Get Out or Die Read Free Page A

under permanent instruction to rip us off. And this afternoon, I was expecting a visit from one of the larger fish in our small provincial pond, the Chief of the Oak Bridges Town Council, no less. He was doing his own bit of supervising, presumably, because we were supplying him with wine for an important dinner. And of course I must make time to see my beautiful black horses, my own special bit of farming enterprise.
    But before all that, we’d better move our unconscious visitor to one of the guest-rooms. The first customers would be arriving soon, and it’s rather demoralising, if you drop in for a reviving drink, to find yourself sitting next to what looks like a semi-corpse.
    I don’t suppose you, or anyone reading this report of mine, will ever have visited the Oak Tree, and you’re probably picturing something poky and flea-ridden in an unfashionable street of a small provincial town. Well you’re wrong. Our town, Oak Bridges, is small and provincial, certainly. I’d call it a village myself, except that the more civilized natives hereabouts have got it officially recognized as a proper town, complete with its own council, and I try not to upset them. Who they had to bribe for that, and what with, you probably know better than I do. Anyway the mansio is a mile or so out of the town, on the main road at the bottom of the Long Hill, which is a stiff climb up to the rolling wold country to the east. Our place is quite big, a farm as well as a mansio. Our main job is to look after officials on the Empire’s business, but private guests stay with us from time to time, and we keep open house in the bar-room, where passing travellers, including quite a few natives, drop in for a beaker and a bite to eat.
    The bar-room and kitchen and the private dining-room for important guests are in the main block at the front, and there are two wings of rooms sticking out behind, forming three sides of a courtyard. The fourth side is a bathhouse suite, with separate rooms for men and women. Oh yes, we may be in the wilds, but at least we’re clean.
    The left-hand wing is our private one, mine and Albia’s, with windows looking onto a secluded area of garden. The other is for guests. At present there were several spare rooms, so there’d be no problem finding a warm bed for our wounded traveller.
    All right, you’ll probably cut all that description out on the grounds that the Governor doesn’t need a guided tour of the mansio. What I’m trying to make clear is that most of the rooms are connected by corridors and there are several doors to the outside as well. So guests, or anyone, can come and go to the various parts of the house unobserved. Bear that in mind before you start blaming me for not keeping a proper eye on the stranger’s room.
    Taurus and one of the houseboys carefully carried the man into the cheapest guest room, the one with dull brown walls and without a glazed window. After all, I didn’t know who, if anyone, would ever pick up the bill for his stay. As I tucked his blankets round him and Albia opened the shutters, he gave a groan, then a cough, another groan, and opened his eyes. He said, “Burrus! Burrus, are you there?”
    Then his gaze seemed to focus properly. He looked at me for a couple of heartbeats, long enough for me to register that his eyes were a very dark blue, almost purple, and that their expression was more surprised than anxious.
    “Where am I? Where’s Burrus? And who in Hades are you?”
    And good morning to you too, sunshine, I thought, but reflected that he was probably feeling pretty foul.
    “I’m Aurelia. We’re not in Hades though, I’m glad to say.”
    “Aurelia!” he exclaimed, and lifted his head, which was about all the movement he could manage. “Not….I mean….Aurelia who?”
    “Aurelia Marcella. Innkeeper at the Oak Tree Mansio.”
    “But that’s wonderful!” He gazed at me with a sudden dazzling smile, then his eyes closed and his head lolled back. He was