'Of course, Master; I understand.' 'And also, Congrio…' 'Yes, Master?' He wrinkled his fleshy brow. 'You will say nothing to embarrass me while you are in Claudia's service.'
'Of course not, Master!' He seemed genuinely hurt.
'You will not exchange gossip with the other slaves, or trade opinions of your respective masters, or pass along what you may perceive to be my opinions.'
'Master, I fully understand the proper behaviour of a slave who has been lent to a friend of his master.'
'I'm sure you do. Only, while you keep your mouth closed, I want you to keep your ears open.'
'Master?' He inclined his head, seeking clarification.
'This applies more to your assistants than to you, since I assume you may not leave the kitchen at all, while they may assist in serving the Claudii at their meal. The family will mostly be discussing politics and the upcoming consular elections; about that I care nothing, and you may ignore whatever they say. But if you should happen to hear my name mentioned, or any other matter concerning this farm, prick up your ears. Indicate no interest, but note what is said and by whom. Do not discuss the details among yourselves, but remember them When you return, I will want to hear any such details, faithfully recounted. Do you understand, all of you?'
Congrio drew back with a sudden look of self-importance and nodded gravely. His assistants, watching him for their lead, did likewise. What makes a slave feel more warmly wicked than to be commissioned as a spy?
'Good. About the instructions I have just given, you will say nothing, not even to the other slaves. Not even to Aratus,' I added. They nodded again.
After I sent them on their way, I stepped to the window and leaned out, breathing in the warm fragrance of mowed grass. The bloom was finally off the grass, and the slaves had begun to make hay. I also noted the figure of Aratus walking quickly alongside the house, his back turned to me, as if he had been standing by the window and listening to everything I said.
It was two days later, in the afternoon, when the stranger arrived. I had taken a stroll to the stream and had settled on a grassy slope, my back against the trunk of a spreading oak, a wax tablet on my knees and a stylus in my hand hi my imagination a mill began to take shape on the bank of the stream I tried to draw what I saw in my mind, but my ringers were clumsy. I smoothed the wax with the edge of my hand and started again.
'Papa! Papa!' Diana's voice came from somewhere behind me and echoed off the opposite bank. I stayed quiet and continued to draw. The result was no more satisfactory the second time. I rubbed the tablet clear again.
'Papa! Why didn't you answer me?' Diana stepped in front of me, putting her hands on her hips in imitation of her mother.
'Because I was hiding from you,' I said, beginning a fresh mark in the wax.
"That's silly. You know I can always find you.'
'Really? Then I hardly need to answer when you call, do I?'
'Papa!' She rolled her eyes, imitating Bethesda again, then collapsed on the grass beside me as if suddenly exhausted. While I drew, she contorted herself into a wheel and pulled at her toes, then lay flat again and squinted up at the sunlight that filtered through the oak canopy above. 'It's true that I can always find you, you know.'
'Can you? And how is that?'
'Because Meto taught me how. Meto says that you taught him. I can follow your footsteps in the grass and always find you.' 'Really?' I said, impressed. 'I'm not sure that I like that.' 'What are you drawing?'
'It's called a mill. A little house with a great wheel that dips into the water. The flowing water turns the wheel, which turns other wheels, which will grind corn, or stones, or a little girl's fingers if she isn't careful.'
'Papa!'
‘Don't worry, it's just an idea. A problem, if you like, and probably too complicated for me ever to solve it,'
'Meto says that you can solve any problem'
'Does he?' I put the tablet aside. She squirmed and rolled on the grass and laid her head in my lap. The broken sunlight spangled her hair, jet black in shadow and shot through with lustrous rainbows, like oil on water, where the light struck it I had never seen a child with hair so black. Her eyes were also black, very deep and clear as only a child's eyes can be. A bird flitted above us. I watched Diana follow it with her gaze, amazed at the beauty of her least movement.
She reached for the tablet and stylus, stretching her body awkwardly, and held them, above her.
'I don't see a picture at all,' she said.
'It's not very good,' I admitted.
'Can I draw over it?'
'Yes.'
She did a thorough job of obliterating my tentative lines with her small hand, then set to drawing. I stroked her hair and studied my imaginary mill by the stream. At length, across the water, two women emerged from the woods. They were kitchen slaves carrying clay jugs. They saw me and gave a start, conferred for a moment with their heads close together, then disappeared back into the woods. A little later I glimpsed something farther down the stream and saw them stepping down to the water's edge at a less convenient place. They dipped their jugs into the current, hoisted them onto their shoulders, and struggled up the steep bank and into the woods. Had Publius Claudius told them I was a monster who would eat them?
'This is you!' announced Diana, turning the tablet about and thrusting it towards me. Among the squiggles and curlicues I could barely make out a face. She was an even poorer draftsman than myself, I thought, but not by much.
'Extraordinary!' I said. 'Another Iaia Cyzicena is among us!'
'Who is—' She stumbled over the unfamiliar name.
'Iaia, born in the city of Cyzicus, on the Sea of Marmara far away. She is a great painter, one of the greatest of our day. I met her down in Baiae, when your brother Meto first came into my life.'
'Did Meto know her?'
'He did’
'Will I ever meet her?'
'It is always possible.' Nine years had passed since the events in Baiae, and Iaia had not been so very old. She might yet live long enough for Diana to know her. 'Perhaps one day you and Iaia may meet and compare your drawings.'
'Papa, what is a Minotaur?'
'A Minotaur?' I laughed at the abrupt change of subject. 'So far as I know, there was only ever one, the Minotaur. A terrible creature, the offspring of a woman and a bull; they say it had a bull's head and a man's body. It lived on a faraway island called Crete, where a wicked king kept it in a place called the labyrinth, a great maze.'
'Amaze?'
'Yes, with walls like this’ I wiped the tablet clean and set about drawing a maze. 'Every year the king gave the Minotaur young boys and girls to eat. They would make the children enter here, you see, and the Minotaur would be waiting for them here. This went on for a very long time, until a hero named Theseus entered the Labyrinth and slew the Minotaur’
'He killed it?'
'Yes’
'Are you sure?' 'Quite’
'Completely sure?'
•Yes’
'Good!'
'Why do you ask about the Minotaur?' I said, anticipating the answer.
'Because Meto has been saying that if I'm not good, you'll feed me to it. But you've just said that it's dead’ 'Ah, so it is’
'So Meto is wrong!' She rolled out of my lap. 'Oh, Papa, I almost forgot! Mama sent me to fetch you. It's important.'
‘Yes?' I raised an eyebrow, imagining some dispute with the unskilled slaves who were overseeing the kitchen in Congrio's absence.
‘Yes! There's a man who's come to see you, a man on horseback all the way from Rome, all covered with dust.'
It was not one man, but three. Two of them were slaves, or more precisely bodyguards, to judge from their size and the daggers at their belts. The slaves had not entered the house, but stood outside with their horses, drinking water from a jug. Their master awaited me just inside the house, in the little formal courtyard with its fishpond and flowers.
He was a tall, strikingly handsome young m
an with dark eyes. His wavy black hair was trimmed short over his ears but left long on top, so that black curls fell carelessly about his smooth forehead. His beard was trimmed and blocked so that it was no more than a black strap across his chin and upper lip, accentuating his high cheekbones and red lips. As Diana had said, he was dusty from his journey, but the dust did not hide the fashionable and expensive-looking cut of his red tunic or the quality of his riding shoes. He looked familiar; a face from the Forum, I thought.
A slave had brought him a folding chair to sit on. He stood up as I entered and put down the cup of watered wine from which he had been drinking. 'Gordianus,' he said, 'it's good to see you again. Country life agrees with you.' His tone was casual, but it carried the polish of an orator's training.
'Do I know you?' I said. 'My eyes fail me. The sunlight is so bright outside, here in the shade I can't see you clearly
'Forgive me! I'm Marcus Caelius. We've met before, but there's no reason you should remember me.'
'Ah, yes,' I said. 'I see you more clearly now. You're a protege of Cicero's-and also of Crassus, I believe. You're right, we've met before, no doubt at Cicero's house or in the Forum. Memories of Rome are so irrelevant here, I sometimes have a hard time recollecting. And the beard fooled me. The beard is definitely new.'
He reached up and stroked it proudly. 'Yes, I was probably clean-shaven when we met. You've grown a beard, as well.'
'Mere laziness — not to mention cowardice. At my age a man needs every drop of blood he has to keep his bones warm. Is that the fashion in Rome these days? The way you trim it, I mean.'
'Yes. Among a certain set.' There was a trace of smugness in his voice that put me off.
'The girl has already brought you some wine, I see.'
'Yes. It's quite good.'
'A modest vintage. My late friend Lucius Claudius was rather proud of it. Are you on your way from Rome to some point farther north?'
'I've come from Rome, yes, but this is my destination.'
'Really?' My heart sank. I had hoped he was merely passing through.
'I have business with you, Gordianus the Finder.' 'It's Gordianus the Farmer now, if you don't mind.' 'Whatever.' He shrugged. 'Perhaps we could retire to another room?'
"The courtyard is the coolest and most comfortable place at this time of day.'
'But perhaps there's another place more private, where we might be less likely to be overheard,' he suggested. My heart sank again.
'Marcus Caelius, it's good to see you again, truly. The day is hot and the road is dusty. I'm glad I can give you a cup of cool wine and a respite from your horse. Perhaps you require more than a drink and a brief rest? Very well, my hospitality is not exhausted. To ride all the way from Rome to my door and back again in a single day would challenge even a man as young and fit as you appear to be, and so I will gladly offer you accommodations for the night, if you wish. But unless you want to talk about haymaking or pressing olive oil or tending the vine, you and I have no business to discuss. I have given up my old livelihood.'
'So I've heard,' he said amiably, with an undaunted glimmer in his eyes. 'But you needn't worry. I haven't come to offer you work.'
'No?'
'No. I've come merely to ask a favour. Not for myself, you understand, but on behalf of the highest citizen in the land.' 'Cicero,' I sighed. 'I might have known.'
'When a duly elected consul calls him to duty, what Roman can refuse?' said Caelius. 'Especially considering the ties that bind the two of you. Are you sure there's not another room that might be more appropriate for our discussion?'
'My library is more private… if hardly more secure,' I added under my breath, remembering my glimpse of Aratus skulking away from the window two days before. 'Come.'
Once there, I shut the door behind us and offered him a chair. I sat near the door to the herb garden, so that I could see anyone approaching, and kept an eye on the window above Caelius's shoulder, where I had caught Aratus eavesdropping. 'What have you come for, Marcus Caelius?' I said, dropping all pretence of pleasant conversation. 'I'll tell you right now that I will not go back to the city. If you need someone to spy for you or dig up trouble, you can go to my son Eco, though I hardly wish it on him.'
'No one is asking you to come back to Rome,' said Caelius soothingly.
'No?'
'Not at all. Quite the opposite. Indeed, the very fact that you are now living in the countryside is what makes you so appropriate for the purpose Cicero has in mind.'
'I don't like the sound of that.'
Caelius smiled thinly. 'Cicero said you wouldn't.'
'I'm not a tool that Cicero can pick up whenever he wishes, or bend to his purpose at will; I never was and never will be. No matter that he's consul for the year, he's still only a citizen, as I am. I have every right to refuse him.'
'But you don't even know what he's asking of you.' Caelius seemed amused.
•Whatever it is, I won't like it,'
'Perhaps not, but would you refuse an opportunity to serve the state?'
'Please, Caelius, no empty calls to patriotism.'
'The call is not empty.' His face became serious. "The threat is very real. Oh, I understand your cynicism, Gordianus. I may have lived only half as long as you, but I've seen my share of treachery and corruption in the Forum, enough for ten lifetimes!'
Considering his political education at the side of men like Crassus and Cicero, he was probably speaking the truth. Cicero himself had trained him in oratory, and the pupil did his master proud; the words that poured from his lips were polished like precious stones. He might have been an actor or a singer. I found myself listening to him in spite of myself
"The state stands poised on the brink of a terrible catastrophe, Gordianus. If it steps over that brink — or is pushed, against the will of every decent citizen — the descent will be more abrupt and harrowing than anything we've known before. Certain parties are determined to destroy the Republic once and for all. Imagine the Senate awash in blood. Imagine a return of the dictator Sulla's proscriptions, when any citizen could be named an enemy of the state for no reason at all — you must remember gangs running through the streets, carrying severed heads to the Forum to receive their bounty from Sulla's coffers. Only this time the anarchy will spread unceasingly, like waves from a great stone cast into a pond. This time the enemies of the state are determined not to reform it, at whatever bloody cost, but to smash it altogether. You own a farm now, Gordianus; do you want to see it taken from you by force? It will happen, most certainly; because in the new order everything already established will be usurped and thrown down, ground into the dust. The fact that you no longer live in Rome will provide no protection to you or your family. Bury your head in a haystack if you wish, but don't be surprised when someone comes up behind you and cuts it clean off'
I sat for a long moment in silence, unblinking. At last I managed to shake my head and suck in a breath. 'Well done, Marcus Caelius!' I said. 'For a moment there, you had me entirely under your spell! Cicero has taught you exceedingly well. Such rhetoric could make any man's hair stand on end!'
He raised his eyebrows, then his lids grew heavy. 'Cicero said you would be unreasonable. I told him he should have sent that slave of his, Tiro. Tiro you know and trust—'
'Tiro I sincerely like and respect, because he is such a kind and openhearted man, but I would have beaten him back with words at every turn, which is no doubt precisely why Cicero did not send him. No, he did very well to send you as his agent, Marcus Caelius, but he did not count on the depth of my disgust with Roman politics, or the strength of my resolve to steer clear of any involvement with his consulship.'
Then what I've said so far means nothing to you?'
'Only that you've mastered the skill of making insanely exaggerated statements as if you sincerely believed them.'
'But every word is true. I exaggerate nothing.'
'Caelius, please! You're a Roman politician in the making. You are not allo
wed to speak the truth, and you are absolutely required to exaggerate everything.'
He sat back, momentarily rebuffed but regrouping, as I could see from the glimmer in his eyes. He stroked his narrow beard. 'Very well, you care nothing for the Republic. But surely you at least retain some vestige of your personal honour as a Roman.'
'You are in my house, Caelius. Do not insult me.'
'Very well, I won't. I will argue with you no longer. I will simply remind you of a favour you owe to Marcus Tullius Cicero, and request on his behalf that you pay back that favour now. Having faith in your honour as a Roman, I know you won't refuse.'
I shifted in my seat uneasily. I glanced over my shoulder, through the doorway into the herb garden, where a wasp was buzzing among the leaves. I sighed, already sensing defeat. 'I assume you refer to the case that Cicero argued on my behalf last summer?'
'I do. You inherited this estate from the late Lucius Claudius. His family, quite reasonably, contested the will. The Claudii are a very old and distinguished patrician clan, whereas you are a plebeian with no ancestry at all, a dubious career, and a most irregular family. You might very well have lost your case, and with it any claim to this farm where you have so comfortably retired from the city you claim to loathe so much. For that you can thank Cicero, and don't deny it — I was in the court that day and I heard his arguments myself. I have seldom witnessed such eloquence — excuse me, untruths and exaggerations, if you prefer. It was you who asked Cicero to speak for you. He might well have declined. He had just finished a gruelling political campaign, and as consul-elect he was pressed on all sides with obligations and requests. Yet he took time to prepare your case and to present it himself. Afterwards, Cicero asked no payment for his service to you; he spoke on your behalf to honour you, acknowledging the many occasions on which you have assisted him since the trial of Sextus Roscius, seventeen years ago.’ Cicero doesn't forget his friends. Does Gordianus?'
I looked out at the herb garden, avoiding his gaze. I watched the wasp, envying its freedom 'Oh, Cicero trained you well indeed!' I said under my breath.
'He did,' Caelius acknowledged quietly, with a crooked smile of triumph on his lips.
Catilina's riddle rsr-3 Page 3
