Lindsey Davis - The Ides of April

There had been men before. I was no Vestal. Well, these days not even the Vestals were Virgins. If the rumours were true, all those hard-faced venerated women took lovers. As for me, I had on-off affairs, occasionally with people I liked a lot. None lasted. Being truthful, none so far had been connections I really wanted to last. I took one or two of the least dopey to family occasions, though that was never a success. Their deficiencies were soon exposed because Manlius Faustus was not the only person in Rome who used background checks; I had my personal scrutineer, whether I wanted it or not. Once our loving father scented any male interest in one of his daughters, he soon prepared an informer's dossier on her suspect friend. He had been doing this professionally for a lifetime, so he was brutally good at discovering faults.

That tended to kill the passion. Most lovers soon ran off, petrified. Sometimes the dossier contents made me keen to dump the lover anyway.

Hey ho.

To thwart the runner and the high-handed "appointment" he thought he had made with me, I scrambled out of bed early, gathered my things and went out to Prisca's bathhouse, ready to lounge there all morning. I could take a bite of breakfast from the pedlar who circulated with a snack tray. During official opening times he had palatable warm sausages; in the morning all he could produce were last night's offerings-but I think that on occasions a mature cold sausage, congealed in its fat, is an end in itself.

Prisca let me in and had her usual moan about me turning up before lunch. I told her anyone with a love life was likely to do that. You have to plan ahead. She offered to recommend a trepanist who drilled holes in skulls, a good one who mostly managed not to kill people, because if I was getting a love life I needed my brain seeing to.

I went through the cleansing rooms, taking my time. Serena happened to be there so I placed myself in her hands for a renovating massage. Some baths employ huge masseurs, mountains of flab who give powerful workouts. Serena was so slim and tiny it seemed impossible she could manipulate anybody, yet she would spring up onto the platform where she laid out her victims and kneel right on you with her whole weight, crunching tight muscles magnificently. I liked the fact she never wanted to talk. Who wants gossip while you are being forcefully tied in knots?

All I desired today was to flop while she did whatever was necessary, leaving me to dream of the archivist, with his bright eyes and appealing expression, and what I knew had been his plan last night, to have his wonderful way with me…

It was a short dream. While I was lying there naked on the slab, we heard a male voice angrily arguing with staff" out in the anteroom. I was shocked. The aediles runner had tracked me down and was even attempting to interview me here. I shot an appalled glance at Serena. She was an astute young woman and always conscious of clients' modesty. By the time the obnoxious Tiberius shouldered his way into the treatment room, Serena had dropped a towel across my midriff-though baths are notoriously mean, so it was a small towel.

My privates stayed private. All the rest was clean, oiled, toned, and on display. He had a good view. At least that unsettled him. Reddening up, he backed out, while rudely ordering me to get dressed and come to speak to him. Serena took him on without even consulting me, pushing him from the room ahead of her, with the flat of her hand against his chest. She called to me from the corridor that she would collect my things for me from the manger in the changing room.

"Let the repulsive bastard wait!" I snarled loudly.

I was up off the slab already. My tunic and sandals, as Serena well knew, were hanging from a wooden hook here in the massage room. I wriggled into the tunic, before dragging the treatment slab sideways, including the trestle it rested on. When it was close to the wall, I scrambled up on it, climbing towards a high, square unglazed window that lit the room. I could reach it, but the opening was very small. This needed planning.

I could go out the obvious way, squeezing through headfirst, but that was the fool's choice. The exterior wall of the building was smooth, with nothing I could grasp and I would have to drop down outside headfirst too, inevitably breaking both arms and cracking my head open when I landed. A man might try that way, stupidly hoping for the best, but I made myself struggle with the sensible method: stayed inside and pushed my feet out first, so I could then shimmy over the sill, clinging on to it while I twisted to face the wall and lowered myself as far as possible. Eventually I could land more safely.

I did this. I was proud of myself. The window was so small that the tunic I hoped would shield me runkled up as I squeezed out; the wooden frame then scraped my skin like a cheese-grater. As I descended, I was also treated to admiring whoops from the courtyard, where the two women who played at being gladiators had been knocking about. They had been alerted when I threw out my sandals. If they were lesbians, they were receiving a big treat as they watched me emerge, bared from the armpits down and backside first. I slithered out, pulling my tunic after me as best I could. They had the kindness to catch me; I dropped to ground level, without too much indecent groping.

I thanked them for their assistance. They were leering unashamedly. As I shook down my garment, I reckoned they deserved that thrill.

Zoe and Chloe introduced themselves. They already knew who I was.

They rushed me to a back exit that we all knew. They forced the locked gate by leaning on it (they were hefty girls and unafraid of strain), while I hopped about strapping my sandals on.

I thanked them again. I shot off down the alley. They cheered and I heard the gate close after they went inside again.

That was good. It meant they did not see the disappointing end to my madcap escape: I ran straight into Morellus, from the Fourth Cohort. The podgy swine was leaning on a corner, chewing his thumb, waiting for me to scamper away from Prisca's and into his arms so he could escort me for the promised interview with his tribune.

"Flavia Albia! What's your hurry?"

"Oh spit, Morellus! How did you trace me?"

"Rodan mentioned where you might be." I don't know why I bothered asking. "That charmless turd from the aediles' office was ahead of me, but I reckoned you were capable of giving him the slip. So here I am. The twerp is still waiting for you pointlessly out front but, sweetie, you are all mine for the foreseeable."

"Soldier, I admire your reasoning." I was cursing it.

Morellus asked if I would come quietly, or should he fasten a collar and chain on my pretty neck? I assured him that was unnecessary, so he could forget any erotic thrill. Bondage was out; the only formality needed was to drop in at the home of a mature female relative who could come and be my chaperone. He said there was no time for that. Surprise! At least it saved two women having to endure abuse in the interview. I would not want an auntie to see this.

On principle I asked, would he send for my father then, since he was my male head of household, who ought to speak for me legally? Morellus said request noted, but no he would not, and did I think he was stupid? Surprise again.

So far, this was banter, almost routine. But I assumed what happened next with the tribune would be very different.

The Fourth Cohort's main barracks was conveniently positioned right at the end of the Marcian Aqueduct, from which they could draw water. One corner of the building abutted onto the Street of the Public Fishponds (an amenity which no longer existed), with the station house entrance on the road that came up the Aventine through the Ardeatine Gate, at that point called the Clivus Triarius. The barracks was the usual forbidding edifice, with two-storey interior courtyards where the men on call hung about "preparing equipment"; they took an unnatural interest in an unchaperoned woman. I had expected that. Morellus fielded most of the suggestive remarks. I played deaf.