“Hard work and the goodness of God, Doctor. Sit down. You look worn-out. What can I get you?”
He had intended to rush, but she was right: He was tired, and he needed to eat. He sat, leaning back against a wall on which peacocks and doves strutted in a rather blotchy garden. Before he could order anything, Susanna had joined him and dispatched one of her girls—not one he remembered—to bring them both drinks and him a bowl of pancakes with honey. “You’ll like them,” she promised. “Now, let’s see, what’s happened to everybody since you were here? I hear you and Tilla are married and having a blessing!”
“We married in Gaul,” he told her. Her face fell when he explained who he was looking for. “We heard. That poor family. Such a terrible thing, and in daylight too! They’re lucky they have you there to help.”
It was not a popular view, but he enjoyed hearing it anyway. Conscious of the couple on the next table now straining to catch every word, he leaned closer to ask a delicate question.
“Lupus?” Susanna considered her answer for a moment. Then she said, “Yes. Yes, I’d say he might. It’s a pity you weren’t here yesterday. He was sitting at that table over there.”
He blinked. Surely it couldn’t be that easy?
It wasn’t. “But he was leaving town today.”
“I need to know whether he sold the boy on while he was here,” he said. “If he didn’t, I need to find him.”
A soft hand closed over his. “You leave the locals to me, Doctor. If that little boy’s here, I’ll find out.”
After a faintly embarrassing pause while she gazed deep into his eyes, Susanna let go. “Aemilia will be sorry to have missed you,” she said. “They’re out of town.”
“That’s a shame,” he said, relieved. Tilla’s cousin Aemilia meant well, but today he did not have time to listen to her.
“In fact, I thought . . .” She stopped. “Well, I must have misunderstood.” She patted him on the hand. “You enjoy your meal while I just pop out and ask where Lupus went. I’ll get the girls to pack you up some food to take with you.”
Ruso allowed himself to relax back against the doves and peacocks. Finally, somebody was pleased to see him. Better still, she seemed to know what to do.
The pancakes arrived, generously dolloped with honey, and as he sliced each golden surface and rolled it onto his spoon, he began to word his next message to Tilla. He would tell Accius as well, of course, but he wanted to imagine Tilla crouching beside the old man and saying, “Good news! Your boy is on the way home!” He could imagine the welcome as he rode back to the farm with the boy seated—no, two on a horse would never work over that distance. He would get a pony assigned to the boy. Or maybe they would arrive in style, in an official vehicle supplied by the local commandant. The news would have run ahead of them. Neighbors, weary with searching but elated, would be lining the road, cheering and waving. Locals and foreigners together, differences forgotten in the joy of knowing that a missing child was safe and well. Ruso would sit back in the carriage and smile the satisfied smile of a man whose efforts had been justly rewarded, and modestly tell everyone that Fortune had been kind to him and that he was glad to have been able to help.
The elation did not last.
Chapter 56
Ruso had arrived at the wrong time of day for a man who wanted a fresh horse. Everything was either out or worn out. Finally he was granted the reserve mount: a mare with a peculiarly uncomfortable gait and reins repaired with twine.
Luckily, Lupus’s cartload of caged stock trundled along no faster than the couple of dozen slaves chained behind it could walk. Three men with clubs were assigned to encourage them, but even so, the assembly was only a couple of miles out of town and heading east when Ruso found it. That was when his vision of triumph began to fade.
He surveyed the lines of chained slaves as he passed, but there was no sign of Branan. The cage held only a nursing mother and a couple of small children. There were two men at the front of the vehicle: one who was driving the mules and another whose skinny neck poking out from a mound of furs reminded Ruso of an ostrich. “Lupus?”
It was, but Lupus did not recall any native boy sold to his agent in Vindolanda.
“We know he bought him,” insisted Ruso, struck by a sudden fear that the agent might have got rid of the boy privately rather than deliver him to Lupus. “There are witnesses.”
The neck sank into the furs as if fearing attack.
“If we don’t find him, the family can still prosecute your agent for receiving stolen goods.” It ought to be true, although he had no idea whether it was.