by Rice, Anne
My eldest brother Antony had said, “The Dead are nowhere and are nothing.”
My Father had raised his cup. “To Rome,” he said, and it was he this time who had quoted Lucretius: “ ‘Too many times, religion mothers crimes and wickedness.’ ”
Shrugs and sighs all around. The Roman attitude. Even the Priests and Priestesses of Isis would have joined Lucretius when he wrote:
Our terrors and our darknesses of mind
Must be dispelled, then, not by sunshine’s rays,
Not by those shining arrows of light,
But by insight into nature, and a scheme
Of systematic contemplation.
Drunk? Drugged? Bull’s blood? Systematic? Well, it all came down to the same thing. Know! Twist the poetry as you will. And the phallus of Osiris lives forever in the Nile, and the water of the Nile inseminates the Mother Egypt eternally, death giving birth to life with the blessing of Mother Isis. Merely a particular scheme and a sort of systematic form of contemplation.
The ship sailed on.
I languished some eight more days in this torment, often lying awake in the dark, and sleeping only in the day to avoid the dreams.
Suddenly, in the early morning, Jacob pounded my door.
We were midway up the Orontes to the city.
Twenty miles now from Antioch. I did up my hair as best I could (I’d never done it without a slave) into a chignon on the back of my head, then covered my Roman gowns with a great black cloak and prepared to disembark—an Eastern woman, her face draped, protected by Hebrews.
When the city came into view—when the immense harbor greeted us and then embraced us with all its masts and racket and odors and cries, I ran to the deck of the ship and looked out at this city. It was splendid.
“You see,” Jacob said.
Taken from the ship by litter I found myself carried rapidly through vast waterfront markets, and then into a great open square, crowded with people. I saw everywhere the Temples, porticoes, booksellers, even the high walls of an amphitheater—all that I could have expected in Rome. No, this was no town.
The young men were crowded about the barbershops ready to have their obligatory shave and the inevitable fancy curls on their foreheads, which Tiberius with his own hairstyle had made fashionable. There were wine shops all over. The slave markets were jammed. I glimpsed the entrances to the streets devoted to crafts—the street of the tent-makers, the street of the silversmiths.
And there in all its glory, in the very center of Antioch, stood the Temple of Isis!
My goddess, Isis, with her worshipers coming and going, undisturbed, and in huge numbers. A few very proper-looking linen-clad Priests stood at the doors! The Temple was aswarm.
I thought, I can run away from any husband in this place!
Gradually I realized a great commotion had come upon the Forum, the center of the city. I heard Jacob ordering the men to hurry out of the broad market street and into the back streets. My bearers were running. The curtains were brought shut by Jacob’s hand so I couldn’t see out.
News was being shouted out in Latin, in Greek, in Chaldean: Murder, Murder, Poison, Treachery.
I peeped out of the curtain.
People were weeping and cursing the Roman Gnaeus Calpurnius Piso, cursing him and his wife, Placina. Why? I didn’t much like either one of them, but what was all this?
Jacob shouted again at my bearer to hurry.
We were rushed through the gates and into the vestibule of a sizable house no different in design or color than my own in Rome, only much smaller. I could see the same refinements, the distant peristyle, clusters of weeping slaves.
The litter was promptly set down and I stepped out, deeply concerned that they had not stopped me at the doors to wash my feet, as was proper. And my hair, it had all fallen down in waves.
But no one noticed me. I turned round and round, amazed at the Oriental curtains and tassels that hung over the doorways, the caged birds everywhere singing in their little prisons. The woven carpets lying all over the floor, one heaped upon another.
Two obvious ladies of the house came towards me.
“What’s the matter!” I asked.
They were as fashionable as any rich woman in Rome, drenched in bracelets and wearing gold-trimmed gowns.
“I implore you,” said one of the women, “for your own sake, go! Get back into the litter!”
They tried to push me inside the curtained cell of the litter. I wouldn’t go. I became furious.
“I don’t know where I am,” I said. “And I don’t know who you are! Now, stop pushing me!”
The Master of the House, or someone who certainly appeared to be such, came dashing towards me, with tears streaming down his cheeks and his short tousled gray hair a mess—torn as if in mourning. He’d ripped his long tunic. He’d smeared dirt on his face! He was old with a bent back and a massive head, loaded with skin and wrinkles.
“Your Father was my young colleague,” he said to me in Latin. He grabbed me by the arms. “I dined in your house when you were a baby. I saw you when you crawled on all fours.”
“Tender,” I said quickly.
“Your Father and I studied in Athens, slept under the same roof.”
The women stood panic-stricken with their hands over their mouths.
“Your Father and I fought with Tiberius on his first campaign. We fought those lurid barbarians.”
“Very brave,” I said.
My black outer cloak fell down, revealing my unkempt wild long hair and plain dress. Nobody cared.
“Germanicus dined in this house because your Father spoke of me!”
“Oh dear, I see,” I said.
One of the women motioned for me to get in the litter. Where was Jacob? The old man wouldn’t let me go.
“I stood with your Father and with Augustus when news came to us of the massacre of our troops in the Teutoburg Forest, that General Varus and all his men were slain. My sons fought with your brothers in the legions of Germanicus when he punished those Northern tribes! Oh, God!”
“Yes, very marvelous, indeed,” I said gravely.
“Get back in the litter and get out,” said one of the women.
The old man clutched me.
“We fought the madman, King Arminius!” said the old man. “We could have won! Your brother Antony wasn’t for giving up and coming back, was he?”
“I … no …”
“Get her out of here!” screamed a young patrician man, who had also been weeping. He came forward and shoved me towards the litter.
“Stand back, you imbecile!” I said to him. I slapped his face.
All this while, Jacob had been talking to the slaves, getting the scoop.
Jacob appeared beside me, as the gray-haired Greek sobbed and kissed my cheeks.
Jacob took over, guiding me into the litter.
“Germanicus has just been murdered,” Jacob said in my ear. “Everybody loyal to him is convinced that the Emperor Tiberius put the Roman Governor Piso up to the murder. It was done with poison. Word is spreading through the city like fire.”
“Tiberius, you idiot!” I whispered, rolling my eyes. “One cowardly step after another!”
I sank back into the darkness. The litter was being lifted.
Jacob went right on: “Gnaeus Calpurnius Piso has allies here, naturally. Everybody’s fighting everybody else. Settling scores. Mayhem. This Greek family traveled with Germanicus to Egypt. There are riots already. We go!”
“Farewell, friend,” I cried to the old Greek, as I was carried from the house. But I don’t think he heard me. He had gone down on his knees. He cursed Tiberius. He screamed of suicide and begged for the dagger.
We were outside once more, hurrying through the street.
I lay askew in the litter, thinking dully in the darkness. Germanicus dead. Poisoned by Tiberius!
I knew that this recent trip of Germanicus to Egypt had made Tiberius very angry. Egypt was like no other Roma
n province. Rome was so dependent upon it for grain that Senators could not go there. But Germanicus had gone, “just to see the ancient relics,” his friends had said in the streets of Rome.
“A mere excuse!” I thought in desperation. “Where was the trial? The sentence? Poison!”
My bearers were running. People were screaming and sobbing around us. “Germanicus, Germanicus! Give us back our beautiful Germanicus!”
Antioch had gone mad.
At last, we were obviously in a small narrow street that was little more than an alleyway—you know the kind, for a grid of them was uncovered in the ruins of Pompeii in Italy. You could smell the male urine collected in the jugs on the corner. You could smell food cooking from high chimneys. My bearers were running and stumbling over rough cobblestones.
Once we were all thrown to the side as a chariot came crashing through the narrow place, its wheels no doubt finding the ruts in the stone intended for it.
My head had hit the wall. I was furious and frightened. But Jacob said, “Lydia, we are with you.”
I covered up all over with the cloak, so that only one eye allowed me to see the seams of light between the curtains on either side of me. I had my hand on my dagger.
The litter was set down. It was a cool indoor place. I heard Jacob’s father, David, arguing. I knew no Hebrew. And I wasn’t even sure that he was speaking in Hebrew.
Finally, Jacob took over in Greek, and I realized that they were purchasing outright a proper house for me which came with all fine appointments, including much fine furniture, left recently by a rich widow who had lived there alone, but alas, the slaves had been sold off. No slaves. This was a quick cash deal.
Finally, I heard Jacob say in Greek:
“You damn well better be telling me the truth.”
As the litter was lifted I beckoned to him. “I owe you my life twice over now. That Greek family who was to shelter me? They are truly in danger?”
“Of course,” he said. “When a riot starts, who cares? They went with Germanicus to Egypt! Piso’s men know that! Anybody with the slightest excuse will attack, murder and plunder someone else. Look, fire.” He told the men to hurry.
“All right,” I said. “Never say my real name again. From now on say this name: My name is Pandora. I am a Greek from Rome. I paid you to bring me here.”
“You have it, my dear Pandora,” he replied. “You are some strong woman. The Deed to your new house is made up in a fake name with less charm. But the Deed verifies you are widowed, emancipated and a Roman Citizen. We’ll get the Deed when we pay up the gold, which we won’t do until we are in the house. And if the man does not give me that Deed with everything written out in full to protect you, I’ll strangle him!”
“You’re very clever, Jacob,” I said wearily.
On and on went this dark bouncing journey in the litter until at last it came to a halt. I could hear the metal key turning in the lock of the gate, and then we were brought into the large vestibule of the house itself.
I should have waited out of consideration for my guardians, but frantically I climbed out of this miserable little black veiled prison, throwing off the cloak and taking a deep breath.
We were in the broad vestibule of a fine house, with great charm to it and much ingenuity in its decoration.
Even now, my thoughts scattered, I saw the lionhead fountain right near the gate through which we’d just come, and I washed my feet in the cool of the water.
The receiving room, or atrium, was huge, and beyond it I saw the rich couches of the dining room on the far side of a rather large enclosed garden—the peristyle.
It was not my massive ancient opulent old home on the Palatine Hill, which had grown new corridors and rooms over many generations, penetrating its broad gardens.
It was a bit too glossy. But it was grand. All the walls were freshly painted with a more Oriental bent, I think—more swirls and serpentine lines. How could I judge? I could have fainted from relief. Would people really leave me alone here?
There sat the desk in the atrium, and near it books! Along the porticoes flanking the garden, I saw the many doors; I looked up and saw the second-story windows closed on the porches. Splendor. Safety.
The mosaic floors were old; I knew the style, the festive figures of the Saturnalia on parade. They had to have been brought here from Italy.
Little real marble, plastered columns, but so many well-executed murals full of the requisite happy nymphs.
I went out into the soft wet grass of the peristyle and looked up at the blue sky.
I wanted only to breathe, but now came the moment of truth regarding my belongings. I was too dazed to ask about what was mine. And as it turned out, no such thing was necessary.
Jacob and David first did an entire inventory of the household furnishings they were purchasing for me, as I stood there staring at them in near disbelief at their patience with detail.
And when they’d found every room quite fine, and a bedchamber down the hall to the right, and a small open garden somewhere to the left, beyond the kitchen, they went upstairs, found things proper and then unloaded my possessions. Trunk followed trunk.
Then to my utter shock, Jacob’s father, David, drew out a scroll and actually started taking a full inventory of everything that belonged to me, from hairpins to ink and gold.
Jacob was meantime sent on an errand!
I could see the hasty writing of my Father on this inventory that David read under his breath.
“Personal toilet articles,” David said in final summation of one portion of this examination. “Clothes, one, two, three trunks—to the largest bedroom, go! Household plate to the kitchen. Books here?”
“Yes, please.” I was too shocked at his honesty and meticulousness to speak.
“Ah, so many books!”
“Fine, don’t count them!” I said.
“I cannot, you see, these fragile …”
“Yes, I know. Carry on.”
“You want your ivory and ebony shelves assembled here in the front room?”
“Magnificent.”
I slumped down on the floor, only to be lifted at once by two helpful Asian slaves and settled in an amazingly soft cross-legged Roman chair. I was given a cup of fresh clean-smelling water. I drank it down, thought of blood. Closed my eyes.
“Ink, writing materials on the desk?” asked the old man.
“If you will,” I sighed.
“Now, everybody out,” said the old man, dispensing coins quickly and generously to these Asian slaves, who bowed from the waist and backed out of the room, nearly stumbling over each other.
I was about to try to form some sensible words of gratitude when a fresh brace of slaves rushed in—nearly colliding with the departing crew—carrying baskets of everything edible that a marketplace could yield, including at least nine kinds of bread, jugs of oil, melons, green vegetables and much smoked food that would last for days—fish, beef and exotic sea creatures dried out to look like parchment.
At once to the kitchen, save for a plate of olives and cheese and bread at once for the lady on that table to her left. Fetch the lady’s wine, which her Father has sent.
Oh, how incredible. My Father’s wine.
Then everyone was ordered out again with lots of coins freely given and the old man at once returned to his inventory.
“Jacob, come here, count for me this gold as I read off the list to you! Plate, coin, more coin, jewels of exceptional value? Coin, bars of gold. Yes …”
On and on they went, rushing at it.
Where had my Father hidden all this gold? I couldn’t imagine it.
What was I going to do with it? Were they really going to let me keep this? They were honest men but this was such a fortune.
“You must wait until everyone is gone,” said David, “and then hide this gold yourself in various places about the house. You will find such places. We cannot do that for you, for then we would know where it was. Your jewels? Some I leave
here to be hidden for they are much too valuable to be flashed abroad among the populace in your first days.” He opened a casket of gems. “See this ruby? It is superb. Look at the size of it. This can feed you for the rest of your life if sold to an honest man for half of its worth. Every jewel in this box is exceptional. I know jewels. These are hand-picked from the finest. See these pearls? Perfection.” He returned the ruby and the pearls to the casket and shut the lid.
“Yes,” I said weakly.
“Pearls, more gold, silver, plate …” he muttered. “It’s all here! We should take more care but …”
“Oh, no, you have done wonders,” I declared.
I stared at the bread and the wine in the cup. My Father’s wine bottle. My Father’s amphorae around the room.
“Pandora,” said Jacob, addressing me most seriously. “Here in my hand is the Deed to this house. And another paper which describes your official entry into the port under your new made-up name, Julia, La, La, La and so forth. Pandora, we have to leave you.”
The old man shook his head and bit his lip.
“We have to sail for Ephesus, child,” he said “I am ashamed that I must leave you, but the harbor will soon be blocked!”
“There are ships on fire already in the harbor,” said Jacob under his breath. “They’ve pulled down the statue of Tiberius in the Forum.”
“The transaction is closed” said the old man to me. “The man who sold the house has never laid eyes on you and does not know your real name, and there is no evidence of it remaining here. Those were not his slaves who brought you here.”
“You’ve done miracles for me,” I said
“You are on your own, my beautiful Roman princess,” Jacob said. “It hurts my soul to leave you like this.”
“We must,” said the old man.
“Don’t go out for three days,” said Jacob, coming near to me, about as near as he could as if he even meant to break all the rules and kiss my cheek. “There are enough legions here to quell this riot, but they will let it burn itself out, rather than slaughter Roman citizens. And forget those Greek friends. Their house is already an inferno.”
They turned to leave!
“Were you well paid for all this?” I asked. “If not, take from my gold now, freely. I insist!”