John Roberts - The Year of Confusion

“You are far too kind. Oh, I must clarify something. In this unspoken language of gesture, which includes things like posture, physical address, attitude, and so forth, there is one exception to the cultural division.”

“And what is that?” I asked.

“The language of sexual allure and seduction. Ashthuva was using it last night.”

“But you were a group of women except for the escort-not Julia?” I was aghast, but she laughed almost girlishly.

“Oh, no, Senator, have no fear on that account. Ashthuva was trying to seduce me.”

I have always been able to summon up some courage when it was absolutely necessary, as it was now. I have dealt with unpredictable Gauls and Britons, fearsome Germans, ferocious Spaniards, treacherous Syrians and Egyptians, and even a dangerous Greek or two, although those were really Macedonians, which is not quite the same thing. Now it was time to dredge up that courage once more. I was about to call on Servilia.

This was an age of dangerous women, and Servilia was more dangerous than most because she was more subtle than most. I knew she was ambitious because she was trying to win Caesar and you couldn’t get more ambitious than that. Calpurnia stood in her way, but I doubt that she ever let a mere wife thwart her plans. There was also Cleopatra, but she was a foreigner whom Caesar would never marry. Servilia on the other hand was a patrician and eminently suitable, could she but convince him.

Their relationship was one of long standing, dating from a time when Caesar was nothing but a debt-ridden young politician whom nobody credited with much of a future. Yet Servilia saw something in him, or perhaps he was just a formidable lover. Caesar’s dalliances were legendary, and almost all of his conquests were wives of senators. When news of his affair with Cleopatra reached Rome certain Forum wags proposed a day of thanksgiving to Venus that this didn’t mean yet another senatorial cuckold.

That morning I sent Hermes off to his practice at the ludus and walked alone to Servilia’s house on the Palatine. Hermes was useful and he was ordinarily good company, but I sometimes enjoyed being by myself. Julia thought this was terribly undignified, but I have never been perfectly conventional. I made my way, stopping from time to time to chat with shopkeepers and idlers. In a street lined with the stalls of cutlers, I found a dealer in luxury weapons and bought a new dagger, its ivory handle carved in the form of a Thracian gladiator. I decided that Julia would not upbraid me for extravagance because I wouldn’t tell her about it.

Whatever her plotting and scheming, Servilia maintained an exceedingly correct household, probably because she thought it was a fit setting for her beloved Brutus. The major-domo who greeted me at the door was a Greek of immense dignity, and educated Greek slaves were esteemed to be in the highest of taste. In fact, there was a notable absence of beautiful girls, which may have been because Servilia considered them a bad influence or because she didn’t want to be compared unfavorably with them. The Greek led me to the courtyard with its beautiful pool, and I admired the fine statuary around it, all of it original, from the Greek islands. The wall paintings were similarly tasteful.

“Senator Metellus!” Servilia swept in swathed in a saffron-colored gown of Coan cloth, layered to avoid the scandalous transparency for which that fabric was famous and for which it was frequently banned by the censors, to no effect. “Your dear wife visits me for the first time in ages, and now here you are. Can this be coincidence?” Servilia was nearing sixty, but her face was unlined and the years had served only to refine her loveliness, bringing out the fine bone structure that is the basis of true beauty. Admiring her, I had to remind myself that Medusa had been a beautiful maiden who turned out rather badly.

“As a matter of fact, it was something you said to Julia that brings me here today,” I said.

“Oh? What might that have been?”

“You are aware of the investigation Caesar has me working on?”

“About the murdered astronomers? Surely. How may I help?” While we spoke slaves hustled in and arranged chairs and a table. It was early in the day so they set out bread and sliced fruit and a pitcher of water instead of wine. This was more respectability than I cared for.

“According to Julia, when she inquired about a reputable astrologer, you told her that since Polasser of Kish was dead, the best to consult would be this foreign woman. I take this to mean that you had consulted with Polasser?”

“Why, yes, I did,” she answered coolly, offering no further information.

“When would this have been?”

“Several times in the last half-year.”

“Not to pry, but, what did you consult with him about?”

“You are prying.”

“And I apologize humbly, but I am trying to frame an impression of what this man was doing. Whoever killed him had a reason and that reason may have had something to do with his clients.”

“Why should that be? Demades was murdered as well. Why not inquire about him?”

“Demades was more of a cipher. Polasser was more colorful and, to be blunt, he was the sort of man to attract enemies.”

“I can see that he might be more enjoyable to investigate, but I certainly wasn’t one of his enemies.”

“I would never suspect that you were.” That was a laugh. “But did anyone of your acquaintance perhaps make remarks indicative of a certain hostility toward the late astrologer?”

“Let me see-” she seemed to go into a reverie, doubtless studying the mental scroll of all her acquaintances together with whatever they might have said. I found this somehow unlikely. Servilia would remember instantly anything pertinent that had been said, who had said it, exactly when, and probably the phase of the moon on that date. For whatever personal reason, she was stalling me. Finally she returned to the world we all know, shaking her head. “No, I can think of nothing.”

“That is unfortunate,” I said. “Caesar will be very unhappy if I do not soon find the man’s killer.” I expected this to strike home considering she wanted to link Caesar’s fortunes to her own, but I was disappointed.

“Caesar,” she said, “will rather quickly get over the death of a foreign astronomer. He has had to cope with a great many deaths, and some of those were persons of importance.” Servilia, patrician to the core, had a fine appreciation of the relative value of people’s lives. To her, Roman patricians were of utmost significance and no one else, Roman or foreign, counted for much at all. I myself, being a Caecilian and a plebeian, was one of those persons of little importance. My wife Julia, who was not only a patrician but a Caesar, was another matter entirely. I could see that I had made a mistake. I should have sent Julia to pump Servilia for more information.

“Nonetheless, I have been charged with this investigation,” I said.

“Which I am sure you will fulfill to everyone’s greatest satisfaction,” she said.

“What’s this?” The voice came from the direction of the atrium and a moment later I saw Brutus emerge from the dimness of the colonnade. He was a dreadfully serious-looking man who always seemed to have deep matters on his mind, although I suspected he spent more time thinking of ways to collect on his outstanding loans than on philosophical matters.

“Decius Caecilius is looking into the deaths of those two astronomers on the Tiber Island, dear,” Servilia said.

“Oh, yes. Terrible business. I shall miss Demades.”

“You knew him?” I said.

“Yes, and I wish I had known him better. He was marvelous when he spoke of his astronomical observations. He could make you feel the excitement of discovery, which can seldom be conveyed on the written page.”