If the first lines did not mark me for a fool, then what followed surely would. There was a young poet who had been causing a stir around town with his frank and irreverent verse. His name was Valerius Catullus. My master was particularly fond of him because occasionally his caustic wit would nip at the heels of his nemesis:
Caesar, I have no great desire
To stand in your good graces,
Nor can I bother to inquire
How fair or dark your face is
It was from one of Catullus’ other short poems that I stole the following fragment…
Once, bright days shone for you,
when you came often drawn to the girl
loved as no other will be loved by you.
Then there were many pleasures with her,
that you wished, and the girl not unwilling,
truly the bright days shone for you.
… and sent it off to Livia.
If one cup of honeyed wine steadies the hand that drinks it, then a second will surely calm them both. Pouring one, then another and downing them quickly, I filled a third and stared at it, wondering if I might not be straining the boundaries of this dispirited philosophy. What was I thinking? Earlier that day, when we believed the line drawn for the length of our lives had been abruptly shortened with alarmingly little notice, Livia took my hand. What of it? In such a moment of fear and stress, I might have clung to Malchus had he stood but a little closer. What foolery to misconstrue the reflexive grasp of a friend’s hand as a token of love.
The unexpected fragrance of sweet rush and myrrh joined the cool breath of air that flowed from the peristyle, across the colonnade and into the kitchen. I looked up. Livia drew aside the heavy portiere and padded barefoot through the opening. “I’m cold,” she said, walking to the opposite side of the table where I sat. Without invitation, she picked up the untouched third cup of wine and drank its contents without pause for breath. “Better.” She threw off the thick, woolen shawl draping her shoulders, tossed a scrap of parchment toward me and leaned over the table, hands askew, elbows locked.
Misery! She had thrown the poem back in my face. I could not bear to look at it. Instead, I stared wide-eyed at her transformation. She wore a skin-tight, ankle-length dress in the Egyptian style, of a fabric so sheer imagination became as superfluous as thought. The wide, beaded collar around her neck stopped just above the swell of her barely covered breasts. Her eyelids and lashes were darkened by galena, matched by wings of malachite that swept up from below her eyes to reach almost to her temples. Her hair was tied at the base of her neck but she had draped it over her right shoulder and bound its mass with a coiled, silver snake. There was heat in her eyes that outshone the glow of the lamps.
“You have avoided me ever since that day in the balnea.”
“You have been drinking,” I said.
“And it’s working, too. I have almost forgotten the day’s events.”
“Where are you going dressed like that?”
Livia laughed. “Back to bed, if you’re not quick. I’ll have more wine.”
I poured and as she drank, admitted, “I have been avoiding you.”
“You’re afraid of me.”
“I’m afraid of being spurned by you. Again.” I hope you’ll agree that I deserve some modicum of credit for confessing that one as intelligent and quick-witted as I might at the same time be as callow as a Vestal.
“I’m here, aren’t I? Maybe you should read that,” she said, gesturing at the scrap of parchment before me.
I took a breath, picked it up and found a different fragment by Sappho:
The sinking moon has left the sky,
The Pleiades have also gone.
Midnight comes-and goes, the hours fly
And solitary still, I lie.
“Have I not made my feelings clear,” Livia said, “or was my kiss that day not up to your standards.”
I shook my head and lowered my eyes to the table. “What standards? One needs to have a base of comparison…”
“Stand up.”
“Why? What are you going to do?” I rose, not as steadily as I had planned.
“Be impetuous.” She leaned further across the table. “Now put your mouth on mine.”
Her lips were glossy with the taste of honey and cassia. I disappeared into that kiss, and if thinking were a talent I still possessed, I would have wished that the soft mingling of breath and lips would never end. Breaking that embrace was a fall from timeless skies to a mundane present, and neither of us had a desire to remain earthbound.
“Where can we go?” she asked.
“Don’t move,” I said. I pushed the lamps and wax tablets aside and to the astonishment of us both climbed up and over the long worktable and into her arms. It was simply too far to go around. We held each other’s faces in our hands and for a moment let our eyes speak the language our mouths had just relearned.
“Take me to your room,” she said.
“We can’t. It’s just down the hall from dominus and domina. The clinic?”
“Too far. I will wait no longer. What about there?” She pointed behind me to the locked door of the pantry. I fumbled in my tunic to pull out the chain holding the key. A second necklace, entangled in the first, glinted dully.
“My scallop,” Livia said. “You’ve kept it all this time.” Her eyes had become brighter in the lamplight.
“If that bracelet of shells had not come undone that day under the statue of Apollo…”
“But it did, and we are here now. You were so clumsy trying to retie the string about my wrist you woke me from my nap. This is fine silverwork,” she said, untangling the two chains.
“Not my doing. Dominus insisted his atriensis wear a chain worthy of the station. He meant it as a gift, but I prefer the string.”
“Perhaps these links were made with metal mined from Laurion.” My smile crumpled. “How ironic if a gift from Crassus to you had something of my mother forged within it.”
“Livia.”
“Forgive me, that was a stupid thing to say. I cannot help but miss her, but you are not to blame. It is you that I want, Alexandros. Very much. It is my curse: my mouth will be speaking long before I even think to advise silence. You know,” she said, her eyes atwinkle, “perhaps I acquired this evil trait from you.”
I laughed, and surprised myself by saying, “I shouldn’t wonder. But you have taught me how two mouths may hold each other speechless.”
“Then let us be silent, but not still.” We walked to the pantry door holding the lamps and each other.
With the key in the door, I turned to Livia and said, “Are you certain?”
“My sweet man,” she said, caressing my cheek, “this is the time for you to be silent.”
Once inside, we kissed again. The press of our bodies soon made plain the state of my arousal. I pulled away. “Livia, I…”
“Shhh.” She put her fingers to my lips. “You are safe with me,” she said.
“I am unschooled,” I said, my face reddening.
“Then, for once, I shall be your teacher.”
Chapter XIV
56 — 55 BCE Winter, Rome
Year of the consulship of
Cn. Cornelius Lentulus Marcellinus and L. Marcius Philippus
Now that the first of the year had passed, an interrex had been “found” friendly to my master’s cause; the names of Crassus and Pompeius had finally been put up for consul. In the morning, Betto and I met the line of shivering clients waiting to greet their patron in the daily salutatio. We told them dominus was sleeping late, took their lists of requests and promised to pass along their good wishes. Betto then gave each client a purse of 2,000 sesterces with instructions to spread the word among the people that stability and the end of violence could only come with the election of these two venerated conscript fathers, Crassus and Pompeius. They trudged back down the hill, blue-lipped but content. My own people would be following close behind with campaign encouragement in the guise of jingling leather purses.