John Roberts - A Point of Law

“Unfortunate woman,” I said idly.

“She’s brought it on herself. Anyway, she says she was about to give up and go back home to Baiae, but now she’s thought better of it since she’s to remarry.”

“I don’t expect to see Antonius back from Gaul anytime soon,” I said, raising a cup of her heavily watered wine.

“But she isn’t to marry Antonius. She’s going to marry that man you asked about this morning: Curio.”

I all but choked in midswallow. “What!”

“Exactly,” she said, pleased with her timing and effect. “Curio was one of Clodius’s friends who stayed in Rome. He’s on the rise, which is where Fulvia likes to catch them. He’s standing for Tribune of the People, and if he’s elected, he can’t leave Rome for two consecutive nights during his year in office, so she can’t very well leave Rome, can she?”

“But what about her betrothal to Antonius?”

“Neither of them is terribly serious about such things. They are two of a kind. Besides, Antonius is in Gaul while Curio is here. That makes a difference.”

I knew Antonius well, and I knew that, if news of losing Fulvia to another man bothered him at all, he’d just console himself by taking another Gallic woman into his tent, to join the five or six who were already there.

“Did you learn anything about her brother, Fulvius?”

“She said that, at home, he’d been a layabout who accomplished nothing. He’d written her some time ago that he intended to come to Rome to become Clodius’s client, but Clodius was killed and Fulvius stayed in Baiae. Apparently, if he couldn’t get a great man to be his patron, he didn’t think he had much chance of rising in Roman politics.”

“So why did he come here?”

“She said that a few months ago he wrote her, said he was coming after all, and hinted that he now had powerful patronage.”

“But he wouldn’t say who it was?”

“He said that she’d learn soon enough. After he moved here he called on her a few times; but there was little affection between them, and he didn’t talk about anything important.”

“Where was he living?”

“He had a house near the Temple of Tellus,” she said. “She never went there.”

“Housing in Rome isn’t cheap,” I said, “even slum housing. Did she know who owned the place?”

“I didn’t think to ask her, but if she knows so little about her brother, I would doubt that the name of his landlord would be among her store of facts.”

“ If she was telling you the truth. Somehow, truthfulness is not the quality that first comes to mind when discussing Fulvia.”

“Well, it may be true that her evil reputation is exaggerated. I felt rather sorry for her. It is a terrible thing for a woman of her birth, accustomed to every privilege and honor, to be forsaken by her own class. While Clodius was alive she could fancy herself the uncrowned queen of Rome. Now she is a friendless widow.”

“Not entirely friendless, if she’s to marry this Curio. I think I should talk to her.”

Julia’s eyes narrowed. “Why?”

“I’m not as sympathetic as you. She might be more forthcoming under more rigorous questioning.”

Julia bit into an orange section. “Why should she talk to you at all? You have no official standing, and she may hold it against you that you killed her brother.”

“I doubt that. I suspect that she knows perfectly well I did not.”

“How are you so sure?”

“I didn’t say I was sure . I said I suspect .”

Julia rolled her eyes. Sometimes even she had trouble understanding me.

"I want you,” I told Hermes, “To find out where Fulvius lived. It was somewhere near the Temple of Tellus. Once you’ve located the place, find out who owns it. Then report back to me.”

“I’ll do it,” he said. “Are you really going to Clodius’s house?”

“Clodius is dead. His widow has a bad reputation, but I don’t think she wants to kill me.”

“Take some men with you anyway.” We stood in my atrium with a crowd of my clients. A lot of them were hard-looking specimens: veterans from my various military postings who had attached themselves to me; farmers from Metellan-dominated areas of the countryside, in town for the elections; a few of Milo’s old gang, who needed a patron while he was in exile.

“It wouldn’t look good to have them with me in the daytime,” I told him. “I won’t have the voters thinking I go around in fear of my fellow citizens. I want these men to attend the Plebeian Assembly meeting and shout my praises.”

He looked disgusted. “You’re getting as bad as Julia. What’s more dangerous than your fellow citizens? Just be careful, and keep your weapons handy.”

“Did I take you on as a nurse?”

Out in the streets, I felt a pleasant sense of freedom, being on my own for a change. Since returning to Rome, I had been going everywhere amid a cloud of my supporters, constantly campaigning for election. It felt good to be alone. Since the gangs had been broken up and the noncitizens driven from the City, it was considered bad form for a politician to go around with a violent-looking following, although a small bodyguard was permissible. The voters would appreciate my show of bravado in appearing in public without so much as a single slave.

Being under suspicion of murder did not hamper my freedom. This is because Romans are civilized people and don’t clap suspects into prison like barbarians. It would take an order of a lawfully convened court even to place me under house arrest.

When I came to the house of the late Publius Clodius Pulcher I thought how strange it was that I could just walk up to the door and knock. There were times when my life would have been forfeit just for showing up in the neighborhood. It was situated in the most fashionable district of the Palatine, just as in Catullus’s famous poem: “… five doors up the Clivus Victoriae.…”

The janitor who opened up at my knock wasn’t the usual aged, used-up slave you usually found performing that task. This one was a stalwart young man with handsome, Cappadocian features, wearing a brief tunic. The housekeeper to whom I gave my name and errand was a raven-haired Greek beauty and all the household slaves, at least in the front of the domus , were pretty boys and girls. Some things hadn’t changed in this household anyway. Clodia had had a similar liking for beautiful things.

“Please come with me, Senator,” the housekeeper said, returning from the inner fastnesses of the mansion. I followed her attractively swaying backside to the peristyle, where rare trees and shrubs grew from giant pots surrounding the pool. The woman showed me to an exquisite bronze table, its fretwork discus supported by three ithyphallic satyrs. The chair was one of three made as a suite with the table, all of the finest Campanian bronzework. Their cushions were stuffed with down and sweet herbs. This was one of those luxurious households Cato was always railing about.

“Please be seated, Senator. My lady will be here presently.” I sat and a pair of twin German slave girls brought a pitcher of hammered gold and cups of the same metal, embossed with doves and flowers. The wine was the exquisite Caecuban favored by the Claudian family, wholly unwatered.

While I sipped, admiring the Greek statuary, I tried to guess from which direction Fulvia would make her entrance. Every doorway opening off the peristyle was beautifully decorated and flanked by fine sculpture. Finally I settled on the door with Leda and the swan on one side, Ganymede and the eagle on the other. Both had been executed in scandalous erotic detail and were the most eye-catching works of art within sight. I was right. When she arrived it was between those two statues and for further counterpoint, the pale marble contrasted nicely with her gown.