The Ides of April (12 page)

Like anyone who has ever spent a long period as an unloved starveling, I ate my full share. I never waste food. Like any freedman from a privileged home, the archivist had been spoiled all his life. Whatever the miseries of slavery and of patronage after formal manumission, he had never had to earn his keep. Rome was full of people like him, who knew there would always be free food at home and who gave no thought to waste. He snatched at enough of the pork nuggets to keep him going, then concerned himself with other things.

This meant, first the sliding of the arm. Then, stroking the back of my neck. Then, engaging more closely. He had one hand moving up my left arm, with his fingers encroaching well under my tunic; he had one hand cupping my chin for a kiss. Although my real concentration was elsewhere, I was fumbling with fasteners, to assist him. He was preparing to fondle where I was desperate to be fondled . . .

I became reacquainted with that thrilling but slightly awkward moment when you adjust to a brand new lover. You are wondering what he will be like. Not quite in tune yet. Not absolutely certain that you have an understanding. Not wanting to admit your own desperate interest, in case you have misjudged his, and end up looking foolish . . .

Of course I knew. Andronicus was my kind of hero: attractive, amusing, nice-looking, around my own age, of low-class origins and hungry for self-improvement. He made me laugh; how badly I had been missing that. He seemed devoted. We discussed my work, we ate and enjoyed wine together, we were plainly soulmates. I had fallen for him just about as hard as it is possible to fall. The fact that all my family would cluck that I had not known him long enough, and would warn me to be careful, only made the situation swooningly attractive.

As we approached the final moment of full commitment, we were completely wrapped up in each other – yet not too much to be unaware of our surroundings. At exactly the same instant we both heard somebody coming. We pulled apart and tried to look nonchalant.

Normally I heard visitors. Shoes or boots are noticeable if you are an alert person, and after six flights, most people arrived breathless and stumbling noisily. Someone who had managed not to do that was now outside, at the top of the stairs. This person had approached so quietly it could only be on purpose. They had crept up on us and were right outside my door, shamelessly fiddling with the latch.

I
recognised the man who broke in. I had despised him at our first encounter, the time he barged into me at the aediles’ office; I took against him furiously now. It was the fellow called Tiberius, who was supposed to act as a runner for the magistrates.

He was stocky, the way my plebeian grandfather had been – not overweight, yet strong in the body, with sturdy legs. His shoulders could have broken down my door had he not successfully manoeuvred the latch instead. Today he was in a porridge-coloured tunic in some rough material that must be itchy; he kept scratching absent-mindedly, though I saw no fleas hop off. A wide, crude belt held him in. The same cloak as last time was folded over one shoulder; this must be his informal indoors mode.

If the aedile’s uncle chose his slaves for their beauty, he must have sent a short-sighted steward the day this man was first purchased, assuming he had once been bought in the slave market. The unshaven face gave him the classic look of any worker on the Roman streets. He could be a driver or a rent collector. More than a manual labourer, however: a man doing some job that called for competence, with considerable trust from whoever employed him. There was nothing timid in his manner.

‘Cosy!’ he commented sourly. He had sized up the situation between Andronicus and me, even though we were acting unflustered. It was the first time I had heard him speak. His accent was more refined than his appearance suggested. Like the archivist, he was presumably a freedman now. He would have been encouraged to develop a diction to suit their well-off home.

I glared. ‘Most people knock,’ I stated in a cold voice. ‘Most people think they should let a householder believe that the right to admit visitors lies in their own control.’

Tiberius gave me a steady, half-amused stare. He had grey eyes. I always notice that. Mine are the same. His were a chillier colour; mine had been blue when I was younger.

The general crowd in Rome have brown eyes, though there are many of blue and grey. Nero had blue eyes. Grey is not significant. I was never going to fantasise that this fellow might be related to me. All the same, I do notice.

‘You are Flavia Albia!’ He did not wait for a snappy retort. It was just as well, because I was so surprised at the way he burst in that no ideas were flowing. Inevitably, I would find plenty of thoughts to sum him up later. The wit would not be complimentary.

He turned his attention to Andronicus. ‘You have been missed – at work and at home.’ Andronicus showed no reaction. Tiberius snapped back to me. ‘I need to speak with you – not now. It’s too late and, frankly, it’s inconvenient. I am putting you on notice. I shall call tomorrow morning. Be in − if you can manage that for once.’ I gathered he had tried to find me previously. Once more, he spoke to Andronicus. ‘I am going to the house for dinner. You can walk with me.’

It was not exactly an order. Still, the way he spoke left little choice. As a ‘runner’ he was no more than a messenger, even if the errands he was sent on meant his master trusted him. He was several years older, though hardly superior to an archivist, least of all one who had been assigned that role in a major temple. As his equal, therefore, I half expected Andronicus to argue. Instead, he shot me one of his rueful looks and swung to his feet, ready to leave with the other man.

I tried to understand. Andronicus might be reluctant to admit that there was something between him and me. I knew better than to question the dynamics of a strange household, but if he left meekly, I was bound to start wondering if I had been wrong. If, after all, we were
not
soulmates.

They did leave together. I heard their feet clattering downstairs, this time even Tiberius making a noise as he went. As far as I could tell, they were not speaking.

I was furious, tantalised, passionately disappointed.

I did what women have to do: I tidied the office; took the Stargazer’s titbit skewer downstairs to wash and return to the caupona tomorrow; retreated glumly to my apartment; went to bed alone.

That night I heard the terrible, near-human screams that I knew to be the foxes. It was unlikely anyone else noticed. Violence and fear were commonplace in the hours of darkness and few would want to investigate.

It reminded me that soon officials of the Temple of Ceres would be setting traps to catch the necessary animals for their horrible ritual. That plebeian aedile, Manlius Faustus, would be supervising the Games, so he must have an interest in the ritual with the torches. It made another reason for me to dislike him.

I
woke feeling groggy. Though sluggish and bitter, I was determined to rebel against the abominable Tiberius. No stubbly factotum would command me to stay in for an appointment. Nor would I ever forgive his interruption of my tryst. It was clearly malicious; he broke us up last night deliberately.

I lay for a while in the arid mood of a physically frustrated woman. I looked around the apartment, remembering how my husband and I had made love here together with such energetic young joy.

I had brought no man here since I lost him. This had been our place. After eight years, it was unsentimentally
my
place, where I could do as I chose; even so, only a really good love affair would make me break the chaste regime I had imposed on these rooms after Lentullus died.

I was now ready to allow a new man in; I knew that.

It would have been, could have been Andronicus last night, even though my head said it was too soon in our relationship to open my home to him. I was half glad he had pre-empted me by rushing up to the office. On the other hand, if we had been secreted here in my apartment, Tiberius would never have found us . . . Although Andronicus was a vibrantly intelligent man, he had apparently not noticed there was no proper bed up in my office. He cannot ever have wondered where I usually slept. No informer would have missed that point.

There had been men before. I was no Vestal. Well, these days not even the Vestals were Virgins. If the rumours were true, all those hard-faced venerated women took lovers. As for me, I had on–off affairs, occasionally with people I liked a lot. None lasted. Being truthful, none so far had been connections I really wanted to last. I took one or two of the least dopey to family occasions, though that was never a success. Their deficiencies were soon exposed because Manlius Faustus was not the only person in Rome who used background checks; I had my personal scrutineer, whether I wanted it or not. Once our loving father scented any male interest in one of his daughters, he soon prepared an informer’s dossier on her suspect friend. He had been doing this professionally for a lifetime, so he was brutally good at discovering faults.

That tended to kill the passion. Most lovers soon ran off, petrified. Sometimes the dossier contents made me keen to dump the lover anyway.

Hey ho.

To thwart the runner and the high-handed ‘appointment’ he thought he had made with me, I scrambled out of bed early, gathered my things and went out to Prisca’s bathhouse, ready to lounge there all morning. I could take a bite of breakfast from the pedlar who circulated with a snack tray. During official opening times he had palatable warm sausages; in the morning all he could produce were last night’s offerings – but I think that on occasions a mature cold sausage, congealed in its fat, is an end in itself.

Prisca let me in and had her usual moan about me turning up before lunch. I told her anyone with a love life was likely to do that. You have to plan ahead. She offered to recommend a trepanist who drilled holes in skulls, a good one who mostly managed not to kill people, because if I was getting a love life I needed my brain seeing to.

I went through the cleansing rooms, taking my time. Serena happened to be there so I placed myself in her hands for a renovating massage. Some baths employ huge masseurs, mountains of flab who give powerful workouts. Serena was so slim and tiny it seemed impossible she could manipulate anybody, yet she would spring up onto the platform where she laid out her victims and kneel right on you with her whole weight, crunching tight muscles magnificently. I liked the fact she never wanted to talk. Who wants gossip while you are being forcefully tied in knots?

All I desired today was to flop while she did whatever was necessary, leaving me to dream of the archivist, with his bright eyes and appealing expression, and what I knew had been his plan last night, to have his wonderful way with me . . .

It was a short dream. While I was lying there naked on the slab, we heard a male voice angrily arguing with staff out in the anteroom. I was shocked. The aedile’s runner had tracked me down and was even attempting to interview me
here
. I shot an appalled glance at Serena. She was an astute young woman and always conscious of clients’ modesty. By the time the obnoxious Tiberius shouldered his way into the treatment room, Serena had dropped a towel across my midriff – though baths are notoriously mean, so it was a small towel.

My privates stayed private. All the rest was clean, oiled, toned, and on display. He had a good view. At least that unsettled him. Reddening up, he backed out, while rudely ordering me to get dressed and come to speak to him. Serena took him on without even consulting me, pushing him from the room ahead of her, with the flat of her hand against his chest. She called to me from the corridor that she would collect my things for me from the manger in the changing room.

‘Let the repulsive bastard wait!’ I snarled loudly.

I was up off the slab already. My tunic and sandals, as Serena well knew, were hanging from a wooden hook here in the massage room. I wriggled into the tunic, before dragging the treatment slab sideways, including the trestle it rested on. When it was close to the wall, I scrambled up on it, climbing towards a high, square unglazed window that lit the room. I could reach, but the opening was very small. This needed planning.

I could go out the obvious way, squeezing through head-first, but that was the fool’s choice. The exterior wall of the building was smooth, with nothing I could grasp and I would have to drop down outside head-first too, inevitably breaking both arms and cracking my head open when I landed. A man might try that way, stupidly hoping for the best, but I made myself struggle with the sensible method: stayed inside and pushed my feet out first, so I could then shimmy over the sill, clinging on to it while I twisted to face the wall and lowered myself as far as possible. Eventually I could land more safely.

I did this. I was proud of myself. The window was so small that the tunic I hoped would shield me runkled up as I squeezed out; the wooden frame then scraped my skin like a cheese-grater. As I descended, I was also treated to admiring whoops from the courtyard, where the two women who played at being gladiators had been knocking about. They had been alerted when I threw out my sandals. If they were lesbians, they were receiving a big treat as they watched me emerge, bared from the armpits down and backside first. I slithered out, pulling my tunic after me as best I could. They had the kindness to catch me; I dropped to ground level, without too much indecent groping.

I thanked them for their assistance. They were leering unashamedly. As I shook down my garment, I reckoned they deserved that thrill.

Zoe and Chloe introduced themselves. They already knew who I was.

They rushed me to a back exit that we all knew. They forced the locked gate by leaning on it (they were hefty girls and unafraid of strain), while I hopped about strapping my sandals on.

I thanked them again. I shot off down the alley. They cheered and I heard the gate close after they went inside again.