Nor was I intending to ask Silvanus which outfit he graced. The Twentieth or Ninth, perhaps; both did fight Boudicca, and neither would be friends of mine. These days Britain also had one of the patched-together new Flavian units, the Second Adiutrix. I ruled it out. Silvanus did not strike me as a man from a new legion; he had old lag written all over him from his scuffed boots to his scabbard, which he had customized with tassels that looked like bits of dead rat. At least I knew he did not belong to the dire, gloating Fourteenth Gemina. They had been relocated to Germany to reform their habits, were that possible. I had met them there-still pushing people around and pointlessly bragging.

"This place should never have been rebuilt." Silvanus wanted to carp about the town; it stopped me brooding about the army, anyway.

"Disaster has that effect, man. Volcanoes, floods, avalanches-bloody massacres. They bury the dead, then rush to reconstruct in the danger area… Londinium never had any character."

"Traders," Silvanus grumbled. "Wine, hides, grain, slaves. Bloody traders. Ruin a place."

"Can't expect high art and culture." I spoke slowly and slurred my words like him. It was coming quite easily. "This is just a road junction. A huddle of industries on the south bank, a couple of cranky ferries coming across. North side, a few low-rise stinking warehouses… Everything about it tells you it's nothing."

"The end of the road!" exclaimed Silvanus. Slurred by a drunken centurion, it sounded even more unappealing than when Petronius had complained.

"Does that give you problems?"

"It's a bugger to police."

"Why's that? The natives seem docile."

"When not dropping each other down wells?" His voice cracked with mirth and I felt my hackles rise. I had known Verovolcus, even if I had not liked him. Silvanus failed to notice my expression. He was enlarging his theories. I told myself that was what I wanted. "This place is a draw to scum, Falco."