Pompeii (12 page)
“Now, that’s the greatest villa on the bay,” said Torquatus. He nodded toward an immense colonnaded property that sprawled along the shoreline and rose in terraces above the sea. “That’s the Villa Calpurnia. I had the honor to take the new emperor there last month, on a visit to the former consul, Pedius Cascus.”
“Cascus?” Attilius pictured the lizard-like senator from the previous evening, swaddled in his purple-striped toga. “I had no idea he was so rich.”
“Inherited through his wife, Rectina. She had some connection with the Piso clan. The admiral comes here often, to use the library. Do you see that group of figures, reading in the shade beside the pool? They are philosophers.” Torquatus found this very funny. “Some men breed birds as a pastime, others have dogs. The senator keeps philosophers!”
“And what species are these philosophers?”
“Followers of Epicurus. According to Cascus, they hold that man is mortal, the gods are indifferent to his fate, and therefore the only thing to do in life is enjoy oneself.”
“I could have told him that for nothing.”
Torquatus laughed again, then put on his helmet and tightened the chin strap. “Not long to
Pompeii
now, engineer. Another half hour should do it.”
He walked back toward the stern.
Attilius shielded his eyes and contemplated the villa. He had never had much use for philosophy. Why one human being should inherit such a palace, and another be torn apart by eels, and a third break his back in the stifling darkness rowing a liburnian—a man could go mad trying to reason why the world was so arranged. Why had he had to watch his wife die in front of him when she was barely older than a girl? Show him the philosophers who could answer that and he would start to see the point of them.
She had always wanted to come on holiday to the
Asia
to
Rome
, lost in grief, when he found himself contemplating the Mediterranean shore. Afterward he described his feelings to Cicero, who had also just lost his daughter: “There behind me was Aegina, in front of me Megara, to the right Piraeus, to the left Corinth; once flourishing towns, now lying low in ruins before one’s eyes, and I began to think to myself: ‘How can we complain if one of us dies or is killed, ephemeral creatures as we are, when the corpses of so many towns lie abandoned in a single spot? Check yourself, Servius, and remember that you were born a mortal man. Can you be so greatly moved by the loss of one poor little woman’s frail spirit?’ ”
To which, for Attilius, the answer still remained, more than two years later: yes.
He let the warmth soak his body and face for a while, and despite himself he must have floated off to sleep, for when he next opened his eyes the town had gone, and there was yet another huge villa slumbering beneath the shade of its giant umbrella pines, with slaves watering the lawn and scooping leaves from the surface of the swimming pool. He shook his head to clear his mind, and reached for the leather sack in which he carried what he needed—Pliny’s letter to the aediles of
Pompeii
, a small bag of gold coins, and the map of the
Augusta
.
Work was always his consolation. He unrolled the plan, resting it against his knees, and felt an immediate stir of anxiety. The proportions of the sketch, he realized, were not at all accurate. It failed to convey the immensity of Vesuvius, which still they had not passed, and which must surely, now he looked at it, be seven or eight miles across. What had seemed a mere thumb’s-width on the map was in reality half a morning’s dusty trek in the boiling heat of the sun. He reproached himself for his naÏveté—boasting to a client, in the comfort of his library, of what could be done, without first checking the actual lie of the land. The rookie’s classic error.
He pushed himself to his feet and made his way over to the men, who were crouched in a circle, playing dice. Corax had his hand cupped over the beaker and was shaking it hard. He did not look up as Attilius’s shadow fell across him. “Come on, Fortuna, you old whore,” he muttered and rolled the dice. He threw all aces—a dog—and groaned. Becco gave a cry of joy and scooped up the pile of copper coins.
“My luck was good,” said Corax, “until he appeared.” He jabbed his finger at Attilius. “He’s worse than a raven, lads. You mark my words—he’ll lead us all to our deaths.”
“Not like Exomnius,” said the engineer, squatting beside them. “I bet he always won.” He picked up the dice. “Whose are these?”
“Mine,” said Musa.
“I’ll tell you what. Let’s play a different game. When we get to
Pompeii
, Corax is going out first to the far side of Vesuvius, to find the break on the
Augusta
. Someone must go with him. Why don’t you throw for the privilege?”
“Whoever wins goes with Corax!” exclaimed Musa.
“No,” said Attilius. “Whoever loses.”
Everyone laughed, except Corax.
“Whoever loses!” repeated Becco. “That’s a good one!”
They took it in turns to roll the dice, each man clasping his hands around the cup as he shook it, each whispering his own particular prayer for luck.
Musa went last, and threw a dog. He looked crestfallen.
“You lose!” chanted Becco. “Musa the loser!”
“All right,” said Attilius, “the dice settle it. Corax and Musa will locate the fault.”
“And what about the others?” grumbled Musa.
“Becco and Corvinus will ride to Abellinum and close the sluices.”
“I don’t see why it takes two of them to go to Abellinum. And what’s the Greek kid going to do?”
“Polites
stays
with me in
Pompeii
and organizes the tools and transport.”
“Oh, that’s fair!” said Musa, bitterly. “The free man sweats out his guts on the mountain, while the slave gets to screw the whores in
Pompeii
!” He snatched up his dice and hurled them into the sea. “That’s what I think of my luck!”
From the pilot at the front of the ship came a warning shout—“
Pompeii
ahead!”—and six heads turned as one to face her.
She came into view slowly from behind a headland, and she was not at all what the engineer had expected—no sprawling resort like Baiae or Neapolis, strung out along the coastline of the bay, but a fortress-city, built to withstand a siege, set back a quarter of a mile from the sea, on higher ground, her port spread out beneath her.
It was only as they drew closer that Attilius saw that her walls were no longer continuous—that the long years of the Roman peace had persuaded the city fathers to drop their guard. Houses had been allowed to emerge above the ramparts, and to spill, in widening, palm-shaded terraces, down toward the docks. Dominating the line of flat roofs was a temple, looking out to sea. Gleaming marble pillars were surmounted by what at first appeared to be a frieze of ebony figures. But the frieze, he realized, was alive. Craftsmen, almost naked and blackened by the sun, were moving back and forth against the white stone—working, even though it was a public holiday. The ring of chisels on stone and the rasp of saws carried clear in the warm air.
Activity everywhere. People walking along the top of the wall and working in the gardens that looked out to sea. People swarming along the road in front of the town—on foot, on horseback, in chariots, and on the backs of wagons—throwing up a haze of dust and clogging the steep paths that led up from the port to the two big city gates. As the
Minerva
turned into the narrow entrance of the harbor the din of the crowd grew louder—a holiday crowd, by the look of it, coming into town from the countryside to celebrate the festival of Vulcan. Attilius scanned the dockside for fountains but could see none.
The men were all silent, standing in line, each with his own thoughts.
He turned to Corax. “Where does the water come into the town?”
“On the other side of the city,” said Corax, staring intently at the town. “Beside the Vesuvius Gate.
If
”—he gave heavy emphasis to the word—“it’s still flowing.”
That would be a joke, thought Attilius, if it turned out the water was not running after all and he had brought them all this way merely on the word of some old fool of an augur.
“Who works there?”
“Just some town slave. You won’t find him much help.”
“Why not?”
Corax grinned and shook his head. He would not say. A private joke.
“All right. Then the Vesuvius Gate is where we’ll start from.” Attilius clapped his hands. “Come on, lads. You’ve seen a town before. The cruise is over.”
They were inside the harbor now. Warehouses and cranes crowded against the water’s edge. Beyond them was a river—the Sarnus, according to Attilius’s map—choked with barges waiting to be unloaded. Torquatus, shouting orders, strode down the length of the ship. The drumbeats slowed and ceased. The oars were shipped. The helmsman turned the rudder slightly and they glided alongside the wharf at walking pace, no more than a foot of clear water between the deck and the quay. Two groups of sailors carrying mooring cables jumped ashore and wound them quickly around the stone posts. A moment later the ropes snapped taut and, with a jerk that almost knocked Attilius off his feet, the
Minerva
came to rest.
He saw it as he was recovering his balance. A big, plain stone plinth with a head of Neptune gushing water from his mouth into a bowl that was shaped like an oyster shell, and the bowl
overflowing
—this was what he would never forget—cascading down to rinse the cobbles, and wash, unregarded, into the sea. Nobody was lining up to drink. Nobody was paying it any attention. Why should they? It was just an ordinary miracle. He vaulted over the low side of the warship and swayed toward it, feeling the strange solidity of the ground after the voyage across the bay. He dropped his sack and put his hands into the clear arc of water, cupped them, raised them to his lips. It tasted sweet and pure and he almost laughed aloud with pleasure and relief, then plunged his head beneath the pipe, and let the water run everywhere—into his mouth and nostrils, his ears, down the back of his neck—heedless of the people staring at him as if he had gone insane.
HORA QUARTA
[
hours]
Isotope studies of Neapolitan volcanic magma show signs of significant mixing with the surrounding rock, suggesting that the reservoir isn’t one continuous molten body. Instead, the reservoir might look more like a sponge, with the magma seeping through numerous fractures in the rock. The massive magma layer may feed into several smaller reservoirs that are closer to the surface and too small to identify with seismic techniques . . .
—AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE,
NEWS BULLETIN, “MASSIVE MAGMA LAYER FEEDS
MT. VESUVIUS,”