Steven Saylor - The Venus Throw

"They're only half siblings, then," Eco said. "So any copulation- conjectural or otherwise-would be only half incest, I suppose."

"Not that such a distinction would matter to anyone this side of Egypt," I said. "Actually-more gossip-one hears that Clodius has been the lover of all three of his sisters, the two full-blooded, younger ones as well as his big sister Clodia. Just as one hears that Clodius was groomed as a catamite by his older brothers when he was a boy, to sell his sexual favors to wealthy rakes."

"But I thought Clodius and his family were wealthy to begin with."

"Fabulously wealthy by our standards, Eco, but not by those of their peers. During the civil wars, when Clodia and Clodius were children, their father Appius was on the side of Sulla. When Sulla's fortunes ebbed, Appius had to flee Rome for several years. His children had to fend for themselves in a city full of enemies. Clodia, the oldest, was barely into her teens. It can't have been easy for those children. Those were hard years for everyone." This was something I hardly needed to tell Eco; it was in those years of chaotic civil strife that his own father had died and his mother had been reduced to such poverty that she eventually abandoned him to fend for himself in the streets, until I took him into my home and adopted him.

"When Sulla eventually triumphed and became dictator, Appius Claudius returned and for a short while thrived. He was elected consul in the year that Sulla retired. Then he took his reward, a provincial governorship-of Macedonia, I think-where he could bleed the locals for taxes, collect tribute from their chieftains and thus provide his sons back home with silver to start their political careers and his daughters with dowries. So it goes for a Roman with a successful political career. But not in the case of Appius Claudius. He died in Macedonia. The taxes and tributes were collected by his successor, and the only thing the children of Appius Claudius got back from Macedonia were the ashes of their father. They must have gone through a bad patch after that. They were never so poor that they dropped from sight, but one can imagine them scrimping and cutting corners to keep up appearances- the kind of petty humiliations that privileged patricians find so galling.

"And without a father in the house, the children must have made their own rules. Did young Clodius and his sisters carry on like rutting sheep without a shepherd to separate them? I don't know, but growing up in a turbulent, often hostile city with their father absent for years at a time, and then losing him while they were still quite young, must have brought the siblings close together-perhaps uncommonly or even un-naturally close. And while I seriously doubt that young Clodius was ever a prostitute in the strictly commercial sense-that kind of talk reeks of slander-given the circumstances, it's not hard to imagine him using whatever attributes he possessed to curry favor with those who could help him and his brothers get ahead. It's also not hard to imagine that there were those who found him desirable. Even now Clodius still has the look of a boy-sleek-limbed, slender-hipped, broad-chested. Smooth skin. A face like his sister's… "

"Yes, I was forgetting that you've just seen him naked," said Eco, raising his eyebrows.

I ignored his teasing. "The third name attached to their branch of the Claudian line is Pulcher, you know-'beautiful.' Clodius's full name is Publius Clodius Pulcher, and his sister is Clodia Pulcher. I don't know how far back the name goes, or which of their ancestors was vain enough to add it, but it certainly fits the current generation. Pulcher, indeed! And yes, I speak advisedly, having just seen both of them naked, or near enough-fact, not gossip! You know, I can well imagine that there are those, having seen the two of them together, who rather like to picture Clodia and Clodius making love, whether it's true or not." "Papa, your eyes are glazing over!"

"They most certainly are not. But never mind all that. Everyone knows that the Clodii are good-looking, and everyone suspects that they both have far too much sex for anyone's good. What else do we know about them? I think the first time that I ever heard of Clodius was when he acted as a prosecutor in the trials of the Vestal Virgins."

"Ah, yes, when he accused Catilina of seducing the Vestal Fabia."

"But when both Catilina and the Vestal were acquitted, things got so hot for Clodius in Rome that he had to flee down to Baiae until the furor cooled down. He burned his fingers on that one. I don't suppose he was even twenty at the time. I could never make out what his object was, except to stir up trouble. Perhaps he wasn't quite sure himself, just testing his powers."

"The next thing I remember about him happened a few years later," said Eco. "Something about stirring up that mutiny among the troops."

"Ah, yes, when he went off to serve in the East as a lieutenant under his brother-in-law Lucullus. Clodius styled himself as the soldiers' champion. They were already dissatisfied with the way Lucullus was driving them from campaign to campaign with no end in sight and no sure prospect of a reward, while Pompey's troops were already receiving farms and settlements for fewer years of service. Clodius made a famous speech to the troops, saying they deserved more from their general than the chance to lay down their lives protecting his personal caravan of camels laden with gold. 'If we must never have an end to fighting, shouldn't we reserve what's left of our bodies and souls for a commander who will reckon his chief glory to be the wealth of his soldiers?' "

"Papa, what a head you've always had for remembering speeches, even those you've heard only secondhand!"

"Such a memory is as much a curse as a blessing, Eco. Anyway, you can see that Clodius was a rabble-rouser even then, making himself the advocate of the masses against their rulers, setting himself up in opposition to the status quo. No wonder he switched to the plebeian form of his name."

"And then more scandal," said Eco. "The affair of the Good God-

dess."

"Yes. Was it only six years ago? Ironic that the man who started out by prosecuting a Vestal Virgin and her alleged lover should have gotten himself into such a sacrilegious scandal. The hearsay-gossip, not fact-was that Clodius was carrying on with Caesar's wife, Pompeia, but Caesar had caught on and set his mother to watch Pompeia like a hawk, so that it became impossible for the lovers to meet. Never one to let his appetites be denied, Clodius concocted a scheme to reach Pompeia. He decided to sneak into the women's festival of the Good Goddess, Fauna, which was being held that year in Caesar's house. No men allowed, of course. How could Clodius get in? By dressing up as a woman! Imagine him all fancied up as a singing girl in a saffron robe with purple hose and slippers-I wonder if his sisters helped dress him up."

"Perhaps it wasn't his first time in a stola," said Eco.

"I suppose he couldn't resist the idea of taking Pompeia in Caesar's own bed, with Caesar's own mother and scores of other women chanting and lighting incense in the next room. I wonder if Clodius planned to keep his stola on while he did it?"

"Papa, I object! You're letting your lurid imagination seduce you into accepting hearsay, and then compounding the slander."

"Granted, Eco. I shall try to get back to the facts. The story goes that Clodius almost pulled it off. In the haze of the incense and the confusion of the chanting and dancing-who knows what sort of rituals these women engage in behind closed doors? — Clodius managed to make his way into the house and to find one of Pompeia's slave girls, who was expecting him. She went to fetch her mistress, but when she failed to return, Clodius became impatient and started wandering through the house on his own, staying out of the light as much as he could, observing the proceedings."