He looked deep into his own eyes in the mirror and was not surprised to see an unhealthy dose of defeat in them. He’d had such high hopes for this business. It was something strategic and real in which to immerse himself without diving into the political cesspools of Rome or the bloodbaths of the army. The military was out of the picture anyway. Even if he felt like going back, which in his current physical state would be truly dreadful, Caesar’s time in Gaul was coming to an end shortly and those legions would be stood down as their general returned to Rome to take up higher office. By the time he arrived in Caesar’s tent, there probably wouldn’t be a legion there to command. And that left Rome as an option. To take up a role in the government and be gradually ground down to sand between the rough edges of Caesar and Pompey. Lucilia had broached the idea once that perhaps he could grease a few palms in the senate and try to secure himself a governorship. Fronto had laughed at that until wine came out of his nose.
He wasn’t laughing now.
Who
was
that old man in the mirror?
‘Marcus?’
He turned and riveted a beaming smile on his face.
‘Don’t give me that,’ Lucilia snorted.
He let the forced smile slide from his visage and sighed.
‘You thrashed around like a windmill in a storm last night,’ she said quietly. ‘Worse than usual?’
Fronto shrugged. ‘Same as usual. I was just finally actually settling and hoping to squeeze in another hour of slumber when Amelgo woke me. Got to get going early today, you see? Irenaeus is due in port this morning and he’s one of few Greek captains who’ll still give me the time of day. I need to get down to the port and get his mark on my contract before that po-faced bastard Hierocles gets to him and turns him from me.’
‘Marcus, you should have a man to do this for you.’
‘Who? Aurelius? The brothers? Masgava maybe? No. All our lads are workers, not spokesmen. This is a job for glib tongue and I’m the nearest thing here. Unless you want to take a turn at the steering oars of this enterprise?’
Lucilia gave him a look that startled him, as though she were actually considering it. Hurriedly, wanting to draw the argument to a close before it began, he waved concerns aside. ‘Do you know where my best chiton is? The blue one with the white edging.’
‘Must you dress as a Greek?’
‘When dealing with these people it is better not to over-publicise my Romanness. Irenaeus is a good man, but even he might be better disposed to a man in a chiton than in the red tunica of a Roman officer. Do you know where it is?’
Lucilia nodded. ‘Amelgo laid it out in our room, along with your best sandals and the white cloak. You will look quite the Hellenic gentleman.’
‘Thank you, my love. Are the boys up?’
‘And crawling about like a pair of rodents. Lucius is up on his feet, holding onto table edges and pulling himself round. Marcus, as usual, cannot be bothered to try and walk, and simply sits there drinking. I’m beginning to wonder if the very name is cursed?’ The harsh words were delivered with a sly upturn of the mouth to remind Fronto that she was as dry a joker as her father, and he chuckled. ‘He’ll stand up in his own good time. Never fret about him walking. Children always learn in the end. You don’t see many forty year olds still crawling about on the floor, do you?’
‘Only you and your friends on market day after a session in the Ox.’
Again the upturn, and Fronto laughed aloud. Gods, but it felt good to laugh.
His mood slumped again at the all-too familiar sound of a shattering amphora outside in the gardens. The distressing noise was followed by a verbal altercation between the recognisable Greek slur of Pamphilus and Clearchus and the angry Latin of Aurelius and Masgava. Odd though it was to hear a polyglot argument like that, the novelty had long since worn off.
‘Why did I put idiots and jugglers in charge of the best stock?’
And it
was
his best stock. The very finest of wines he’d managed to import into the city before Hierocles’ cartel of hate had interfered and soured the deal with the trader who had been set to buy it. After another ‘accident’ at the warehouse, Fronto had had the best stock moved to the villa, and had finally managed to line up another buyer, though for considerably less profit. And now it sounded like he’d have to speak to the buyer and apologise for being at least one amphora short.
‘You need more men,’ Lucilia said quietly. ‘And not ex-soldiers or surly Greeks. You need to get down to the slave market and get some bargains. Go early on the morning three days after market day, when the leftover stock has gone but the new slaves have come in.’
‘I don’t like buying slaves. I don’t really like owning slaves. Father always said a man who works for a wage you can trust, but a man you have to keep at the end of a stick will beat you with it the moment you turn your back.’
‘Your father, gods forgive me for saying it, was a hopeless drunk with less sense than a Scythian.’
‘Lucilia…’
‘Don’t snap at me. I’m quoting your sister. I’ve noted your aversion to owning them, and I know that there are those who won’t do it for fear of another slave war. I didn’t even argue when you emancipated Amelgo after only a week of being back. But those slaves who are treated well are happy with their lot, Marcus. Slaves are the
norm
. Good grief, even the Greeks keep slaves, and
they
consider themselves the masters of equality. Daddy has slaves.
Everyone
has slaves. And slaves will be careful with your stock out of respect, or at least fear.’
‘Listen Lucilia…’
He was interrupted by another muffled crash of pottery and further bellowing in two languages.
‘Alright,’ he sighed. ‘I take your point. I don’t like spending money we haven’t really got, but I suppose I could maybe buy three or four, if I can find them cheap enough.’
‘And another two for the house, Marcus. We’re woefully undermanned here.’
He winced, but nodded.
‘If money’s too much of an issue, talk to Father. I’m sure he would happily lend you a few sesterces.’
Fronto winced again and coughed to cover his nerves. ‘That won’t be necessary. I’ll take your advice on timing though. Five more days until the old stock’s gone and the new are in.’
Lucilia smiled reassuringly. ‘If it makes you feel better, just keep the slaves long enough to know that they’re good at the job and trustworthy, then give them their freedom along with room and board. But at least then they’ll be bound to you and more careful than those hirelings out there.’
‘I tell you what: five days, and you can come with me and help me choose.’
As the shouting intensified outside, he sighed, kissed his wife on the cheek and strolled off to find his fine Greek clothes to face the day as best he could.
* * * * *
Fronto lurched to the side as a burly Greek with a two-week beard, reeking of sour wine, pushed past him into the throng of the agora and on into the crowd, muttering something angrily. His grumbling was soon lost in the general chaos and din of arguing amateur philosophers, fishmongers, salesmen, beggars and madmen, though Masgava turned and shot the man the darkest of looks on principle.
The entrance and solid, otherwise-featureless rear wall of the theatre loomed on their right, seated at the foot of the green, rocky hill upon which sat one of the city’s three great temples. To the left, the narrow, disorganised tangle of streets cobwebbed off into the heart of the city, for Massilia’s agora was oddly offset at one end of the wide bay. Behind them the pandemonium of that public space raged and surged like a stormy sea of humanity, but the way ahead was little better. The wide thoroughfare from the agora to the northernmost jetties of the port was packed with life as merchants and teamsters hurried this way and that, carts bouncing and jolting on the cobbled ground, stray dogs winding in and out of the unheeding legs. Men haggled and argued, and the masts of ships were visible over their heads a tantalisingly short distance away. All this, and the sun was still barely over the horizon. On a busy day and with a clear sea, even in winter Massilia made Rome look sedate, calm and organised.
It had taken Fronto some time to get used to the utter bedlam that was the last free Greek city in the west. It had seemed to him that the place had no rules and no order, but long-term exposure was teaching him otherwise. Massilia
had
its rules and its order, but they were a far cry from the Pax Romana, and a foreigner could never hope to understand the workings of the city-state or the Hellene mind behind it in a year of market days.
Slowly, though, he was unburdening his soul of Roman canker. If only Massilia would stop resisting his acclimatisation...
‘If you would let us come with you armed and in force, you would not have to fight your way through the crowd,’ the huge ex-gladiator grunted.
‘And my almost non-existent popularity would disappear into the cracks between the cobbles, Masgava. It’s all a game.’
‘Other merchants have bodyguards.’ The Numidian threw out a finger and pointed at a man in a yellow chiton, dripping with gold and jewels, surrounded by a gang of burly Gauls in mail shirts, their fingers dancing on the pommels of their swords as they eyed the crowd suspiciously.
‘He’s a Greek. He can afford to stand out because people don’t hate him for what he is.’
Masgava eyed the ostentatious jewellery and snorted. ‘
I
hate him.’
‘But here and now, sadly, your opinion counts for about the same as mine, which is to say: not at all. Today is about trying to foster good relations with our Greek neighbours, not asserting our Roman-ness with red tunics and blades. Come on, that looks like Irenaeus’ ship.’
As the two men moved on through the crowd, pushing towards the port, Fronto kept his gaze intermittently on the tall mast, which he felt sure would be the friendly Greek’s ship. Very few of the port’s sailors would contemplate a black sail, for the ill luck associated with the colour, though Irenaeus allowed himself this little foible, since at the sail’s centre Apollo’s white raven theoretically overrode all misfortune.
Fronto’s heart sank as he emerged from the crowd with Masgava at his shoulder to see the ship’s owner busily haggling with a Levantine merchant with a beard like the ancient Cypriots or Sumerians, tightly curled, oiled and falling to twin points at his collar bones. Gods, but the sailor was early. It had been said that Irenaeus would be in Tauroentum, a little way along the coast, and would not arrive in Massilia until the middle of the morning. He was, instead, already part unloaded as the height of the ship riding in the water confirmed. He must have arrived before dawn and, since no sailor in their right mind would try the rocky coast of southern Gaul in the dark, he must have actually put in at Massilia late last night.
The Roman’s hopes of getting Irenaeus’ mark before any opposition got to him were almost shattered in that realisation. The only chance was that Hierocles and his fellow arseholes were equally unaware of the new arrival. And that the squint-eyed Levantine currently sealing a deal had not filled the hold with a proposed cargo already.
‘Make sure we’re not interrupted as soon as that Phoenician leaves, alright?’
Masgava nodded and flexed his muscles. A moment later, Fronto was standing a disrespectful three feet behind the intricately-bearded merchant, hovering and trying to catch the eye of Irenaeus. The Levantine had clearly finished his actual business and was now passing the time of day with the Greek captain, and Fronto’s impatience was rising at a dangerous rate. His business was urgent and, while he had no intention of further alienating himself from the city’s Greek populace, he had no trouble arguing with another foreigner who got in his way.
Noisily, he cleared his throat and the Levantine looked around in surprise. As he turned, his face creased into an angry scowl ready to unleash his feelings on Fronto, but the sight of Masgava, looming a foot taller than Fronto and more than a foot wider at the shoulders, all muscles and teeth gleaming in the sun, seemed to rip the invective from his tongue and leave him with a weak apologetic smile.
‘I shall be moving on, sirs. Good day to you captain, and to you, sir.’
Fronto nodded impatiently and waited for the man to be out of the way by only the narrowest of margins before stepping into his place.
‘Irenaeus, you’re early.’
‘Good winds for this time of year, my Roman friend. And your motherland has been almost as kind to me as Poseidon these past weeks.’
His tone was affable, but Fronto was enough of a student of humanity to spot the underlying tension. Something unsaid. Something disquieting. There was a faint troubled look to the man’s eyes, which kept flicking downward.
‘What’s the matter, Irenaeus? You’ve sold off the last of your hold space?’
The Greek’s eyelid twitched as he shook his head.
‘Good, ‘cause I have a shipment of Falernian costing me warehouse fees in Puteoli, and I need to get it here as soon as possible. Your next trip, yes?’
Again, there was a shifty discomfort in the Greek’s expression. ‘How big a shipment?’
‘Forty amphorae, roughly eighty talents in weight, all well-sealed and stamped by the producer. A good shipment, but small enough still to leave room in your hold.’