The House of the Vestals rsr-6

by Steven Saylor

  "You make them sound almost superior to humans," said Titus, laughing and tracing kisses on Antonia's wrist.

  "Oh, hardly. They're still ruled by kings, after all, and haven't advanced to having a republic, like ourselves," explained Lucius earnestly, not realizing that he was being teased. "So, who wants to go and see the honey collected?"

  "I shouldn't want to get stung," said Antonia cautiously.

  "Oh, there's little danger of that. Ursus sedates the bees with smoke. It makes them dull and drowsy. And we'll stand well out of the way."

  Eco nodded enthusiastically.

  "I suppose it would be interesting…" said Antonia.

  "Not for me," said Titus, lying back on the grassy bank and nibbing his temples.

  "Oh, Titus, don't be a dull, drowsy king bee," said Antonia, poking at him and pouting. "Come along."

  "No."

  "Titus…" There was a hint of menace in Antonia's voice.

  Lucius flinched in anticipation of a row. He cleared his throat. "Yes, Titus, come along. The walk will do you good. Get your blood pumping."

  "No. My mind's made up."

  Antonia flashed a brittle smile. "Very well, then, have it your way. You will miss the fun, and so much the worse for you. Shall we get started, Lucius?"

  "The natural enemies of the bee are the lizard, the woodpecker, the spider and the moth," droned the slave Ursus, walking beside Eco at the head of our little procession. "Those creatures are all jealous of the honey, you see, and will do great damage to the hives to get at it." Ursus was a big, stout man of middle years with a lumbering gait, hairy all over to judge from the thatches that showed at the openings of his long-sleeved tunic. Several other slaves followed behind us on the path that ran along the stream, carrying the embers and hay torches that would be used to make the smoke.

  "There are plants which are enemies of the bees as well," Ursus went on. "The yew tree, for example. You never put a hive close to a yew tree, because the bees will sicken and the honey will turn bitter and runny. But they thrive close to olive trees and willows. For gathering their honey-dew they like red and purple flowers; blood-red hyacinth is their favorite. If there's thyme close by, they'll use it to give the honey a delicate flavor. They prefer to live close to a stream with shaded, mossy pools where they can drink and wash themselves. And they like peace and quiet. As you will see, Eco, the secluded place where we keep the hives has all these qualities, being close by the stream, surrounded by olives and willows, and planted with all the flowers that most delight the bees."

  I heard the bees before I saw them. Their humming joined the gurgling of the stream and grew louder as we passed through a hedge of cassia shrubs and entered a sun-dappled, flower-spangled little glen that was just as Ursus had described. There was magic to the place. Satyrs and nymphs seemed to frolic in the shadows, just out of sight. One could almost imagine the infant Jupiter lying in the soft grass, living off the honey of the bees.

  The hives, ten in all, stood in a row on waist-high wooden platforms in the center of the clearing. They were shaped like tall domes, and with their coverings of dried mud and leaves looked as if they had been put there by nature; Ursus was a master of craft as well as lore. Each hive had only a tiny break in the bark for an entrance, and through these openings the bees were busily coming and going.

  A figure beneath a nearby willow caught my eyes, and for a startled instant I thought a satyr had stepped into the clearing to join us. Antonia saw it at the same instant. She let out a little gasp of surprise, then clapped her hands in delight.

  "And what is this fellow doing here?" She laughed and stepped closer for a better look.

  "He watches over the glen," said Ursus. "The traditional guardian of the hives. Scares away honey-thieves and birds."

  It was a bronze statue of the god Priapus, grinning lustfully, with one hand on his hip and a sickle held upright in the other.

  He was naked and eminently, rampantly priapic. Antonia, fascinated, gave him a good looking-over and then touched his upright, grotesquely oversized phallus for luck.

  My attention at that moment was drawn to Eco, who had wandered off to the other side of the glen and was stooping amid some purple flowers that grew low to the ground. I hurried to join him.

  "Be careful of those, Eco! Don't pick any more. Go wash your hands in the stream."

  "What's the matter?" said Ursus.

  "This is Etruscan star-tongue, isn't it?" I said.

  "Yes."

  "If you're as careful about what grows here as you say, I'm surprised to see it. The plant is poisonous, isn't it?"

  "To people, perhaps," said Ursus dismissively. "But not to bees. Sometimes when a hive takes sick it's the only thing to cure them. You take the roots of the star-tongue, boil them with wine, let the tonic cool and set it out for the bees to drink. It gives them new life."

  "But it might do the opposite for a man."

  "Yes, but everyone on the farm knows to stay away from the stuff, and the animals are too smart to eat it. I doubt that the flowers are poisonous; it's the roots that hold the bee-tonic."

  "Well, even so, go wash your hands in the stream," I said to Eco, who had followed this exchange and was looking at me expectantly. The beekeeper shrugged and went about the business of the honey harvest.

  As Lucius had promised, it was fascinating to watch. While the other slaves alternately kindled and smothered the torches, producing clouds of smoke, Ursus strode fearlessly into the thick of the sedated bees. His cheeks bulged with water, which he occasionally sprayed from his lips in a fine mist if the bees began to rouse themselves. One by one he lifted up the hives and used a long knife to scoop out a portion of the honeycomb. The wafting clouds of smoke, Ursus's slow, deliberate progress from hive to hive, the secluded magic of the place, and not least the smiling presence of the watchful Priapus gave the harvest the aura of a rustic religious procession. So men have collected the sweet labor of the bees since the beginning of time.

  Only one thing occurred to jar the spell. As Ursus was lifting the very last of the hives, a flood of ghostly white moths poured out from underneath. They flitted through the smoky reek and dispersed amid the shimmering olive leaves above. From this hive Ursus would take no honey, saying that the presence of the bandit moths was an ill omen.

  The party departed from the glen in a festive mood. Ursus cut pieces of honeycomb and handed them out. Everyone's fingers and lips were soon sticky with honey. Even Antonia made a mess of herself.

  When we reached the villa she ran ahead. "King bee," she cried, "I have a sweet kiss for you! And a sweet reason for you to kiss my fingertips! Your honey is covered with honey!"

  What did she see when she ran into the foyer of the house? Surely it was no more than the rest of us saw, who entered only a few heartbeats after her. Titus was fully dressed, and so was Davia. Perhaps there was a fleeting look on their faces which the rest of us missed, or perhaps Antonia sensed rather than saw the thing that set off her fury.

  Whatever it was, the row began then and there. Antonia stalked out of the foyer, toward her room. Titus quickly followed. Davia, blushing, hurried off toward the kitchen.

  Lucius looked at me and rolled his eyes. "What now?" A strand of honey, thin as spider's silk, dangled from his plump chin.

  The chill between Antonia and Titus showed no signs of abating at dinner. While Lucius and I made conversation about the honey harvest and Eco joined in with eloquent flourishes of his hands (his evocation of the flight of the moths was particularly vivid), Antonia and Titus ate in stony silence. They retired to their bedchamber early. That night there were no sounds of reconciliation. Titus alternately barked and whined like a dog. Antonia shrieked and wept.

  Eco slept despite the noise, but I tossed and turned until at last I decided to take a walk. The moon lit my way as I stepped out of the villa, made a circuit of the stable and strolled by the slaves' quarters. Coming around a corner, I saw two figures seated close together on a bench
beside the portico that led to the kitchen. Though her hair was not in a bun but let down for the night, the moon lit up her face well enough for me to recognize Davia. By his bearish shape I knew the man who sat with one arm around her, stroking her face: Ursus. They were so intent on each other that they did not notice me. I turned and went back the way I had come, wondering if Lucius was aware that his cook and his beekeeper were lovers.

  What a contrast their silent devotions made to the couple in the room next to me. When I returned to my bed, I had to cover my head with a pillow to muffle the sounds of Titus and Antonia arguing.

  But the morning seemed to bring a new day. While Lucius, Eco and I ate a breakfast of bread and honey in the little garden outside Lucius's study, Antonia came walking up from the direction of the stream, bearing a basket of flowers.

  "Antonia!" said Lucius. "I should have thought you were still abed."

  "Not at all," she said, beaming. "I was up before dawn, and on a whim I went down to the stream to pick some flowers.

  Aren't they lovely? I shall have one of my girls weave them into a garland for me to wear at dinner tonight."

  "Your beauty needs no ornament," said Lucius. Indeed, Antonia looked especially radiant that morning. "And where is- mmm, dare I call him your king bee?"

  Antonia laughed. "Still asleep, I imagine. But I shall go and rouse him at once. This day is too beautiful to be missed! I was thinking that Titus and I might take a basket of food and some wine and spend most of the day down by the stream. Just the two of us…"

  She raised her eyebrows. Lucius understood. "Ah yes, well, Gordianus and I have plenty to occupy us here at the villa. And Eco-I believe you were planning to do some exploring up on the hill today, weren't you?"

  Eco, not quite understanding, nodded nonetheless.

  "Well, then, it looks as though you and the king bee will have the stream all to yourselves," said Lucius.

  Antonia beamed. "Lucius, you are so very sweet." She paused to kiss his blushing pate.

  A little later, as we were finishing our leisurely breakfast, we saw the couple walking down toward the stream without even a slave to bear their basket and blanket. They held hands and laughed and doted on each other so lavishly that Eco became positively queasy watching them.

  By some acoustical curiosity, a sharp noise from the stream could sometimes carry all the way up to the house. So it was, some time later, standing by Lucius in front of the villa while he discussed the day's work with his foreman, that I thought I heard a shout and then a hollow crack from that direction. Lucius and the foreman, one talking while the other listened, seemed not to notice, but Eco, poking about an old wine press nearby, pricked up his ears. Eco may be mute, but his hearing is extremely sharp.

  The shout had come from Titus. We had both heard his raised voice too often over the last few days not to recognize it.

  The spouses had not made up, after all, I thought. The two of them were at it again…

  Then, a little later, Antonia screamed. We all heard it. It was not the familiar shriek of Antonia in a rage. It was a scream of pure panic.

  She screamed again.

  We ran all the way, Eco in the lead, Lucius huffing and puffing in the rear. "By Hercules," he shouted, "he must be killing her!"

  But Antonia wasn't dying. Titus was.

  He was flat on his back on the blanket, his short tunic twisted all askew and hitched up about his hips. He stared at the leafy canopy above, his pupils hugely dilated. "Dizzy… spinning…" he gasped. He coughed and wheezed and grabbed his throat, then bent forward. His hands went to his belly, clutching at cramps. His face was a deathly shade of blue.

  "What in Hades!" exclaimed Lucius. "What happened to him, Antonia? Gordianus, what can we do?"

  "Can't breathe!" Titus said, mouthing words with no air behind them. "The end… the end of me… oh, it hurts!" He grabbed at his loincloth. "Damn the gods!"

  He pulled at his tunic, as if it constricted his chest. The foreman gave me his knife. I cut the tunic open and tore it off, leaving Titus naked except for the loose loincloth about his hips; it did no good, except to show us that his whole body was turning blue. I turned him on his side and reached into his mouth, thinking he might be choking, but that did no good either.

  He kept struggling until the end, fighting to breathe. It was a horrible death to watch. At last the wheezing and clenching stopped. His limbs unfurled. The life went out of his staring eyes.

  Antonia stood by, stunned and silent, her face like a petrified tragedy mask. "Oh, no!" she whispered, dropping to her knees and embracing the body. She began to scream again and to sob wildly. Her agony was almost as hard to watch as Titus's death throes, and there seemed as little to be done about it.

  "How in Hades did this happen?" said Lucius. "What caused it?"

  Eco and the foreman and I looked at each other dumbly.

  "Her fault!" wailed Antonia.

  "What?" said Lucius.

  "Your cook! That horrible woman! It's her fault!"

  Lucius looked around at the scattered remains of food. Crusts of bread, a little jar of honey, black olives, a wineskin. There was also a clay bottle, broken-that had been the hollow crack I had heard. "What do you mean? Are you saying Davia poisoned him?"

  Antonia's sobs caught in her throat. "Yes, that's it. Yes! It was one of my own slaves who put the food in the basket, but she's the one who prepared the food. Davia! The witch poisoned him. She poisoned everything!"

  "Oh, dear, but that means-" Lucius knelt. He gripped Antonia's arms and looked into her eyes. "You might be poisoned as well! Antonia, do you feel any pain? Gordianus, what should we do for her?"

  I looked at him blankly. I had no idea.

  Antonia showed no symptoms. She was not poisoned, after all. But something had killed her husband, and in a most sudden and terrible fashion.

  Her slaves soon came running. We left her grieving over the body and went back to the villa to confront Davia. Lucius led the way into the kitchen.

  "Davia! Do you know what's happened?"

  She looked at the floor and swallowed hard. "They say… that one of your guests had died, Master."

  "Yes. What do you know about it?"

  She looked shocked. "I? Nothing, Master."

  "Nothing? They were eating food prepared by you when Titus took ill. Do you still say you know nothing about it?"

  "Master, I don't know what you mean…"

  "Davia," I said, "you must tell us what was going on between you and Titus Didius."

  She stammered and looked away.

  "Davia! The man is dead. His wife accuses you. You're in great danger. If you're innocent, the truth could save you. Be brave! Now tell us what passed between you and Titus Didius."

  "Nothing! I swear it, by my mother's shade. Not that he didn't try, and keep trying. He approached me at the master's house in the city that night he first saw me. He tried to get me to go into an empty room with him. I wouldn't do it. He kept trying the same thing here. Following me, cornering me. Touching me. I never encouraged him! Yesterday, while you were all down at the hives, he came after me, pulling at my clothes, pinching me, kissing me. I just kept moving away. He seemed to like that, chasing me. When you all finally came back, I almost wept with relief."

  "He harassed you, then," said Lucius sadly. "Well, I'd believe that. My fault, I suppose; I should have told him to keep his hands off my property. But was it really so terrible that you had to poison him?"

  "No! I never-"

  "You'll have to torture her if you want the truth!" Antonia stood in the doorway. Her fists were clenched, her hair disheveled. She looked utterly distraught, like a vengeful harpy. "Torture her, Lucius! That's what they do when a slave testifies in a court. It's your right-you're her master. It's your duty-you were Titus's host. I demand that you torture her until she confesses, and then put her to death!"

  Davia turned as white as the moths that had flown from the hive. She fainted to the floor.

>   Antonia, mad with grief, retired to her room. Davia regained consciousness, but seemed to be in the grip of some brain-fever; she trembled wildly and would not speak.

  "Gordianus, what am I to do?" Lucius paced back and forth in the foyer. "I suppose I'll have to torture the girl if she won't confess. But I don't even know how to go about such a thing! None of my farm slaves would make a suitable torturer. I suppose I could consult one of my cousins…"

  "Talk of torture is premature," I said, wondering if Lucius would actually go through with such a thing. He was a gentle man in a cruel world; sometimes the world's expectations won out over his basic nature. He might surprise me. I didn't want to find out. "I think we should have another look at the body, now that we've calmed down a bit."

  We returned to the stream. Titus lay as we had left him, naked except for his loincloth. Someone had closed his eyes.

  "You know a lot about poisons, Gordianus," said Lucius. "What do you think?"

  "There are many poisons and many reactions. I can't begin to guess what killed Titus. If we should find some store of poison in the kitchen, or if one of the other slaves observed Davia doing something to the food…"

  Eco gestured to the scattered food, mimed the act of feeding a farm animal, then vividly enacted the animal's death-an unpleasant pantomime to watch, having just witnessed an actual death.

  "Yes, we could verify the presence of poison in the food that way, at the waste of some poor beast. But if it was in the food we see here, why wasn't Antonia poisoned as well? Eco, bring me those pieces of the clay bottle. Do you remember hearing the sound of something breaking, at about the time we heard Titus cry out?"

  Eco nodded and handed me the pieces of fired clay.

  "What do you suppose was in this?" I said.

  "Wine, I imagine. Or water," said Lucius.