Stone Cold

Eight

'Do you believe human beings can travel through time, like the gods?' a small voice piped up, as Claudia sat in the shade of a sour apple tree.

Claudia looked down at the scrap. Six years old, with a round, pink face like a cherub and eyes as big and blue as the Aegean, little hands twisted in anxiety.

’Do you?' the child asked again.

'I don't know,' Claudia replied tentatively. 'Why do you ask?'

'Because Mummy said if I don't tidy my room she will knock me into next week. Is that how the gods move?'

'Only if they don't tidy their bedrooms.'

The girl climbed on to the marble seat and wriggled into Claudia's lap. 'You've come all the way from Rome, haven't you?'

'I certainly have.'

'Is Rome further than Santonum?'

'A little bit.'

'Do you think I'd get there by the middle of next week?' Claudia sucked in her cheeks. 'Only on Pegasus.'

Big blue eyes swivelled up at her. 'Who's Pegasus?'

As Claudia explained about the winged son of the sea, the stallion who could only be tamed with a bridle of gold and who lived in the stables of the gods on Olympus, she reflected on the cut of the little girl's tunic, the quality of the leather of her tiny sandals, and wondered whom she belonged to. Marcia didn't have children, but who else would dress their daughter in Roman garments and tie her hair up in Roman-style ribbons? And why, if her clothes reflected her status, was this child tidying her own room, when Marcia had slaves for every last discipline — and Claudia wasn't just talking about hairdressers and masseurs. There were slaves of the wardrobe, guardians of the jewels, furnace slaves, wine servers, ushers for when she went out, ushers for visitors who came to the villa, foot washers, perfume custodians, fan wallahs to keep her egotistical brow at its ambient temperature.

'Wherever Pegasus stamps his hoof, water gushes out of the rock, and if poets drink from this source they will always find inspiration.'

'Gosh!' Little white teeth bit into her lower lip. 'Do you know any more magic animal stories?'

'Well, there's the three-headed dog, who guards the Underworld, and the reason he has three heads, you see, is so he can watch outwards and sideways at the same time. But since no one ever leaves the Underworld, he doesn't need a fourth head to see backwards.'

'More! Tell me more!'

'All right, what about the sea witch with snakes for hair-'

'There you are, Luci!' A young woman with tired eyes came bustling down the garden path.

'She means me,' the child whispered. 'It's short for Lucina. Bet I'm in trouble again.'

'I'm sorry if my daughter's causing a nuisance.'

Despite her Roman tunic, the woman's dark, glossy hair was scrunched back Gallic-fashion in a band at the nape of the neck, and instead of being manicured her hands were red and work-roughened.

'Hardly, she's just joined me from tidying her bedroom,' Claudia assured her, shooting Luci a conspiratorial wink.

'I doubt that,' the woman sighed. 'That child never does one damn thing I tell her.'

'Told you,' Luci muttered, wriggling down off the bench.

'Put your baby brother to bed, would you, there's a good girl.' Her mother patted the little blonde curls and then gasped. 'My goodness, would you look at the dirt on the back of your neck!'

'Like I'm an owl,' Luci grumbled, but she scampered inside all the same, hopscotching up the flagstoned path and singing at the top of her off-key tinny voice.

'Never have children.' The woman laughed. 'But if you do, never have six. You need arms like an octopus and more eyes than Argus himself.'

'I've forgotten,' Claudia said. 'Did he have a hundred eyes, or a thousand?'

'Who cares, it's never enough. I'm Stella, by the way. Marcia's cousin.'

There was a resemblance, now you looked closer. Same pointed features, same slender hips. Except Stella's beauty hadn't faded through hardness or been obliterated by a plastering of cosmetics. Her loveliness was still very much evident, albeit tempered by exhaustion and buried beneath a mountain of worry.

'Won't you join me?' Claudia asked.

'There's a lot I need to get on with…'

'Sure?' She reached beneath the marble bench and drew out a pitcher of sherbet and a plate of spiced raisin buns.

Stella wiped her hands down the sides of her tunic as though it was an old apron. 'Maybe ten minutes.' How quickly the lines disappeared when she smiled! 'Heaven knows, there'll be enough left to do in the morning.'

Made from unripe carob pods, the sherbet was thick, sugary and bursting with raspberries, and the buns melted on the tongue in an explosion of cinnamon and ginger.

'If you don't mind my asking,' Claudia said between mouthfuls, 'why are you doing the work of Marcia's slaves?'

There were traces of charcoal on Stella's gown, and laundry stains on the hem.

'I'm not,' she replied, reaching for a second bun. 'I'm doing the work of my own slaves. My husband walked out. Left me with five young kiddies and another one on the way.'

'Debts?'

'No,' she sighed, 'that…' She took a deep breath. 'That's what I can't get over. He left without any explanation. Just tidied his desk, folded his clothes and then pff! The only thing he did was leave a note saying "sorry", but sorry for what? Not bothering to let us know whether he's alive or dead? I don't mean to sound bitter,' she said, and the funny thing about it was that she didn't, 'but because officially he's alive, it falls on me to support the family, but how can I? The law prevents me from divorcing him in his absence, obviously I can't inherit his estate and I'm not free to remarry, even if anyone wanted me.'

'How long have you lived this way?'

'Four years that feel like forty.'

When Stella pushed an overhang of hair out of her eyes, Claudia could smell her fresh, tangy scent and decided she was too young and too decent to face such an ordeal.

'Once it was seen as heroic, me struggling to raise half a dozen kids on a shoestring. Now, other people just see me as dull, and who can blame them? You know, Claudia, it's hard to meet expenses in my situation. They're everywhere I turn. I lost the estate through debts I simply couldn't manage, and whilst I'm grateful to Marcia for taking us in I don't wish to be beholden to her more than I have to.'

Stella talked of being heroic, but heroes come in all shapes and sizes, Claudia reflected, and in this instance they seemed to come with freckles on their nose, tired brown eyes and a heart overflowing with love.

'You've done a good job of raising your brood.'

'Only because I lie to them, but, you know, I'm so tired of lying all the time. I'm tired of waiting and,' she added softly, 'I'm tired of hoping for news of his death.'

'Oh, don't worry. If I find him, I'll kill the bastard for you.'

Stella laughed, and ten minutes turned into twenty. 'Is it true,' she asked eventually, 'that a village boy tried to kill Marcia yesterday?'

'At the time I think he was serious, yes, but Garro struck me as a hot-headed youth and I don't think he would have planned murder in the cold light of day.'

In all probability it was passion that moderated his aim.

'I'm not surprised one of them went too far,' Stella sighed, and sighing, Claudia noticed, was something this girl did a lot. 'Marcia will pick up these young men — not usually as young as Garro, thank god — and then, when she tires of them, which doesn't take long because they have no conversation or interests in common, she discards them. Who can blame the poor boys for being bitter.'

Who indeed? They'd been petted and pampered, showered with fancy clothes and had experienced luxuries they couldn't even have dreamed of, yet no sooner had they adjusted to this wonderful life, they were thrown out on their ear.

'What are you two girls gossiping about?' Marcia breezed, rounding the hedge.

Behind her, of course, the usual flurry of flunkies dressed in her distinctive green and gold livery, and, at her shoulder, the big Basc bodyguard in his leather cuirass, looking as rough-hewn as ever.

'Men,' Stella said.

'Totally intimidated by me,' Marcia breezed, squeezing between the two women. 'I'm sure you find it yourself, Claudia, but the more one achieves, the more men are put off. Strikes at the very heart of their male pride, but I say who needs them? I have my pick of virile young studs who keep me young- I say, is something the matter?'

'Sherbet,' Claudia spluttered. 'Went down the wrong way'

'Now, as much as I would like to spend more time with you girls, it's time for my enema. You know Koros, of course?'

An elderly man of indeterminate heritage was summoned out of the liveried ranks with a snap of imperious fingers. His beard fell long and white to his chest, his face was wizened and serious, and he wore a white robe that fell to his ankles. In fact, Koros was exactly what Claudia had imagined a Druid to look like. Right down to his meaningless, all-purpose smile.

'Delighted to make your acquaintance, my lady.'

'If you'd like one of Koros's excellent purges, let me know,' Marcia said. 'He can make up practically anything.'

'I don't doubt it,' Claudia replied smoothly. The old boy had the word 'fraud' all but tattooed on his liver spots, as did Padi, the little fat Indian soothsayer.

'Right, then, Koros, enema time! Oh, Stella,' Marcia turned abruptly, 'I couldn't help noticing that Lucina is wearing one of the tunics I'd had made for her sister.'

'Poppi's outgrown it,' Stella began.

'I've had my dressmakers run up new frocks for all three girls, matching designs naturally, and of course they're in this season's shades.'

'Luci's old enough to choose her own colours.'

'Tch, what does a child know about style? Little girls only want bright pinks and blues-'

'Little girls don't care about fashion,' Stella sighed. 'They want rainbows to play in-'

'Yes, play. Thank you, because that's another thing, Stella. I've brought in four new tutors from the university in Burdigala, so from now on all but the littlest one can attend studies from sunrise, instead of horsing around with hoops and spinning tops, and I have to overrule you about the housework, Stella. It's not fitting that either you or your offspring are engaged in domestic activities, and, since there is an auction in Santonum tomorrow, I'll be buying slaves to take over these tasks. Koros, this new rosemary purge you've created? Is it for mornings or night?'

As the entourage swept off into the house, Stella shrugged. 'You see how it is? My own children, and I have no say in their upbringing. She means well, my cousin, and it's not that I have any great objection to her changing our names to Latin equivalents or giving my babies a good education. I don't even mind not having a life of my own. One can hardly miss what one's never known.' She stood up and smiled sadly. 'It's having my little girls paraded as miniature fashion queens that sticks in my throat.

'Thank you for the sherbet and buns,' she said. 'I expect it's taught you a valuable lesson — that no good deed goes unpunished! But now, if you'll excuse me, I intend to take a scrubbing brush to my daughter's neck while teaching her the importance of religion in her little life.'

'Religion?' Claudia echoed.

'Luci can shin up as many trees as she likes, but she'd better start praying that mud comes out of her tunic, because, hand-me-downs or not, I'm not having any daughters of mine prancing around like a set of tiered mannequins and that's final.'

Watching her bustle away up the path, Claudia's smile was tinged with sadness. Stella possessed beauty, sparkle and life, but for how much longer, that was the question. And how long before the children learned the truth about their father from someone else? Especially now they were growing up fast.