Man Eater

Strange. That was Sergius’ bedroom. Why should Orbilio decide to visit the sick? Claudia ran her finger up and down the cool, smooth upstand, absently noting the quality of the Numidian marble. It was difficult to know what to make of that man Pictor. On the face of it he was urbane and charming, and he’d extended every hospitality since her arrival, it was difficult to read anything sinister into his actions. Except, maybe…

‘That’s my father.’ Alis’ voice made Claudia jump.

‘Handsome,’ she remarked, glancing at the serene, white face set in its eternal watch over the colonnade.

‘I fear the sculptor somewhat flattered him.’ The enigma that was Sergius’ wife let out a slight, self-deprecating laugh. ‘He had the same ill-defined jaw as the rest of us.’

Providence might have pushed Alis into Claudia’s path, but there was no way Providence was going to have her back again. Not until Claudia had extracted her ore. She was on the point of commenting that Euphemia’s jaw was exceptionally well defined when she remembered that the man in the statue was in no way related to her.

‘How come you didn’t stay with your father after he divorced your mother?’

The law was rigid. Adulteresses, by definition, lose all their rights and access to their offspring-in fact, most consider themselves lucky if they’re granted an annual visit.

Tears filled Alis’ eyes. ‘Papa was such an honourable man, Claudia, I wish you could have met him. As a merchant who spent much of the year travelling, he believed that, at nine, I was too young to be subjected to constant upheaval.’

‘You’d have preferred that?’

‘Claudia, I’d have followed him through the Pillars of Hercules and searched for Atlantis if he’d so much as whistled. Instead I was stuck at home with the woman who’d cuckolded my father then laughed in his face when she was heavy with another man’s child.’

Quite. ‘Didn’t you get on with Euphemia’s father at all?’

‘That man!’ The keys at her girdle agitated as she shuddered. ‘He was coarse, he was common and oh, the way he and my mother flaunted their bodies! If I told you what they got up to, you’d throw up.’

I doubt it. ‘How did Euphemia cope?’ It was probably just honest, earthy sex.

Alis’ lower lip twisted and untwisted. ‘To be truthful, I’d have to say she was too young to understand and, in any case, they spoiled her rotten with pets and toys-will you think me terribly wicked when I say I was glad the plague took them?’

It makes you refreshingly human, Alis. Welcome to the human race.

‘They ruined my life, marrying me off to Isodorus like that, it was a nightmare, I can’t begin to describe it. Look, I have to go. It’s been such a relief talking to you, would you mind awfully if I…if I-’

‘Oh no,’ Claudia replied truthfully. ‘Come and have a chat any time you like, Alis.’ Enlightenment is always a welcome visitor.

‘Thank you! Thank you so much, but I’m late.’ Alis had reverted to type, fluttering her hands and tut-tutting. ‘I still haven’t prepared the dining hall for dinner.’

She set off up the atrium on the run, then stopped suddenly. ‘Where are my manners? I forgot to ask whether you’d like to organize the silver. Claudia? Claudia?

The side room into which Claudia had dived was small and cosy and very, very comfortable. Its friezes commemorated Agamemnon, the warrior king, from his initial involvement in the Trojan War through his quarrel with Achilles to his ill-fated return to Mycenae, and, on the floor, an exquisitely tessellated Paris was dithering about who to dish that golden apple to, which, to judge from his expression, was getting a tad too hot to hang on to.

Had it not been for the fact that the room was full of Euphemias, Claudia would have liked it very much. She was slouching against the window, watching the rain hammering down on the bath-house roof as she chewed a lock of hair.

‘I hate the country, don’t you?’

With every fibre of my body! I’ve had it up to here with birds tweeting, buds opening, bees buzzing and frog spawn clogging up the ponds. You can keep your blue swathes of Venus’ Mirrors, your marsh marigolds and your aconites in the orchard. I want to watch the concentrated frown of the leather-worker as I munch on hot sausages, wince at the burned arms of the glassblower as I drink tansy wine-and forget migrating cranes honking all over the place, give me the cheeky backchat of the fruiterer’s boy any day.

‘How can you say that, when the fields and waysides are chequered with anemones, the bellies of hinds are heavy with fawn and baby bear cubs are gambolling their paws off after winter hibernation?’

‘If Sergius makes the money he thinks he will with his shows, we’re going to live in Rome, did you know that? The Esquiline’s the place. Since they pulled the old stuff down, it’s gone really upmarket. Is that where you live?’

The Esquiline Hill is a pocket of aristocracy, Euphemia. Old money only need apply. ‘My house-’

‘Is Rome fun? Is it exciting? What’s it like this time of year?’