Truthfully, in that moment she resembled a sibyl. The exaggerated cosmetics she wore made her face a hiero-phantic mask, but I hoped that this was a mere effect of the light. The prospect of Publius Claudius wielding real power in Rome was horrifying in the extreme.
She relaxed from the rigid pose. “But we are being too serious. I did not invite you here to argue. I will make a bargain with you: If you will refrain from passing judgment on my chosen means of relaxation, I will not bore you with predictions of my own or my brother’s future prominence.”
“Agreed,” I said, Indeed, it seemed a fine idea. My mind had entered an odd state, free-floating and detached, in that degree of preternatural receptiveness which the more lurid Epicurean philosophers agree is the best for indulging in pleasure, without the distractions of everyday life or the fears of future consequences. “Let us carve this night from the fabric of our lives and hold it separate forever.”
“I could not have put it better. Chrysis, perform for us.”
I had all but forgotten the girl, and was a bit surprised to see her sitting on a cushion, sipping from a goblet, as if she were an equal. This was yet another indication of her uncertain status. She rose and went into one of the other chambers, to return holding a coiled rope. One end of this she affixed to a bronze ring set into one wall of the room. She stretched it across the room and fastened it to another ring in the wall opposite. It was not taut, about four feet from the floor. It was only about the thickness of a man’s smallest finger.
“Chrysis has so many talents,” Claudia whispered, leaning close so that our shoulders touched. “She has been a professional tumbler, among other things.” What other things? I thought. But then my attention was taken once more by Chrysis. Her hand went to her shoulder and her dress fell to pool around her bare feet. She stood dressed only in the briefest of loincloths and her body was almost that of an adolescent boy. Only her large nipples and the rondure of her buttocks attested to her sex. I found this androgyny strangely stirring. It was especially strange since I had the utterly feminine Claudia so near me. I decided that it was an effect of the rare wine, and I sipped more of it.
With an adroit leap, Chrysis sprang onto the rope and crouched with her knees deeply bent, her arms spread for balance. Slowly, she straightened until she was standing, one foot poised delicately before the other. Then she began to bend backward, her hair falling to touch the rope as her spine bent like a full-drawn bow. Her hands touched the rope and her pelvis arched upward like, it seemed to me, that of a woman offering herself to a god. The image, bizarre as it was, seemed pleasing at the time.
Her feet kicked free of the rope and she was standing on her hands. Slowly, she raised her head and bent her spine until the soles of her feet rested against the back of her head. Then, impossibly, her feet slid past her ears and continued downward until her toes dangled an inch or two above the rope. Her body was now bent backward into a near-circle. I could scarcely believe that a human spine could be so flexible.
“She can play the double flute in that position,” Claudia whispered. “She can play a harp with her toes and shoot a bow with her feet.”
“A many-talented girl,” I murmured. Unbidden through my mind went lascivious images of other possibilities of which such a body might be capable. Claudia could read my expression.
“Perhaps later we can have her demonstrate the talents she never uses for public performances.”
I turned to her, managing to shake off a bit of Chrysis’s spell. “I am not interested in her,” I lied. “I am only interested in you.”
She leaned even closer. “Why be so quick to dispose of one of us?”
I was not certain of her meaning, but then my mind was playing tricks, disoriented by wine, the unexpected surroundings and the seemingly impossible things Chrysis was doing. One can watch a single improbability without losing equilibrium. Several, either simultaneously or in succession, unsettle the brain.
Chrysis performed a backward somersault from the rope and launched into a series of back handsprings, each time touching the floor so lightly that even these violent exertions were accomplished in the eerie silence that seemed to accompany all her movements. Then she stood before us, her legs spread wide, bending backward until her face appeared between her knees, as if she had been beheaded and now gripped her head between her legs like a ball. Her hands grasped her ankles. Slowly, her head turned and her tongue snaked out to slide upward along her thigh. Her head twisted intricately and she straightened, but now a long strip of white dangled from her mouth. Somehow, she had unknotted her loincloth with her teeth and stripped it off as she whipped her spine back into a more normal position. Now she stood before us dressed only in a fine sheen of sweat. There could be no doubt of her gender now, her smooth-shaven pubis gleaming before us like a pearl. She spat out the loincloth and smiled proudly as she bowed.