Suddenly, there was a gasp from the lower tiers and an ironic cheer from the upper stands. Rufus didn't hear the gate opening, but he knew he was now being stalked by Africanus. This was the game they had played during the long weeks of training.
But the helmet did not know and now the helmet was even more puzzled. Were they cheering it? Really, it? Oh, it was so undeserved. There was no need. The helmet acknowledged the acclaim with a wave of its unwieldy sword.
Africanus kept low to the ground, each deliberate movement of his huge paws taking him nearer the solitary, unsuspecting figure in the centre of the arena.
Still the helmet's vacant eyes remained fixed on the crowd. Ah, this was the only place to be, among the finest and most courtly people on earth. The helmet nodded its gratitude.
The suspense grew with each inch the lion moved closer to his victim. By now most of the mob was captivated by the heart-stopping hunt unfolding before them. They held their collective breath. But the helmet's eccentric vulnerability had endeared it to a few of the younger spectators and one could not help herself screaming out.
The helmet looked even more puzzled. Who? Where? What?
Rufus counted the seconds in his head. Now the voice had been joined by a hundred other shouts of warning. Africanus was crouched feet from his back. Three, two, one… Africanus was in the air, his hooked claws outstretched to tear the unsuspecting body in front of him.
Oh, look! The helmet had seen something glinting in the sand. It bent to pick it up.
Rufus felt the disturbed air as Africanus sailed across his back, missing him by less than the width of one of the loaves he had baked for Cerialis. He heard the roar of the crowd as the big lion rolled head over heels towards the edge of the arena.
The helmet turned towards the opposite side of the arena, shaking in wonder at all this undeserved attention. Oh! They liked him too?
The roars turned to laughter and applause.
Then the second lion snarled her presence.
Now the suspense of the hunt was replaced by the thrill of the chase.
The helmet ran this way and that, sometimes from the lions, sometimes towards one or the other, but always somehow missing the lethal claws and fangs by a matter of inches. The lions roared in frustration; the helmet waved his long sword in defiance.
But what was this? The helmet was tiring, his stride faltering. He stopped.
The lions stopped too.
The helmet bent at the middle, chest heaving as it pumped in great breaths of air.
The lions lay, tongues hanging from their mouths.
The helmet straightened. It looked at the lions. The lions looked back. Agreement was reached. The chase was on again.
Half the crowd was urging on the lions. The other half was cheering the fool in the giant helmet. Both were happy.
Somehow, the helmet found itself in an open-ended barrel. The lions pushed the barrel around the arena in a great circle. The mob cheered the lions.
Somehow, the helmet escaped the barrel and stood its ground, its unwieldy sword drooping impotently. The mob still cheered the lions.
Now was the time for blood. The fool in the helmet was dead.
The lions roared in triumph, but the sound was instantly drowned by a thunder of hooves more powerful than anything the crowd had heard before.
The monster had come.
This was the moment Rufus had spent hundreds of frustrating, muscle-aching hours practising. The rhinoceros was notoriously unpredictable, but he discovered he could judge her moods just enough to trust her for the few fleeting seconds he needed. As the slabsided grey bulk charged past him in a cloud of dust, he threw down the sword and helmet and sprang on to her broad back, somehow managing to keep his balance as the monster bucked and swayed beneath him and chased the lions from the arena.
Her job done, the great beast ambled to a halt in the centre of the arena with Rufus still crouched over her hindquarters. As the dust cleared, he slowly straightened, raised his arms to the skies and bowed low at the waist.
At first, there was a shocked silence. Then a buzz of puzzled conversation. The buzz grew louder as the seconds passed, and turned into an explosion… of laughter.
Rufus had won.
Cupido was the first to congratulate his young friend as he walked from the arena, quickly followed by an over-excited Fronto.
'We were wonderful,' the animal trader exulted, his face wreathed in smiles as his mind calculated the possibilities for future profit. 'I will organize the next performance for two weeks today. We will make it an appetizer for the main event. After all, the mob is going to want to see real blood at some point. We will play every arena in Rome, and when everyone in the city has seen us, we'll go on tour. I can just see it — '
'I'm not going out there again.'
Fronto gaped. 'But the crowds, the money, the… But…' He stuttered to a halt.
Rufus turned to Cupido. 'I can't go out there again.'
Cupido nodded gently. He, of all men, understood what Rufus was saying. For some, the cheers of the crowd were a drug. The waves of acclaim that flowed down from the stands mesmerized them, and when they strutted from the arena they lived only for their next performance, even though they knew it might be their last. But for others, the wall of sound chilled the blood and shattered the nerves. If these men were gladiators they died, reactions slowed by the same power that gave others incredible speed. If, like Rufus, they were given a choice, they never returned. He had used every ounce of his courage to perform before the mob. He had nothing left to give them.
Rufus turned to Fronto, who still stood with his mouth open. 'I won't go back,' he repeated. 'But I can train men who will.'
'What?' The word came out as a strangled croak and Fronto grasped dramatically at his chest. 'Are you trying to kill me, boy?'
'I'll train our animals to work with athletes and clowns who know how to please a crowd better than I ever could. And you're right, we should go on tour. When the Romans think they have seen everything we have to offer we will come back with a bigger and better performance. We can use other animals, other combinations. We cannot fail.'
Tears ran down Fronto's cheeks into his beard. He hugged Rufus to his chest. 'You are like a son to me. I always knew I could put my faith in you. Come, we will discuss this further over some wine.'
They walked away, leaving Cupido in the darkness. What might have been a smile touched his lips.
Rufus was proved right. Their initial celebrity proved a powerful attraction and entertainers flocked to the menagerie asking for work. Rufus trained man and beast hard and anyone who did not make the grade was quickly weeded out. The lions were soon joined in the arena by the other big cats, even bears, but it was the rhinoceros that always drew most cheers. Only the bravest would take to her broad back to escape the teeth and claws of the hunters.
They were successful, but their fame never matched that of Cupido, whose reputation grew with every kill he made. And he made many, particularly in the great games held in memory of the Emperor Tiberius, who died that year, the twenty-third of his reign. The games were sponsored by his joint heirs, his great-nephew Gaius and his grandson and namesake Tiberius Gemellus.
VIII
Gaius Caesar Augustus Germanicus studied the view from the great pillared window overlooking the house of the Vestals. He wondered idly what they did in there apart from keeping the flame. It might be interesting to find out. His eyes moved over the arched frontage of the venerable Basilica Aemilia, the walls of the forum of Augustus and the octagonal dome of the temple of Mars, and onward over the villas and mansions to the terracotta plain of pitched roofs that disguised the slums and cesspits of Subura the way a blanket covered the sores on a leper's legs. How many years was it since Romulus founded this city? He should know, but the date escaped him. Now it was all his. Or almost.