by Tessa Afshar
Our house grew warm with his presence. The ice that had divided him from Father started to melt for the first time in two years. Those became some of the happiest months I had ever known. Months of hope. Months of healing. We shared suppers together, listened to Theo’s stories, and told him about the latest gossip in Corinth. Sometimes Claudia would join us, and to my delight, Justus, too, became a frequent visitor.
Once only did I feel the jolt of an odd uneasiness, like the mild rumblings that sometimes come before an earthquake breaks a mountain in half.
Father arrived home one evening, carrying a mysterious bag. “Come and see the curiosity I have bought.”
He sent Galatea to fetch towels and a large bowl of hot water, while Theo, Delia, and I gathered about him to investigate. Out of his bag, he pulled a round ball of a soft-looking substance. It was the color of cream and smelled faintly of fat.
“What is it?” I said.
“Soap.”
“Well, that explains . . . nothing.”
“I have heard of this,” Theo said. “It’s used for cleaning.”
“Precisely.” Father pulled the bowl Galatea had fetched to the middle of the table. “I thought we could test it for ourselves.”
“What is it made of?” I asked, poking it with a finger.
“Tallow and ashes.”
“Tallow?” I wrinkled my nose. “It sounds disgusting. What’s wrong with using proper olive or grape-seed oil?”
“With soap, you do not need to scrape the body with a strigil, as you would with perfumed oil.” Father threw a different ball to each of us, Galatea and Delia included. “Let us begin our assessment, shall we?”
The women brought more bowls of water as well as additional jugs for rinsing, so that Theo and I could share one, Delia and Galatea work with another, leaving Father with his own bowl.
Galatea began to wash a piece of Delia’s hair, as Father had claimed that soap was supposed to be especially beneficial for that purpose. Father washed his hands, his feet, and a linen napkin. Theo and I engaged in a hilarious battle, more interested in soaking one another than cleanliness.
Father examined his hands as well as the linen, seeming impressed by the results. “Although it is a German invention, it seems quite useful,” he said. “The Gauls have it too, apparently, though theirs is reported to be inferior.”
He tossed one of the balls into the air and caught it. “What do you think, Theo? Will there be a wider market for this? Would it be worth investing in soap?”
Theo picked up one of the balls and sniffed it. “The smell is not ideal. But it has possibilities for convenience if nothing else. I doubt Romans will willingly give up the use of a strigil. This cannot scrape up dead skin. It works faster, though, with less fuss.”
“You could add perfume,” I said. “A mix of myrtle, cypress, and lemongrass for men; roses for women. That would appeal to the fastidious Roman nose.”
“I will say this much for it: this soap cleans hair much better than our oils,” Delia said.
“If we add perfume as Ariadne suggests,” Father said thoughtfully, “we could sell it as hair pomade. Nothing like it exists in the Roman world. Perhaps one day soap might grow quite popular.”
“Mistress Ariadne, we should try washing your hair with this,” Delia said, rinsing her hands.
“Let’s do it now,” Theo declared with a grin, and pounced. Before I knew it, he was trying to drown me in water. The man had earned a victory wreath for wrestling, and I proved no match for him. He wrapped a hand around my arm and pulled me toward him. I fell laughing against his chest, trying to push against him and wrest the jug of water out of his hand at the same time.
Abruptly, he dropped the jug on the table with a clatter. His laughter evaporated. For a moment he held me against him.
I felt a shift in his mood. In the air itself. Not understanding the change, I wriggled out of his arms. Something about his touch, his manner, the stillness in his gaze made me uncomfortable and I frowned.
To break the tension, I threw a ball of soap at his head. He did not even bother to catch it. It hit him on the head, near the silver streak in his hair, and fell to the ground unheeded. His face had turned stony.
I thought he was angry with me for throwing soap at him and apologized. He said nothing. Instead, he climbed on the back of one of the horses and left for a long ride. When he returned, smelling of sweat and horse and grass, he looked tired but restored to good humor.
Men, I thought. They had their own time of the month.
CHAPTER 19
IN EARLY SPRING we attended the long-awaited wedding of Claudia the Elder to Spurius Felonius. The groom, a widower significantly older than the bride, had been a resident of Corinth for under a year. This explained the wedding. He did not know the bride well enough to run the other way.
That was the year Gallio was declared the proconsul of Achaia, and being a friend of the groom, he was in attendance at the wedding feast. Lucius Junius Gallio was a thin man with veiny legs who complained of the air in Corinth, which gave him a headache and hampered his digestion. He spoke of his health half the night, a trait he did not lose for the duration of his two-year term.
He may not have been a diverting wedding guest, but the presence of a proconsul, even a man who was hypervigilant of his health and spoke in an annoying nasal tone, added a deal of consequence to the festivities. We were rubbing elbows with the elite of the world, not merely the elite of Corinth.
For the occasion, I had loaned Claudia the Younger my best tunic, made from purple linen, embroidered with gold thread. Theo had bought it in Philippi for my birthday the previous year, at Father’s request. He had found an establishment owned by a woman named Lydia who produced exquisite purple goods at a price we could afford. Although not made from true purple, a dye extracted from tiny sea snails and prohibitively expensive, it was by far the most luxurious garment I owned.
Delia had arranged Claudia’s hair, twining fresh flowers into a coronet of braids, creating a clever arrangement that accentuated my friend’s delicate features. I thought her lovelier by far than her eldest sister’s famed voluptuous beauty, which had grown tired and petulant with the passing years.
Galatea had seen to my own cosmetics and hair. Although proficient, she had nowhere near the talent Delia possessed. I looked well enough in my yellow tunic. In the old days, I would have washed my face, combed my hair, used tooth powder, and called myself ready. Delia had changed me more than I liked to admit. I could distinguish an eyelid darkened with expert hands from one drawn by an uninspired attendant.
I cared little for how I looked. My happiness came from Claudia’s glowing joy. It was the first time she had outshone her feted sister; the first time she wore rich clothing instead of the second- and third-hand leavings of older sisters.
Justus approached me during the banquet. “I salute you,” he said, lifting his cup to me.
“What have I done?”
“It is not every woman who places kindness before vanity. It was good of you to lend your best tunic to your friend.”
Confused by this compliment, devoid as it was of his usual pinch of irony, I studied the floor. Coming to myself, I asked, “What news of Dionysius?”
Justus plucked a handful of almonds from a passing tray. I had the odd sensation that he was playing for time rather than satisfying an urge. “I have not seen him for some months.”
“Has he not written you?”
“He has. Yes. He seems happy. Some new philosophy has all his attention. You know how he is consumed by knowledge.”
I expelled my breath. “I hope they have women philosophers in Athens, or that man will never find himself a wife.”
Justus laughed. “He is not so lost as all that.”
I studied the bride and groom, seated in the place of honor. Spurius Felonius weaved slightly as he refilled his cup, omitting the water flagon. His new wife played with a necklace of pearls, a wedding present from her groom.
She had not smiled, not once, in the whole time she had sat there.
“I suppose it could be worse,” I said. “Dionysius could marry the wrong woman and spend the rest of his life unhappy.” It occurred to me that I would never meet my brother’s wife when he did choose to wed.
By mutual consent, Father and I had not discussed the possibility of another theft while Theo remained at home. We had gained enough gold from Aniketos to be safe from moneylenders for a season. Each theft required careful planning, research, preparation, and we did not wish to lose time to such things while we had Theo with us. He would resume traveling soon enough and be absent from us for months.
After seeing Claudia’s happy transformation at her sister’s wedding, I gave Theo a few coins and told him to set them aside. “Go back to the establishment of that woman. Lydia. Go back there and buy a tunic for Claudia the Younger. I wish to surprise her with a gift.”
Theo gave me a hard look. “I hope this is not your misguided attempt at matchmaking. My affection for Claudia is that of a friend. It will never become anything else. Do you understand, Ariadne? Never. My heart . . . my heart is not hers.”
So he was not as mystified by women as he pretended. “Of course not,” I said. “I am not matchmaking. The gift is on my behalf. Not yours. We have nothing like Lydia’s purple here in Corinth. And if we did, it would come at twice the price I can afford. Since you plan to travel to Philippi, I hoped you would not mind doing me this small service.”
He took my money, his hand a fist around the coins. His lips were pursed, the well-formed lines thinned as if he wanted to blurt something but could not compose the words.
“What is it?” I asked, frustrated. For weeks now I had had the sense that he withheld some important knowledge from me. His unspoken words hung between us, irritating me like a thorn.
He rolled his eyes and left me standing in the middle of the courtyard. It occurred to me that I might not be the only one with secrets in this house. But at least mine did not turn me into a capricious and sulky child.
I thought the worst troubles in life came through unfulfilled desires. Came because our longings went unmet. I did not realize that the answers to our deepest pleas could be as painful as they were healing. I had not believed in miracles. Not until Dionysius walked into our home again.
I was hunkered on my knees before a pot of fragrant mint in the courtyard, pruning dead stalks and adding fresh soil, when I heard footsteps. Looking up, I saw the face I thought never to behold again. It had been over a year since I had seen him. I sat frozen on the cold mosaic of that courtyard, my hands full of dirt, eyes wide and unblinking as I wondered if I were dreaming. He fell to his knees before me. Without words, he clasped me in his arms.
A simple embrace can speak more eloquently than words. More than reams of letters. More than books.
He wept, shaking as he held me. I wept with him, tears and mucus and joy mingling in melting relief, in helpless gratitude, in elated wonder. Because I knew my brother had returned to me. By some incomprehensible spinning of their threads, the fates had brought him home.
“Forgive me, Ariadne,” he said, wiping his eyes.
“There is nothing to forgive. Well, except that I wiped my nose a little on your tunic.”
He laughed. The sound was slightly hysterical and utterly splendid. “I have missed you,” he said.
Father rushed in, Galatea at his side. She must have fetched him when she realized who had walked into the house unannounced. A few steps away from us, he came to a crashing stop, frozen. His eyes devoured Dionysius. My heart contracted. I did not know if Dionysius had come only for me, or if he had enough mercy to stretch to Father.
My brother rose to his feet with a slow unfurling of long muscles. He ran—ran like a sprinter rather than an Areopagite—and enfolded Father in his arms.
There weren’t enough tears in the world to throw at the feet of that moment. The long separation was washed away, cleansed in our thanksgiving. They had much to say to each other, those two men. Months of silence and hurt to bridge. But for those first few moments, embraces did the speaking.
When they finally disappeared into Father’s tablinum, doors closed, voices a quiet murmur, I perched on a chair and gave thanks to the Unknown God who had brought my brother to us. If only I had known his name then, I might not have been so grateful.
Father and Dionysius spoke in private for long hours. We ate supper together that night, Theo joining us. The last time we had all gathered like this, I had been eight years old. I was now twenty-one. So many years lost.
That first supper became a feast for the senses. We had not found the equilibrium of being together yet. We wept and laughed randomly, shared memories, casual incidents that bound us, events no one else in the world could comprehend quite as we did. I don’t think anyone ate. The platters of food returned untouched, congealing, to the kitchen.
I realized as I crawled exhausted into bed that in spite of the hours we had spent together, neither my father nor my brother had mentioned what had brought about Dionysius’s change of heart.
Several days passed and a new pattern emerged in our household. In the mornings, Dionysius and Father would speak for hours in private, redeeming the stolen years, I supposed, spanning the thousands of events they had missed in each other’s lives. In the afternoons, everyone came together for supper. We ate and talked, becoming a family again instead of strangers tied by blood and the accidents of fortune.
Some mornings, when my father and brother emerged from the tablinum, they seemed shrouded in a curious reticence, as though they were holding something back from the world. From me. They made veiled references to things I could not understand, spoke cryptic comments, smiled at odd moments.
Our home had become a house of secrets. Father and I hid our own mystery from everyone. Theo was hiding something that ate at him. And now Dionysius and Father were adding their own secrets to the growing pile.
My nerves grew stretched. The air itself seemed to sizzle with the unknown. I wondered where they would lead, so many dark threads of our lives weaving together. So many truths unrevealed.
On the eighth afternoon following Dionysius’s arrival, Theo took him for an early supper at Justus’s house. Men only. I was not invited, and Father declined to go. I did not begrudge them their young men’s pastime. What hurt was watching my brother walk out the door, though in my head I knew he would return in a few hours. After all we had been through, even short partings strained my damaged heart.
I perched on my favorite couch in the courtyard. It was made of chipped marble with a large crack running through the middle that we hid with a variety of cushions. I used to conceal myself under the seat when I was a little girl, trying to evade my mother.
Father joined me. “Dionysius has invited a friend to supper tomorrow evening. Justus will join us too.”
“Who is it?”
“A man named Paul. Of Tarsus. He is a Jew who has recently moved to Corinth. A Pharisee.”
“What is that?”
“A learned man of their faith.”
“Are they conducting business together?” It seemed the only plausible explanation for my brother inviting a stranger into our home at such a time. We had not even invited Justus to supper yet, preferring to solidify our own relationships first, before opening the doors of our home to outsiders. Only those closest to us would be welcome in our midst so early after Dionysius’s return.
“They are friends,” Father said. “Dionysius has spoken much about this man to me. I look forward to meeting him. It is a happy coincidence that he lives in Corinth at the moment. He travels extensively, as I understand.”
“Friends? Where did they meet?” I could not imagine Dionysius having anything in common with a religious Jew.
“In Athens. But I must let Dionysius tell you that story himself. I only wanted to warn you that you should expect company tomorrow.”
Corinth was home to a large Jewish community. I h
ad met several, though I did not know any of them on intimate terms. I remembered one pertinent fact, however. “Do they not eat a special diet, the Jews? What should I have the cook prepare for this man?”
“Dionysius assures me that he is not fastidious with his food.”
“So he is not very religious, this . . . What did you call him? Pharisee?”
Father’s smile was enigmatic. “He is a man of faith. But his faith does not burden him with troublesome religious rules.”
CHAPTER 20
I STUDIED OUR GUEST as Dionysius welcomed him with obvious affection before introducing him to Father. Short and wiry, he had the legs of a man who walked long distances. His unruly hair had touches of gray. Large, dark eyes, wreathed in laugh lines, settled on me with sharp intelligence. It was not a shallow gaze. I felt stripped before that survey—not of my clothing, as I had at times experienced with other men, but of my defenses. You would not remain a stranger before that gaze for long. Instinctively, I lowered my lashes.
Father invited him into the peristyle, the roofed garden of our house, where I had arranged for supper to be served. He folded his body onto the couch with a singular economy of motion, as if he had no wish to draw attention to himself. Yet there was no doubt that he was the center of everyone’s attention.
The man reminded me of a sheathed dagger, a storm held back. There was about him an air of power, wrapped up in silky kindness. We have invited a hurricane under our roof, I thought. Any moment now, he will explode and wash away everything in his tide.
“How did you meet Paul?” I asked my brother once the first course had been served.
“I heard him speaking in the public square in Athens a few months ago. For ten days, he stood in a corner of the marketplace and spoke to whoever happened to be there.”
“I’m not bashful,” Paul said.
Dionysius chuckled. “As I found to my detriment. I began to question him, for his ideas, while exotic and wild, had a cogency that intrigued me.”
