'How nice for you!' No wonder the Empire had been creaking at its seams lately. I refused to react, but it was ill-judged and inexcusable. The girl possessed a mixture of schoolgirl arrogance and ignorance that was likely to cause trouble. If Gracilis didn't watch her, I gave him six months before there was a scandal with a centurion or an incident in a barrack block that had people being sent home hurriedly.

'Excuse me for invading your privacy. I need to see your husband, but he was not at the Principia-'

'He's not here either!' This time she spoke out quickly, with the triumphant edge some people use instead of wit. Her brown eyes gave me the once-over, which was fair enough since I had done the same to her. Yet she was seeing nothing, trying only to insult me.

I twitched up an eyebrow. 'You must be very concerned. Does Gracilis make a habit of vanishing?'

'The legate's habits are his own affair.'

'Not quite, madam.'

Annoyance yanked her mouth into an uglier twist. Men in shapeless sorrel-coloured tunics with woolly linings in their battered boots did not usually answer her back. (I would have liked to be kitted out more excitingly, but my banker had counselled against overstretching my budget that year. Bankers are so predictable. My budget, too.)

'Your ladyship, there seems to be a problem here! A man of your husband's standing ought not to become invisible. It worries the lower orders. In fact, the Emperor might consider it politically inept: If Gracilis is dodging his creditors-' I had been joking, but she let out a bitter laugh. A wild guess had struck lucky. 'Oh, is that it?'

'Possibly.'

'Can you give me a list of his debts?'

She shrugged. Gracilis had probably brought her to Germany to avoid the risk that back in Rome she might suborn his numerous stewards into letting her spend cash. Men like that keep their wives securely cut off from the household abacus. I prodded, but she seemed genuinely uninformed. I was not surprised.

'So you cannot tell me where to start looking? You have no idea where your husband may be?'

'Oh I know that!' she exclaimed archly. I bit back my irritation.

'Madam, this is important. I have a message from Vespasian for Florius Gracilis. When the Emperor sends despatches, he expects me to deliver them. Will you say where your husband is?'

'With his mistress, presumably.' She was so vapid, she did not even watch me to see the effect it had.

'Look,' I said, still trying to keep my temper, 'your domestic life is private, but however modern your views on marriage, I assume you and Gracilis follow some rules. The conventions are clear enough.' I stated them anyway: 'He fritters away your dowry; you eat into his inheritance. He can beat you; you can slander him. He supplies you with moral guidance and an extravagant dress allowance; you, madam, at all times protect his reputation in public life. Now try to grasp this: if I don't find him quickly, there is going to be a scandal. Whatever else, he will want you to avoid that!'

She jumped up in a jangle of atonal jewellery. 'How dare you!'

'How dares a public man have the front to disappear right under the nose of the provincial governor?'

'I couldn't care less!' cried Maenia Priscilla with her first real sign of liveliness. 'Get out of here, and don't come back again!'

She swept from the room. A gust of unlikeable balsamic perfume swirled round after her. She bounced off so angrily that an ivory hairpin shot itself from the torsion of a castellated braid in her elaborate hair, and landed at my feet.

I picked it up, then silently handed the missile to one of the waiting-women. The maids looked resigned, then gathered their trappings and followed her out.

I was not alarmed. Somewhere in the residence there would be a wizened accountant who would take a more realistic attitude to my enquiry than the petulant wife had. He was bound to know exactly which creditors he was fobbing off on a daily basis, and if I took an interest in his work, he would probably tell me.

As for the name of the legate's mistress, that would be common coin anywhere in the barracks.

During my search for information, I at one point bumbled into the legate's private gymnasium. I saw what Justinus meant about Gracilis being a sporty type: his den was packed with weights, dumb-bells, beanbags for throwing-games, and all the other paraphernalia that normally suggest a man who is afraid of seeming puny-probably because it's true. At one end of the room his spears and hunting trophies were hung on hooks. A sad Egyptian who would have been better employed mummifying kings for their meeting with Osiris sat cross-legged, engaged in taxidermy on a rather small deer. I never waste time talking to Egyptians. He could stuff a roebuck, but hearing his views on life as a timeless river of sorrows would not help me find his master. I nodded and passed on.

I finally tracked down the accountant, who supplied me with a lengthy list of disappointed wine merchants, furriers, bookmakers, stationers and importers of fine-scented oils.

'Jupiter, this man certainly does not believe in paying bills!'

'He's a little unbusinesslike,' the scribe agreed mildly. The fellow had swollen eyes and a restrained manner. He looked tired.

'Is there no income from His Honour's estates in Italy?'

'They're flourishing, but mostly mortgaged up.'

'So he's in trouble?'

'Oh, I doubt that!'

He was right. Gracilis was a senator. In the first place, teetering on the brink of financial disaster was probably second nature, so unlikely to worry him. Marrying Maenia Priscilla must have given his collateral a fillip. In any case, he came equipped with massive clout. To the small tradesmen of a remote provincial town, his lordship must be untouchable. A few adroit business fiddles would soon get him out of any temporary squeeze.

'Can I take it you have no idea then why your master might have disappeared?'

'I was unaware of any mystery.'

'He left you no instructions?'

'He's not renowned for forethought. I thought he was off on business for a few days. His bedchamber slave is absent too.'

'How do you know that?'

'Heard the man's girlfriend bemoaning the fact.'

'She works in the house?'

'She's a barmaid at the Medusa, near the Principia Dexter Gate.'

I took away the names of both the creditors and the slave's girlfriend scratched on my pocket memo tablet. Its wax had hardened up through lack of use, a sure hint that it was time to do some work.

'Tell me something else: is your master a ladies' man?'

'I couldn't possibly comment.'

'Oh, stretch a point!'

'My sphere is purely financial.'

'That needn't be unrelated to what I asked! His funds could be tight as a result of expensive mistresses:'

I let him stare me out. We both knew I would find other sources eager to supply me with the sordid facts.

I left the residence with a light step. Having clues always gives my optimistic side a boost.

I then made the mistake of pushing my luck again with the highhanded XIV Gemina.

Prefect of the camp was never a post in the traditional republican legion. As with so much else, I reckon the old republicans got it right. Nowadays these prefects wield an undue influence. Each legion appoints one, and they have a wide range of responsibilities for organisation, training and kit. In the absence of the legate and senior tribune they take command, which is when things become dangerous. They are drawn from the pool of first spears who are resisting retirement, which makes them too old, too pedantic, and too slow. I don't like them on principle. The principle being that it was a camp prefect whose obtuse behaviour destroyed the Second Augusta's reputation in the British Revolt.