Read Online Requiem for a Slave by Rosemary Rowe - Free Book Online

had seen it and was obviously aggrieved. He had put on his feeble, stupid face again. I gave the turnip-seller another warning frown. ‘Of course I have told him that I have lost my slave,’ I said, with careful emphasis. ‘That’s what we were discussing in the street just now. And he’s been a lot of help. He overheard some people talking in the alleyway – it may turn out to be quite relevant.’ I didn’t know how sharp the turnip-seller was, but I hoped that he would realize that I had not mentioned Lucius.
    I need not have worried. Radixrapum thought a moment, then flashed a knowing grin, clearly delighted to be in my confidence, though his reaction was so careful and extreme that he might have been an actor in the theatre representing a conspirator in a comedy. ‘So, of course, you want me to help you with the fire, seeing that you no longer have a slave.’
    That was clearly nonsense. Glypto was obviously skilled with building fires himself and was looking mystified, but Radixrapum had already taken the brazier from him and was on his way around the counter and through the inner door. I followed with my lamp, and we closed the door on Glypto, shutting him outside. The smell in here was noticeably worse, although, compared to the tannery, not so bad at all.
    ‘You don’t want to tell him that there’s been a murder here?’ the turnip-seller murmured.
    ‘There has been a murder, but I’m not sure it was here. I think that Lucius was killed elsewhere and brought here afterwards.’ I went over to Lucius’s body as I spoke and started to move it very gently from the pile. The army would do that very soon in any case, I thought.
    The turnip-seller took the legs and helped me with my task. ‘I see. But you are still afraid that news will get about?’
    ‘The tanner is a dreadful gossip and he loves to talk,’ I said, when we had done. I went over to the wall, took down a bunch of home-made tapers that I kept hanging on a nail and selected two of the most perfect ones. ‘At the first opportunity he’ll spread the news abroad, and I will have customers refusing to come near. Especially the one that ordered that piece there.’ I indicated the almost-completed Apollo piece still laid out on the floor. ‘Pedronius is inclined to change his mind in any case.’
    He nodded. ‘Pedronius the tax-collector? Even I have heard of him. Didn’t he buy that fancy villa just a little while ago, from the councillor who died so suddenly?’
    ‘Or from his heirs, at least,’ I said, and made him smile. ‘In fact, the man in question left no living family, so everything went to the “residuary legatees” – most of the important men in town got some of it.’ I knew that for a fact. Marcus had been a beneficiary himself.
    This was not unusual. Any man who wished to rise in life would make a will like that, nominating a series of influential men to inherit his estate if no other heirs were found: it prevented confiscation by the imperial purse, which would otherwise have been inevitable, and had the additional advantage of ensuring patronage from the people who were named, although in practice they rarely profited from the will. However, it did sometimes happen, as in the present case. ‘In fact, the villa was left to the chief town councillor, the very customer that you saw outside my shop, but he didn’t want it – he had a bigger one – so he put it on the market before it cost him tax. I believe that’s how Pedronius came to hear of it.’
    The turnip-seller handed me the taper-spikes to stick the candles on. ‘I gather the tax-gatherer paid an enormous price for it – and then discovered that the deal did not include the slaves.’
    ‘So my patron told me at the time,’ I assented. ‘It was not entirely the decurion’s fault – the slaves had been bequeathed to someone else – but Pedronius threatened to take him before the aediles, and in the end Quintus agreed to provide him with a chief slave to