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load of wood that he was carrying on his back, put down his burden and turned round to glare at me. ‘And to think that I gave deference to him! Only a tradesman!’ he muttered to the ancient woman at his side – deliberately just loud enough to make sure I could hear.
    But his companion – who was probably his wife, since she was stooped under a load of kindling of her own – shook her head and whispered something in his ear. He looked alarmed and moved as far away as possible from me. Instead of glaring he gazed pointedly away, spat, then licked his finger and rubbed it on the skin behind his ear – the age-old ritual to ward off ill-luck.
    Florens’s servant noticed and gave a little smirk, while I felt myself turn redder than his cloak. It was obvious what the crone and her husband were so anxious to avoid. Dressed as I was, I did not look remotely like a Roman citizen, so it must have looked suspiciously as though I were being hustled into Glevum under loose arrest – no doubt to be accused of some unpleasant crime, and very likely thrown into the jail, there to await some painful punishment. The wood-sellers were afraid that my fate might somehow pass to them, and that my breath and shadow were contagious, like the plague.
    Their comic superstition almost made me smile, but then I thought again. Perhaps their interpretation of my plight was nearer to the truth than I supposed. For some reason which I couldn’t understand, I seemed to be suspected of collusion in this crime. But why? Was it simply because I had chanced to call on Calvinus today? That was unfortunate timing on my part, perhaps, but hardly more than that.
    I couldn’t possibly have known about the robbery until I reached the flat, I told myself, mentally marshalling arguments in my own defence. The message had only reached Calvinus a few minutes earlier, and there was no opportunity for the news to get to me.
    That made me pause. Who could have known, in fact? I could see how Florens might have learned the news. He was at the garrison, by all accounts, and Calvinus had sent there for assistance as soon as he heard about the crime. But, if Florens was at the army headquarters at that time, how did he find out that I had visited the lictor’s flat? There was no time for him to have set a watch on it.
    Could it have been simple gossip which reached him afterwards – for example, from those gamblers on the stairs? I shook my head. Between the garrison and the curia, there was little opportunity for idle talk to reach his ears and no one would have made a point of going to find him to report the news. Unless . . . I felt myself turn cold. An awful thought had just occurred to me.
    Suppose that Voluus had posted spies himself, to watch the place and guard his property while he was away? Such things were not unknown, especially if the resident house-slaves were not trusted very much. So had there been somebody watching the apartment all the time? Or, more unnerving still, was someone watching me? But why should they do that? Because I had been asking questions about the lictor and his treasure-carts, perhaps? I had, of course – and Florens knew it, from what his servant said.
    Dear gods! In the light of subsequent events, that must seem peculiarly suspicious now. What is more, my reasons for those enquiries, though genuine enough, would sound woefully feeble and unlikely, I could see. What an unfortunate series of events! I would have to call on my patron to speak for me, after all! I only hoped that he already had business in the town today; if they had to send and fetch him from the villa to speak on my behalf, he would be imperially annoyed.
    ‘Citizen? Are you planning to stay where you are all day? Remember they are waiting at the curia!’ My escort’s voice came sharply from somewhere ahead of me. I realized that I had been so lost in thought that I had paused, stock-still, and he was waiting in a doorway further down the street.
    I paddled