The River God's Vengeance(54)

“You still have Caesar on your side,” Hermes said.

“Caesar is far, far away,” I said. “And if I get killed over a matter of politics and money, he’ll be understanding about the whole situation. It will just mean that whoever is responsible will owe Caesar a big political favor to make up for it.”

We came to a lane where all foot traffic was stopped by a group of men hoisting chests and other furniture onto the roof of an insula. Items that couldn’t be carried were being moved to upper stories and roofs everywhere, but many things were too large to carry up the narrow stairways so they had to be lifted by ropes from the streets. Since few Roman streets were wide enough for two people to pass one another comfortably without turning sideways, the effects on traffic were predictably chaotic.

“What about your neighbors?” Hermes asked. “They’ve rallied to your aid before.”

“Hermes, I get the distinct impression that you don’t believe I am competent to handle this situation.”

“I felt safer when the Germans held us prisoner.”

At last the creaky bundle of household goods swayed aloft and we passed beneath it, feeling none too safe in the process. This same activity was going on in all the valleys between the hills, and once in a while you heard the snap of parting ropes, accompanied by the smash of shattering furniture along with occasional screams from someone who didn’t step lively enough.

“Just let me get to my arms,” I said, “and I will be ready to take on the whole pack of them!” The look Hermes cast at me in return for this boast was too eloquent to describe.

Eventually, we made it home. Even though the Subura lay primarily in the valley between the Quirinal and the Esquiline, it was well away from the river, and little of it was low enough to be liable to serious fiooding. Even so, the streets were almost as chaotic as elsewhere. Jammed with people at the best of times, the load was doubled as those who lived near the river sought refuge with friends and relatives in the higher parts of the City, even if this just meant camping on the roof of a Subura slum.

The cacophony was made all the more colorful because of the great variety of languages being shouted from all directions. Perhaps half of my neighbors were native citizens, speaking their own Suburan dialect of Latin. The rest were foreigners, either immigrants and resident aliens or recently freed slaves, all fiocking to the Subura for the cheapest housing within the walls. There were near-black Numidians, Gauls with yellow mustaches and twisted neck rings, wigged Egyptians, Syrians with oiled ringlets, many Jews wearing pointed caps and striped coats, and the usual Greeks looking Greek. When excited, they all forgot their broken, outrageously accented Latin and reverted to the barking, beastly sounds of their native tongues.

Julia was in the colonnade surrounding the impluvium, apparently getting the household staff organized. Her eyes went wide when she saw me.

“You’re home and the sun is still shining. Is anything wrong?”

“Father Tiber is about to throw one of his occasional rampages, and I may soon be attacked by armed men.”

“If you aren’t going to be attacked soon, perhaps you can suggest where we might put this.”

She stood aside to show me what she had the slaves doing. They were prying boards away from a wooden crate, just under man height. Three boards had already been removed, and a litter of straw lay on the fioor tiles, revealing a beautiful statue of polished white marble. The subject was Venus, or rather the Greek Aphrodite, about two-thirds life size.

“It’s lovely,” I said, my worries momentarily forgotten in the presence of such sublimity. The goddess was depicted nude except for her sandals, one of which she was fastening as she leaned on a smaller statue of Pan. It is one of the conventional poses of that particular goddess, and it takes a master sculptor to render it gracefully. This one had done the job perfectly. The white marble had been tinted so faintly that you had to look hard to make sure it was tinted at all. The result was the effect of genuine human fiesh, but made of a substance as pure and insubstantial as the clouds. Her nipples, lips, and hair were gilded, a treatment that looks garish on most statues, but on this one the effect was breathtaking. I later determined that the underlying marble on those areas had first been stained dark, then the gold leaf had been lightly stippled on, rather than laid on in sheets.

“I’ve seen copies of this statue before,” Julia said, “but none so fine as this.”

“It isn’t the work of a Roman shop,” I agreed. We had long since looted Greece of its best art works, and there were never enough of them to satisfy the growing wealthy classes of the Empire. So there were many workshops turning out copies of the scarce originals. Some of these were comparable in quality to the originals, but most of them were quite inferior. Then I got over the wonder of the thing and thought of what it must have cost.