And Beric noticed for the first time a square patch of blackness in the moon-whitened deck, just before the mast; a square hole, and a ladder leading down into the dark belly of the sea monster. It reminded him uncomfortably of the mouth of a trap, but of course that was simply foolishness, and Aristobulo, whose salt he had eaten, was already disappearing down it. ‘Come down backwards,’ Aristobulo called. ‘You are the less likely to break your neck. It is as black as Erebus down here, but we’ll get a light before you can sneeze.’
Beric hesitated an instant longer, then slipped over the edge of the hole, found the rungs, and dropped downward. The seamen by the bulwarks were still talking and laughing with the tribesmen on the bank. Below him, out of the darkness, rose a faint sense of life, a breathy, formless rustling, something that might have been a groan, and the thick smell of too many people packed in too small a space, not hounds or poultry; a human smell. It was very odd.
Suddenly the little warning hammer began to beat again, sharp and urgent this time. Danger! danger!’ His feet had just found the lower deck, and the moonlit sky was a glimmering square level with the top of his head, as he sprang for it again—too late. There was a swift movement behind him, and in that same instant something seemed to burst in the back of his head, and he stumbled forward into a spinning blackness shot with coloured lights.
V
THE ARM-RING
HIGH overhead the white, high-piled clouds drifted slowly before the early autumn wind across a sky of speedwell blue, but down below in the principal slave-market of Rome there seemed no air at all. It was still early in the day, but already the market was crowded, as always. Here a master builder moved purposefully between the pens, looking for a good strong human animal to carry stones and mix concrete; there a stout matron looking for a girl to spin and carry cushions, and getting very hot and flustered about it; a senator in search of a secretary; a young Tribune wanting a body-slave; a grey-haired steward of a great household—himself a slave—making careful choice of a new under-cook to replace one that had just died. A many-coloured, many-voiced, shifting throng that came and went and came again, up and down the lanes between the pens and pitches where the slaves that they were seeking waited to be bought.
In the corner of one such pen, Beric sat on the hard, hot pavement with his arms across his knees, staring straight before him. Some of his companions spoke to each other from time to time, but mostly they sat silent, as listless and hopeless as himself. Aaron Ben Malachi, whose property they were, leaned against a temple column that formed the corner of his pitch, discussing prices with his neighbour. Prices were bad, it seemed. ‘A big fine Athenian, gently born and played upon the lyre like an angel, and I had to let him go for three thousand sesterces! Only last week that was. Ai, ai, ai, I shall be ruined if the market does not improve!’ Beric heard the long complaint going on and on; he saw the feet of the passers-by moving in front of him: dusty sandals, military boots, the pretty scarlet slippers of a lady of rank, the bare blistered feet of a beggar; but he was not thinking of what he heard or saw. He was wondering—how long was it since that night at Isca Dumnoniorum? Five moons? Six? Seven? He did not know, he had lost count long ago. He knew only that they had been the moons of a nightmare, such a nightmare as one wakes from with the taste of evil in one’s mouth. Sometimes he thought that that was what it really was, an ill dream from which he might awake at any moment; but the waking never came.
After that night in Isca Dumnoniorum he had woken to find himself in the belly of the strange sea-beast that was a ship, lying with several others of his kind, in what space remained between the piled bales of the cargo. The Clio was at sea, and they had all been very sick. Most of the others had been bought perfectly legally from Roman landowners along the south coast, but two beside himself had been carried off, and one of these, who had been captured while out fishing, seemed to find a certain comfort for himself in explaining the whole hideous situation to Beric and enquiring whether he had never heard of Greek slavers and their ways. The slavers themselves had met his furious protests and rebellion with a few floggings and a certain amount of knocking about; not too much, for it was in their interest to get the cargo in reasonably good condition to its destination, but sufficient to school him. And Beric’s hands became quivering fists as he remembered their schooling. He was living again the misery of those past moons. Sold and resold from one trader to another, like a dressed skin or a cooking-pot; the filthy Tiber-side sheds where he had been herded with slaves of every colour and smell, all his brothers and sisters in misery; the scanty food, the kicks and blows of the slave-drivers; above all, the sense of utter helplessness, of being caught and caged and lost to all eternity.
A little cur dog, scavenging among the feet of the crowd, slunk past him, and he stretched out a hand to it. It sniffed his fingers, fawned for an instant with flattened ears under his touch, and then slunk away. There was one thing he had to be thankful for, anyway, he thought, watching it out of sight: that he had not had Gelert with him that night. What would have become of Gelert, left alone in a strange town—always supposing that he had not been knifed by the slavers? At the thought of Gelert a wave of blinding misery swept over Beric. His Tribe, his father and mother, even Cathlan, he had shut away from him; but his dog, that was another matter.
There was a sudden stir around him. A pretty, bold-looking girl, with a crimson edge to her tunic and a gold chain round her neck, had come up and was speaking to Ben Malachi, who had abandoned his column and come forward, smiling hopefully and rubbing his hands together, to receive her orders.
‘My mistress, the Lady Julia,’ said the girl, with a gesture of her head towards a richly curtained litter carried on the shoulders of six men, which had halted a few paces off, ‘needs a replacement for one of her Gaulish litter-bearers. Have you anything that might do? It must be something good; only the best will serve for my Lady.’
Beric, who had picked up a good many words of Latin by now (though he no longer thought of it as the tongue of his own people), understood what she said well enough, but paid no heed, since he was not Gaulish, and therefore it could have nothing to do with him.
But Ben Malachi was not one to let slip the chance of a sale for so small a matter as that. ‘I have the very slave to suit the Lady Julia, the best—oh, yes, indeed; would I think for one moment, my dear, of trying to sell anything but the best to so great a lady?’ He made a quick gesture to his slave-driver, a slant-eyed Syrian, who promptly kicked Beric with a nailed sandal.
‘Up, you.’
Beric stumbled to his feet without protest; he was well used to kicks by now, and followed Ben Malachi and the girl towards the curtained litter.
The curtain was drawn back a little now, and the lady inside was talking to a tall man with the purple stripe of a senator down his tunic, who had just paused to greet her. ‘He took to brawling, so of course I had to sell him, and put Philo in his place for the present,’ Beric heard a clear, musical voice saying. ‘But you may see for yourself that it completely ruins my matched team.’ Then as the little group came up: ‘Ah, Ben Malachi, have you brought me something?’
The curtain was drawn back farther, and Beric found himself looking at the woman within. A beautiful woman, but cold, so cold. She looked him over with careless eyes that never noticed that he was human, and scarcely seemed to listen to Ben Malachi’s list of his good points. Then she shook her head. ‘No, no, he will not do. I must have a Gaul.’
‘This one is British, my Lady; the same stock——’ the slave merchant began, bowing; but she cut him short.
‘He is too dark and too red. I must have a golden Gaul, or spoil my team.’
‘As to the colour of his hair, noble lady’—Ben Malachi was bending almost double—‘might I suggest a few lime-washes, a very few——’
This time it was the man with the Senator’s stripe on his tunic who cut in, saying lazily: ‘Julia, you cannot do that! Percol! It would be like faking a chestnut t
o make a matched chariot team with bays.’
‘My dear Hirpinius, you may make your mind easy: I have no intention of doing it,’ said the Lady Julia with bored amusement, then to Ben Malachi, ‘unless you can show me something else, I must leave the matter for now, or try elsewhere.’
‘In a few days, but three at the most, I shall have some fresh stock.’ Ben Malachi bowed again, his thin grey beard flapping up and down on the breast of his black robe. ‘Very fine stock! If the most gracious lady permits, I will send along any that seem suitable for her inspection before anyone else sees them. I am a poor man and——’
‘As you will. I may look at them if I have found nothing to suit me in the meantime,’ said the most gracious lady. ‘Hirpinius, do you walk my way? No? Until our next meeting, then.’ She made a gesture to her golden Gauls: the embroidered curtain fell back into place, and the litter-bearers moved off, carrying their burden, with the maid walking beside it.
Beric was herded back into the pen, and squatted hopelessly down again in his corner.
The hours dragged by, and in the crowded slave-market there seemed less and less air to breathe. Three of his fellow-slaves were sold. One of them, a big negro, had been friendly, and if it were possible for Beric to feel more desolate than he did already, he would have done so as he watched the broad black figure follow his new master away. Long past noon, when the slave-market was almost deserted and the pavements threw back the heat like the blast from an oven, a man came by, glanced at Beric, hesitated, and came back. He was a young man with a broad, pleasant face, and carried himself as though used to the weight of a soldier’s harness. He spoke to Ben Malachi, but his gaze remained on Beric, and meeting it, Beric was filled with a sudden desperate hope, and got up without waiting to be kicked to his feet by the slave-driver.
‘How much do you want for him?’ the young man was asking, cutting short Ben Malachi’s usual flow of praise for his wares.
‘Only two thousand sesterces, Centurion.’
‘One thousand,’ said the young man.
‘The centurion makes a jest.’ Ben Malachi spread his hands and smiled. ‘Nineteen hundred, my dear.’
‘Eleven hundred.’
The bargaining was so quick and quiet that Beric could scarcely follow it, but he understood all too clearly when at last the young man said with a little gesture of finish:
‘Thirteen hundred and fifty. I can go no higher.’
‘Seventeen hundred,’ said the Jew. ‘You will not get a good strong slave to take with you into Dacia for less than that anywhere, my dear.’
‘Then I must needs go without one.’
‘Sixteen hundred and fifty—take him for sixteen hundred and fifty!’ wailed Ben Malachi. ‘And may it never come between you and sleep that you have ruined an old man!’
‘I cannot go beyond thirteen fifty; I have not got it,’ said the young man, already turning away. Over his shoulder he looked back. ‘I am sorry,’ he said, not to Ben Malachi, but to Beric himself. Then he was gone: and Beric, feeling suddenly sick, sat down again.
More time crawled by. Two more of Ben Malachi’s slaves found purchasers. The westering sun slanted across the slave-market, which had become crowded again; and still Beric sat in his corner, where the stones were beginning to cool in the widening shade. He was no longer thinking, just sitting, with his elbows on his knees and his aching head in his hands, while still the feet of the throng moved by: saffron shoes of a priest, nailed sandals of a gladiator … . He was roughly jerked out of the half stupor into which he had sunk, to find that another purchaser had appeared. Thrust forward by the heavy hand of the slave-driver, he found himself standing before a small stout man with a puckered pink face, and hot-tempered eyes of very faded blue which were looking him up and down exactly as they might have studied the points of a pony—save that probably they would have had more of kindness in them for a pony.
After the first glance, his head went down, and he stood with stubborn, hunched shoulders, and wide-planted feet, staring at the small man’s stomach, which was round and pompous.
‘Is this the best you have?’ the small man was demanding.
‘I have a very pretty Syrian boy, Excellency——’
‘The whole market is full of pretty Syrian boys. I have had them before, and they thieve like monkeys.’ Excellency sounded both tired and exasperated.
A depressed-looking man hovering just behind him said anxiously,’ If you would allow me to attend to the matter to-morrow, sir.’
‘If I required anyone to choose the household slaves for me, it would be my steward’s job, not my secretary’s,’ said his master waspishly. ‘I always choose my own slaves: you should know that by now. No, I said I would replace Damon to-day, and I am a man of my word.’ Then to Ben Malachi: ‘Apart from the Syrian, is that the best you have?’
The Jew bowed again. ‘He is a very fine boy, Excellency, worthy even of the household of Publius Lucianus Piso the Magistrate. Unbroken, yes, but intelligent; ai, ai, ai, your steward could train him to anything in half a month.’
‘He is sullen,’ said Publius Piso.
‘He is new to slavery. The British do not take easily to the arm-ring; but a few whippings will soon remedy that.’ Ben Malachi made a sign to his slave-driver, who promptly thrust a hand under Beric’s chin to force it up. The boy flung his head back from the man’s touch, and stood staring, straight enough now, into the round pink face before him.
‘British, is he?’ said the Magistrate.
‘British indeed, Excellency, and a chieftain’s son, as like as not, in his own country.’
The Magistrate grunted. ‘Every barbarian slave is a chieftain’s son in his own country if you and your kind are to be believed. More likely he’s the son of a renegade legionary, by his build.’ He hesitated. ‘Still, I like the look of him. He is healthy?’
‘Oh, he is indeed, Excellency; you would not find a healthier boy.’
‘Hmm,’ said Publius Piso, and reached out to feel the boy’s arm. Beric started as though he had been stung, then stood rigid, frowning from the plump pink hand on his arm to the plump pink face of its owner, and back again. ‘Good muscle,’ said the Magistrate approvingly. ‘Breathe in.’
Beric stared at him between bewilderment and outrage, but a cuff from the slave-driver pointed the demand, and he breathed in; breathed in until he felt his chest must burst. His hands had become quivering fists, but no one seemed aware of that. ‘Hmm,’ said the Magistrate again. ‘Open your mouth.’
And so it went on.
‘He seems sound enough,’ the round pink man admitted at last. ‘I still say he is sullen, though. He didn’t like it when I looked him over. You will have to take something off the price for that.’
The Jew spread his hands. ‘Does one lower the price of a colt for the fire there is in him?’
‘I want a slave, not a colt,’ Publius Piso said shortly. ‘How much do you want for him?’
‘Two thousand six hundred sesterces, Excellency.’
‘Fifteen hundred.’
The bargaining began again. But this time it ended with agreement reached. Beric’s papers changed hands, and at a word from his master the secretary paid over the purchase money into the eager palms of Aaron Ben Malachi, who received it bowing again and again. ‘The noble Publius Piso will never regret his bargain, and when next he has need to buy a slave, it may be that he will remember——’
‘Yes, yes, I daresay.’ The Magistrate was already turning away. ‘Send him up some time this evening. You know the house.’
‘Who does not know the house of Publius Lucianus Piso the Magistrate?’
So a little later, having been given a large bowl of lentil porridge, lest he should seem unduly hungry when he arrived, Beric was following one of Ben Malachi’s own slaves through the streets of Rome on the way to the home of his new owner. Lest he should try to break away, there was a running noose round his neck, and the slave in charge of him held the other end o
f it. ‘You don’t turn difficult, and I don’t jerk this rope, see?’ said the man.
But Beric was beyond turning difficult, anyway.
They climbed steadily out of the lower city, with its ceaseless, shifting crowds and the faint, sickly smell that Beric knew by now for the smell of the summer plague, into quieter streets and fresher air. They came at last to a gateway in a high wall, and passed through, with the exchange of a few words between the porter and Ben Malachi’s slave. Beric was standing in a wide courtyard already growing shadowy in the fading light, and people were swarming in as it seemed from every side, to gather round him, pointing and staring and asking questions that he could not find enough Latin to answer. Then someone who seemed to be in authority joined the group and spoke to Ben Malachi’s man, and quite suddenly Ben Malachi’s man had slipped off the halter and gone his way.
Left alone in the strange courtyard, Beric had one moment of blind panic. Ben Malachi’s man had been a brute, but at least he had been a familiar brute; and now he was gone. Two girls in the group nudged each other, giggling. ‘We shan’t be keeping this one long,’ said one of them. ‘He’s soft in the head—just look at him.’
‘You have no call to laugh at him, even if he is, Tina,’ said another, more kindly.
‘Best get him cleaned up before Nigellus sees him,’ said a third.
And an impatient voice snapped at Beric himself. ‘Well, don’t stand there all night, looking like a mooncalf.’
He heard them woollenly, through the throbbing in his head. And then he was stumbling across the courtyard and along a passage-way after someone’s broad back. The broad back led him to a place where there was a plunge-bath, and he pulled off his filthy rags and got in, slowly and carefully, like an old man. The cold water felt wonderful on his hot, dirt-parched skin, and the chill of it seemed to clear his head; and he scrubbed himself with silver sand, and soaked, and scrubbed again. It was good to feel clean after so many moons.