Marilyn Todd - I, Claudia

Poor old Gaius! To her credit, Cypassis had known how to organize a decent funeral, thanks, largely, to her having gone through the whole palaver quite recently when her old master the oil merchant popped off. The mourning women were that professional you were left with the serious impression Gaius had been closely related to every single one of them, and the dirges-oh, the dirges were sung with such a depth of feeling it left your gut churning. Oh yes, the funeral had been a tremendous success, apart from one thing.

Without doubt it turned out to be the splendiferous occasion Claudia had wanted it to be, the funeral that eclipsed all others when it came to being talked about in years to come. It simply hadn’t been in the way she’d either planned or expected…

Despite Junius’s insistence that she be spared the sight of her husband’s corpse, still in situ, on Monday, Claudia lost no time reminding him who was in charge here and marched up to see for herself.

Dear Diana, it was a depressing spectacle.

The heat of the day had intensified the sickly combination of blood and wine, of body odour and bad teeth. Black and green flies had already begun to cluster. Worse, the huge figure of Gaius Seferius seemed to have shrunk by an alarming degree and the bald spot he worked so hard to conceal was shining like a frypan in the midday sun. Quietly Claudia closed the door behind her.

‘Gaius, you silly daft sod, what did you do this for, eh?’ She stroked the hair back over the glistening dome. ‘In this scruffy old tunic, too. You should be ashamed of yourself.’

His neck, twisted and turned inwards, ended in a face which, though waxen, seemed placid enough, and the eyes, thankfully, were closed. She wiped her cheeks with the back of her hand. It was obvious what had happened. He’d sat in the chair, positioned his sword-that splendid symbol of his rise to the equestrian order-then lunged forward. Her eyes roamed his bedroom. Rarely, so very rarely, did she enter his private domain yet how familiar it seemed. Every piece of furniture, every knick-knack, every picture on the frieze screamed of Gaius. From the redness of the decor to the heavyhandedness of the silver-work, from the marble statuary to the leopardskin on the floor, it reflected his flamboyancy, his extravagance, his love of the good life and, perhaps most importantly, the fruits of his labours. Slowly her hand travelled across his writing table, over his rolls of papyrus, the wax tablets, his favourite stylus, the dolphin seal. How typical of Gaius’s attitude to life, she thought. Two dolphins in midleap. She felt a shudder run through her body. What a bloody, bloody shame it had to end like this.

Claudia broke the seal on the letter and opened it out. The page was shaking so violently, she was forced to spread it over the desk before she could read the words.

‘I’m sorry, my sweet, but this is for the best. Love always, Gaius.’

Oh, shit. She sank down on to the bed. Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit!

Several long minutes had passed before Claudia Seferius stood up, blew her nose, brushed specks of dandruff from her husband’s tunic, pinched her cheeks and strode to the door.

‘LEONIDES!’

The lanky Macedonian, hollow-eyed from shock, was wringing his hands. Small wonder she thought. It was bad enough when Melissa topped herself, the whole contingent of household slaves thought retribution would fall upon their uncombed heads. Who could imagine the terror in their veins now the master was dead as well? Tempting as it was to reassure them, Claudia realized that she’d get far more out of them by letting them stew for a while.

‘Leonides, go straight to the temple of Venus up on the Esquiline. You’ll need to register the death immediately.’ She wasn’t prepared to let Marcellus start meddling in affairs that didn’t concern him. ‘Cypassis?’

‘Yes, madam.’

At least this one looked in control of herself.

‘Go with him. Order the best mourners, musicians, dancers money can buy. Spare no expense, do you hear me?’

‘Pardon me, madam.’ The steward stepped forward. ‘But I think the undertakers will want to organize that themselves.’

‘I’m sure they will, Leonides, which is precisely why I’m sending you and Cypassis. I don’t want any outside interference, we’ll do this ourselves.’

The banquet might not have been the eye-popping extravaganza Gaius had hoped for but, by Jupiter his funeral procession would be. She owed him that at least.

‘Report back to me as soon as you can. I’ll be in my room.’

Julia, Flavia, Marcellus, Antonius, they’d all be huddled in the garden, pretending how sorry they were, the hypocritical sons of bitches, and she couldn’t trust herself to speak to them. Not at the moment.

‘Junius! I don’t want Gaius’s old bed on display in the atrium, see if you can lay your hands on something a little grander can you?’ Poor sod deserved a decent lying-in-state. ‘Something fancy, with a bit of gold on it, perhaps. Or ivory. And, Junius, I know you’re not his personal slave, but would you mind…laying him out?’

It was a filthy job, but the boy not only shook his head with considerable vigour he actually seemed happy to do it. Which only goes to show, you can never really get inside these strange Gaulish minds, can you?

‘It means…taking the sword out.’

‘No problem, madam.’

‘He’s already stiffening…’

‘Leave it to me.’

‘Yes-well-’ Claudia cleared her throat. ‘His parade uniform should still fit, so once you’ve got him, er, cleaned up, perhaps you could…?’

He’d need help, of course, but she was sure the boy was more than capable of sorting that out by himself. What Claudia had needed more than anything else was peace and quiet and time to think. Think, think, think.

She caught the Macedonian at the door. ‘Leonides, before you slink off I want you to tell me exactly what happened this morning.’

The steward was unable to meet her eye. He was very sorry, but there didn’t seem to be much to tell. The master started drinking the moment he came downstairs, apparently oblivious to the argument raging around him, and when he retreated to his room to consolidate the job of getting drunk, it seemed the family wouldn’t leave him in peace. How easily Claudia pictured the scene. Flavia, screaming that she wasn’t going to marry Scaevola, never, ever, ever. Julia, nagging her brother to put his foot down. Antonius, demanding what the hell was going on. And finally Marcellus, shoving his two asses’ worth in by suggesting that Gaius wasn’t pulling his weight here. Some of them went up two or three times, the steward said, and he felt very sorry for the master in the end.

‘Although I didn’t think he’d kill himself because of it,’ he added hastily. ‘Had I realized-’

‘What was his mood like?’

Again Leonides had been reluctant to answer but eventually Claudia got him to admit that Gaius had been crying constantly, refusing to see clients who called, refusing even to wash. The only clear word he’d uttered all morning was ‘Lucius’.

Well, he was with Lucius now…

A feather drifted down through the open roof of this fine patrician house to settle on Odysseus’s big toe. Immediately a young slave girl pounced and carried it silently away.

Claudia thought of the green glass bowl containing Gaius’s ashes. Tomorrow they’d be carried in a leaden basket to be interred, alongside the son he adored, in a handsome tiled chamber along the Appian Way. She leaned forward, supporting her head in her hands. Who could have predicted a month ago, when he was giving Lucius’s funeral oration, that his own would have followed so quickly?

Without a male heir, it had fallen upon the widow to deliver Gaius’s tribute, which, because the occasion demanded something sensational in view of the rumours, she’d secretly hired Syphax the playwright to script for her. He may only have had twenty-four hours to knock it into shape, but if she said so herself it was exceptional, and she would have defied anyone listening to keep a dry eye when she read it aloud. And here lay the flaw in the entire arrangement.