Tabula Rasa(15)

“Soldiers have no homes,” Conn said, looking round at the household as if he were explaining something new. “This is why they do not understand what it is to turn people off their land.”

Tilla said, “My husband’s family has a farm in the south of Gaul. His brother looks after it.”

“The south of Gaul?” Senecio raised one white eyebrow. “I hear the land there is very dry in the summer.”

“There is not much rain,” Ruso agreed.

“How many cows do you have?”

“Just the one.” Aware that the Britons would think he was a pauper, he added, “We have a lot of vines and olives. Some . . .” He turned to Tilla for the native word, then realized there wasn’t one. “Some peaches,” he said, “and a little wheat.”

“Wine and oil,” Senecio mused. “You can feed a family on these things?”

“We sell them.” Not very profitably.

“Ah.” It was Senecio’s turn to explain to his audience. “The Romans have to use coins,” he explained, “because they cannot feed themselves on what they grow.”

Conn said, “This is why they come here wanting our good land to grow real food on.”

Ruso felt Tilla’s thigh press up against his own. He wanted to tell her not to worry. If they wanted to score points at his expense, he would put up with it. It was only one evening, and if these people were gullible enough to believe that he had been lured away from the sunny vineyards of southern Gaul by windswept grass and reedy bogs, nothing he said would change their minds.

He waited for the next challenge, but instead Senecio said, “You have a good understanding of our tongue, healer. This is not usual in a foreigner.”

Ruso put a hand on Tilla’s knee. Perhaps they really were clinging to each other for support. “I have a good teacher.”

“That is as well. We do not speak Latin in this house.”

“Never mind!” put in a cheery voice from the other end of the bench. “Now my mistress is here, she can teach you!”

Tilla hissed, “Sh!” and Virana subsided with, “But I was only saying—”

“Sh!”

Ruso was fairly sure that there was a difference in British between We do not speak Latin and We cannot speak Latin. Perhaps Senecio too wanted to lay down some boundaries.

Senecio handed his cup to Enica. As she poured the beer, he reached back and squeezed her thigh.

This was unexpected. Either Ruso had made the wrong assumption about Enica and Conn, or he had at last found evidence of Julius Caesar’s assertion that the Britons shared their wives. Was that what very traditional meant? He hoped he wasn’t expected to share his own wife. Or, indeed, anyone else’s.

Senecio took a gulp and held the cup out. Enica, whom Ruso no longer knew how to place, took it and brought it across to him. Ruso nodded his thanks. As he drank he could hear Virana whispering, “Why don’t they want to learn Latin?”

Tilla murmured, “I think they already know some.”

“Then why will they not speak it to the master?”

It was Tilla’s turn with the beer. When the cup had gone back to the old man, Ruso heard, “Because they want to stay Corionotatae.”

“But they are Corionotatae.”

“They don’t want the children to forget where they come from.”

“But how will they get by without—”

Tilla’s “Sh!” almost covered the sound of Senecio’s announcement that it was time to eat and that their guest should be served first.

Enica stepped forward again.

Virana hauled herself up from the bench. “I’ll do it!”

Enica paused, ladle in hand, and looked to the old man for instruction.

Tilla seized Virana by the wrist. “Sit down!”

“But you said I was to help!”

“Enica will do it.”

Virana pushed her hair out of her eyes and slumped back down. “I never know what helping I’m supposed to do and what other people are there for.”

Moments later Enica had done her duty and Ruso had realized that she must be the old man’s wife, and Branan’s mother, and that was perhaps why she was less than thrilled at her husband inviting the daughter of his old flame to eat with them. By the time he had worked this out he found himself with his own beer and nursing a thick wooden bowl filled with stew at the temperature of molten lava.

He had assumed the woman would go on to serve everyone else, but instead she served only Senecio and then stepped back. Senecio gestured to him to begin. Evidently the foreign guest was expected to eat first.

Ruso glanced around. He had attended all manner of dinner parties, most of them reluctantly, but never before had he been expected to put on a display of eating for the rest of the diners. Tentatively, he licked the bottom of the spoon.