He reached it and glanced around. There was no sign of anyone. He lifted the cover and looked in.
The cart was almost empty. Only three amphorae of wine remained, and some sacking. He reached in and felt around under the sacking, until his hand encountered something hard. He pulled. It was heavy. Grinning to himself, he reached in with his other hand. And lifted out a single sack of coins.
It was not large. He could hold it in his two cupped hands. But even this was a fortune. No need to bother about the rest. One sack like this was enough. It was time to run.
A shout behind him. He half turned. The soldier was almost upon him. Instinctively, he dropped the sack, ducked his head, dodged round the cart, and ran. As he did so he heard another voice. And, he thought, a third. The centurion.
“Get him.”
Straight up the alley. Left. Then right. A moment later he was in the great thoroughfare. He ran across it, looked for another alleyway, found one and fled up it.
They knew he had seen the gold. He was a witness. They had to kill him. As he ran, he thought fast. Where could he go? Where could he hide from them? Their voices were still there; they seemed to be to his right and left at the same time. Then he had an idea. It was his only hope. He pushed himself forwards, gasping for breath, as their footfalls echoed close behind him.
Martina waited by the bridge. There was not a soul to be seen. Just below, the wide, clear waters of the river flowed silently by, glinting in the sunlight. From the bridge, she could see the fish, silver and brown, moving about beneath the surface.
The fish had company. She was alone.
Martina was furious, as only a young woman can be who, having prepared herself to be kissed, finds herself ignored instead. She had been waiting for an hour. Now and then she had heard huge roars from the distant crowd as the gladiators fought. She disliked the killing, but that was not the point. He had sent her a letter and promised a present. She had taken a great risk and now, humiliated and frustrated, was going to be left standing there like an idiot until she decided to crawl away. She waited a little longer, then shrugged. Perhaps something bad had happened to young Julius. Perhaps.
“I’ll forgive him if he’s broken his leg,” she murmured to herself, “but not if it’s anything less.” If he thought he could ignore her, just let him see how she would repay him.
She was in a receptive frame of mind, therefore, when to her surprise she saw a familiar figure come out from the shadows of a side street and approach her.
Seeing her alone, it was second nature to Sextus to approach Martina. As for her, seeing the man she had avoided for the faithless Julius, it was only natural that she should welcome him now with a kiss. If Julius were anywhere near, she hoped he would see it. To make certain, she kissed Sextus again.
Sextus was a little surprised that this girl he had been pursuing should suddenly seem so warm towards him. His conceit told him it was to be expected; his experience told him not to ask for reasons. He smiled pleasantly.
He discovered she had come from the bridge. Had she seen his friend Julius down there? he enquired. No, she told him with a wry smile, Julius was certainly not in that area. “Perhaps he’s at the games,” she suggested. “Shall we go and see?” And she linked her arm in his.
It was a pleasant walk for Sextus. He had business to attend to with Julius, but he did not want to waste this unforeseen opportunity. By the time they came in sight of the amphitheatre, he had arranged that he would come to her that night.
If I’m not in jail, he thought, I’ll be in heaven.
“Better not be seen going into the amphitheatre with you,” he lied cleverly, as they drew close. “Until tonight then.” Then he slipped away to wait for his former friend. In his hand, he felt the knife.
The evening was warm and a pleasant pall of sweat and dust hung in the air as the great amphitheatre was emptied. The crowd was well satisfied. They had eaten and drunk on the long, curved terraces; they had seen lions, bulls, a giraffe, all manner of beasts; they had seen a bear maul a man and two gladiators had died before them. Londinium might seem far from Rome, but at these moments, beneath the serried arches in the theatre of stone, when men saw the beasts of Europe and Africa and watched men fight, the imperial capital of the ancient, sunlit world seemed no further away than a cry over the southern horizon.
Julius moved with the crowd. They had probably saved his life. Having managed to get about a hundred yards ahead of his pursuers, he had raced out of a lane, across a short cobbled space and dived through a doorway into the amphitheatre. Round the huge circular passage in the walls he had run, up two flights of steps, and then through a narrow doorway into the upper terraces. Two gladiators were fighting. People had stood up to see the kill. He had been able to slip in and find a place without anyone taking any notice.
All afternoon he remained there. Many times he scanned the audience, half expecting to see the legionaries looking for him. He had not dared to venture out in case they were waiting, but now, as he emerged with the crowd, he saw no sign of them. With luck, they had not got a proper look at him.
Maybe I’ve made it, he grinned to himself.
But what to do next? His parents would be starting their feast with the neighbours very soon. All day they must have been wondering where he was and they would be expecting him now. Indeed, after all the danger of the last few hours, the safety of his cheerful home seemed inviting.
But there was still the matter of the bag of forged coins. His mother knew about it. Sooner or later he was going to have to discuss the business with her – and with his father too, no doubt. He dreaded it, but braced himself. “Anyway,” he muttered, “she’s got to tell me what she’s done with them so that I can get Sextus off my back.”
Julius sighed. Sextus had given him until sundown. The sun was sinking now. I’ll just have to stall him until the morning, he decided. In the meantime, I’m quick on my feet, he said to himself. And besides, he grinned, he’s got to find me first.
He allowed himself to go with the crowd that had flowed into the upper thoroughfare and was mostly drifting towards the eastern hill. As he went, his mind returned to Martina. Was she there somewhere? Would he be able to make it up to her? Perhaps. Certainly there was no need to give up hope.
And then, once again, as he had so many times during the long afternoon, he thought of the gold.
To have held that sack in his very hands! To know that even now it was close by, resting in some cellar probably, not yards from where he had seen the cart. Would the legionaries still be there, guarding it? Surely not. If they had stolen the gold they would keep well clear of the place for the time being.
But then another thought occurred to him. Perhaps they would not leave it there. In a day or two, they might return and start to disperse the gold. Why leave it all in one place where it might be discovered and lost? At the very least, there was a chance the gold might not remain there for long. If I want to get my hands on it, I’d better start looking soon, he concluded. And then laughed softly. I wasn’t going home anyway.
He stepped into a side street and discreetly returned to where he had seen the cart standing. There were a few people about, but no sign of the soldiers. He scouted the area carefully. There seemed to be half a dozen places where the cache could be hidden. He would have to break into them. Dusk would be coming soon. He would need an oil lamp. Cautiously, he went upon his way.
He did not know that he was being followed.
It was only after nightfall that Julius’s mother began to be concerned. The neighbours were enjoying their meal. The fat girl had just consumed her third chicken. Her husband, Rufus, his round, cheerful face now red as a berry, was telling his friends a funny story. But where was the boy?
“He’s after some woman,” Rufus had told her with a grin when his son had failed to show up when the feast began. “Don’t you worry.”
But then she had not told Rufus about the coins yet. And what had that Sextus got to do wi
th it? She did not like the heavy-browed fellow.
The stars were out as Martina waited. She hardly knew what she felt now. Her fury with Julius had subsided since the afternoon. Perhaps something had happened to him. Had she been too quick to blame him?
And now Sextus was about to arrive.
Part of her was excited. After all, he was a man. It was the thought of a man, that warm summer night, that made her tremble with anticipation. And yet, did she really want Sextus, with his deep-set eyes and muttonchop whiskers? Perhaps not very much. “It was the young boxer I wanted,” she confessed aloud.
But Sextus was coming, and she felt sure that if he arrived, she would not be able to get rid of him so easily. She sighed. At that moment she hardly knew what she wanted.
Under the bright stars, the little boat slipped silently downstream on the ebbing tide. The air was warm, even on the river. Round the great loop beneath the city of Londinium it went, gliding unnoticed through the waters as they drained silently towards the eastern sea.
The body in the bottom of the boat lay still, its face towards the night sky. The knife wound that had killed him had been made so cleverly that he had scarcely bled at all. Now the body was weighted so that it would sink to the bottom of the river and stay down.
It took skill, all the same, to dispose of a body in the water. The river had secret eddies and currents, a hidden will of its own, and a body sunk in one place, even weighted down, might mysteriously be conveyed to some other spot entirely where it might be found. On such occasions, it was necessary to know the river’s secrets.
But then the mariner knew the river very well.
He had been surprised, at first, to see his wife and Sextus greet each other with kisses. He knew Sextus by sight, knew his name. And the letter, he recalled, had been signed with a J. But then he had realized his mistake. It must have been not a J but a poorly made S.
He had killed Sextus while the carpenter was trailing his friend Julius through the alleys in the gathering dusk.
He had only to decide what to do about Martina now. His first instinct was to punish her in a way she would not forget. In his mother’s country she would have been stoned to death. But he was wiser than that. After all, he might not find it so easy to replace her. He had had his revenge on her lover. He would treat her with kindness, and see what happened.
In the autumn of the year 251, the theft of a considerable amount of gold and silver coinage was discovered.
The centurion who was ordered to lead the investigation under one of the governor’s most senior officials, was unable to discover anything.
Shortly after this, the centurion and a number of troops from the garrison at Londinium were abruptly transferred by the governor to aid in the rebuilding of the great fortress of Caerleon in Wales. No date was set for their return.
For Julius, however, events went well. The question of the bag was not raised by his mother, and the mysterious disappearance of his friend Sextus seemed to end the matter.
His business with the mariner prospered. Better yet, satisfied that he had dealt with his wife’s lover, the mariner never had the least suspicion of the affair that began between Julius and Martina the following spring. And when the mariner was lost at sea a year later, Julius not only took over his business but married his widow too.
On the birth of their second son, to the great delight of his father Julius became a full member of the Temple of Mithras.
It was also at about this time that strong rulers emerged once more in Rome, and both in the empire and in Londinium it seemed, for the time being, that things were returning to normal.
Yet one thing continued to trouble Julius. Again and again, since the day of the games, he had returned to the place, searching high and low, by day and night. When the centurion was suddenly sent away, he was sure he could not have taken the heavy treasure with him. Somewhere, therefore, within a short distance of the spot where he had last seen the donkey cart, there might still be hidden a cache of coins whose value it was hard even to calculate. Months went by, years, and still he searched. On long summer evenings, he would stand by the quay or on the ramparts of the great wall of Londinium, watching the departing sun, and wonder.
Where, by all the gods, was that gold?
THE ROOD
604
The woman stared at the sea. Her long hair fell loosely over her hunting dress, which flapped in the wind. The bright autumn sun was still in the east.
Her last moment of freedom. For three days she had delayed in this wild place that was her refuge, but now she must return. And decide. What answer would she give her husband?
It was Haligmonath – holy month – as they called the old Roman month of September in the pagan countries of the north.
The place where she was standing lay on the huge, curving coastline beyond the Thames Estuary where England bulges out some seventy miles eastwards into the waters of the cold North Sea. Before her, the great, grey sea. Behind her, huge, flat tracts of fen and heath, wood and field stretching to the horizon. And to her right, the long, desolate beaches that continued southwards for fifty miles before they curved into the wide entrance to the Thames.
Her name was Elfgiva – “The faeries’ gift” in the Anglo-Saxon tongue. Her richly embroidered dress proclaimed her a noblewoman. She was thirty-seven, with four grown sons. Her complexion was fair, her face handsome, her eyes bright blue. Although strands of silver had stolen into her golden hair, she knew she was still a fine-looking woman. I could still have another child, she thought. Even the daughter she had longed for. But what was the use of that if this terrible business remained unresolved?
Though the two servants waiting with the horses could not see the anguish on her face, they could guess her feelings. They felt sorry for her. The whole household knew how, after a quarter-century of happy marriage, the master and mistress had suddenly fallen out.
“She’s brave,” one groom whispered to the other. “But can she hold out?”
“Not against the master,” the other replied. “He always gets his way.”
“True,” the groom agreed. And then, with admiration: “But she’s proud.”
It was not easy for a woman to be too proud amongst the Anglo-Saxons of England.
Profound changes had taken place in the northern island of Britain during the last two centuries. The first was that, since the empire of Rome had effectively collapsed, Britain had ceased to be a Roman province. The second was that, like most of the empire, it had been invaded.
There had always been barbarians at the empire’s gates, but Rome had either repelled them or absorbed them as mercenaries and immigrant settlers. From about 260, however, as the sprawling empire fragmented into regions, the incursions grew harder to control. And around the year 400, the many tribes of eastern Europe, stirred up by the appearance of the terrible Huns from Asia, began a long series of huge migrations west. The process was a gradual one. But slowly the Goths, Lombards, Burgundians, Franks, Saxons, Bavarians, Slavs and many others, settling beside the existing populations, established their tribal territories and the old order and civilization of western Europe had been completely disrupted.
It was soon after 400 AD that the hard-pressed Roman emperor withdrew the garrison from Britain, sending the island provincials only the bleak message: “Defend yourselves.”
At first, the islanders coped. True, there were raids from Germanic pirates, but the island’s ports and towns had defences. After a few decades, they started employing German mercenaries to protect them. Gradually, however, with the old trade from the Continent disrupted, things began to slide. Regional leaders sprang up. The mercenaries settled and sent messages to their kinsmen overseas that the island province was weak and fragmented.
They were north Germans – tribes from the coastal regions of today’s Germany and Denmark – Angles, Saxons and others, including, probably, a related tribe known as the Jutes. Most of these people were fair-haired and blue-eyed.
They came in a steady stream, extending their hold on England from east to west. Sometimes they were successfully resisted. Around the year 500, a Romano-British leader held the West Country against them, and his name, discovered by chroniclers long after, gave rise to the legend of King Arthur.
But despite these valiant attempts to preserve the old Romano-British world, within a century and a half of their first coming, the immigrants were masters of the English land. Wales in the far west and Scotland in the north they failed to colonize. Elsewhere, except in some place names and river names – Thames from Tamesis, for instance – even the old Celtic and Latin languages largely died out. The settlement evolved into several famous kingdoms: the Angles set up Northumbria and midland Mercia; in the south lay the Saxon kingdoms of Wessex in the west, Sussex in the centre, and Kent in the old peninsula of the Cantii. The huge, low-lying eastern tract of land across the estuary from Kent was divided in two: in the northern half were the Angles of East Anglia; in the south, the East Saxon King of Essex.
It was from East Anglia that Elfgiva was returning to her husband.
It was her childhood home. Every year she went there to visit her father’s grave. This time, in particular, she had hoped the visit would give her strength, and in a way it had. How happily she had wandered along the open coast where the broad flats and beaches were broken only by the long, low lines of sand dunes before they merged with the shallow waves. How she had enjoyed the salt breeze that came in, harsh and bracing, off the sea. They said the East Anglians lived longer than others because of it.
A little way inland lay the burial ground, a series of mounds, a few feet high, by a clump of furze and small trees whose tops had long since been brushed to flatness by the winds. She had spent several hours there during her visit. The largest of the mounds was her father’s grave.