then he and Tenuis squeezed in as before – though, as the woman had predicted, there was far more room for all.
So we were ready and would have gone at once, had not Marcellinus caused a short delay. He seemed to realize that we were going to leave him there. He dropped the buzz-bone he’d been playing with and came rushing to the cart and – when he wasn’t lifted into it – burst into furious raging tears, stamping his feet and bellowing inconsolably. For a moment I feared that we would have to stop and take him after all, but then the oldest boy came out and took him by the hand and led him off to show him how to bait a trap. Thankfully, the crying stopped at once and as we shambled off Marcellinus did not even glance at us again.
Esa shook his head. ‘Dependent on his mother! And he must be two or three! I sometimes think the ancient Celtic system was the best, when children were farmed out to relatives, so that their parents didn’t bring them up at all, and they learned independence from an early age. But that’s all disappeared – like many of the fine traditions of our ancestors. The most you hear of these days is what we’re doing now, wet-nursing an infant who is no kin at all for money, and only for a year or two at most. The Roman way, I suppose. But it will do your grandson good to be more self-reliant – and a little less indulged.’
I did not translate for Kennis. I had seen her face when her son began to cry and thought that she was going to start to weep herself – though when he was so easily consoled, she was still more upset because he’d forgotten her so fast. It would not be tactful to share Esa’s views, so I changed the subject. ‘How far is this estate that we are looking for, trapper?’ I enquired.
He squinted at the sky – still blue and cloudless after yesterday. ‘Eight or ten thousand paces, possibly. With luck we might be there by noon,’ he said.
We did a little better than that, in the event – partly because there wasn’t a great deal on the road. We did encounter an ox-cart here and there, and once a fancy travelling gig with outriders which forced us to the verge, but aside from an errant herd of cows which seemed to have escaped and a couple of imperial couriers who galloped past at speed, we saw almost no one else except pedestrians.
We had been travelling for perhaps four hours or so – no constant stopping for the children’s needs today – and had fallen into a sort of silent reverie, each lost in our own thoughts, when Esa startled me by shouting suddenly, ‘That’s it! That’s the place, I’m almost sure of it. I recognize that hillock and that fallen oak. And there’s the house, look, you can see it through the trees.’
I looked where he was pointing and whistled in surprise. Whatever picture I had formed of Eliana’s home, it wasn’t this.
It was a proper Roman villa, though on a modest scale: a handsome pillared central doorway and a range of rooms each side, with small upper storey (almost certainly for storage and a sleeping-space for slaves), all fronted by a little courtyard with a gated entrance arch and what had clearly once been a shelter for a gatekeeper, though – like the wall which ran around the house – it was in ruins now. There was even a broken statue and a fountain in the court. Hebestus had been right. This had clearly been a very prosperous household at one time.
I glanced around at the surrounding land. There was evidence of what had been a sort of orchard once, and traces of straggling crop-rows in the fields either side, though these were now either barren or wholly overgrown. Here and there gaunt blackened trunks remained, towering over the surrounding undergrowth – silent evidence of that ancient fire, which no one had taken the trouble to remove. No one had pollarded the trees or mended walls for years and the track that led towards the gate had turned to mire. Even the paved courtyard had become a wilderness of weeds.
‘You’d better let me down then, if you mean to go inside!’ Esa startled me a second time. ‘Though you may require assistance to broach that gate, perhaps.’
I followed the direction of his glance. The wooden gateway was probably not barred – that would have had to be done from the inner side – but it was secured by a hefty length of iron chain, passed through a hole in either gate and fastened with a sturdy lock-bolt. It was intended to deter intruders – and it certainly presented quite an obstacle.
I signalled to Minimus, who slid down to the ground, then came and took the ox-ropes from me while I got down myself. I picked my way along the muddy track and was examining the heavy hinges of the gate, wondering if they could be somehow lifted free.
Gwellia came to join me and I explained my thoughts. She made a doubtful face. ‘That looks impossible. Eliana clearly did not mean that people should get in. But over there the boundary wall is falling down – why don’t we get the slaves to move a few more stones and make a gap that’s big enough to get the ox-cart through?’
She was quite right, of course – it was the easy way, and I should have seen it for myself. I tried to look judicious. ‘A sensible suggestion. Of course there is no track on either side that way, but given the condition of the lane that hardly makes a difference, I suppose.’
She looked so pleased and proud to be of help, that I regretted being churlish with my praise. I raised my voice. ‘My clever wife has had a good idea. We’ll move the stones from that collapsing wall and get in through the hole. We may need to push the cart – Esa, if you’d be good enough to stay a little while?’ I tailed into silence. He hadn’t understood. I repeated it in Celtic and he broke into a smile.
It was the first time that he had done so, and it transformed his face. ‘A splendid notion, but you’ll need stronger arms than yours.’ He all but elbowed me aside and strode up to the wall. ‘Or perhaps we’ll use the ox. If we can move this section …’ He laid hold of a stone, then all of a sudden gave a barking laugh. ‘On second thoughts, you don’t need strength at all. Even your little slaves could manage this, I think.’ He put his shoulder to the wall and heaved and another great section of the stone collapsed. He stood up, dusting off his hands. ‘It’s so decayed that only custom is holding it in place! One more shove like that and we will be inside.’
It proved nothing like as simple or as quick as that, of course, though everybody helped – except for Julia, who looked so shocked at the idea of moving stones that I gave her the task of ‘staying with the cart’ – thus freeing Minimus, who was a lot more use. Even when the lumps of wall had been pushed down – and some of them proved most reluctant to come loose – they all had to be moved to clear a route for us. That was no easy task. They were heavy, awkward, dirty and recalcitrant. Some clung in big clusters – with sharp edges too – threatening our toes and fingers constantly, others crumbled into piles of dust and fragments at our touch making humps and hollows which needed stamping flat.
But just as I was wishing that I’d tried to move the gates instead, the last enormous wall-stone in the gap yielded to my shoulder, and fell down with a thud that made the ground vibrate. When the dust had settled and I’d regained my breath, Esa and the slave-boys dragged the rock away (rocking it on one corner) and the way was clear.
A cheer from the main road behind us greeted this, and I turned round, surprised. A small knot of passers-by had gathered at the entrance of the lane and had evidently been observing our antics for some time – though nobody had offered to assist in any way. So much for our attempts to get here unobserved! I cursed the Fates, but to ignore the watchers now was to excite more interest, so I smiled and waved. ‘Forgot the key,’ I shouted cheerfully.
There was a mocking jeer and they waved back to me, then – presumably convinced that there was nothing more to see – they drifted on.
I heaved a sigh of some relief and while the slaves helped Esa empty the panniers on the mule, load in his pelts and climb up on her himself, I took the ox from Kennis and got up onto the cart.
I turned my head. Arlina was already trotting down the road in the direction of Aquae Sulis and the market-stalls. So, leaving my passengers to walk, I edged the wagon through the gap that we had made – and found myself in Eliana’s old estate at last.