While the servant announced us, I studied the group and saw some faces I knew. Catullus the poet was there, as was Marcus Brutus. Brutus was a pontifex, and as a patrician he was barred from the contio that afternoon. He was known for his enthusiasm for Greek philosophy. The rest were men and women of Rome’s literary and philosophical community, both Romans and Greeks.
The woman herself rose to greet us. I had rather expected an overeducated crone, but she was a tall, stately woman with the handsome, slightly heavy features so favored by Greek sculptors. Her hair was purest black, divided in the middle and falling over her shoulders. Her gown was as simple and as beautiful as a Doric column. She took Asklepiodes’s hand first.
“Welcome, learned Asklepiodes, fountain of medical knowledge.” She turned to look at me. “Thrice welcome for bringing the famous Decius Caecilius Metellus the Younger to my house.” She released his hand and took mine. “I have hoped for so long to see you, Senator.” Her eyes were disconcertingly direct. Not to mention beautiful.
“I am amazed you even know my name, distinguished lady, and I apologize for arriving thus unannounced.”
She smiled and she did this, as she did everything else, beautifully. “Oh, but your all-too-brief stay in Alexandria is, shall we say, still remarked upon after nearly eleven years.”
“Oh, well,” I said, almost blushing, “what’s one more riot in Alexandria’s long history of them?” The riot had been the least of it.
“Besides, Princess Cleopatra recently spoke of you in the most glowing terms. She said her adventures with you on Cyprus were wonderfully exhilarating.”
“Life always seems to be exhilarating around young Cleopatra,” I told her. “She has a way of attracting excitement.”
“And Ione, the high priestess of the Temple of Aphrodite at Paphos, wrote to me of you. She said that you are the most gifted Roman to come to Cyprus. She believes you to be touched by the gods.”
This was getting embarrassing. “I’m just another Roman drudge, trying to do my duty and dodge the odd assassin,” I told her.
“Please join our little group,” she said. “I believe you must know most of these people.”
She introduced them anyway, then Asklepiodes and I took our seats while their discussion continued. Courtesy dictated that I wait until their evening’s conversation was concluded before I took my problem to her.
Catullus nudged me in the ribs and said in a stage whisper, “Touched by the gods, eh? Bacchus, I’ll bet.”
“Venus,” I muttered back at him. “Princesses and priestesses find me irresistible.” Some of the others turned and frowned at us.
They talked for a long time on some points of philosophy that I couldn’t follow, then about the poetry of Pindar, with which I was at least familiar. I kept my mouth shut rather than stress my ignorance.
I must confess that I felt absurdly flattered that this woman knew who I was, had spoken with Cleopatra, and corresponded with Ione about me. Even better, she had not once mentioned my connection to Caesar. By that time I was beginning to feel that, in most peoples’ eyes, being married to Caesar’s niece was the highest distinction I had achieved.
I was struck by the foolishness of my feelings. Why should I, a widely experienced soldier and magistrate of the greatest republic in the world, feel warmed by the esteem of a foreign woman? After all, she was only a woman. And while we Romans had a grudging admiration, even awe, of the Greeks of former times; we regarded their descendants, our contemporaries, as a pack of foolish degenerates, political imbeciles, and natural-born slaves. We often marveled that the Greeks we saw every day could be even distantly related to Achilles and Agamemnon, or even to the later ones like Pericles, Leonidas, and Miltiades.
Perhaps the truth was that I had grown tired and disillusioned with the Romans of my own class, self-seeking politicians and grasping conquerors who were slowly destroying the Republic more surely than any barbarian enemy could hope to.
Not that I expected to find some cure for our ills in the supposed wisdom of aliens. Many of the more idle and empty-headed members of the senatorial and equestrian orders were forever discovering the answers to the problems that have plagued mankind in the ancient “enlightenment” of Persia or Babylonia or Egypt. They never explain how this wonderful wisdom failed to save those utterly fallen and destroyed civilizations. At least men like Brutus and Cicero chose to admire the relatively rational Greeks, who knew how to carve wonderful statues.
Eventually, people began to rise and take their leave. While Callista bade each good night I spoke briefly with Brutus. He was a man of the highest reputation but far too solemn and serious for my taste. He couldn’t decide which direction to spit without wondering how it might reflect on the honor of his ancient family. I thought it a grotesque fixation in one so young. His mother, Servilia, had been one of the great beauties of her generation, and Brutus had inherited some portion of her comeliness, which did not otherwise run in his aptly named family.