Meanwhile her slave-woman prepared a hot bath in her porphyritic pool. Naked, she went into the bathroom before me and asked me with tears in her eyes to do everything as swiftly as possible. I opened the vein in the fold of her elbow as tenderly and painlessly as I could with a sharp knife in the hot water. She tried to ignore the pain so as not to hurt me, but could not keep back a slight groan.
When the blood began to well up to the surface of the water and color the balsam-scented bath red, Antonia asked me to forgive her for her weakness, and told me that because of her rich and sheltered life, she had never become used to even the least unpleasantness. She used to stick pins into the breast of the slave-woman who brushed her fair hair if the woman pulled it.
As I held Antonia, leaning over her bath, one arm around the back of her neck, my mouth against hers, her hand in mine, my own life seemed so worthless that I asked to be allowed to die with her.
“That’s the greatest courtesy any man has ever paid me,” she whispered in a feeble voice, kissing my ear. “But you must go on living for the sake of our son. Don’t forget all the advice I have given you for his future. And remember, too, to put one of your old Etruscan gold pieces in my mouth before my jaw is bound and I am made ready for the pyre. That will be the most beloved and the last gift I shall receive from you, although I have to give it to Charon to pay him. He’ll know then to treat me according to my rank. I should not want to be crowded by the mob on the ferry.”
A moment later her lips parted under mine and her grip on my hand loosened. But I continued to hold her slim fingers and kiss her beloved face until the end came.
When she was dead and I could not feel the smallest breath, I carried her bloodstained body back to the bed and quickly washed the bloodstains from myself. To my delight I saw that Antonia used my Gallic freedman’s latest Egyptian soap. Naturally it was not exactly Egyptian, but manufactured in Rome like all his other soaps and popular tooth powders. But people paid more for soaps if he gave them fine names.
After I had dressed, I called in the centurion and the soldiers to witness that Antonia had voluntarily committed suicide, and then I left her body to the slave-woman, after first putting into her mouth one of the ancient gold pieces which my freedman had found in some old graves in Caere. I asked her steward to see that it was not stolen, for I had to hurry back to Nero.
In the tension of waiting, Nero had drunk quite a quantity of wine after his lion game, and he thanked me in surprise for having fulfilled my unpleasant task so rapidly. Once again he assured me that I could retain my inherited land in Britain and he himself would put in a word for me in the Curia so that I should receive a senator’s stool. But I have told you about that. I am relieved to have got the saddest part of my story written down.
Compared with all that, it seemed a mere bagatelle when two weeks later I nearly lost my life because of Antonia. Fortunately I had friends who informed me of the investigations Nero had started in connection with Antonia’s will. In this way I could prepare Claudia in time, although the whole of my plan was distasteful to her.
I still do not know why Antonia, an experienced and politically minded woman, felt she had to remember you in her will, although I had warned her against just that. Before her death I did not mention her will again. We had other things to talk about and to be honest, I completely forgot about the thoughtless promise she had made when she wanted you to take the name of Antonianus.
Now I had to be rid of Rubria immediately, for as the eldest of the Vestals, she was the only legal witness to your real origins. I do not wish to tell you any more of my meeting with her. All I shall say is that before that I had to go and see old Locusta in the pleasant country place which Nero had given her. In the garden she and her pupils cultivated many medicinal herbs while, with superstitious thoroughness, she observed the positions of the stars and the phases of the moon at the sowing and harvesting of her seeds and roots.
To my delight, Rubria’s unexpected death did not arouse any surprise among the physicians. Her face had not even darkened, so well had Locusta developed her art in her old age. But Nero was glad to allow her to test some of her medicines on certain criminals who deserved nothing better.
My visit to Rubria did not lead to any questions, for she usually had many visitors in the Vestals’ atrium. So I was able to wall into my secret hiding place the sealed document in which she had certified Claudia’s descent, repeated the confession of the dead Paulina and confirmed that Antonia had regarded your mother Claudia as her real half sister, and in confirmation had given you the name Antonianus.
From several outward signs I noticed beforehand that I had fallen in disfavor and so was not surprised when Nero summoned me. Indeed, I thought I was well prepared.
“Tell me about your marriage, Manilianus,” said Nero, chewing his lips, his chin trembling a little, “as I know nothing about it. Try to give me a credible explanation of why Antonia has remembered your son in her will and has even given him her own name. I did not even know you had a son except Epaphroditus’ bastard.”
I avoided his eyes and tried to the best of my ability to tremble with fright, and I must say that I did not have to make all that great an effort to do so. Nero thought I was hiding something.
“I should have understood if Antonia had been content to leave the boy just her Uncle Sejanus’ signet ring,” Nero went on. “But it’s incredible that she has left him some of the Julian family jewels which she inherited from Claudius’ mother, old Antonia. Included in them, among other things, is a shoulder insignia which the god Augustus is said to have worn in the field and at State sacrificial ceremonies. Even more extraordinary is that your marriage is not written in any of the books and your son is not in the new census, not to mention the rolls of the Noble Order of Knights, although the prescribed time has long since run out. There’s something very fishy about the whole thing.”
I threw myself down at his feet and cried out in feigned regret, “My conscience has been troubling me about it, but I am so ashamed that I’ve never been able to reveal it to any of my friends. My wife Claudia is a Jewess.”
Nero burst into such a violent laugh of relief that his thick body shook and tears came to his eyes. He never liked to send people to their deaths on mere suspicion, least of all his real friends.
“But Minutus,” he said reproachfully, when he could speak again, “to be a Jew is no shame in itself. You know perfecdy well how much Jewish blood has been mixed into the best families for hundreds of years. For my dearest Poppaea’s sake, I cannot regard the Jews as any worse than other people. I even tolerate them in the State service, within reasonable limits, of course. While I rule everyone is regarded as equal as human beings, whether Roman, Greek, black or white. So I tolerate Jews too.”
I rose and looked suitably sorrowful and embarrassed.
“If that were all, then I should not hesitate to introduce my wife to you and my friends,” I said, “but she is descended from slaves too. Her parents were poor freedmen of Claudius’ mother, Antonia, that is, your grandmother in some ways. That’s why she’s called Claudia. You must see why I am ashamed of her. Perhaps that’s why Antonia wanted to give the boy some cheap jewelry in memory of her grandmother. It was my wife who wanted him to be called Antonianus.
“But still,” I went on, trembling with excitement and anger, “that will, which came as a complete surprise to me, is just an attack of Antonia’s boundless ill-will, to bring me under suspicion. She knew I had denounced Scevinus, Piso and the others, although she could not have known that for your safety and driven by my conscience I should be forced to denounce her as well. In truth, I do not regret that in the slightest”