‘Oh, sneaky! Was that deliberate?’ I wondered.
‘Whether it was or not, they, too, were happy. For Julia Verecunda that must have been even harder to bear. She took herself off and married Ennianus Optatus, generally regarded as mild-mannered.’
‘More fool him for having her. Their son is Ennius Verecundus – the Mother’s Boy candidate for aedile.’
‘Precisely.’
‘So far, so clear.’ And doom-laden, I could already see that.
‘It gets muddier,’ gloated Philippus.
‘I thought it might.’
‘Listen, please, Flavia Albia. The two brothers were well established and well liked in the community. Callistus Valens ran a shipping fleet on the Tiber. Callistus Volusius had a boat-building business, which passed to his son after Volusius and his wife Julia Firma both died. At that point, Julia Verecunda suddenly initiated a thaw. She and Julia Firma had continued to feud until her sister’s dying day, but for a short period Verecunda apparently mellowed. Perhaps losing her sister was the reason.’
‘Or a convincing excuse,’ I scoffed.
‘Mother’s Boy,’ said Philippus, becoming more human as he picked up my nickname, ‘has four sisters. They, and their marriages, are important. To trace their relationships, my father had to draw a chart.’
‘Wonderful! May I see it?’
‘When you leave.’ Philippus had no faith in visual aids. Old school – an idiot. I cursed, but I could wait. ‘When Verecunda had her theoretical change of heart, Valens accepted her overtures. As a result, the Callisti took three of Verecunda’s daughters in marriage.’
‘Three!’ That was surely overdoing it.
‘One daughter was given to the newly orphaned Volusius Firmus and, perhaps more surprisingly, two other daughters married the two sons that Callistus Valens had fathered.’
‘Primus and Secundus,’ I spelled out. ‘This I know. The marriage of Volusius Firmus and Julia Laurentina survived; she is currently pregnant. The other two unions rapidly failed, with unhappy divorces. That may have been caused by Julia Verecunda’s poisonous influence on her daughters.’
Philippus nodded. ‘Cynics think she always intended to cause grief to the Callisti, as a punishment for Valens having refused her.’
I nodded. ‘If so, the most scandalous breakdown will have particularly pleased her: when Julia Pomponia, who was the wife of Callistus Secundus, left him. Ran away and married a hod-carrier, hunky, but trouble. Aren’t they all? A building-site Adonis. One of the other sisters now has to give them cash handouts. They have just produced a child, but are estranged.’
‘Julia Pomponia and one Aspicius,’ agreed Philippus. ‘Callistus Secundus has regarded Pomponia very bitterly ever since she deserted him. His brother, Primus, similarly loathes his ex-wife, Julia Optata.’
‘By whom he had a daughter, Julia Valentina. Acrimonious custody battle,’ I said. ‘I have seen the girlie – she looks normal, considering the permanent bad feeling between her parents. Valentina’s mother, Julia Optata, took as second husband Vibius Marinus, the candidate my friend the aedile is supporting. Marinus and Primus seem to have no quarrel.’
‘Unusual in this family!’
‘I don’t know why Primus ended up on such awful terms with Julia Optata. People say they were simply young and ill suited. But I learned yesterday that, understandably, she has never forgiven the Callisti for taking away her newborn baby.’
‘My father tried to look up law-court records,’ said Philippus. ‘He found none. Bitter or not, the custody battle must have been settled privately. Nor is there anything in our records to explain the divorce.’
I smiled. ‘And Domitian takes such a keen interest in people’s divorces! Still, they wouldn’t be the first plebeians who don’t believe in lawyers … I am starting to see why your admired father, Laeta, said the election list was too closely interwoven.’
‘My father believed Firmus standing for aedile led directly to the death of Callistus Valens,’ Philippus told me. ‘If you are as quick as you seem, Flavia Albia, you may wonder whether there is still feuding within this complicated family.’
‘Oh, no doubt of it!’ I exclaimed. ‘Clearly, things came to a head during the election campaign.’
Once again I had jumped in, annoying Philippus. ‘The situation became vitriolic. My good father wanted to impress upon you Julia Verecunda’s lasting hatred for Callistus Valens.’
‘I hear you,’ I assured the po-face. ‘Candidate rivalry must have been a nightmare. On one side, the Callisti must have strongly opposed Ennius Verecundus, whose horrible hostile mother is his most visible supporter. She in turn would have opposed Firmus, and also Vibius. Then when Firmus was forced to drop out of the contest it placed Ennius more securely in the running.’
‘My father saw that as critical,’ Philippus managed to put in.
‘How did it happen?’ I demanded. ‘Firmus was the favourite, Caesar’s candidate. His family paid over squillions to gain that. It put them deep in financial trouble, all for nothing. I’d like to know your colleague’s involvement. We all assume that Abascantus being sent off for a rest-cure was why Firmus gave up. But here’s a worse scenario. Can Julia Verecunda have worked some trick specifically to shove Firmus out? Is she capable? Does she have contacts at court, influence over Abascantus? If the Callisti even suspected she was responsible for Firmus losing out, they would be incandescent.’
Philippus glanced around the finely decorated suite he had ‘borrowed’ from Abascantus. We could hear the evening silence. Nobody was listening in. It was so quiet that if the marble cladding moved on a contracting wall, as the day’s heat died, we would notice the subtle creak. ‘I have no reason to think my senior colleague went back on whatever he had promised the Callisti.’
‘Oh, so he covered his tracks?’ I mocked. Philippus did not deny that. ‘Olympus! Can it be that Abascantus took money from both sides?’
‘The relevant issue,’ Philippus hedged, in a tight voice, ‘is that Julia Verecunda openly hates all the candidates opposing Ennius, but what she hated most intensely was having one of the Callisti in her son’s way.’
He stared at me significantly.
I blinked back, not quite with him.
‘These are my father’s words to you, Flavia Albia. Think of how much Julia Verecunda hated Callistus Valens.’
I could follow that.
Bribing Abascantus to remove the Emperor’s backing from Volusius Firmus was vicious and probably illegal, but no different from tactics any candidate deployed. Julia Verecunda ought to have been satisfied. To anyone normal, ejecting Firmus from the campaign should have been enough.
‘So Verecunda never forgave Valens,’ I mused. ‘Even when she pretended to thaw, it was a ploy to get closer so she could cause him misery through marital strife. His rejection years ago still dominates her existence.’
In my youth I had been in the same position. I knew how it hurt. How you threatened the direst punishment for the rat who betrayed you, by day and by night brooded upon him and threatened his destruction … I grew up, changed by the experience yet moving on from my loss, which is what most people do. I learned to be content, on occasions even happy. Other men had become more important to me.
Julia Verecunda never mellowed. She married, a man who sounded harmless, and she had a large family, but nothing gave her consolation. She never forgot. She never forgave. At one point she pretended to be reconciled, married three of her girls into Valens’s family as a peacemaking gesture, but she had sent them to the Callisti full of hate.
Assuming the Callisti had responded to their let-down over Firmus with quietness and dignity, a woman who liked to cause sorrow would be left disappointed. I had seen her gloat in public over Firmus stepping down. That was not enough. A woman of such ingrained, obsessive bitterness would want Valens to know this was his fault for refusing her.