The Venus Throw - Roman Sub Rosa 04

by Steven Saylor

  Meto's age exactly; no wonder the fellow looked to me like a child playing soldier. I studied his face, searching for some sign of the horrors he must have beheld already in his young life, and saw only the bland innocence of youth framed by a soldier's helmet.

  His stern expression abruptly softened. He looked puzzled. I realized he was staring beyond me at someone in the doorway.

  As I swung about I heard Belbo bluster, "Master, another guest— I told him to wait in the foyer, but he's followed me anyway—"

  At first I hardly saw the visitor, blocked as he was by Belbo's bulk. Then he slipped into view, and what he lacked in stature was more than made up for by the gaudy splendor of his garb. He was covered from the neck down in a gown of vibrant red and yellow. Silver bracelets dangled from his wrists, a silver pectoral with glass beads hung from his neck, and his ears and fingers sported silver rings. His cheeks were painted white. On his head was a multicolored turban, from which his bleached hair hung down in wavy tresses. The last time I had seen him he had been dressed in a toga, not in the vestments of a priest of Cybele.

  "Trygonion," I said.

  He smiled. "You remember me, then?"

  "I do. It's all right," I said to Belbo, who continued to hover uncertainly, ready to interpose himself between the gallus and myself. Belbo could easily have lifted the little priest over his head and could probably have snapped him in two, but he kept his distance, afraid to lay his hands on a holy eunuch. Trygonion had slipped into my study without missing a step, while a man three times his size blustered for him to stay back.

  Belbo gave the gallus a disgruntled look and withdrew. Behind me I heard the clearing of a throat and turned to see the soldier slipping my letter into a leather pouch. "I'm off, then," he said, nodding to me and then looking at the eunuch with a mixture of curiosity and distaste.

  "May Mercury guide you," I said.

  "And may the purifying blood of the Great Goddess spring from between her legs and wash over you!" added Trygonion. He pressed his palms together, making his bracelets jingle, and bowed his head. The soldier wrinkled his brow and hastily moved to depart, uncertain whether he had just been blessed or cursed. As he moved to slip out the narrow doorway, he turned sideways to avoid touching the eunuch, but Trygonion deliberately shifted his stance so that their shoulders brushed, and I saw the soldier shudder. The contrast was striking, between the stern, virile young Roman in his military garb and the diminutive, grinning, foreign-born gallus in his priestly gown. How odd, I thought, that the larger, stronger one, trained to kill and defend himself, should be the one to shiver in fear.

  Trygonion seemed to be thinking the same thing, for as the soldier stomped down the hallway the eunuch looked after him and made a trilling laugh. But as he turned back to me his smile quickly faded.

  "Gordianus," he said softly, bowing his head in greeting. "I am again honored to be admitted into your home."

  "It would seem I had little choice over whether to admit you or not, considering how giants give way before you and soldiers flee in panic."

  He laughed, but not in the trilling way he had used to mock the soldier. It was a throaty chuckle, such as men exchange over a witticism in the Forum. The gallus seemed able to change his persona at will, from feminine to masculine, never seeming wholly one or the other but something which was neither.

  "I've been sent to fetch you."

  "Oh?"

  "Yes, imagine that — a priest of Cybele, dispatched like a messenger boy." He cocked an eyebrow. "Dispatched by whom?" "By a certain lady." "Does she have a name?"

  "Of course she does—many names, though I'd advise you to avoid the more scandalous ones and call her by the name her father gave her, unless you wish to have your face slapped. That is, until you get to know her better."

  "What name is that?"

  "She lives here on the Palatine, only a few steps away." He gestured toward the door with an ingratiating smile.

  "Still, before I go off to see her, I think I should like to know her name and what business she might have with me."

  "Her business involves a certain mutual acquaintance. Two mutual acquaintances, actually. One living; one . . . dead." He looked coy, then somber. Neither expression seemed quite genuine, as if he had exchanged one mask for another. "Two mutual acquaintances," he repeated. "One, a murderer—the other, the murderer's victim. One who even now moves through the Forum, laughing with his friends and flinging obscenities at his enemies, while the other moves through Hades, a shadow among shadows. Perhaps he will meet Aristotle there and debate him face to face, and the dead can decide which of them knew more about living." "Dio," I whispered.

  "Yes, I speak of Dio—and Dio's killer. That's the business I've come about."

  "Whose business?"

  "The business of my lady. She has made it her business." "Who is she?" I said, growing impatient.

  "Come and see. She longs to meet you." He raised an eyebrow and leered like a pimp procuring for a whore.

  "Tell me her name," I said slowly, trying to keep my temper.

  Trygonion sighed and rolled his eyes. "Oh, very well. Her name is Clodia." He paused, saw the expression on my face, and laughed. "Ah, I see that you've already heard of her!"

  Chapter Nine

  Onour way out, we passed Bethesda and Diana in the hallway.

  "Where are you going?" Bethesda cast a chilly glance of recognition at Trygonion, crossed her arms and gave me the Medusa look. How could such a woman ever have been anyone's slave, least of all mine? Diana stood alongside and slightly behind her mother. She too drew back her shoulders and crossed her arms, affecting the same imperious gaze.

  "Out," I said. Bethesda's arms remained crossed; the answer did not suffice.

  "The gallus may have some work for me," I added.

  She stared at the little priest so intently that I would hardly have been surprised to see him turn to stone. Instead, he smiled at her. The two of them seemed impervious to each other. Trygonion was not intimidated; Bethesda was not charmed. "You'd better take Belbo with you" was all she had to say before uncrossing her arms and proceeding down the hallway. Diana followed, mimicking her mother's movements with uncanny precision—until I swung around and tickled her under her arms. She let out a scream of laughter and ran forward, stumbling into Bethesda. They both turned and looked back at me, Diana laughing, Bethesda with one eyebrow raised and the merest hint of a smile on her lips.

  "Take Belbo!" she repeated before turning her back and walking on. Now I understand, I thought: she remembers Trygonion from his visit with Dio, she knows about Dio's murder, and now, seeing me leave with Trygonion, she fears for me. How touching!

  The three of us—the gallus, Belbo and myself—stepped out into the bright afternoon sunshine. The warmth in my study had seemed mild and the air sweet, like early springtime; here in the street, the sun had heated the paving stones and the air was hot. Trygonion produced a tiny yellow parasol from the folds of his robe, opened it up and held it aloft.

  "Perhaps I should have brought my broad-brimmed hat," I said, squinting up at the cloudless sky.

  "It's only a short walk," said the gallus. "Straight ahead for a block or two, then off to the right."

  We walked up the street and passed the apartment building where Marcus Caelius lived. The shutters of all the upper-story windows were closed, despite the heat. Could he be sleeping, at this time of day? What a life!

  The building was owned by the rabble-rouser Publius Clodius; now I was on the way to see his sister. What a small town Rome is, I thought, and growing smaller with each passing year. I had never met either of the notorious Clodii. They were distant cousins of my old patron Lucius Claudius, but our paths had never crossed. That had suited me. In recent years I've grown increasingly selective both of those I choose to help and of those I choose to offend. From what one heard about them, Clodia and Clodius were the sort it was best simply to avoid.

  An obscure citizen lamenting the theft of
his family's silver; an old acquaintance threatened by anonymous letters; a young wife unfairly accused of adultery by her vindictive mother-in-law—in my semiretirement, these struck me as the sort of people to whom I should lend my expertise. Men who deal in raw power, who control vast networks of secret operatives, who dispatch strong-armers to crush their opponents— the Pompeys and King Ptolemies of this world—these struck me as men I should take extreme care to avoid offending, even if it meant passing up the chance to help an old friend; even though it had meant turning my back on Dio of Alexandria.

  Now I found myself on the way to the house of Clodia, supposedly to discuss some matter relating to the murder of Dio, following a priest of Cybele carrying a bright yellow parasol through the sunny streets of the Palatine. The gods delight in surprising men with the unexpected— and are notorious for the cruelty of their mirth.

  Clodia's house was situated at the end of a little cul-de-sac off a quiet lane. Like the houses belonging to most patrician families, it looked old and showed an unassuming face to the street.

  The windowless front was stained with a muted yellow wash. The doorstep was paved with glazed red and black tiles. Twin cypress trees framed the rustic oak door. The trees soared to a great height; I had often noticed them from the balcony at the back of my house, but had never known exactly where they were located. Like the house, the cypresses had obviously been there for many years.

  The slave who answered the door was a burly young man with a neatly trimmed black beard and bushy eyebrows that grew together above soulful brown eyes. He opened the door only halfway and smirked when he saw Trygonion. He hardly looked at me or Belbo. "She's gone out," he said, crossing his arms and slouching against the door frame.

  "Gone out?" said the gallus. "But I only just left her, to go fetch this fellow."

  The doorkeeper shrugged. "What can I tell you? You know how she

  is."

  "But she knew I was coming straight back," said Trygonion in a petulant voice. "Where has she gone?"

  "Down to the river." "What, to the markets?"

  The slave narrowed his eyes.

  "Of course not. You know she never goes to the public markets anymore. Afraid Milo's men will be there to start up the chants about her. Pretends she doesn't care, but you know how she hates that." The slave arched his right eyebrow, which created a striking effect, since his eyebrows were joined.

  "She's gone down to her place on the Tiber. Said it was the only spot to be on a beautiful day like this. 'Everyone will be at the river,' she said. Looking to catch an eyeful, I imagine—the swimmers."

  A sudden twitch at the corner of his mouth turned into a smile, as a hand belonging to someone hidden behind the door slipped across the gap and made its way onto the slave's backside. The visible patch of wrist moved in a sinuous fashion, like a wriggling snake. The young doorkeeper gave a ticklish start and flexed his muscular forearms. "She should have taken me with her," he sighed, "but I'm managing to stay busy."

  "Did she leave any word for me?" asked Trygonion, exasperated. "She must have!"

  From just beyond the door I heard a woman's laugh, then a smiling face appeared, pressed cheek to cheek with the burly doorkeeper. "Don't worry, she didn't forget you," the woman trilled. Her voice had a cultured accent and her chestnut hair was extravagantly put up, though a few stray tendrils had escaped the pins and combs. The lines around her eyes and mouth had been skillfully softened with makeup, but I could see she was no longer young. "Barnabas is teasing you! Aren't you, Barnabas? Wicked!" She playfully bit the slave's ear.

  Barnabas laughed brusquely and jerked away, freeing his ear from the woman's gleaming white teeth and his buttocks from her grip. "Off with you, then!" she said, laughing and snapping her fingers. "Go on! I'll tend to you later." She growled deep in her throat and clicked her teeth. The door slave departed.

  "It's a Hebrew name, you know," she said, turning back to us. "Barnabas, I mean. Clodia says it means 'consolation.' She should know!" The woman laughed, and I caught the smell of wine on her breath.

  "What did Clodia say about me?" demanded the gallus.

  "About you, Trygonion? Hmm, well, we all know where your name comes from, don't we?" She looked at him knowingly.

  "Never mind!" snapped the gallus. "What did she say before she

  left?"

  The woman's expression soured, undoing the illusion of her makeup. "Oh, all right, then. She said she simply couldn't stay indoors for another instant, and she's been dying to get down to her place on the river for days, so she told Chrysis to call for her litter bearers and pack up a few things and off they went in a cloud of dust. She asked me to come along, but I told her I was too, too despondent and in great need of consolation. Ha!" She barked out a laugh, showing perfect white teeth. "So, since I was staying, Clodia asked me to please give you a message if you should happen to come around, to tell you that you and your" — she looked at Belbo and me blearily, as if noticing us for the first time — "your friends, or whatever, should trot down to the river and meet her there. Is that clear enough?"

  "Yes, thank you," said Trygonion curtly. He turned around and hurriedly strode away, taking the longest steps his short legs would allow.

  "Cut off their balls and see what pests they turn into," the woman muttered between clenched teeth. She shrugged and slammed the door.

  "Horrible woman!" Trygonion said as Belbo and I caught up with

  him.

  "Slow down," I complained. "Who is she?"

  "Just a neighbor. Nobody. A cousin or something. I don't have money for a litter, do you? I suppose we can walk."

  Which we did. As we made our way down the western slope of the Palatine, through the cattle markets, across the bridge and up the west bank of the Tiber, at several points I considered telling Trygonion that I had changed my mind and was turning back. What was I doing, after all, coming at the summons of a woman I had happily avoided until now, to discuss a matter from which I had deliberately distanced myself? Blame it on Cybele, I thought, as I followed her priest, his parasol held resolutely aloft.

  It is a sign of wealth and good taste to own a green patch on the banks of the Tiber. Such estates are something of a cross between a park and a garden; the owners call such grounds horti. There is usually a structure of some sort—sometimes no more than a rustic retreat with quarters for the groundskeeper and a few guests, sometimes a whole complex of buildings. The grounds themselves are often a mix of wilderness and cultivation, depending on the size of the property, the owner's proclivities and the gardener's skill; patches of tall grass and woodland may be interspersed with rose gardens, fishponds, fountains, and stone-paved walkways adorned with statuary.

  Clodia's horti were unusually close in. A hundred years ago, the property must have been well out in the countryside, but the city had greatly expanded since then. It was an enviable location for a piece of riverfront property and must have been in her family for generations.

  The impression of great age was reinforced by the grounds them-selves, which on such a warm, windless day had the feeling of a place where time stopped long ago. The immediate approach was a long, narrow lane bordered by sprawling berry bushes which met overhead, shading the way. This tunnellike path opened onto a broad field of grass kept closely mown by a pair of goats which bleated at our approach. Facing the meadow and perpendicular to the river, which was almost entirely obscured by an intervening stand of dense trees, was a long narrow house with a red-tiled roof and a portico running along the whole front. The open meadow was as private as any walled garden in the city, for the view on all sides was shielded by tall cypress trees and majestic yews.

  "She won't be in the house, but I suppose we can take a look all the same," said Trygonion.

  We crossed the meadow and stepped under the shade of the portico. Trygonion rapped on the nearest door, then pushed it open and stepped over the threshold, beckoning to Belbo and me. Each room of the long house opened onto the next, and every
room had its own door onto the long portico, so that one could walk from end to end of the house either along the shaded outdoor walkway or through each room in succession.

  I could tell at once that the house was empty. It had the feeling of a place left unoccupied all winter, which had not yet been brought back to life. The air was still and cool inside, the walls and the sparse furnishings exhaled a slightly musty, odor, and every surface had a thin coating of dust.

  We followed Trygonion slowly from room to room as he called

  Clodia's name. In some of the rooms, dropcloths covered every object. In other rooms the cloths had been pulled away, apparently quite recently, for they still lay carelessly crumpled on the floor. Having acquired a furnished house on the Palatine, I know a few things about furniture. The pieces I saw in Clodia's house on the Tiber were of the sort which fetch astonishing prices at auction nowadays, especially among our burgeoning empire's new rich who have no such treasures in their obscure families—sleeping couches saved from the flames of Carthage, their plush cushions so faded that the exotic patterns can barely be made out; gilded cabinets and trunks with massive iron hinges of a sort no longer made; ancient folding chairs that the Scipios or the Gracchi brothers might have sat on.

  There were paintings as well, in every room, and not theatrical wall paintings such as are fashionable among the wealthy nowadays, but portraits and historical scenes painted in encaustic on wood and mounted in elaborate frames. These were darkened by age, their smooth surfaces covered by a skein of very fine cracks. Collectors set great store by these qualities, which time alone creates and which cannot be mimicked by human artists. There were also tiny sculptures mounted here and there on pedestals, none of them taller than a man's forearm, in keeping with the small scale of the rooms, and all of rustic subjects to match the rustic mood of the place—little statues of Pan and Silenus, of a slave boy pulling a thorn from his foot, of a wood nymph kneeling on a rock.

  We came to the end of the house and stepped back onto the covered portico. Trygonion peered toward the woods on the opposite side of the meadow, where I could see nothing. "No, she wouldn't be over at the kitchens or the slave quarters or the stable," he said. "She's down by the water, of course." We set out across the meadow again, toward the grove of trees along the river. In their shade, we came upon a statue of Venus— not a small, decorative object like those in the house, but a magnificent, towering bronze upon a marble pedestal. The goddess looked out on the water with an expression of almost smug contentment on her face, as if the river flowed merely to give music to her ears, and the city on its further bank had been erected for no other purpose than to amuse her.