She nodded. ‘Indeed, or so the cloth-woman told me. She had it from one of the maidservants, who calls at the cloth stall very often. The pontifex does not like it — if he were a flamen his wife would have to wear simple, homespun clothes, but Aurelia Lucilla will have none of it. Apparently she keeps a maid whose only job is to buy dyed cloth and to attend her robes. What a lucky life!’
I smiled. ‘To have a servant only for your clothes?’
She looked surprised. ‘I meant to spend your life with nothing more to do than to choose fine wool and sew a bit, and then sponge your mistress’s stains with lavender and brush her hems each time she wears the gowns!’ She broke off. ‘I don’t mean you, dear master — but when I think of what some of my owners demanded of me!’
I winced. Gwellia never spoke much about her life as a slave. It still pained me to think of all the indignities she must have endured. But giving her that assignment in the market had been a good idea. It seemed to have given her back her confidence to speak freely to me — though she still lapsed into silence if I looked at her too long.
‘Go on,’ I said, turning my attention to the stew again.
She needed no further encouragement. ‘And there is another maid whose only job is to prepare her unguents, and bring the sheep’s milk for her beauty wash. That’s because Aurelia’s husband won’t have goat’s milk in the house: it is forbidden to the Flamen Dialis and he won’t allow her to have it, either, so she insisted on ewe’s milk instead. Claims that she had these luxuries in her father’s house in Rome, and would not consent to be sent here to marry the old priest without them.’
The spoon stopped halfway to my lips. ‘She comes from Rome, too? Now that I didn’t know. I was aware that he did, originally.’
Gwellia nodded. ‘From one of the oldest patrician families in the city. And so was she — and both their sets of parents were married in the old religious style. That is why he married her, they say. There aren’t so many people who fulfil those requirements, but the old man needed a wife who did, apparently, if he hoped to be appointed to the flamen’s post. The Emperor himself suggested the arrangement — since there was no other candidate in view.’
I swallowed another mouthful of soup. ‘No wonder he was disappointed at being passed over as flamen. He must have thought it was a certainty, with the Emperor taking an interest in his chances.’ Everyone knew that the senior priestly posts were largely political appointments.
Gwellia looked thoughtful. ‘Of course, Marcus Aurelius was emperor in those days, and he may not have intended that at all. The girl’s family was under his protection and he may simply have wanted to repay a favour. The girl was just of marriageable age, but apparently she had been a bit wayward at home — too many smiles for cavalry officers with good looks and no money — and her father was delighted to see her wed. At least that is what the cloth-woman said. It seems Aurelia didn’t want it in the least.’
‘And she submitted?’ It was a foolish question. Obviously once the Emperor had made the suggestion it would have been impossible for either party to refuse.
Gwellia gave me a look which said more than any words. We both knew that few Roman families take a bride’s inclinations into consideration — not when there is money, status and political connection hingeing on the match.
I said hastily, ‘She laid down conditions, though, you said?’ That was much more unusual.
Gwellia nodded. ‘They were accepted readily enough. The would-be priest was not short of money, and all he really wanted was a wife who’d last his tenure through. But he didn’t get the flaminate. They offered him the priesthood here instead. Though even now he hasn’t given up hope of being appointed, one of these days, when the current flamen dies.’
I was doing some rapid calculation. By Celtic standards Romans marry young — a girl can be a wife as soon as she is twelve. That meant Aurelia was now perhaps twenty-two or — three. Young enough beside her husband, certainly, but still a little older than I’d guessed. ‘Of course,’ I said, aloud, ‘I hadn’t thought of that. The Flamen of Jupiter must have a wife, and if he chose her before he came to Glevum. .? She must have been married to him for many years.’
Gwellia leaned forward, as if the walls were listening. ‘It all depends, citizen, on what you mean by married. Poor girl. The cloth-maker says that in fact she is barely wife to him at all — the old man is too terrified of losing her in childbirth to come anywhere near her. He’d never find another wife with her qualifications, and then he could never be flamen. Or that’s what the household slaves report. But that’s not all. Do you know who the young lady was?’
I looked at Junio. He was more in touch than I was with the chatter of the town. But he shook his head.
‘Who was she?’
‘None other than the niece of that very Fabius Marcellus you are expecting here.’ Gwellia produced this sentence with a flourish, like a praestigiator at a festival conjuring a coin from a spectator’s ear.
Like the magician’s trick, it made me gasp. ‘Fabius is her uncle? Surely not. If her family were favourites of Marcus Aurelius. .’ I hardly needed to complete the sentence. All the world knew that almost the first act of Commodus, when he attained the imperial purple, was to remove his father’s favourites by exiling or even executing the most important men in the city — especially after an early assassination plot hatched by his own household. ‘Fabius would hardly be singled out as a legatus now, if his family supported the old emperor.’
‘He might be these days, master, with respect,’ Junio put in. ‘Look at His Excellence the Governor Pertinax. He was out of favour, wasn’t he, at first — and then brought back when things were difficult?’
The boy was right, of course. Pertinax had once been exiled in disgrace, but — since Commodus’s personal favourites proved themselves, one by one, as treacherous and unreliable as their master — he had been reluctantly reinstated and even given the governorship of this troublesome province. And now he was about to be promoted to still higher things.
I looked hopefully at Gwellia, but she shook her head. ‘If Fabius Marcellus was ever out of favour, I don’t know. But when Optimus knew him in the legions he was already rising fast, we know that — and that must have been in Marcus Aurelius’s time.’
That was well argued, and I should have thought of it. I had been teaching Junio to help me in my deductions, and now here was Gwellia out-thinking me. I nodded, in what I hoped was a judicious manner. ‘Exactly so. It seems Fabius Marcellus has somehow managed to continue in favour, despite the change of emperor. I wonder what service he provides Commodus?’ I pushed aside my plate and allowed Junio to refill my water beaker. ‘And speaking of Optimus, as we were, you learned something about him too, I think you said?’
‘He has a big house very near the temple-’ she began.
I couldn’t resist interrupting. ‘As I know, since we have just visited the place.’
She flushed. ‘Of course, master,’ she said humbly, and I felt ashamed. ‘It is merely that, being so close to the temple, it is also close to the chief priest’s house. Of course Optimus has a wife, she followed him around the legions and he married her as soon as he was free of the army, but she is no longer young. While Aurelia. .’
I was so astonished that I jumped up from my stool. ‘You mean that Optimus and the chief priest’s wife. .?’
‘Nothing as strong as that, dear master. This is women’s gossip, that is all. Only Aurelia’s servants say that last year Optimus came to the high priest’s house to arrange a sacrifice, and was invited to take refreshment with the pontifex — that is a signal honour, as you know. Aurelia was there, they say, and Optimus and she were very conversational — though the old man was too self-absorbed to see what was under his nose. Since then, there have been several “accidental” meetings — when Aurelia goes out into the street, or takes a litter, it’s odd how often Optimus is there. It is even rumoured that his steward was seen delivering a letter to her once.’