How could he tell her that it was her inappropriate tone that distressed him? “I find myself wondering about Hypatius. A man of great worth, it seems.”
“If Hypatius were a book, his cover would be of carved ivory but his verses wouldn’t scan.” Anna pulled her cloak closer around her angular frame as they turned into the street on which stood her father’s house. “While we should not speak in ill fashion of the departed, the reason I say this is that he had been paying romantic attention to me for some time. Frankly, I had become very tired of it.”
John observed that was entirely understandable. A servant girl opened the house door for them and took their snow-damp cloaks.
He noticed that the atrium was darker than usual. Because of the cold weather, several folding wooden panels had been shut, closing the senator’s office off from both the garden beyond and the rest of the house.
“Some spiced wine, please,” Anna instructed the servant. “And two cups. And ask Dorotheus to send someone to light the brazier in my study. We’ll be in father’s office.”
Suppressing a surprised giggle, the girl vanished toward the kitchen.
“Father won’t mind if we wait in here until my study’s warmed up.” Anna led John into the office and motioned him to take a seat. “He’s attending a church service. Tiresome, perhaps, but necessary for a senator.”
John made no reply. Although never spoken of, it was obvious to him that Opimius was a pagan. Like a handful of other senators who remained loyal to the gods of their ancestors, Anna’s father made a show of observing the state religion. He had no other choice. However, it was exceedingly improper, not to say unwise, for Anna to refer to the matter even obliquely.
The office’s rich wall hangings and carpet seemed to hold the heat from its lamps. Anna went immediately to the brazier.
“Why don’t you warm your hands, John? You suffer from the cold just as I do. You think I haven’t noticed?”
John assured Anna he was warm enough. It made him uneasy that she should notice such a thing, or mention it. Anna sat down on an upholstered couch next to John’s chair.
“Hypatius was a friend of my father’s,” she continued. “Naturally he often visited. He was a pious man, but a man who was pious in an obvious way. He attended services daily, funded charitable works, gave the church ostentatious gifts, and so on.”
The servant entered to place a wine jug on the table beside the couch. She looked John over with obvious curiosity before she was dismissed.
John took a sip from his wine cup. Orange lamp light flickered around the rim. He suggested that Hypatius’ activities were not unworthy.
“As you say.” Anna drained her cup. “However, there are those who do good deeds for the sake of the doing and those who do them for the sake of being known for their charity.”
“Still, charity is charity.”
Anna smiled at him again and John looked down into his wine.
“I suppose you are right, John. Perhaps I do him a disservice. He was a regular visitor here for years. I never felt that I got to know him very well or much about him except that he was very wealthy and his business interests were many and varied. And, as I said, he pawed at me when father wasn’t looking.”
“You did not want to know him well?”
“Father would have been happier if I had. In fact, he would have been positively ecstatic if I had become that old hypocrite’s wife. Fortunately for me, Hypatius did not have the opportunity to propose I be thus honored.”
“Did you think he intended to?” John finished his wine. Before he realized it, Lady Anna had picked up the jug and began to refill his cup.
John felt his chest constrict. He could hardly draw his cup back and allow the wine to spill onto the senator’s fine carpet. He looked at Anna, questioningly, and she fixed her gaze on him. Her eyes were unremarkable yet he could not look away. His cheeks prickled as if all the lamps in the room had suddenly flared up into raging bonfires.
Anna poured the wine slowly until his cup had been filled. She was not very adept at such duties. A trickle ran down the side of the vessel and puddled on the table top.
“Hypatius intended to hold a banquet next month, and hinted he intended to make an announcement of some import during it. I thought it might have to do with me, I admit, and had been dreading it.” She sighed. “I am not certain. He was, after all, a wealthy man. He did not need my attractive dowry. He could have bought himself some woman as beautiful as a sculpture of Helen.”
“But he was paying you unwanted attentions,” John managed to say.
She pursed her lips. “Perhaps he thought he was being kind. No, a rich man like him would not wish to take as wife someone plain as I am. I’m sorry if I sound cross, John, but everyone seems to believe they know what is best for me. Or, rather, what father has told them is best for me. Everyone wishes to please father. He has convinced a widow of his acquaintance, a redoubtable woman indeed, to counsel me on how a single woman of wealth conducts her affairs. I suppose this would be in case I remain obdurately single should father die. A few months ago Dominica, that’s her name, suddenly began visiting more frequently. At first I thought she had her eye on father! Then she started taking me aside for little talks.”
“I am familiar with such well-meant lectures,” John said. He couldn’t help but remember the advice Dorotheus had insisted on giving. It was not proper for a lady to converse in such manner with a slave. Yet how could a slave properly tell a lady that? To his dismay Anna plunged ahead.
“And now there is the matter of Trenico.”
John scowled, but remained silent.
“His wealth is, it seems, not unlike the Christian’s Lord, something one must take on faith. Lately there are fewer believers amongst his creditors. Father tells me that Trenico’s dropping broad hints about marriage and dowries. That’s as far as it’s gone.”
“You will be hoping then that he does not mention any upcoming banquets of great import.”
“I trust not. I know Trenico well enough to realize that marriage would not put an end to his romantic liaisons with ladies of the court, not to mention those in lower strata of society. Not that I would criticize his being attracted to a woman of a humbler class. We are all of the same flesh, after all.”
John was saved from finding a reply by the hollow sound of the stout front door being banged shut, closely followed by raised voices in the atrium. Quick steps sounded and Senator Opimius stamped into his office, brushing snow from his hair.
Anna’s father was as plain as his daughter. Of average height, his pale features seemed rather too small and crowded together. He could have been mistaken for one of the hundreds of minor functionaries populating the palace’s administrative offices.
“Anna. Always at the lessons, I see. John, fetch me wine.” His voice trembled.
Anna handed her cup to the senator. “Here, father, take mine. There’s more wine in the jug. I can see something terrible has happened. What was it?” Senator Opimius took the wine and sat heavily in the chair John had hurriedly vacated.
“Please remain, John,” Opimius told him. “This concerns you also. By great good fortune, you brought Anna home without mishap, but she will not be venturing out again without at least three bodyguards. Do you hear that, Anna? I just escaped grave injury myself.”
“Injury…?”
Opimius took a gulp of wine before speaking. “We were attacked by a ruffian. Or a demon. In that narrow way that runs between the Church of Eirene and Samsun’s Hospice…Yes, yes, I know it was foolish to cut through there, but I was anxious to be home. This man, this demon, appeared from thin air and flew at us like a wild beast. I’ve never seen such rage on a human face…The slave escorting me fought him off but-”
“There’s blood on your sleeve,” Anna interrupted, panic in her voice. “Let me-”
Opimius shook his head. “It’s not my blood, Anna. Dorotheus defended me.”