'He won't come.'
'Does it matter? If he refuses, he looks guilty and you're cleared. By virtue of his non-co-operation, I can oppose any charges against you. Marponius would have to go along with it. So what are your plans, reprieved suspect?'
'I'm going out with my damned father for an educational talk on art.'
'Enjoy yourself,' smiled Petronius.
Relations between us had improved drastically. If I had known it would be so easy to retrieve our long-standing friendship. I would have invented a name for a suspect days ago and given him someone else to chase around after.
'To save you having to tail me,' I replied with my customary courtesy, 'I'm picking up Pa from the Saepta now, then spending the rest of the morning at some big house in the Seventh Sector, after which-if my parent sticks to his usual rigid habits-we'll be returning to the Saepta prompt at noon so he can devour whatever the redhead has stuffed into his lunch-satchel.'
'This is all very filial! When did you ever spend so much time in the company of Geminus?'
I grinned reluctantly. 'Since he decided he needed protection-and stupidly hired me.'
'Such a pleasure,' chuckled Petronius, 'to see the Didius family sticking together at last!'
I told him what I thought of him, without rancour, then I left.
XLII
Aulus Cassius Carus and his wife Ummidia Servia lived in a house whose exterior unobtrusiveness told its own tale of wealth. It was one of the few big houses built by individuals after the great fire in Nero's time; it had then managed to escape both looters and arsonists during the civil war following Nero's death. This house had been commissioned by people who flourished in hard times, and who had somehow avoided offending a half-mad emperor whose favourite subjects for execution had been anybody else who dared to proclaim artistic good taste.
Carus and Servia proved an unlikely moral: it was possible to be both Roman and discreet.
In a city where so many thousands were crammed into high-rising tenements, it always surprised me how many other folk managed to acquire large plots of land and live there in stately private homes, often virtually unknown to the general public. These two not only managed it, but did so in the classic Roman style, with blank walls apparently guarding them, yet an atmosphere of making their home available formally to anyone who produced a legitimate reason for entering. After a few words with their porter, Father and I established our business, and what had appeared from the outside to be a very private house opened all its public rooms to us.
A slave went off carrying our request for an audience. While we waited for a reaction we were left free to wander.
I had assumed my toga, but was otherwise my happy self.
'You might have combed your hair!' whispered Geminus. He eyed the toga; that had belonged to Festus, so it passed muster.
'I only comb my hair for the Emperor, or women who are very beautiful.'
'Dear gods, what have I brought up?'
'You didn't! But I'm a good boy, who won't ingratiate himself with thugs who kick his ancient pa in the ribs!'
'Don't cause trouble, or we'll get nowhere.'
'I know how to behave!' I sneered, subtly implying I might not draw upon the knowledge.
'No one,' decreed Didius Geminus, 'who wears a coloured tunic with his toga knows how to behave!'
So much for my indigo number.
We had passed a senatorial statue, presumably not ancestral, since our hosts were only middle rank. Also in the atrium were a couple of loyal portrait heads of the Claudian emperors, their clean-cut boyish looks at odds with the gruff and rugged features of Vespasian who ruled Rome today. The first general collection was out of doors in a peristyle garden just beyond the atrium. In March the effect was bare horticulturally, though the art showed up well. There were various columnar herms, among a rather twee gathering of hounds and hinds, winged cupids, dolphins, Pan among the reeds, and so forth. They had the inevitable Priapus (fully formed, unlike the vandalised creature at Father's warehouse), plus a gross Silenus sprawled on his back while a fountain trickled uncertainly from his wineskin. These were ordinary pieces. As a plant lover, I took more interest in the Eastern crocuses and hyacinths that were enlivening the garden.
My father, who had been here before, led me with a firm step to the art gallery. At this point I began to feel shafts of envy.
We had passed through several quiet, well-swept rooms with neutral decor. They contained a spare quantity of extremely good furniture, with one or two small but superb bronzes displayed on plinths. The entrance to the gallery was guarded by not one, but a pair of gigantic sea creatures, each bearing nereids on their threshing coils, amid fulsome waves.
We crept between the sea-nymphs and in through a majestic portal set. The alabaster door-case stood as high as my rooms at home, with huge double doors in some exotic wood studded with bronze. They were folded back, probably permanently since pushing them closed would take about ten slaves.
Inside, we were dumbstruck by a twice life-size Dying Gaul in glorious veined red porphyry. Every home should have one-and a stepladder for dusting him.
Then followed their set of Famous Greeks. Rather predictable, but these people had crisp priorities in throwing together a set of heads: Homer, Euripides, Sophocles, Demosthenes, a handsome bearded Pericles, and Solon the Law Giver. Crowding afterwards came some anonymous dancing maidens then a full-length Alexander, looking nobly sad but with a good mane of hair that should have cheered him up. These collectors preferred marble, but allowed in one or two excellent bronzes: there were Spear Carriers and Lance Bearers; Athletes, Wrestlers and Charioteers. Back with the classic Parian stone we came on a winged and sombre Eros, plainly in trouble with some mistress who had stamped her foot at him, facing a pale, even more remote Dionysus contemplating the eternal grape. The god of wine looked youthful and beautiful, but from his expression he had already realised his liver would be for it if he carried on that way.
Next came a wild jumble of delights. Plenty and Fortune; Victory and Virtue. A Minotaur on a pedestal; a caseful of miniatures. There were graceful Graces, and musing Muses; there was a colossal group of Maenads, having a ripping time with King Pentheus. There was what even I immediately recognised as a more than decent replica of one of the Charyatids from the Erechtheion at Athens. Had there been room, they would probably have imported the whole Parthenon.
The Olympian gods, as befitted their status, were lording it in a well-lit hall to themselves. Enthroned there were Jupiter, Juno and Minerva, that good old Roman triad, plus a formidable Athene, partly in ivory, with a pool to keep her humid. There was, I noted bleakly, no lord of the oceans-unless (faint hope) he was away in a workshop being cleaned.
All these pieces were astounding. We had no time to scrutinise how many were original, but any copies were so good they must be desirable in their own right.
I can only summon up a certain amount of reverence before an uncontrollable need to lighten the atmosphere sets in: 'As Ma would say, I'm glad someone else has to sponge this lot down every morning!'
'Hush! Show some refinement!' This was one of my many quarrels with Pa. Politically, he was perfectly shrewd, and as cynical as me. Move on to culture, and he became a real snob. After selling antiques to idiots for forty years, he should have been more discerning about owners of art.
We were about to leave the Hall of the Gods when the owners thought it time to appear. They must have reasoned we would be gasping with admiration by now. On principle I tried to look too ethereal to have placed a value on the goods; no one was fooled. One of the reasons for letting folk walk around was so they could reel at the stupendous cost of what they had just seen.
The pair came in together. I already knew from Father that I was about to meet a couple where his taste and her money had made a long, successful bond. He was to speak the most, but her presence remained a force throughout. They were a firmly welded pair, welded by an inexorable interest in grabbing things. W
e had come to a house where the need to possess hung in the air as strong as a sickness.
Cassius Carus was a thin, mournful streak with dark curly hair. About forty-five, he had hollow cheeks, and pouched, heavy-lidded eyes. He had apparently forgotten to shave lately-too enraptured with his monumental nudes, no doubt. Ummidia Servia was perhaps ten years younger, a round, pallid woman who looked as if she could be irritable. Maybe she was tired of kissing stubble.
They both wore white, in lavishly formal folds. The man had a couple of gross signet-rings, the woman gold filigree about her, but they did not trouble much with jewellery. Their uncomfortably dignified dress was to set them up as fitting custodians of their art. Personal adornment did not come into it.
They knew Father. 'This is my son,' he said, producing a chill for a second while they worked out that I was not the fabulous Festus.
Each gave me an upsettingly limp hand.
'We've been admiring the collection.' My father liked to slaver.
'What do you think?' Carus asked me, probably sensing more reserve. He was like a cat that jumps straight on the lap of the only visitor who sneezes at fur.
In my role as the auctioneer's respectful son I said, 'I have never seen better quality.'
'You will admire our Aphrodite.' His slow, light, slightly pedantic voice made this virtually an instruction. Carus led the way for us to view the wonder, which they kept until last in the collection, in a separate courtyard garden. 'We had the water put in specially.'
Another Aphrodite. First the painter's special, now an even more suggestive little madam. I was becoming a connoisseur.
The Carus model was a Hellenistic marble whose sensuality stopped the breath. This goddess was too nearly indecent to be displayed in a temple. She stood in the middle of a circular pool, half undressed, turning to gaze back over one lithe shoulder as she admired the reflection of her own superlative rear. Light from the still water suffused her, setting up a gorgeous contrast between her nakedness and the rigid pleating of the chiton she had half removed.
'Very nice,' said my father. The Aphrodite looked even more satisfied.
Carus consulted me.
'Sheer beauty. Isn't she a copy of that very striking Venus on the great lake at Nero's Golden House?'
'Oh yes. Nero believed he had the original!' Carus said 'believed' with a flick of contemptuous malice, then he smiled. He glanced at his wife. Servia smiled too. I gathered Nero thought wrongly.
Putting one over on another collector gave them even more pleasure than possessing their incomparable piece. This was bad news. They would enjoy putting one over on us.
It was time to tackle business.
My father walked away around the path, drawing Carus with him while I murmured about nothing much to Servia. We had planned this. When two members of the Didius family go visiting there is always some fraught plan-usually an interminable dispute about what time we are going to leave the house we have not even arrived at. On this occasion Pa had suggested we should each try our wheedling skills on both parties, then we could adopt whichever approach seemed best. Not this variation, anyway. I was getting nowhere with the woman. It was like plumping a cushion that had lost half its feathers. I could see Pa going rather red, too, as he and Carus conversed.
After a while Geminus brought Carus back round the remaining half of the circle. Adroitly changing partners, he imposed what was left of his famous attraction for women on the woman of the house, while I attacked her spindly spouse. I watched Pa oozing masculine civility over Servia as she waddled at his side. She hardly seemed to notice his efforts, which made me smile.
Carus and I moved to stone benches, where we could admire the pride of the collection.
'So what do you know about marbles, young man?' He spoke as if I was eighteen and had never before seen a goddess undressing.
I had stared at more nude femininity than he owned in his whole gallery, and mine was alive, but I was a man of the world, not some boasting barbarian, so I let it pass.
In our introductory message, I had been described as a junior partner at the auction-house. So I played gauche and offered, 'I know the biggest market is in copies. We cannot shift originals these days even if we bundle them in fives and throw in a set of fish skillets.'
Carus laughed. He knew I was not referring to anything so important as a Phidias original. Anyone could shift that. Somebody probably had.
My father despaired of entrancing Servia even more quickly than I had, so they both rejoined us. These preliminaries had established the rules. Nobody wanted to be charmed. There would be no easy release from our debt. Now Pa and I sat side by side, waiting for our limpid hosts to put the pressure on us.
'Well, that's a sign of modern life,' I carried on. 'Only fakes count!' By now I knew that in chasing after Festus I was destined to expose another one.
'Nothing wrong with a decently done fake,' Pa opined. He looked calm, but I knew he was miserable. 'Some of the best current reproductions will become antiques in their own right.'
I grinned desperately. 'I'll make a note to invest in a good Roman Praxiteles, if ever I have the cash and the storage-room!' As a hint of our family poverty this was not impressing our creditors.
'A Lysippus is what you want!' Geminus advised me, tapping his nose.
'Yes, I saw the fine Alexander in the gallery here!' I turned to our hosts confidentially: 'You can always tell an auctioneer. Apart from a wandering look in his eye from taking bids off the wall-inventing non-existent calls, you know-he's the one whose ugly snout bends like a carrot that's hit a stone, after years of giving collectors his dubious investment tips…' We were getting nowhere. I dropped the act. 'Pa, Carus and Servia know what they want to invest in. They want a Poseidon, and they want it by Phidias.'
Cassius Carus inspected me coldly in his fussy way. But it was Servia, their financier, who smoothed down the thick white folds of her mantle and broke in. 'Oh no, it's not a future investment. That piece already belongs to us!'
XLIII
I saw my father grip his hands.
Rejecting the humble role that had been imposed on me, I hardened my attitude. 'I came to this tale rather late. Do you mind if we just run over the facts? Am I right in my understanding? My elder brother Didius Festus is said to have acquired from Greece a modest statue, alleged to be a Poseidon and thought to be by Phidias?'
'Known to be bought by us,' responded Carus, obviously thinking he had put me down wittily.
'Pardon me if I'm churlish, but do you have a receipt?'
'Naturally,' said Servia. She must have dealt with my family before.
'I have been shown it, Marcus,' murmured Pa. I ignored him.
'It was made out to you by Festus?' Carus nodded. 'Festus is dead. So what has this to do with us?'
'My point exactly!' stated Pa. He drew himself up. 'I made my son Festus independent of parental authority when he joined the armed forces.' This was probably a lie, but no outsider could refute it. It sounded straight, though I could not imagine why Pa and Festus would have gone through such a formality. Acquiring emancipation from the power of his father is something that only troubles a son who feels bound by his father's power in the first place. In the Didius family this had never applied. Any pleb on the Aventine would probably grin widely and say the same.
Carus refused to accept any disclaimer. 'I expect a parent to take responsibility for his son's debts.'
I felt a strong need for irony. 'Nice to see that some people still believe in the family as an indissoluble unit, Father!'
'Bull's testicles!' Maybe Carus and Servia took this as a reference to the mystical rites of an Eastern religious cult.
Maybe not.
'My papa's upset,' I excused him to the couple. 'When somebody says he owes them half a million, he loses his grip.'
Carus and Servia gazed at me as if what I said was incomprehensible. Their indifference to our problem astonished me. It also made me shiver.
I had
been in many places where the atmosphere was more sinister. Toughs armed with knives or staves have a vivid effect; there were none of those here. Yet the mood was sour and in its way just as intimidating. The message reaching us was uncompromising. We would pay up, or we would suffer; suffer until we gave in.
'Please be reasonable,' I pressed on. 'We are a poor family. We simply cannot lay hands on so much cash.'
'You must,' said Servia.
We could talk all we wanted. But however closely we argued, we would never actually communicate. Even so, I felt compelled to struggle on: 'Let's follow through what happened. You paid Festus for the statue. In good faith he attempted to import it, but the ship sank. By then you owned the statue. It is,' I declared, more boldly than I felt, 'your loss.'
Carus tossed a new nut into the mixing bowl: 'No mention was ever made to us that the statue was still in Greece.'
That was tricky. My heart lurched. I wondered what the date was on their receipt. Trying not to look at my father, I even wondered if my impossible brother had sold the Phidias to them after he already knew it was lost. Surely Pa would have noticed this detail when he saw the receipt; surely he would have warned me?
One thing was definite: I could not draw attention to our lad's fraud by asking to see the receipt for myself now. It did not matter; if Festus had deceived them, I did not want to know.
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