Roman Games(92)

“She is still very weak.”

“But she has the resilience of youth. She will live to bear you more sons. And now I have a favor to ask of you. I’m told you are something of a writer, that you record your thoughts and observations of life in the form of letters, which, from time to time, you publish. You will oblige me by omitting me from your reminiscences and leave me to a welcome oblivion. I ask it not for my sake but for the Order.”

“I assure you both,” Pliny replied with feeling, “that I have no wish to revisit these past two weeks. They have left a bitter taste on my tongue. The world will not learn of it from me.”

No, the world would not learn of it, but what had he learned? He felt he had grown older, as if those fifteen days had been as many years. Most Romans drank in cynicism with their mother’s milk. He somehow never had. But now he no longer felt the comfort of his old certainties. At the crucial moment, they had turned to water and trickled through his fingers. Would he ever again find firm ground to stand on? He suspected he would be a long time looking.