'I provided the food and drink for the feast.'

I put down my winecup.

'Claudia Sacrata, far be it from me to pry, but can you tell me something-' This oddly comfortable yet insensitive woman was upsetting me. I studiously changed the subject. 'What's the true story about losing the general's flagship?'

She smiled and said nothing.

It had been another stupid incident. I told her what I already knew from my research. After an unsuccessful period of campaigning in northern Europe, where Civilis and the Batavians had engaged him in guerilla warfare around the marshes of their homeland and had seemed set to fend off Rome indefinitely, Petilius Cerialis had taken a breather (his favourite kind of action) and gone to inspect some new winter quarters at Novaesium and Bonna, intending to return north with a much-needed naval flotilla. Yet again discipline was poor; yet again his pickets were careless. One dark night, the Germans crept in, slashed the guy ropes, and wreaked havoc while our men were fumbling under their collapsed tents and running about the camp half dressed and terrified. They had no one to rally them, because, of course, yet again Cerialis had slipped off elsewhere.

'Then the enemy towed off the flagship, Julius Civilis believing the general to be aboard.'

'His mistake!' Claudia agreed purringly.

'Sleeping out of camp again?' I tried not to sound critical.

'Evidently.'

'With you, as people said?' I was having great trouble imagining this.

'You really can't expect me to answer that.'

'I see.' With her.

'You said your enquiries had nothing to do with Petilius, so why all these questions about past events?' I was pushing matters further than she liked now.

'I'm a sucker for lively background.' I was hoping my interest in Petilius might appear to threaten him, so that she would try to deflect me with the information I really wanted. But she was tougher than she seemed. Any impression of foolishness hid a shrewd business sense. 'What happened to the flagship in the end?'

'At daybreak the rebels all sailed away in the Roman ships. They towed the flagship into their own territory as a present for their priestess.'

'Veleda!' I let out a low whistle. 'So if Cerialis was with you that night, you saved his life.'

'Yes,' she agreed proudly.

'If he had been aboard-' As he should have been. '-his fate would have been gruesome. The last Roman officer the rebels sent to Veleda has never been heard of since.'

'Terrible!' she agreed, with conventional sympathy.

'That's my mission,' I told her. 'He was a legionary legate. I have to find out for the Emperor and his family what unkind fate befell him. I doubt you would ever have met this one; he was stationed at Vetera, a long distance from here-'

'Munius Lupercus?' She sounded surprised. 'Oh you're wrong there, dear,' declared the imperturbable Claudia. 'I knew Munius very well.'

XXXVI

I sighed inwardly, I tried to shift position on the cushions beneath me, but they gripped me with embarrassing suction. When Claudia Sacrata told a man to make himself comfortable, she didn't intend him to prise himself free without the aid of a building-yard fulcrum.

I had brought myself to the home of a woman who knew everyone. Names were dropped here like water drips around a fountain. Gossip was the common language. I was sitting, on an aching bottom, at the centre of a social spider's web which might be anchored to any point in Europe.

'You knew Lupercus?' I croaked. I hate to be repetitive, but I was in no condition for more sinuous oratory.

'Such a nice man. Very genuine. Very generous.'

'I'm sure! You have a wide circle of acquaintances.'

'Oh yes. Most of the boys from Rome pass through here at some time. I am famous,' stated Claudia complacently, 'for my hospitality.'

That was one word for it.

'A woman of influence!' I threw my next dice with a casual air. 'How are you on the incumbent of the legio Fourteenth Gemina?'

She seemed equal to anything. 'Would that be Priscus? Or the new one, Gracilis?' Apparently both had hung up their armour on her cloak-peg.

'The new man.'

'I've met him once or twice.'

'Nice man?' I hazarded before I could stop myself.

'Oh very!' She took it at face value, luckily. Her sense of humour-assuming she had one-would be jolly and obvious, rather than my twisted kind.

'Has Gracilis visited you recently?'

Whatever else he indulged in here-and it was best not to speculate-Gracilis must have been asking the same questions as me. She answered with a knowing wink I could hardly tolerate: 'I believe he did!'

'I expect he had a good explanation for turning up here?'

She laughed. It sounded unattractive and I noticed she had several teeth missing. 'Something about a hunting trip:'

'That old line!'

'Oh he must have meant it, dear-a group of Gauls were taking him.'

Gauls? I already had my hands full with the German interest. This new complication was more than I liked while my brain was infused with aromatic wine.

'What was he after?' Apart from pipping me in the search for Civilis and Veleda.

'Wild boar, I believe.'

I tried a different tack. 'People at Moguntiacum are worried about what's happened to his bedchamber slave. Has Rusticus gone along on this Gallic safari to keep his master well groomed behind the spear?'

'There was no one like that with him.'

I decided not to ask any more about the Fourteenth's infernal legate. I would only find myself trying to track down some pitiful runaway slave who might simply have seen his master's absence from home as a chance to make a break for it.

I gave in, smiling. Claudia was pleased to see she had defeated me. So pleased that she condescended to add, 'The Gauls were paying for everything.'

I had to know. 'I hate to be pedantic, but you do mean they were treating Florius Gracilis to his visit here to you?'

She assented without speaking.

I had him now. If the Fourteenth Gemina's legate was being trailed around on an extended sweetener of this kind, Vespasian would swipe his name off the list of officials before anyone could blink.

'What sort of Gauls were they?'

'Potters,' said Claudia.

I wondered why she had chosen to inform on this client in particular. Germanic rivalry with Gaul? Annoyance at the blatant way her services had been offered for bribery? I decided it was the commercial dishonesty. Claudia being a businesswoman herself, she would naturally hate fraud.

'I won't embarrass you by prying further. Look, we were talking about Munius Lupercus. The war was a long time ago, and I'm struggling to find leads. I'm even faced with the prospect of going across the Rhenus to follow his route as a captive. Does your useful network of contacts extend to the other riverbank? You won't have met the prophetess-'

I should have known better. 'Veleda?' cried Claudia Sacrata. 'Oh I know her!'

A faint mood of exasperation coloured my tone: 'I thought she was incommunicado? I heard she lived above the treetops, and that even the ambassadors who went from Colonia to negotiate terms with her had to send messages via the men in her family.'

'That's right, dear.'

A dreadful thought struck me. 'Did you take part in the Colonia embassy?'

'Of course,' murmured Claudia. 'This is not Rome, Marcus Didius.' That was certainly true. German women obviously liked to be at the front of things. It was a terrifying concept to a traditional Roman boy. My upbringing was outraged-yet fascinated too. 'I have standing in Colonia, Marcus Didius. I am well known here.'

I could guess what ensured her prominence-the universal status badge: 'You are a wealthy woman?'