Roma - Saylor Steven (книги полностью .TXT) 📗
After a while he set the documents aside, extinguished the lamp, and slept for another hour, as men do when they have made an irrevocable decision and are at peace with the gods and themselves.
When Titus Potitius next came to call, it was ostensibly to pay his respects to the newlyweds. Kaeso received the visitor in his new home without a trace of rancor. He even spoke warmly to him, and apologized for his earlier harsh words, then introduced him to his new bride.
To Potitius, it seemed that a night of marital bliss had done wonders to correct Kaeso’s attitude. And why not? As he saw it, there was no need for Kaeso to be unfriendly. Having convinced himself that selling the family’s rights to the Ara Maxima was acceptable, Potitius had further convinced himself that his request for assistance from Kaeso was entirely reasonable. They were kinsmen, after all. Kaeso had plenty of money, and Potitius was in dire straits. The gods smiled on generosity. There was no reason the transaction should be unpleasant. Indeed, Kaeso should be proud to help an elder kinsman in need.
With his head full of such rationalizations, and his guard down, Potitius thought nothing of it when the bride offered him a portion of the traditional dish of beans left over from the wedding feast, and he did not notice that it was Kaeso who actually put the bowl in his hands. He was hungry, and the beans were delicious. Kaeso discreetly slipped him a small bag of coins, then hurried him out the door. Potitius took no offense at being dismissed so quickly. It was only natural that the groom was eager to be alone with his bride.
Patting the money bag that hung from his waist, humming a happy tune, Potitius crossed the Aventine, heading for his house on the less fashionable south side of the hill. Walking in front of the Temple of Juno Regina, he saw that one of the sacred geese had escaped its enclosure and was strutting across the porch, craning its neck this way and that. Potitius smiled, then felt a sudden tingling in his throat. His mouth was very dry; he should have asked for something to drink to wash down the beans.
Abruptly, a flame seemed to run down his throat all the way to his bowels. The sensation was so intense and so peculiar that he knew something was seriously wrong. He had reached that advanced age when a man might die at any moment, suddenly and without apparent cause. Was that happening now? Had the gods at last chosen to end the story of his life?
Without knowing how he got there, he found himself lying flat on his back on the ground in front of the temple, hardly able to move. A crowd gathered around him. People stooped over and peered down at him. Their expressions were not encouraging. Men shook their heads. A woman covered her face and began to weep.
“Cold,” he managed to say. “Can’t seem…to move.”
As if to contradict him, his arms and legs began to twitch, a little at first, and then so violently that people drew back in fright. The alarmed goose honked and flapped its wings.
Potitius realized what had happened. He hardly thought of it as murder, but rather as yet another misfortune to befall the Potitii. How the gods must hate his family! It never occurred to him to accuse Kaeso with his dying breath; to admit his extortion would only blacken his own name and further humiliate the family. His convulsions ceased, along with his breathing.
Titus, reigning paterfamilias of the Potitii, died swiftly and in silence.
Two lictors sent by the curule aedile arrived to look after the body until a family member could claim it. The lictor who took an inventory of the dead man’s possessions recognized Potitius and expressed surprise that the old fellow should be carrying such a substantial amount of money on his person. “The Potitii are always crying poverty, but look at all these coins!”
“Maybe it’s what left of that settlement the censor gave him for selling the rights to the Ara Maxima,” said his companion. “No good could come of such sacrilege.”
“No good’s already come to this poor fellow!”
To Kaeso’s eye, Titus Potitius, the son of the deceased paterfamilias, looked only slightly younger than his father.
“So you see,” said Potitius, “as far as I was able to figure out, you must have been one of the last people to see him alive. Papa told one of the slaves he would be stopping here on his way home, but he didn’t say why. It’s a bit of puzzle how he came to have so much money on him. No one has a clue as to where he got that bag of coins.”
The two of them sat in the tiny garden of Kaeso’s new house. There was no innuendo or suspicion in Potitius’s voice; he sounded like a bereaved son who simply wanted to learn all he could about his father’s final hours. Still, Kaeso felt a flutter of anxiety in his chest. He chose his words carefully and spoke in what he hoped was a suitably commiserating tone of voice.
“It’s true, your father paid us a brief visit that day. He and I had met briefly once before, at the house of Appius Claudius. It was very considerate of him to come by and congratulate us on our nuptials.”
“Such a nice old fellow,” remarked Galeria, who sat nearby with her spindle and distaff, spinning wool with the assistance of her slave girl. Galeria had many old-fashioned virtues, but keeping silent was not one of them, and the house was too small for Kaeso to conduct a conversation out of her hearing. “He seemed very fond of you, Kaeso.”
Potitius smiled. “I can see why Papa might have taken a liking to you. You probably reminded him of cousin Marcus.”
“Oh?”
“Yes, the resemblance is quite striking. And Papa was very sentimental. And…he wasn’t above imposing on people. He didn’t…” Potitius lowered his eyes. “He didn’t by any chance ask you for money, did he? I’m afraid Papa had a bad habit of asking for loans, even from people he barely knew.”
“Of course not!”
Potitius sighed. “Ah, well, I had to ask. I’m still tracking down his unpaid debts. Where he acquired that bag of coins may remain a mystery.”
Kaeso nodded sympathetically. Clearly, the younger Titus Potitius knew nothing of his father’s scheme to extort money from him. And yet, the man’s fretting over the bag of coins, and his remark about Kaeso’s resemblance to a kinsman, made Kaeso uneasy.
Kaeso took a deep breath. The flutter in his chest subsided. As had occurred in the early hours of his wedding day, a resolution came to him, and with it a sense of peace.
He looked earnestly at Potitius. “Like my dear friend Appius Claudius, I’m moved by your family’s plight. That one of Roma’s most ancient families should have dwindled so greatly in numbers and fallen into such poverty should be a cause for concern to all the city’s patricians. We of the old families squabble too much among ourselves, when we should be looking out for one another. I’m only a young man, and I have very little influence—”
“You underestimate yourself, Kaeso. You have the ear of both Quintus Fabius and Appius Claudius. Not many men in Roma can say that.”
“I suppose that’s true. And I should like to do what I can to help the Potitii.”
“I would be very grateful for any assistance you can give us.” Potitius sighed. “The duties of paterfamilias weigh heavily upon me!”
“Perhaps I can help to relieve that burden, if only a little. Upon my recommendation, my cousin Quintus might be able to secure positions for some for your kinsman, and so might the censor. You and I should meet again, Titus, over a bit of food and wine.”
“I would be honored,” said Potitius. “My house is hardly worthy to receive you, but if you and your wife would accept an invitation to dinner…”
And so Kaeso began to insinuate himself into the household, and into the trust, of the new paterfamilias of the Potitii.
311 B.C.
The new fountain at the terminus of the aqueduct was not merely the largest fountain in all of Roma, but a splendid work of art. The shallow, elevated pool into which the water would spill was a circle fifteen feet in diameter. In the center, from the mouths of three river sprites magnificently carved from stone, water would continuously jet into the pool.
