The Chariots of Calyx (15 page)

I had meant it as the simplest overture, but the effect was dramatic. The tongue flicked out again, and his voice almost failed him. ‘I should be honoured, naturally,’ he managed at last, ‘if in my humble way I could render the remotest service to His Excellence the Governor, but I know nothing about it. I did not see the race at all, so I do not see how I can assist you, citizen.’ There was so much sweat on his face, he looked as if he had been drinking from a street fountain.

When a man grovels like that it usually means, in my experience, that he has something to hide. Also, he is often easy to bully. He had mentioned the governor, and that gave me an advantage. I assumed my most menacing expression.

‘Nonetheless, on behalf of His Excellence Helvius Pertinax, I would like to know . . .’ I began, but the words died on my lips. From the recesses of the stall another man had appeared.

This was the Blue team coach, that much was clear from his manner and his dress, and he was as hefty as his driver was slight. He was muscular enough, under his colourful tunic, and had no doubt once been athletic, but now the body was running to fat. Wine and good living had etched the face almost as much as the ugly scar which ran across it from eyebrow to chin – the relic of some ancient shipwreck on the chariots, no doubt. Most trainers have been drivers in their time, some of them ex-slaves from other provinces, and this man had the swarthy skin and dark eyes of a Greek. He hurried towards us courteously enough, but there was no trace of welcome in his eyes.

‘Perhaps I can be of help to you, gentlemen?’ He was having to speak loudly and deliberately to make himself heard. ‘As he told you, our replacement driver did not witness the race. I did. A most unfortunate incident, and terrible for Fortunatus. A tragedy for our
factio
. I am the team manager, by the way. My name is Calyx.’ He smiled. The corners of his mouth moved reluctantly, as if they were pulled up by strings, and were not used to the exercise. ‘Yes, a tragedy. If it had not been for that, the Blues would almost certainly have won.’

I glanced at the substitute driver. He was mopping his face with the back of his hand, and looking as relieved as any man can look who is about to risk life and limb in a flimsy cockleshell amidst the hooves of thundering horses. The unfortunate slave he had been lambasting, I noticed, had picked up his water bucket and escaped.

I turned back to Calyx. ‘What exactly caused the accident?’ I asked, raising my own voice over the enthusiastic sounds of the crowd. ‘It was not like Fortunatus, by all accounts, to be shipwrecked.’

It was more a comment than a question. In fact I thought I knew the answer. Almost certainly Fortunatus had been caught at an unguarded moment and barged by the chariot of another colour while he was off-balance – that happens all the time, as we had seen earlier, and is regarded as part of the contest. The only surprise was that an experienced charioteer like Fortunatus should have allowed himself to be caught out like that.

The carefully sculpted smile hardened on Calyx’s face, as if it had been suddenly set in wax. ‘Most unfortunate,’ he said loudly. ‘Some fault with the chariot perhaps, or one of the horses skittish. Perhaps we shall never know for sure. No other chariot was involved and Fortunatus himself can remember nothing of the accident.’ He spread out his hands and moved forward as if to usher us physically from the scene. ‘So perhaps you will excuse me, citizen. I don’t think I can be of further help to you, and I have a race to supervise.’

I can be stubborn when I wish. ‘But you saw the fall yourself?’ I said. Or rather I hollered. The hubbub from the track was increasing every moment.

He shrugged. ‘It was all over so quickly. One moment Fortunatus was galloping away from the start and the next moment he was lying on the track. Luckily it was near the starting stalls or he might have gone under the wheels of another colour, and then what would have happened to the team?’

It was hard to keep up a conversation in the circumstances, but I pressed him again. ‘You did not see what caused it?’ I shouted over the din.

The wax smile was slipping little by little, but he kept his manner civil. ‘There must have been some problem with the chariot, citizen. I did not see what, exactly; my attention was elsewhere for a moment. When I glanced back I was simply in time to see him fall.’

In that case, I thought, Fortunatus might have staged the accident. It seemed a desperate expedient – the last driver to feign a fall in Rome was put to death for his presumption. His
factio
had dragged him before the courts, furious that he had taken bribes and lost the rest of the team their share of the purse. Too risky, surely? Or perhaps the accident was not of Fortunatus’ making.

‘Was there damage to the horse, or chariot? You must have seen them, after the race . . .’ I stopped. The roaring of the crowd had risen to a climax, and a moment later the gates burst open and the local teams came trotting in, the victor (it seemed to be Paulus Fatface) brandishing his garland. The others came behind him, most of them looking dazed and dishevelled, although they were all still aboard their cars. They streamed past us in a whirlwind of leather and dust.

Calyx held up his hand, and spoke for the first time in a normal voice. Even the pretence of a smile had left him now. ‘I tell you, citizen, I know nothing about it. It was an accident, is all. These things happen in chariot racing. Even the best drivers have mishaps, often when they are trying hardest. As for the chariot, I could not say. After the race I was more concerned for Fortunatus than for his racing car.’ He was still moving us away from the Blue quarter.

I was almost walking backwards. ‘But surely one of the stable-team . . .?’ I protested. ‘Someone must have looked at the chariot?’

‘I will ask them, since you require it, citizen. When the day is over. I cannot interrupt them now. Our next race will begin in a moment. Now, if you will excuse me, I have work to do. I’m sorry to be unhelpful, but I’ve told you all I know.’ He nodded, turned on his heel and hurried back to his team.

The
optio
turned to me. ‘You want me to arrest him, citizen? I am sure a short session at the guardroom would assist his memory.’

I shook my head. ‘It is too late. No doubt he and his friends are already preparing a plausible account of the event, in case we should ask again.’ I nodded towards the stables where Calyx was already in deep conversation with two men in tunics, whom I had not noticed earlier, who had now emerged from the shadows. An ugly-looking pair too: one was short and fat, with shoulders like an ox, grizzled hair, and a face like a discontented bull, presently lowering in my direction. The other was taller, thinner, greyer and possibly more sinister. The most disconcerting thing about him was not his narrow face, with its long crooked nose and cruel thin slit of a mouth, but the dreadful, casual strength of the long supple fingers which were even now twisting and testing a strip of narrow leather. As I glanced towards him I saw that he had fixed his eyes on me: cold, grey, close-set eyes with a dead, expressionless stare which chilled my blood. He saw me looking and turned swiftly away.

‘You think that Calyx was lying, citizen?’ The officer sounded shocked, as if the idea of lying to an
optio
was the height of civil disobedience.

‘I don’t
think
that he was lying,’ I said. ‘I know that he was.’ I turned to my young slave. ‘Isn’t that right, Junio?’

Junio grinned. This was a game we often played. I was trying to instruct him in my skills, and he was delighted by the opportunity to show off his abilities in front of strangers. ‘I think so, master. Obviously he was lying when he said he wasn’t watching Fortunatus,’ he said. ‘The race had just begun, he said so himself, and that is the very moment when the whole event can be won or lost by someone getting into a good position. Calyx is the coach and manager, and there were hundreds of
denarii
hanging on that race, yet he tells us that his “attention was elsewhere”. Of course he was watching. Or if he wasn’t, that is still more odd. Fortunatus was his most successful driver.’

It was exactly what I had reasoned myself, and I rewarded the boy with a smile. Junio preened.

One of the soldiers looked admiring, too, but the
optio
said, ‘Oh,’ in the tone of someone who felt he should have thought of it himself. ‘He isn’t watching now,’ he added, as an afterthought.

‘Exactly,’ I said. ‘You would expect him to be out here in the preparation area during a race. If he was in the stadium, it must be because that particular race was important to him. And yet, as Junio points out, he wasn’t even looking at a crucial moment. Or says he wasn’t. Very curious, to say the least. And he seems oddly unmoved by the whole event. Not that he would weep for Fortunatus, but he strikes me as a man who would become very angry if his financial expectations were crossed. Yet he appears to have taken his losses like a stoic.’ I signed. ‘I’d give a great deal to know exactly what happened to cause that shipwreck.’

A small hand tugged at my toga. ‘Citizen?’

I looked down. It was the cold-water slave with his bucket, his arms and shoulders already turning blue from the blows he had received. Around him, the four-in-hands were beginning to assemble again. The drivers seemed twice as lofty and assured after the amateurs of the last race. Even the new driver for the Whites looked perfectly at home in his flimsy car.

‘Citizen?’ the boy said again, more urgently.

‘Well?’

‘I can tell you a little bit. The slave who shares my sleeping space was on duty in the circuit at the time. There really wasn’t anything to see, he says. Fortunatus simply seemed to let go and topple out of his chariot – nobody was near him and there was nothing the matter with his car or horses. He thought perhaps Fortunatus had been ill.’

I stepped aside to let a stable-hand pass with the bandaged chestnut before I asked, ‘And had he?’

The boy glanced nervously towards Calyx and his companions, but they were still conferring earnestly, their backs now turned to us. ‘Not at all, citizen. That is the strange thing. He had been in the very best of spirits. And afterwards, when he was brought back to the inn on a shutter, the team coach cursed and ranted, but he did not seem really upset, if you know what I mean. I know what he is like when he is genuinely angry.’

‘I imagine you do.’ I looked at him suspiciously. ‘And you are in danger of enraging him now, if he sees us together. Why are you telling me all this?’

The boy shrugged his bruised shoulders. ‘You saved me from a flogging, citizen. Besides, I heard what you were saying just now, about how you would give a great deal for information. Fortunatus promised me a
sestertius
if I looked after his horse after the event, only of course, as it was . . .’

I could take a hint. I did not have a great deal to give but I gestured to Junio, and he produced the extra
denarius
which we had won on the horses. The boy was delighted with it. His eyes opened as wide as oyster shells, and he took it reverently and slipped it into his tunic folds at once. Then with a murmur of gratitude he disappeared about his business. Not a moment too soon. The four-in-hands were assembling again, and already Calyx had left his companions and was glaring around the courtyard, thundering, ‘We are ready for the arena. Where is that wretched bucket-boy!’

We left him to it, and went back through the gates. We only just had time to get off the course and out of the stadium before the trumpets blew again, and the professional drivers came cantering in. As we walked away from the enclosure we could hear the cheering that told us the next race had begun.

‘Well then,’ the
optio
said briskly. ‘What is your next step, citizen? Do you wish us to accompany you to the inn where the Blue team is staying?’

I thought about that for a moment. ‘We might send a messenger,’ I said at last. ‘Just to be quite certain that Fortunatus really did go back to Londinium.’

The
optio
nodded. He muttered an order and one of the escorting soldiers set off at a lumbering run, his armour creaking and clanking as he went. ‘You suspect that he did not return to the city after all?’

‘On the contrary, I am almost certain that he did exactly that. If he did, then I should go back there myself at once. In the light of everything I’ve learned, I am particularly anxious to talk to him as soon as possible. I presume the governor’s gig is still at my disposal?’

‘It is standing by in the stables, waiting for you,’ the
optio
said. ‘The horses and the driver will have been fed and rested by this time. But are you sure there is nothing further that I can show you here?’

There was something rather plaintive in his tone, and it occurred to me that the officer was mildly disappointed. He had been looking forward to a day at the racing as my escort, and no doubt when he returned to normal duty in the barracks the duties awaiting him would be much less agreeable.

I hardened my heart. ‘I would love to see more of the city, but like you I have official business to perform. Perhaps we could return to the garrison, and wait for the return of our messenger? I will have a better idea of what I want to do when I find out for sure where Fortunatus is.’

‘As you wish, citizen!’ He seemed to take my words as a rebuke, and we made our way back, along the route by which we had come, at a brisk pace and without a word exchanged. No wonder the stares of the passers-by were more goggle-eyed than ever.

At the gate the
optio
gave the password of the day – ‘Mighty Saturn, chosen of the planets’ – and we were admitted, to make our way back across the little gravelled parade ground, where a group of men were now training noisily with swords and spears against wooden stakes hammered into the earth, under the shouts and curses of their officers.

Through the inner gate we went and into the headquarters building, where the
optio
went off to announce our presence and I was shown to a bench in an ante-room to wait.