`Something special,' repeated Petronius thoughtfully.
On the assumption he was welcoming the offer, Macra cheered up. `As it's your first time being entertained here, it will be on the house. May I recommend Itia. She's a lovely creature, a freeborn girl who normally only works on private hire. One at a time suit you? For both together we would have to make a small charge, I'm afraid.'
`Freeborn?' asked Petro. `So you can tell me which aedile she's listed with, and her registration number?' Any freeborn woman who wished to shed her reputation could work as a prostitute, so long as she formally declared her profession and put herself outside the reach of the adultery laws.
As soon as Petro's attitude became clearer, Macra kicked the sleepy bouncer, who condescended to show an interest. He stood up.
`Sit down,' said Petronius pleasantly. The man sat down again.
Macra took a very deep breath. `If you scream I'll knock your head off,' said Petro, still in a level tone. `I can't abide loud noises. We're here to see Lalage.'
Macra managed to defer screaming. `Lalage is engaged at the moment.' It would be her stock rejoinder. The madam is never available.
.`Don't panic. We're not asking to query a bill.'
`Very funny! Is she expecting you?' Another tactic.
`She's a brothel-keeper,' said Petro. `Her whole life must be spent expecting questions from the law! Do you want fish pickle on it? Stop stalling. There's no point.'
`I shall go and enquire,' the girl informed him pompously. `Kindly wait just here.'
`No. You'll take us,' Petronius corrected. `Hit the grit.' She pretended not to know the expression. `Walk, Macra!'
With a curse she didn't much bother to muffle the girl led us in, swinging her hips in a parody of a seductive dance. Artfully untidy tangles of black hair swished on her bare shoulders. Her heels clattered loudly. She was grimy, and not very pretty, though she did have a certain style.
We passed a series of dim cubicles. Crudely obscene pictures above the doors made a feeble attempt at suggesting erotic art. The grunts we overheard were far from high culture. One customer
was washing himself from a ewer, so minimal hygiene must be provided for. There were cloak pegs and a sign to the latrine.
A small slave boy with a trayful of flagons dashed past us and dived into a room like an inn's refectory, where low-class men were crouched about tables either gambling or conspiring. Petro half-heartedly started to investigate, but the door swung across behind the slave and he gave up. Maybe it was just the weekly meeting of the chicken-feed suppliers' guild.
Up narrow steps we found a corridor with doors to larger rooms for higher-paying customers. We could hear a tabor being thumped, and smell insidious smoke. By now we had realised that Plato's was much more extensive than its street frontage suggested. It also provided for a varied clientele. I reckoned there were probably other ways in and out of it too.
The odour of burning bay leaves gave way to imitation frankincense. I coughed slightly, and Petronius grimaced. Further on Macra led us through a veritable banqueting hall. It had a sunken floor; Jove knows what orgies were carried out there. Tired flower petals still lay squashed on the steps. There was a statue of two entwined figures who appeared to have more than two full sets of procreative organs, though as we said afterwards, we might have been misled by some scraps of left over garland and the fact that a stone goat was also participating.
The corridor grew darker. From a room at what must have been the farthermost end of the building came sounds of an unexpectedly professional flute. Macra knocked, then kept the half-open door against her hip so we could not see past her. With a rapid apology she relayed who we were. A woman's voice swore briefly, then said, `I'm sorry for the intrusion. Look after him nicely please, Macra.'
There was an angry movement. A half-naked teenage-girl flautist pushed past Macra and vanished. Then a magistrate we could not fail to recognise walked out.
He did not deign to greet us. Petronius gave an ironic salute, and I squeezed against the wall so as not to dirty His Honour's purple stripes as he rushed by. The Very Important Patrician ignored these courtesies. Maybe that was because he was famous for his devotion to a cultured, highly connected, slightly older (but immensely wealthy) wife.
Macra sneered at us and flung open the door, releasing natural daylight amid curious wafts of violets and hydromel. She twirled off after the magistrate. We walked in to meet Lalage.
She had the face of a once very beautiful woman, painted so thickly you could hardly detect the sweetness it still carried. She wore a yellow silk gown, which she was casually readjusting after most of it had been removed to allow access to an oiled and perfumed body that made two honest citizens gulp. Her headdress contained Oriental pearls an empress would die for; her necklace was of mixed sapphires and amethysts; her arms were sheathed in bracelets of Greek gold filigree. Her eyes were angry. She did not welcome us to her establishment, or offer us a glass of the strong honeyed wine.
The notorious Lalage had a scar on her delicate left ear. It brought back nostalgic memories. She was pretending to be an elegant Oriental courtesan, but I knew exactly where this precious pullet came from. I had met her before.
XX
WILL THIS TAKE long?' Her voice had all the fluting charm of pebbles in vinegar cleaning out a blackened skillet. `We're expecting guests.'
`Lycians, maybe?' asked Petronius.
`You've got a nerve.' She was still pinning folds of her dress, more interested in how it draped than in dealing with us. `This had better be good,' she snapped, looking up abruptly. `Luckily we'd finished, or I'd kill you for interrupting that customer. He's my best client.'
`Who gets a personal service,' Petro commented.
`He knows this is where he'll receive the best!' smirked Lalage. I noticed her giving us a thorough squint: Petronius solid, tough and hostile; me less tall, but just as tough and even more disparaging.
`Left his lictors at home, did he?' I asked, in an offensive tone. I was referring to the mighty man's state-employed bodyguard; they were supposed to escort him everywhere, showing the axes and rods that symbolised his power to chastise. Or as Petro used to say, symbolising what a big donkey he was.
`We're looking after the lictors.'
`I bet! Lictors usually know how to park their' rods,' I said.
`A man should always take his lictors, Marcus Didius,' Petro reproved me gravely.
`Oh true, Lucius Petronius,' I corrected myself formally. `Leaving your lictors at home is the right way to make the wife suspicious.'
`And he's a magistrate, so he must be a clever man! He'll know how to bluff the old broomstick he left at home in his atrium. Besides, I expect the lictors only keep quiet about his habits, provided they get theirs -'
`Spare me the comedy!' Lalage interrupted. She swung her bare feet to the floor and sat up on the edge of her couch, an ornate affair with bronze curlicues all over it, dripping with cushions of the type that are described as `feminine'. I could think of several women who would shove Lalage out of a window and fling her tasselled and pleated pink fripperies after her – not so much for moral reasons, but in disgust at her decor.