The Last Stoic

by Morgan Wade

  “Ok, that was Paul.” Gus said as he replaced the cell phone in its cradle. “He says he can meet us at the Oasis.”

  “Shouldn’t we stop in at the office?” Mark asked.

  “We work hard and we play hard,” was the reply.

  The Oasis looked remarkably like an oasis. The highway they followed from the bus station cut through many miles of parched, ochre fields and the occasional bristled tree. Now there were lush, low hanging boughs heavy with foliage, palms and ferns, and a broad waterway coursing its way unhurriedly through the middle. Dozens of boutiques, upscale book stores, cafes and bars crowded the river banks. The shops surrounded a courtyard consisting of a multi-level, common outdoor seating area that extended out over the river, the sections connected by arched, wooden bridges with heavy rope railings. Towering leisure cruisers and sleek speedboats bobbed in their nearby slips. The aromas of ground coffee beans, baking pastries, rich French cigarettes, and Cuban cigars, competed with each other in the heavy, humid air. Mark followed Gus as he sought out his usual, favourite table on one of the higher platforms.

  “This is the best table because of the vantage point. It’s my office away from the office.” Gus winked. “It’s always crammed with students here. Lots of beautiful, young women.”

  Gus was compact. He stood at a modest five foot six, his body trim and his muscles taut. His hair consisted of a closely cropped carpet of tight curls with a hairline cleanly delineated around the entire circumference of his head. His mostly flat nose tapered into a tight cylinder and he talked out the side of his mouth. Even his eyes, a restrained grey-green, were on the small side, coolly scanning the clientele.

  Mark was alarmed when Gus’ face suddenly contorted and he winced dramatically, as though he’d been shot.

  “Oh fuck.” Gus whispered.

  “What is it?”

  “Look!”

  Mark followed Gus’ pointing eyebrows down from their platform across two tables at a young brunette who had just sat down with a coffee, a bagel and a book.

  “Oh yeah. Very pretty.” Mark agreed.

  Gus ignored him and continued to study the undergraduate.

  “Wait here.”

  Gus was up from their table in a quick fluid motion. Mark watched as he approached the table at which the woman was seated. The woman passed a hand casually through her shoulder length auburn hair. She tilted her head coyly to the side and smiled. Mark tensed as he saw her stand and follow Gus back to their table. I could never do that, he thought. I would never do that.

  “Mark, Chantelle.”

  “Hi there.”

  “Hello.”

  Mark stood up from his seat and shook the young woman’s cool, moist hand, which folded limply into his like layers of smoked salmon. Chantelle took a seat, placing her coffee and her plate on the table top with the other cups and saucers. Mark and Gus again took their seats and Gus placed her book, which he had gallantly carried, next to her cup.

  “So, as I was saying, this young fellow is just down from Canada…”

  Mark interrupted.

  “I don’t believe it!” he said. He had just seen the cover of Chantelle’s book.

  The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius.

  “What a coincidence!”

  “What?”

  “That’s the book!”

  Chantelle crooked an eyebrow at Gus.

  “I’m sorry. My grandfather gave me a special copy of The Meditations to take with me. It’s like a bible to him. But I left it behind.”

  “That’s a shame.” Chantelle said, smiling. “But you can’t have my copy.”

  Mark blushed. He would never have dreamed of speaking to a girl like Chantelle back home. There, his die had been cast. His spindled, graceless limbs, his narrow eyes and beaked nose, his stilted use of the youthful vernacular; all gave him away instantly. He was never able to crawl out from under that first judgment and the long shadow of his reputation. Michelle Bradford was the first and last local girl he had spoken to non-trivially, asking her in his halting way whether she might like to see the Stirling engine he’d built with his grandfather, using paraffin lamps, bicycle spokes, and empty juice cans. “Your what engine,” she had answered, wrinkling her nose, “you’re kidding right?” She had laughed as she walked away. Mark suffered enough from unsolicited humiliation; he had no interest in inviting more.

  But Chantelle didn’t laugh, she smiled. And she looked him in the eye. I’m thousands of miles from home, Mark remembered. I’m unknown. The old shadow doesn’t extend this far.

  “That’s ok,” he said, lifting his long face and raising his eyes, “I’m sure I can get another copy. Actually, once I get an address, I plan to have it mailed down. I think it’s an amazing coincidence. The first book I lay eyes on since leaving is The Meditations. Funny, eh?”

  “Yeah, funny.” Gus said.

  “Do you mind if I take a look?” Mark asked.

  Chantelle shrugged, shook her head and pushed the book across the table to him.

  “We’re studying it this term at school, in my Western Foundations class. It’s actually pretty interesting.”

  “What is it,” Gus asked, “philosophy?”

  “Yeah. Stoics.”

  Mark scanned the text.

  “So read some.” Gus said.

  Mark flipped through the pages randomly and opened the book around the middle.

  “Quidquid quacunque tandem ratione pulcrum est…”

  “There is an English translation on the facing page.”

  “Ok. I see. Anything in any way beautiful derives its beauty from itself, and asks nothing beyond itself. Praise is no part of it, for nothing is made better or worse by praise. This applies even to the more mundane forms of beauty: natural objects, for example, or works of art. What need has true beauty of anything further?”

  Mark did not look up from the pages. He felt the length of his neck flushing.

  “That’s lovely,” Chantelle said. “I don’t think we’ve read that far yet, I don’t remember it. My favourite line is here.”

  She grabbed the book back, found a passage that was highlighted on a page with a folded-over corner and read out loud. Mark watched her as she read.

  “Allow your mind freedom from all other considerations. This you can do, if you will approach each action as though it were your last.” She handed the book back to Mark open to the page she’d read from.

  “Nice,” said Gus. “Meaning?”

  Chantelle beamed. “Live life to the fullest. Live every minute like it’s your last.”

  Mark continued reading, silently, the paragraph surrounding the highlighted section.

  Hour by hour resolve firmly, like a Roman and a man, to do what comes to hand with correct and natural dignity, and with humanity, independence, and justice…

  “I’m a Buddhist myself.” Gus said.

  Mark glanced up and tried to reconcile Buddhism with the bawdy stories he had heard Gus telling in the car on the way over. He continued to read, listening with one ear.

  …dismissing the wayward thought, the emotional recoil from the commands of reason, the desire to create an impression, the admiration of self, the discontent with your lot.

  “I once spent a month at a Buddhist retreat near Taos, New Mexico. I was living at a resort in Colorado at the time, working as a ski instructor, and one day I just snapped.”

  …See how little a man needs to master, for his days to flow on in quietness and piety….

  “I just burned out. It’s a real lifestyle. Parties every night, lots of booze, wicked weed, babes, and lots of other stuff. I mean, it was fucking fantastic in the beginning. But it can wear on you.”

  …Are you distracted by outward cares? Then allow yourself a space of quiet, wherein you can add to your knowledge of the good and learn to curb your restlessness…

  “Anyway, I just up and left one day, grabbed my stuff and pffft!” Gus shot his hand straight out in front of him and away, to indicate how
quickly and completely he had vacated the resort. “I didn’t tell anyone I was leaving, not my pals or my girlfriend or my boss, and I just drifted down the highway for a few days until I got to Taos.”

  …Guard also against another kind of error: the follow of those who weary their days in much business, but lack any aim on which their whole effort, nay, their whole thought, is focused…

  “I was really fucked up. I camped out in a city park in Taos for a few days, not knowing where else to go. I’d sit there on a park bench just crying for hours on end. It was pathetic.”

  …Were you to live three thousand years, or even thirty thousand, remember that the sole life which a man can lose is that which he is living at the moment…

  “On the third night, I was out of my mind. I was so stoned that, I was later told, I passed out under the statue of Kit Carson.”

  And furthermore, that he can have no other life except the one he loses. This means that the longest life and the shortest amount to the same thing…

  “Imagine my surprise when I woke up in a Buddhist fucking monastery! These guys had heard about me, found me, and brought me back to their hideout.”

  …For the passing minute is every man’s equal possession, but what has once gone by is not ours. Our loss, therefore, is limited to that one fleeting instant, since no one can lose what is already past, nor yet what is still to come…

  “So, for the first two weeks, I lived in a hut on this hill, all by myself, I didn’t talk to anyone. Not a soul. I didn’t know where I was, I didn’t know how to leave.”

  Mark looked up again from the book.

  “The monks wouldn’t talk to me and when I talked to them, they just acted like they weren’t hearing anything. They brought me food and drink every morning and every evening. That’s it. All I did was stroll in the woods and sleep. I was a bit nervous, but I didn’t have anywhere else to be, so I sat tight.”

  “On the third week, they started bringing me books with my breakfast, a different one each day, but still no talking.”

  “At the end of the fourth week, the chief monk comes to see me. He asks me how I feel. Better, I say. You may leave, he says, and gives me directions to the highway. So I leave, thumb a ride into town, and I’ve been a Buddhist ever since.”

  They are quiet for a moment.

  “Wow!” said Chantelle.

  “Unbelievable.” Mark said, and he meant it. He finished reading the last line on the page that was open before him.

  …The sole thing of which any man can be deprived is the present; since this is all he owns, and nobody can lose what is not his.

  Mark shut the book with a sharp snap, returned it to Chantelle, and thanked her.

  “There are some similarities between Stoicism and Buddhism,” she said.

  “Oh yeah?”

  “They both advocate freedom from earthly desires as a way of achieving true happiness.”

  Gus erupted with a gruff laugh. “And that’s not easy!”

  Mark laughed also.

  “What?” Gus asked, still grinning.

  “Nothing.”

  Chantelle caught sight of her friends from the college entering the courtyard to take up a table. She waved strenuously, caught their attention and then motioned that she would join them.

  “Well, fellas, it’s been fun,” she said as she collected her book and coffee mug. “Welcome to town and I hope you get your copy soon,” she added.

  “Thanks, I do too.”

  “Nice talking to you Chantelle, maybe we’ll see you around here again,” said Gus.

  Chantelle smiled back over her shoulder. As she departed from their table and traversed the wooden bridge clutching the rope railings, Gus winced again.

  “Damn! What’s the expression? I was sorry to see her go but glad to watch her leave?”

  Finally, she reached her destination and Gus turned back toward Mark.

  “That was smooth! So this is this how you operate?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “All that bullshit about forgetting the book back home, gift from your uncle…”

  “Honestly,” Mark said, “my grandfather gave me that exact book just before I left.”

  “And then that quote, what was it? Everything is beautiful, the beautiful be praised, or something like that? She lapped it up like it was fucking cream!”

  “I opened it up to a random page.”

  “You can’t bullshit a bullshitter. That was impressive. I’ll have to remember that one, especially if I see Chantelle here again.”

  Gus peered in the direction of the marina. A yellow rocket-shaped boat chugged toward the docks.

  “Let’s go meet the boss.”

  SIX

  The meeting with Paulus Cornelius at the oasis had been a brief exchange of pleasantries and introductions. Gus conveyed Marcus to the Frontinus worksite and introduced him to a number of his new colleagues, including Primus, Secundus, and Tertius, names he himself had given them “because their Hispanic names are too hard to remember and too hard to pronounce.” Marcus quizzed his new acquaintances about life at a Frontinus outpost. They set to discussing Gus the moment he stepped out of earshot.

  “His real name is Gaius, I think.”

  “No, Lucius.”

  “You’re both wrong,” said Tertius, “it’s Spurius.”

  “Why is he known as Gus?” Marcus asked.

  “Short for Augustus.”

  “He thinks he’s emperor around here,” said Secundus, “a little emperor.”

  Primus tapped his fingers together, forming a peak.

  “Thus, Gus.”

  Marcus’ new companions were of slight stature, with fine, coffee-coloured skin, dark shiny hair and thick, broad eyebrows. He was convinced they must be brothers the men looked so similar to one another. It amused him how they spoke all at once, finishing each other’s sentences, bright and animated, with darting eyes and brilliant smiles, like children at a birthday party.

  “He doesn’t mind that no one uses his real name?” Marcus asked, directing his question to Primus.

  “Mind? He calls himself Gus.”

  Tertius nodded.

  “He prefers it.”

  Marcus sprinkled more caroenum and garum on his portion of aper retostus, the blackened rack of roasted boar’s ribs, before taking another large bite.

  “Don’t mind Gus. We never do.”

  “Welcome to the outpost. We’re all three from Baetica, the foremost Hispanic province,” Primus said, bowing as much as was possible while sitting at the table, his face almost touching his plate.

  “From Verulamium,” Marcus replied, mumbling through a mouthful of roasted meat, “Britannia.”

  “There’s Xander the antique Greek.”

  Secundus jerked his thumb toward an old man who was hobbling toward the tent exit. Perfectly white hair swayed in all directions from the top of his head.

  “Nice enough fellow, sharp as a wasp’s ass.”

  “Too sharp. Mark me, he annoys.”

  “All defer to him like sheep to a shepherd. Even Paulus.”

  “Xander thinks the Greeks, from their own genius, invented mathematics and astronomy and, due to their benevolence, took it upon themselves to bestow the gift of knowledge on the rest of us ignorant pig-fuckers.”

  Secundus gestured lewdly with the rib bone in his hand.

  “Speak for yourself,” Tertius said, feigning offence.

  “They did invent mathematics didn’t they?” Marcus asked. That’s what they taught at the academy in Verulamium. The Baeticans were tickled.

  “What about the Egyptians?”

  “The Sumerians?”

  “Xander claims to have apprenticed under Ptolemy.”

  “Is that possible,” Marcus asked, “wouldn’t that make him 125?”

  “Look at him. Does he look a day under 150?”

  “I’ve seen dried figs looking fresher.”

  Tertius pointed a triangle of bread toward the en
d of their table to a large, shambling man with pallid, splotchy skin who was hunched behind a great arc of charred meat.

  “That’s Gnaeus. A northerner. A Gaul.”

  Gnaeus raised a shiny hand in their direction and snorted without raising his face.

  “The Immensus from Narbonensis, we call him.”

  “As you can see, he’s vast. Particularly around the middle.”

  “Supposedly he is our demolition specialist.”

  “Not much of an engineer, but he can dismantle a full rack of boar’s ribs in under twenty minutes.”

  The giant Gaul grinned at him, sticking his tongue out between two thick, oily lips. Marcus averted his eyes.

  The Baeticans laughed and went around the rest of the room describing each of the few architecti left in the tent, complaining and lauding with equal measure. Marcus was surprised to find that so many of his new colleagues came from the far flung corners of the empire. Only one or two were from old Roman families or established regional lineages.

  “Yes,” Secundus agreed, “and you’re the first Briton.”

  “What brought you here?” Marcus asked.

  “Same as you I expect. To suck at the teat of the great Roman she-wolf.”

  “Well, actually, I’m here to apprentice, so eventually I can return to Verulamium and take over my grandfather’s firm.”

  Tertius giggled.

  “You want what we all want.”

  “What’s that?”

  “To be richer than Croesus,” Primus replied, “and to spend the rest of your days drunk as a priest, eating and drinking and fucking.”

  The Baeticans began discussing at length how they might pursue those aims that very evening. Marcus considered protesting again to better explain his motives but Gus had reappeared. Secundus, Tertius, and Primus reverted to their native tongue.

  “Come Marcus, I’ll show you the rest of the worksite.”

  Marcus followed Gus out of the dining tent to a stand of palm trees under which loin-clothed men lay snoozing beneath the generous shade of the fronds. Litters and wagons were scattered around the shade’s circumference. Gus picked out the largest litter, climbed up onto its couch of brocaded cushions and beckoned to Marcus.