“On his own?”
“I felt sorry for him. He said it was cold at night and his tentmates weren’t very nice.”
“Do you think he might have gone somewhere else instead?”
Virana frowned. “Where would he go?”
Where indeed? “Did he mention meeting anyone he hadn’t seen for a while?”
Virana’s face brightened. “When he first saw me he said, ‘Haven’t I seen you somewhere before?’ ” She looked puzzled. “But I don’t remember him, and he said he’s never been to Eboracum.”
“He was probably just making conversation,” Ruso told her, wondering if Candidus had also invited her to come and help him polish his equipment, or whatever euphemism they used these days. “Can you remember anything else at all? Did anyone follow him?”
Virana pondered this for a moment.
“This is important,” he explained. “You may be the last person who saw him before he disappeared.”
“Oh, no, master!” Her confidence was unexpected. “I am not the last person who saw him.”
It was all Ruso could do not to grab her and shake the rest of the pins out. “Then who is?”
Virana frowned. “I don’t know, master. Surely you saw him the next morning when he was working at the hospital?”
“You’re talking about . . .” He paused to think. “The day after market day? Not the day he disappeared?”
Virana said, “You didn’t say when. You asked if I saw him.”
Ruso let out a long breath and managed, “Yes. That’s true. Let’s see if you can remember somebody else.”
“Another soldier?”
“A man called Liber.”
Her face lit up. “He was in here yesterday. Did he say something about me?”
“No,” said Ruso. “I’m just trying to sort out who was where when Branan went missing. Can you remember when he arrived and when he left?”
“It was after the mistress had the headache,” said Virana. “She went upstairs, and then . . .” She thought for a moment. “You must have seen him yourself, master. He was sitting at table three when you came in.”
“I didn’t notice,” Ruso confessed.
“Then he had to go because he was on duty.” She pushed her hair back from her face, leaned across the table, and whispered. “I think he likes me!”
“I think he likes quite a few girls,” Ruso told her, wishing he did not have to disappoint her and wondering yet again why Virana’s experience had failed to conquer her optimism where good-looking young men were concerned. He downed the last of the wine. “I need to go. Thanks for your help.”
“I hope you find Branan soon. He’s a nice boy. I like him.”
He said, “We’re getting nearer,” because he had to say something, and because it might be true. For all he knew, the lad had turned up by now. In case he hadn’t, Ruso was about to visit the local brothel in the hope of meeting Larentia, Delia, and a blonde girl with a mole on her left buttock.
Chapter 37
The woman’s hair was dyed a harsh, unnatural fox-pelt red. Heavy makeup had collected in her wrinkles so the painted eyes in the artificially whitened face made him think of black beetles in a snowdrift. But she still had most of her own teeth, or someone else’s skillfully attached, and the smile that revealed them was professional. So was the disappointment when she realized Ruso had only come for information and was not intending to pay for it.
Yes, she had heard about the boy. It was a terrible thing.
“Do you have many customers who ask for boys?”
“Not often enough to warrant buying one,” she said, as if it were a matter of regret. “I send them to Vindolanda.”
“Do you know who those customers are?”
“I know who all my customers are.”
Ruso waited.
“Discretion, Doctor,” she explained. “I’m sure you understand.”
“And I’m sure you understand how urgently we need to know.”
The muscles holding the cheeks into a half smile relaxed, and the skin around her mouth fell to a slackness that betrayed her age. Ruso looked her in the eye until she pulled the smile back into place.
She remembered a tall gentleman with only one leg, and one who was short and stout and wheezy. She could hardly have invented anyone less like the man who had taken Branan.
“If you see either of them,” he said, “ask them to look out for him on their, ah . . . on their travels.”
“I’m sure they will,” she said, not in a way he liked. “Now. Who else can we offer you, Doctor?”