Her response astonished me. ‘Tedious? It is a form of torment. And so unnecessary too! If my husband had been appointed flamen, as he hoped, perhaps all these restrictions would be acceptable, but he does not even have the post! And yet he insists on these petty regulations – not only on his own life, but on mine! Preparation for the role, he calls it. Preparation for the netherworld, more like! And it’s not one thing, or two, it’s everything! Look at this room!’ She gestured to the mural I had noticed earlier.
I muttered something about ‘impressive painting’.
‘Impressive?’ She almost snorted. ‘What woman wants to spend her life with that? And only bulls depicted, you notice! No “inauspicious” goats or horses, only bulls. And that frieze! We can’t have graceful vines or ivy patterns, like anybody else, because they trail and that would be unlucky, wouldn’t it, given the flamen’s intolerance of bonds and knots? Only, of course, he is not the flamen, yet! Or ever will be now, as far as I can see. In the meantime, I have to live with that. Isn’t it the ugliest thing you ever saw?’
I was embarrassed. It was indiscreet and inappropriate, talking like this to a stranger. No wonder her family had found her ‘wayward’! All the same I found myself increasingly liking this extraordinary creature, who had at least the rudiments of artistic sensibility. I remembered what Gwellia had said about the circumstances of this marriage: how Aurelia had been dragged into it against her will, and how the pontifex was afraid to come near her in case she died in childbirth. It was impossible not to feel sympathy for her – a woman trapped into a childish role, caught in a kind of permanent immaturity.
I could see why the old pontifex indulged her – more as a daughter than a wife – permitting her extravagances in the market and allowing her to have a garden if she wished. I only hoped it was enough. This young lady was no shrinking flower – if she were too far from satisfied I could envisage her walking out, and causing a sensation in the forum by publicly demanding to be sent back home!
What I could not imagine was that discreet liaison with Optimus which my wife had hinted at. This Aurelia seemed quite the least likely person to attract that elderly, quadrans-pinching man, and the least likely to keep it quiet if she did. Surely her love of spending money (which I found myself mentally justifying, as a trapped girl’s appreciation of fine things) would offend his frugal miser’s ways? Of course, she had powerful family connections; perhaps that was what attracted Optimus. Status mattered to him very much. But whatever did she see in him? I began to wonder if the gossip might be wrong. It sometimes was – as I had cause to realise today!
Perhaps she was simply grateful for a friend, I told myself, and the whole relationship was wholly innocent. On the whole I rather hoped it was. Even if Aurelia escaped exile and the disgrace of a divorce, surely consorting with Optimus was merely exchanging one misery for another? However, it was none of my business, and Aurelia was still chattering about the frieze.
‘My husband paid a fortune to have it done,’ she was saying. ‘And look at it! A simple stencilled pattern would have looked far better.’
I heartily agreed, though I could hardly say so. ‘You have a good eye, lady,’ I said tactfully.
She smiled, actually colouring with pleasure. It transformed her face. ‘Why, thank you, citizen. It is not often anyone pays me a compliment. I take it doubly kindly from an artist like yourself. I hear Optimus’s pavement is quite spectacular. If only my husband had asked for your advice! But there! I am neglecting my duties. You have eaten nothing in our house. Can I send for something a little more to your taste? We only have unleavened bread, I fear. A flamen cannot touch or come into contact with yeast – so, naturally . . .!’ She gave me a wry smile. ‘But we could find some fruits, perhaps, or cheese? My slave is waiting, just outside the door.’
I shook my head. ‘You are most kind, citizeness, and I don’t wish to be discourteous, but just at the moment I don’t think I could eat. Outside, in the town, there are armed men searching for me, wanting to kill me.’ I found myself explaining as though talking to a child. ‘All I want is to rest here, and to see your husband when I can.’ I stopped, suddenly recalling what she’d told me earlier. ‘Did you say he was expecting me?’
She nodded. ‘That’s right, citizen. Your slave brought word to us. He came here looking for your patron and told us what happened. He said that you were coming here.’
‘Marcus Septimus was already here?’
‘Indeed, because we had just received a messenger from Fabius Marcellus insisting that he will visit Glevum anyway.’ She looked at me. ‘Marcus has been with my husband half the afternoon. They’re in the temple making a special sacrifice, so they can read the entrails and find out what to do.’ She made a little face. ‘I hate all that – sticking your hands into an animal’s blood and looking at its innards. Thank Jupiter I didn’t have to watch. But my husband felt he had to do it. He is taking this very badly, you understand? All these goings-on in the temple, and disturbances in the street. And with the legate coming too. He knows this is the end of his hopes of getting the flaminate.’
‘I’m very sorry about that,’ I said. I meant it sincerely. I was desperately reliant on the pontifex for help, and I was not going to endear myself to him if he saw me as someone who’d helped destroy his dreams.
Aurelia shot me a look. ‘Don’t be sorry on my account, citizen. I shan’t be at all upset if this is the end. Perhaps then he will be persuaded to give up these ridiculous rules of his, and allow us to live a normal sort of life. There are restrictions enough in being High Priest of Jupiter, without adding to them of your own accord. I could wear my rings and necklaces again – he can’t be in the same house with “bonds” like that! – and eat bread and beans and goat’s cheese like anybody else. And get rid of this stupid wreath he makes me wear – because the Flaminia Dialis has one, of course. And wear my own hair, too, instead of this!’
To my astonishment she seized the piled black locks and tore them off, revealing them as a clever wig. Her own hair, dark, uncombed and wispy, fell around her face. I had been warned about her hairpieces, but the transformation was startling. Without her wig she looked younger and more vulnerable than ever.
‘You see what I have to put up with, citizen? You realise, if he was appointed, I’d have to weave and sew all my own clothes and his – with my own hands? Not even a slave to help me. And go back to live in Rome, which I don’t think I could bear. But the Flamen of Jupiter cannot leave the city for more than three nights in a row. Or take his hat off at any time. Or even have an empty table in his house. He’s got to be ready to make sacrifice at any hour of day or night! You know he already has the legs of his bed rubbed with earth, as the flamen does? It’s perfectly disgusting. The gods alone know why!’ She paused suddenly, sighed, and gave me a rueful smile. ‘Believe me, I shall not be sorry if he doesn’t get the job.’
I found myself saying gently, as though to a child, ‘Let’s just hope that he doesn’t lose the job he has. You realise he might? If the Emperor holds him responsible for what has been happening here? It is his temple, after all.’
She looked at me in evident dismay. ‘You think that’s possible? By Hermes, citizen, I hadn’t thought of that. Commodus can be . . . well—’ She broke off, biting her tongue. Even she felt the need for some discretion here – no one criticised the Emperor in front of strangers.
‘Swift in his punishments?’ I suggested.
She nodded gratefully. ‘Exactly, citizen. My husband is an old fool, sometimes, but I should not wish any harm to come to him.’
She always called him ‘my husband’, or ‘the pontifex’, I noticed. More deference to his would-be rank, no doubt, even when calling him a fool. I wondered how she referred to him in private. Even the high priest must have a name. Perhaps, if a man wishes to be flamen, not even his family can use his praenomen.
I was about to make some conventional remark when we heard the opening of the inner gate and the murmur of
voices in the garden court.
‘Ah! No doubt that will be my husband now. By the way, citizen, I hardly like to mention this, but I suppose you are aware that your face is smeared with dust, and you seem to have stone chips in your hair?’
Great Jupiter, I had forgotten that. No wonder those citizens outside had stared at me. How could I meet the pontifex like that? And my patron was arriving too. I looked around wildly. I thought of using the water in the jug, but that was specially matured, and cost accordingly. My eyes fell on the ornamental pool, but before I could do anything the page came in.
‘His Excellence Marcus Aurelius Septimus and my master have arrived,’ he announced.
The two men came in, accompanied by the unmistakable odour of sacrifice – burnt feathers and fresh blood – and also by Junio, to my great relief, though naturally he was unannounced. I saw his eyes widen as he saw me and took in the ashes on my hair and face. He shook his head pityingly.
But it was too late now. I knelt to greet my patron, as I was. ‘A thousand apologies, Excellence . . .’
He waved his acceptance loftily. ‘Very well, very well. Get up, Libertus.’
The high priest said, in that reedy voice of his, ‘Ah, there you are! I hear you’ve become the centre of a storm. Dear me. Most unfortunate. However, since you’re here, you can tell us all about it.’ It was not exactly a welcome, but he held out his staff of office to be kissed.
I bowed over it. ‘All homage be to Jupiter, Greatest and Best . . .’ I began, but I got no further.
‘Gracious Hercules, what’s that?’ Marcus exclaimed, but, with a sinking of my heart, I had already recognised the sound.
From the direction of the temple, clearly echoing around the high priest’s garden court, there came that long, low, unearthly moaning sound again, like the desolate wailing of the dead.
Chapter Nineteen
There was a moment’s horrified silence. Marcus and Junio both turned to me, shock and dismay carved on their faces. Aurelia and her page looked terrified. Only the pontifex seemed unconcerned.
‘That noise again,’ Marcus said, after a little pause.
‘A noise? Ah! One of the temple trumpeters, I expect.’ The high priest was vague. ‘No doubt they’re practising for later on.’
Behind him, Marcus met my eyes and shook his head. I scarcely needed the assurance. No temple trumpet ever made a noise like that. It moaned into silence and was still. Everyone breathed a sigh of palpable relief.
‘All the same, Sacredness,’ Marcus persisted. He spoke in the loud and measured tones which everyone used when talking to the pontifex, but he was courteous. The temple might be part-servant to the state in many things, but the priest was final arbiter on actual dealings with the gods. ‘I think someone should make sure. Perhaps if . . .’ I thought for a moment that he was going to suggest that I investigate again, and I was horrified. I was in enough trouble already. If that had been his idea, he seemed to think better of it. ‘Perhaps if Junio . . .?’
‘If you so wish, Excellence.’ The pontifex was preoccupied with a pair of elaborate folding chairs, which a silent slave had brought and was setting down near the impluvium.
It was tantamount to an order from the highest sources, but all the same Junio looked towards me for permission. I would have been much happier not to have him leave my side, but in the circumstances I could hardly refuse.
I nodded and he bowed himself quietly out, while Marcus settled himself on the grander of the seats, and the high priest sat down fussily on the other.
Aurelia, instead of disappearing discreetly into the interior as most women would have done, sank down upon the visitors’ bench and watched us with an air of alert curiosity, like a spectator at the games, or at a trial.
It felt rather like a trial. I was the only person, apart from the slaves, still on my feet. In any normal social situation, someone of my humble status would have been expected to sit somewhere inferior – as Aurelia had done – so that my head was decently lower than my betters’. If the room had reminded me of a courtroom earlier, the impression was ten times stronger now – and it was clear what role I was playing here. Marcus and the high priest were both senior magistrates, and even without bonds or chains (which, in any case, no one could wear in the presence of the pontifex) I felt like a man accused. Especially as I still had penitential ashes on my head.
What’s more, I was beginning to suspect that this was how the pontifex intended me to feel. When he turned to me he seemed more pale and fragile than ever, but though his voice was cracked and feeble his glittering eyes were shrewd. ‘Your patron and I have sacrificed a pair of doves and consulted with the augurers. We think a full procession round the town is best – a proper torchlight ceremonial, that sort of thing – carrying small statues of the triad gods, and a threefold sacrifice at dawn. Marcus is arranging for the animals.’ He rubbed his thin hands briskly, as though he were relishing the prospect.
Marcus nodded his agreement.
‘We’ll have the censers, dancers, pipers and cymbals too,’ the old man went on happily. ‘I’ve sent word to the households of all priests from the other temples of the Olympian gods. Trinunculus and several of the slaves are calling on the chief priests of Apollo, Mercury, and all the other patron gods of the major craftsmen’s guilds. No doubt some of the priests will join the ritual. Dear me! That will ensure a good crowd at the shrine, and that should satisfy the populace. Nothing like a big religious procession to make the townsfolk think that something’s happening!’
‘It’s most unfortunate the townsfolk have turned on you, Libertus!’ Marcus leaned back on his chair, placed his fingertips together magisterially and addressed himself to me.
I said nothing. I could think of nothing to say. I was feeling increasingly uncomfortable.
Marcus smiled at me indulgently. ‘Most unfair, I know,’ he went on, in that brisk this-is-not-of-my-choosing tone which officials always use to convey unwelcome news, ‘Especially as you were not even there when the first of these phenomena occurred. But people do seem to associate all this with your presence in the temple, or at any rate with your return to town.’ He was interrupted as the page, on a signal from the pontifex, brought him the plate of honeyed dates. Marcus picked one up and bit it thoughtfully. ‘And once they get an idea like that, an angry crowd is hard to reason with. Ah . . . wine!’
He broke off again as the slave poured a little from a ewer. It was already watered – no respectable Roman household would offer undiluted wine – but the pontifex motioned for it to be topped up with additional water from the jug.
My patron took a sip. ‘Good water, this.’
‘Oak-aged five years,’ the pontifex said, tasting his own, and nodding his white head with satisfaction.
I did not need an augurer to read the omens here. This diversion was not merely a gesture in the direction of social convention. I was convinced that the pontifex was deliberately contriving it: partly to emphasise my inferior status – important visitors like Marcus merited wine and folding chairs, whereas I did not – and partly to add to my anxieties by keeping me waiting helplessly. If that was his intention, he was succeeding admirably.
The old man shot me a sly look, and then said silkily, ‘You were saying, Excellence? About the crowd?’
Marcus took another date. ‘Ah, indeed. The crowd.’ He seemed oblivious of these undertones. ‘It seems to us, Libertus my old friend, that the best thing you can do is join the procession as a flagellant. It looks penitent, that sort of thing – and with the sacrifice, that should dispel the mob. I see you’ve smeared yourself with dust and ashes, so you’re already half prepared for it.’
A flagellant! I felt myself grow pale. Of course self-flagellation was by no means unknown – young converts followed some parades, dressed in skins or ragged skirts, whipping themselves savagely until they fell bleeding and half-senseless to the ground. But for an ageing man? And it was no good doing the thing half-heartedly: some helpful me
mber of the crowd would seize the whip and do the job himself. I swallowed. I might as well have stayed to face the sticks and stones.
‘But Excellence!’ I blurted. ‘I have been the merest bystander.’ I gave him a brief outline of my day.
He condescended an uncomfortable smile. ‘Unfortunate for you, I know, but the imperial ambassador has decided that he’s coming after all. It is essential that some gesture should be made. One must think of the greater good – the peace and welfare of the town.’
My heart sank. So there was nothing to be hoped for there. Marcus only retreated into that kind of social rhetoric when he felt forced into some course of action which he did not like.
The high priest wafted all this aside with a wave of his thin hand. ‘Citizen, it’s no good you muttering your discontent like this. You did defile the sanctuary. Dear me! Some public gesture of atonement is required.’ He looked at me with his pale, vague smile. ‘Though we can arrange to administer it, if you would prefer.’
The public torturers, he meant. Men had been known to die under their floggings. I found myself babbling. ‘As to my desecration of the shrine, that was an accident. And it was this morning, Mightiness, long after most of this had happened. I wasn’t at the temple when that moaning first began. Or when the corpse was found. Or the returning bloodstain—’
The high priest interrupted me impatiently. The old man was as pale as ashes but he could be decisive when he chose. ‘This is all very well, citizen, but it is no excuse. The crowd are superstitious, but there is justice in what they say. There have been supernatural happenings here, there’s no denying that. I’ve been a Priest of Jupiter for thirty years, and I’ve never seen anything to equal it. And they are right. These things have all occurred since you returned to town. No, pavement-maker, don’t protest. Even if you have done nothing deliberate, it is possible for a man to be the unwitting channel of the gods.’
This was what Scribonius had been frightened of. I felt my hands go clammy.
The Legatus Mystery Page 17
