Scaurus shifted uneasily.
‘And just who are you suggesting we should arrest on the grounds of some grain store workers having more money to spend than ought to be the case, Prefect?’
Caninus shrugged.
‘That all depends whether we want to scare them into inactivity, and have the gains of their crime vanish into thin air, or to catch every man involved and recover the money they’ve been salting away. And that sum, Tribune, is likely to be large enough to put everyone involved very much in the emperor’s eye.’
He watched intently as tribune and first spear exchanged glances. Scaurus shook his head slowly, his eyes locked on the prefect’s.
‘That’s not a status I crave, Quintus Caninus. The attention of the throne can be a double-edged sword, as anyone with any experience of imperial politics will tell you. I’ll settle for recovering the gold and making sure that it is returned to its rightful owner. So, whose doors would you have me send my men to kick in? I’m presuming that you want me to put on a display of overwhelming force?’
‘What in Hades are you doing, Tribune? Do you have such delusions of grandeur that you think you can arrest me and assume my responsibilities in your ceaseless quest for power? Do you imagine that I won’t…’
Albanus, standing under the watchful eyes of a pair of Tungrian veterans in the middle of the basilica’s main chamber, was literally spitting his indignation at Scaurus, who sat before him with an expression of weary contempt. Julius, standing close behind the prisoner with his vine stick in one hand, reached out and tapped him hard on the arm with the baton. As he did so the tribune raised an eyebrow, pointing with one hand at the fuming procurator.
‘The next time my officer’s vine stick touches you, the force used will be sufficient to silence you. And it will be repeated as many times as necessary to achieve that objective. Bruised or unmarked, either way you’ll be silent when I command it. Shut your mouth and consider for a moment which outcome you would prefer, if you will.’
The two men stared at each other in silence before the tribune gestured with his raised hand to the stony- faced Julius, who stepped back with another tap of the stick, smiling quietly to himself as the procurator flinched at its touch. Albanus composed himself, looking down at the broad flagstones on which he stood before Scaurus’s chair. Lifting his head to look at the tribune, he waited in silence for permission to speak.
‘Very well, Procurator, now that you’ve had some time to consider our relative positions in this redefined relationship, do please continue with whatever further expression of outrage you had in mind.’
When he spoke again, Albanus’s previous fury had been replaced by a more calculated approach, part submission, part sardonic sneer.
‘Thank you so much, Tribune, for allowing me to voice my opinion. You have my admiration for your ploy of dragging me from my bed and forcing me to stand here, while you sit in comfort, to reinforce the difficulty of my position. It’s interesting psychology, Tribune, but I’m afraid-’
Scaurus cut him off before he could warm to his subject, his tone matching the look of disparagement he was playing on his prisoner.
‘I am sitting, Procurator, because I’ve been on my feet all night organising a series of raids on multiple locations within Tungrorum. Would you like to hazard a guess at who else we might have bagged this morning? No? Enlighten the prisoner, if you will, Centurion.’
Julius read aloud from his tablet, his parade-ground-hardened voice harsh in the room’s echoing silence.
‘Four grain store workers, the grain store loading and unloading supervisor, two records clerks, the store manager, your deputy, Petrus, and yourself, Procurator.’
Scaurus stood up and stretched, then took the two paces that set him toe to toe with the procurator. When he spoke his voice was pitched low, but with an edge of unmistakable ferocity.
‘All of you, Albanus. I’ve rolled up the entire organisation that was engaged in perpetrating your fraud against the empire, every man in the city with any official part in the store’s management. They’re all being questioned as we speak, and doubtless one or two of them will sing in order to earn a more lenient sentence. Not that we really need them to, of course, the evidence is already more than convincing. Centurion?’
Julius opened the door to the antechamber and hefted a corn sack into the room. Scaurus walked over to it, opened the top and sank his fist deep into the black, mould-crusted grain within before pulling it back out. He opened it under Albanus’s nose, watching as the procurator’s face creased in reflexive disgust.
‘Rotten grain. Not just a dusting of mould, but actually rotting in the bag. A bag that was found, I hasten to add, in a separate granary, well away from the sound supplies. So you were still accepting sub-standard grain into the store, but it was being stored apart from the legions’ supply of good corn.’ He raised a hand, forestalling Albanus as he opened his mouth to comment. ‘No, no need to say it. I’ll say it for you. There’s been no crime committed simply because your men found a bad bag, and segregated it in a separate store built purely for that necessary expedient. But the rebuttal to such justifications is usually to be found in the detail, Procurator, and so it proves in this case. Just how many such bags do you think we found, eh? No answer? You need to take more of an interest in the workings of your operation, Albanus. We found seven hundred and forty-three spoiled bags in total, most of them nowhere near as bad as this, although not one of them would get past a legion stores officer.’
He dropped the corn in his hand back into the bag, rubbing his hands in distaste at the mould stains that remained on his skin.
‘Nasty stuff, bad grain. Quite unusable for anything, including animal feed. Except, that is, for the purposes of fraud. One or two bags quietly pulled from the back of the store and loaded onto each cart, an irritation for the stores officer at the other end when they’re eventually opened and found to be rotten, and doubtless you’ve had a few letters come back down the road already, detailing the problem and asking you to keep a closer watch on what gets loaded, but still well within the usual incidence of spoiling. It’s a work of genius, Albanus, to ruthlessly weed out the usual percentage of bad grain and then turn it to your own profit. Although of course you’re quite sure I have no way to prove my allegations, aren’t you?’ He stared at the silent Albanus for a moment, and the procurator looked back, his blank expression betraying his uncertainty as to whether or not the soldier had any means of proving the allegations he was making. With a sigh, the tribune nodded to Julius. ‘Centurion?’
Julius stepped out of the room, and returned with a heavy wooden box under his arm. Albanus took one look and blanched, his eyes widening. The tribune met his gaze and then gestured to the box, a tight smile on his lips.
‘Yes, indeed. Your hiding place was well chosen, and quite expertly camouflaged, but like most soldiers my men are experts in finding hidden valuables. The flagstone under which you had it hidden was just a little lower than the stones around it, which was more than enough to excite their interest. And so this is the moment when you know without any doubt that I have you, all of you, in the palm of my hand. I’ve no proof of the actual physical action of the fraud yet, although I expect that your accomplices will be singing like birds given a little vigorous encouragement, but this find has provided some very interesting evidence as to the profit you’ve been taking from it.’ He opened the box and lifted out a scroll, unrolling it and reading in silence for a moment. ‘An impressive sum, Procurator, and still growing at a rate that implies ongoing activity. But not enough to account for the full profit, nowhere close to it, even after the deduction of the bribes you’ve been paying to your staff. I’m guessing that you have a partner in crime, someone with control of the sale of grain, perhaps even the milling. You steal the good corn by substituting the mouldy grain, for which you’ve paid a pittance, then you pass it on to your business partner and he handles the onward sale into the city. The evidence is consumed within days of the theft and everyone’s happy. The farmers get to sell corn with no market value, even if they make little enough on the deal, you make a healthy profit on the price you charge your business partner, and he sells on the stolen grain at market rates and makes his own turn. Yes, everyone’s happy. With the exception of one rather significant party to the deal, now I come to think about it. The Emperor Commodus, Procurator, would be less than delighted at this state of affairs, if he were to be made aware of it. He’s being defrauded of thousands of denarii every month, and I can assure you that no emperor has ever reacted well to having his purse lightened, even if it is by a well-bred character like yourself.’
He turned away, strolling across the chamber and taking a spear from one of the Tungrians. Walking back, he put the weapon’s vicious point under Albanus’s chin, a look of disgust on his face.
‘And since the emperor can’t be here in person to register his unhappiness with your actions, I’ll just have to take his place in dispensing justice to you. Imperial justice, Albanus.’ He stood the spear on its butt spike with a scrape of metal on stone and leaned closer, whispering his next words. ‘Harsh justice.’ He walked away across the room, shaking his head in apparent sorrow. ‘A skilled executioner can nail a man up in such a way that he’ll live on
