The Boat of Fate (14 page)

The horror that filled me, as soon as the words were out and unretractable, I remember to this day. All was quite obviously over between us, but before she left the spot I would give her something more permanent than a memory. Some of that Patrician blood of which she was so inordinately proud would be spilled forthwith; I had been played with more than long enough.

Obviously she saw the intention form in my eyes. She turned to bolt, but for once she wasn’t quite quick enough. I grabbed for her, caught the dress instead. She tripped, rolling across the grass; and the whole thing pulled from the clasp, came away in my hands.

Beneath it she wore nothing but a little loincloth, scarcely larger than the garment in which I had first seen her and drawn tightly between her thighs. The sight inflamed me. I flung myself on her, one hand between her legs squeezing and kneading at what I found there; and my stilus, the bronze spike I always carried in my belt, flew out and landed on the grass. She grabbed for it, fast as a snake, lashed up at my face. I flung myself away; and she changed her aim, stabbing savagely at my hand where it rested on the ground. I felt a blow, a dumb and painless shock, and stared down amazed. The little weapon, needle-sharp and driven with all her force, had passed completely through my hand; the tip protruded a clear inch from the palm. Twin streams of blood were already running from the wound, uniting at my wrist to drip to the grass by her feet.

I sat back, stupidly. It seemed that horror and surprise had driven all sensation from me. I remember thinking absurdly that this just would not do; I could hardly go about with a metal spike poking through my palm. I gripped the handle of the thing, tugged till it came free with a creaking against bone. I had thought the wound would close; instead blood spurted brightly. Fear came then in a great flood, and blackness at the edges of my sight; and I was beating her where she still lay on the grass, and she was screaming at the full pitch of her lungs.

I think I might have killed her, but a shadow flicked across me and some instinct, gained maybe from those years of training with Marcus, made me roll violently to one side. The slave overbalanced, grunting; the hand-sickle he carried, that would certainly have buried itself in my back, wasted its stroke on the air. He was up instantly, coming at me again. Injured as I was and unarmed, I was in no condition to face him; but there was no time for decision or conscious thought. My legs were already pumping, carrying me to the wall. He was close behind as I gained the top; the hook swung, missing me by inches. I fell heavily from the tree, rolled to my feet and set off for the city at a stumbling run, trying as I went to staunch the wound with the torn edge of my tunic.

In my bemused state I was convinced I was still pursued, that any moment the blade would come slicing at me again. The sun burned on my shoulders and back, dazzled from pavements and reeling white walls. I wept and cursed, calling on Hadrian and Marcus, Julia, Calgaca; while ahead the roaring grew, mingled finally with the pounding in my ears. Fear and grief robbed me of what sense I owned; my one thought was to escape, to my bed, to my room, lie and lie in silence and let the sickness go away.

My chest was hurting. I was aware, dimly, that my legs still pounded, but I could no longer feel the pavement beneath my feet. Round me the din seemed solidly to fill the air; there were eyes and hands and faces, shouting mouths. The pressure of bodies was immense; it was as if I ran not in air but some thick, impeding fluid. Time after time I thought I saw my own street in front of me, but all streets were the same. The blackness was back, leaping and flickering. I reeled, like somebody drunk; and the pavement rose, quite slowly it seemed, to punish my knees. The hands found me instantly, and the faces. I wrenched away, and thought I was running again; but this couldn’t be, for the paving still pressed my shoulder and side. I squeezed my palm between my knees, trying to stop the huge, hollow ache.

Cloth flapped before my eyes, poppy-bright. They had my wrist, they were trying to lift and turn. I was raised, unresisting. Above me I saw the roof-edge of a building, dark against the hot blue sky; and a statue on its column, white face remote, apple-small and blazing like a god.

The noise, though still immense, seemed more remote, like sounds heard in a tunnel or great vault. Also I was shivering; I was glad when somebody draped a cloth round my shoulders. I sat indifferently, seeing between the legs of the crowd the swirl of wheels and hooves, feeling the shaking of the ground where Theodosius Augustus passed in glory.

The Emperor dealt leniently with Rome. For days the field army camped under the walls while the city accorded him the honours that were his due; at the end of that anxious time of waiting he made his intentions known. Almighty God, he told a packed and silent Senate, had once more manifested his divine will. By his hand the Empire’s enemies had been scattered, the doubters silenced for ever. Therefore let all men. praise the Lord for their deliverance. Meanwhile, as a reward for faithfulness, he named his younger son Honorius as Caesar of the West. For Rome herself he had prepared a unique honour. Other cities might surpass her in the arts of government, but from henceforward her Bishop would be foremost in the councils of the Church; through the good Damasus her voice would once more be heard in world affairs. How Symmachus and his party received the news was not recorded; for the moment it was enough that Theodosius departed, grey and worn, for Constantinopolis. There less than six months later he was to die, leaving a child of thirteen the master of our fates.

Shortly after the Augustus and his followers left Rome the guards at the Aurelian Gate witnessed a curious sight. A singular traveller passed through, headed away up the long slope of the Janiculum. It ill became the dignity of such a man to walk; accordingly he had hired a bobtailed mule, across which he sprawled ungracefully, muffled in a variety of tunics and scarves although the day was warm. He wore an ill-fitting ginger wig; over it, to protect himself from the dangerous glaring of the sun, he had clamped a floppy-brimmed straw hat. From time to time he sniffed, rubbing his nose with the back of his hand or blowing it vigorously into a large and insanitary kerchief. Some natural infirmity, coupled with the broken-down gait of his mount, imparted to his movements a peculiar bobbing motion; it was as if he ducked and weaved incessantly to protect himself from the blows of an invisible assailant. The guards, who were used to oddities, watched the voyager stolidly out of sight before returning to their contemplation of the sailing clouds and sky.

Petronius Gratianus received my uncle courteously. Wine was produced, a sweet mulsum, and trays of nuts and confections. A lesser man than Lucullus might have been subdued by the opulence of his surroundings; my uncle pecked and gobbled, seeming oblivious to the material evidence of wealth, while the conversation wheeled ponderously round to the purpose of his visit. Some of that conversation I heard afterwards from Marcus; the blanks I can fill in readily enough for myself.

The Senator was affable to a degree. Certainly the affair was regrettable, unfortunate in the extreme; but as it happened no lasting mischief had been done. He himself was prepared to overlook the whole business; after all, he had enough to engage his energies without troubling his head over the fate of the odd trespasser in his grounds. And--here was the point--the boy had offered violence to his daughter; he could still find himself dragged most unpleasantly through the courts, were Petronius so inclined. Thank the Gods the girl had had enough spirit to defend herself; the intruder--pardoning Lucullus’ presence--had, after all, only got what he deserved. No, there had been upset enough. Daughter hysterical, wife in tears ... he was prepared to drop the whole matter, forget it. Indeed he insisted on it. The Senator rose, giving Lucullus a decent cue to leave.

My uncle, who had finished an entire bowl of sweets, looked round mournfully for more. None was forthcoming. He stared at the Senator regretfully. His twitch had become worse, as it always did in moments of high stress. His head, large and irregular-featured, rolled alarmingly; his speech thickened and blurred; but Petronius was uncomfortably aware that throughout the performance two eyes like beads of steel remained clamped unwaveringly on his face.

Court cases, agreed Lucullus, were unpleasant in the extreme. But while the subject was in the air ... the boy was sick, might easily die. In that case some action ... almost inevitable. Endless repercussions. Manslaughter, one might almost term it. Perhaps even ... murder ... The word seemed to hang between them in the air, unpleasantly.

The Senator relaxed, gracefully. Obviously the situation stood in need of further clarification. What exactly did the good Lucullus have in mind?

Very little, really. This was a social visit, purely social; the Senator, of course, appreciated that. A mere chat between friends. Regardless of its outcome, the business could easily have an adverse effect on the reputation of the household. Rome, unfortunately, was a city of rumours. Should a certain tale, for instance, be carried through the streets of... say, for the sake of example, Subura … The girl ... beautiful girl, the Senator’s daughter ... waiting to receive ... ah ...
lovers
, beside the wall .. . Results difficult to assess. Could bring troupes, positive regiments, of undesirables ... house besieged ... the retreat to Neapolis could yet become something in the order of a rout.

All in all, a quiet settlement was to be preferred. A little favour, between friends. The lad was useful certainly, but headstrong. In need of discipline. After all, he’d never make an architect. Heart not in it. A new start perhaps, at some little distance from Rome ... My uncle shrugged exaggeratedly. The farther away, he seemed to be suggesting, the better.

The Senator understood, perfectly. And agreed, After all, for a man with his connections the affair would be easy to arrange. Light broke across the curious battlefield, and Lucullus rose, with all the dignity of the Fathers of the People themselves, hobbled back to his round of eyedrops and cough mixtures, pease-pudding and beds and chairs.

Sometime, I opened my eyes. Marcus was with me. His face seemed to swim in sharp light, though the rest of him was shadowy and vague. I remember thinking inconsequentially how old he had begun to look; the lines deepened on his face, hair at his temples iron-grey and white. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘you’ve got what you’ve been asking for. And I hope you’re satisfied. If that becomes infected you’ll get a damn sight more.’ He turned then, I saw, and left the room, tramping heavily away down the stairs. It was the last thing I was to see clearly for some days.

By midnight the pain in my arm had worsened; by dawn--or maybe the third day or the second, I lost all real count of time--it was intense. It seemed I held the sun gripped in my palm; when I raised my arm, with a creaking of great doors and bones, his hot juice ran to the shoulder, leaving behind streaks and traceries of bright-coloured flesh. The pain heightened by degrees. It was as if I climbed a range of hills; each plateau gained, which was a resting, however slight, from agony, led to a worse steep; each steep took me farther from comfort and help, from what I had known as life. My senses told me Marcus was close; but I could neither speak to him nor understand his voice, he seemed separated by great gulfs from where I hung or floated. I have wondered since why I came so close to death. I was young, and healthy; there seemed no cause for the poisoning of the wound. Except that as I have grown older I have come to believe the mind and spirit, the insubstantial parts of man, to be intimately connected with the flesh. If the soul is sick, no potion or medicine will be of use; the body will also pine.

Certainly in my lucid moments I saw no reason for continuing to live. I searched my memory time and again recalling every meeting with Julia, every word that had passed between us. Could she have lied so persistently? It seemed absurd; what on the wide earth had she stood to gain? Where then had I sinned, where lay the fault that had led to such bitterness? I could find nothing; in all the time I had known her I had remained faithful to my dream. So it seemed my crime lay simply in being poor; an eccentricity no woman, least of all a Roman, was ever likely to forgive. It was I who had tried to take everything, giving nothing in return. When I remembered what I had proposed I cringed with self-contempt. I would have dragged Julia from home and family, made her share my poverty in Subura; for what? I saw myself clearly for the first time; bumbling and clumsy-bottomed, shod like an Hispanian colt, whining and scrabbling for things outside my reach. And I had dared to feel rage at her refusal! Sweat stood on my forehead at the very thought. Then the agony would come again and I would wonder why I had not seen before that Julia, my griefs and sad estate, were shadows. All that mattered, all that a man should ask, was that there be an end to pain.

Marcus fetched a harassed Precinct doctor, practically lugging him up the stairs by the scruff of his robe. What he did to call me back to life I can’t say, but I remember lying sleepily, without pain. Rome, it seemed, was calm in evening light; a mellow light, very golden and clear. The noise of the Circus rose over the city, like the cheering of a distant sea; above, many Gods floated in the crystal sphere of the sky.

I woke, in our room; a square, cold little room, smelling of cabbages and rain. The raindrops banged and clattered, bouncing from the one high sill; others tinkled from the ceiling, falling into buckets and an earthenware bowl. As my senses adjusted, the noise receded. I would have drifted back to sleep, but the persistent shaking of my shoulder roused me. Marcus was leaning over me. He seemed pleased by my recovery; though why he should roar with laughter and rattle papers underneath my nose was more than I could understand. He let me rest, finally; later he read the words to me, again and again, till my brain could take them in. I reached for the things then, dimly. Everything was in order; here was my posting, countersigned by the office of the Praefect of the Gauls, here the chit authorising me to draw my kit and stores, here the pass entitling me to levy horses at staging posts throughout the West. I examined the seals again, too confused for thought. My life had been changed once more; I was to serve Honorius Caesar as a Tribune in the Army of Rome.