It made no difference in practice. And if she enjoyed the quiet company of the little steward, it was, she thought, one of her few pleasures in life.
He sat on a stool opposite her. He had just proposed to barter a -third of the year’s expected grain with another farmer for some cattle. It seemed to both of them a wise move.
“Are we right to hire these Germans?” she suddenly asked him.
He looked at her seriously.
“I think so.”
“My husband does not think so.”
Numincus looked awkward.
“The villa must be defended,” he said slowly. “So should you be,” he added, and then blushed.
She smiled. She knew that he loved her.
Then she sighed. The question was, how could she break it to Constantius without destroying his dignity?
As usual, Numincus had read her thoughts.
“Someone must take action.” He said it softly, but firmly. “It’s better to act than to argue.”
She nodded. She was glad of his support and it was comforting.
She smiled at him. Within the limits prescribed between mistress and servant, she tried to return to the strange little fellow some of the affection he so richly deserved.
Then they both turned, as they heard Petrus coming.
Constantius Porteus was at prayer.
Since the incident the day before, too ashamed to approach his wife and son, he had spent his time alone. He had drunk nothing, so for once his mind was clear.
And he had been busy: busy making the plans that he should have made long ago for defending the villa. That Petrus had gone to Venta he had no idea. He would begin, he had decided, by arming Numincus and some of the men.
The room in which he was kneeling was remarkable. It stood at the north eastern corner of the villa and was almost bare of furniture; but it did not appear empty because it seemed to be completely filled by a huge and remarkable mosaic on the floor. It was unlike any other mosaic in the house. On a background of solid green, and presented frontally, stood a single figure in a white robe; his arms were outstretched in the attitude of prayer the Romans called orante; his large, pale face was round and clean shaven; under black brows, as regular and heavy as the arches of a bridge, two huge eyes stared straight ahead, apparently fixed on some landscape beyond this world. In the figure’s raised hand was the Chi-Rho symbol: (??? check m/s symbol p.371)P; which signified that this staring man represented Christ. Where the Orpheus mosaic had been wistful and decorative, every line of this one was bold, striking and insistent.
Constantius prayed.
“Paternoster, qui es in coeli: Our Father, which art in heaven,” he murmured. “The emperor has turned his face from us, but surely you will not desert your servants.”
Besides the mosaic, there was another strange feature of the room. On the wall immediately opposite him, painted on the plaster in red, was a curious arrangement of five Latin words:
ROTAS
OPERA
TENET
AREPO
SATOR
By themselves the words had no particular significance, except that an observant reader might notice that they formed a palindrome, for they could be read the same way back to front. But to every Christian at that date they had a well known significance, dating back to the time before the Emperor Constantine in the last century when Christians had been persecuted for their faith. For the secret of the five words was that they could be arranged to read:
When this arrangement was completed, two letters remained unused: a and o, which stood for Alpha and Omega, the Greek biblical description of God. It was this ancient rubric that had for several generations served as a kind of altar before which the Christian family of Porteus had prayed.
He had been at prayer some time when he was suddenly aware that he was not alone. In the doorway stood his wife, Numincus and the boy. There was a red mark across Placidia’s face that made him blush. It was Petrus who spoke.
“The Germans are here. They’ve camped at the dune and I’ve hired them for a year.”
Constantius felt his face grow cold and pale. He stared at them, bemused. And then he found that he was trembling.
Petrus was gazing at him steadily.
His anger rose. It was an outrage: the blinding fury of the day before was mild compared to what he now felt. But today he was sober.
He got up slowly. The disrespect, the contempt of the action cut him to the quick. He saw that they were all watching him: the boy’s eyes were cold; Placidia looked concerned. With a huge effort of self-control, he stood before them and spoke evenly.
“You disobeyed my wishes.” His voice shook a little, but it was very quiet.
“It was necessary, Constantius.” It was Placidia who replied – gently, almost pleading. He ignored her and kept his eyes on the boy.
“You disobeyed.”
“No, Constantius.” Placidia began. “I told him to bring them. I urge you to reconsider.”
Had she really, or was she just defending the boy?
“And how will you pay your mercenaries?” he demanded coldly.
“With gold solidi,” the boy answered simply. “Numincus will see they are fed. We have plenty of grain.”
Constantius’s eyebrows rose.
“What gold solidi?”
“Mine.” Placidia.
He started. Truly, it was like a knife stabbing him. His voice became a little husky, but still he kept his control.
“Since you and your mother wish to pay these mercenaries against my wishes,” he went on, “do you also intend to let them camp on my land?”
There was no answer.
“I can send them away,” he continued.
Now his son shrugged.
“You’ll find them difficult to dislodge. They’re armed.”
The insolence of the boy! Still Constantius held on to his control.
“Numincus,” he said quietly, “you will collect twenty men and bring them here. Then we will go to the dune, pay off the Germans and tell them to leave. Go now.”
He paused, waiting for something to happen. But Numincus only bowed his round, balding head and stared at the floor. He did not move.
The silence continued.
Then Constantius realised that he was going to cry.
The humiliation was complete. There, in the family chapel, they had left him nothing, not even the last shred of his dignity. He looked at his wife: surely she would not do this to him? He found that he could not see properly because his own eyes were clouding over. With a desperate gesture he waved them away, and saw them turn.
Constantius waited as he heard their departing footsteps echoing in the empty rooms; he waited until they had died away into silence. Then, when he was sure he was alone, he finally sank to his knees on the floor and gave in to the sobs that shook his body. He doubled up. His head touched the cool mosaic floor, as the tears fell.
But even as he wept, a thought formed itself in his mind, a warning that he must give the family even though they had decided to despise him. It was a perceptive thought that saw clearly into Sarum’s future. For if the Germans could not be dislodged by him, would Petrus and Placidia be able to control them either?
It was midnight and there was a full moon. On the hill, the silent dune was bathed in light.
Petrus had already passed the dune, however, and was walking with determined steps through the woods below. A light frost encrusted the fallen leaves that covered the ground.
He could feel his heart beating with excitement.
The clearing lay in the curve of the river, twenty yards from the water; it was a small space, less than thirty feet across, and at first glance there seemed to be nothing unusual about it.
But as Petrus reached it, a curious activity was taking place. Two men were pulling up long planks from the ground and as he watched the surface of leaves began to disappear, revealing in the centre of the clearing a circular pit. It was about eight
feet across and covered with a heavy grid of wooden beams over which the planks had been laid and then concealed with leaves. At one side of the pit a wooden ladder descended into it. The pit was twelve feet deep.
As the last plank was removed, the stooped form of Tarquinus the cowherd emerged from the shadows. By his side walked demurely a young girl of sixteen. She had a pale face, narrow like the cowherd’s, but not without beauty; on her feet she wore only sandals, and she was wrapped in a heavy cape made of furs. She was his niece. All three bowed to each other solemnly. The girl was to go through the important rite of initiation at the same time as Petrus.
At a nod from Tarquinus, both Petrus and the girl took off their sandals and stripped naked, the girl with a single delicate gesture slipping out of the heavy furs that had been her only covering. She did not seem in the least self-conscious; her slim, hard body seemed almost ghostly in the moonlight; but Petrus noticed that, despite herself, she shivered slightly in the cold night air as they stood side by side in front of Tarquinus. Then at a nod from him, they knelt.
Without speaking, Tarquinus now carefully unwrapped a small bundle he had been carrying and held it out towards Petrus. It was the little stone figure from the shrine, the goddess Sulis who was the guardian of the place where the five rivers met. Petrus reverently kissed it.
“Sulis, be my friend,” he whispered.
For in the act which he was about to perform, it was important that the local goddess should act as a messenger and intermediary, pleading his case before the unknowable gods who ruled the heavens and who could not be approached directly by man.
The girl also did the same.
Then, at a further signal from Tarquinus, the two young people went to the ladder and began to descend into the pit, Petrus going first. When they were both down, they knelt again.
“May the gods accept their servant and make me pure.” Petrus prayed aloud.
Meanwhile, Tarquinus and his two assistants had vanished. For long minutes, Petrus and the girl waited silently in the pit. And then they heard heavy footfalls above.
From the trees Tarquinus and his men had reappeared. They were leading a large, black bull.
The bull lumbered forward slowly. It was Tarquinus’s magic that he could, by speaking to it softly, control the huge animal and keep it docile; but when its hoofs touched the wooden grid over the pit it halted, unwilling to go on. Still Tarquinus muttered in its ear, his skilful hands coaxed it, and finally the bull lumbered forward, its heavy tread echoing in the pit below. Petrus and the girl looked up at the huge black shadow: they could see the hairs on its long belly and feel its warm breath as it snorted impatiently.
Now came the critical moment. From his belt Tarquinus gently drew a long narrow sword. Still whispering to calm the bull, he stepped back, and then, with a single movement, so smooth that it was hard to believe anything had happened, he drove the sword straight down to the bull’s heart.
For a moment the huge animal stood transfixed, not knowing what had happened; then suddenly its hoofs slipped across the wooden grid with a clatter, and its heavy body crashed.
It was now that the stout wooden grid served its purpose. As Tarquinus moved about, hissing between his teeth, he made small slits in the animal’s carcass so that the blood flowed, not too much at a time but in a steady stream through the grid and into the pit below. Gazing up at the black form outlined against the moonlit sky, Petrus and the girl shifted their position so that the warm dark stream of blood fell on their naked bodies. And all the time Petrus, lost in concentration, murmured half aloud: “May the gods make me pure.”
For this was the sacred rite of the taurobolium, an important ceremony of purification that was practised all over the pagan empire. Men and women who had gone through the rite in the pit knew that by doing so they had been purified and drawn closer to the gods, and they often recorded the fact on their tombstones with the word tauroboliatus or tauroboliata.
For more than an hour, Tarquinus continued his work, cleverly opening new cuts in the bull’s body until he had satisfied himself that all the animal’s blood had dripped into the pit. The two young people below moved about on the earthen floor, now slippery with blood, placing themselves under each new jet. Finally, when it was over, Tarquinus called quietly to them to come up; once again, while the blood dried on their bodies, they knelt before him while he recited prayers and his two assistants carefully dissected the heavy carcass on the grid and carried it away.
At last he motioned them to rise and dress again; when they had done so, all three bowed gravely, and Tarquinus led his niece away.
As she left, the girl turned back and stared at Petrus’s body with a look of secret greed; but Petrus did not notice. Conscious only of the great and mystical event that had taken place, and of the wonderful fact that from this day onwards he was purified and closer to the gods, he turned away and started back towards the northern valley.
In the Orpheus room, Constantius Porteus had been drinking ever since dusk; it was now the early hours of the morning, but surprisingly he was neither tired nor drunk. He was brooding on the events of the day.
Suddenly he saw the form of his son quietly crossing the open doorway on his way to the courtyard. He started violently and rubbed his eyes. The boy was covered in blood.
For a moment even his anger was forgotten. What could have happened? Had the German mercenaries attacked him? Stumbling up, he moved with surprising speed out of the room and caught Petrus before he disappeared.
“My dear son,” he cried, “are you hurt?”
Petrus turned. To his father’s astonishment he wore on his face a look of calm serenity that he had never seen before. He smiled at his father. His eyes, instead of being filled with their customary hostility, were kindly. He cheerfully dropped his bombshell.
“Not hurt, father, purified.”
Constantius’s mouth dropped open. What could the boy mean?
“I am tauroboliatus, father. I am returning Sarum to the ancient gods.”
Before Constantius could say a word, he was gone.
For several minutes he stood there, stupefied. His son not only disobedient but a pagan? He wondered if it was a dream, pinched himself, but knew that it was not.
A few minutes later he burst into his wife’s room.
Placidia was not asleep when he came in, and as she looked up she could see by the lamplight that Constantius was very pale, through apparently sober.
He stood in the doorway; it had long been an unspoken rule that he did not enter her bedroom; though after the events of the day, she had nearly, out of simple compassion, invited him in; now, as he stood there, he looked so woebegone that she motioned him to enter.
“What is the matter, Constantius?” she asked quietly.
He made a gesture of desperation and told her briefly about Petrus.
“The taurobolium!” he concluded dismally. “A monstrous heathen rite.” He wiped his hand across his eyes. “Did you know that our son was a secret pagan?”
She considered. “I did not know.”
He stared at her.
“Did you suspect?”
“Perhaps.”
He shook his head in disbelief.
“And you said nothing?”
She sat up slowly, pulled a cushion behind her and lay back, allowing her hands to fall palm upward beside her.
“I only suspected. Something about him – secretive. And he is close to Tarquinus, you know.”
“I should have sent that cowherd away,” Constantius moaned.
His wife’s calmness about this terrible business baffled him. As he continued speaking, it was almost to himself.
“This is a Christian house. First heathen Germans, now this.” He looked miserably at Placidia. “What are we to do?”
Poor man. At times, even now, she still loved him; if only he could be wise.
As for Petrus, she did not take this latest enthusiasm very seriously.
“We shou
ld do nothing. Petrus is impulsive, but he has a good heart. We must just be patient.”
Perhaps, since the boy was almost all she had, she was too indulgent towards him. But she was far too sensible a woman to be blind to his faults; she knew very well that it was only her balance and good sense, and the hard work of Numincus the steward, that held the household and the estate together. Petrus with his obsessive enthusiasms was very like his father, and her secret fear was that if he failed to achieve anything and did not find a good wife to steady him, he would degenerate just as Constantius had done, despite her own unsuccessful efforts to strengthen him.
But none of these thoughts was apparent to Constantius. Although he had come to her instinctively for guidance, her calmness was beginning to irritate him.
“You seem unconcerned,” he said bitterly. “Perhaps you approve.”
“You know very well that I do not. I am a Christian.”
In truth, she supposed that with her stern and practical attitude to life, touched, she knew, with more than a tinge of resignation, she was nearer to being a stoic than a true Christian. But she was content to be a Christian in name and had little use for heathen magic and the pagan gods.
None of this satisfied poor Constantius.
“You seem to me to condone the boy,” he said angrily.
“We must be wise, Constantius. He is headstrong. There are many pagans in Sarum – you know that. Why even Numincus . . .”
At the mention of the steward’s name Constantius stiffened. Only that afternoon, Numincus had disobeyed his orders; he knew very well that, because of his neglect, it was the steward who ran the estate and he was jealous of the hardworking, solemn little fellow who was always, it seemed to him, closeted with his wife.
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