[Getorius and Arcadia 01] - The Secundus Papyrus

by Albert Noyer

  As archdeacon, Behan had emphasized, Renatus would be contacted prior to the time of the prophecy’s fulfillment. Curiously, he had not asked for alms, as was normal with everyone who came to deacons. That alone gave the man’s enigmatic words some credibility, and yet the monk would surely have known that an archdeacon controlled vast sums. Behan might still have been intending to demand money after the prophesied event had come to pass.

  Renatus chuckled softly as the litter bearers turned into the Via Basilicae. Christ had predicted that the poor would always be present, but he had failed to mention their cunning ways.

  The archdeacon was suddenly thrown to one side of the small conveyance when the two men carrying it ducked under a porch overhang to avoid being drenched by the water that was gushing from the eaves. He brushed water off his cloak, recalling that Getorius had called the Celtic verses ‘word games.’ Prophecies were often hidden in cryptic phrases that needed interpretation. Who would give out the meaning, now that Behan was dead?

  At the side entrance of the bishop’s residence the carriers made a show of refusing payment, but Renatus insisted that each take one of Valentinian’s bronze coins, which proclaimed him SALVS REIPVBLICAE, ‘The Health of the Republic.’ The amount was generous, so Renatus assumed their snickering was connected with the inscription.

  Inside, the old porter took Renatus’ damp cloak, then said, “Archdeacon, while you were away a boy brought a sealed note.”

  “Boy? From where?”

  “He didn’t say, Excellency. It’s on your desk.”

  Renatus nodded. Once in his office, he saw that the note’s vellum flap was secured with a lump of red wax. He angled the seal up to the dim light of the window and squinted at the impression. It was the strong image of a cockerel, much like the one Behan had made with his ring.

  Renatus’ hand trembled as he slipped a thumbnail under the wax and worked it loose.

  Perhaps this note will clear up the mystery and tell me what I’m involved in. After he read the greeting, he bit his lip nervously, then mumbled, “Who in the name of salvation is Smyrna? And why does he want me to meet with him?”

  Chapter seven

  Getorius watched the ides of November dawn with a cold deluge that poured in translucent sheets onto the buildings and streets of Ravenna. Well before midmorning the downpour sloshing off the roof tiles had backed up some of the city’s sewers. Marshes already swollen by the wet autumn could not contain the extra water, and a foul-smelling effluent was forced over curbs and into the narrow streets. The sour smell replaced the fragrance of baking bread and roasting meats that normally filled the morning air.

  Only a few patients braved the wet weather to come to the clinic. Getorius was able to continue his animal dissections, still disappointed that he had felt unable to continue on the body of Marios, yet realizing that the risk, had he been discovered, could have had him and Arcadia exiled from the city—and even Italy itself.

  He was about to leave the clinic for his midday meal when a free servant arrived from the villa of Publius Maximin. Tetricus said that the senator’s aged mother was ill, and Maximin wanted Getorius to look in on her.

  Getorius knew that Maximin was the wealthiest and most influential man in Ravenna. He had been treasurer of the City of Rome twice, as well as Prefect of the Province of Italy, public services that had merited him a statue in Rome. Valentinian had appointed him Consul six years ago. The senator was out of public office now, but reportedly petitioning the emperor for the title of Patrician. All Ravenna knew that he delighted in showing off his affluence by hosting lavish banquets; one reason, Getorius surmised, that Galla Placidia had not invited him to her presumably austere evening. Another reason might be that Valentinian was rumored to be enjoying periodic hospitality in the bed of Maximin’s wife, Prisca. Placidia wanted people at her dinner that embodied the ideal she believed—or pretended to believe—existed at the time of the Roman Republic.

  Irritated, and wondering why Maximin had not asked Antioches to come from the palace, Getorius hunched down in a leather cloak and straw hat borrowed from Brisios, as he followed Tetricus. The senator’s villa was in the oldest quarter of Ravenna, the Oppidum, where many of the wealthy citizens lived. His residence occupied a triangle formed by the Via Aurea, Via Honorius, and Vicus Maximin, the latter narrow street named after his family. Retired legionaries, who had no desire to give up urban comforts to begin a rustic life farming the land they had been allotted, patrolled the area.

  After the two men turned into the Aurea from the Honorius, they were challenged by a scarred veteran and his companion, a burly brute who may have had only one arm, but who looked capable of strangling a bear with his remaining hand alone.

  “Where y’going?” one-arm asked.

  “Senator Maximin summoned this surgeon,” Tetricus replied. “I’m his servant.”

  “Never seen you before.”

  “I work inside the villa, but was entrusted with this errand.”

  “This is my medical case.” Getorius held up the leather box slung over his shoulder, then reached into his belt purse and selected a silvered bronze follis. “When you’re off duty, men, get yourselves some hot mulled wine.”

  One-arm’s companion grinned and palmed the coin. “On your way, bone-cutter.”

  “Money, the universal gate-opener,” Getorius muttered. “How far is Maximin’s?”

  “Not far, Surgeon.”

  “Good, perhaps I won’t be spending all of my fee on bribes.”

  Tetricus turned in at the entrance to a sprawling villa that was set back from the street and surrounded by a wall. Its brickwork was in disrepair, and sections of stucco on the villa facade were crumbling. In a port city like Ravenna, Getorius surmised, young freemen found it easier to make their fortunes in trading or shipping than through an apprenticeship in the building trades.

  While Tetricus rapped a bronze Gorgon head against its plate, Getorius shivered. Even though the cape and hat had kept his upper body reasonably dry, his boots and trouser bottoms were soaked. That would not help his humor imbalance. He wiped drops of water from his face, realizing that Maximin probably had called Antioches, but the old man would have refused to come out in weather that gave only marsh ducks a reason to rejoice.

  After a locking bolt grated through its retainer, Maximin’s porter opened the door.

  “I brought the surgeon,” Tetricus told him.

  The man nodded and led the way through a vestibule into an atrium. Both areas were paved in a pattern of alternating green and white marble slabs, rather than the mosaic tiles usually found in private homes. Not even Lauretum Place boasted a marble entranceway. A loud splashing sound came from an overflowing atrium pool, where water cascading from the roof was spilling onto the floor. Three soaking-wet slaves were frantically sponging the overflow into buckets.

  “Where’s Senator Maximin?” Getorius asked the porter.

  “Master is away. I will take you to his mother.”

  “Her name?”

  “Domina Agatha Maximina.”

  At the end of a colonnaded porch surrounding the drenched garden, a folding door led into a fair-sized bedroom. Getorius found it overly warm and smelling of camphor. Agatha, a cadaver of a woman who looked as if she should have gone to meet her namesake Saint Agatha years ago, lay in bed. Another woman, presumably her slave, sat by an oil lamp, sewing. She stood up when Getorius entered.

  “What seems to be the trouble, Domina?” he asked Agatha, pulling a folding stool to her bedside. “Your ailment?”

  Agatha fixed him with watery blue eyes that were alert, despite her emaciated face. “Which one, Surgeon?” she asked wryly. “Haven’t you heard that old age has a thousand illnesses?”

  Getorius smiled. Nothing wrong with her mind. “Then we must treat the worst one first. Where do you hurt the most?”

  “My spine. Fabia has now become my legs.”

  “Fabia? Your slave?”

  Agatha gave a hoar
se chuckle. “Oh, I’ve freed her, Surgeon. She’s just waiting around for an inheritance from me.”

  Getorius looked toward the woman. “Turn your mistress on her side, facing the wall, so I can examine her back. Gently.”

  Agatha’s cervical and thoracic vertebrae were curved in a humpback. Her shoulder blades, lumbar vertebrae, and pelvic bones protruded in sharp lumps through the silk of her night tunic. She winced as Getorius felt along the skeletal ridge of spine. Agatha implied she couldn’t walk. Her vertebrae have deteriorated to the point that all I can hope to do is relieve her pain. “Fabia. Put a pillow against the headboard. I’ll help your mistress turn back around and sit up.” He grasped Agatha’s bony wrist and eased her into an upright position with his other hand.

  Agatha’s wrinkled face creased into a smile that still suggested it had once dazzled young men. “Surgeon, your hands are strong. Not like Antioches, who spills most of my medication.”

  “The palace physician is old.”

  “And my son…the Senator…sent me rather a handsome replacement.”

  “Domina, you tease me.”

  “Tease? When I was younger…” Her blue eyes misted as she glanced away. Agatha wiped an eye and turned back to Getorius. “Well? Can you help me walk again?”

  “I…I’m afraid I can only alleviate your pain. Send Fabia to my clinic for an opion solution.”

  “Opion?” Agatha looked back at him. “The water of the river Lethe…to forget.”

  “I…I’m sorry.”

  “Am I also to forget that Dis Pater beckons from the opposite shore?”

  “Father Death? I don’t think you’ll—”

  “I’ll miss not being in my garden,” she went on. “Do you think Dis Pater has a garden?”

  “Domina Agatha,” Getorius said as an idea came to him, “a carpenter could build you a cushioned chair fitted with light wheels. Fabia could roll you into the garden…around the house. Perhaps even to the marketplace.”

  “You are clever, Surgeon. My son should have thought of that.”

  “Publius Maximin is concerned with governing,” Getorius replied. Fabia slid a small gold coin from a leather bag toward him as he stood up. “The Senator left your fee, Surgeon.”

  “A tremissis? That’s too much,” he objected. “The pay of a laborer for an entire day.”

  “The Senator can afford it…” Agatha winced and shifted position. “My son is a conceited man. Did you know they erected his statue in the Forum of Trajan after his consulship?”

  “I’d heard. You must be very proud of him.”

  “I was at one time, but ambition has changed Publius. The saying is that it’s better to be first in a village than second in Rome. He wants to be first in both.”

  “To be Augustus?” The prospect is arrogant, if not treasonable. “Yes, well, send Fabia for the opion.” Getorius grasped both of the old woman’s hands. “I’ll look in on you again.”

  “I’d like that…Getorius.”

  “My gateman knows a carpenter. Brisios will bring him.”

  Agatha closed her eyes and murmured, “Then I can ride in style to meet Dis Pater.”

  Getorius sloshed home twice as wet, sniffling, and in a humor as foul as the weather.

  There was about an hour left before he had to dress in a ridiculous garment, go to a dinner attended by unfamiliar people, and be forced to listen to conversation about undoubtedly boring subjects. If that were not enough aggravation, the Augustus of the Western Roman Empire would probably try to seduce Arcadia. She would not succumb, of course, but depending on the degree of Valentinian’s fascination with her, the emperor might decide there was one husband too many still lurking around.

  He found his wife in the bedroom, where Silvia was helping her dress.

  “You’re soaking, Getorius,” Arcadia observed. “Is it still raining out there?”

  He gave an authentic but exaggerated sneeze as an answer.

  “Go to the hot pool.”

  “I haven’t time.”

  “Then have Brisios give you a quick rub-down. Silvia, bring him here,” Arcadia ordered.

  “What is Placidia thinking?” Getorius grumbled as he dried his hair with a towel. “Does she expect to raise the body of the Republic like Christ did that of Lazarus? Ancient Rome has had rigor mortis for over four hundred years.”

  “Perhaps she wants to bring a little morality back into the court.”

  “Morality.” Getorius grunted and stripped off his wet clothes, then lay on the bed watching Arcadia examine her hairstyle in a silver hand mirror. “The whole affair makes me uncomfortable. If I recall Livius’ history, the Republic began with the rape of a Roman woman, and ended with the rape of the Celts and then the Senate, by Julius Caesar.”

  “Why are you so upset?” Arcadia put down the mirror, sat on the bed and rubbed his back. “So my ancestors are Roman and yours are mostly Celtic. Are you blaming me?”

  “No, no, of course not, cara. I just think this play acting is in bad taste…to say nothing of going out in this miserable weather when my phlegm humor is acting up.” Getorius brought Arcadia’s hand to his lips and nibbled her fingers. “What if we spent the evening in the bathhouse instead? You know—”

  “You satyr!” Arcadia tousled his hair and pulled the blanket over him. “I hear Silvia coming back with Brisios. I know, the whole affair seems silly, and I’m not sure of Placidia’s motive, but it might get you into the palace.”

  And you into her son’s bed. Instead of voicing the thought, Getorius buried his face in his wife’s stola. “You smell good. What’s that new scent?”

  “Something Silvia found in a Syrian importer’s shop near the docks. Make that a short rub,” she told Brisios, after he entered with a jug of oil. “Veneranda isn’t here to help with the Surgeon’s toga. I’ll have to adjust it.”

  Brisios poured out a palm full of warm, scented oil and began to knead his master’s shoulder and neck muscles.

  “Tell me again, Arcadia, who’s going to be there?” The pillow muffled Getorius’s question.

  “The archdeacon. Your librarian. Sigisvult.”

  “‘Aetius the Wifeless.’”

  “Yes. Of course, the Augustus and Augusta.”

  Getorius looked up from the pillow. “I don’t want Valentinian sitting next to you.”

  “It’s not up to you. Besides, I doubt if we’ll be sitting. Placidia will have us reclining on couches like all my decadent Roman ancestors did.”

  “Even worse!” Getorius started up, almost knocking over the jug. “I won’t have that lecher lying next to you.”

  “Thank you, Brisios,” Arcadia said, flushing. “The Surgeon will have to dress now. Please could you bring the covered carriage to the courtyard.”

  “Where then, is that furcing toga?” Getorius snapped. “Sorry, cara. Some army slang I picked up.”

  “Silvia, bring the toga,” Arcadia said quietly, ignoring her husband’s outburst. From helping treat soldiers she knew the term derived from the furca, a two-pronged cross to which legionaries were tied as punishment. It had become a derogatory term for the men.

  By the time Arcadia draped the length of material around Getorius—to her satisfaction if not to his—and Brisios had the carriage ready, the drizzle had stopped. A reddish glow in the early afternoon sky silhouetted the remaining dark wisps of cloud that were scattering to the east. The rose color was reflected in water gurgling through the streets to sewers, or lying in miniature lakes that mimicked the marshes surrounding Ravenna’s walls. A cool freshness was tempered by the pervading stench of sewage that overlaid the air.

  The Via Caesar was an open cesspool when Brisios left the villa and drove the short distance to the Via Honorius. At the intersection, the market square had become a pink lake cluttered with floating baskets and barrels. Vendors on the north portico were sweeping the water away, and opening shops for a few customers who might come after the rain. Unfortunate slaves, who had drawn the short straw,
picked their way over the raised stones across the Honorius to reach the market.

  While Brisios waited for a line of wagons to pass, Arcadia glanced at her husband. Getorius was hunched in his toga, against one side of the carriage seat, with a sullen expression on his face. “I did a little research on the old ides,” she said, to lighten his mood. “It was the only festival day in November.”

  “One too many.”

  “The aedile still schedules a drama in the theater. I heard it was Aulularia, by Plautus, although I imagine the performance was rained out.”

  “It’s a wonder that Bishop Chrysologos allows them to go on at all.”

  “The play is about a gentle miser. People make fun of him because—”

  “I know the story, Arcadia,” Getorius interrupted. “I hear our esteemed archdeacon counts the number of those who attend the theater against the ones who go to the cathedral for Mass.”

  Arcadia ended the exchange when the carriage turned into the Honorius. “The palace is just ahead,” she warned, “try to be pleasant. Remember that our hosts are the emperor, his wife, and his mother.”

  Getorius roused himself when the carriage pulled up to the entrance, and two of the tallest men he had seen, Hun or otherwise, came down the steps. “Look at the size of those brutes!” he exclaimed. “Aetius is trying to impress someone with his personal guards.”

  “Put a shield over your mouth,” Arcadia hissed, “your babbling could get us exiled. Next, you’ll be shouting about Pandora during dinner.”

  Her comment surprised him. Arcadia had not mentioned the dissection again, but it was obviously on her mind. “Just an observation. Everyone invited lives at the Lauretum, except us and Renatus.”