Steven Saylor - The House Of The Vestals

"The Virgo Maxima herself is awaiting us, Gordianus. Come along!"

Dubiously, I followed him up the stairs. He knocked softly on one of the doors, which swung silently inward. Taking a deep breath, I followed him over the threshold.

We stood in a lofty foyer that opened onto a central courtyard, surrounded all about by a colonnaded walkway. All was dark; not a single torch was lit. The long, shallow pool in the center of the courtyard was black and full of stars, its glassy surface broken only by some reeds that grew from the center.

I felt a sudden superstitious dread. Hackles rose on the back of my neck, a sheen of sweat erupted on my forehead and I was unable to breathe. My heart pounded so hard that I thought the noise must be loud enough to wake a sleeping virgin. I wanted to clutch Rufus's arm and hiss into his ear that we must go back to the Forum, at once-so deep is the fear of the forbidden ingrained from childhood, when one hears tales of men found skulking in sacred precincts and made to suffer unimaginable punishments. Ironically, I thought, it is only through association with the most respectable people in the world-like Cicero and Rufus-that a man can suddenly, unexpectedly find himself in the most forbidden spot in all Rome, at an hour when his mere presence could mean death. One moment, innocently asleep in my own bed, and the next-in the House of the Vestals!

There was a faint noise behind us. I turned to see a vague white shape in the darkness, which by degrees resolved itself into a woman. She must have opened the door for us, but she was not a slave. She was one of the Vestals, as I could tell by her appearance-her hair was cut quite short, and around her forehead she wore a broad white band like a diadem, decorated with ribbons. She was dressed in a plain white stola, and about her shoulders she wore the white linen mantle of the Vestals.

She flicked her fingers, and I felt drops of water on my face. "Be purified," she whispered. "Do you swear by the goddess of the hearth that you enter this house with no evil intent, and at the request of the mistress of this house, who is the Virgo Maxima, the highest priestess of Vesta?"

"I do," said Rufus. I followed his example.

The Vestal led us across the courtyard. As we passed the pool I heard a soft splash. I stiffened at the noise but saw only a gentle ripple traverse the black surface, causing the reflected starlight to glimmer and wink. I leaned close to Rufus's ear and whispered: "A frog?"

"But surely not a male one!" he whispered back, then gestured for me to be quiet.

We stepped beneath the colonnade, into deep shadow, and stopped before a door that was invisible except for the faint bar of light that escaped beneath its bottom edge. The Vestal knocked very gently and whispered something I couldn't hear, then left us and disappeared into the shadows. A moment later the door opened inward. A face appeared-frightened, beautiful, and quite young. She, too, wore the diadem of a Vestal.

She pulled the door open to allow us to enter. The room was dimly lit by a single lamp, beneath which another Vestal sat holding an open scroll. She was older than her companion, of middle age. Her short hair was touched with silver at the ternples. As we approached, she kept her eyes on the scroll and began to read aloud in Greek. Her voice was soft and mellow:

"Evening star, gatherer of all The bright daybreak parted: You gather the sheep, the goat; You gather the child safe to its mother."

She laid the scroll aside and looked up, first at Rufus, then at me. She sighed. "In times of distress, the poetess comforts me. Ate you familiar with Sappho?"

"A little," I said.

She laid the scroll aside. "I am Licinia."

I looked at her more closely. Was this the woman for whom the richest man in Rome had endangered his life? The Virgo Maxima seemed in no way extraordinary, at least not to my eye; on the other hand, what sort of woman could sit calmly and read Sappho in the midst of what even staid Cicero had decreed a catastrophe?

"You are Gordianus, called the Finder?" she said.

I nodded.

"Cicero sent word by Rufus that you would come. Ah, what would we have done tonight without Cicero to help us?"

" 'Like is he to a god immortal,' " said Rufus, quoting another line from Sappho.

There followed an uneasy silence. The girl who had opened the door remained in the shadows.

"Let's get on with it, then," said Licinia. "You must know already that I have been indicted for conduct forbidden to a Vestal; they accuse me of a dalliance with my kinsman Marcus Crassus."

"So I've heard."

"I'm far past my youth, and have no interest in men. The charge is absurd! It is true that Crassus seeks out my company in the Forum and the theater and pesters me constantly-but if our accusers only knew what he talks about when we're alone! Believe me, it has nothing to do with matters of the heart. Crassus is as legendary for his greed as are the Vestals for their chastity-but I will not elaborate. Crassus has his defense and I have mine, and in three days the courts will hear our cases and decide. There are no witnesses and no evidence of any act contrary to my vow; the suit is nothing more than a nuisance intended to embarrass Crassus and to undermine the people's faith in the Vestals. No reasonable panel of judges could possibly find us guilty; and yet, after the events of this evening, things could go very badly for us both."

She looked into the darkness and frowned, and caressed the scroll in her lap, as if the conversation had grown distasteful to her and she longed to escape again into the soothing rhythms of the Lesbian poet. When she spoke again, her voice was languid and dreamy.

"I was consecrated to Vesta at the age of eight; all Vestals are chosen at an early age, between six and ten. We serve for no less than thirty years. For the first ten years, we are novices, students of the mysteries like Fabia here." She gestured to the girl in the shadows. "In the second ten years we perform the sacred duties-purify the shrine and make offerings of salt, watch over the eternal flame, consecrate temples, attend the holy festivals, guard the sacred relics. In the third ten years, we become teachers and instruct the novices, passing on the mysteries. At the end of thirty years we are permitted to leave the consecrated life, but the few who choose to do so almost always end in misery." She sighed. "Within the House of the Vestals a woman acquires certain habits and expectations, falls into rhythms of life incompatible with the world outside. Most Vestals die as they have lived, in chaste service to the goddess and her everlasting hearth.

"Sometimes…" Her voice quavered. "Sometimes, especially in the early years, one can be tempted to stray from the vow of chastity. The consequence of that is death, and not a simple, merciful death, but a fate quite horrible to contemplate.

"The last such scandal occurred forty years ago. The virgin daughter of a good family was struck by lightning and killed. Her clothing was rent and her nakedness exposed; soothsayers interpreted this to mean that the Vestals had violated their vows. Three Vestals were accused of impurity, along with their alleged lovers, and tried before the college of pontiffs. One was found guilty. The others were absolved. But the people were not satisfied. They raged and rioted until a special commission was set up. The case was retired. All three Vestals were condemned."

Licinia's face grew long. Her eyes glinted in the lamplight. "Do you know the punishment, Gordianus? The lover is publicly scourged to death; a gruesome matter, but simple and quick. Not so with the Vestal. She is stripped of her diadem and linen mantle. She is whipped by the Pontifex Maximus. She is dressed like a corpse, laid in a closed litter and carried through the Forum attended by her weeping kindred, forced to live through the misery of her own funeral. She is carried to a place just inside the Colline Gate, where a small vault is prepared underground, containing a couch, a lamp, and a table with a little food. A common executioner guides her down the ladder into the cell, but he does not harm her. You see, her person is still sacred to Vesta; no man may kill her. The ladder is drawn up, the vault sealed, the ground leveled. It is left to the goddess to take the Vestal's life…"