George Gardiner: A Forbidden History.The Hadrian enigma

She greeted the Roman with a shy deference he found disarming. She whirled and teetered on tip-toe to prominently display her bodily wares. Suetonius preferred her lively approach rather than the lascivious insolence tediously affected by the other girls. In fact Surisca vaguely reminded him of his late concubine Priscilla, which was a pleasing recollection. So he called for the steward and clapped hands on the price, which was trivial.

The steward departed. This left his servant standing discreetly by the door awaiting further instruction. Macro stood guard outside to maintain vigilance against intruders.

Surisca began her contract with Suetonius by taking a cue from the sultry music echoing throbbingly from the main salon beyond his chamber. She performed a distracted, sensually arousing dance before him. This was her sex worker's preliminary routine for a client, leisurely displaying her fleshy showcase of goods and erotic possibilities.

Loosening her hair so it tumbled down her back in a flood of shiny waves, and letting fall all her Damascene veils to the floor, she cheekily tossed her more private vestments into his face with a chuckle and grin. They exuded the scents of roses and the female creature.

Then Surisca slowly undulated and writhed before him in subtle shifting moves matching the echoes of the music, moving ever closer to him with each phrase of its melody. Her body surged and flowed with the rhythms, her full bosom and pink nipples were invitingly prominent, while her shapely configurations revealed every nook and cranny of her flesh, every pore of her skin, every fold of her femininity, just as she intended. The shy smile had now become a remote sensuality as her eyes locked dreamily onto the older man's attention in alluring, if professional, calculation.

Despite the leaden effects of the inhalant's fumes and being over three times Surisca's age, Suetonius felt his blood race into his genitals, incite his lust, and firm his member for action. Well, almost. With very little effort nubile Surisca had aroused the older man with her simple arts, searching eyes, and fleshly rounded curves. He began to melt in readiness for enveloping her in his arms and penetrating that Doorway to Eternity which the female Other holds in perpetual mastery over mere mortals such as he.

As Surisca drew closer to him in rhythmic distraction he could detect the redolence of myrrh and frankincense oil on her skin, while her breath was fragrant with musk and mint. The mixed scents, the impact of the heady inhalant, and the leisurely throb of the music induced a swooning delight.

Of course Surisca had other intentions prior to satisfying Suetonius's increasingly urgent impulses. Like the experienced working girl she was, she intended to prolong his pleasures and titillate his body's nine orifices with other arts of touch, mouth, tongue, and breath. Delay was delicious. Exquisite tension was thrilling excitement. She blew whispers into his ear, she nibbled and sucked at his navel, she fondled and licked his nipples. She explored hidden places of his physique that he himself might not choose to, and she did it with bravado.

He responded clumsily with the vapor's leaden, ineffectual, distraction.

She toyed with his genitals with abandon and stroked his struggling member with delicacy. She knew inherently she had touched some remote part of his psyche and provoked some distant memory of a past liaison. She played with him and his memories in a manner which brought him a marvelously pleasing satisfaction. Yes, she was certainly professional.

But it was to be not to be for long -

The chamber door burst open with a tumult of voices. Both the steward and Suetonius's manservant tumbled into the chamber genuflecting and groveling profusely before him. Macro, the gladiator, stood with his back to the room with his gladius sword unsheathed at the ready, awaiting Suetonius's signal for action.

Surisca clutched up her garments to flee to a corner to cower at the sudden intrusion.

At the door stood a tall senior officer of the Praetorian Guard, the emperor's security police, plus several lesser officers. The Praetorian, spectacularly regaled in his muscular leathern breastplate, ceremonial swathes and tassels, plus a crested helmet with its heroic horse-hair brush typical of the Guard, stepped forward with military precision. He disdainfully brushed the gladiator aside. He snapped the honor-and-hail arm-salute at the bare-arsed Roman senior flustering messily on the divan before him.

"Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus? Equestrian knight and former private secretary to the Imperial Court? Hail!" the Praetorian declaimed.

Suetonius stumbled to his feet and clutched his private parts behind his tunic with as much dignity as his clouded state, unsteady gait, and distressed arousal could marshal.

Damn! he thought, things were just getting really interesting!

"I am he," he mouthed in his best legal-argument voice trained in earlier years at the Bar of Rome. He had only the faintest nervous tremor in his vowels. "All hail, Praetorian!"

"On the instruction of Imperator Caesar Publius Aelius Hadrian, I convey to you an Imperial Summons."

The officer extended a small furled scroll at arm's length. It was bound in the scarlet silk tie and clay seal of the Imperial Administration which Suetonius instantly recognized from his own years earlier as Private Secretary to Hadrian.

Gathering his composure, he took the scroll and broke the seal to unfurl the small roll beneath. His mind had cleared swiftly and his nerves returned to a steadier flow as the inscrutable Praetorian stood at ease intently observing his responses. The officer would already know what he was about to learn, Suetonius imagined.

He read the epistle silently to himself, trying to ensure his hands weren't trembling. It began with the standard triumphalism.

"Imperator Caesar Trajan Hadrian Augustus, son of the divine Trajan Parthicus, grandson of the divine Nerva, pontifex maximus, tribunican power for the fifteenth time, thrice consul, pater patriae, on this 28th day of October of the thirteenth year of our rule, to Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus, knight and scholar of Rome. Greetings — !"

"Greetings", Suetonius thought, so this was not to be something alarming. Without this word the document would inspire immediate fear in the sturdiest soul. It continued -

"It is our desire you attend our person immediately on receipt of this summons."

That's all, "attend our person immediately", finalized with the usual politesses.

The Praetorian unlaced his helmet, swept it under his arm, and snapped to attention.

"I am instructed to deliver you immediately into the presence of our lord and master, the Princeps, Imperator Caesar Hadrian. Immediately. Now. Praise be to Caesar!"

He pronounced his message with the same unemotional tone he probably used when announcing someone's transport to a giddily joyful wedding, or receipt of a glorious military commission, or summons to immediate execution.

"I have a horse at your disposal, and we are instructed to accompany you into Caesar's presence across the River. Now, sir. Praise be to Caesar!"

By this time Suetonius had recovered his wits and realized the fellow meant business. He signaled to his attendant to help him gather his belongings.

He waved wanly at Surisca hovering demurely in the corner and tossed a small gold coin in her direction from his belt-purse, a sum far beyond the negotiated price with the steward.

"I'll be back sometime soon, Surisca," he whispered. He made a point of remembering her name.

Turning to the officer he blurted aloud, "But how did you know where to find me?"

Suetonius simply had to ask. How would Praetorians locate someone enjoying the private pleasures of a bordello in an outback town late of a holiday afternoon?