Mika Waltari - The Roman

The music played on and naked dancers and acrobats were writhing all over the floors as I went in search of my father. He was lying on a couch beside Tullia in gloomy silence.

“Perhaps it is the custom in Rome,” I said, “that noble women are sick all over the place and the men make indecent gestures at me, but I simply cannot tolerate that anyone seems to think they have the right to paw me anywhere on my body. I’m neither a slave nor a eunuch. I want to go home.”

“I’m much too weak-willed and comfortable,” my father admitted, “to extract myself from this depravity, but you must try to be stronger than I. I’m glad to hear your decision, and that you yourself have made it. I am forced to stay here, for no one can avoid his destiny, but it would be better if you lived with Aunt Laelia, and anyhow you have your own fortune now. You would gain nothing by living in your stepmother’s house.”

Tullia was not looking at me so kindly as she had the previous evening. I asked if I could come the next morning to fetch my father so that we could choose a horse for me, but she briskly cut me off with the words, “Your father is too old to ride. He would only fall off the horse and injure his valuable head. At the centenary festival parade he can lead his horse.”

I realized I had lost my father, and a sense of desolation came over me, for I had experienced his favor for a very short time. But I also realized that it was better for me to harden myself and create a life of my own. I went in search of Aunt Laelia, hitting out as hard as I could at a half-naked woman with glittering eyes who tried to hang around my neck. But the blow on her backside only spurred her on, so Barbus was forced to pull her away.

Tullia was so pleased to be rid of us so easily that she let us take her own sedan. Inside the sedan Aunt Laelia adjusted her clothes and began to chatter.

“I’ve heard a great deal of gossip about what goes on in the new houses in Rome,” she said, “but I could not believe my ears. Valeria Tullia is considered to be a decent woman. Perhaps marriage has made her quite unrestrained after the abstemious life of widowhood, although there were many fine men who seemed to make themselves at home at her house. Your father will have much to do keeping her in order.”

Early next morning, while we were eating our bread and honey, I spoke to Barbus.

“I must go and choose a horse,” I said, “and I must do it alone, for now that I am an adult I don’t need a companion as I did as a boy. Now you have the chance to realize your dream of becoming an innkeeper.”

“I have looked at several pleasant inns in different parts of Rome,” replied Barbus seriously, “and I am also in a position to buy one, thanks to your father’s goodness. But when all is said and done, the idea no longer delights me as it did in the days when I slept on the bare ground and drank the legion’s sour wine. And also an inn needs a woman as well as a landlord, but in my experience good landladies are very hardhearted women. In fact I’d prefer to stay in your service for the time being. Of course, you don’t need me any longer as a protector, but I’ve noticed that every knight who is the slightest concerned with his dignity usually has one companion or more, some even ten or a hundred if they are going out of the city. So it would be wisest if only for your own sake that you had a scarred old veteran with you.

“The cavalry is another matter,” he went on, “but I fear you have several difficult weeks ahead of you. In the eyes of the others you are nothing but a recruit. I’ve told you how they train recruits in the legion, but you probably didn’t believe it all and thought I was exaggerating a bit, perhaps to amuse you. Above all, you must remember to control yourself, clench your teeth and never be angry with a superior. We’ll go there together. Perhaps I can give you some advice.”

As we walked through the city to Mars field, Barbus remarked sadly, “I should really have the right to bear the insignia of an under-centurion, the mural crown, if only I hadn’t been so given to fighting after drinking. Even the chain I received in memory of Tribune Lucius, that time I swam across the Danube between the ice floes with him bleeding on my back, ended up in pawn in some wretched barbarian inn in Mesia, and I never got it out again before we were moved on. But we could go and look in some weapon shop and buy a secondhand souvenir chain. Perhaps you’d be better treated if your companion was wearing one round his neck.”

I said that he had sufficient insignia of honor on his tongue, but Barbus insisted on going in and buying a triumph badge of copper on which the inscription was so worn that one could not discern who it was had once given them out to his veterans. But when Barbus fastened it at his shoulder, he said he felt more secure among all the cavalrymen.

On the great field there were about a hundred young knights practicing for the centenary equestrian games. The stablemaster was a big churlish man who laughed loudly when he read the certificate I had received from the quaestor at the Noble Order of Knights.

“We’ll soon find a suitable horse for you, young man,” he shouted. “Do you want a big one or a small one, a wild one or a quiet one, a white one or a black one?”

He led us to the stable of available horses. I pointed to one and saw another which I liked, but he looked in his papers and said coldly that they were already taken.

“It’d be safest if you had a quiet horse which is used to the exercises and the noise of the circus and which knows the horn signals, if you’re thinking of taking part in the centenary parade,” he said. “Have you done any riding before?”

I admitted modestly that I had practiced a bit in Antioch, for Barbus had told me not to boast, and I added that I thought all cavalry horses were used to horn signals.

“But I’d be glad to take an unbroken horse and break it in myself,” I dared to suggest. “However, I realize that I’d not have time to do that before the festival.”

“Excellent, excellent!” cried the stablemaster, almost choking with laughter. “There aren’t many youngsters who know how to break in a horse. So help me, Hercules, to keep me from bursting. Professionals do the breaking in here.”

One of the professionals came up at that moment and looked me over from head to foot.

“We’ve got Arminia,” he suggested. “She’s used to the circus racket and stands still even if you drop a sack of stones in her saddle.”

He showed me a large black mare who turned in her stall and gave me a look of distrust.

“No, no, not Arminia,” said the stablemaster in horror. “She’s much too sedate for such a young man. She’s so handsome and yet as gentle as a lamb. We must keep her for some old senator who wants to ride in the parade.”

“Naturally, I had not thought to receive a horse for nothing,” I said, “just with a certificate. If you’ll allow me, I’d like to try this horse.”

“He wants to try it and pay for it as well,” said die breaker-in delightedly.

After a few protests, the stablemaster finally agreed.

“It’s much too quiet a horse for a boy like you,” he said, “but get your boots on and your riding kit. Meanwhile I’ll have the horse saddled.”

I told him that I had nothing with me to wear, but the stablemaster looked at me as if I were mentally deficient.

“You weren’t going to ride in parade costume, were you?” he said. “The State pays for your practice clothes.”

He took me to the equipment room and helpful slaves laced the chest harness so tightly that I found it hard to breathe. I was given a battered helmet and an old pair of short boots. They did not give me a shield, sword or spear, but told me to be content with testing my ability to ride the first time.