Legatus Legionis: Book Two in the Gaius Claudius Scaevola Trilogy (36 page)

I hope you are securing good quarters for winter, which cannot be far away when this gets to you. Keep warm, and keep safe.

I miss you very much,

Your loving Vipsania.

The corn issue was a continuing sore. What were the facts? It appeared that about ten per cent of the corn had been taken over the last three years. This three-year period was the time Quintus had been managing the shipments. When Timothy appeared, the loss stopped. Timothy had mentioned to Quintus that he was going to check.

Either Quintus was guilty or he was not. All the facts fitted with his guilt, but suppose he were not guilty? Somebody else may have seen Quintus as a soft touch, someone who was simply not doing his job properly. Possibly Quintus had told somebody else about the corn, and that somebody else had seized the opportunity. They may have simply watched Quintus accept the grain at the waterfront, then if Quintus had wandered off to a tavern and left somebody else do the work, the theft could easily happen.

Quintus need not be a thief; just somebody not very useful. But what about the last time? Timothy had remained hidden. Either the thief would have had to spot Timothy, which was unlikely, or he had heard Timothy tell Quintus, or Quintus had told somebody else. Quintus' mouthing off about a secret plan was depressingly likely.

So, he still did not know what to do about Quintus, not that there was much he could do since he was Lucilla's husband and was living near Rome, while he was in Britain.

* * *

Over the next few weeks, rafts were built to ferry timber over the river, and fortifications were quickly built, together with storehouses and barracks. A suitable building was quickly erected for Gaius, both for his personal use and as an administrative centre. Gaius had brought a considerable amount of blank scroll material with him, and once everybody had their assigned tasks, he would have plenty of spare time to write.

He remembered Athene's instruction: record his discoveries of where Aristotle was wrong, but show them to no person. It was not quite clear what the last part meant, but the first was clear enough. He would record all his findings, including that contraries were the opposite or absence of the other, that contraries to motion were applied by the medium, and were not a property of the object itself, that all things fell at the same rate, which meant that if the force on a falling object was its weight, the acceleration had to be the weight divided by the amount of matter present. That allowed Aristarchus to be correct, and he could show geometrically what happened as the planets fell around the sun. He knew roughly how far away they all were, and exactly how long each of their "years" was, so he should be able to work out the accelerating factor for each of them. Maybe there would be a relationship? Whatever, he would prove through his evidence from the tides that Earth moved, he would put that down geometrically, he would show what that predicted regarding the Moon's and Sun's contributions, and he would put Timothy's data in.

That would be impressive. It would also be the very first scroll to enter this new Library of Rome that Claudius had promised. That would mean that work would last for years, even after his death. Yes, that was worth quite a bit.

Meanwhile, construction progressed at quite an impressive rate, for the Roman soldier worked very hard when given a task. The Celtic villagers watched with varying expressions: the older Celts were either surly or downcast, but the children were fascinated at the huge construction. Gaius approached one or two of the young men.

"Impressed?" He asked one.

"Hard not to be."

Gaius smiled encouragingly at the response. "You could build much stronger warmer houses for yourselves, you know."

"We couldn't build like that," the young man said sadly.

"Only because you don't know how. The question is, do you want to learn?"

"What do you mean?"

"If you, and any of your friends, want to help build that bridge, you'll work hard, you'll get paid for it, and more to the point, you'll learn some building tricks."

"I don't think those soldiers will want the likes of us."

"Oh yes they will," Gaius smiled. "They will be only too happy to teach you and look after you, and nobody will hurt you or bully you."

"That's what you say."

"No! That's what I will order," Gaius said coldly. "The Roman soldier obeys orders because they all know what will happen if they do not. So, if you're interested, come with me."

Two days later half a dozen young Celts were busy measuring and cutting timber.

* * *

Gaius had heard stories that the Celts celebrated the winter solstice at a great stone monument to the west, and this monstrous monument was aligned precisely so that the solstice could be shown by the way the sunlight passed between stones onto another. Not this year, he muttered to himself. It had drizzled for a week, and had the senators come the previous year and seen a similar miserable scene, this invasion probably would not have taken place.

Still, thanks to shipments from Gaul, supplies of food were adequate, if not luxurious, there was plenty of wine, and there was plenty of firewood. There was also more open ground, as all the construction and firewood gathering had caused a considerable retreat of the forest. As far as he was aware, the Celts in the adjacent village had sufficient food, but he was only too well aware that there would not be too much to spare. If some of his men and the elephants were put to work on those stumps, there should be more farmland for the next season. The question was, who would get the use of it? Perhaps he should make it common land. Perhaps he should invite the Celtic chief and some guests nominated by the chief to one of the Saturnalia festivities.

The meal was strained. The Celts seemed to think there was a hidden motive, so they kept reasonably silent, at least for a while. Part of the difficulty seemed to be that the Roman style of cooking and the actual menu was somewhat strange to them, and they were determined not to get to like it too much. Gaius provided ample wine, but most of the Celts left it alone, however he had also purchased mead and ale from a Celtic brewer, and this was somewhat harder to avoid.

Eventually the Chief came over to Gaius. "What do you want for the coming year?" he asked.

It was then that Gaius realized that this Chief had viewed the evening as a summons, master to servant. It was not what he had intended, but there was not much he could do about that. Most Roman commanders would simply have summoned the subjects through the day and given orders, and would never have dreamed of offering a meal. He could almost feel Rebecca's look.

"Apart from your paying taxes and keeping the peace, not much," Gaius replied. "As you know, over to the north there's a large area we have cleared, and next year this will make good grazing land."

"So?"

"I want that to be common land for your people, and specifically the poor must have as much right to graze animals as the rich. The grazing rights must be so many animals per person."

"I see."

"Now," Gaius said, looking into the Chief's eyes, "I have told you what outcome I want, but you can gain from this."

"How?" he frowned.

"As long as you do what I told you to do," Gaius smiled, "I will not contradict how you do it. If I were you, I would announce this to your people by saying that you negotiated with me and acquired the land, and it is your idea that it becomes common land. That way everybody will be grateful to you, which makes it harder for anyone to challenge your leadership."

"I suppose it would be," he nodded.

"It is one thing to challenge a man," Gaius pointed out, "and altogether another to challenge the tribe."

"That's true," the Chief nodded. He looked away, seemingly uncertain as to what to do next, then he appeared to come to some sort of decision. "What do you want?" he asked.

"I want your people to be more prosperous," Gaius smiled. When it appeared that this explanation was not entirely believed, he added, "If your people have the chance to be prosperous, they'll be busy. Busy people aren't organizing revolts."

A look of understanding passed over the Chief's face.

"Believe me, I can put down any revolt that's likely to come up," Gaius continued, "and the way I would do it would lead to a bloody mess. I really don't want to do that and neither do your people want to suffer for no good reason.

"Let me give you some advice. Think more about your followers than yourself, and you will be a really great chief."

It was not entirely clear what the young man thought of this, or why he did it, but shortly after this meeting he announced the availability of the common grazing area.

* * *

Construction continued through the gloomy winter. The troops grumbled about the cold, they grumbled about the incessant drizzle, but work continued. Their one advantage of having been stationed on the German frontier was that they had experienced winters like this before. That did not make this one any more pleasant, but they had learned how to deal with it, and they had better furs than would be found in other legions stationed in warmer climates. Progress on the bridge was good, and the engineer outlined his plans as to how this bridge would be finished, and pointed out what had been completed. The work had stopped for the day because the light was too poor. The light seemed to be eternally poor in this place during winter, Gaius thought, but he had to agree that it was getting gloomy. He wrapped the cloak about him, thanked the engineer, then he set off walking towards the small building that was used to hold the plans and records relating to the bridge.

He was halfway there, and was passing a small hut when he heard a "Psssst!" He looked around to see a hand beckoning him towards the hut. With his hand on the hilt of his gladius, he walked towards the doorway. It was somewhat darker inside, but he could easily make out the form of the young man he had enticed into bridge building. He was unarmed, so Gaius quickly took his hand away from his gladius and asked, "You want something?"

"I want to thank you for helping me."

"You don't have to be quite so secretive," Gaius smiled.

"Yes, I do, and please, when you leave here, don't look back, and don't tell anyone you spoke to me."

"I didn't know I was so disliked."

"It's not that! I have some information, and if it were known I told you, I'd be killed."

"Then you'd better tell me what it is."

"There's a plot to kill the Chief and replace him with someone who will give refuge to Caratacus' men. There'll also be a raid by Caratacus' men so that it'll look like those killed were killed for aiding you, they'll destroy what they can of yours, and . . ."

"And these people would kill you if they thought you'd told me about it."

"You have to save me."

"There's no need for you to be involved at all," Gaius smiled. "Do you know when this raid is going to take place?"

"In five days time, and I'm afraid I don't know the route they'll take."

"Tell me the names of those responsible."

The young man did, then when he finished, he pleaded, "Everyone will know it was me who gave you the names when you do whatever you are going to do to them. You've got to take me somewhere . . ."

"I won't do anything to them until I catch the raiders," Gaius explained, "and I shall announce to everybody that those men talked."

"They may not," the man said doubtfully.

"They may not, but nobody else will know that. Now, when I leave, go back and act normally. If you run into trouble and you can escape, run to the legion. Tell them I told you to do this, and tell them I said they would protect you."

"They won't believe me."

"Probably not," Gaius reassured him, "but they won't let any Celt hurt you, and before they'd dream of doing anything to you, they'll check out your story with me, because if it were true and they let you get hurt, they know they'd be in deeper shit than you can probably imagine."

Gaius explained the situation to Matius, and three days later cavalry
turmae
quietly left to patrol the area, together with bands of
exploratores
. The orders were simple: this might be an exercise, but if they failed to find these raiders . . . No explanation was needed; it was not their business to fail.

They did not. Two days later, a band of fifteen Celts appeared in a line, roped together, hands roped behind their backs, and gagged. They were separated and lashed to posts within separate tents where they were told individually that the complete details of their mission was required, including the names of Celts within the local village they were to contact. Some names were known. If they told everything they knew they would be kept as prisoners in Britain for a year, working on road building, then once the Roman Army had conquered the rest, they would be free to return to their families. If they were reluctant to cooperate fully, they would be sent to Rome as slaves, to work in the most dangerous mines. If they refused to cooperate at all, examples of a crucifixion were required for other purposes, and they would suffice. They would have an hour to think on this, then they would be approached at hourly intervals. As soon as enough information was gained, the opportunity would cease; those who had cooperated would be rewarded, those who had not would very soon wish they had.

At the end of the second hour, Gaius had all the information he needed. He approached the Chief and explained that his men had caught these raiders during a routine patrol, and on interrogation they had informed him of their mission.

"They aimed to help a small group of traitors to set up resistance and destroy Roman property," Gaius explained.

"I assure you, I wouldn't . . ."

"I know," Gaius interrupted. "There were some who they felt would cooperate with us, and they were to be killed. Your name was top of their list, and you were to be replaced with . . ."

"Who?"

"I don't think you need to know. He was one of these, all of whom were traitors."