And she remembered how she too had wept, in those first days, as though her heart would break. It was only the tenderness of her new “mother,” the Vestalis Maxima, that had eased her sorrow then. Perhaps it was because the Purissima herself seemed to wear an air of perpetual sorrow that made her so gentle a friend and so patient a teacher to the young ones.
But where was she now? When would she come back to them? She had told them she was ill and must leave the cloister for awhile. But that was so many days ago, and not a word from her since. But surely, Laelia thought, she would come back today, the day of Jupiter’s banquet. Hope fluttered in the little girl’s breast.
The “sisters” breakfasted together, and then their serving women helped them arrange their hair in the archaic fashion: coils of hair bound with fillets of red and white wool massed on top of the head and covered with a long veil that fell over their shoulders.
Outside, Laelia heard the shuffling of many feet and the lowing of cattle. It was beginning! It was only these few grand occasions that punctuated the tedium of her life. And this time the second-oldest Vestal, who was temporarily in charge of them, had given her permission to attend the ritual banquet. With two Vestals left behind to tend the flame, there would be only three of them going. But oh, if only the Purissima could be among them!
Groggy after a sleepless night, Pliny stood atop the Capitoline Hill with a very subdued Aurelius Fulvus and other officers of the City Battalions. His bronze corselet felt noticeably less snug than it had just nine short days ago when he wore it at the opening of the Games; worry had done this to him.
At that moment silver trumpets blared, the signal for the three massive doors of the temple to swing open. The feeding of the gods was the central rite of the Roman Games. The three-chambered temple of Jupiter, Juno, and Minerva had been consecrated on this day six centuries ago, when Rome was only a collection of mean little cottages huddled on the slopes of seven low hills. Today, as on that first day, Jupiter’s face was painted a fiery red, symbolic of the blood of his slaughtered enemies, and he and his two female consorts were gorgeously dressed for dinner.
Public slaves carried the massive gold and ivory statues, freshly tinted and dressed for the occasion, down the temple steps and laid them lengthwise on banqueting couches built for giants. They placed tables before them and began to carry in steaming platters of food. Other couches had been arranged for the guests, senators and magistrates, who would share this sacred meal. Truly, at times like this, Pliny thought, the gods felt very real and very close. For a little while he could imagine himself among those shaggy ancestors, who in their simplicity believed that the divine images were nourished by the same food as they themselves ate. But what should he think of these deities now after what he had been through with Domitian, Lord and God, last night?
The emperor and empress dined with the gods at their table. Pliny, sitting not far away, stole cautious glances at them. Domitia Augusta sat as still as a statue herself; her face betrayed no emotion. Very different was her husband’s. His sullen, red-rimmed eyes seemed never at rest. He had gone through the long morning’s ritual of sacrifice and prayer like a sleep-walker. Now his lips were moving. Was he talking to his wife—or to Minerva, who had deserted him in his dreams? Was he, perhaps, begging Jupiter for his life? Was he insane?
Pliny turned back to his food without relish. At last, the emperor and his entourage stood up. Slaves ran up to drape him in his triumphal toga, purple stitched with golden stars, and placed a laurel wreath on his head. His lictors, bearing the ceremonial bundles of rods and axes on their shoulders, shouted for the crowd to clear the way.
The emperor would mount his golden chariot now and lead a procession of chariots representing the six racing teams, each liveried in its distinctive color, to the Circus Maximus—that immense oval, nearly half a mile long, ringed by tier upon tier of stands, capable of containing a full fourth of the city’s population. Today the races would begin and continue everyday until the end of the Games.
Pliny would join in the procession but then slip away as soon as possible. He regretted having missed most of the theatrical performances during the first week of the Games. He had no such regrets about missing the races. Almost unique among his countrymen, he found them inexpressibly tedious. How the Roman populace could rouse itself to a fever pitch of excitement over the Blues and the Greens, the Reds and Whites, the Golds and Purples, as if it made a particle of difference which team won, was quite beyond him.
But his musings were interrupted by a shocking occurrence. One of the Vestal Virgins, only a child, broke away from the others and streaked toward the emperor. What was she shouting? Something about her mother? The girl threw herself sobbing against Domitian’s legs, holding onto his toga. He raised his hand to slap her, and would have, only the empress pulled her away just in time and handed her to an older Vestal who had raced after her.