A dying light in Corduba mdf-8 Page 21

  Constans was pleasant-looking, nothing more. His nose, set in a young, unformed face, was a weak shadow of his sister's but there was something of her in the way he peered shyly at the world. At twenty or so, I felt he had not yet decided his ethical position. He seemed unfinished, and lacking the weight he would need for the elite public career his proud grandfather had charted for him. Maybe I was feeling old.

  'I've been meaning to ask you,' I tackled the young man casually, 'how did you enjoy the theatre?'

  'What?' He had a light voice and restless eyes. It may be that any lad of twenty who finds himself knee to knee in a jolting carriage with an older man who has a lively reputation may automatically look shifty. Or perhaps he had something to hide.

  'I nearly met you during your trip to Rome with your grandfather. But you and Quinctius Quadratus decided to go to tne theatre instead.' Was it my imagination or did the playgoer look hunted? 'See anything good?'

  'Can't remember. A mime, I think. Tiberius took me drinking afterwards; it's all a blur.'

  It was too early in the night to turn nasty on him. I smiled and let the lie go past. I felt convinced it was a lie. 'You want to be careful if you go out on the town in Rome. You could get mugged. People are getting beaten up on the streets all the time. You didn't see any of that, I suppose?'

  'Oh no.'

  'That's good.'

  'I'm sorry I missed the chance of meeting you,' Rufius added. He had been brought up to be polite.

  'You missed some excitement too,' I said.

  I did not say what, and he displayed no curiosity. An exceptional young fellow, apparently.

  I felt sour. I was still thinking about the dead Valentinus, and even about Anacrites, when the carriage pulled up at the smatt out-of-town Annaeus residence.

  Lucius Annaeus Maximus Primus, Lucius Annaeus Aelius Maximus, and Lucius Annaeus Maximus Novatus (to honour Spunky, Dotty and Ferret officially) knew how to throw a bash. Money was no object, and neither was taste. They had the household slaves scampering about with great vigour. It was all much more exciting than the stultified jollifications I had seen here at the Parilia festival. Released from parental authority, our hosts were being themselves, and a hilarious trio they were. I was glad they weren't my boys.

  They had bought up every garland of flowers in Corduba. Their father's frescoed house smelt like all the gardens of ancient Tartessos, its air thick with pollen, a nightmare for sensitive noses. To add to the lamp smoke, the floral scents and the all-pervading aromatic odours of young bodies given unaccustomed hours of grooming, the lads had devised an Egyptian theme for the evening. It involved a few home-made dog-headed gods, some wicker snakes, two ostrich-feather fans, and cones of scented wax which new arrivals were instructed to wear on their heads: as the heat of the party rose so the cones would melt, giving everyone a bitter aura of Pharaonic myrrh and impossibly matted hair. I made sure I lost mine.

  Word had gone around all the baths and gymnasiums in town that the three great lads were holding a party. The news had spread like foot-fungus. The seediest youths of the city had suddenly muttered to their parents that they were going over to a friend's house, being careful not to specify which friend. All over Corduba parents were now vaguely wondering where their pallid offspring had scuffled off to, and why there was such a reek of breath-freshening pastilles. Inadequate teenage owners of large personal allowances, mostly with skinny shoulders and pustular skin, had been waiting weeks for this night. They were hoping it would make men of them; the only certainty was that it would make them bilious.

  Girls had come too. Some were nice, though their reputations might not last the evening. Some were slightly soiled to begin with and would be horrendous by the time they had swallowed several jugs of unwatered wine and had their frocks pulled off behind laurel bushes. Some were clearly professionals.

  'It's worse than I expected, Falco,' Optatus confessed. 'You're getting too old to take it?'

  'I feel like a bad-tempered grandfather.'

  'You're not entering into the spirit.'

  'Are you?' he huffed defiantly.

  'I'm here to work.' That made me wonder: what was Marius Optatus here for? He had some ulterior motive, I was sure of it.

  Optatus and I were the eldest men there. At least ten years separated the Annaeus sons. Primus, the eldest, might be almost our age, but his youngest brother was not yet twenty, and Fortune had arranged it that he was the one with the most friends. This largest group coalesced first, though all they did was to mill around trying to find food, drink or sinful women; they were stuck with the stuff in cups and bowls because they did not know how to recognise the other. We worried them. (They worried me.) We belonged to a wholly different generation. They all slipped by us, avoiding contact, because they thought we were somebody's parental police.

  A second party had developed in the cellar, to which friends of Dotty, the middle son, zoomed with a sense of purpose which would quickly leave them. They despised food, and had probably tried women, but were all betrothed to sweet, virginal girls (who were currently behind bushes with other young men). Suspicions that they were being deceived, and that life would only bring them more of the same, made the middle son's cronies a brooding, cynical group. Optatus and I exchanged a few witty thoughts with them, before we moved on.

  Spunky, who would be known to posterity and the Censor as the honourable Lucius Annaeus Maximus Primus, was pretending to be grown up. He had retreated from the noise and debauchery to his father's elegant library. It was a quiet upper room with a splendid balcony which gave views across the ornate gardens. There he and a few jaded companions were pulling scrolls from their pigeonholes, examining them satirically, then tossing them into a heap on the floor. An amphora had made a vicious ring on a marble side table. Another had been knocked over after uncorking, so some spirited soul had pulled down a curtain to mop up the mess. How thoughtful. I was pleased to see they were not all bad.

  Optatus told me that this Annaeus, unlike his two younger brothers, was actually married, though to a girl so young she remained with her parents while he simply enjoyed the income from her dowry and pretended he was still safe from responsibility. He was a plump-faced, solidly built young Baetican, whose amiable nature made him instantly forgive me for being the man he and his brothers had shoved about (twice) the last time I visited their palatial home. He greeted Optatus like a lost lamb. Optatus seemed genuinely friendly towards him.

  Rufius Constans, though rather young for this group, had already made his way here. I thought he coloured up when I first walked through the door, and after I found myself a place to squat he seemed to edge away as far as possible. Wine was being splashed around at that point, so maybe he just wanted to avoid the spillage. Slaves were serving, but they looked extremely nervous. When the guests wanted more, they bawled for it loudly; if nobody came soon enough they grabbed the jugs for themselves, deliberately missing their cups when they poured.

  I had been among this type before. It was a long time since I had found them amusing. I knew what to expect. They would sit around for hours, getting pointlessly drunk. Their conversation would consist of bloody-minded politics, coarse abuse of women, boasting about their chariots, then making exaggerated assessments of their wealth and the size of their pricks. Their brains were no bigger than chickpeas, that's for sure. I won't speculate on the rest.

  Several scions from other families were among this group. They were introduced to me at the time, though I reckoned there was no real need to remember them. These would be the chubby heirs to all the fine folk Helena and I had seen at the parilia, the tight little section of snobs who ran everything in Corduba. One day these would be the snobs themselves. There would come a time for most of them when a father would die, or they married, or a close friend was killed very young; then they would move silently from being crass young idiots to being the spit image of their staid fathers.

  'Bollocks!' muttered a voice beside me in the chaos.


  I had thought I was next to Optatus, but when I turned it was another who had joined us without introductions. I knew who he was. I had seen him here before, collecting Aelia Annaea, and since then I had learned that he was Quinctius Quadratus.

  At close quarters familial resemblance to his father was clear. He had a thick thatch of black crinkled hair, muscular arms, and a lordly expression. He was tanned, hirsute and strong-featured. Sporting and popular. possessed of ease and happy arrogance. He wore a white tunic with broad purple stripes and had even put on his scarlet boots, things I had rarely seen in Rome: he was a senator-elect, and new enough to want to be seen in every detail of the historic uniform. I was looking at the recently appointed financial controller of Baetica. Even though the proconsul was unhappy with his assignment here, Quadratus himself was flaunting it. So I already knew one thing: he had no official tact.

  The cause of his exclamation was not a spot of mind- reading, but an uncouth response to a scroll which he had plucked from the library columbarium. I couldn't read the title. He sneered, rolled it up very tightly, then stuffed it into the neck of an empty wine vessel like a plug.

  'Well, well,' I said. 'They told me you were charming and gifted, but not that your talents extended to instant crits of literature.'

  'I can read,' he answered lazily. 'I say, I don't believe we've met?'

  I viewed him benignly. 'The name's Falco. And of course I know who you are, quaestor.'

  'There's no need to be formal,' he assured me in his charming way.

  'Thanks,' I said.

  'Have you come out from Rome?'

  'That's right,' I replied for the second time that night. 'We nearly bumped into each other there recently, but I hear you were at the theatre instead. The last dinner for the Society of Baetican Olive Oil Producers?'

  'Oh, them!' he replied offhandedly.

  'What was the play? Any good?'

  'A farce, I think.' Rufius Constans had pretended it was a mime. 'So-so.' Or not. He paused. He knew what I was doing here. 'Is this an interview?'

  'Great gods, no,' I laughed, reaching for more wine. 'I'm – bloody well off duty tonight, if you don't mind!'

  'That's good,' smiled Tiberius Quinctius Quadratus, quaestor of Baetica. He was off duty too, of course. The proconsul had arranged that.

  XXXVII

  The room was squashed, and noisy with brash young idiots' chatter. What was more, they were about to amuse themselves playing the ancient Greek game of kottabos. Spunky, who would have made a good crony for the Athenian reprobate Alcibiades, had been given the apparatus for his birthday – an aptly chosen gift from his younger brothers. Clearly nobody had told him that kottabos explains why the Greeks no longer rule the world.

  For refined readers of this memoir who will certainly never encounter it, kottabos was invented by a group of uproarious drunks. You have a tall stand, with a large bronze disc suspended horizontally halfway up. A small metal target is balanced on the top of the stand. The players drink their wine, then flick their cups to expel the dregs. They aim to make the flying lees hit the target so it falls off and hits the lower disc with a noise like a bell. All the wine they flick splatters the room and themselves.

  That's it a little gem from the wise, wonderful people who invented the classic proportions of sculpture and the tenets of moral philosophy.

  By mutual consent Quadratus and I took wine and cups to drink it from, then we moved out smartly to the balcony. We were the mature ones here. We were men of the world. Well, he was a Roman official, and I was a man of the world. So we drew apart to give ourselves space to spread a bit. (It's hard to fulfil your potential as a man of the world when your knees are jammed under a readmg couch and a murex-merchant's nephew has just belched in your ear.) Optatus, who was talking earnestly to young Constans, raised his winecup wryly as I stepped over him, following my smart new pal.

  We were going to be pals, that was obvious. Quadratus was accustomed to being friendly with everyone, apparently. Or maybe his father had warned him I was dangerous and should be disarmed if possible.

  The night air was cool and perfect, barely touched by the scent of the torches which flickered on the terraces below. Occasional shrieks reached us from crude horseplay among the adolescents. We sat on the marble balustrade, leaning against pillars, and drank Baetican white and the fresh air in equal measure.

  'So, Falco – Baetica must be a change from Rome?'

  'I wish I had more time to enjoy it.' There is nothing like a fake polite chat to bring on my apoplectic tic. 'My wife's expecting. I promised to take her home for the birth.'

  'Your wife? She's the sister of Camillus Aelianus, isn't she? I didn't know you were actually married.'

  'There's a theory that marriage consists of the decision by two people to live as man and wife.'

  'Oh, is there?' His reaction was innocent. As I expected, he had been educated by the best tutors – and he knew nothing. He'd be a magistrate one day, laying down laws he had never heard of to people whose lives in the real world he would never understand. That's Rome. City of glorious tradition – including the one that if the landed elite can bugger up the little man, they will.

  'Ask any barrister.' I could be pleasant too. I grinned at him. 'Helena and I are conducting an experiment to see how long it takes the rest of Rome to admit the fine theory holds good.'

  'You're very courageous! So will your child be illegitimate?' He wasn't carping, just curious.

  'I had assumed so – until it struck me that if we regard ourselves as married, how can it be? I'm a free citizen and I'll register it proudly.'

  Quinctius Quadratus whistled quietly. After a while he said, 'Aelianus was a good lad. One of our set. The best.' 'Bit of a lively character?'

  Quadratus chuckled. 'He lost his rag over you!'

  'I know.'

  'He'll be all right when he finds his feet.'

  'Good to hear.' Young men with weak spots are always keen to assess others. The quaestor's patronising tone almost made me defend Aelianus. Lad about town?' I suggested, hoping for dirt.

  'Not as much as he liked to think.'

  'A bit immature?'

  'Cock shy.'

  'That won't last!'

  We poured more wine.

  'The trouble with Aelianus,' the quaestor confided dismissively, 'is he can't judge his length. The family's poor as Hades. He's aiming for the Senate with absolutely no collateral. He needs to make a rich alliance. We tried to set him up with Claudia Rufina!

  'No good?' I prompted neutrally.

  'He wanted more. His idea was Aelia Annaea. I ask you!' 'Too old for him, presumably?'

  'Too old, too sharp, too aware of what she's got.' 'And what's that?'

  'A quarter of her papa's estate when he passes on – plus the whole of her husband's property.'

  'I knew she was widowed.'

  'Better than that. She had the good taste to be widowed by a man with no close family. There were no children and no co-heirs. He left her everything.'

  'Wonderful! How much was "everything"?'

  'A whopping tract of land – and a small gold mine at Hispalis.'

  'She seems a nice girl!' I commented, and we laughed.

  'The Annaeus lads look like a boisterous bunch.'

  'Just the job,' cackled Quadratus. He libelled his friends without a second thought: 'Thick as curd cheese, aud just as rich!'

  That seemed to sum up Spunky, Dotty and Ferret well enough for my purposes.

  'What's your reaction to young Rufius?' I asked, hoping that his prot at least would attract some approval. 'Oh, Jupiter, what a waste!'

  'How's that?'

  'Haven't you noticed? All that energy being squandered on making him something, but he's just not up to it. There's some decent cash in the family, but Constans is never going to use it properly.' He defined everything in monetary terms. It grew wearisome for a man like me, with virtually nothing in the bank.

  'You don't think he will be the succ
ess his grandfather wants? Won't he make it to Rome?'

  'Oh, he can be bumped into the posts, of course. Licinius Rufius can afford to get him whatever he wants. But Constans will never enjoy it. He doesn't command much attention here, and the sharks in Rome will swallow him. He can't take Grandpa along to give him authority.'

  'He's young. He could grow into it.'

  'He's just a raw Spanish ham that's not been smoked enough. I try,' Quadratus declared. 'I show him a thing or two when I can.'

  'I expect he looks up to you.'

  A sudden grin split the handsome face. I had disturbed the smooth, bland, utterly plausible exterior and the result was a shock. 'Now you're pissing yourself laughing at me!' He said it without malice. His candour in discussing his friends had had a tone I didn't care for, but he knew how and when to turn the conversation. He seemed modest now. People were right to compliment his charm.

  'Someone told me, Quadratus, you were about to exchange contracts with the Rufius girl yourself?'

  He gave me a level stare. 'I couldn't comment. My father will make any marriage announcement in due course.' 'Not ready yet?'

  'You have to get it right.'

  'Oh yes; it's an important decision for anyone.'

  'There are personal issues – and I must think of my career.'

  I had guessed correctly. He would never be paired off in Baetica.

  'Tell me about yourself, Falco.'

  'Oh, I'm nobody.'

  'Bull's testicles!' he said crudely. 'That's not what I heard.'

  'Why, what have you heard?'

  'You're a political drain-cleaner. You do missions for the Emperor. There's some rumour about you sorting a problem in the British silver mines.' I said nothing. My work in Britain was known only to a very close circle. It was highly sensitive. Records of the mission had been burned, and however important the quaestor's father thought himself in Rome, Attractus ought not to have known about it. If he really did, that would alarm the Emperor.