CHAPTERS XXIX-XXX

XXIX.

– …. And above all, be apparently virtuous, though she might not be so in her private life. Mainly when her stability as a wife is not guaranteed. Calpurnia, I think that Portia is right when she recommends you not to expose yourself to public opinion. However, neither should you let yourself be humiliated by an obsessive fidelity to… those rules that your husband imposes you

My inner fibres started to quiver.

–There’s no need to betray him; you must start to consider you own dignity and how to handle it without any dependence on what he may dictate you. Remember that not even old Calpurnius Piso will be very willing to help you when he sees that the best business of his life has faded away. However, Calpurnia, what mostly worries me is being conscious that, long ago, I made a contribution to this state of things that is about to come. No wonder that, sooner or later, Rome may be seen seriously convulsed. This explains why I feel deep aversion for aristocrats like those Clodii, Curiones, Fulvii and everyone around them. Young old-lineaged noblemen who, under the mask of alleged humanitarianism and with the rabble’s support, aim at concentrating power in them, not far from pre-Republican kings. And this could happen again soon. At least we did it all openly ,in the broad daylight, so that ,when the accumulation of power was no longer necessary , we would immediately give it up. Calpurnia… at least you can be sure that your natural moral integrity will not…be perverted by collaborating in that strategy.

–Why do you take it all for granted, Kornel? Don’t I have the right to hope that….what is thought to be unmovable will ever change? How can I be sure that night’s experience was no more than… the reflection of my own obsessions?

That silvery light-blue transparency through his eyelashes spread widely, desert-like, before my expectant look. Those little wrinkles around his eyes seemed to have increased. It might be the effects of those emanations in my body, activated by that anointment with which I massaged it every day .Why did that smell of incense and myrrh seem specially dense, so that it could almost be tasted, invading my eyes and nostrils, deep down into my entrails?Wasn´t that spicy resinous mist ascending, thicker and thicker, taking shape in front of me?Merging into that living body I had in front, almost absorbing it… Some kind of waxy Kornel…made up of incense, myrrh and cinnamon. A barren frightening feeling went all through my shivering body and showed itself before my eyes. Some kind of heartbeat… Was it mourning?...Full of anguish, blazing… a funeral pyre?Bellona’s temple? No, it wasn’t taking hold of me, though. Only that queasy ascending quiver….

–Calpurnia, little Calpurnia…

Again that old voice, fleshy and nearby, while I, still trembling, was recovering my consciousness. Those supple slender fingers were running through my sweat-damped locks… Those lips, still firm, touched my forehead…

XXX

Fortunately, Marcia and Portia accepted my offer. It happened to be a sort of salvation for my convulsed mood. I badly needed some really trusty company at all times in order to avoid being crushed by all those unknown sensations which hastily sprang up within my restless womb.

– Not even my father’s intercession, despite his connection to your husband, Calpurnia, has proved useful to convince him not to expropriate my own house. Why should Caesar have chosen him as his representative and lieutenant in Rome? Isn´t he aware how treacherous Antony may be? He can only get on well with that gang of demagogues and parasites ….

–I am fully aware of that, Marcia. As for these people my husband chooses as his collaborators… what can I tell you? You well know that he has never told me anything about it, due to obvious reasons. Anyways, let’s thank Bona Dea for having dissuaded him from visiting me. This lingering perfume of ointment would seem highly suspicious to him and, therefore, his information might seriously alarm my husband. No, I don’t think he could be very interested in coming here.

I was aware I was moving on a ground that was utterly unknown to both of them and that it wasn’t Kornel who I had before me. In fact, they found it so weird, that I should kept that habit of anointing myself with something so extremely, even unbearably penetrating and sweetish. However, in those days when , due to my prostration, I had to stop my massage, my mood experienced a remarkable change that forced me to return to my ointment as soon as I recovered my independence and I had no more need of depending on other people. What would I do when I ran out of it?

Despite the caution many had recommended me, including Kornel, maybe encouraged by those changes that this massage might have made in my personality, making it more assertive, I made up my mind: I would go with Portia and Marcia to Cato’s confiscated home on Palatine Hill. We would be driven there within Portia’s litter, which would be carried by some of the serfs she had managed to keep within Domus Publica. It wasn’t just mere curiosity but some kind of drive, beyond simple boredom and fear of remaining alone in my room with all this amount of new disturbing emotions. I made sure I was well covered: the knife-like damp cold that heralded the beginning of winter helped me to be as cloaked as possible. Marcus Portius’ domus was, as it was known all around Rome, extremely austere, even compared to that customary sobriety of Palatinian entrances and front walls. Obviously, there were none of those multicoloured marble, porphyry or jasper stones that some patricians chose to frame their thresholds with them. It was a strikingly small house. However, ten, twelve… maybe fifteen or more people, maybe philosophers, teachers from the insulae and even some undercover aristocrat were clustering around the small flight of stairs, sitting, like marble figures, merged within themselves. Their eyes were alien to what was surrounding them, weaving a net of silence that no neighbour would dare profaning. Not only thanks to Marcius Philippus’ doing but also due to the fact that they were all aware of how sacred this bond was, not only that one between the unfortunate deified tribunus and all those gathered individuals but also his connection with a good part of Rome, either patricians or people from Subura or any other vicus.. Everybody, neighbours from Palatine Hill and plebeians, joined into prayer...They were all worshipping the memory of old Republic’s last remainder. You well knew that it would imminently happen, that Rome would definitely stop being what they claimed it really was. Did you really feel, like Kornel, that the ancient monarchic ghost would return to stay forever? Before my friends could react, I pushed myself out of the litter. No, I did not mean to stay therein, as they had initially thought. No, by no means. I must, I needed to breathe that air which was impregnated with respect and feelings, something beyond any other thing I may have known so far. We three let ourselves fall on those three or four stairs leading to the door. I pressed my friends’ hands, which I felt trembling, partly shocked by that unusual atmosphere that had sprung up around, partly because of their downheartedness at sitting at the feet of what had been their home, now like strangers who came to a sacer place....

“Some day I will have the same sensation whenever I go past Domus Publica.” Despite those thick furs with which we had covered the inside of our clothes, the ground felt icy. I sharply wished I could hold my girls tight but I thought it fitful to try to remain anonymous, though our clothes and our litter made it difficult, notwithstanding our refusal to be attended by our serfs or be served any food or drink, like all those scattered human beings, which kept reminding me of ivory figures. Like that over there, sitting near the neighbouring domus, wrapped in linen cloaks which had been dyed in wood, earth and stone colours, a mantle covering his head so that nobody could make out his grey, red-golden hair or his gold-and-silver-streaked crimson beard. Only his transparent, grey penetrating eyes, sparkling through that net of thin lines around them.

“In spite of all our differences, we both loyally loved old Rome and we were determined not to let it be ravished by kings in order to make her become their own domus as they did in Etruscan times, alien to the greatness of being a Roman citizen...”

I made an effort to shake off that gaze, which, as usual, was going deeper into the most private part of me, penetrating that point where my purest, natural femaleness lay.... How could I join the thought of all who were gathering there? In fact, what did I have to do with Marcus Portius Cato, my own husband’s old irreconcilable enemy, apart from sharing his plebeian origin...I mean, only half of it since his mother, Livia Drusa, was an ancient patrician? Or was this a mere token of loyalty to my friends? Gods... there is no doubt. This is an answer to what I know is still to come. A reaction against that disloyalty, which, in its due time, will be revealed to me. Like the fact of lodging my friends, Marco Portio himself’s wife and daughter, in the Pontifex Maximus’ house. Like this inebriating toxic-like quiver?

The sun was setting. Portia’s hand, warmly pressing my forearm, made me understand that it was time to come back home.