Dream Boat by Marilyn Todd Read Free Book Online Page B

towards the sky, and her grip was as tight as a stonemason's vice.
    'What do you reckon? Six years down the silver mines for conspiracy to kidnap? Add on theft and, oh dear, that's nine and whoops, I almost forgot the attempted murder charge, which I think you'll find neatly doubles your sentence.'
    Claudia slid off the fleecy bank, jerking the thief to his feet.
    'Still, dark as it is down the mines,' she said, and it was easy to be cheerful in victory, 'at least they provide their prisoners with decent clothing.'
    Her eyes indicated the gaping hole in his tattered tunic and the urchin's grimy breast thrusting through the rip. A breast which also happened to be pert and round and full - with a rosy pink nipple peeking through!
    'Janus!'
    It was bad enough when Claudia had believed the guttersnipe was male. Now it transpired the hardcase was a girl!

Chapter Six
    Due to increased congestion along the Appian Way, the horse carrying Marcus Cornelius Orbilio was forced to slow to a canter, and whereas a lesser horse would have registered its disapproval with several loud snorts and a repeated flick of its mane, this one kept its feelings to itself. The rider, however, being every bit as thoroughbred as the stallion, sensed the disappointment in the strong black shining flesh beneath his saddle. Comforting pats on its neck quickly mollified his mount and, with a twitched-ear acknowledgement, it continued at a happy trot, eyeing coldly, though, the plodding mules and oxen, the pedestrians and soldiers which had cut short its gallop on the open road. Look at them, the stallion snickered. Heat weary, trudging slower than a funeral. Poor breeding always tells!
    Orbilio tossed a coin to a mother with a withered arm, whose toddler child was a mass of open sores.
    'Bless you, sir,' she cried, 'oh, bless you,' and suddenly a crowd of beggars surged around him, attracted by the woman's vocal gratitude, only his thoughts had closed in to engulf him and Marcus rode on, as impervious to their pleas as he was to the beauty of the countryside, the dappled wooded hills, the shimmering heat haze, the waysides teeming with buttercups and campion, columbines and mallow. How could his boss do this to him? It's an administrative role, overseeing that the Roll of Honour was inscribed correctly on Mount Alban!
    'Don't you think it's important, then?' sneered the fat toady who headed Rome's Security Police. 'Recording the participating luminaries in marble for posterity?'
    'Of course I do, sir.' That aspect was not in dispute. Every year, both consuls plus all the other magistrates in Rome rode out to Mount Alban to make sacrifice to Jupiter at the long lines of semi-circular altars laid out in his honour. It was a solemn and religious ritual which culminated in the lighting of a giant beacon on the mountain, and naturally there had to be a record. It was his being assigned to the task that galled!
    'Jupiter's balls, man, we're the Security Police!' his boss had bawled. 'We're not bound by bloody bureaucracy.' He snorted in derision. 'You don't expect spies and agents to be hampered by an army of clerks and scribes, now do you?'
    'No, sir.' The sensitive nature of their work put them outside every government department, including the army. 'But—' 'The Mount Alban ceremony, Orbilio, involves every highflier leaving the city at once. We have our bloody work cut out making sure that Rome remains secure on the one hand, while at the same time ensuring those illustrious dignitaries in the hills can sleep safe from the assassin's knife.'
    'I realise that, sir.' If there was ever a better time to mount a coup, no one could think of one! 'It's just that—'
    'Therefore, having achieved our objectives, I made a personal petition to the Senate to allow us to follow through this year and supervise the Roll of Honour.'
    And in so doing, had tied Orbilio tighter than a hog for market! Stressing each official's individual