Three Hands in The Fountain

XXVIII

None of us could face doing any more that evening. Petro and I escorted the Consul to his house, where he returned my tunic after divesting himself on the doorstep. You could tell he was upper class. A plebeian would shy off such eccentricity. I've known wrestlers who turned their backs to strip, even in the suitable surroundings of the baths. Frontinus' own door porter looked alarmed, and he presumably was used to his master. We handed over the Consul into safe keeping, and the porter winked to thank us for keeping straight faces.

Then Petro and I walked slowly back to Fountain Court. A few shops were reopening to catch the evening trade as the Circus emptied. All the streets seemed to contain men with sly expressions, drunks, hustlers, slaves up to no good, and girls on the make. People talked too loudly. People barged us off the pavement, then when we took to the roadway others knocked us into open drains. It was probably by accident, but anyway they didn't care. Instinctively we started shoving too.

This was the city at its worst. Maybe it was always like this, and I was just noticing it more tonight. Maybe the Games had brought out extra dross.

Upset by the interview with Cicurrus, we did not even pop into a winebar for a pre-dinner relaxer. Perhaps for once we should have done. We might have missed a very unpleasant experience in Fountain Court. We were walking along glumly with our heads down, which gave us no time to make good our escape. Instead I laid a warning hand on Petro's arm, and he groaned loudly. The litter we had seen outside the laundry when we left earlier was still there. Its occupant had clearly been watching for our return.

She jumped out and publicly accosted us. However, this was not little light-footed, violet-clad Balbina Milvia. The litter must be a shared one, used by all the women of the Florius household. It had brought us a much more terrifying visitor than Petro's pert piece of dalliance: this was Milvia's mama.

Even before she flew at Petronius and started bawling, we could tell she was furious.