Render Unto Caesar (39 page)

“But you regret that you never fought.”

It was not a question. “Yes,” he admitted. “I do.” After a minute he added, “My father had me taught Latin from when I was very young. That's very unusual, but my father was an unusual man. He wanted me to understand how our rulers saw us. The trouble is, I did. I heard the way they talk about us when they think we don't understand. These degenerate half-Greeks, they say, these Alexandrian cowards: led by a woman and a rabble of eunuchs, no wonder they didn't fight even for their own country.”

She stroked his hair. “So now you are fighting to make them see you differently?”

He laughed. “I suppose I am. How did we get onto this?”

“My husband.”

“Oh. Yes.”

She ignored his lack of enthusiasm for the subject and continued her cautious probing. “You said your wife died five years ago. But you have not remarried.”

“No. I made arrangements with a couple of courtesans. Not both at the same time, of course—one after the other. I … don't really want to marry again. Poor little Eudaimonis, she suffered so much at the end it still hurts when I think of it. Childbed fever, after a stillborn son. Everyone kept telling her she must give me a son, she must give me a son, even though I said I was perfectly happy with my daughter. She wanted that boy so badly, but he killed her. I sat with her, and gave her opium as I could, and watched her die. My mother died the same way, when I was nine, and I had to watch that, too. I don't think I could bear to do it again. Courtesans use contraceptives.”

“What if
I
have a child?” she asked, in a very small voice.

He hadn't even considered that—but of course it was entirely possible. More than that: it was very likely. And he knew, without any word spoken, that she
wanted
a child. Nothing could replace the ones the soldiers had murdered, of course—but if she had a child she would become fully herself again: Maerica, a woman who could love and be loved, and not a gladiator anymore.

It was perfectly respectable for a gentleman who'd lost a wife to take a concubine, but bastards were another matter—particularly when the gentleman had legitimate children, and in-laws who might be insulted. Contraceptives were in order, and, if they failed, abortion—and, if that failed, exposure of the unwanted infant in a public place, to die or to be raised in another man's house as a slave. He could not require that of this woman. He recognized it between one shocked breath and another: he could not and would not require it. He had promised that he would never hurt her.

“You will have to try very hard not to die,” he made himself say.

She hugged him so hard he winced. “I won't die,” she whispered into his ear. “I am strong, and I will give you a strong son.
You
must not die, either.”

He felt another delicious stirring in the groin. “If I promise not to die,” he said, beginning to smile again, “will you let me touch you?”

The rest of the afternoon and evening passed in a daze of erotic intoxication. Maerica got up at one point, put on her wet tunic, and went to buy some supper. Then they sat on the floor together feeding one another morsels of leek and sausage and talking about Rome and Alexandria. He started trying to teach her Greek.

Morning brought a visitor. They'd risen—late—and Maerica was preparing to go out to buy food and fetch water when there was a knock on the door. She opened it warily and found Gellia.

“Sorry to disturb you two,” the landlady said with a leer, “but Calvus wanted a word with your ‘employer'—heh!—if you can spare him for a minute.”

Maerica went red: the color stained even the back of her neck and her ears, which were all Hermogenes could see of her face. They hadn't taken into account how flimsy the apartments were. Probably the whole building had heard his shrieks for mercy.

Embarrassed, and eager to show solidarity with his embarrassed lover, he hurried forward. Standing nervously on the landing behind Gellia was the old man from the party, Sentia's music-loving husband.

“Ah!” said the old man, with relief. “There you are, sir.”

Hermogenes smiled politely. “Greetings, Calvus.” He was glad Gellia had mentioned the name: if he'd ever heard it, he'd forgotten it. “You want to speak to me?”

Calvus nodded and edged past Gellia into the apartment, still with that nervous air. Hermogenes suspected an appeal for money, and braced himself to refuse.

Maerica surveyed the old man a moment, saw no threat, and picked up the amphora to resume her errand. She scowled when Gellia, avid for gossip, followed her off down the stairs.

“What I come about,” said Calvus, as soon as the door shut, “is—I don't know how to say this, sir. That partner you mentioned, the one you think cheated you—I think he's looking for you.”

Hermogenes blinked, off-balance.

“See, they were talking about it at the barbershop wheres I get myself seen to,” Calvus went on, into the silence. “How the word's out from Vedius Pollio that a Greek called Hermogenes stole something from him, an' I know you said your name's Herapilus, but they said a short man with a cut on his face and a bad foot. There's an offer of a denarius for news.”

“Did you collect it?” Hermogenes asked sharply.

The old man shook his head. “I remembered what Gellia tol' us, that you suspected your partner was keeping money you give him as a present for this Titus you was asking about, and that he turned you out of his house in the middle of the night when you asked him about it. I thought to myself, maybe he wasn' tellin' us the whole story, maybe he did mean that villain Pollio. I always heard how that scoundrel has lots to do with money matters in the East. And it seemed to me that if it was you Pollio wanted, it wasn't nothing to do with anything stolen; no, it'd be because he knew you were going to show him up to Statilius Taurus, and he wanted to kill you before you could. So I didn't say anything, and I warned my friends not to say anything neither. But I thought probably you'd like to know.”

“Yes,” Hermogenes said grimly. “Thank you very much.” He regarded the old man a moment with respect, then added, “I'd like to give you the denarius you lost by your silence. My bodyguard has the money, but if you'll wait until she gets back—”

“That's all right, sir,” Calvus interrupted with a smile. “I couldn't take it from you, not after you were robbed on the street, and turned out of the house by that scoundrel, and falsely accused an' all. Anyway, you got my Sentia singing cantica again. She hasn't done that since our boy died, and to hear her sing again is worth more to me than a
hundred
denarii. I just thought you should know. Will you be all right?”

“Yes,” Hermogenes replied, humbled. “Thank you. I have an appointment to speak to Statilius Taurus tomorrow, which should settle the matter.”

“Ah, he'll do right by you!” Calvus declared, with satisfaction. “They all say he's a man of honor, and he never liked that Pollio. You should never have gone to such a rogue in the first place—but I suppose that bein' a foreigner and all, you couldn't know that. You just lie low then, till tomorrow, and you'll be fine.”

He shook hands with dignified formality and took his leave.

When Maerica returned with the water and a loaf of bread, he told her the old man's news.

“Huh!” she exclaimed in disgust, banging the water down in the corner. “I
told
you!”

“So you did,” he admitted. “You were right.”

It didn't seem to appease her. She hunkered down on the floor, ripped a chunk off the loaf as though it were a mortal enemy, then sat scowling at it.

“What is the matter?” he asked in surprise.

“Gellia!” she spat. She set her chunk of bread down, gazed up at him in anguish, and cried, “People
heard
us yesterday! Gellia
congratulated
me: she thinks I set out to
catch
you!”

He didn't know what to say. “You know you didn't,” he managed at last, “and I know you didn't, so what does it matter what Gellia thinks?”

“Because she won't be the only one!” snarled Maerica. “A man like you—a rich man who's lost a wife—
lots
of people must've tried to catch you. And I'm an ugly barbarian—”

“Not ugly!”

“—an ugly barbarian who was sleeping in temple porches and living on scraps when you hired me! I was a gladiator, which means I'm no better than a whore, as far as the law's concerned. I'm infamous—you know what that means?”

He did, vaguely. As a term in Roman law,
infamy
meant a diminishment of legal status. An infamous person could not normally appear as a witness in court, and was unable to marry, inherit, or undertake most sorts of legal contract. He'd been aware that prostitutes were infamous, but not that the status also applied to gladiators, though it wasn't really surprising.

“We can try to get your status changed,” he said after a silence. “After all, you're not a gladiator anymore.”

“Then what am I?” she demanded miserably. “You said I can be anything I want, but it's not true. I can't be a respectable woman again. Nobody's going to believe that I didn't set out to catch you the moment you crossed my path, and they'll think it's a terrible shame I succeeded. Even your courtesans will turn up their noses, and say, ‘How could he love her, after us?' All your friends will be horrified. Your aunt will be furious, and your wife's family. They'll all think I'm a disgraceful old whore!”

He remembered how desperately she had resisted that trade, and understood some of the anguish. He came over and sat down beside her. He considered putting an arm around her, then reconsidered.

“I will tell my friends you're nothing of the sort,” he promised. “If they are my friends they'll believe me, and if they're not, I'm well rid of them.”

“Huh!
None
of them will believe you, but the ones who are your true friends will tell you you so, and the ones who aren't will be polite to your face and laugh at you behind your back. Everyone who cares for you will tell you to send me away. They'll be especially horrified if you let your daughter be friends with me.”

“What am I to say?” he asked impatiently. “It will not be easy, and I'm sorry, but I can live with their opinion if you can. Eventually they will see that they were wrong.”

“Maybe you'll decide they're right,” she whispered.

“I will not,” he said flatly. “Maerica, please.” He held out his hands to her. She did not take them, though she looked into his face.

“What would your father say if he saw you now?” she asked bitterly.

It stung. He lowered his hands.

“He was an important man, wasn't he? He made you what you are, a gentleman and a businessman and a Latin-speaker; you always listened to him, didn't you? And he would be as horrified by me as your aunt, wouldn't he?”

He let out his breath unsteadily. “He's
dead,
” he pointed out.

“If he were alive, he'd make you send me away.”

“I wouldn't have obeyed him.” Even as he said it, he realized with a shock that it was true. He could not remember ever having defied his father, but he would have, over this. “Please. It won't be as bad as you think. I am a respectable businessman, not a silly youth, and you are a sober woman, not some extravagant dancing girl or scandalous actress. People may raise their eyebrows at my choice, but if I say I want to keep you as a concubine, they—”

She looked shocked. “Keep me as a what?”

“A concubine.”

“No! I won't accept that!”

He hesitated, puzzled by the ferocity of that cry—then remembered that most of her Latin had been learned in a gladiatorial school. “Do you know what the word means?” he asked gently.

She frowned suspiciously. “It's a kind of whore, isn't it?”

“No,” he said firmly. “It's a kind of wife. Men of my rank not infrequently fall in love with women who for some reason they cannot marry. Maybe he's Alexandrian and she's Egyptian, or he's a Roman citizen, and she isn't, so there's a legal bar, or maybe it's just that she's a slave and he's rich and of good family—for some reason, he can't marry her. If they settle together anyway, she is called a concubine. It is a far more respectable title than ‘whore' or even ‘mistress.' Only a wife's name is more honorable.”

“Oh,” she said, and looked at his face searchingly.

“I'm not lying,” he told her. “You're not a citizen, so concubinage is the best I can offer you. There are things we can do to improve your status, though. We can apply to get you the status of a free resident of Alexandria, and we can get you title to some property. Maybe you could try running a business. You are a clever woman, and so strong that even the school of Taurus couldn't crush you. However bad this is, it has to be better than the arenas. Don't surrender to the opinions of fools!”

She bit her lip. “This word ‘concubine'—do you really mean that you would
marry
me, if the laws allowed it?”

He was silent a moment, shocked by himself, by the certainty of his own feelings. Then he said simply, “Yes.”

She looked as shocked as he felt. “I … didn't expect that.”

“You were talking about having children!”

“Yes, but … I don't know what I was expecting. Not that.”

“You keep telling me what a strange man I am, but do you think there's another woman like you in all the world? The whole weight of the Roman Empire fell on you, and you not only survived but preserved your soul in integrity. Don't you see how extraordinary you are? That cruel Taurus—he thinks he owned you, that you were his slave, property at his school. He was wrong: he never even knew your name. You never sold yourself, never yielded your consent to any of the degradations they forced on you, never broke. But what all the power of Rome could not force from you, you gave to me. Do you think I don't know that that is a jewel beyond price, and treasure it?”