I promised to think about the matter, but Barbus found out more about Corbulo and maintained that he had been more distinguished as a road builder in Gaul than a warrior in the forests of Germany.
Naturally I read the little book I had been given. The philosopher Seneca wrote in a fine modern style and asserted that a wise man could keep a balance of mind throughout the tests of fate. But I thought he was long-winded, for he gave no examples but just philosophized so that not many of his ideas stayed in my mind.
My friend Lucius Pollio also lent me a letter of condolence Seneca had written to the Emperor’s freedman Polybius. In it, Seneca was consoling Polybius over the death of his brother, telling him he need not grieve as long as he had the good fortune to be allowed to serve the Emperor.
What had amused readers in Rome was that Polybius had recently been executed after being found guilty of selling privileges. According to Pollio, he had quarreled with Messalina over the division of the money. Messalina had denounced him which the rest of the Emperor’s freedmen had not liked at all. So the philosopher Seneca had struck bad luck again.
I was surprised that Claudia had not tried to get in touch with me all through my illness. My self-esteem was hurt, but my good sense told me that I should have more trouble than joy from her. But I could not forget her black eyebrows, her bold eyes and her thick lips. When I was better, I began to go for long walks to strengthen my broken leg and to quell my restlessness. The warm Roman autumn had come. It was too warm to wear a toga and I did not wear my red-bordered tunic so as not to attract too much attention on the outskirts of the city.
I walked over to the other side of the river to avoid the stench of the city center, past Emperor Gaius’ amphitheater to which he had at immense expense had an obelisk brought all the way from Egypt, and then on up the Vatican hill. There was an ancient Etruscan oracle temple with wooden walls there which Emperor Claudius had had protected with a layer of tiles. The old soothsayer raised his stave to attract my attention, but did not bother to call after me. I walked down the far side of the hill, right out of the city toward the market gardens. Several prosper-ous-looking farms lay within sight. From here and from farther away, every night an endless stream of ratding bumping carts brought in the city’s vegetables which were then unloaded and sold to the dealers in the market halls before dawn, when they all had to leave the city.
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I felt no desire to inquire after Claudia from the sunburnt slaves who were working in the vegetable fields, but went on my way. I let my feet take me where they wished to go, but Claudia had said something about a spring and some old trees. So I looked around and my thoughts led me the right way as I followed a dried-up stream bed. Below some ancient trees stood a little hut, near a large farm. In the vegetable field beside it crouched Claudia, her hands and feet black with earth, wearing only a coarse shift and a wide pointed straw hat to keep off the sun. At first I scarcely recognized her. But I knew her so well, although several months had gone by since we had last met, that I recognized her by her hand movements and her way of bending down.
“Greetings, Claudia,” I called. I was filled with exultant joy as I crouched down on the ground in front of her and looked at her face under the brim of the straw hat.
Claudia started and stared at me with her eyes widening in fright and her face flushing scarlet. Suddenly she flung a bunch of muddy pea stalks in my face, stood up and ran away behind the hut. I was flabbergasted by such a reception and swore to myself as I rubbed the earth out of my eyes. I followed her hesitantly and saw that she was splashing in some water and washing her face. She shouted angrily at me and told me to wait on the other side of the hut. Not until she had combed her hair and put on clean clothes would she come back.
“A well-brought-up man gives notice when he is coming,” she snapped angrily, “but how can one expect such good manners from the son of a Syrian money-lender. What do you want?”
She had insulted me. I flushed and turned away without a word. But when I had taken a few steps, she came after me and took my arm.
“Are you really so touchy, Minutus?” she cried. “Don’t go. Forgive my hasty tongue. I was angry because you took me by surprise, ugly and dirty from work.”
She took me into her modest little hut which smelled of smoke, herbs and clean linen clothes.
“You see, I too can spin and weave, as Romans of old should be able to,” she said. “Don’t forget that in the old days even the proudest Claudian steered his oxen behind the plow.”
In this way she was trying to excuse her poverty.
“I prefer you like this, Claudia,” I replied politely, “with your face fresh from spring water, to all the painted silk-clad women of the city.”
“Of course,” Claudia admitted honestly, “I’d rather my skin were as white as milk and my face beautifully painted and my hair set in lovely curls on my forehead and my clothes revealing more than they concealed and myself smelling of the balsam of the East. But my uncle’s wife, Aunt
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