Calm now, she turned to the right, ambling along under the colonnade. The columns were a pretty pink, with white bases and tops. Most of sculptures and paintings she could not identify. Unable to read their inscriptions, to her they were just a young athlete, a beautiful girl, or a grizzled wrestler. But some she knew. Here was Venus climbing from her bath, and over there was the shrine of Ganymede, with the convenient privacy of its hedges. It was deserted now, but memories of other days at that naughty little shrine made her smile.
She turned the corner, and made her way towards the offices of the Prefect of the City. Sometimes she liked to go into the public room, and look at the great marble plan of the city on the wall. It made her feel like a bird or a goddess gazing down at Rome, as if able to peer into the lives of all those people in the endless buildings, and then soar away. Once an earnest young man standing beside her had said it was odd that South was at the top of the plan. He was trying to pick her up, but she had asked him why. He had looked at her strangely, and said because North was at the top of most maps. When she had again asked why, he had looked put out, obviously not knowing the answer.
The offices were shuttered and chained today. Everyone said that the Prefect of the City had not been seen since Vitalianus had been murdered yesterday morning, and certainly the Urban Cohorts had remained in their barracks. Apparently the Prefect was a friend of Maximinus. Some said he had fled north to the protection of the tyrant.
I smell a she-wolf. Three men were sitting by the doors. They were unshaven, dirty, and were passing a jug from hand to hand. Normally the guards would have shooed their sort away.
Come and have a drink, little she-wolf.
Caenis ignored them, and went to walk past.
One of them reached out, and caught the hem of her gown. Just a little fun, no need to be stuck-up.
Caenis pulled her gown free, saying she had to get to work.
Start early, the man said. We have money.
She walked on.
One of the others laughed. Turned down by a Quadrantaria.
Caenis bristled; how dare he call her a quarter-ass whore.
Come back here. She sensed the man who had grabbed her getting up.
She walked faster, knowing the others were on their feet too, that they would all follow her. There was no one in sight.
Come back here, and get what is coming to you.
They were gaining, she hitched up her gown, and started to run.
Fucking bitch, one shouted.
She darted to the left, down between a row of stalls, then right along a flowerbed, cutting towards the nearest gate. Their footfall slapped on the earth behind her.
There were two men, a little way off.
Help!
They turned, took in the situation, shrugged, and turned away.
She burst through the gate. No one. The Street of the Sandal-makers was near deserted; just an old beggar off to the left, slumped against the base of the statue of Apollo. Of course, fear of unrest must have driven away the fashionable young men, and shut all the bookshops.
Her pursuers crowding through the gate, she sprinted towards the statue. There was a bar there, The Lyre, if it was open, and she got inside, she might be safe.
Her head jerked back, searing pain as one of them grabbed her hair. Her legs went out from under her. She landed hard, agony driving up her spine.
Over there, do her up against the wall.
She was half-pulled, half-dragged across the street. They pushed her into a corner formed by a buttress, crowding in at her.
You should have taken the money, bitch.
Hands were hauling her gown up her legs, pawing her breasts, pushing between her thighs.
Show us what you have got.
The neck of her gown was torn open, her breast-band yanked up.
Look at those tits.
She was forced to her knees. No point in fighting now, they would beat her, perhaps mark her for life.
The man who had first accosted her, undoubtedly the leader, unbuckled his belt, pulled up his tunic, and fumbled in his breeches.
Get the old beggar. Let him have a go after us.
The laughter died. The man facing her spun around, his penis still in his fist.
Caenis tugged her gown together, gathered her legs under her, waiting for a chance to run.
Put it away, and go. The speaker was her neighbour, young Castricius. The old die-cutter stood with him.
The man laughed, with no mirth and little conviction. A boy and an old man.
One of the others had a knife in his hand.
Castricius shook his head. Leave.
Run along, boy.
Last chance. Castricius spoke softly, as if saddened by the stupidity of the world.
Fuck off, and take your grandfather with you.
One hand stuffing his penis back into his breeches, wrestling with the buckle of his belt, with the other the leader tugged a knife from the sheath on his belt.
In a moment, all the men, even the die-cutter, were crouched forward, balanced on the balls of their feet, steel flicking this way and that.
The die is cast. A strange, unreadable emotion slid across Castricius thin, angular face.
A sudden movement, making Caenis start. A scuffle of feet and a grunt of pain. The die-cutter was down, clutching his thigh. His assailant bent over him.
Neatly, Castricius stepped inside the knife of the third man, and stabbed him deep in the stomach.
Before anyone else could react, with the grace of a dancer, Castricius whirled, and again faced the leader.
The man who Castricius had stabbed dropped his weapon, and curled over, blood flooding out between his splayed fingers. He has done for me.
Yes, Castricius replied, never taking his eyes off the other two. And now I will deal with your friends.
The leader backed away. The remaining man joined him. Their eyes flitted between each other, their friend gasping his life out in the dirt, and the long blade in Castricius hand.
We will get you one day, the leader shouted. Then they turned, and ran.
Caenis sprang up to do the same.
Give me a hand with him. Castricius was kneeling by the old man, cutting the material away from the wound, peering closely at it.
She wanted nothing but to run.
We have to get him away, before the Watch arrive.
Caenis had to live in the same block with them. Tugging her clothes into some decency, she went to help the die-cutter.
Chapter 8
Rome
The Senate House,
The Nones of March, AD238
Today I shall meet with interference, ingratitude, insolence, disloyalty, ill-will, and selfishness. Menophilus turned over the words of the Meditations. Was Marcus Aurelius correct that man naturally inclines to virtue, and so all vice was due to the offenders ignorance of what is good or evil, all some sort of near-blameless mistake? Regarding his fellow Senators, he judged that the divine Emperors view could be true only in the very strictest sense of Stoic philosophy.
Menophilus had answered Gallicanus question with honesty. He could give no realistic estimate how long it would be before the Gordiani arrived from Africa. The tone of the query had been offensive, somehow implying both that any tardiness was his fault, and that previously he had failed to give proper consideration to the issue. The hirsute Cynic appeared quick to impute blame, like most of his kind.
Since he had despatched the summons, Menophilus repeatedly had deliberated on the capabilities of ship and crew, the vagaries of the weather and potential routes, and the parameters of previous voyages. The Liburnian was said to be a fast galley, well manned, and its captain recommended as a seafarer of experience. Yesterday, after it had pulled out of Ostia, obligingly the wind had picked up and shifted to the north. It was just possible that it would make Carthage today. But if it had been overtaken by the full force of the storm, it might have been forced to run for shelter in Sicily or Malta, or might have been blown wildly off course, perhaps even to the dreadful shoals of the Syrtes. At worst, it could have foundered. When the storm abated, he would send another ship. Perhaps Gallicanus was right; he should have sent two vessels initially. There was all too much to think about in the midst of a revolt, even if he did not have the killing of Vitalianus on his conscience.
Like countless generations of Senators before, Menophilus gazed out of the window set high in the wall opposite the bench where he sat. Low, black clouds, dragging curtains of rain, scudded across. Open the doors! The angry chants were muffled, but audible. Only conspirators debate behind closed doors! Someone behind the scenes was whipping up the plebs, Menophilus had no doubt. Normally the first drops of rain dispersed any mob, no matter how riotous. Continued urban unrest best served whose interest?
Gallicanus had the floor. There had still been no sighting of the Prefects of either the City or the Watch, and, in the continuing absence of Sabinus and Potens, with no soldiers on the streets still loyal to Maximinus, many more Senators had found the courage to venture out of their close guarded homes, despite the mob. The Curia was packed. Gallicanus was speaking. Menophilus dragged his mind back.
Outside the storm rages. The people of Rome grow impatient. They need leadership. There is no telling when the Gordiani will come. Conscript Fathers, it is our duty to bring order to the streets of the city.
Yes, Menophilus thought, your bluff democratic posturing appeals to the plebs.
The Gordiani are far away over the seas. Maximinus and his army are close at hand. At any moment the tyrant will cross the Alps.
An exaggeration, but a real fear. What Maximinus would do to the man who had killed his Praetorian Prefect did not bear thinking. Still, the human condition was that of a soldier assaulting a town; at every moment you should expect the barbed arrow.
The barbarian and his vicious son will bring fire and sword, murder and rape. In their savage and perverse fury none will be spared. I see the Tiber foaming with much blood. I see shrines and temples consumed with fire; northern tribesmen ruling amid the ruins and on the ashes of a burnt-out empire. Conscript Fathers, it is our duty to protect Italy.
Followers of Diogenes were encouraged to eschew bookish learning, instead to rely on a god-given education, a bolt of instruction from the blue, something open to all, something far less time consuming and requiring no foreign languages. Replete with reminiscences of Cicero and Virgil, Gallicanus speech might not fit the ideal of Cynicism, but it was having an effect on its cultured audience. The Senators were receptive. Now all that remained, Menophilus thought, was to discover where it was all leading, and what Gallicanus actually wanted.