The Eyes of Aurora

by Albert A. Bell, Jr.

  “I’m going to have to think about that.”

  “Are you going to tell Agricola? Put him on alert?”

  “I’ll have to think about that, too.”

  A profound silence rose between us, like a curtain going up at the end of a scene in a play to allow the actors a chance to get off the stage. But neither of us moved.

  “I’m sorry I can’t share your dedication to an ideal,” I finally said. “I do admire it, no matter how old-fashioned and ill-fated it may be.”

  “And I admire your pragmatism—your realism might be a better word. Perhaps we can’t restore the Republic, but I see no reason why we shouldn’t try.” He put a hand on my shoulder. “I promise you one thing, Gaius Pliny. This is not the end of our friendship.”

  I covered Tacitus’ hand with mine. “I certainly hope not.” But I was deeply hurt that a man I’d come to trust and, yes, love would abandon me at this moment.

  “When we got back from Naples, I had word that my brother is not doing well,” Tacitus said as he drew away from me and reached for the door. “I haven’t seen him in almost a year, so I’m going to make that trip. Because of our friendship I postponed it to support you in your prosecution against Regulus and for our ride out to Marinthus’ taberna. I don’t think I should wait any longer. And southern Gaul is lovely at this time of year. I might be there for a month or so.”

  Tacitus’ younger brother was born with some abnormalities which make it necessary for someone to care for him at all times. My uncle mentioned his condition in a section on human oddities in his Natural History, so I had heard of Tacitus before I met him. His brother, who has the mind of a child, lives on Tacitus’ estate in the south of Gaul, not far from the coast. Everyone is surprised he’s lived as long as he has.

  “Julia’s going to visit her mother,” he continued, “so I’m going to send those clowns Segetius and Rufinus over here. I don’t want them in my house if I’m not there to supervise them.”

  “That’s fine. I’ll put them to work cleaning the latrina. Have a safe journey.”

  With his hand on the latch, Tacitus turned back to me. “Before you wade too far into what could be a treacherous stream with all sorts of slippery rocks under the water, remember that this interpretation of AREPO has been put forward by a murderous madman under the influence of some self-deluded ‘prophet.’ The letters—if they stand for anything at all, which I doubt—could have dozens of meanings. The R could be for Roma. The P could be for Publius or Poppaeus.… Or how about this?”

  He stepped to the table, picked up a pen, dipped it into an inkwell, and wrote on a scrap of papyrus: AD REGIS EXCIDIUM PLINIUS OPTATUS. Then he crossed out REGIS and under it wrote ROMAE. “You could destroy Rome, Gaius Pliny.”

  *

  I was still sitting in the library, cutting up the papyrus Tacitus had written on—I dared not leave something that incriminating lying around—when Aurora came in with one of my tunics over her arm. “Crispina is saying good night to Clodius,” she said, “and I showed her where her room will be.” She glanced around. “Oh, has Tacitus left?”

  “Yes. He’s going to see his brother in Gaul.”

  She let that sink in. “So…he’s not going to help you in…this matter?”

  “No. As you know, he wouldn’t shed a tear if something happened to Domitian. He would sound more like Cicero exulting in the death of Caesar.”

  “Well, we can work on it then,” she said brightly, “like we did when we were children.”

  “My darling, if we pursue this, we could be risking our lives, maybe even more. I can’t ask you to do that.”

  She handed me the tunic. “You’re going to risk getting sick if you don’t get on some dry clothes.”

  As absorbed as I’d been in Crispina’s story, I’d almost forgotten how damp and uncomfortable I was. I thought the chill came from what I was hearing, not what I was wearing. “Yes. Thank you.” I stood and took the tunic from her. “There’s no one outside the door, is there?”

  “I didn’t see anyone on my way in.”

  I peeled off my wet dinner garb and slipped on the dry garment. Aurora did not turn her back. Instead she smoothed the wrinkles so the tunic would hang properly and gave me a quick peck on the cheek.

  “We probably shouldn’t do things like that,” I said. “You know my mother can sneak up on you without any warning. And Naomi’s as silent as a shadow.”

  “As you wish, my lord,” she said, teasing me with a smile and a deep bow. When she was standing up straight again, I took her face in my hands and kissed her. Outside in the atrium someone dropped something. Aurora stepped back and took a breath.

  “I guess that’s how it has to be for us from now on,” I said, “frightened at every sound.”

  “We can’t go back, and I wouldn’t if we could.” She turned Popilius’ papyrus so she could read it. “Gaius, you know I’m not going to let you get any more deeply involved in this…whatever it is…without my help. I got you into it to begin with. Please don’t use your authority over me to make me step back.”

  I smiled. “Do I still have any authority over you?”

  “You certainly do…legally.”

  “I guess I’ll have to be content with that.”

  We sat down on opposite sides of the table and Aurora began to play with the pieces of papyrus I had cut up.

  “You don’t usually waste scraps like this. What was written on it?”

  “Something no one needs to see.” I swept the pieces away from her and gathered them on my side of the table. Fetching a lamp, I began to burn them. “If we’re going to work on this puzzle together, what do you make of Crispina’s story?”

  Before she could say anything there was a knock on the door. Without waiting for an invitation, Naomi stuck her head in. “Your mother sent me to see if you need anything, my lord.” She didn’t have to add, And to see what you’re doing.

  “No. We’re almost finished here.”

  “Yes, my lord.” She withdrew, leaving the door partly open. I walked over and closed it. By the time I’d done that, I was sure, my mother knew that Aurora and I had been seen sitting together.

  “What do you think of Crispina’s story, Gaius?” Aurora asked as I returned to the table.

  I sat down next to her, with my shoulder touching hers. “It may be the most bizarre thing I’ve ever heard. But, if it’s true, it could rock Rome to its foundations. I don’t see how Popilius can succeed, though.”

  Aurora leaned against me and picked up Popilius’ papyrus. “It might succeed because it’s so outlandish. Agricola, or someone like him, wouldn’t be able to kill Domitian because Domitian’s forces would resist him, but Popilius might be able to slip into the palace like a little mouse that nobody notices. Or he could get close to him in the Amphitheatre or the Circus Maximus, just one more face in a crowd. A few of his henchmen could create a diversion and he could be within arm’s reach of Domitian before anyone sees him. Doesn’t Livy say that’s what happened when the king Lucius Tarquinius was killed?”

  “Livy admits that most of those stories from the early days of Rome are more suited to poetry than to history. Orators use them as exempla, but I wouldn’t want to base a course of action on them.” I sat back down at the table and looked at the piece of papyrus that Popilius had scribbled on. “I need to talk to someone who has Domitian’s ear.”

  “One of his secretaries? The captain of the Praetorians?”

  I drew back in horror. “By the gods, no! If I even hinted to one of them that I knew about a possible assassination plot, I’d be tortured until they squeezed everything I know out of me.”

  “But you don’t know anything.”

  “That wouldn’t matter. I would be arrested and never seen again. No, I need to talk to someone who has Domitian’s ear but who has no power to arrest me—a conniving scoundrel whose only interest is his own advancement.”

  Aurora’s shoulders slumped. “You mean Regulus, don’t you?”
<
br />   “Who else?”

  “You want to talk to Regulus? After you humiliated him in court like that? I doubt he’ll even let you in his house. He’s more likely to set his Molossian hounds after you. And he certainly won’t come here for a nice convivial dinner.”

  “That’s why I need to meet him somewhere else, on neutral ground. And I know just where that will be. And now, my dear, I need a little time to myself. I’ve got a lot to sort out.”

  “Of course. I’ll go see if Clodius is all right. He wanted to sleep in the same room with Hashep and Dakla. Is that all right with you?”

  “I have no objection. He didn’t want to sleep with his mother?”

  “No, and she didn’t ask to have him with her.”

  “That’s strange, considering what they’ve been through these last few days.”

  “There’s something odd about this whole family. I hope we don’t come to regret that I brought them into our lives.”

  “You were trying to help someone in need. Whatever happens, I can’t blame you for that. We can never foresee all the consequences of even the best of our deeds.”

  *

  Aurora had barely left the library, leaving the door partly open, when I heard her say in surprise, “Oh, good evening, my lady.” I thought she had run into my mother, but I couldn’t hear the other voice distinctly.

  “Yes, he’s in the library,” Aurora said. “Shall I—”

  She didn’t say any more. I braced myself for another intrusion, another tirade from my mother. Nothing could have surprised me more than to see Livilla step into the room. She had changed from her dinner gown into a light blue stola and a dark blue cloak, drawn up over her head to protect her from the rain.

  “Good evening, Gaius. I hope I’m not disturbing you.” Her voice, always soft, was barely a whisper. The redness in her eyes told me that she had been crying.

  “Not at all.” I jumped to my feet and held out my hand to her, but she drew back. “Livilla, what’s the matter?”

  “I have something to say, Gaius, and I can’t wait until a more opportune time.”

  “Please, sit down. Do you want something to drink?”

  She remained standing and dabbed at her eyes with the edge of her cloak. “No. I just want to say this and be on my way.” She took a deep breath. “I do not want to marry you, Gaius.”

  “What? Why—”

  “The reason is quite simple. I’ve seen the affection—no, the devotion—you have for Aurora. It was auspicious, I suppose, that I met her coming out of this room a moment ago.”

  “She’s…she’s a servant. We’ve known each other for fifteen years.” As long as you’ve been alive, I thought. It didn’t take an oracle to see that this conversation wasn’t likely to end well.

  “Don’t take me for a fool, Gaius.” Her voice betrayed more sadness than anger. “There’s a great deal more to it than that. Your face lit up like a beacon when you got that message from her at dinner tonight.”

  “We’re working on a puzzling case.” I picked up the piece of papyrus Crispina had shown us. “It looked like she had some important information.”

  “I appreciate your trying to spare my feelings.” Livilla drew up her small, slender frame as much as she could. “You don’t have to love me in order to marry me. I didn’t expect you to. My father never loved my mother, and their marriage lasted twenty years. Like him, you are a kind and thoughtful man. I know you would never do anything to hurt me—not intentionally—but you have no idea how much you hurt me tonight.”

  “I’m truly sorry. You must hate me.”

  “No. I envy her. I don’t love you, although I’m sure I could learn to. No matter how we feel about one another, I could live happily with you, but I won’t live in the same house with the woman you do love.”

  “Livilla, please—” I took a step toward her, but she moved toward the door.

  “I’ve thought about what I should do. I could marry you and demand that you sell her or send her to another of your estates, but that would only make you miserable, and I would be miserable in turn because you would hate me. I don’t want to punish you or antagonize you, just release you.”

  I started to protest, but she reached out, put a finger on my lips, and shook her head.

  “I don’t know how you will ever work things out so you can be with Aurora, but I hope you will find that happiness.” She stretched up to kiss me lightly on the cheek and flashed a tearful smile. “I won’t tell my mother the real reason why I’m doing this. You may tell your mother whatever you like. Now, I know you’re enough of a gentleman that you won’t heave a great sigh of relief until I’m out of sight.”

  She turned and ran out of the room.

  * * *

  I know Gaius hates it when servants try to overhear conversations that aren’t any of their business, but after our experience at Marinthus’ taberna, I feel I have a right to know certain things. I thought, once Livilla left, that I might go back in and continue my conversation with Gaius about Crispina and the ROTAS square.

  But Livilla was in tears when she ran out of the library and Gaius closed the door. I can’t believe he would have told her he wanted to end the engagement. What did they talk about? I don’t want her to be hurt.

  Livilla and I have more in common than she probably realizes. Like all women in Rome, it is our fate to be controlled by some man. Our fathers rule over us until we’re married or—in my case—sold into slavery. Just as Medea says in Euripides’ play, if we are fortunate, we find a husband, or a master, we can tolerate. Many husbands think they are our masters. In either case, a man has control of our bodies.

  What they cannot control is our feelings. Even if we have to keep them bottled up, they are ours.

  IX

  By midday the next day, accompanied by half a dozen servants, I was outside the Baths of Titus, one of Martial’s regular haunts. Hastily built at the bottom of the Esquiline Hill to celebrate the opening of the nearby Flavian Amphitheatre a few years ago, it already shows its need for repair. In addition to its physical decrepitude, it has gained a reputation as the most disreputable bath in all of Rome, becoming little more than the largest brothel in the city. Assaults and murders are almost daily occurrences here. Domitian—in spite of a string of moralizing decrees forbidding castration of slaves, excessive spending on dinners, and so on—had made no effort to clean it up. Some say he wants its unsavoriness to be associated in the public mind with his deceased brother’s name.

  Although this is the public bath closest to my house, I have been inside it only once, and then only out of dire necessity, because I needed to get into the ruins of Nero’s Golden House, which lie beneath the bath. But the depravity of those who frequent the place makes them a natural audience for the most risqué of Martial’s poems. He tells me that he garners dinner invitations and other, less desirable, overtures every time he reads his work here.

  The day was proving warm and humid after last night’s rain. Crowds of men played games on the “boards” scratched into the steps of the bath. Keeping one eye on a hotly contested game of latrunculus, I hoped to catch Martial on his way into the building, and I was fortunate. He came along only a short time after I arrived.

  “Why, Gaius Pliny, this is most unexpected,” he said as he responded to my signal to join me. “And most welcome.”

  “Good day, Valerius Martial. I hope you’re well.” He is a robust man, whose physique and straight dark hair make him stand out from the foppish, well-oiled habitués of Titus’ baths.

  “I am well,” he said. “I am, though I’m still smarting from the insult you offered me at the beginning of the month.”

  “How did I insult you?” I hoped I hadn’t, because Martial can repay an affront by spearing a person on his epigrams, like a fisherman with his trident, and holding him up to flop and gasp, for display and ridicule.

  “One morning, on your way to court, just before you were doused by a chamber pot, I gave you a copy of my n
ewest book, and you invited me to dinner. Then you left town. I was told you went to Naples.” He stuck out his lip, as though pouting. “I’ve had people go to some lengths to avoid hearing me read, but never quite that far.”

  “It was urgent business, I assure you.”

  “Have you had a chance to read my poems?”

  I was afraid he would ask. At the moment I didn’t even know where the damn book was. “I enjoyed them very much.”

  He cocked his head. “Any particular one a favorite?”

  “I would be hard-pressed to choose.” I wanted to get off this subject. “But I do apologize for not being there to greet you at dinner. You did attend, didn’t you?”

  “Yes, I did.”

  “I hope you were treated well.”

  He shook his head. “Your mother put me on a couch so far toward the back of the room that my feet were hanging out the door.”

  “I am truly sorry.” That was even closer than I would have placed him to my table. The man amuses me, and—for the sake of his relationship to Lorcis—I have helped him on occasion, but I would rather not have him around. I hold him on the fringe of my clientela, not someone to whom I would grant friendship, my formal amicitia, just someone who can be useful and entertaining now and then, if I’m in a salacious mood. “I promise I’ll invite you over another time and try to atone for the insult. But right now I need to ask a favor of you.”

  “And what would that be?”

  I put an arm around his shoulder and drew him closer to me so I could lower my voice. “I need for you to arrange a meeting for me with Regulus.”

  He drew back, his face looking like he had bitten into something that didn’t taste at all like he’d expected. “Why don’t you knock on his door, or send a servant to ask him?”

  “It has to be a meeting no one can know about or possibly eavesdrop on.”

  He arched an eyebrow. “And you want me to play host at my farm.”

  “You’re well ahead of me.”

  “My livelihood, Gaius Pliny, depends on my being able to anticipate what people of your class are thinking.” Though not a poor man, Martial had no stripe on his tunic.