The Legatus Mystery by Rosemary Rowe

sure that Marcus had not intended it. But it was an adroit way of establishing religious precedence. The old man was not as foolish as he looked, I thought. Meanwhile I dropped hastily to one knee. It would never do for me to remain standing while my patron bowed.
    ‘All homage be to Jupiter, Greatest and Best, and to his priests who serve his temples.’ Marcus muttered the formula dutifully, and straightened up again as quickly as protocol allowed. I followed suit, and grinned inwardly to see the forced smile on my patron’s lips. But Marcus was not easily subdued. ‘I was hoping to speak to you, most revered one,’ he went on, speaking to the old priest firmly, but deliberately slowly and loudly, as though in deference to infirmity. I knew my patron; he was reasserting his authority. Sure enough . . . ‘As representative of the governor, I have to make a decision. I felt I should at least ask your opinion. About these unfortunate events this morning.’
    The pontifex nodded slowly, but it was some moments before he spoke. The deliberation, and his frail appearance, gave him an air of thoughtful dignity. The dice were back in his cup. No wonder he was widely half revered as well as affectionately mocked. The old priest might need a discreet nudge from his acolytes at public festivals when it was his turn to speak, and mutter the rituals so that nobody could hear, but he knew how to impose himself when the occasion demanded it. I found myself wondering how much of his deafness and apparent dithering was a conscious choice.
    ‘The body?’ He did not avoid the ill-omened word, as Marcus had so carefully done. ‘Alas, unfortunate events indeed. It is as well I did not go into the shrine myself. It is not permitted for a pontifex to set eyes on such a thing – but I heard that one had been found. A dreadful portent.’
    ‘You heard that now it has disappeared?’
    ‘
What
did you say?’ No careful pauses now. The question seemed startled out of him, and the creaking voice was clearly audible.
    ‘Dis-ap-peared, Mightiness,’ Trinunculus repeated helpfully, stressing each syllable. ‘Gone. Not there.’ He outlined briefly what had happened since we arrived at the temple.
    ‘But that’s not possible,’ the old priest said.
    ‘Not
humanly
possibly,’ Trinunculus supplied.
    The pontifex looked startled. ‘Indeed.’ The pale eyes flickered with sudden animation. It might have been anxiety, or amusement. ‘Dear me. A sign from the gods right here in my own temple. We haven’t had a proper sign for years.’ He clasped his hands solemnly and raised his eyes to the symbol of the sun god on the pediment. ‘Great and Immortal Jove, I am honoured,’ he intoned. ‘I vow a thank-offering to you this afternoon.’ He unclasped his hands and refocused his attention on the assembled mortals. ‘Well, this is very unexpected. A sign! Dear me.’
    Marcus looked at me and raised an eyebrow, but when he turned back to the priest he was still resolutely smiling. ‘And then there was that sound . . .’
    ‘Sound? And when was this?’
    ‘That appalling moaning. Only a few minutes ago. And I believe it happened once before, earlier this morning.’
    The old man frowned. ‘I think I was aware of something, now you mention it. Dear me. Another sign perhaps. Most odd.’
    ‘But,’ Marcus said, with increasing irritation, ‘the question is, revered one, what it was a sign
of
. What was the meaning of it? Trinunculus here thinks these things are warnings.’
    The pontifex nodded, the little cap dancing in sympathy. ‘Oh, a warning, certainly. Clearly a warning.’ He regarded us benevolently. ‘They almost always are, you know. Warnings. I remember, when I was a young priest—’
    This time Marcus cut him off. ‘A warning, perhaps, to Fabius Marcellus? The ambassador from Rome? Trinunculus suggests that we should warn him not to come. After all, it was a legate’s body that was found.’
    The thin voice was no more