Colleen McCullough - 5. Caesar

In the midst of reading Bibulus's letter Cato began to feel a peculiar, crawling dread. The basis of it he couldn't quite pin down, except that it had to do with Caesar. Caesar, Caesar, always and ever Caesar! A man whose luck was proverbial, who never put a foot wrong. What had Catulus said? Not to him, to someone else he couldn't for the life of him remember... that Caesar was like Ulysses; that his life strand was so strong it frayed through all those it rubbed against. Knock him down, and up he sprang again like the dragon's teeth planted in the field of death. Now Bibulus was stripped of his two eldest sons. Syria was, he said, unlucky for him. Could it be? No! Cato rolled up the letter, put his misgivings from him, and sent for the hapless Brutus. Who would have to deal with the faithlessness of his sister, the wrath of his mother, and the grief of Cato's daughter, whom he would not see himself. Let Brutus do it. Brutus liked that sort of duty. He was to be seen at every single funeral; he had a deft touch with a condolence.

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So it was that Brutus plodded from his own house to the house of Marcus Calpurnius Bibulus, miserably conscious of his role as the bearer of bad tidings. When informed that Junia was being a naughty girl, Servilia simply shrugged and said that she was surely old enough by now to manage her own life on whatever terms she chose. When informed of the identity of the man with whom Junia was dallying, Servilia soared higher than Ararat. A worm like Publius Vedius? Roar! Screech! Drum the heels, grind the teeth, spit worse curses than the lowliest laborer in the Port of Rome! From indifference she passed to an outrage so awful that Brutus fled, leaving Servilia to stride around the corner to Vatia Isauricus's house and confront her daughter. For the crime to Servilia was not adultery, but loss of dignitas. Young women with Junian fathers and patrician Servilian mothers did not gift lowborn mushrooms with access to their husbands' property. He knocked on the door and was admitted to Bibulus's house by the steward, a man whose snobbishness exceeded that of his master. When Brutus asked to see the lady Porcia, the steward looked down his long nose and pointed silently in the direction of the peristyle. He then walked away as if to say that he wanted nothing to do with the entire situation. Brutus had not seen Porcia since her wedding day two years ago, which was not an unusual state of affairs; on the many occasions when he had visited Bibulus, his wife was nowhere to be seen. Marriage to two Domitias, both of whom Caesar had seduced for no better reason than that he loathed Bibulus, had cured Bibulus of inviting his wife to dinner when he had male guests. Even if the male guest was his wife's first cousin, and even if his male guest was as blameless of reputation as Brutus. As he walked toward the peristyle he could hear her loud, neighing laughter, and the much higher, lighter laughter of a child. They were galloping round the garden, Porcia handicapped by a blindfold. Her ten-year-old stepson frolicked about her, tugging her dress one moment, standing still and absolutely silent the next while she blundered within an inch of him, groping and giggling. Then he would laugh and dash away, and off she would go again in pursuit. Though, noted Brutus, the boy was considerate; he made no move toward the pool, into which Porcia might fall. Brutus's heart twisted. Why hadn't he been dowered with a big sister like this? Someone to play with, have fun with, laugh with? Or a mother like that? He knew some men who did have mothers like that, who still romped with them when provoked. What a delight it must be for young Lucius Bibulus to have a stepmother like Porcia. Dear, galumphing elephant Porcia. "Is anybody home?" he called from the colonnade. Both of them stopped, turned. Porcia pulled off her blindfold and whinnied with delight. Young Lucius following, she lolloped over to Brutus and enfolded him in a huge hug which took his feet off the terrazzo floor. "Brutus, Brutus!" she cried, putting him down. "Lucius, this is my cousin Brutus. Do you know him?" "Yes," said Lucius, clearly not as enthusiastic at Brutus's arrival as his stepmother was. "Ave, Lucius," said Brutus, smiling to reveal that he had beautiful teeth and that the smile, were it located in a less off-putting face, possessed a winning, spontaneous charm. "I'm sorry to spoil your fun, but I must talk to Porcia in private." Lucius, the same kind of diminutive, frosty-looking person as his father, shrugged and wandered off, kicking at the grass disconsolately. "Isn't he lovely?" asked Porcia, conducting Brutus to her own rooms. "Isn't this lovely?" she asked then, gesturing at her sitting room proudly. "I have so much space, Brutus!" "They say that every kind of plant and creature abhors emptiness, Porcia, and it is quite true, I see. You've managed to overcrowd it magnificently." "Oh, I know, I know! Bibulus is always telling me to try to be tidy, but it isn't in my nature, I'm afraid." She sat down on one chair, he on another. At least, he reflected, Bibulus kept sufficient staff to make sure his wife's shambles was dust-free and that the chairs were vacant. Her dress sense hadn't improved, he noticed; she was wearing yet another baby-cack-brown canvas tent which emphasized the width of her shoulders and gave her a slight air of the Amazon warrior. But her mop of fiery hair was considerably longer and thus even more beautiful, and the large grey eyes were as sternly luminous as he had remembered them to be. "What a pleasure to see you," she said, smiling. "And to see you, Porcia." "Why haven't you come to call before? Bibulus has been away now for almost a year." "It isn't done to call on a man's wife in his absence." She frowned. "That's ridiculous!" "Well, his first two wives were unfaithful to him." "They have nothing to do with me, Brutus. If it were not for Lucius, I'd have been desperately lonely." "But you do have Lucius." "I dismissed his pedagogue idiotic man! I teach Lucius myself these days, and he's come ahead so well. You can't beat learning in with a rod; you have to sustain fascination with it." "I can see he loves you." "And I love him." The reason for his mission gnawed at him, but Brutus found himself wanting to know a lot more about Porcia the married woman, and knew that the moment he broached the subject of death, his chance to discover her thoughts would vanish. So for the moment he pushed it away and said, "How do you like married life?" "Very much." "What do you like most about it?" "The freedom." She snorted with laughter. "You've no idea how marvelous it is to live in a house without Athenodorus Cordylion and Statyllus! I know tata esteems them highly, but I never could. They were so jealous of him! If it looked as if I might have a few moments alone in his company, they'd rush in and spoil it. All those years, Brutus, living in the same house as Marcus Porcius Cato, knowing myself his daughter, and yet never able to be alone with him, free of his Greek leeches I loathed them! Spiteful, petty old men. And they encouraged him to drink." A great deal of what she said was true, but not all of it; Brutus thought Cato drank of his own volition, and that it had a great deal to do with his animosity for those he deemed unworthy of the mos maiorum. And Marcia. Which just went to show that Brutus too hadn't divined Cato's most fiercely guarded secret: the loneliness of life without his brother Caepio, his terror of loving other people so much that living without them was agony. "And did you like being married to Bibulus?" "Yes," she said tersely. "Was it very difficult?" Not having been raised by women, she interpreted this as a man would, and answered frankly. "The sexual act, you mean." He blushed, but blushes didn't stand out on his dark, stubbly face; he answered with equal frankness. "Yes." Sighing, she leaned forward with her linked hands between her widely separated knees; Bibulus clearly had not broken her of her mannish habits. "Well, Brutus, one accepts its necessity. The Gods do it too, if one believes the Greeks. Nor have I ever found any evidence in the writings of any philosopher that women are supposed to enjoy it. It is a reward for men, and if men did not seek it actively, it would not exist. I cannot say worse of it than that I suffered it, nor better of it than that it did not revolt me." She shrugged. "It is a brief business, after all, and once the pain becomes bearable, nothing truly difficult." "But you're not supposed to feel pain after the first time, Porcia," said Brutus blankly. "Really?" she asked indifferently. "That has not been so for me." Then she said, apparently unwounded, "Bibulus says I am juiceless." Brutus's blush deepened, but his heart was wrung too. "Oh, Porcia! Maybe when Bibulus comes back it will be different. Do you miss him?" "One must miss one's husband," she said. "You didn't learn to love him." "I love my father. I love little Lucius. I love you too, Brutus. But Bibulus I respect." "Did you know that your father wanted me to marry you?" Her eyes widened. "No." "He did. But I wouldn't." That blighted her. She said gruffly, "Why not?" "Nothing to do with you, Porcia. Only that I gave my love to someone who didn't love me." "Julia." "Yes, Julia." His face twisted. "And when she died, I just wanted a wife who meant nothing to me. So I married Claudia." "Oh, poor Brutus!" He cleared his throat. "Aren't you curious as to what brings me here today?" "I'm afraid I didn't think beyond the fact that you've come." He shifted in his chair, then looked directly at her. "I'm deputed to break some painful news to you, Porcia." Her skin paled, she licked her lips. "Bibulus is dead." "No, Bibulus is well. But Marcus and Gnaeus were murdered in Alexandria." The tears coursed down her face at once, but she said not one word. Brutus fished out his handkerchief and gave it to her, knowing full well that she would have put hers into service as a blotter or a mop. He let her weep for some time, then got to his feet a little awkwardly. "I must go, Porcia. But may I come back? Would you like me to tell young Lucius?" "No," she mumbled through the folds of linen. "I'll tell him, Brutus. But please come back." Brutus went away saddened, though not, he realized, for the sons of Marcus Bibulus. For that poor, vital, glorious creature whose husband could say no better of her than that she was oh, horrible word! juiceless.