Roman Games
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There being nothing else for it, Martial was forced to follow his audience, only to hear the vice prefect protesting that he had no comment, and would they kindly let go of him! Spying Martial in the crowd, Pliny shouted over the hubbub, “I fear I’ve spoiled your recital, and most amusing it was.”
“Not your fault, sir.” Martial shouldered his way to Pliny’s side and held out his right hand. Never to quarrel with a potential meal was the chief rule of his life. “Marcus Valerius Martialis at your service.”
“I know your name. Who in Rome doesn’t? How can I make it up to you?”
“Well,” the poet favored him with his most winning smile—he could be charm itself when he wanted to. “It is approaching dinner time, and I find myself actually unengaged…”
“Say no more. Literary men are always welcome at my table. I’m on the Esquiline near the Lake of Orpheus. Ask anyone in the neighborhood for directions. I’m going home soon. Come in an hour. Vale.”
As Pliny passed through the exercise yard, some rowdy young men were making a nuisance of themselves, kicking a ball around in a circle, running and making diving catches, accompanied by much shouting and laughter. Suddenly the laughter died in their throats. One of them had kicked the ball high up over the heads of his companions and they watched in horror as it struck the gilded body of the Lord and God, towering on its pedestal over the exercise yard. Instantly they scattered, trying to lose themselves in the crowd. But some weren’t quick enough. An older man tackled one, held onto him by the ankle, crying, “Here, I’ve got the traitor!” From the edge of the crowd grim-faced troopers closed in on the terrified boy.
Pliny didn’t stay to watch the outcome. He felt a coldness in his belly.
Chapter Ten
The tenth hour of the day.
The sun was dipping behind the housetops as Martial, dressed in his one presentable dining-out suit, set out from his tenement on the Quirinal along cobblestone streets still littered with the detritus of the morning’s festivities. His way lay across the Viminal, and up the steep slope of the Esquiline. At his heels trotted a sad-looking little boy who carried his napkin. The poet couldn’t afford to keep a slave, but hired one sometimes for appearance’s sake. Martial was hungry, starving in fact, but the evening held no further enticements for him. Dinner with this earnest, unimaginative lawyer and his equally dull friends would be something to suffer through. But that was how impecunious poets survived.
A slave met him at the doorway, removed his shoes and gave him dining slippers to wear, and conducted him into the triclinium, where his host rose to greet him.
To his surprise, Martial found himself the only guest. “We dine intimately tonight,” said Pliny, “just my wife and my freedmen. Simple fare. No roast piglet stuffed with thrushes, no honeyed dormice, no sows’ udders. A ‘philosopher’s meal’ is my style.”
Martial, who relished sows’ udders, did his best to hide his disappointment.
“I feed my freedmen and my humblest guests the same food and wine I consume myself,” Pliny burbled, “I make no distinctions of class.”
“Admirable,” murmured the poet, wishing that Pliny fed his freedmen on mullet and Lucrine oysters.
“Recline here by me in the place of honor. I’ve long wanted to meet you, in fact. I’m a bit of a poet myself actually. Oh, I don’t publish. Just for my own amusement.”
The slaves brought honeyed wine and Pliny poured the customary libation to the Lares and Penates.
Martial gave him an appraising look. “You don’t include the emperor’s bust among your household gods?”
Pliny’s hand froze for an instant. Without looking at the poet, he said, “Do you?” Then they measured each other with their eyes. “Of course, I worship him—” they both said at once. Then both stopped. Then both smiled. It was a delicate, dangerous moment. Either one of them might have been a spy. “We must serve the emperor we have,” said Pliny carefully.
“Indeed we must,” said Martial. The moment passed. It would be all right.
While slaves carried in the first course, Pliny introduced his freedmen; there were three of them reclining on one couch. “This is Zosimus,” he indicated a thin, serious young man in his twenties. “He is my secretary and my most gifted Greek reader, and my trusted friend. And this is—but, ah, here she comes now!”
Leaning on her nurse’s arm, the heavily pregnant girl came into the room and eased herself onto the dining couch beside her husband.
Well, here’s a tasty morsel, thought Martial. Though his preference ran mostly to the other thing, the poet was an admirer of feminine beauty. He noted her lustrous dark eyes and her swelling breasts.
For her part, Calpurnia didn’t know what to make of this shaggy bear of a man with his flashing teeth and rolling eye. He was certainly unlike any other of her husband’s friends, being rather what she imagined an aging pirate might look like. She struggled with her shyness and risked a smile. “I am pleased to meet any friend of my husband’s. Are you new to our city?”
Though you would not have guessed it from his poems, Martial had a charming manner with women. He made her a low bow, then laughed. “I come from gold-bearing Tagus, from high-girt Bilbilis and the banks of rugged Salo, in short, from Spain. I came to Rome to seek fame and fortune as a writer, and Rome has grizzled my locks.” He raked his fingers through his hair. “The noise, the distractions drive me wild, and yet I can’t break away. The city gets in your blood. And though I am read all over Rome, nay, all over the Empire, it brings me no money. Fortune still eludes me.”
“You wish to be known at court, my friend?” Pliny broke in.
“That is my desire, sir.” The poet put on his serious face. “I’ve sent trunksful of verse up to the palace. I’ve praised the worthy Parthenius, I even dedicated half a dozen poems to little Earinus, though I blush to admit it.”
“You know your language is rather, ah, indelicate for the ears of this chaste court.”
“I’ve been told so once already today by that old fart Statius,” the poet replied. “However, I’ve lately written a whole book of poems praising the emperor, and all without a single word that would make your maiden aunt squirm. But I need someone to actually put it in his hands, don’t you see? I halfway believe that Statius intercepts my offerings.”
“Papinius Statius,” said Pliny stiffly, “happens to be a very dear friend of mine. I assure you, your suspicions are absurd. Nevertheless, when this Verpa business is over I’ll see what I can do for you.”
“I would be forever grateful, Patrone.”
“Now, now, no such word as that between us. You must consider me a friend.”
The first course was served and cleared away. During the interval Pliny urged his young wife to recite for them. “I mean if you’re feeling up to it, my dear. It’s her pregnancy,” he said in an aside to Martial, “she’s under doctor’s orders not to tire herself. Still, if you would…” He gazed at her hopefully. “I mentioned I write verses. Calpurnia sets them to music and accompanies herself on the lyre, with no schooling from a music teacher, but with affection, which is the best possible teacher.”
Martial steeled himself. Clearly, the pompous man was dying to show off his verses and show off his child wife too.
The verses were pedestrian, but she was charming. She sang in a light, girlish voice while her fingers plucked complex patterns on the strings, and all the while her husband beamed at her with indescribable complacency.
“Bravo!” Martial clapped his hands when she had finished. “Why, mistress, put my verses to music and you’ll make my fortune for me!”
She blushed. “My talent is small, sir, but it is at your service. Tell me, what meters do you employ? For the lyre I find that iambic trimeter works best, although the dactylic, of course—”
“Calpurnia?” Pliny ’s face was a picture of baffled embarrassment.
“Why, husband, what is the matter?” She raised an innocent eyebrow. “I must ask him, mustn’t
I?” Martial caught a gleam of amusement in her eye and an answering one from the freedman, Zosimus across the table. Well, well, thought Martial, this young lady has been taking lessons, and not only from Cupid. And now she’s teasing him. Here’s a girl with more spirit than she’s given credit for.
They spent the next few minutes discussing Latin lyric meters and the poet was impressed, both by her knowledge and by her tact in drawing her husband back into the conversation and smoothing his ruffled feathers. Meanwhile more dishes were brought out—filling, if not exciting. Presently Calpurnia stifled a yawn and excused herself.
“You chose wisely, my friend,” said Martial when she was gone, and meant it. “She’s charming. I’ve been in half the bedrooms in Rome, but I’ve no one to go home to tonight. It’s no life for a man my age.”
“She is devoted to me, the dear thing.” Pliny was moist-eyed. “She memorizes my courtroom speeches, you know; even sleeps with a sheaf of them beside her on the bed when I have to be away from home.”
“No, really?” said Martial. He had to bite his lip to keep from laughing. “But when you’re lucky enough to be in the bed, she’s not, ah, too modest, I hope.”
“Oh, goodness no,” Pliny assured him. Lately, of course, because of the fear of a miscarriage, they had been abstaining. Pliny had a more ardent nature than many would have suspected and he was beginning to feel quite definitely deprived.
Leaving the subject of his host’s marital bliss, Martial ventured, “This murder case you’re on…”
“Mehercule,” Pliny burst out with feeling, “I don’t know why this business has been thrust upon me. The babe unborn has as much knowledge of crime detection as I do. I’m no more a policeman than you are.”
“But it is of some interest,” the poet replied. “What little I’ve gathered from the barber shop gossip. What have you learned so far?”
Pliny described his morning’s investigation.
“Jewish assassins,” said the poet. “And you believe it?”
“Well, I mean to say, the evidence all points that way. I only hope I can save the other slaves.”
“You actually care about them, don’t you? It does you credit. I once composed an epitaph in verse for a little slave girl who died on our estate back home. A dear little thing. I’m not all winks and nudges, you know.”
Pliny affirmed that he was glad to hear it.
The poet made a temple of his fingers and rested his chin on them. “You knew Verpa, of course.”
“Only slightly, and his wretched family not at all. Lucius seems to be a typical young man of our age, that is to say good for nothing. And as for the lady, she is either a mad woman or she’s afraid of something. Her behavior this morning was extraordinary.”
“You don’t say. Well, I can tell you that our Lucius has been living far beyond his allowance; gambled and whored it all away—reminds me of myself when I was his age. I’ve learned that half a dozen usurers are pursuing him and have threatened to cut off his credit or even complain to his father if he doesn’t pay up.”
“That’s an old story in our city,” Pliny sighed. “A son with a living father possesses nothing of his own, can’t sell anything to raise money, can’t legally borrow money, but they all do anyway. And then they wait for father to die.”
“And sometimes, if father is tiresomely long-lived, they don’t wait,” Martial concluded the thought. “I’m told he begged his father to free him from patria potestas or, at least, raise his allowance, and the old man refused. Now, of course, that’s all changed. Lucius is his own man at last.” Martial paused and moistened his throat with more wine, enjoying the attention of Pliny and the freedmen, whose eyes were riveted on him. “And as for Turpia Scortilla, her case is more interesting. Did you know she’s not his wife?”
“What are you saying, she’s only a concubina?”
“Exactly. Her father was a stable hand for the Greens, she grew up in the Circus, started out as a bare-back rider and acrobat, if you can believe it. Yes, quite an athlete, our Scortilla: handstands on a galloping horse during the intermissions between races. From there she worked her way up to high-class courtesan. She was some courtier’s girlfriend, and burrowed her way into the palace, where she made herself a fixture and eventually a nuisance. She drank too much and made scenes. A nasty piece of work altogether. And she and Domitilla didn’t get on at all. Which is interesting, isn’t it, in light of that lady’s recent condemnation for atheism. Anyway, Scortilla wanted the wealth and status a senator could provide, and Verpa, who was recently divorced, fancied her. She was beautiful once, in a brittle sort of way, and she got her hooks into him. Of course, the Julian Laws don’t permit a senator to marry a woman with a background like hers, so she settled for being his concubine.”
“But I gather,” said Pliny, “that they haven’t been intimate for years. Why didn’t Verpa break it off when she no longer pleased him?”
“Probably because she knows all his secrets. She’s not an absolutely stupid woman, and she amuses herself with the slaves just as he does. Those eight strapping German litter bearers of hers? It’s said that they carry her all day and she carries them all night. Say, that’s rather neat, isn’t it? I must make a verse of that.”
“My good man,” Pliny said in a tone that approached awe. “How on earth do you know all this?”
“Scandal is my stock in trade,” Martial smiled modestly. “Everything is meat for a satirist, and ‘smoke,’ my friend, is everywhere if you have a nose for it. I swim in waters where you would not dip your toe, if I may mix my metaphors.”
“And so you think…”
“I don’t think anything. Probably it was this Jewish brute after all. But I would like to hear more as you carry on your investigation. It’s food for a satirist. Perhaps occasionally over one of your excellent dinners we might exchange thoughts?”
“Why, I should like nothing better, my dear Martial. You’re a gift from the gods! With your assistance I will get to the bottom of this business. Shall we say tomorrow at this hour?”
“I’m honored by your confidence, sir.” The poet heaved an inward sigh of relief and vowed an offering to Bacchus. That was dinner taken care of for the next few days!
The tenth hour of the night.
In a corner of the temple compound in the Campus Martius, almost under the shadow of the great Isis temple itself, a passerby might observe a shop sign with a painting of the mummified Osiris, brother-husband of the Queen of Heaven. Within the cluttered workshop, the curious visitor would notice a cage with an elderly ibis, its beak tucked under its shabby wing, a stuffed crocodile, a pair of somnolent cobras, a bale of linen, a nested pile of caskets, and jars containing various unguents. The odor of camphor, resin, and myrrh hung like a fog in the small workroom. But Nectanebo used none of these in his work. Their only purpose was to impress the temple trade, who were directed to his establishment by Alexandrinus, the priest of Anubis, in return for a share of his fees. Quite a satisfactory arrangement really. And this was only the beginning, for Alexandrinus had plans to enlarge the embalming works and Nectanebo intended to be a part of that. He had latched onto a good thing. Until lately, Roman worshippers of Isis had cremated their dead like everyone else, but in just the year since he’d set up shop, with the backing of the temple, Nectanebo’s exotic services were beginning to catch on.
Of course, it was all a sham. The ancient ritual of mummification was supposed to take half a dozen men seventy days to complete—you could read that in Herodotus. But nobody these days had time for that. Nectanebo had been given a mere five days to prepare the body of the murdered devotee. Well, they couldn’t expect miracles, then, could they? Scoop out the guts, stuff in a lot of sawdust and rags soaked in cheap oil, shovel on some salt, wind the wrappings, none too carefully, and nail a lid on the casket. By the time the smell got too bad the thing would be safely in its tomb. Of course, in this unseasonable heat they’d been having lately…
“Here, what’s this, then?” he spoke aloud to the sleepy little slave who sat beside him and whose job, performed with a minimum of effort, was to wave a horse-hair whisk at the cloud of buzzing flies that hovered over them. Holding the lamp closer, Nectanebo peered and poked at the little, livid bump which was already turning from purple to black. “By the beard of Ptah, most peculiar.” It looked for all the world like a nasty bee sting. Nectanebo frowned in thought. “Now, how in the world does a man get a bee sting in a place like that?”
Beyond Nectanebo’s workshop the columns of the great temple rose up black against the midnight blue of the sky. Before the temple stretched a broad courtyard flanked by porticos of lotus-stalk columns under whose eaves inert figures lay curled on papyrus mats, men and women indiscriminately. One could hear the collective sigh of their breathing. Now and then, one would moan or stir in his sleep. Serpents glided silently among them, tongues flicking out, touching eyelids, bringing dreams. Incense hung heavy in the moist night air.
The only illumination was the pale glow of oil lamps set upon the ground by each sleeper’s head. The priests of the temple kept watch throughout the night, some resting on stools, others bending over the recumbent figures, those who were restless, whose dreams wouldn’t come—touching, whispering incantations, assuring them that the compassionate Mistress of the Universe and her consort were with them and would heal them of their gout, their headache, their infertility. Attending were the priests of Isis, of Serapis, of Thoth; and the priest of Anubis—Alexandrinus—his head covered by the towering jackal mask, long-snouted and sharp-eared, painted black on one side and gold on the other. Through small eye-holes in the long neck he peered into the darkness.