Pompeii

by Harris, Robert

  The engineer took off his hat and wiped his forehead. Already there was something about the place he did not much like. A hustler’s town, he thought. Full of people on the make. She would welcome a visitor for exactly as long as it took to fleece him. He beckoned to Corax to ask him where he would find the aediles – he had to cup his hand to the man’s ear to make himself heard – and the overseer pointed towards a row of three small offices lining the southern edge of the square, all closed for the holiday. A long notice-board was covered in proclamations, evidence of a thriving bureaucracy. Attilius cursed to himself. Nothing was ever easy.

  ‘You know the way to the Vesuvius Gate,’ he shouted to Corax. ‘You lead.’

  Water was pumping through the city. As they fought their way towards the far end of the forum he could hear it washing clear the big public latrine beside the Temple of Jupiter and bubbling in the streets beyond. He kept in close behind Corax, and once or twice he found himself splashing through the little torrents that were running in the gutters, bearing away the dust and rubbish down the slope towards the sea. He counted seven fountains, all overflowing. The Augusta’s loss was clearly Pompeii’s gain. The whole force of the aqueduct had nowhere to run except here. So while the other towns around the bay were baking dry in the heat, the children of Pompeii paddled in the streets.

  It was hard work, toiling up the hill. The press of people was mainly moving in the opposite direction, down towards the attractions of the forum, and by the time they reached the big northern gate Baculus was already waiting for them with their horses. He had hitched them to a post beside a small building that backed on to the city wall. Attilius said, ‘The castellum aquae?’ and Corax nodded.

  The engineer took it in at a glance – the same redbrick construction as the Piscina Mirabilis, the same muffled sound of rushing water. It looked to be the highest point in the town and that made sense: invariably an aqueduct entered beneath a city’s walls where the elevation was greatest. Gazing back down the hill he could see the water towers which regulated the pressure of the flow. He sent Musa inside the castellum to fetch out the water-slave while he turned his attention to the horses. They did not appear too bad. You would not want to enter them for a race at the Circus Maximus, but they would do the job. He counted out a small pile of gold coins and gave them to Baculus, who tested each one with his teeth. ‘And the oxen?’

  These, Baculus promised, with much solemn pressing of his hands to his heart and rolling of his eyes to heaven, would be ready by the seventh hour. He would attend to it immediately. He wished them all the blessings of Mercury on their journey, and took his leave – but only as far, Attilius noticed, as the bar across the street.

  He assigned the horses on the basis of their strength. The best he gave to Becco and Corvinus, on the grounds that they would have the most riding to do, and he was still explaining his reasons to an aggrieved Corax when Musa reappeared to announce that the castellum aquae was deserted.

  ‘What?’ Attilius wheeled round. ‘Nobody there at all?’

  ‘It’s Vulcanalia, remember?’

  Corax said, ‘I told you he’d be no help.’

  ‘Public holidays!’ Attilius could have punched the brickwork in frustration. ‘Somewhere in this town there had better be people willing to work.’ He regarded his puny expedition uneasily, and thought again how unwise he had been in the admiral’s library, mistaking what was theoretically possible with what actually could be achieved. But there was nothing else for it now. He cleared his throat. ‘All right. You all know what you have to do? Becco, Corvinus – have either of you ever been up to Abellinum before?’

  ‘I have,’ said Becco.

  ‘What’s the set-up?’

  ‘The springs rise beneath a temple dedicated to the water-goddesses, and flow into a basin within the nymphaeum. The aquarius in charge is Probus, who also serves as priest.’

  ‘An aquarius as priest!’ Attilius laughed bitterly and shook his head. ‘Well, you can tell this heavenly engineer, whoever he is, that the goddesses, in their celestial wisdom, require him to close his main sluice and divert all his water to Beneventum. Make sure it’s done the moment you arrive. Becco – you are to remain behind in Abellinum and see it stays closed for twelve hours. Then you open it again. Twelve hours – as near exact as you can make it. Have you got that?’

  Becco nodded.

  ‘And if, by any remote chance, we can’t make the repairs in twelve hours,’ said Corax sarcastically, ‘what then?’

  ‘I’ve thought of that. As soon as the water is closed off, Corvinus leaves Becco at the basin and follows the course of the Augusta back down the mountains until he reaches the rest of us north-east of Vesuvius. By that time it will be clear how much work needs to be done. If we can’t fix the problem in twelve hours, he can take word back to Becco to keep the sluice-gate closed until we’ve finished. That’s a lot of riding, Corvinus. Are you up to it?’

  ‘Yes, aquarius.’

  ‘Good man.’

  ‘Twelve hours!’ repeated Corax, shaking his head. ‘That’s going to mean working through the night.’

  ‘What’s the matter, Corax? Scared of the dark?’ Once again, he managed to coax a laugh from the other men. ‘When you locate the problem, make an assessment of how much material we’ll need for the repair job, and how much labour. You stay there and send Musa back with a report. I’ll make sure I requisition enough torches along with everything else we need from the aediles. Once I’ve loaded up the wagons, I’ll wait here at the castellum aquae to hear from you.’

  ‘And what if I don’t locate the problem?’

  It occurred to Attilius that the overseer, in his bitterness, might even try to sabotage the entire mission. ‘Then we’ll set out anyway, and get to you before nightfall.’ He smiled. ‘So don’t try to screw me around.’

  ‘I’m sure there are plenty who’d like to screw you, pretty boy, but I’m not one of them.’ Corax leered back at him. ‘You’re a long way from home, young Marcus Attilius. Take my advice. In this town – watch your back. If you know what I mean.’

  And he thrust his groin back and forth in the same obscene gesture he had made out on the hillside the previous day, when Attilius had been prospecting for the spring.

  He saw them off from the pomoerium, the sacred boundary just beyond the Vesuvius Gate, kept clear of buildings in honour of the city’s guardian deities.

  The road ran around the town like a racetrack, passing beside a bronze works and through a big cemetery. As the men mounted their horses Attilius felt he ought to say something – some speech like Caesar’s, on the eve of battle – but he could never find those kinds of words. ‘When this is done, I’ll buy wine for everyone. In the finest place in Pompeii,’ he added lamely.

  ‘And a woman,’ said Musa, pointing at him. ‘Don’t forget the women, aquarius!’

  ‘The women you can pay for yourself.’

  ‘If he can find a whore who’ll have him!’

  ‘Screw you, Becco. See you later, cocksuckers!’

  And before Attilius could think of anything else to say they were kicking their heels into the sides of their horses and wheeling away through the crowds thronging into the city – Corax and Musa to the left, to pick up the trail to Nola; Becco and Corvinus right, towards Nuceria and Abellinum. As they trotted into the necropolis, only Corax looked back – not at Attilius, but over his head, towards the walls of the city. His glance swept along the ramparts and watchtowers for a final time, then he planted himself more firmly in the saddle and turned in the direction of Vesuvius.

  The engineer followed the progress of the riders as they disappeared behind the tombs, leaving only a blur of brown dust above the white sarcophagi to show where they had passed. He stood for a few moments – he barely knew them, yet so many of his hopes, so much of his future went with them! – then he retraced his steps towards the city gate.

  It was only as he joined the line of pedestrians queuing at the gate that he not
iced the slight hump in the ground where the tunnel of the aqueduct passed beneath the city wall. He stopped and swivelled, following the line of it towards the nearest manhole, and saw to his surprise that its course pointed directly at the summit of Vesuvius. Through the haze of dust and heat the mountain loomed even more massively over the countryside than it had above the sea, but less distinctly; more bluish-grey than green. It was impossible that the spur should actually run all the way on to Vesuvius itself. He guessed it must swerve off to the east at the edge of the lower slopes and travel inland to join up with the Augustas main line. He wondered where exactly. He wished he knew the shape of the land, the quality of rock and soil. But Campania was a mystery to him.

  He went back through the shadowy gate and into the glare of the small square, acutely aware suddenly of being alone in a strange town. What did Pompeii know or care of the crisis beyond its walls? The heedless activity of the place seemed deliberately to mock him. He walked around the side of the castellum aquae and along the short alley that led to its entrance. ‘Is anyone there?’

  No answer. He could hear the rush of the aqueduct much more clearly here, and when he pushed open the low wooden door he was hit at once by the drenching spray and that sharp, coarse, sweet smell – the smell that had pursued him all his life – of fresh water on warm stone.

  He went inside. Fingers of light from two small windows set high above his head pierced the cool darkness. But he did not need light to know how the castellum was arranged for he had seen dozens of them over the years – all identical, all laid out according to the principles of Vitruvius. The tunnel of the Pompeii spur was smaller than the Augusta’s main matrix, but still big enough for a man to squeeze along it to make repairs. The water jetted from its mouth through a bronze mesh screen into a shallow concrete reservoir divided by wooden gates, which in turn fed a set of three big lead pipes. The central conduit would carry the supply for the drinking fountains; that to its left would be for private houses; that to its right for the public baths and theatres. What was unusual was the force of the flow. It was not only drenching the walls. It had also swept a mass of debris along the tunnel, trapping it against the metal screen. He could make out leaves and twigs and even a few small rocks. Slovenly maintenance. No wonder Corax had said the water-slave was useless.

  He swung one leg over the concrete wall of the reservoir and then the other, and lowered himself into the swirling pool. The water came up almost to his waist. It was like stepping into warm silk. He waded the few paces to the grille and ran his hands underwater, around the edge of the mesh frame, feeling for its fastenings. When he found them, he unscrewed them. There were two more at the top. He undid those as well, lifted away the grille, and stood aside to let the rubbish swirl past him.

  ‘Is somebody there?’

  The voice startled him. A young man stood in the doorway. ‘Of course there’s somebody here, you fool. What does it look like?’

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘You’re the water-slave? Then I’m doing your fucking job for you – that’s what I’m doing. Wait there.’ Attilius swung the grille back into place and refastened it, waded over to the side of the reservoir and hauled himself out. ‘I’m Marcus Attilius. The new aquarius of the Augusta. And what do they call you, apart from a lazy idiot?’

  ‘Tiro, aquarius.’ The boy’s eyes were open wide in alarm, his pupils darting from side to side. ‘Forgive me.’ He dropped to his knees. ‘The public holiday, aquarius – I slept late – I –’

  ‘All right. Never mind that.’ The boy was only about sixteen – a scrap of humanity, as thin as a stray dog – and Attilius regretted his roughness. ‘Come on. Get up off the floor. I need you to take me to the magistrates.’ He held out his hand but the slave ignored it, his eyes still flickering wildly back and forth. Attilius waved his palm in front of Tiro’s face. ‘You’re blind?’

  ‘Yes, aquarius.’

  A blind guide. No wonder Corax had smiled when Attilius had asked about him. A blind guide in an unfriendly city! ‘But how do you perform your duties if you can’t see?’

  ‘I can hear better than any man.’ Despite his nervousness, Tiro spoke with a trace of pride. ‘I can tell by the sound of the water how well it flows and if it’s obstructed. I can smell it. I can taste it for impurities.’ He lifted his head, sniffing the air. ‘This morning there’s no need for me to adjust the gates. I’ve never heard the flow so strong.’

  ‘That’s true.’ The engineer nodded: he had underestimated the boy. ‘The main line is blocked somewhere between here and Nola. That’s why I’ve come, to get help to repair it. You’re the property of the town?’ Tiro nodded. ‘Who are the magistrates?’

  ‘Marcus Holconius and Quintus Brittius,’ said Tiro promptly. ‘The aediles are Lucius Popidius and Gaius Cuspius.’

  ‘Which is in charge of the water supply?’

  ‘Popidius.’

  ‘Where will I find him?’

  ‘It’s a holiday –’

  ‘Where’s his house then?’

  ‘Straight down the hill, aquarius, towards the Stabian Gate. On the left. Just past the big crossroads.’ Tiro scrambled to his feet eagerly. ‘I can show you if you like.’

  ‘Surely I can find it by myself?’

  ‘No, no.’ Tiro was already in the alley, anxious to prove himself. ‘I can take you there. You’ll see.’

  They descended into the town together. It tumbled away below them, a jumble of terracotta roofs sloping down to a sparkling sea. Framing the view to the left was the blue ridge of the Surrentum peninsula; to the right was the tree-covered flank of Vesuvius. Attilius found it hard to imagine a more perfect spot in which to build a city, high enough above the bay to be wafted by the occasional breeze, close enough to the shore to enjoy the benefits of the Mediterranean trade. No wonder it had risen again so quickly after the earthquake.

  The street was lined with houses, not the sprawling apartment blocks of Rome, but narrow-fronted, windowless dwellings that seemed to have turned their backs on the crowded traffic and to be looking inwards upon themselves. Open doors revealed an occasional flash of what lay beyond – cool mosaic hallways, a sunny garden, a fountain – but apart from these glimpses, the only relief from the monotony of the drab walls were election slogans daubed in red paint.

  ‘THE ENTIRE MASS HAVE APPROVED THE CANDIDACY OF CUSPIUS FOR THE OFFICE OF AEDILE.’

  ‘THE FRUIT DEALERS TOGETHER WITH HELVIUS VESTALIS UNANIMOUSLY URGE THE ELECTION OF MARCUS HOLCONIUS PRISCUS AS MAGISTRATE WITH JUDICIAL POWER.’

  ‘THE WORSHIPPERS OF ISIS UNANIMOUSLY URGE THE ELECTION OF LUCIUS POPIDIUS SECUNDUS AS AEDILE.’

  ‘Your whole town appears to be obsessed with elections, Tiro. It’s worse than Rome.’

  ‘The free men vote for the new magistrates each March, aquarius.’

  They were walking quickly, Tiro keeping a little ahead of Attilius, threading along the crowded pavement, occasionally stepping into the gutter to splash through the running stream. The engineer had to ask him to slow down. Tiro apologised. He had been blind from birth, he said cheerfully: had been dumped on the refuse tip outside the city walls and left to die. But someone had picked him up and he’d lived by running errands for the town since he was six years old. He knew his way by instinct.

  ‘This aedile, Popidius,’ said Attilius, as they passed his name for the third time, ‘his must have been the family which once had Ampliatus as a slave.’

  But Tiro, despite the keenness of his ears, seemed for once not to have heard.

  They came to a big crossroads, dominated by an enormous triumphal arch, resting on four marble pillars. A team of four horses, frozen in stone, plunged and reared against the brilliant blue sky, hauling the figure of Victory in her golden chariot. The monument was dedicated to yet another Holconius – Marcus Holconius Rufus, dead these past sixty years – and Attilius paused long enough to read the inscription: military tribune, priest of Augustus, five times magistrate, patron
of the town.

  Always the same few names, he thought. Holconius, Popidius, Cuspius . . . The ordinary citizens might put on their togas every spring, turn out to listen to the speeches, throw their tablets into the urns and elect a new set of magistrates. But still the familiar faces came round again and again. The engineer had almost as little time for politicians as he had for the gods.

  He was about to put his foot down to cross the street when he suddenly pulled it back. It appeared to him that the large stepping stones were rippling slightly. A great dry wave was passing through the town. An instant later he lurched, as he had done when the Minerva was moored, and he had to grab at Tiro’s arm to stop himself falling. A few people screamed; a horse shied. On the opposite corner of the crossroads a tile slid down a steep-pitched roof and shattered on the pavement. For a few moments the centre of Pompeii was almost silent. And then, gradually, activity began again. Breath was exhaled. Conversations resumed. The driver flicked his whip over the back of his frantic horse and the cart jumped forwards.

  Tiro took advantage of the lull in the traffic to dart across to the opposite side and, after a brief hesitation, Attilius followed, half-expecting the big raised stones to give way again beneath his leather soles. The sensation made him jumpier than he cared to admit. If you couldn’t trust the ground you trod on, what could you trust?