Ovid

12

When I finally got back home more dead than alive my father was waiting for me. It put the cap on a perfect day. Bathyllus had strict standing instructions whenever I arrived and wherever I'd come from to have a full wine jug ready and waiting for me on the table by the door. I picked this up, filled the winecup next to it and emptied it at a swallow.

'So what is it now, Dad?' I said. 'You on another message from the palace? Don't tell me. The Wart needs a clean lavatory sponge.'

My father was staring at the stains on my tunic, the crusted blood in my hair, and especially at the bloody gash on my left shoulder.

'What happened, Marcus?' he said.

'I had a run-in with a few roughs.' I eased myself onto the master couch, filled the cup again and set the jug down on the table beside me. 'Nothing to worry about. If you are worried.'

He turned to Bathyllus, who was hovering in the doorway.

'Send for Sarpedon,' he snapped. Sarpedon was one of the best doctors in Rome; he'd cost Dad a small fortune when he'd bought him. 'And make sure the baths are hot.'

'Look, Dad, I'm okay, right?' I stretched out carefully and sipped my wine, more slowly this time. 'Just leave it, will you?'

'Sarpedon will be the judge of that, boy. Certainly the cut in your shoulder needs attention.'

I was too tired and too sore to argue. When Bathyllus had left my father turned back to me.

'Now what's this all about?' he said.

I shrugged, or tried to. 'I was over the other side of the river. I got jumped. They cut me and took my purse. End of story.'

'You're lying.'

I noticed with surprise that his hands and the muscles of his face were trembling. My father isn't the emotional type. At banquets he gets mistaken for the fish course. And he doesn't use straight crude words like ‘lying’ either. The nearest he ever comes is something like ‘I don't believe that's strictly accurate’ or just ‘I think you're mistaken’. The flat accusation came as such a shock that I didn't even think of denying it.

'Yeah, okay. So I'm lying,’ I said. ‘So you caught me. Now what?'

He was trembling; with anger, I assumed.

'Marcus, give it up,’ he said. ‘Believe me, you don't know how dangerous what you're doing is.'

'So tell me,' I was getting pretty angry myself now. I'd had a long hard day and I wasn't taking this crap from anyone. 'You just tell me, Dad. Tell me why the emperor hates a dead poet so much he won't allow his ashes back to Rome. Tell me why when I ask questions about a scandal so old that you can't even smell it any more everyone keeps his mouth shut closer than a Vestal's kneecaps. Tell me why I nearly end up in the Tiber with my throat cut just because I go to see someone who Augustus didn't exile for not screwing his granddaughter. And if you can work out what that last little gem means, then you can explain it to me because I haven't got a fucking clue.'

My father's face was ashen.

'I can't do that, Marcus,' he said. 'I can't trust you enough.'

That stopped me. Not, ‘I don't know what you're talking about’ but ‘I can't trust you enough.’

'What the hell does that mean?'

'Just what it says.'

'Trust me to do what?'

'To keep the information to yourself.'

I laughed. 'Jupiter fucking Best and Greatest! Half of Rome is in on this, Dad!'

'Don't blaspheme. Not quite half of Rome. Only the responsible element. And the reason they don't tell is that they know it doesn't matter.'

I couldn't believe this. 'Run that one past me again. If it doesn't matter then surely there's no reason why I shouldn't be told.'

'Listen to me!' My father's fist suddenly thudded onto the table top. 'I'm trying to save your life here! Of course you're being stonewalled! Of course there's a secret! Of course there's a conspiracy of silence! Do you expect me to deny any of that? What I'm telling you is that there's a point to it, that if the details leaked out they would do far more harm than good. And that before they let that happen the powers-that-be would see you or me or any other individual, no matter how well-born or powerful, go to the wall. Not because the information is important to the survival of the state but because it isn't. Now have I made myself clear?'

We stared at each other in silence. Finally, my father sat back. He was still shaking, and a droplet of sweat gleamed on his forehead. In spite of myself I was impressed: the guy really meant it. Or sounded like he did.

'Okay,' I said. 'Trust me. I swear I won't tell another living soul. Not even Perilla. And if it's as innocent as you say it is — '

My father closed his eyes and pressed his palms to them as if forcing the eyeballs back into their sockets.

'You still haven't understood, have you, son?' he said. 'There're no if's or but's. It isn't a question of personal judgement, either yours or mine. And I never said the secret was innocent. I said it didn't matter.'

'I don't give a toss if it's innocent or not. I have to know. One way or the other, for my own satisfaction. You may as well tell me and save us both a lot of grief. I'll swear that it won't go any further, if that's what you want.'

'And that you won't use it as the basis for action? That if I tell you you'll drop this whole stupid Ovid business right now?'

I was silent. My father nodded. 'You see? We're both trapped by our principles. I can't tell you what you want to know unless you promise not to use it, you can't make that promise until you know what the secret is. And I can't be responsible for telling you unless you do promise. That would only get both of us killed. And much though I love you, son, in spite of everything, I'm not prepared to take that risk.'

'Risk?'

'Certainty, then. It would be a certainty, Marcus. Give it up. Please. The knowledge isn't important, not now especially, I promise you that. And if you persist you won't live long enough to regret it.'

The emotional appeal impressed me. I hadn't thought my father was capable of making one. If it was genuine, of course, and not some rhetorical trick. As an experienced orator Dad was perfectly capable of counterfeiting any emotion he pleased. Even granted that the emotion was real, however, if he had his beliefs he must allow me mine.

'I'm sorry, Dad,' I said. 'I told you. I've got to know. And if you won't tell me I'll just have to find out for myself.'

He looked at me for a long time, rather sadly I thought but with a touch of something that could possibly have been pride. 'You're like your Uncle Cotta, son,’ he said. ‘You know that? You both think with your heart, not with your head. Other people grow out of it. He never did, and you won't either.'

'Is that so bad?'

His tone of voice didn't change. He wasn't arguing, he was just…talking.

'Of course it's bad. This is the modern world, Marcus, and it belongs to the grey bureaucrats. If you'd been born five centuries ago you'd be in the school books along with Horatius and Scaevola and all the other heroes. You're the kind that stands alone on bridges facing impossible odds or holding your hand in the fire until it withers just to prove a point. Then you'd've been called a hero. Nothing would've been too good for you. Now you're only an embarrassment.'

I said nothing. I'd never heard my father talk before. Not like this.

'Have you ever thought why Cotta's never made the consulship? Never even held one of the senior magistracies? He's from a good family. He's clever, popular, politically aware, a good speaker. A better man in every way than I am. Yet I had my consul's chair before I was thirty-five, while at forty-one he's never made it past junior finance officer. Why do you think that is?'

'Because he isn't an arse-licker.' I was intentionally brutal.

My father didn't even blink.

'Just because someone is for established government,' he said quietly, 'doesn't mean to say he need automatically be labelled a sycophant. Tiberius isn't perfect, the imperial system isn't perfect, but it could be worse. Might be yet for all I know. Tiberius may not be charismatic, but he's steady, and that's what we need in an emperor. Steadiness, not heroics. Flashy isn't always best, Marcus, there's too much at stake. Look at Germanicus's histrionics in Germany. What good did they do except lose us men and reputation?'

I had to agree. Tiberius's adopted son's campaign — which Germanicus himself had trumpeted as a glorious revenge for the Varian massacre — had bombed pretty spectacularly.

'You know the story of the two bulls?' my father said suddenly.

Startled, I shook my head.

'Well, then.' He smiled: a curious, enigmatic smile I'd never seen before. 'There were two bulls, an old one and a young one, looking down into a valley at a herd of cows. The young bull says to the old one, "Look at all those cows down there, Dad! Let's run down and cover a couple." And the old bull turns to him and says, "No, son. Let's walk down and cover them all."'

It took me a moment to realise that my father had made a joke; and then another moment (because he didn't smile) to realise that it wasn't a joke at all.

'I can't help what I am,' I said. 'No more than you can. We're different people and we don't mix.'

He nodded, sadly. 'Yes, son, I know. We're different people. That is the pity of it.'

And then Sarpedon arrived with his salves and bandages, and there was no more time for talking.