Household Gods (17 page)
Authors: Judith Tarr
Julia was watching her, nodding sagely, as if she could see an effect Nicole couldn't feel. “That will do you good, Mistress,” she said.
“I doubt it,” Nicole said. Her belly was rumbling again, knots and snarls that were more nerves than sickness. The wine hadn't made it worse, at least. She was grateful for that.
Medicine. She could think of it as medicine. Even her mother had had a stash of medicinal brandy, that her father had never managed to find.
Julia's voice broke in on her thoughts, as so often before: as if it were a kind of lifeline, an anchor to this world. “Are you feeling well enough to go out and buy things today, Mistress, or will you send me?”
Nicole focused abruptly and too sharply, though the edges of things still wavered just a little. Julia was watching her alertly, with a look she'd seen on a dog hoping for a portion of the humans' dinner. So was this a new game, then? A gambit to get hold of some money, to do God knew what with it?
Nonsense
, Nicole thought. Julia could get at the till either way, whether she stayed to mind the tavern or went out shopping. Maybe she just wanted to get out of the house.
, Nicole thought. Julia could get at the till either way, whether she stayed to mind the tavern or went out shopping. Maybe she just wanted to get out of the house.
If that was it, too bad. Nicole hadn't gone out since she got here, either. Her insides still felt very uncertain; and even though Imodium looked like a Latin word, it surely wasn't, or she'd have found a bottle of it by now. Maybe if she could get out, breathe relatively fresh air, see more of Carnuntum than she could from window or doorway, she'd forget her indisposition for long enough to make it go away.
“I'll go,” she said. Julia's face fell, but she didn't argue. After all, her expression said, she wasn't the boss. Nicole
did her best to sound brisk. “Let's seeâwhat do we need?”
did her best to sound brisk. “Let's seeâwhat do we need?”
Julia visibly swallowed her disappointment to focus on the duties at hand. “That amphora of Falernian in there”âshe pointed to the barâ“will last the day out, I think, but not tomorrow. And we're out of scallions and raisins, and we could use some more mutton.”
“I'll get some fish, too, if I see any worth buying,” Nicole said. She had to say something, if she expected people to think she was staying on top of things.
“All right, Mistress.” Julia sounded vaguely dubious, but then she nodded. She'd dropped her façade of submission again, Nicole noticed. It seemed to go up when Nicole was giving orders, but to go down when they were working togetherâas if a slave could think for herself, sometimes, if her mistress gave the signal. Had Nicole been giving the right signals after all?
Maybe it was all those years of dealing with secretariesâpardon, administrative assistantsâand paralegals. They hadn't been much more than slave labor either, not at the pay they got and with the workload they carried.
Julia had gone right on talking, in a tone that reminded Nicole almost poignantly of a paralegal invited to voice an opinion on a case: “Fish spoils fast, so there's always that risk, but we can eat it ourselves tonight if no one else does. And people will probably order it. You were doing some interesting things with it yesterday when they brought it in for you to cook. Word will get around.”
“I suppose so,” Nicole said, though she wondered how. No TV, no radio, no telephones, no e-mail. How did people find out what was going on in the world, or even in Carnuntum?
She wasn't going to find out by staying cooped up here. Under Julia's eye, she unlocked the cash box and chose a selection of coins, picking them out with care, as if she knew to the
as
how much she was leaving behind. Julia's glance didn't flicker; her brow didn't wrinkle. Nicole drew in a breath of relief, and escaped out the door.
as
how much she was leaving behind. Julia's glance didn't flicker; her brow didn't wrinkle. Nicole drew in a breath of relief, and escaped out the door.
She turned left more or less at random. She'd gone several
steps before she realized: she didn't know where to buy any of the things on her mental list. Nothing in sight looked like a supermarket, or even like the corner grocery stores the supermarkets had forced out of business. A vague memory of her honeymoon brought to mind tiny shops, boucheries and boulangeries and something with a horse's head out front that she'd found very pretty till she learned it was a horsemeat butcher. She didn't see anything like that, either.
steps before she realized: she didn't know where to buy any of the things on her mental list. Nothing in sight looked like a supermarket, or even like the corner grocery stores the supermarkets had forced out of business. A vague memory of her honeymoon brought to mind tiny shops, boucheries and boulangeries and something with a horse's head out front that she'd found very pretty till she learned it was a horsemeat butcher. She didn't see anything like that, either.
A voice called out behind her. She stopped and turned, expecting it to be Julia, calling out that she'd gone the wrong way. But it was someone from the next house down, a little bony bird of a woman with an extraordinary crown of curled and frizzed hair, waving and calling, “Umma! Oh, Umma! Good morning!”
Nicole almost didn't respond. But the woman was looking straight at her, looking so delighted that Nicole wondered if Umma and she were long-lost sisters. She raised her hand and waved back, trying to put a little enthusiasm in it, so as not to seem suspicious.
“Off to market then?” the woman asked. “And isn't it a lovely morning? Do come over later, will you please, dear? It's been ages since we had a good gossip!”
Nicole hoped her expression didn't betray what she felt, which was a kind of horror. Neighbors in West Hills didn't lean out of upstairs windowsâif they had anyâand yodel at passersby. This neighbor obviously thought she was a friend, too. Or else she really was a relative.
“Later,” Nicole managed to say. “Yes, I'll come over later.” In about ten years. She put on a bright company smile, and wished she had a watch to glance at significantly. “Well. I'm off, then. Good morning.”
“Good morning!” the stranger caroled, and mercifully ducked back inside.
She hadn't said Nicole was going in the wrong direction, either. Nicole decided to take that as an omen. She strode on out, feeling better already, though she had to be careful where she stepped; and she kept a wary eye on the windows above. Some of her original sense of adventure was coming
back. She felt like a brave explorerâMontezuma's Revenge and all.
back. She felt like a brave explorerâMontezuma's Revenge and all.
Â
Pigeons strutted in the streets of Carnuntum, arrogant and brainless and half tame, just as they did in Los Angeles. Life here was riskier for them, however. A fellow tossed a fine-meshed net over a couple, scooped them up before they could let out more than one startled coo, and ran back inside his house, shouting, “I've got supper for today, Claudia!”
Nicole wouldn't have wanted to eat them. Living in Los Angeles, she'd come to despise the automobile for the pollution it caused, even while she worshipped at its shrine. No cars in Carnuntum. But that didn't mean no pollution, as she'd thought it would. The streets were packed deep with ox droppings, horse droppings, donkey droppings. The pigeons mined them for any number of treasures: seeds, insects, the unmistakable and nauseating pale wriggle of a worm.
One good look at what they were pulling out of the heaps of ordure, and Nicole knew she wouldn't touch one of those birds if a waiter from Le Bistro brought it.
She'd hated the air she'd had to breathe in the San Fernando Valley, back in the twentieth century: thick, stinking, and the color of filthy old chinos. It had stung her eyes and caught at her lungs with every breath she took. The air in Carnuntum stank worse than the air in the Valley ever had. It was clogged with smoke. It stung her eyes and caught at her lungs with every breath she took.
It was also full of flies. Every time someone walked past, they rose in buzzing clouds from the dung that beasts of burden had left behind, and from the occasional dog turds in the street. At least, Nicole hoped that was what those were. Some of them seemed on the large side for that.
The flies didn't all go back to their suppers, either. Some decided to take the long way home, pausing to snack on passing animals or, better yet, people. Slapping while walking looked to be as automatic as breathing.
It wasn't so easy or mindless for Nicole, nor apparently
so effective, either. In the first few minutes after she'd left the restaurant, she took at least three powerfully annoying bites. These weren't little itching mosquitoes, either, like the ones that had made the summer evenings miserable in Indiana. These were horsefliesâB-52s, people had called them when she was little. Their bites stabbed like a red-hot needle.
so effective, either. In the first few minutes after she'd left the restaurant, she took at least three powerfully annoying bites. These weren't little itching mosquitoes, either, like the ones that had made the summer evenings miserable in Indiana. These were horsefliesâB-52s, people had called them when she was little. Their bites stabbed like a red-hot needle.
Slapping, cursing, wishing in vain for a vat of Woodsman's Fly Repellent, she turned off her own street onto a larger one. A block or two down, that one ran into a bigger one yet, one big enough to boast a cobblestoned paving. At the intersection sat a fountain from which water splashed lethargically into a stone tank. Women stood around chatting and filling jugs from the tank.
They can't use all that for cooking or washing,
Nicole thought.
They must drink some of it.
She shuddered, wondering how often it made them sick. And that was just the water itself, without help from lead pipes and lead-glazed jars. She shuddered again. If the galloping trots didn't get you, lead poisoning would.
Nicole thought.
They must drink some of it.
She shuddered, wondering how often it made them sick. And that was just the water itself, without help from lead pipes and lead-glazed jars. She shuddered again. If the galloping trots didn't get you, lead poisoning would.
A block farther down the cobblestoned street stood a marble statue, half again life size, of a nude, bearded man. The Getty Museum, twenty minutes from West Hills, had a marvelous collection of ancient statuary; the couple of times Frank dragged her there on one of his cultural-literacy jags, Nicole had admired the cool white elegance of the stone.
This statue was neither cool nor white nor elegant. It had been painted to look as lifelike as possible, down to eyeballs, nipples, and pubic hair. It was, in Nicole's opinion, one of the tackiest things she'd ever seen. Hadn't they run a Saudi sheik out of Beverly Hills for painting the statues on the grounds of his mansion like this?
Seeing her astonished stare, a woman in a grimy linen tunic mistook its meaning. She pointed to the marble penisâalso half again life sizeâand said, “I wish my husband got that hard. How about you, dearie?” The woman didn't wait for or seem to expect an answer. She bustled on down the street, chortling at her own bawdy wit.
The statue had to be just as bad a joke as the one the
woman had made. Nicole wondered if some civic-minded person would come along and sandblast the paint off the marble to make it decently pure again.
woman had made. Nicole wondered if some civic-minded person would come along and sandblast the paint off the marble to make it decently pure again.
Then, as she rounded a corner, she came on the next one. This was of a woman, mostly and graphically nude. It had been painted with the same loving attention to detail and the same total lack of taste as the male statue.
If that physique represented Carnuntum's ideal of beauty, Umma's body was on the skinny side by local standards. At least half of the old wheeze,
You can't be too thin or too rich
, didn't apply here. Somehow, Nicole suspected the other half was still in force.
You can't be too thin or too rich
, didn't apply here. Somehow, Nicole suspected the other half was still in force.
Distracted by the statue; she almost jumped out of her skin as a nightmare of teeth and glaring eyeballs lunged out of a shop almost into her face. Just as her scattered wits identified the thing as a dog, a stout iron chain brought it up short. Nicole's yelp of alarm was lost in its yelp of surprise.
A roar from the shop reduced them both to silence: “Hercules! Blast you to Hades, you fornicating thing!”
The owner of the voice burst into the street, armed with a stout stick and a glare as red-eyed and wild as the dog's had been. The glare reduced the dog to a whimpering puddle, but the owner never seemed to notice. The stick slashed the dog across the nose; a foot armed with a hobnailed sandal booted it in the ribs. The dog whined piteously and slunk back into the shop, chain rattling behind it.
The shopkeeper tucked the stick in his belt and shook his head. “Damn, Mistress Umma, I'm sorry for that. You know why I got the miserable beastâthree break-ins in six months, and the last time the bastards got as far as the cash box before I drove them off. But even with the sign, the blasted dog's scared off half my customers.” He tilted his head toward the wall, where a neatly painted inscription read, CAVE CANEM:
Beware the dog.
Beware the dog.
Nicole was still shaking with reaction and a surprising, unexpected surge of anger. “I don't care if you do have a sign,” she said. “If that dog had bitten me, I'd have sued.”
The sentence came as naturally in Latin as it would have in English.
The sentence came as naturally in Latin as it would have in English.
It had the same effect it would have had in English, too. The shopkeeper turned a chalky white, stuttered something she couldn't make out, and scuttled back inside the shop. Thumps and anguished barks told her he was beating the dog again. Mean or not, no animal deserved that. But what could she do about it? There was no SPCA in this world. For the first time, Nicole really understood what the phrase “dog-eat-dog” meant.
As if the CAVE CANEM sign had flicked a switch in her head, Nicole found herself sharply aware of other signs and scribbles than the ones that announced a shopkeeper's name and business. The Romans might not have spray paint, but they knew about graffiti. They wrote in chalk on dark walls and, more often, in charcoal on light ones.
MARCUS LOVES LYDIA, someone had scrawled in charcoal now faded. Nicole wondered if Marcus had done it, or if some of his friends were giving him a hard time. Either way, the graffito had a modern ring to it. Two doors farther down the street she found another, fresher, charcoal scrawl: BAL-BUS SCREWED LYDIA AGAINST THIS WALL. Was he boasting? Was he teasing Marcus? Was he talking about a different Lydia?
Nicole didn't usually wonder about things like that, questions she might never answer, things she'd likely never know. Somehow, here, now, time seemed more flexible.
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