Medicus

settling on a soggy ball of rag that she shook open and applied to her blotchy face. 'It's all my fault.'

Ruso, relieved that he was no longer being blamed, said nothing.

'I should never have said anything about Saufeia's stupid letter,' said Chloe, unexpectedly. 'Then you wouldn't be poking your nose in and asking questions…' She paused to sniff. 'And Bassus wouldn't know I'd talked. He told Merula about Lucco's silly trick with the oysters so she'd sell him. And he did it to get back at me.'

Ruso let out a long sigh. It was his turn to lower his head into his hands. He should have had more sense than to question Bassus about the letter. 'I'm sorry,' he said. 'I'm just trying to find out what's happened to Tilla.'

Chloe stretched herself out on the bunk and lay with her eyes open, gazing at the slats holding the mattress above. 'I knew it would all go wrong in the end,' she said.

From beyond the kitchen door there was a crash and a shout of exasperation. Ruso took a deep breath. He stared at his toes. He wished he were somewhere else. Another country Another lifetime. Anywhere he might never have met the girl he called Tilla. If he had ignored the fuss around the fountain, none of this would have happened. But Chloe was right: He had to interfere. And from that moment everything had gone wrong. It was as if he was cursed from the moment those beautiful eyes had… gods above! Now he was starting to believe all that rubbish himself.

Stichus reappeared, looking angry. 'I can't get the cash,' he said. 'Miserable cow says it's locked in a strongroom and she hasn't got the key. I'm going down there anyway.'

'Stop!' Ruso was reaching for his purse. 'How much are you expecting from your wages?'

Stichus waved a hand to indicate that anything Ruso could offer was nothing compared to his need. 'A bloody sight more than you've got.'

For answer, Ruso knelt on the floor and upended his purse. Chloe gasped.

Ruso glanced at Stichus. The man opened his mouth and closed it again as if he had lost the power of words.

'I'm about to repay a loan,' explained Ruso. 'But that can wait a day.' Since Tilla had vanished, Priscus could hardly seize her if the Aesculapian loan was not paid on time.

When Stichus had hurried out with the money, Chloe said, 'I'm sorry for the things I said. I think you do try to do the right thing.'

'I'm beginning to wonder why I bother.'

He glanced at her. Chloe had managed a weak smile.

'I examined Saufeia's body after they pulled her out of the river,' he told her. 'Someone said to me that no one should die like that. And it's true.'

Chloe sat up and put her bare feet on the floor. 'If I knew where Tilla was,' she said, 'I would tell you. I don't. But I can tell you some of what you want to know. If you promise, really really promise, to keep quiet about it now? You won't tell anyone or ask any more questions?'

'If it will help someone, I can't stay silent.'

'How can it? It's about Saufeia, and she's dead.'

'Very well.'

'I don't know who killed her in the end. But I do know the thing they're so frightened of everyone finding out. Saufeia was a Roman citizen.'

Ruso felt himself blink. 'A citizen?' he repeated. A citizen could not be a slave, let alone a slave forced to work as a prostitute. 'How could she be…?'

'What she told us-what she started to tell everybody before Bassus gave her one of his little private coaching sessions-was, she was a centurion's daughter who'd run away with her boyfriend after a fight with her stepfather.'

A centurion's daughter. So that explained the smattering of education. And the knowledge of army expletives.

'Then she fell out with the boyfriend-that was the one thing she was good at, falling out with people-and he dumped her on the road. She had no money, of course. So she went to an inn to ask for help and got picked up by some lowlife who said he'd take her home. Well, of course he didn't. So she ended up here.

'As soon as she got here she started whining about who she was, but Merula was short-staffed so she told her to shut up and they put her to work. They must have known they'd done a stupid thing, but by then they were in serious trouble anyway, so they just kept on serving her to the customers and everybody was too scared to talk because Merula said we'd all be arrested and whipped. Of course they couldn't ever let her out. She must have realized they were just going to work her to death. Or sell her on to someplace worse.' Chloe gave a bitter laugh. 'Don't believe any of those stories about girls from places like this being rescued by men who fall in love with them. I've been here longer than all of them, and I can tell you, it doesn't happen.'

'Tilla told me about Daphne's punishment.'

'Daphne should have had more sense. Most of the men we meet aren't as soft as poor old Decimus.'

'She was trying to copy Asellina?'

'I always thought it was odd that Asellina didn't get in touch,' said Chloe. 'The truth is, the only way you can go from here is down.'

Ruso wondered if the men who came to relax with these girls real ized the true ghastliness they were paying to support. 'You've been fortunate.'

'I've been determined,' she said. 'I have a child to think of.' She dropped her head into her hands. 'What if someone outbids him?'

'He has plenty of money,' said Ruso, whose own unspoken question was, What if he runs off with it? 'Tell me some more about Saufeia.'

Chloe nodded. 'The cook took pity on her and got her some writing things. She wrote a letter to the legate at the fort asking to be sent home. The cook was supposed to deliver it, but Bassus saw it and said he'd take it instead. We all thought she'd get a beating when he read it, but it looked as though he'd just gone and delivered it, 'cause a couple of days later some official lackey arrived here with a letter for her. Said he wouldn't hand it over to anybody else. She burned it as soon as she'd read it and she wouldn't tell anybody what was in it, but I got the idea she thought somebody was coming to save her.'

Ruso scratched his head. 'But if someone was coming to get her, why did she run away? Surely if she'd waited they'd have sent an officer down with a whole squad, made arrests…'

'Like they tried with Phryne.'

Ruso scratched his ear. 'I truly meant well, Chloe. I was told the child was kidnapped.'

'You were told that by Tilla?'

He nodded.

'She should have known better.'

Ruso shrugged. 'She was convinced it was true. She was cooking up potions to help.'

'I meant, she should have known better than to tell you. Of course Phryne was kidnapped.'

'What?'

'I tell you, if they ever get their hands on that Claudius Innocens, he's a dead man. After Saufeia you'd think they'd learn, but he offered them Phryne cheap and they didn't ask too many questions. And nobody 'round here was going to say anything, not after everything that had happened.'

'But I was told the second spear questioned Phryne in private!'

Chloe pursed her lips. 'Your second spear's men aren't very bright. One of them told our lovely management why he was here before he sent them to fetch her. So they had time to have a word with her before they brought her downstairs. They told her a string of lies about how much trouble she'd be in if she didn't say what they wanted. She was too scared to know who to trust.'

'So where did Bassus get her documents?'

'Bassus and Innocens between them,' said Chloe, 'must know every forger in the province.'

Ruso shook his head slowly from side to side, as if trying to settle all this jumbled information in his brain. 'Tilla told me I was poking about in a wasps' nest,' he observed.

'We did try to warn you.'

Ruso frowned. 'Let me get this straight. You're telling me Saufeia knew help was coming but she still ran away?'