The Roman (15 page)

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mother�s half sister�s granddaughter who calls herself Valeria Messalina, if I�ve got it right,� I said. �In fact then, Messalina is just as noble birth as Agrippina?� �More or less;� admitted Aunt Laelia. �But she has none of Marcus Antonius� depraved blood in her, which the others all suffer so much from. Her son Britannicus has of course some of it through Claudius to the extent �To the extent ...?� I repeated questioningly. �Well, Claudius had an illegitimate child before,� Aunt Laelia said reluctantly. �It�s not absolutely certain that Britannicus is really his son, when one knows everything that�s said about Messalina. It was said at the time that that marriage was arranged by Emperor Gaius just to save the girl�s reputation.� �Aunt Laelia,� I said solemnly. �From loyalty to the Emperor, I ought to denounce you for insults like that.� �As if Claudius would believe anything bad about his lovely child-wife;� snorted Aunt Laelia. But she looked around carefully all the same. Afterwards I asked Barbus whether he had really had such a prophetic dream just as he had wakened from his drunken sleep, and he maintained stubbornly that he had in fact seen what he had described, although it could have come from the wine and the surprise. �Wine makes you have such strange dreams in the heat of the summer,� he said, �that it�s quite frightening sometimes.� When I had been walking on crutches for a while, the cavalry doctor found me a good masseur who treated my legs and exercised my slack muscles so well that I could soon walk unaided. I have worn a thick-soled shoe on the injured foot ever since, so my limp is scarcely noticeable. I began to ride again, but soon noticed that only a very few young nobles chose to take part in the riding exercises. Most of them had no thought of a military career. For them it was sufficient if they could somehow remain in the saddle for next year�s parade. A restlessness and a desire for activity seized me in the heat of the summer. Once or twice I went to see Lucius Domitius, but in spite of everything he was much too childish company for me. He was busy writing poems and he read verses to me from his wax

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tablet and asked me to correct them. He modeled surprisingly will and fashioned animals and people out of clay. He was very pleased if you praised him but was easily hurt if you made critical remarks, although he tried to hide it. He seriously suggested that I should take lessons from his dancing master so that I could learn to move gracefully with pleasing gestures. The art of dancing is not much use to anyone who is going to learn to use a sword and spear and shield,� I said. Lucius said that he hated the sword fights at the amphitheater, which rough gladiators injured and killed each other. I�m not going to be a gladiator,� I said, offended. �A Roman knight has to learn the skills of war.� War is a bloody and unnecessary occupation,� he said. �Rome has given peace to the world. But I�ve heard that a relation of my late father, Gnaius Domitius Corbulo, is skirmishing in Germany on the other side of the Rhine to earn the right of a triumph. II you really want to, I can write to him and recommend you as a tribune. But he�s a hard taskmaster and will make you work hard if he is not posted away from there. I don�t think Uncle Claudius wants any of my father�s relations to become too famous.� I promised to think about the matter, but Barbus found out aware about Corbulo and maintained that he had been more distinguished as a road builder in Gaul than a warrior in the forests of Germany. Naturally I read the little book I had been given. The philosopher Seneca wrote in a fine modern style and asserted that a wise man could keep a balance of mind throughout the tests of fate, But I thought he was long-winded, for he gave no examples he just philosophized so that not many of his ideas stayed in my mind. My friend Lucius Pollio also lent me a letter of condolence Senaca had written to the Emperor�s freedman Polybius. In it, Seneca was consoling Polybius over the death of his brother, telling him he need not grieve as long as he had the good fortune to be allowed to serve the Emperor. What had amused readers in Rome was that Polybius had recently been executed after being found guilty of selling privileges. According to Polio, he had quarreled with Messalina over the division of the money. Messalina had denounced him which

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the rest of the Emperor�s freedmen had not liked at all. So the philosopher Seneca had struck bad luck again. I was surprised that Claudia had not tried to get in touch with me all through my illness. My self-esteem was hurt, but my good sense told me that I should have more trouble than joy from her. But I could not forget her black eyebrows, her bold eyes and her thick lips. When I was better, I began to go for long walks to strengthen my broken leg and to quell my restlessness. The warm Roman autumn had come. It was too warm to wear a toga and I did not wear my red-bordered tunic so as not to attract too much attention on the outskirts of the city. I walked over to the other side of the river to avoid the stench of the city center, past Emperor Gaius� amphitheater to which he had at immense expense had an obelisk brought all the way from Egypt, and then on up the Vatican hill. There was an ancient Etruscan oracle temple with wooden walls there which Emperor Claudius had had protected with a layer of tiles. The old soothsayer raised his stave to attract my attention, but did not bother to call after me. I walked down the far side of the hill, right out of the city toward the market gardens. Several prosperous-looking farms lay within sight. From here and from farther away, every night an endless stream of rattling bumping carts brought in the city�s vegetables which were then unloaded and sold to the dealers in the market halls before dawn, when they all had to leave the city. I felt no desire to inquire after Claudia from the sunburnt slaves who were working in the vegetable fields, but went on my way. I let my feet take me where they wished to go, but Claudia had said something about a spring and some old trees. So I looked around and my thoughts led me the right way as I followed a dried-up stream bed. Below some ancient trees stood a little hut, near a large farm. In the vegetable field beside it crouched Claudia, her hands and feet black with earth, wearing only a coarse shift and a wide pointed straw hat to keep off the sun. At first I scarcely recognized her. But I knew her so well, although several months had gone by since we had last met, that I recognized her by her hand movements and her way of bending down. �Greetings, Claudia,� I called. I was filled with exultant joy as I crouched down .on the ground in front of her and looked at her face under the brim of the straw hat.

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Claudia started and stared at me with her eyes widening in fright and her face flushing scarlet. Suddenly she flung a bunch of muddy pea stalks in my face, stood up and ran away behind the hut. I was flabbergasted by such a reception and swore to myself as I rubbed the earth out of my eyes. I followed her hesitantly and saw that she was splashing in some water and washing her face. She shouted angrily at me and told me to wait on the other side of the hut. Not until she had combed her hair and put on clean clothes would she come back. �A well-brought-up man gives notice when he is coming,� she snapped angrily, �but how can one expect such good manners from the son of a Syrian money-lender. What do you want?� She had insulted me. I flushed and turned away without a word. But when I had taken a few steps, she came after me and look my arm. �Are you really so touchy, Minutus?� she cried. �Don�t go. Forgive my hasty tongue. I was angry because you took me by surprise, ugly and dirty from work.� She took me into her modest little hut which smelled of smoke, herbs and clean linen clothes. You see, I too can spin and weave, as Romans of old should be able to,� she said. �Don�t forget that in the old days even the proudest Claudian steered his oxen behind the plow.� In this way she was trying to excuse her poverty. �I prefer you like this, Claudia,� I replied politely, �with your hue fresh from spring water, to all the painted silk-clad women of the city.� �Of course,� Claudia admitted honestly, �I�d rather my skin Were as white as milk and my face beautifully painted and my hair set in lovely curls on my forehead and my clothes revealing more than they concealed and myself smelling of the balsam of the East. But my uncle�s wife, Aunt Paulina Plautia, who has let me live here since my mother died, does not approve of such things. She is always dressed in mourning, prefers silence to speaking, and keeps away from her equals. She has more than enough money but she gives her income to charity and to even more doubtful purposes rather than allowing me to buy rouge and eye shadow. I could not help laughing, for Claudia�s face was so fresh and

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clean and healthy that she really had no need for cosmetics. wanted to take her hand, but she jerked it away and snapped that her hands had become as rough as a slave-girl�s during the summer. I asked if she had heard about my accident, but she replied evasively. �Your Aunt Laelia would never have let me in to see you,� she said. �Anyhow, I�ve become humble and realize that nothing but harm would come to you from knowing me. I wish you well, Minutus.� I replied roughly that I could make my own decisions about my own life and choose my own friends. �Anyhow, you�ll soon be rid of me,� I remarked. �I have promise of a letter of recommendation to go to war against the Germans under the famous Corbulo. My leg is better and only a fraction shorter than the other one.� Claudia quickly said she had not even noticed that I limped at all. Then she thought for a moment. �Actually you are safer in the field,� she said sadly, �than in Rome where some strange woman can take you away from me at any moment. I should grieve less if through some foolish ambition you lost your life in war, than if you fell in love with someone else. But why do you have to go and fight against the Germans? They are horribly large and powerful warriors. If I ask Aunt Paulina nicely, she�d certainly give you a letter of recommendation to my uncle, Aulus Plautius, in Britain. He commands four legions there and has been very successful Obviously the Britons are much weaker opponents than the Germans since Uncle Aulus is no military genius. Even Claudius managed to claim a triumph in Britain, so the Britons can�t be very fierce opponents.� I did not know this and I asked her eagerly for more details. Claudia explained that her mother was a Plautius. When Aulus Plautius� wife, Paulina, had taken her husband�s parentless niece under her wing. Aulus had good-naturedly regarded Claudia as a member of his family, especially as they had no children of their own. �Uncle Aulus did not like my mother, Urgulanilla, at all,� Claudia told me, �but in any case, Mother was also a Plautia and my uncle was very offended when Claudius, for indefensible

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reasons, divorced my mother and sent me naked to be laid on her threshold. In fact Uncle Aulus was prepared to adopt me but I am too proud for that. Legally I am and shall remain the daughter of Emperor Claudius, however repulsive his habits are.� To me her descent was a dull topic of conversation, but the thought of the war in Britain excited me. Your legal father Claudius by no means tamed the Britons, even if he did celebrate it as a triumph,� I said. �On the contrary, the war goes on there all the time. It is said that your Uncle Aulus can already claim over five thousand enemy dead from several years� fighting and that he thus has also earned a triumph. They are obstinate and treacherous people. As soon as there is peace in one part of the country, war breaks out again in another. Let�s go and find your Aunt Paulina at once,� You�re in a great hurry to gain military honors,� said Claudia teasingly. �But Aunt Paulina has forbidden me to go alone into the city and to spit on the Imperial statues. So I�d be glad to come with you, for I haven�t seen her for several weeks.� We walked back into the city together and I hurried home to change into more suitable clothes. Claudia did not want to come in for fear of Aunt Laelia, but waited at the gate and talked to Barbus. When we went on to the Plautia house on the Celius hill, Claudia�s eyes were glittering with rage. �So,� she cried, �you�ve been making friends with Agrippina and her cursed son, have you? That shameless old hag is a dangerous woman. Anyhow, she�s old enough to be your mother.� I protested in surprise that while Agrippina was certainly beautiful, she was reserved in her manner and her son was much too young and childish for me. �I know more than enough about those depraved Claudians,� mapped Claudia. �Agrippina sleeps with anyone if she thinks he might be useful. The Emperor�s treasurer, Pallas, has been her lover for a long time. She is trying to find a new husband, but in vain. The men who are noble enough are much too cautious to get involved in her intrigues, but anyone as inexperienced as you could be easily seduced by any immoral widowed matron of Rome, Bickering together, we walked through the city, but in fact Claudia was pleased when I told her that no one had seduced

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me yet and that I had remembered the promise I had made to her on the way home from the Moon temple the day I had received the man-toga. In the Plautius courtyard there was a long row of busts of ancestors, death masks and war souvenirs. Paulina Plautia proved to be an old woman with large eyes which seemed to be looking straight through me. One could see from her eyes that she had been weeping. When she heard my name and errand, she was surprised and brushed my cheek with her thin hand. �This is strange,� she said. �Like an unbelievable sign from the only Cod. Perhaps you don�t know, Minutus Manilianus, that your father and I became friends and exchanged a holy kiss when we had broken bread and drunk wine together at the love-feast. But something very evil has happened. Tullia had spies put on your father. When she had sufficient evidence she denounced me quite recently for having partaken in shameful Eastern mysteries.� I realized at once from where Claudia had acquired her knowledge of the heresies of the Jews. �By all the gods of Rome,� I cried in horror, �has my father really become involved in the conspiracies of the Christians as well? I thought he�d left all those fads behind in Antioch.� The old woman looked at me with strangely brilliant eyes. �Minutus,� she said. �It is not a fad but the only way to the truth and an eternal life. I�m not afraid to believe that the Jew and Nazarene Jesus was and is the son of God. He appeared to your father in Galilee and your father has more to tell about him than many a man here. He considers his marriage to the domineering Tullia to be God�s punishment for his sins. So he has said farewell to his former pride and received the holy Christian baptism, as I have. Neither of us is ashamed of it, even if there are not many rich or noble people among the Christians.� This fearful news left me speechless. Claudia noticed my expression and said, �I�m not baptized into their faith, but on the other side of the Tiber, in the Jewish part of the city, I�ve listened to their teachings. Their mysteries and holy meals absolve them from all their sins.� �Rowdies,� I said angrily, �eternal squabblers, troublemakers and rabble-rousers. I�ve seen it all in Antioch. The real Jews hate them worse than the plague.�