ABOUT three years after her farewell to Almo, on entering Vocco’s house
one afternoon, Brinnaria had a presentiment of something wrong. The
children were as vociferous and as whimsical as usual, but there was
a nameless difference in Flexinna’s expression and bearing. As soon as
they were alone in their bath, after she had had one good plunge in the
pool, Brinnaria, treading water in the deepest part of the tank, shaking
her head like a wet spaniel, demanded:
“What is the matter? There’s something wrong. You might as well tell
me.”
But Flexinna put her off and laughed at her insistence.
To Brinnaria the laughter seemed forced and so did the talk at dinner.
No sooner was the dinner over and the tray of figs, almonds and
pomegranates and other fruit on the table, than she whispered to
Flexinna:
“Tell the servants to stay out. I want to talk.” Flexinna signed to
Vocco and they exchanged glances.
“Why did you keep up the farce so long?” Brinnaria sneered. “I saw
through it from the first.”
“We were afraid,” Vocco apologized, “that what I have to tell you would
spoil your appetite.”
“It would take something pretty bad to spoil my appetite,” Brinnaria
reflected. “Is Almo dead?”
“Not so b-b-bad as that,” spoke Flexinna.
“Tell me, Quintus,” Brinnaria breathed.
Vocco fidgeted.
“It’s an amazing story,” he began.
“All his story, all my story, all our story,” Brinnaria cut in, “is
amazing. Leave out the comments and tell the story.”
“While Almo was away on the expedition against the nomads of the
plateau,” Vocco narrated, “Pennasius fell ill, was allowed to resign his
governorship and Grittonius took his place. On Almo’s return Grittonius
complimented him most highly and promised him any reward he asked for.
Almo amazed him by asking for a full and honorable discharge from the
army. Grittonius expostulated with him but Almo held him to his promise.
In spite of the governor’s appeals to his pride and to his patriotism he
insisted, and Grittonius gave him his full official discharge. At
once Almo applied for permission to sell himself as a slave. This so
astounded Grittonius that he made him repeat the application before
witnesses and give his reasons. Almo explained that he had always been
devoted to horseracing and that he wanted formally and regularly to
article himself to one of the racing companies as a charioteer; that he
had always craved that life and had longed for it more and more as his
career as a soldier went on. He said there was no use in his continuing
a life he detested, nor missing the happiness he anticipated as a
charioteer.
“Grittonius had him examined by a committee of the most reputed
physicians of the province. They reported Almo entirely sane. Grittonius
wanted to hold the matter over until he had special permission from the
Emperor. Almo craftily maintained that Grittonius had been made governor
with the fullest powers on all lines specifically to save the Emperor
from being bothered about such trifles. Grittonius yielded. The
necessary papers were drawn up, all the depositions were made out in
duplicate. Every formality was fulfilled and Almo was publicly sold as a
slave in the market place of Hippo.”
“What company did he enter?” Brinnaria queried.
“Veppius did not state,” Vocco replied; “he merely said that Almo sailed
the next day for Spain.”
“The fool!” Brinnaria cried. “The three fools; a fool of a Veppius to
write so vaguely, a fool of a governor to be persuaded so easily and
Almo the biggest fool of all!
“What a fool of a lover I have! Are all men like that? I’m as much in
love with him as he with me and I can behave myself decently and keep
outwardly calm and observe the conventions of life. Why can’t he be
decent? How can it comfort a man in love to throw away a splendid
career, abandon a great income and vanish from the ken of all who love
him? What madness is this with which the gods afflict him? Oh, I could
tear my hair with rage!”
To trace Almo everything was done that could be done. Vocco himself
set out at once for Hippo. He found that Almo had been sold to a Greek
slave-dealer named Olynthides, brother of the well-known dealer at Rome.
He found Olynthides a small man with a club-foot. He said he remembered
the matter, that he had been employed to buy Almo and resell him for
cash, especially to conceal the real purchaser.
When Vocco expressed astonishment Olynthides said:
“There is nothing to be surprised at, the thing happens every day. It is
a regular feature of slave-trading. There are all sorts of reasons why
a man wants a slave without any past. Such sales are customary and
habitual.”
When pressed further he retorted:
“Of course I did not ask the buyer’s name; equally of course, I did not
take any note of him, it was my business to forget him. I didn’t notice
him when he came into the courtyard, there are always knots of people
coming in all day, looking over the slaves I offer for sale, and going
out again. He came in like anybody else and looked over my stock. When
he spoke to me he had a servant with him carrying a stout leather bag.
He indicated Almo and asked his price. I named it.
“‘Cash sale,’ says he; ‘no papers except a bare sale certificate.’
“‘Done,’ says I.
“He counted out the cash from his servant’s bag and I gave him the
customary certificate, with a description of Almo and the statement:
“‘Sold on this day and date for cash’ and my signature and seal. That
was all there was to it.”
When Vocco was persistent, Olynthides averred that he had “heard” that
the purchaser’s name was Jegius and that he came from Cadiz. Vocco could
not discover anyone in Hippo who had ever heard of a slave-dealer named
Jegius.
When Vocco returned to Rome with his report Brinnaria set in motion all
the forces of her world which could be utilized under the circumstances.
Aurelius was on the Rhine frontier, but Brinnaria had, by this time, a
close acquaintance with all important court officers and was on terms
of the utmost cordiality with the officials who governed Rome in the
Emperor’s absence. They sympathized with her and put at her disposal
all the machinery of the government secret service. They agreed with
her that the matter must be kept quiet, there must be no proclamations,
posters, no rewards offered by crier or placard, no publishing of
descriptions. With emphatic injunctions of secrecy they sent warnings to
every provincial governor, to every local magistrate, to the aldermen
of every free city, to institute unobtrusive investigations and to keep
unostentatious watch. Brinnaria insisted that these mandates should be
sent all over the Empire, pointing out that no one could conjecture what
port of the Mediterranean or of the Black Sea might be the destination
of any nameless trading ship. But, with special care, full orders were
distributed throughout Spain.
Towards Spain, likewise, Brinnaria directed the energies of those
organizations of the ancient world which were analogous to our modern
private detective bureaus, and upon Spain she focussed the energies of
the managers of the racing companies.
These great corporations were among the most important money-making
enterprises of the Roman world. They maintained luxurious headquarters
in the most congested business districts of the capital. They had
offices adjacent to each of the circuses, they possessed huge congeries
of buildings utilized as stables for their crack racers and barracks for
their charioteers, and provided with spacious courtyards for
training their teams. Outside of Rome they had similar offices and
training-stables in every city and in most towns of any size or wealth.
Besides they owned countless stud-farms, estates and ranches in every
province of the Empire and maintained an army of herdsmen, ostlers and
drovers to convoy their horses by land and whole fleets of ships to
transport them by sea.
They were joint-stock companies, and while many smaller ones existed in
various parts of the Empire and a few even at Rome, the small concerns
were insignificant and generally ignored. When one spoke of the
racing-companies one meant the six great companies whose central
organizations were domiciled at Rome and whose ramifications penetrated
every district of the Empire. These were known, after the racing-colors
of their jockeys, as the Greens, the Blues, the Reds, the Whites,
the Crimsons and the Golds. The Reds and the Whites were the oldest
companies, the Crimsons and the Golds were companies established in
the heyday of the Empire by coteries of millionaires, the Blues and the
Greens were the largest, the wealthiest and the most popular, especially
the Greens. In the Greens, somewhere, Brinnaria expected to find Almo,
as he had been enthusiastic about the Greens from boyhood. He had been
wearing their leek-green colors the day she had sat in his lap in her
father’s courtyard. He had haunted their training-stables during
his brief sojourn at Rome before Aurelius sent him to Africa, he had
inherited a big block of stock in the Greens. In the Greens, likewise,
Brinnaria owned stock; and, having entered into inheritances from
more than seventy different wealthy relatives who had died during the
pestilence, she happened to own stock in every one of the six great
companies. She had personal friends among the directors of each of the
six. Therefore it was especially easy for her to enlist their help in
her efforts to find Almo. It would have been easy, anyhow, since to be
able to oblige a Vestal was a refreshing novelty for almost anyone
at Rome and to find a Vestal seeking one’s influence and one’s help,
equally novel and refreshing; generally the shoe was on the other
foot--most persons in public life in Rome were used to attempting to
enlist the help and the interests of the Vestals for their purposes
and were generally utterly at a loss for any means of requital, if the
interest of a Vestal was enlisted and her help obtained.
Consequently all that the racing-companies could do to find Almo was
done as well as all that could be done by the private detective agencies
and by government officials.
All that was done was utterly in vain. No trace of Almo could be
discovered after he had sailed from Hippo with Jegius. No slave-dealer
named Jegius could be found nor anyone who knew such a slave-dealer.
No clue, no ghost of a clue came to light. The Greens, like the other
companies, could find among their charioteers, their jockeys, their
free employees, their slaves, no individual in the least answering
to descriptions of Almo. All governmental efforts, all professional
efforts, all private efforts, all Vocco’s efforts, all Brinnaria’s
efforts, were completely baffled.
Almo had completely vanished.
When Aurelius, passing through Rome on his way from the Rhine frontier
to Syria, was in his capital for a brief period, Brinnaria had an
audience with him.
“Daughter!” he said, “it is all my fault. I should have given Grittonius
explicit injunctions about the boy. But the assaults of the Marcomanni
were particularly furious just at that time; I was feverishly hurrying
from point to point along the frontier; I accepted the resignation of
Pennasius; by letter. I appointed Grittonius by letter; I assumed that
Grittonius would have sense; I assumed that Pennasius would impart to
him his secret instructions. I erred by inadvertence; I should have set
a special watch on the boy. But I never thought of it. He was doing so
well and he seemed so interested in his work. He was wonderfully
fitted for frontier duty along the desert. I was watching him with keen
interest; each report of him gave me greater pleasure. I do not hesitate
to tell you that I had him in my mind’s eye to command this very
expedition which I must now command myself, as there is no other man in
the Empire fit to take charge of it.
“Is it not a shame that a man whom the Empire needs, who had before him
so splendid an opportunity, who was fitting himself for so brilliant
a career, should throw it all away from mere perversity? Yet I am not
wrathful against him; I see many reasons for sympathizing with him.
“Rigid and unflinching celibacy affects different individuals very
differently. Some it does not affect at all, apparently. It does not
seem to affect you. You are as plump and rosy, as healthy and alert,
as happy and normal a young woman, to all appearance, as could be found
among matrons of your age in all the Empire. Celibacy seems to agree
with you.
“Manifestly it did not agree with Almo. It got on his nerves somehow.
That is the most probable explanation of his eccentric vagary. Don’t be
discouraged. He’ll turn up somewhere, after a while, safe and sound and
none the worse for his experiences.”
Brinnaria, in fact, was not discouraged. She resolutely and unweariedly
prosecuted her efforts to find Almo. Nor was she despondent. She scouted
the suggestion that he might be dead. She kept up her spirits, did not
mope or brood and never lost her hearty appetite. She was the life of
the dinners she attended and as talkative and witty as ever.
But the strain affected her greatly. She was outwardly controlled,
statuesque and dignified, but the inward turmoil of emotion that surged
through her manifested itself in an unremitting activity. She slept well
and soundly, but rose early and kept on the go. Besides her duties, her
music and her participation in social gatherings, she must needs find
other outlets for her energy, other means to pass her time and distract
her thoughts.
In the course of her dealings with the racing companies she became
interested in them not merely as means towards locating Almo, but for
themselves. She became particularly interested in their stables, their
jockeys and their horses. There was no bar of religious tradition or
of social custom which hindered a Vestal from freely mingling with men
visibly in the open daylight in public. Visiting the stables of the
racing companies had long been a fad with Rome’s social leaders, men and
women alike. Brinnaria availed herself of her freedom in this regard and
followed her inclination. She haunted the training-stables of all six
corporations, but mostly of the Greens, always in company with Manlia,
or Flexinna, or Nemestronia or some other of her women friends; she
visited the barracks almost daily, chatted with the charioteers, grooms
and ostlers, watched the exercising of the teams, inspected the stalls,
conned the racers.
She made herself an excellent judge of a jockey and a better judge of a
horse.
She interested herself in the methods by which the companies obtained
and selected their animals. She became an adept on the entire subject of
horse-raising. It engrossed her thoughts.
Then she herself took over the management of several of her estates in
the environs of Rome; of all, in fact, which were near enough for her
to visit personally. She redistributed the force of slaves that
managed them, sold some, bought others and fitted up the properties
as stud-farms. Herself she selected the brood mares and stallions with
which to stock these estates. She herself laid down the principles
guiding their management and she herself dictated the methods of
breeding them. She herself superintended the carrying out of her orders,
visiting each estate frequently and inspecting everything carefully and
intelligently.
Her first offering of two-year-olds sold at good prices. She was
encouraged, felt herself completely an adept, and would take no one’s
word about anything relating to horses, relying solely on her own
judgment.
All this would have subjected her to much reprehension had Faltonius
Bambilio survived. But he had died just about the time of Almo’s
disappearance. His son, also named Faltonius Bambilio, had taken up a
political rather than a priestly life and was not to be thought of as
his successor. In his place Aurelius, on his way to Syria, had nominated
Lutorius Rusco, a man who impressed everyone at first sight, and more
and more the better anyone knew him, as the paragon of a Pontifex. He
was not lacking in ecclesiastical unction, but did not wallow in it as
had Bambilio. He was pious, but did not think it necessary to advertise
it day and night unremittingly. He was not lax in religious matters, but
he was no stickler for minute trifles. He inspired confidence by every
characteristic of his appearance and behavior. He was a man somewhat
over medium height, well built, neither heavy nor large, with an
unusually dignified bearing and carriage, not a hint of self-assertion
and with a genially comprehending smile. It was impossible not to
confide in him and unthinkable that confiding in him should ever be
regretted. Brinnaria confided in him and never regretted it.
Of Almo’s disappearance she talked to him freely; freely also she talked
of her feelings for Almo. He was as sympathetic and comprehending as
the Emperor and Empress and he encouraged her to hope that Almo was yet
alive, which she sometimes doubted.
Of her stock farms he said to her:
“I should certainly not have advised any woman to enter upon such an
enterprise, least of all a Vestal. I know of no other member of our
hierarchy who has any similar interests, except Calvaster, whose
haunting of the gladiatorial schools and association with trainers
of gladiators has given some scandal. Some people would call your
horse-breeding unseemly for a Vestal. But I see no harm in it. I have
talked with Causidiena and it is clear that you do not neglect or skimp
your duties, that you give them full time and close attention. Your
leisure is your own to do with as you please. And your immediate success
appears an evidence that, to say the least, your undertakings give no
offence to the gods.”
During the latter months of Bambilio’s oversight Brinnaria had felt
restive and as if some inward force was forever driving her to feverish
activities; under the care of Lutorius she became placid and thought
less of her stock-raising, journeys to and fro to her estates, talks
with grooms and such like activitie and devoted herself with more cool
ardor to her duties.