Anatolius observed it was certainly a strange circumstance that servants whose names were not known to history could become as famed as their master.
As they emerged into an atrium graced by a fountain set about with curved benches, Crinagoras’ commentary ran on as ceaselessly as the water splashing into the pink marble bowl.
“Sometimes it’s as hard laboring to find the right word as it is to dig a ditch. On the other hand, now and then inspiration strikes as suddenly as the tortoise that fell on the head of Aeschylus over there. Though not as fatally, of course.”
Anatolius, ruefully remembering a few of his youthful more than impertinent verses about Empress Theodora, thought that in some circumstances poetry might indeed prove fatal.
“Now, take Demosthenes,” he replied, unable to resist playing the game Crinagoras had started. The statue to which he called attention depicted a man in his later years, his thin face wrinkled and brow furrowed. “No doubt he would have orated at length about Diogenes there going about with a lantern looking for an honest man in broad daylight! Considering the lurid reputations of some who regularly patronize of this establishment, his would be a lengthy task, I fear.”
Crinagoras nodded appreciation. He fluttered a hand toward the marble Alcibiades standing guard at the entrance to the baths.
“Handsome fellow, isn’t he, especially for a general? Even if he did wear his hair at such barbaric length,” he sniffed. “I suppose when one is successful one can carry it off. Anyway, it isn’t going to grow any longer!”
Anatolius scowled. His companion’s hair did not look that much shorter than the statue’s. Worse, the comment had reminded him of a man named Thomas, whose hair had been overly long, and who was a barbarian to boot. Not to mention he’d paid far too much attention to John’s daughter Europa.
Why should he suddenly think of people he had not seen for years?
Crinagoras’ prattling about his long lost beloved Eudoxia must have put the thought in his mind, not to mention his own preoccupation with Lucretia, another person from his past. With death everywhere, those who were gone, who were dead, seemed no less substantial than the living. All might soon join together in the legions of memory.
Even as the thought occurred to him he visualized his old mathematics tutor again, as harrowing a presence as if he were actually standing nearby.
Anatolius had truly tried to put Lucretia out of his memory as surely as her marriage to Balbinus had removed her from his life.
She simply refused to leave.
Perhaps Crinagoras, with his endless agonizing over the departed Eudoxia, was not entirely wrong about the way of things.
***
It was late morning by the time they reached the cemetery between the city’s inner and outer walls. Crinagoras climbed off his mount with the grace of a one-legged septuagenarian, lamenting about the sad state of his nether regions.
They might have ridden all the way to Rome rather than up the Mese, Anatolius thought in exasperation. “Let’s have a look at some of the epitaphs you wrote,” he suggested.
They picked their way between innumerable fresh mounds of earth. Surprisingly no burials appeared to be in progress in the necropolis.
The wind had shifted and the smoke that had so often shrouded the city in mourning during the past weeks drifted overhead in ragged clouds. Anatolius could taste it in the air. The sudden thought that the smoke carried specks of the dead chilled his blood.
Crinagoras limped theatrically to a modest tomb, little more than a marble box with a steep roof and pillars at each corner.
“Here is the very first verse Paraskeve commissioned.” He read the chiseled inscription. “It says ‘Here lies the earthly husk of Didia, beloved wife of the baker Julius.’ Husk, you see, because the husband made his living from grain. Much more subtle than the tomb-maker’s notion of appropriate decorations.”
He pointed at the carved wheat sheaves embellishing the pillars, all that distinguished the tomb from many of its neighbors.
“The architecture may be less than classic,” Anatolius ventured, “but marble will preserve your words long after the last piece of parchment touched by your kalamos has crumbled into dust.”
Crinagoras sniffed. “This dreadful smoke is burning my eyes. I am not ungrateful for the work, you understand. It’s just that I feel I’m neglecting my duties toward my dear Eudoxia. It’s been a while since I’ve composed a poem for her and even longer since I sold one.”
They walked through the miniature city of tombs. A bird sang, bees buzzed in the grass.
Crinagoras stared thoughtfully in the direction of the inner wall from which they had just ridden. “If it weren’t for the smoke, it’d be hard to imagine what we’ve just left. All those deserted streets, the endless lamentations reminding us how near we are to death.”
“Not to mention it is right underfoot.”
Crinagoras looked down hastily. “How could I forget!”
Strolling along, they stopped to admire other examples of the poet’s work.
“‘Do you caress my cold stone, tickle my mossy epitaph with your warm fingers? Alas, I know not, for I am dead,’” Crinagoras declaimed.
“I like this one,” Anatolius said. “‘You have journeyed far, now here you are.’”
“It is just as I told you,” Crinagoras declared suddenly, seemingly in response to a conversation he’d been carrying on in his head. “You scoffed at the notion, but you are blessed because Lucretia is still alive. With life there is hope and with the odious senator on his deathbed, you may well be reunited with your beloved after all. Fortuna smiles on you.”
“Yet why on me and not on Balbinus? Am I more deserving?” Anatolius smiled wanly. “That is a question not worth asking, for it is unanswerable.”
“It’s the unanswerable questions that are the most interesting. Besides, I can tell you why you deserve Fortuna’s favor. You are a man of tender feelings, my friend, just like myself.”
Anatolius came to a halt. “I can’t help my feelings, Crinagoras. Yet it’s wrong to wish for happiness at another’s expense.”
“The senator stole her from you. Her family arranged the marriage. She didn’t want it. Would you wish Lucretia to be deprived of her happiness as well?”
“I admit it,” Anatolius confessed shamefaced. “I am hoping her husband will die.”
“Believe me, Anatolius, I know how it is. Lucretia is the sun in your sky. When she married, I feared you might throw yourself into the sea.”
“I try not to recall that time. Not to mention it’s just as likely the fellow who sells me wine threw himself into the sea when I regained my senses and his sales declined so drastically.”
They resumed walking, completing a circle around the lonely space. Not far from the narrow road by which they had entered, a particularly unusual tomb caught Anatolius’ eye. It resembled the Great Church, but reached only as high as his chest.
“Come along.” Crinagoras sounded impatient. “We don’t have time to dawdle over every monument in the place. Remember, it’s some distance yet to Nereus’ estate.”
Anatolius’ gaze slid across the miniature edifice. “You’re in a hurry all of a sudden. I see there’s an inscription on this tomb. It’s one of yours, isn’t it?”
“Well, yes, but do hurry up. At this rate it’ll be dark before we even get to the estate.”
“What is it? Why don’t you want me to read it?” Anatolius bent slightly to make out the epitaph carved into the small church replica. “‘I am only a dead dog, but my tomb is more magnificent than the candlemaker’s.’”