Аннотация
Steven Saylor
Roman blood
A Mystery of Ancient Rome
Part One
High and Low
1
The slave who came to fetch me on that unseasonably warm spring morning was a young man, hardly more than twenty.
Usually, when a client sends for me, the messenger is a slave from the very lowest rung of the household — a grub, a cripple, a half-wit boy from the stables stinking of dung and sneezing from the bits of straw in his hair. It's a kind of formality; when one seeks out the services of Gordianus the Finder, one keeps a certain distance and restraint. It's as if I were a leper, or the priest of some unclean Oriental cult. I'm used to it. I take no offence — so long as my accounts are paid on time and in full.
The slave who stood at my door on this particular morning, however, was very clean and meticulously groomed. He had a quiet manner that was respectful but far from grovelling — the politeness one expects from any young man addressing another man t...
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