Lindsey Davis - The course of Honor

Much as she knew him, he astonished her. "In my house."

It was unbelievable.

The man sat, amid the ruins of their al fresco breakfast—as he would sit, if she did live with him, every day—gazing at her as peacefully as if he had just asked her to read out the election results from the Gazette. They were sharing a table of the most casual kind. He must know she was happy. She had asked him for nothing. Yet he chose to offer this. "That was what I wanted to say." He was perfectly serious.

Caenis sat in silence while the world rocked, and every assumption on which she had built her bitter life was smashed. Caenis believed: It was impossible to win; it was impossible ever to regain what you had lost; life was unequal; affection was temporary; men took; men left and did not return; women lost, grieved, longed, made do with diminishing faith and fading strength. . . .

With his astounding demand, Vespasian had disproved it all.

"Oh, you can't!" she managed at last to gasp. "A senator and consul—set up house with a freedwoman; not even one of his own? Oh, Titus! Why not just marry again? Take a discreet mistress? Me, if you want; you must know that I would—"

He was expecting this shocked protest from her. He stayed immobile, saying calmly, "Caenis, we were strong-minded enough to follow the rules; we are strong-minded enough to break them. I am asking for you."

" What are you asking?"

"Plain enough; live with me. Share my life; share yours with me."

For a moment she could not bear to let him see her face.

* * *

When she dropped her hands, Caenis started briskly to return their relationship to a normal course: "This is unnecessary. I would be quite content to have some regular arrangement. You don't need to cause social apoplexy. There are women a man sleeps with casually, and women he takes solemnly as his wife; there is no middle way. It's not respectable. It's against the law—"

"It is not. It's against the law to marry you. If I could—I will tell you this now—I would have done it years ago. Now, the snobs won't particularly like it, but I have performed my obligations; I can choose. ‘Somebody to bully and a half-decent companion for your old age.' You said it. Caenis, please; have me."

She tried one last feeble protest: "What about your family?"

"Ah yes; the family!" In that deliberate way he had thought it all through. "Well, Titus is clean and good-tempered around the house, though he does practice the harp sometimes; Domitian is obstreperous, and he's going to need attention. Sabinus seems grumpy, but he's easily led. His wife thinks you are wonderful; always did. You will be one of the family—that is what I intend—so you won't expect good manners. You, however, may be your vinegary self in return. You will have to be in charge. My role as head of the household will be to disappear to the Senate whenever there's a row; you'll have to cope all by yourself, of course. Normal home life with an antique hero—no money, no slaves, dismal food, poor conversation, and endless bickering. I expect you to be a drudge, a nurse, an entertainer, a very sharp accountant, and a provider of much physical comfort for me. . . . I have every confidence in you, Caenis."

Caenis wondered whether this speech, which was not obviously preplanned or overrehearsed, rated applause. She sighed, feeling helpless.

His voice fell to that low, benevolent tone that churned her stomach. "Do you want a promise about how much you mean to me, and what I'll do for you?"

"Don't be disgusting; we're better friends than that!"

He laughed happily.

There was sunshine on her face, birdsong overhead. Someone in the house had begun to rattle a broom around the dining room in the normal daily routine. She rubbed her temples with both hands.

Vespasian offered wryly, "I hope the unusual request speaks for itself."

"Oh, it does! You have noticed that I come with a set of silver knives and the best steward in Rome—"

"It's your wonderful knives I want, of course! Are there matching salad servers too? . . . Will you take me on, then?"

"You and I?"

"You and I. I knew a girl once, Caenis—odd little scrap, fierce as a lion, didn't care who she was rude to, nice girl, very good in bed, a true friend—who said life would be what we made it for ourselves."

For the first time since he fed the finch he got to his feet and came to her, holding out his hands. Caenis was trembling. He always knew how to reduce her to rubble, then say exactly the right thing. "Oh, I have missed you!" declared Vespasian in a low voice; she was lost.

With her hands twined in his, but still seated, Caenis spoke, once, what sooner or later she would have to say. Better now, than in some unrelated quarrel afterward. "I have lived the best years of my life, and lived them without you."

He did not flinch. "Agreed."

"I built my own life."

"Yes."

He drew her to her feet. Coming to him, Caenis said, "I missed you too. I missed you more than you or anybody else will ever understand. I have to tell you this. For the sake of what I have been, what I endured, what I have done. This has to be acknowledged between us now."

Gravely he let her speak; probably he did not fear anything she might say because he knew she would always be just. He did not even agitate for her answer. Perhaps he knew what it would be. Then, because even now Caenis could not bear to let him see her cry, she stayed silent for longer than she wanted. She had to struggle to control herself, but in the end she managed in her calm, trained, competent voice: "If it is what you want, yes; I will come."

His reaction was the last thing she expected: She saw, suddenly, that there were tears in his eyes.

"Titus? Oh, love !"

He was smiling the small pale smile that she had seen once before when he left her, though only now, with blinding recognition, did she finally understand it. She saw him swallow as he recovered himself. "Sentimental old beggar. Excuse me; I really didn't think you would."

Faced with an emergency, Caenis was at once herself: "Frankly, if I had thought that you felt sure of me, I don't suppose I would agree."

Then, as he laughed once more in that delighted way, she remembered. It was Crete all over again. In public life the next step after consul was a provincial governorship.

"You are due for a province. Agrippina can't debar you forever. You will be going abroad!" Life never changed.

Last time she had been fending him off; then they were so young, they had years heaped like treasures in spoilheaps ahead of them. This time she was in his arms; he knew exactly how she felt. This time she could let herself feel his devotion to her—and to let him go now would be unbearable.

Titus Flavius Vespasianus muttered a country curse. "I seem to have explained myself badly; or perhaps my assumptions were impertinent. When I asked you to live with me what I meant was that barring riot or rebellion, where I go I hope you will come too."

Caenis could hardly believe it. "One day you will be Governor of Africa; and I—"

"You will be the Governor's lady," he said. "Of course!"

THIRTY-THREE

Sometimes the most major events take place so quietly. Caenis was to live with Vespasian; it was as simple as that.

There were one or two riffles. There was a brief moment of tension the first time she went to Reate. She had been introduced to the servants, who seemed if anything more docile and pleased to see her than the high-handed experts with whom Aglaus had peopled her own home. In the house she had spotted the marks of long-term financial tension: not quite enough furniture, hangings pushed to last half a decade beyond their natural life, even items that were new all faintly drab as if years of having no money made it feel sinful to invest in anything that was genuinely attractive. Caenis did not mind. She was a woman who enjoyed tackling problems.