The Last Girls of Pompeii

  They re-entered the city by the Vesuvius Gate. There were tombs near this gate as well, and beyond the tombs closer to the base of Mount Vesuvius there was a refuse heap where the trash and garbage of the city was taken. It was to that refuse heap that she might have been taken had she been born a century before, or even possibly in this century to different parents. Her father sat on her left side, the side of her withered arm. With her right hand she picked up the limp left one and slipped it into her father’s. He squeezed it slightly. She could not squeeze back. She turned her head toward the mountain. It was massive and seemed to glower under a white sun. Its flanks covered in vineyards were bleached as gray as bones in this heat. The snow that crowned its top in winter was all gone and had been since early March. Take care, my dear, and remember as hot as it is now, when snow comes in summer that is the time to leave.

  The words of the Sibyl of Sarnus. Julia had not thought of them since that day. Well there was certainly no snow coming this summer. Julia wished she could squeeze her father’s hand, but instead she leaned her head against his shoulder and closed her eyes. Some things will never change. Never, she thought.

  Twelve

  “I TELL YOU, HERMINIA, THE CHILD has a morbid turn of mind.”

  “Now just what do you mean by that, Cornelius? Stubborn yes, but morbid never.”

  “Well, do you know what she asked me the other day when we went out ?”

  “What?”

  “She wanted to know if she had been born a hundred years ago would I have exercised my patria potestas, and as father abandoned her on a refuse heap.”

  “By the gods where does she get these morbid thoughts indeed?”

  “Yes, not only that but when I offered that those were brutal times, she went on to say—and to quote your daughter—”

  “Our daughter,” Herminia said sharply.

  “Our daughter,” Cornelius Petreius continued. “She said—I believe these were her exact words ‘But it was the Republic. Many say that those were Rome’s finest hours.’”

  “By Venus, it must be that tutor Remigius. I knew he was a Republican the moment I first laid eyes on him. Well, that’s finished now, thank goodness. Have you written to him yet, Cornelius?”

  Sura eyes widened in fear. It was all beginning to make perfect sense. Perfectly awful horrid sense. On the day Julia had gone out with her father, the lady in green, the damiatrix from the Temple of Damia had appeared and spent long hours in a huddled conversation with the mistress of the house. But could this really be true? Was Julia actually being given to the Temple of Damia? What else was there to do with an unmarriageable girl? The Vestals wouldn’t have her because of her deformity. However, these newer religions or cults were perhaps more lax. And the stature the Bona Dea and her temple was growing in Pompeii. It was considered an honor to be part of it. And now Sura caught her mistress saying just that word.

  “I know it’s considered an honor now, but . . . but . . .”

  “But what, Herminia?” Cornelius asked. “You must remember that there is security for her as well. She is the youngest. She will never marry. They will take care of her into her . . .” His words dwindled off.

  “Old age?” Herminia’s voice broke.

  “It’s a better way,” Cornelius replied firmly. Better than what? Sura wondered.

  “I know, I know you’re right.” She made a sound that Sura thought was either a gasp or a chuckle. “It’s just hard imagining Julia ever old. She’s so young and full of life.”

  “But look at Claudia Plautia’s life,” Cornelius Petreius said with an intensity Sura had never heard before from her master. “She has no deformity such as Julia’s. Yet she’s attracted all sorts of miserable people who try to get money from her. Remember how you hated going to her villa with those people? And now no one of any consequence will go there. She is a lonely old woman, smart about business and stupid about life.”

  “Julia would never be stupid in that way.”

  “Of course she wouldn’t. And she’s smart about many things. She, of all our children, is the most apt student. She will learn a lot about herbs, medicines. The temple is becoming a center of healing superior even to the temple of Rome. This is truly an honor, Herminia.”

  There was a terrible logic to all of this, a brutal logic Sura thought. Once Julia was at the temple, she would no longer need a slave. Thus, she herself was being sold to the fuller Stephanus.

  Sura had been standing behind a tall hedge of cypress in the enclosure where the dormice roamed. She had been sent by Obliata, the cook, to fetch a half dozen. Preparations for the wedding now just three days away had begun in earnest, and although Sura rarely helped in the kitchen, she was now called upon to do so into the long hours of the night. She stood clutching the jug in which six mice scampered around, most likely wondering what they were doing in this dark airless place that smelled of clay and not clover.

  Sura had begun to tremble, but she willed herself to be calm. She had to think of something to do. Julia would die in that temple crawling with snakes. But what could she do? She was a slave and had no more choice about her own life—let alone Julia’s—than these dormice had about what would happen to them in the next few hours as they roasted on spits. Gripping the jug tightly she looked at it, hearing the dormice’s tiny panicked squeaks, the frantic patter of their feet. How odd, she thought, Julia and I both, mistress and slave, are as trapped as these mice. She had a sudden urge to set them free, but what would that get her? A slap by Obliata, and another slave would be sent out to fetch some more. What had been a vague notion, that of freedom, burned with a new intensity. She felt herself almost glow with the possibility. Freedom, she realized, had nothing to do with getting paid. It had nothing to do with the fact that until ten days ago she had felt her life was comfortable. The truth was that it was not her life at all.

  “Well, my dear,” the master was now saying to his wife, “despite your criticism of Livia you must say that in this one respect she was quite helpful.”

  “Yes, and one can hardly consider it a cult in the least, not if Appuleia Messalina contributes. And it is true, Livia’s mother was cured by that damiatrix and not Gaius the Greek, who has even treated the emperor. “

  “And don’t forget Quintilius Pomponius was treated by her as well. I think the day of the Greek physician or the Jewish one might be ending.” Cornelius chuckled. “Our daughter will be a healer, and really Herminia, as I have said, she is the brightest of them all. So we should thank Livia for her help with this. It was a substantial contribution that she arranged for Marcus to give to the temple in appreciation for healing her mother. Usually she is trying to wheedle money from Marcus for jewelry. And this donation certainly made the damiatrix more inclined toward us and Julia.”

  “Yes. Well I’m gratified that Livia was the one who made the initial approaches. The damiatrix is a bit odd. I don’t think I would have been comfortable with her in the beginning.” Herminia paused. “My only real objection to Livia, aside from her minor vulgarities, is that she tends to be promiscuous in terms of the gods and goddesses. So many of the temples she is connected to are these new cults from the east, not true religion. All that Isis nonsense from Egypt. Oriental mysticism is not part of the Roman pantheon! But the Temple of Damia, I admit seems different.”

  Livia! Sura thought. I must contact Marcus. She was not sure what Livia’s son Marcus could do, but he was very smart and he loved Julia dearly. He would be shocked to hear this. And he must be told.

  Thirteen

  “WHAT’S IT WORTH TO YOU? ” the squat burly night porter asked Sura as she stood in front of the gate that led into the villa of her master’s younger brother on the Via degli Augustali. She knew it would come to this. The night porter was a swinish fellow who was always pinching slave girls’ bottoms. A pinch she could stand, but she had a feeling he expected more.

  “Well, I’m not certain.” She cast her eyes down. He hooked a finger under her chin and pried it
up so that she would look him straight in the eye. His eyes were squinty, slightly tilted. Yes exactly like those of a pig.

  “Well, you should be certain, I think.”

  “A kiss?”

  “Just a kiss?”

  “More later, if you can get me in to see the young master.”

  He looked at her slyly. It was said that pigs were intelligent. But this man’s eyes swam with stupidity. A kiss would do. Let him catch her for more. She tilted her chin up higher and looked him brazenly in the eyes now.

  “Yes or no. I can’t stand here all night!” she demanded.

  “Yes!” He suddenly seized her and smashed his face against hers. He was gristly and smelly and Sura gasped when he stuck his tongue in her mouth. She pulled away abruptly. “Now let me in.”

  He opened the gate and Sura entered and threaded her way through a narrow tunnel-like entry into the atrium. Unlike her master’s house the bedrooms were not on a second level but grouped around the atrium. Walking by one room from which snores issued, she guessed that it must be the master’s bedroom. The mistress’s was most likely next to this room with a connecting door. At the very end was a third door. It must be Marcus’s. She tried the door. It was not locked, and praying it would not squeak, she opened it as narrowly as possible and slipped through the slender space. An oil lamp with a low wick cast a flickering light across the room. The figure of Marcus appeared lumpy under the covers. His face was turned away from the door. Sura had taken off her sandals as soon as she had entered the house and now tiptoed to the other side of the bed.

  She stood looking at him for a moment. In the pulsing lamplight his eyelashes cast spiky shadows on his cheeks. How should I wake him? she wondered. If she startled him too much he might shout out. She bent low and began to whisper into his ear. “Marcus. Marcus.” She repeated his name five perhaps six times. His eyes opened, not suddenly, but then he inhaled sharply as he saw her.

  “Sura!”

  “Shhh!” she held a finger to her lips.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “It’s terrible.” Her hear was racing so hard it felt thunderous in her chest. “It’s about Julia.” She wanted to add that it was about herself, too, but that was not why she was there.

  “What? Julia? Is something wrong?”

  “Everything!”

  He sat up in bed. “What is it? Is she sick?”

  “No.” she looked at him steadily. “She is going to be given to the Temple of the Bona Dea.”

  “Damia?” Sura nodded slowly keeping her eyes steady. “How do you know this?”

  She began to explain. When she had finished, he was still for what seemed a long time and then looked at her gravely. “And you are sure of this Sura?” Nodding she began to tell the part of the story that involved her.

  “I am to be sold to Stephanus. To be his concubine. You see, Julia will no longer need me. It is all very neat, isn’t it?”

  A cold look crept into Marcus’s usually warm eyes. She knew that he was convinced.

  “By Jupiter!” His voice was hot with anger. “My mother has gone too far with her damnable cults, and this one especially, ever since my grandmother was supposedly cured by that damiatrix.” But there was something else that he was not saying, and yet he was certain—his mother wanted to get him away from Julia. She had guessed that their cousinly affection was turning into something more. What better way to put an end to that than to get Julia away? But he would not say this to Sura.

  “Mistress Herminia says it is not a cult but a religion.”

  “It’s a cult believe me! And only the gods know what they do at that strange place with their roaming snakes and potions.” He looked directly at Sura. “You say that nothing will happen until after the wedding of Cornelia?”

  “Oh, I am sure of that. They need me too much and Julia’s to be the pronuba.”

  A cunning look flashed in his eyes. “I have an idea.”

  “What?”

  “Do you know my mother is seeing Gavianus the gladiator?”

  “I do, sir. I saw her coming back the other night from the barracks when I went to visit my brother. But what does that have to do with any of this?”

  “Simple. I shall tell her two things. First, that I will tell my father about about her trysts with the gladiator if she does not prevent Julia from being given to the Temple of Damia. If my father finds out he will immediately cut her allowance. And second, if she does not stop Julia’s entry into the temple she can be sure that when my father dies, if she survives him, I shall cut whatever is left of her allowance in half. No—more than half. I’ll cut it by two-thirds. She loves her jewelry more than any temple, believe me. This is not going to happen.”

  “That’s blackmail isn’t it?”

  “It most certainly is. But the worst thing that can happen to my mother is that my father will cut her allowance. She will not be able to spend her usual fifty-thousand sesterces per year on those stupid jewels. Now you tell me, what is worse, that my mother foregoes her necklaces and bangles or that Julia is sent to the Temple of Damia?” He paused and looked at Sura. “ And that you are sold to that whoremonger Stephanus?”

  Sura was almost speechless. She had not expected this at all. He was concerned about her. He was making her almost an equal to Julia. “Thank you, Marcus.” She pressed her lips together. She did not want to cry.

  “Now don’t tell Julia anything at all. The day after tomorrow is the Vulcanalia and the day after that the wedding. Hopefully I can sort this out by the time of the wedding, or at least shortly thereafter,” Marcus said.

  “Yes. I cannot thank you enough.”

  “This is what’s right. One should not have to thank anyone for what is rightfully theirs.”

  Does he mean one’s freedom? Sura wondered. Whose freedom? Julia’s? Mine? Both?

  “One other thing . . .” Sura said.

  “Yes what is that?”

  “I do not wish to leave by the front entrance. The porter ...”

  “Oh that lecherous old man!”

  “Yes.”

  “I can show you a back way out through the baths. The door is locked from the inside.” He swung his legs out of the bed. “Follow me.”

  Sura walked out into the night air. It was odd how quickly things could change. She felt real hope now for the first time in days. Marcus truly was an incredible boy, no he was a young man. He would turn fifteen on the day of the wedding. She wished Julia could marry him. According to Roman law cousins could marry, but he was already betrothed. To break an engagement, although not against any law, violated all kinds of social traditions and brought shame to the family of the party who was responsible.

  The stars had broken out and the peak of Vesuvius shimmered strangely in the moonlight. Sura did not feel tired at all. She decided to go to her brother at the barracks. He would still be awake. The gladiators stayed up late and tended to nap during the heat of the day when it was too hot to train.

  She had just rounded the corner and was at exactly the same spot as on the night when she had seen Marcus’s mother. Only this time it was not Livia Octavia that she spied. It was a wall inscription written with a broad brush in red paint, an edicta munerum, the program announcing to the public the contest in the amphitheater for the Vulcanalia. “Twenty pairs of gladiators will fight at Pompeii. No public moneys shall be used.” Her eyes ran down the list. Two-thirds of the way down she lifted her hand to her mouth in horror. Gavianus, the retiarius would fight Bryzos the murmillo. The retiarii fought with nets and tridents, a style said to be inspired by fishermen. Gavianus was a superb net fighter. Not only had he never been defeated, he had hardly been bruised. He was wily, brutal, and extremely precise with his net.

  “It simply can’t be! No!” Sura murmured to herself, “No! Not Gavianus!” She turned and headed back to the villa of her master. She could not bear to face her brother. Yes, how quickly things can change, she thought again as all her hopes seemed to melt away. Even t
he stars appeared to grow dimmer, and against the blackness of the night a weird baleful light emanated from Vesuvius.

  Despite the heat, Sura felt a shiver run up her spine. She wrapped her palla tighter and hurried home. All the way she noticed that piles of kindling for the Vulcanalia bonfires had been stacked, even though the festival was still two days away. The nights at this time of year had become longer, swallowing up the light of the dawn. So although it was early morning when Sura finally returned to the Villa Petronius, it was still pitch black.

  Fourteen

  THE NEXT NIGHT JULIA DREAMED of a deep cave where the fire god Vulcan lived, belching his flames across the earth. The flames scoured every living thing—animals, people, plants, trees. People and creatures ran in desperation while the god’s thousands of fiery tongues licked the earth. Nothing escaped except the fish. The fish, the fish. If I could only turn myself into a fish I could swim down the Sarnus River into the sea.

  Sura was lost in her own frightening dream. On the pallet she clenched her fists tight. She was standing weaponless. Bryzos was beside her, and advancing on them both was Gavianus. She bent down pick up a handful of the sand from the arena. He laughed at her.

  “You think that will stop me girl—a bit of sand thrown in my face?” There was a roar of laughter. The laughter grew. It was like thunder rolling across the ampitheater. And still Gavianus advanced. The net he carried was huge, just like the one that had captured Sura and Bryzos those long years ago in Thrace.

  That terrible day came back to her now in this dream. I have no weapon, she screamed silently in her dream. No weapon! But the words remained stuck in her throat. And then suddenly she saw that Bryzos had no weapon either, no shield, no sword. The net began to descend on them. The trident glared. We are going to die!