For one thing, they are in love," I said. Helena laughed at my romantic streak. Well, Berenice is so gorgeous he can hardly hide her. Every male at the Circus Maximus thinks that Titus is a lucky dog and Titus has no objection to them knowing all about his luck."
The Emperor disapproves," replied Helena with some sadness.
Vespasian is bound to persuade Titus to end it one day. That won't be mentioned either, except as a note under diplomatic events, when the poor woman is sent home. The Queen of Judaea has concluded her state visit and returned to the East." How much genuine heartache will that leave unsaid? The Queen of Judaea is far too exotic to be received in stuffy patrician homes. Her oriental origins make her unacceptable as a consort to the heir to the Principate. The mean spirited snobs with traditional" values have won; lovely Berenice is to be torn from her lover's arms and dumped."
Meanwhile," I agreed, there will be awful legates" awful daughters holding orgies with the charioteers at the Consualia Games, and senators-elect going up the skirts of the priestesses at the Temple of Virgin Diana like geckos under rocks."
While for light relief Infamia will say that the rumour is false that pirates are operating again off the Tyrrhenian coast." I laughed.
No, that was real," Helena said. Then she laughed too. The one thing every Roman schoolchild knows is that the seas were all cleared of pirates a hundred years ago by Pompey the Great. My old teacher, Apollonius, used to add thoughtfully that fewer people remember how Pompey's own son, Sextus Pompeius, a contender for the highest seat of power, then lured some of the same pirates from peaceful retirement and joined with them to cause upheaval, during his quarrels with Augustus. One place the noble Sextus and his colourful cronies had then raided was Ostia. Their stay on land, with its merciless rape and thoroughly well organised pillage, remained a horrific folk memory.
Don't let's get too excited, love. Not if Infamia says the pirate rumour is false."
True." Helena dug me in the ribs teasingly. But there are all kinds of shorthand ways to make insinuations in the scandal reports." Now we were back to flute-playing. And it was giving me ideas.
Beset by family, I needed escape. We informers are tough men. Our work is grim. When not treading a solitary path, we like to be surrounded by other grim, tough men who feel that life is filthy, but that they have mastered it. I sought fellow professionals. I went to visit the vigiles. A weary group was hauling back a siphon engine after a fire last night. Begrimed and still coughing from the smoke, they trundled in listlessly through the tall gate of the squadron house. A couple dragged charred esparto mats. These seem crude, but used in quantity they can suffocate a small blaze, long before water can be fetched. One squat soul with meeting eyebrows, who must have been on punishment duty, was laden with everyone's axes and crowbars, and had all their ropes slung around him in diagonal coils; the others were joshing him as he dropped his load just inside the entrance and collapsed. They clanged down their empty fire buckets, and straggled off to wash. Ex slaves to a man, they were used to exhaustion, dirt and danger. Each knew that if he survived for six years, he would receive a diploma of citizenship. Quite a few did not survive. Of those who did, some madmen would even choose to stay on afterwards. Self-preservation took second place to the free meals and camaraderie. And maybe they liked roughing up the populace while on the crime roster. I followed them inside. Nobody challenged me. Somewhere there should be an officer of the day, like Petro an ex-legionary who wanted a secure job with a few thrills and plenty to moan about. He was invisible. I could hear the troopers exchanging insults as they cleaned up indoors, but the parade ground was deserted. It added to the impression that detached duty out at Ostia was the free-and-easy option. I walked around the porticoes in the heavy shade cast by the barrack-like buildings. In one of the rooms a handful of prisoners, burglars captured during the night watch, were being processed by a wizened clerk. He kept them subdued by his competent personality. When I coughed, he looked up from his charge sheet; he knew me and when I enquired about applicants, he suggested I might find Rusticus three rooms down.
Who's he?"
