Free A Roman Ransom by Rosemary Rowe Page B

feared that they were both dead, but the boy seemed generally none the worse for his terrible ordeal. Indeed, the medicus had performed a sort of miracle. Marcellinus had been red-faced and fretting visibly, but now he stopped howling, burped once, and then relaxed. The sobs subsided first to gulping gasps, and then to contented little bubbling sounds. Though these were muffled against the toga cloth, I recognised the hissing noises which had alarmed me so. I felt a little stupid recalling my earlier fears.
    ‘You are skilled with children,’ I mumbled awkwardly. ‘Do they teach you that in Greece? Or did you learn it somewhere, afterwards?’ Most Roman-trained physicians I had met, including the state-licensed ones in town, had learned what they knew either from army doctors or from people trained by them, and were more comfortable with wounds and fevers than with children’s maladies.
    If Philades heard this feeble flattery he ignored it utterly. ‘There!’ he said, with brisk efficiency. ‘That was the problem. Digestive vapours. He’s obviously more comfortable now, and fortunately he seems to be more or less unharmed.’ He flashed me a swift, appraising look. ‘I’ll hand it to you, pavement-maker – you may be sick, but you are still cleverer than I gave you credit for. How in the name of Jupiter did you bring this about?’
    At first I didn’t understand what he was driving at. ‘What do you mean?’
    ‘The boy’s return. I presume you did arrange it, somehow, with the kidnappers?’
    I stared at him. If he had suggested that I’d had dealings with Hercules himself, I could scarcely have been more taken aback. I shook my head. ‘He was pushed into the litter in that container there. It was a surprise to me.’
    ‘But you must know who brought him here?’ He was watchful and suspicious, suddenly. ‘You saw the man?’
    ‘I don’t know any more than you do. Someone pushed him in against my back, and ran away into the woods. Or I presume he did. Odd, since there was already an arrangement for the child’s safe return. But that’s all I can tell you. I swear on the gods.’
    Philades paused in the act of patting Marcellinus, as if some passing deity had turned him into stone. ‘Surely you must have caught a glimpse, at least? Since you were unaccountably awake?’ He was avoiding my eyes, I realised.
    ‘I saw nobody,’ I said. ‘I was lying on my side and looking out the other way. By the time I’d turned round it was too late.’
    He was still gazing elsewhere with exaggerated care. ‘So you couldn’t identify the person even from the back? That’s most unfortunate.’
    ‘I was watching you dealing with the logs,’ I said. All this emotion was exhausting me. ‘You know I was. Besides, I’m ill. I don’t know why you – of all people – should expect me to be alert. It’s only chance I wasn’t fast asleep.’
    He grunted. ‘If you say so, citizen.’ This time he sounded frankly sceptical. Did he suppose that I had chosen not to look, because I was sick, exhausted and preferred not to incur the troubles that witnesses invite?
    ‘I’m sure the litter slaves would bear me out on this,’ I went on grumpily. ‘They must have seen me leaning out to look.’
    ‘I doubt it, citizen. I instructed them to keep their attention on the task. We heard your cry, of course – but we all assumed that you were just shouting in your sleep again.’
    I frowned. ‘But you came back?’
    ‘Of course. I was about to wake you from your troubled dreams and give you something to ensure that you relaxed. I have some dried herbs, ready mixed, here in my pouch.’ He gave me that appraising look again. ‘Which, after all this shock, you should have in any case.’
    So he had genuinely expected me to be asleep, I thought. Or drugged into unconsciousness, perhaps. I was suddenly overwhelmed by a strong desire to avoid his sleeping mixtures at all costs.
    I changed the subject with forced cheerfulness.