Read Online Of Merchants & Heros by Paul Waters - Free Book Online Page B

army with you. So did I. I have seldom heard such a battle-cry.’
    I should not have said it; but in my dazed state I turned my head and with a grin said, ‘You should mind yourselves. You are lucky I found you.’ And at this they all laughed.
    I must have passed out shortly after. The next thing I remember is waking on a bed in a strange room. The shutters were closed.
    Brilliant bars of sunlight shone through the slits.
    I lay still, staring up at the ceiling. It was wooden – dark wood, oak or cedar. I must have slept again. When next I opened my eyes, a young man was looking down at me.
    ‘Here, drink this,’ he said smiling. And as I drank, ‘You bled white, but the wound is clean and will heal now.’
    I drank. The water made me feel better. ‘Where is this place?’ I asked.
    ‘You’re at the praetor’s house, in Tarentum. You are quite a hero here, you know.’ I suppose he saw my look of surprise, for then he said, ‘Did you not know, then? You saved the praetor’s life.’
    His hair was light-brown, carelessly unkempt, and curling at the brow. He had a frowning, sensitive mouth, but when he smiled his teeth showed broad and white. His beard was still a youth’s, thin and wispy on his cheeks. But what struck you most was the intense blue of his eyes.
    ‘Who are you?’ I said, propping myself on my elbow and rubbing my eyes.
    He laughed and gave me his hand.
    ‘I am Titus. The praetor is my uncle.’
    When I was well enough, I was taken back to my stepfather, and for a few days I rested. When the bandage was off, I saw the wound in my thigh healed cleanly, as Titus said it would; but it left a long pitted scar, which showed when I wore a short tunic. I examined it in private whenever I was naked, wishing it away, for it made me feel ugly and self-conscious.
    I needed no one to remind me of it. But when I was on my feet once more, and able to undertake some dreary paperwork for my stepfather, he would pull up my tunic and show my wound to the various business associates who came and went all day, saying with a shake of his head, ‘You see? The boy will have it till the day he dies.
    But he got it saving the praetor’s life – I imagine you have heard? – so perhaps some use will come of it.’ And thus, for Caecilius, my pain had value.
    In time the soreness and limping passed. But the shame of having my body exposed and prodded by uncaring strangers stayed much longer. I have often wondered, since, whether he knew quite how much he humiliated me, hauling up my tunic-hem so that he could show his ogling friends.
    The two agents, Florus and Virilis, had told him they had ridden off in pursuit of other bandits, whom they had seen bearing down on us. ‘Is that so?’ I said wryly when Caecilius told me this. But I remembered something my father used to say: Never demean yourself to argue with a liar. I said nothing more.
    One day soon after, when I was back on my feet and had been set to work at the makeshift trestle table in Caecilius’s workroom, the old Greek house-steward came hurrying. ‘Sir,’ he cried, ‘you have a visitor. It is the praetor’s nephew himself, Titus Quinctius.’
    ‘Ah!’ said Caecilius, pushing back his chair and straightening his tunic. He tossed a writing-tablet on my desk. ‘Finish these manifests, will you, Marcus. I may be some time and they must be completed by tomorrow’s sailing.’
    The old slave – a quiet, cultured man called Telamon – coughed and looked vexed. ‘Forgive me, sir,’ he said, ‘but it was the young master he was asking for.’
    Caecilius was already on his way to the door. He halted, then turned, doing his best to fix his face.
    ‘Why yes. How not? Well come along, Marcus, get to your feet.
    He is not a man to keep waiting.’
    I stood, and for a moment old Telamon met my eye, and we exchanged a private look of intelligence and humour. Then, assuming once more his dutiful mask, he conducted us to where Titus was waiting in the high