by Mika Waltari
I sensed that Cephas’ strength lay in this kind of simple story, which he had repeated so often year after year, that he knew them all by heart. In the simple and illiterate way of a fisherman, he well remembered Jesus’ own words and teachings, and with his humility, he tried to set an example to other Christians, who like Hierex could swell like toads in the name of Christ.
No, Cephas was not an unattractive man, but I sensed that he could be frightening should he become angry. He did not make any attempt to convert me either, after looking at me steadily for a while, which offended me slightly.
On our way home, Hierex expounded his own views to me.
“We Christians,” he said, “regard each other as brothers. But as all people are different, so are we Christians different. Thus we have Paul’s side, Apollus’ side, Cephas’ side and then we who simply like Christ and do as we think right. So we are always at each other’s throats because of our internal strife and envy. The newly converted are the worst at squabbling and the first to reproach the quieter ones for their way of life. Since meeting Cephas, I on my part have tried to appear no more excellent or blameless than any other man.”
My enforced delay in Corinth unsettled me and I did not feel at home in my own house. I bought a beautifully carved ivory team of horses as a present for Nero. I remembered his playing with a similar one as a child when his mother would not allow him to go to the races.
The feast of Saturnalia had long since passed when I eventually, after a stormy passage, returned to Rome via Puteoli.
Aunt Laelia was bowed and quarrelsome and reproached me for not writing to her for three whole years. Barbus alone was genuinely pleased to see me and told me that when he had had a bad dream about me, he had paid for the sacrifice of a whole bull to Mithras for my welfare. When he heard about my experiences, he seemed to be convinced that this sacrifice had saved me from my imprisonment in Cilicia.
The first thing I wanted to do was to go to Viminalis to see my father, to whom I felt a stranger. But Aunt Laelia, who had by then calmed down, took me to one side.
“You’d better not go anywhere,” she said, “until you know what has happened in Rome.”
Seething with malicious excitement, she then told me how Emperor Claudius had decided to give the man-toga to Britannicus, despite his youth, and had then in a drunken moment rashly mentioned Agrippina’s lust for power. So Agrippina had given him poisonous mushrooms. This was being spoken of all over Rome quite openly, and Nero knew about it. He was said to have declared that mushroom stew could make a man into a god. Claudius had been proclaimed a god, and
Agrippina was having a temple built for her deceased husband, but few people had applied for the priesthood.
“So Rome is the same old hotbed of gossip as before,” I said bitterly. ‘We’ve known for two years that Claudius suffered from stomach cancer, although he wouldn’t admit it himself. Why do you deliberately try to spoil my happiness? I know Agrippina personally and I am a friend of Nero’s. How can I possibly believe such terrible things of them?”
“Narcissus too was given a push into Hades,” Aunt Laelia went on, without even having heard what I had said. “To his credit, it must be said that he did burn all Claudius’ secret records before committing suicide. Agrippina had wanted those at any price. In that way, he saved the lives of a great many men. Agrippina had to be content with a hundred million sesterces which she demantled from his estate. Believe it or not, but I know there would have been a blood bath if Agrippina had had her way. Fortunately Seneca and Prefect Burrus are sensible men and they succeeded in stopping her. Seneca was chosen as Consul after writing a malicious satire on Claudius to please the Senate. Now no one can hear Claudius called god without laughing. It was really simple revenge for his exile. But we who know about things in Rome are aware that he deserved it after the scandal over Agrippina’s sister. The poor girl lost her life too, in the end. I don’t know what we can expect when an eloquent philosopher makes decisions in State affairs. Things are not what they used to be. The young people even go about indecently dressed like Greeks, now that Claudius is no longer here to make them wear togas.”
Aunt Laelia gabbled on for some time before I could get away from her. As I hurried to my father’s house on Viminalis, I noticed that die atmosphere in Rome had become freer than before. People dared to laugh. The innumerable statues in the forum were covered with jokes which were read aloud for everyone’s amusement. No one bothered to scrape them off, and although it was only afternoon, I saw in the streets quite a number of drunken cittern-playing youths with long hair.
Tullia’s atrium was filled as before with a crowd of people seeking audience or some favor, and clients, and also-to my sorrow-Jews, whom my father would never be rid of. Tullia stopped talking to two well-known old gossips and to my astonishment came up to me and embraced me warmly. Her plump fingers glittered with rings and she had tried to hide the loose skin at her neck with a many-tiered necklace of jewels.
“It’s high time you returned to Rome from your travels, Minutus,” she cried. “When your father heard you had disappeared he was ill with worry, although I reminded him of his own conduct in his youth. I can see that you are quite well, you bad boy. Did you get involved in a drunken brawl in Asia, that you’ve got such ugly scars on your face? I was afraid your father would grieve to death over you.”
My father had aged, but in his capacity as senator, he bore himself with even greater dignity than before. When I looked at him after this long time, I noticed that his eyes were the most sorrowful I had ever seen on any man. We could not talk easily to one another, however glad he was to see me. I was content to tell him about my experiences and I belittled my imprisonment. Finally I asked him, mostly in jest, what the Jews still wanted of him.
“The Procurator in Judaea is now Felix, the brother of the treasurer Pallas,” said my father. “You must know him, the man who married a granddaughter to Cleopatra. Owing to his cupidity, complaints have been pouring in. Or rather, the Jews are eternal troublemakers for whom no one is good enough, and now someone has again gone and killed someone else somewhere. I think the whole of Judaea is in the hands of a band of brigands. Plundering and burning are going on there and Felix obviously cannot maintain order. The Jews are trying to take the matter to the Senate. But which of us wants to become involved in such things? Pallas is much too powerful to offend. And the Senate has genuine troubles in Armenia and Britain to contend with.
‘We meet at the Palace now,” my father went on. “Agrippina wants to listen behind a curtain to the discussions in the Senate. It’s certainly more comfortable there than in that fearful Curia, where some of us have to stand, if by some miraculous chance all of us happen to be there at the same time. You get frostbite in your feet there in the winter.”
“And Nero?” I asked eagerly. “What do you think of him?”
“I know that Nero wished he had never learned to write, the day he had to sign a death warrant for the first time,” said my father. “Perhaps one day he really will be the hope of mankind, as many genuinely believe. In any case, he has handed back part of the jurisdiction to the Consuls and the Senate. Whether this is a show of respect for the city fathers or to avoid having to go to trials in order to attend more pleasant amusements, I could not even guess.”
My father was obviously talking just for the sake of talking. He frowned, looked absently beyond me and did not seem to have the slightest interest in affairs of State. Suddenly he looked straight at me.
“Minutus, my only son,” he said, “what are you going to do with your life?”
“For two years I have lived in a dark cave,” I said, “humiliated and more wretched than a slave. A whim of the Goddess of Fortune has taken away two years of my life. If I were even capable of a constructive thought, then it would be that one day I shall retrieve those two years and be glad to be alive as a man, without moping unnecessarily and denying the bounties of life.”
My father gestu
red toward the room’s polished walls, as if including in the gesture all the pomp and grandeur of Tullia’s house.
“Perhaps I too live in a dark cave,” he said with deep melancholy in his voice. “I submit to duties for which I have not asked. But you are flesh of your mother’s flesh and must not be lost. Do you still have her wooden goblet?”
“It was only a wooden mug and the brigands in Cilicia didn’t even bother to take it away from me,” I said. “When we were given no water for several days and my tongue filled my mouth and our breath smelled like the breath of wild animals, sometimes I pretended to drink out of the goblet, imagining that it was full. But it wasn’t. It was only delirium.”
I was careful not to tell my father about Paul and Cephas, because I wanted to forget them as completely as if I had never met them. But my father said, “I wish I were a slave, poor and insignificant, so that I could begin my life all over again. But it is too late for me. The chains have already grown into my flesh.”
I was not attracted by this philosophical dream of a simple life. Seneca had eloquently described the blessings of poverty and peace of mind, but in reality he preferred to be bewitched by power, honors and wealth, explaining that they could not alter a wise man, just as poverty and exile had not been able to.
We ended by talking about financial matters. After consulting Tullia, who also had plans for my life, my father decided to transfer a million sesterces over to me at first, so that I could live as I should, giving banquets and making useful connections. He promised me more when I needed it, for he himself could not possibly spend all his money, however much he tried.
“Your father lacks an interest which would satisfy him at his age and fill his life,” complained Tullia. “He doesn’t even bother to go to lectures anymore, although I had a special auditorium built in the house, for I thought you would perhaps continue in a literary career. He could collect old musical instruments or Greek paintings and become famous for it. Some people breed special fish in their pools, others train gladiators, and he could even afford to keep racehorses. That’s the most expensive and the finest leisure occupation a middle-aged man can have. But no, he’s so stubborn. Either he frees a slave, or hands out gifts to useless people. Well, I suppose he could have worse amusements. With concessions on both sides, we’ve managed to find a way of life which satisfies us.”
They wanted me to stay for the evening meal, but I thought I ought to report to the Palace as soon as possible, before the news of my arrival reached there by other means. The guards did in fact let me in without searching me for weapons. The times had changed that much. But I was amazed to see how many knights were sitting in the arcades, waiting for an audience. I reported to several court officials, but Seneca was so weighed down with his enormous burden of work that he could not possibly receive me, and Emperor Nero himself had shut himself in his workroom to write poems. One was not allowed to disturb him when he was consulting the muses.
I was depressed when I realized how many people were striving in so many ways for the favors of the young Emperor. Just as I was about to leave, one of Pallas’ innumerable secretaries came up to me and showed me to Agrippina’s room. She was striding restlessly up and down, bumping into stools and kicking the valuable Oriental rugs to one side.
“Why didn’t you report straightaway to me,” she said angrily, “or have you too lost all respect for me? Ingratitude is one’s reward. I don’t think any mother has sacrificed so much for her own son and his friends.”
“Augusta, Mother of the Fatherland,” I cried, although I knew she had no right to these titles of honor. Officially she was only priestess to the god Claudius. “How can you reproach me for ingratitude? I dared not even dream of disturbing you in your widow’s grief with my insignificant affairs.”
Agrippina seized my hand, pressed my arm in her full bosom and breathed the scent of violets into my face.
“It’s good that you’ve come back, Minutus Lausus,” she said. “You’re a lighthearted man, despite your past mistakes, and that was sheer inexperience. At this moment, Nero needs his real friends most of all. The boy is indecisive and much too easily led. Perhaps I have been too strict with him. He seems to be beginning to avoid me deliberately, although at first he sat beside me in the same sedan or politely followed behind it. Perhaps you know the Senate has given me the right to ride all the way up to the Capitoline if I want to. Nero wastes insane sums of money on friends who are unworthy of him, cittern players, actors, racing men and various authors of works of homage, just as if he had no idea of the value of money. Pallas is very worried. Thanks to him, there was at least some order in the State finances during poor Claudius’ time when the Imperial treasury was kept strictly apart from the State treasury. Nero doesn’t understand the difference. And now Nero has become infatuated with a slave-girl. Can you imagine? He prefers meeting a white-skinned slip of a girl to his own mother. That’s no way for an Emperor to behave. And appalling friends egg him on to all kinds of immoral acts.”
Agrippina, strong-willed and beautiful, who usually behaved with the dignity of a goddess, was so upset that she was airing her grievances to me in a way which put too great a reliance on my friendship.
“Seneca has betrayed my confidence,” she cried. “The cursed slippery-tongued hypocrite! I was the one who brought him back from exile. I was the one to appoint him as Nero’s tutor. He has no one but me to thank for his success. You know there is trouble in Armenia now. When Nero was to receive an envoy from there, I went into the room to sit in my rightful place by his side. Seneca sent Nero to me to lead me out again, with a filial piety, of course. But it was a public insult. Women should not interfere in State affairs, but there is one woman who made Nero into an Emperor.”
I could only imagine what the Armenian envoy would have thought if he had seen a woman appearing in public at the Emperor’s side, and I thought Nero had shown better judgment in this matter than Agrippina. But of course I could not say so. I looked at her in terror, in the way one gazes at a wounded lioness, and I realized that I had arrived just in time to witness a decisive stage in the power struggle over who should rule Rome, Agrippina or Nero’s advisers. This I could not even have imagined, for I knew how completely Nero had been dependent on his mother before.
In my confusion I tried to tell her of my own adventures, but Agrip-pina had not the patience to listen. Not until I mentioned Silanus’ heart attack did she pay any attention.
“It was the best thing that could have happened,” she said. “Otherwise one day we’d have been forced to prosecute him for treason. That family have shown themselves to be snakes in the grass.”
Just then a servant hurried in and reported that Nero had begun his meal, late as usual. Agrippina gave me a push.
“Run, stupid,” she said. “Go to him now. Don’t let anyone stop you.”
I was so much under her influence that I did in fact half run and told the servants who tried to stop me that I had been invited to the Emperor’s evening meal. Nero was entertaining in the smaller dining hall, which held only about fifty guests. It was already so full that there were not enough couches, even though there were three people to each one, and several guests had to be content with stools. Nero was animated and carelessly dressed, but his pleasant youthful face radiated happiness. At first he stared at me, but then he embraced and kissed me, ordering a chair for me to be placed beside his own place of honor.
“The muses have been kindly disposed toward me,” he cried, and then he leaned forward and whispered in my ear: “Minutus, Minutus, have you ever experienced what it is to love with the whole of one’s soul? Love and be loved. What more can a human being wish for?”
He ate greedily and swiftly as he gave instructions to Terpnus, who was dressed in his full-length musician’s cloak, and who I did not even know was the most famous cittern player of our time until I was told about him. I was still so ignorant then. During the meal, Terpnus composed an accompaniment to the love poems
Nero had written during the afternoon and then sang them to the guests as they sat in breathless silence.
I lis voice was well trained and so powerful that it seemed to penetrate right through one, and after his song, sung to the cittern, we all applauded vigorously. I do not know how artistic Nero’s poems were, or to what extent they were derivative of other poets’ works, but with Terpnus’ performance they made a deep impression, and I am not particularly musical either. With feigned shyness, Nero thanked everyone for the applause, took the instrument from Terpnus and plucked at it longingly, but did not dare try singing, although many asked him to.
“One day I shall sing,” Nero said simply, “when Terpnus has had time to train and strengthen my voice with the necessary exercises. I know my voice has certain possibilities, and if I ever do sing, I want to compete with only the best voices. That’s my sole ambition.”
He asked Terpnus to sing again and again, never tiring of listening, and glaring at those who had had enough of the music and were beginning to talk quietly together over their goblets.
I myself finally found it difficult to suppress my yawns. I looked at my fellow guests and could see that Nero did not choose his friends with any exaggerated reference to their descent or rank, but followed his own persona] tastes.
The noblest of the guests was Marcus Otho, who, like my father, was descended from the Etruscan kings and to whose father the Senate had erected a statue in Palatine. But he had such a reputation for recklessness and extravagance that I remembered hearing that his father had often beaten him long after he had received the man-toga. Claudius Senecio was also among the guests although his father had been nothing but one of Emperor Gaius’ freedmen. Both were handsome young men who could behave well when they felt like it. Another of the guests was Seneca’s wealthy relative, Annaeus Serenus, to whom Nero whispered in the moments when Terpnus was silent, soothing his voice with an egg drink.