Doctor Who_ The Stone Rose - Jacqueline Rayner [6]
‘Yes, master.’
Rose turned to the Doctor, looking quizzical. ‘She’s a slave,’ he mouthed back silently.
Gracilis sat down in front of the girl. ‘You must tell me where to find my son!’ he implored. ‘I can give you his time and place of birth, all you need to know.’
The girl looked scared.
‘Answer the gentleman, Vanessa,’ said her owner, his grin like a wolf’s.
In a soft voice, she began to ask Gracilis questions about Optatus, then reached out for a piece of parchment and began to work out calculations. They didn’t mean much to Rose – she was never that keen on maths at the best of times, let alone trying to understand it upside‐down – but she noticed that the Doctor’s attention had been grabbed. He stared at the figures in a sort of frozen way for a few moments, before shaking his head as if to clear it and turning back to Gracilis.
Gracilis was looking eager, expectant. Rose felt sorry for him – not just because of his son, but because he was so desperate he’d been driven to ridiculous measures like this. The girl might seem nice enough, not the type to take advantage, but Rose couldn’t say the same for her owner. Preying on the weak and wretched, that was obviously the game here – as if working out where a few stars were at the time of someone’s birth could tell you where they’d gone off to sixteen years later.
Balbus’s smile was getting more and more forced. ‘Answer the gentleman,’ he said again, after several more minutes had passed.
‘Come on. Let us have our money’s worth,’ the Doctor told him. ‘Can’t calculate the movements of the heavens in two minutes, you know.’
The girl looked grateful and began scribbling down a few more sums. Suddenly Rose realised something. The girl was playing for time! Of course she couldn’t give Gracilis a true answer, so she was trying to think of what to say to him.
Perhaps the Doctor had realised that too. He sat down opposite the girl. ‘Obviously I’m not dismissing your abilities, but I expect it’s quite hard to work out something like this with so little information. You need to find out more about the boy, Optatus. And you need to see the place where he disappeared, I bet.’
She nodded desperately, her eyes seeming to plead wit h them. ‘Yes, yes, I need to see the place where he disappeared.’
‘Well, I’m sure your –’ the Doctor paused, the word distasteful – ‘owner won’t mind you popping along with us for a bit. Not in aid of such a good cause.’
But strangely her owner didn’t seem that happy about the idea. ‘I’m afraid I couldn’t consider –’ he began, but he got no further.
Gracilis thumped his fist on the table, causing the girl’s pen to blot ink all over her calculations. ‘Then let me buy her from you,’ he said. ‘Don’t you understand, man, she’s my only hope!’
‘What, give up my little goldmine – I mean,’ Halbus said, obsequious smile coming back into play, ‘give up my sacred duty to protect my charge?’
‘Oh, we can protect her, no problem,’ said the Doctor breezily. ‘I think this sounds like a jolly good idea all round. Gracilis here is a rich man. I’m sure you’ll have no problem coming to some arrangement.’
Balbus shrugged. ‘It is the Quinquatrus coming up. All those women, the tourists, they love to hear their futures. If I do not have Vanessa I will lose much money…’
Rose’s toes curled in discomfort as she listened to them discussing a price for the girl – a human being was being bought and sold as if she was a table or a bag of apples or a jumble‐sale coat.
Vanessa didn’t seem that horrified, though; she seemed happy, eager, unable to believe her luck. Her life here couldn’t be much fun and she obviously envisaged a better time serving Gracilis.
Finally, the negotiations complete, Gracilis, the Doctor and Rose left the apartment with Vanessa in tow.
‘So, what now?’ asked Rose.
‘Just what I said,’ replied the Doctor. ‘I think it would help us all if we went back to Gracilis’s villa