Walking from the master’s quarters back to my office, I passed Sabina coming in from the entrance that led to the servants’ house. She held her favorite bucket and cleaning rags in one hand (yes, she had a favorite bucket), and something clenched in her other fist. She ignored my greeting; in truth I don’t think she noticed me; sweeping quickly by muttering urgently to herself. As she strode away I had the misfortune to hear a single, coherent word: “barefoot.” I called loudly after her and she turned at last. I asked what was troubling her; she stared at me with hard eyes, her mouth a thin, tight line. She looked as if to speak, then thought better of it and continued on her way. I knew her well enough to let her be; hopefully whatever ate at her would sort itself out.
I saw her a second time that afternoon. Sometimes, when the mistress was in town shopping, I stole Livia away from her work in the baths to accompany me on one of my habitual walks in the western wood. That is the name I had given it, western wood. I have never been one for flights of hyperbole, or for that matter imagination. As we strolled, hand in hand, our words were feathers, light, soft, of little consequence. We worked hard at pretending nothing had changed between us, as if one of us had contracted a mortal carcinoma. Unlike most, we could see the end of our time together, and having just begun our journey; it was not enough, it was not fair. Though it was the last thing we wanted, the knowledge that one of us would go on and one of us would not became our own shared cancer. We tried to ignore it, but it lay beneath everything we did, everything we said. A growing stone between us, always pushing us further apart. For as long as I could, I delayed seeking out the master to beg my plight. I did not want to hear the finality of his answer. Of course Sabina had been right. To his credit, Crassus did not laugh. He was moved, yet unmoved. I would become rich by his side, but that would always be my place. The stone grew much larger that day.
We had taken the longest trail, a circuitous ribbon that skirted the boundaries of the little forest. As we neared the halfway point, both of us saw a flash of color off to our left, deep in the heart of the wood. We left the trail and made our way through the brush. A woman was kneeling before a small smear of blue and purple; it was the pale yellow of her tunic that we had spied. As soon as she heard our approach she spun to her feet and walked swiftly to meet us, but not before dropping what appeared at that distance like a bundle of rags.
“Mother! What are you doing out here?”
Sabina rolled her eyes. “Polishing leaves. What do you think I’m doing?”
“Sarcasm so becomes you,” Livia said. “Isn’t your herb garden by your clinic?”
“You’re right. You’ve caught me with dirty hands. Wait a moment
… by Jove’s thunderbolt, it’s awfully hard to garden without getting your hands dirty.”
“Mother, you’re acting even more peculiar than usual.”
“Actually, Sabina, your hands look lovely, as always,” I said.
“Such a flatterer. That may work with some…” Sabina looked pointedly at her daughter.
“But why must you work so far from the house?” Livia pressed.
“What do you see in abundance here, daughter, that you find little of by the domus?” Sabina asked.
“People?” Livia said.
“Some plants prefer the shade,” I said.
“Is it any wonder the young Alexander is the favorite of the dominus?” Sabina said.
“It is no wonder at all,” Livia said, bumping me off balance with brusque affection. “He’ll have the cash to purchase ten slaves before you have bought our freedom.”
“Livia, please. Your mother toils to give you the gift of gifts.”
“He will have money,” Sabina said, “no doubt. We have spoken of this and I have no time to debate it further.”
“Those flowers look lovely,” I said, peering over Sabina shoulder. “May we have a closer look?”
“Not now, Alexander. I have three poultices to make and several balms for the baths. Perhaps another time.”
“Gratitude, Sabina. We will leave you to your work.”
“And best get back to your own,” she said. She waited with her hands on her hips, watching us until we had found the path before she returned to her herbs.
Attendance at the Vulcanalia was voluntary, but who doesn’t love a good bonfire? The immediate family left early to attend services at the Vulcanal, and soon after the house was almost deserted. Tessa, an Ostian, was among the first out of the domus. She grabbed a seat on the lead cart — there were twelve lined up outside our gates — which I had arranged to transport the familia to the Campus Martius. Vulcan is Ostia’s patron god; no wonder, since the majority of Rome’s imported grain passes through that harbor.
As soon as the family had left, I looked in on my teaching staff (in our expanded school, a building Crassus owned near the foot of the hill, we taught everything from shorthand to mathematics, from carpentry to bricklaying) and sent them all off to the festival for the rest of the day. Then I trudged back up the hill to attempt to clean up my work table; if I were able to get caught up, my appreciation of the subtleties of immolated seafood would have fewer distractions and was sure to be enhanced. As I passed through the gates, I noted that Betto had left, probably dragging Malchus with him, passing their duties off to hapless subordinates. I found Sabina hard at work in her clinic and made a joke about how devotion and holidays were rarely found in the same bed, at least not until later in the evening. She laughed politely at the first part of my jest, but found little humor in the final allusion to sexual congress. These acts built throughout every Roman holiday until late at night the only couples not fornicating were either lying unconscious in their own vomit or buried in their own graves. I supposed it was because she assumed I was talking about Livia and myself. Which I was not. I said I would try to find her later on the Field of Mars and made a hasty exit, as all misunderstood comics should.
Just before sunset, I rubbed my eyes, dropped my calamus in its inkwell and decided I had better go and find my master’s banner up on the field. Sabina was still hard at work, but promised to find me. I told her I would send my escort back to fetch her. Down through the forum and up the hill we went, guided by the glow of a hundred bonfires. The entire field had been transformed into a bazaar, each merchant’s stall punctuated by blazing cones of light and heat. People stood in line before each of these infernos, waiting to be blessed by a priest in blue robes, his cowl pulled over his head so that he was almost faceless. He solemnly received their piscatorial offering and flung it into the flames. Something familiar about the holy man nagged at me, but I could not make the connection.
I looked in vain for Livia, which was just as well. The smell of burning fish was hardly enough to dampen the blossoming ardor of the revelers, and I could not risk succumbing to the excitement of the moment in her presence. The best insurance for that policy arrived about an hour behind me: Sabina.
We rallied by Crassus’ flag, but the only people present from our house were two soldiers standing guard over the almost empty baskets of mackerel. I reached into one, slipped a forefinger up through the jaws of two long-dead, slimy specimens and off we marched to the largest of all the bonfires, which also happened to be the nearest.
The line was formidable. We inched forward, seeming to make little progress. The high priest of the Vulcanalia was moving slowly up and down the line, greeting supplicants and encouraging their patience, although shaking few hands. He walked by us and, seeing the plaque around my neck denoting my house and my station, instantly summoned us to the front of the line. He was also hooded, but his robes were a rich purple trimmed in gold. Again, a memory stirred within me, a recent one at that, but I could not put my finger on it. I had the feeling that much depended upon the connection being made, but it was impossible to concentrate. Quite frustrating. While my attention was thus diverted, the high priest was happily recounting how Senator Crassus had donated a special offering; his holiness had commanded that anyone from the house of Crassus must be moved expeditiously through the line as gratitude for their service to the god. I was about to ask what service that might be when a portion of it bumped into me from behind. A terrified herd of goats and sheep was being driven past us into a corral situated perilously close to the flames. Acolytes were sprinkling thousands of rose petals upon them as they passed, which neither mitigated the noise nor the smell. The priest told us that this being a particularly dry year, these dozens of animals were being herded into the blaze as insurance against any fiery mishaps in the coming year. Sabina and I made our way back through the crowd, all of whom were struggling to get closer to what we were trying to avoid. Moments later, the specially constructed corral was folded and collapsed so that it and everything in it became a crackling, squealing paean to Vulcan Quietus.