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here?"
"He came to claim his patrimony." Caius's voice was dry as a desert wind and I
was floundering for a foothold among my swirling thoughts.
"Patrimony? What patrimony? Have you spoken with him? I am amazed that he
would even dare come near you, after the way you dealt with him when you last
saw him. How long ago was that? My God, Cay, that's twenty years ago  more,
closer to thirty."
Caius grunted. "You are growing old, my friend, and like an old man, you are
starting to exaggerate.
Unfortunately, what you say is not far off the mark, but it's not quite twenty
years." He paused and cleared his throat, managing to inject disgust and
distaste into the sound. "The man has improved none in the interim, however 
nor would he, I fear, given another ten years. He is still a charlatan and a
blusterer, though more daring and more insolent than he would have presumed to
be with me twenty years ago. But then, I never found him guilty of a lack of
daring."
Alaric was looking from one to the other of us, curiosity stamped on his face,
and I explained to him, "Philip Ascanus served with us for a short time before
the Invasion, back in '67. He was a bad officer, the worst kind. A brutal
bully and a homosexual torturer. Starved his men and spent the money for their
rations. Caius straightened him out the only way possible  had him
court-martialled, stripped of his rank and expelled from the Legion."
"I should have had him hanged," Caius drawled, his voice bitter.
"I don't understand," I said, turning back to face him. "What in the name of
all the ancient gods was he doing here? What's his business?"
His eyebrow went up in surprise that I should ask the question. "What does he
want? Why, his own good, of course. Apparently, he thought to be our
neighbour."
I was astounded. "Are you serious? How?"
This brought a wordless grunt from Caius, who sniffed and replied,
"Apparently, one of the villas to the north of here was acquired by an uncle
of his, who promptly died, leaving the place to his favourite nephew."
"Good God! And now Philip Ascanus is here?"
"Was here. He didn't stay."
"Which villa? Is it one of the ones close to us?"
"Close enough," Cay said. "I thought of disputing his claim in the courts,
when he told me why he was here. But then I reasoned that I was merely being
petty. The uncle never took possession, formally, but
he paid the purchase, nonetheless, so the villa and its lands go to his only
heir."
"Philip Ascanus!"
"Philip Ascanus. Apparently he lives close to Glevum. Received the news of his
uncle's death from your friend the tribune there."
"Scala?" I had met Tribune Marius Scala during one of my trips to Glevum some
years earlier. He was a pleasant fellow and our friendship, though brief, had
been a delightful one.
"That's the one."
"Good God." Another thought occurred to me. "How did you find out all this?
Are you telling me he actually came here, knowing this was your house?"
A chilly little smile flickered across Cay's mouth and his aristocratic drawl
became more pronounced.
"No, not quite. He seemed quite genuinely surprised to see me here. Quite
severely disconcerted, as a matter of fact. Bereft of words. Looked as though
I had caught him in the act of buggery again. It would have been quite
laughable except for the fact that nothing the fellow did could ever amuse me.
I was the last person on earth he could ever have dreamed of seeing here, and
he was most upset to find himself a supplicant on my doorstep. He thought he
had come to deal with you, you see. Your friend Scala left him with the
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impression that this was your estate."
"With me? My estate? Why would Scala do that?" I stopped and thought about it.
Scala could easily have taken the wrong impression from me; after all, I had
spent less than a week in his company and there had been a lot of things going
on, including some sustained drinking. I shrugged the thought off and
continued. "Even so, I'm surprised Ascanus would have the gall to face me,
knowing that I know what I
know about him. What did he want to see me about?"
Caius shook his head, his little smile spreading wider. "I've no idea. He was [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]