Martial steeled himself. Clearly, the pompous man was dying to show off his verses and show off his child wife too.
The verses were pedestrian, but she was charming. She sang in a light, girlish voice while her fingers plucked complex patterns on the strings, and all the while her husband beamed at her with indescribable complacency.
“Bravo!” Martial clapped his hands when she had finished. “Why, mistress, put my verses to music and you’ll make my fortune for me!”
She blushed. “My talent is small, sir, but it is at your service. Tell me, what meters do you employ? For the lyre I find that iambic trimeter works best, although the dactylic, of course—”
“Calpurnia?” Pliny ’s face was a picture of baffled embarrassment.
“Why, husband, what is the matter?” She raised an innocent eyebrow. “I must ask him, mustn’t I?” Martial caught a gleam of amusement in her eye and an answering one from the freedman, Zosimus across the table. Well, well, thought Martial, this young lady has been taking lessons, and not only from Cupid. And now she’s teasing him. Here’s a girl with more spirit than she’s given credit for.
They spent the next few minutes discussing Latin lyric meters and the poet was impressed, both by her knowledge and by her tact in drawing her husband back into the conversation and smoothing his ruffled feathers. Meanwhile more dishes were brought out—filling, if not exciting. Presently Calpurnia stifled a yawn and excused herself.
“You chose wisely, my friend,” said Martial when she was gone, and meant it. “She’s charming. I’ve been in half the bedrooms in Rome, but I’ve no one to go home to tonight. It’s no life for a man my age.”
“She is devoted to me, the dear thing.” Pliny was moist-eyed. “She memorizes my courtroom speeches, you know; even sleeps with a sheaf of them beside her on the bed when I have to be away from home.”
“No, really?” said Martial. He had to bite his lip to keep from laughing. “But when you’re lucky enough to be in the bed, she’s not, ah, too modest, I hope.”
“Oh, goodness no,” Pliny assured him. Lately, of course, because of the fear of a miscarriage, they had been abstaining. Pliny had a more ardent nature than many would have suspected and he was beginning to feel quite definitely deprived.
Leaving the subject of his host’s marital bliss, Martial ventured, “This murder case you’re on…”
“Mehercule,” Pliny burst out with feeling, “I don’t know why this business has been thrust upon me. The babe unborn has as much knowledge of crime detection as I do. I’m no more a policeman than you are.”
“But it is of some interest,” the poet replied. “What little I’ve gathered from the barber shop gossip. What have you learned so far?”
Pliny described his morning’s investigation.
“Jewish assassins,” said the poet. “And you believe it?”
“Well, I mean to say, the evidence all points that way. I only hope I can save the other slaves.”
“You actually care about them, don’t you? It does you credit. I once composed an epitaph in verse for a little slave girl who died on our estate back home. A dear little thing. I’m not all winks and nudges, you know.”
Pliny affirmed that he was glad to hear it.
The poet made a temple of his fingers and rested his chin on them. “You knew Verpa, of course.”
“Only slightly, and his wretched family not at all. Lucius seems to be a typical young man of our age, that is to say good for nothing. And as for the lady, she is either a mad woman or she’s afraid of something. Her behavior this morning was extraordinary.”
“You don’t say. Well, I can tell you that our Lucius has been living far beyond his allowance; gambled and whored it all away—reminds me of myself when I was his age. I’ve learned that half a dozen usurers are pursuing him and have threatened to cut off his credit or even complain to his father if he doesn’t pay up.”
“That’s an old story in our city,” Pliny sighed. “A son with a living father possesses nothing of his own, can’t sell anything to raise money, can’t legally borrow money, but they all do anyway. And then they wait for father to die.”
“And sometimes, if father is tiresomely long-lived, they don’t wait,” Martial concluded the thought. “I’m told he begged his father to free him from patria potestas or, at least, raise his allowance, and the old man refused. Now, of course, that’s all changed. Lucius is his own man at last.” Martial paused and moistened his throat with more wine, enjoying the attention of Pliny and the freedmen, whose eyes were riveted on him. “And as for Turpia Scortilla, her case is more interesting. Did you know she’s not his wife?”