Oracle of the Dead

9

The next morning, heads ringing and hands a bit shaky, we rode from Pompeii. The weather was no longer as fine as it had been, a drizzle had set in, but a little rain in the face was just what we needed. By noon, we were almost recovered. Every five miles along the road there was a pleasant alcove where travelers could rest. Each one had stone tables, a fountain of clear water, and plane trees for shade.

When we judged that the sun was at zenith (it was not visible, but the rain had stopped), we paused at one of these. We dismounted, put the horses to graze, and unpacked the luncheon Belasus had thoughtfully provided from the leftovers of the previous night’s banquet. My men spread a cloth on one of the stone tables while I sat on the ground at the base of one of the trees. The morning’s drizzle had not been heavy enough to penetrate the plane tree’s dense foliage, and the ground was dry.

“Ready to join us, Praetor?” one of the men asked when all was ready.

“No, I like it here. Just bring me-” and at that moment I was struck by an arrow.

I’ve been wounded many times in my long and belligerent life. I’ve been speared, clobbered by slingstones, stabbed, cut, clubbed, bashed with fists, hit with stones and roof tiles, and even run over by a chariot, but this was the first time I had been struck by an arrow. I had never worried much about arrows. For one thing, Italians are, by and large, wretched archers. We specialize in close-in work with cold steel. The legions usually hire archers from places like Crete or the East where people favor the bow.

So here I was, in southern Campania, sitting beneath a plane tree, and out of nowhere an arrow flew through the remains of a morning mist and skewered me through the upper chest, just below my left collarbone. One second I was peacefully awaiting my lunch, mildly hungover but at peace with the world, the next I was looking down in amazement at the end of a feathered shaft protruding from my own all-too-mortal flesh. Sometimes life is just like that.

“Praetor!” shouted some of my men. They rushed over to me. All but Hermes, of course. He wasted no time in such foolishness. He had his sword out and was running toward the brush on the other side of the road, where the arrow had come from.

“Go help him!” I managed to get out. All of them did except one, a boy named Manius Silvius, son of a family ally. I had slumped over sideways and he gently raised me and leaned me against the trunk of the tree.

“You don’t have much future in Roman politics, Manius,” I managed to grate out, “if you’d rather nursemaid a soon-to-die praetor than chase a murderer, which at least holds an element of fun.”

“You’re not going to die, Praetor,” he stammered with an utter lack of conviction.

“Why not?” I demanded. “Look. I’ve been shot through with an arrow. People die that way.”

“But who could have shot you?” he asked.

“It might have been Cupid, but I doubt it. No women around, for one thing.”

“What?” Sometimes I waste my best wit on such people.

Shortly thereafter, Hermes and the others returned without any trophies. “Let him get away, did you?” I said bitterly. “I’m going to die without the satisfaction of knowing that I’m at least avenged.”

Hermes knelt, took out his knife, and cut my tunic away from the wound. He punched me rudely on the chest.

“Ow! What are you doing, wretch?”

“I’m seeing how bad it is. Asklepiodes taught me this.” He took the arrow by the shaft and wiggled it. The world turned red before my eyes. He punched me lightly in the stomach and I began to vomit.

“No blood in your puke. Good.”

“Good?” I raged in a very weak, strangled voice. “That’s good? I’ll have you crucified, you monster! I knew I never should have given you your freedom.”

“Oh, be quiet. It missed your lung and your heart and your major pipes. We’ll get the arrow out, and if you don’t bleed to death inside and the infection doesn’t kill you, you’ll be fine. Just another scar to impress the voters at election time.”

Somehow, I almost took comfort in this. “You’re going to yank out that arrow, aren’t you?”

“Unless you’d rather keep it,” he said. Snide little bastard.

“Give me a gallon or two of wine and go ahead.” Something occurred to me. “You know what? My hangover is gone.” And that was the last I remembered for a while.

Sometime later I awoke and wished I hadn’t. My chest and shoulders felt like molten lead. It hurt to breathe. I tried turning my head and my neck hurt; so did my head. I had the feeling that someone had just rushed from the room. At least that meant that I was in a room. I was in a bed, for that matter. I tried to look around, moving nothing but my eyes. They hurt, too. I recognized the wall paintings. I was in the villa Hortalus had lent us.

Julia came in. “You see what comes of talking about someone trying to kill you? Now they’ve tried and came within an inch of succeeding.”

“So this is my fault, is it? How long have I been unconscious?”

“Three days. The physician had your wound treated and bandaged and he forced some drugged wine into you. That’s why you’ve slept so long.”

I had a horrible thought. “You didn’t let him run a hot iron through the wound, did you?” I’d seen that done before and it’s far worse than getting skewered in the first place.

“No, this physician doesn’t favor such drastic methods; just drugs and poultices for wounds like yours.”

“Better than some army surgeon, anyway. How is it healing?”

“It wasn’t as red and swollen this morning as when you were brought in. But you won’t be going anywhere for a while. Hermes has canceled all your court appearances and sent word to Rome that you’ve been attacked and wounded. Pompey sent his personal physician, but I wouldn’t let him treat you. He’s one of those who favor hot iron.”

“That was good of Pompey and better of you. I want to sit up.”

“You’d better stay as you are until the wound has healed a bit more.”

“No, I’m not looking forward to it, but I’d better sit up. I’ve seen a lot of wounded men die from lying flat too long. Even if the wounds are healing, they get fluid in their lungs and soon they can’t breathe.”

“Very well, but it’s going to hurt.”

“I hurt anyway.” She left and moments later was back with Hermes, a burly house slave, and one of her slave girls. Hermes and the man took me by the arms and hauled me up while Julia and the girl piled cushions behind my back. A great wave of red washed over me and I clenched my teeth to keep from crying out. I settled back against the cushions and the agony began to fade, but the sweat rolled down my face in torrents. Julia gave me a cup of heavily watered wine with ice in it (the Villa of Hortalus lacked no amenities) and soon I felt able to talk again.

“Have you learned anything?” I asked Hermes.

“I took the arrow to a fletcher and he said that it was locally made, but it’s a common type used for hunting. I borrowed some huntsmen and their dogs and took them back to where you were shot, but you’ll recall that it was raining that day and it rained hard that night. They were able to find where he crouched in the brush to shoot, but that was all.”

“He must have followed us. Do you remember who was near us on the road?”

“There was a good deal of traffic but most was on foot. Whoever followed us must have been on horseback.”

“He might have been in front of us and doubled back when we stopped.”

“If it was a huntsman hired for the job,” Hermes said, “he could have been keeping up with us on foot but off in the fields somewhere. We were just ambling along at no great speed.”

“As usual,” Julia said, “there are too many possibilities.”

“This has not been a case distinguished by good luck,” I noted.

When word got around that I had returned to the land of the living, I got a lot of visitors. All the head men of the towns showed up, as did the major landholders. Pompey dropped by to see how I was getting along and told me I should have taken the hot iron treatment, that it would make me heal faster. I didn’t ask him if he’d ever tried it personally. Sabinilla visited, this time wearing a black wig. Porcia showed up with an armload of medicinal herbs from her own garden and she gave Julia careful instructions on how to prepare and administer them. I thanked her for her thoughtfulness, but I seemed to be healing well enough and didn’t take them. Medical concoctions always taste vile.

Within ten days I was up and walking around and could breathe almost normally. By great good fortune the infection had been mild and had cleared up early. I had feared that infection would bring on months of convalescence. Not to mention death.

As soon as my chest and shoulder could bear the weight, I took to wearing armor beneath my clothes when I went out. It was a reasonable precaution and Julia insisted on it. My men now accompanied me armed at all times. I was nervous any time I walked past a clump of bushes. Indeed, I was as jumpy as a dog with piles. I had been attacked many times, but I’d always felt that I was a match for the situation, blade to blade. Yet there is something profoundly unsettling about being shot from a distance, by an enemy you don’t even see.

Once I was well enough recovered, the physician prescribed a regimen of exercise. The villa had every sort of facility, and a gymnasium was among them, but I was a serving praetor and a man in public life is not supposed to shut himself away from the people, so I elected to use a public facility. Near Baiae there was a large, Greek-style palaestra that was used by the inhabitants of several neighboring towns. It had all the usual provisions for running, wrestling, boxing, and so forth, and this being Italy it had a field for arms training complete with practice weapons and shields, and targets for javelins and arrows. I vowed to keep an eye on those people with bows.

Since exercise was the order of the day, we did not ride there but walked and ran alternately. Some of my men insisted on carrying shields to either side of me. I thought this was a bit excessive and lacking in dignity, but then I thought of how that arrow had felt and indulged them. As we drew near the gymnasium, though, I had them fall in behind me. Couldn’t have the people thinking the Roman praetor was scared, after all.

Because of the Greek influence, the Campanians are passionately fond of athletics, and the place was well attended with men and boys sweating mightily as they heaved balls, lifted stone or bronze weights, swung wooden clubs, jumped, sprinted, and otherwise exerted themselves. They went silent at sight of my heavily armed little troupe. “Hey!” some local wag shouted. “This is the palaestra. The ludus is down the road there!” This sally raised a general laugh and I acknowledged it with a wave.

I was already tired from the trek, but I gritted my teeth, doffed my toga and armor, and stripped to a subligaculum. I wasn’t about to work out stark naked like a Greek. My multitude of scars drew whistles of admiration, especially the fresh, still-red one on my upper chest.

I began to run around the outdoor track, followed by my men like so many hunting dogs. I didn’t last long, but at least I didn’t disgrace myself either. When I’d had enough of that, I went to the target range and threw javelins for a while. I had always excelled at this art, but I found that I’d lost range and aim. Well, I was still recovering from a serious wound. I vowed to keep at it until I had my old strength and skill back. We sparred with wooden swords and wicker shields for a while. Hermes took great delight in whipping the other men one after another, but he took it easy on me. The ludus had taught him how to be a good trainer as well as a fighter.

By the end of all this I was half-dead from fatigue, so greatly had my wound sapped my energy. “I’m going to do this every day until I can run and fight all day long,” I told Hermes.

“I’ve never known you to be in any condition that good,” he said, “but we’ll see what we can manage. Let’s go get cleaned up.”

So at last Julia was getting her wish. I was getting back in shape for the wars. She and the physician had conspired to curb my wine intake as well and she had threatened Hermes into going along with it.

In the exercise yard of the palaestra building we rubbed down with oil, then rolled in the sand and scraped it off with strigils, then went into the bath to soak. The bath needed no fire, as the water was piped in from a nearby hot spring. The sulfur-smelling water soothed away the soreness of my muscles and the lingering pain of my wound. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all.

While we lazed in the water, an unexpected visitor arrived: Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus came in and lowered himself into the water. Apparently he had put himself on a regimen like mine. He wasn’t quite as corpulent as when he arrived in Campania, though he still had a long way to go before he would achieve soldierly fitness. He had almost as many scars as I had, too, but his were mostly on his arms and legs since he got them on the battlefield, wearing armor. I had won many of mine in the streets and alleyways of Rome.

“Well, you seem to be coming along nicely, Praetor,” he said, as he settled in. “You’ll be ready to serve with the eagles in no time.”

“Whatever the noble Senate decides,” I said evasively. “How goes recruiting?”

He made a sour face. “Oh, my veterans have flocked to the standards handsomely, but the youth of Italy are not what they were in my younger days. I’ve gone through all the cities and the country markets calling for volunteers, and I get a handful at a time, a dozen here, a dozen there. There was a time when I could raise ten legions from this area alone, stout young farm lads eager for a good war. I’d have to turn most of them away, there was never enough equipment to arm all the volunteers.”

“Perhaps they don’t smell much loot to be had in a civil war,” I told him, “and there aren’t that many farm lads left these days. The latifundia are worked by slaves, not peasants, and southern Italy is covered with latifundia these days.”

“All the same, I should have more volunteers than I’ve been getting.” He shook his head in disgust. “Have you managed to find out who put an arrow through you?”

Now it was my turn to shake my head. “If anybody knows, nobody is saying.”

“It might have just been some local hothead, a Samnite out hunting who saw a chance to kill a Roman praetor and get away with it. There’s still a lot of bitterness left over from the Social War in these parts.”

“Somehow I don’t think so. I’ve made myself very unpopular with some people in this district. They want to put an end to my investigation and the easiest way to do that is to put an end to me.”

“Maybe you had better give it up, just pack up and move your court to Liguria or somewhere.”

Instantly, I was suspicious. “Just a few days ago you wanted me to find the murderers, and quickly.”

“A few days ago nobody was trying to murder you. Whatever this business is about, it’s not worth the life of an important Roman, especially one I may need soon.”

So he assumed that, because my family now supported him, I would as well. I thought it best not to disabuse him of the notion just yet.

“Actually, I’d been thinking of Sicily.”

“Fine place,” he commended. “Good climate, quiet natives. It’s already been thoroughly looted, of course, but you could do far worse. I recommend it.”

We talked of inconsequentialities for a while, then I dried off and returned to the villa. The next day I awoke stiff and sore, but I made myself take the same long trek back to the palaestra, and did the same on the days following. In an amazingly short time, I was running without breathing hard, hurling the javelin right on target, and even striking Hermes almost as many times as he struck me when we sparred with wooden swords. Before I knew it, I was very nearly in top shape and my wound scarcely pained me any more. Julia seemed pleased.

“I haven’t seen you this tan and fit in years,” she said. “Cutting back the wine has cleared up your eyes marvelously.”

“I hadn’t realized how sloppy I was getting,” I admitted. Sometimes it was a good idea to admit that Julia had been right about something. “Almost being killed is a literally sobering experience.”

Being wounded had one benefit: It gave me an excuse to stay in Campania longer than I should have. There came a day when Baiae celebrated an annual festival dedicated to one of the local gods, an equivalent of Bacchus whose celebrations were even wilder than those of the Roman god. This being shared some of the characteristics of Dionysus and I was eager to see what his adherents got up to. So I gave my lictors the day off, and Julia and I, along with numerous members of our entourage, set off for the city.

The road was crowded, with everyone from the countryside and nearby towns making for Baiae. Many of them were already decked out in wreaths of grape leaves and some carried thyrsi: wands tipped with pinecones. It was late morning when we got to Baiae, and the town was already rollicking. All its statues were draped with huge flower wreaths and more such wreaths hung from all the temples and public buildings. There were places where we walked through flower petals ankle-deep. Children ran about smashing eggs on people’s heads. The eggshells were filled with perfume and the air smelled sweetly, not just from the perfume but from the incense that burned on all the city’s altars. Sounds of pipe and tambourine and sistrum came from every part of town, and everywhere we heard the voices of people singing.

It was one of those days when almost all of the rules were suspended. Slave and free mingled on terms of equality, as at Saturnalia. Men and women partnered promiscuously, without regard to who was married to whom. There were women with their hair let down wearing only wreaths and loosely draped leopard pelts, waving their thyrsi or playing double flutes and dancing to their own wild music. Many people wore masks, and mask vendors were everywhere, doing a brisk business.

“No masks,” Julia warned me sternly. “No fooling around with women, and no wine.”

“Then what am I here for?”

“To show that the Roman praetor honors the local gods and customs. You can do that without acting like a purple-rumped baboon.”

“Spoilsport.”

So we made our way through the throng, leisurely and with impressive gravitas. There were tumblers and mountebanks of all sorts, fire-eaters I had last seen at Sabinilla’s party, dancers, and musicians. There were many stages set up, where actors performed absurd and often obscene farces.

Of course I was quite aware that if someone wanted to kill me, this was the perfect place for it. Some masked assassin could easily step up to me, slip a dagger between my ribs, and be off into the crowd safely. However, I was wearing my armor and Hermes stayed close behind me, his hand always on his sword hilt, his eyes constantly scanning the multitude.

“Way for the praetor!” someone shouted. I thought they meant me, but then there came a roar of laughter from the crowd. Julia and I made our way toward the noise and we saw the crowd part and a procession of dwarfs approached, marching with exaggerated self-importance. First came six “lictors” who, instead of fasces, carried sponge-tipped sticks, of the sort used in public latrines. Behind them strutted the “praetor,” a potbellied dwarf swathed in a purple-bordered toga and wearing a mask that was an unmistakable caricature of my own face, my long, Metellan nose drawn out to an absurd length. Just in case anyone was unsure who was being mocked, he had an oversized arrow protruding from his chest.

“Now, dear,” Julia said, “hold your temper. It’s all in fun.”

“Of course,” I said. “Have you noticed who’s behind him?” The praetor was followed by a dwarf woman dressed in patrician white, her hair almost obscured by a huge, gilt laurel wreath, her mask bearing Julia’s features, twisted into an expression of utter shrewishness.

“This is intolerable!” Julia hissed.

“Way for the proconsul!” shouted the same voice. Now the crowd parted and another procession came through. This time there were twelve dwarfish, obscenely equipped “lictors,” preceding yet another dwarf, this one wearing a helmet and armor that almost reached his ankles. At his side hung a sword at least five feet long, its scabbard dragging along the ground behind him.

As the two processions met, the praetor’s lictors lowered their latrine wipes, just as real lictors lower their fasces when they meet those of a superior magistrate.

“Hail all-powerful, wonderful, godlike General Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus!” shouted the “praetor.”

“Greetings, Praetor Peregrinus Metellus, pursuer of evildoers, smiter of the wicked, target practice for archers, friend of the winesellers, and enemy of sobriety.”

“And to you, glorious Pompey,” cried the “praetor,” “before whom recruits now flee as once your enemies did.”

They went on in this vein for some time, bestowing fulsome compliments that were actually insults. At times it was hard to hear their act, so loud was the crowd’s laughter. Seeing Pompey thus mocked took a bit of the sting out of being on the receiving end of the ridicule. Obviously, on this day, the people had license to lampoon anyone.

Throughout the day we saw more such ridiculous acts, featuring prominent locals, Caesar himself, and even a whole “Senate” made up of dwarfs, albinos, giants, and malformed persons of all sorts, debating all kinds of absurd issues such as war with India, economizing on the navy by building ships without nails, flying to the moon, and so forth. Every debate ended with the “Senate” awarding itself more lands, more money, or more power. This last was probably closer to the truth than most people there imagined.

We watched a troupe of Spanish dancers perform the famously salacious dances of that land, and attended a comedy by Aristophanes that was positively decorous compared with everything else that was going on. As evening drew on, the revelry only increased in its frantic pace, and Julia decreed that we must leave before the temptation to join in got the better of me. Reluctantly I agreed, and we made our way to the city gate, often having to step over unconscious and even unclothed bodies. Someday, I vowed, I’d contrive a way to come down to this festival without Julia.

“You’ve skipped a day at the gymnasium,” Hermes reminded me cheerfully as we began our journey homeward. “Tomorrow you’ll have to work twice as hard.”

“Thank you for reminding me,” I told him.

Back at the villa, Julia said: “We have to make some decisions. As much as I love this place, we can’t stay here much longer. You’ve recovered from your wound and soon you’ll have to take your court somewhere, whether Sicily or somewhere else.”

“I know I can’t dawdle much longer,” I said, “but I hate to leave without catching whoever killed the priests and the girl at the temple, and, incidentally, the one who shot me with an arrow.”

“It’s awful to contemplate, but people get away with terrible crimes all the time. You may just have to admit that you’ve lost this one, swallow your pride, and go.”

“If I do that, you know what my political enemies back in Rome will say. They’ll say Metellus ran because he was frightened. That sort of thing can damage a political career.”

“They’ll lie about you anyway, you know that. Let them say what they want.”

“Still,” I groused, “they’re going to make the most of it. Shot from ambush by an archer! It’s disgraceful. Even Achilles suffered loss of honor when he was killed by an arrow shot by a coward.”

“Are you serious? Does that actually bother you? It’s too juvenile even for you!”

“I know. I just said it to annoy you. I’ll give it a few more days. If I haven’t found them in another four or five days, we’re off to Sicily. I’ll go ahead and send letters to the major towns and tell them I’ll be holding court in Sicily soon.”

This seemed to mollify Julia. Truthfully, I was not so certain. To me it seemed that the contending factions of the day were closing in on me like a great pair of blacksmith’s tongs. I had not the luxury of remaining neutral. They would force me to choose sides in spite of myself. It was my great misfortune that the Republic came to such a pass just in the year when I was a praetor, wielding imperium and therefore a man to court, or to kill, as the case might be. Before, I had not been sufficiently important to merit the attention of the great men of the day. Should I survive my year, I might be inconsequential again. It would be some time before I should be given my propraetorian province to govern.

Perhaps I was deceiving myself. My family was one of the great ones, and I had at last achieved a standing and dignity that made me a power in that family. That made it difficult to maintain a pose of neutrality.

Still, one thing kept me focused on this corner of Campania, shutting out the distractions of a world about to plunge into war and chaos. I had to find out who had committed all these seemingly meaningless murders. It was just my nature.

At the end of the evening I went to bed, exhausted. When I woke in the morning, I thought I had the key to solving the riddle.