Read Online Render Unto Caesar by Gillian Bradshaw - Free Book Online Page B

“That would be stupid.” He hurried after Hyakinthos and patted the boy on the shoulder.
    Hyakinthos shrugged the pat off, and the party walked on in uncomfortable silence.
    When they arrived back at the house on the Via Tusculana, the others went on into the house, but Hermogenes paused in the entranceway looking at the doorkeeper. Now that he knew to look, he could see that the face under the scars had once been handsome, and the reddened eyes were still large and dark.
    â€œSir?” asked the doorkeeper uneasily.
    â€œNothing much,” said Hermogenes. “Your son was our guide to Rome today. He did his task well.”
    The doorkeeper blinked, pleased. “He’s a good boy.”
    â€œDoes he have another name than Hyakinthos? And must I call you Dog?”
    â€œThose are the names our master gave us,” Kyon replied severely. “It wouldn’t be right for us to use different ones, particularly after all his kindness to us.”
    â€œYour loyalty does you credit. Good health, then.”
    â€œGood health, sir.”
    He was aware of the doorkeeper staring after him as he continued into the house.
    It was the end of the eighth hour, the middle of the afternoon, and Crispus’s dinner party was to start at the ninth. Hermogenes went to his room to wash his face and comb his hair. Menestor was there, unpacking the baskets. Hyakinthos was with him, probably because he wanted to put off the hour he saw his master. The letters had gone from the table.
    Hermogenes held out the two wine cakes in their leaf wrappings. “Hyakinthos, will you take these to your mother and your sister? Or would the temptation to eat them yourself be too great?”
    The boy smiled weakly. “I’ll take them, sir. And … thank you for buying the one for my mother. It’s true, nobody ever buys her cakes, and she’ll be very pleased.”
    He set off on the errand. Hermogenes picked up the jar of wine he’d bought for his host, then set it down again, troubled by the boy’s unhappiness. He wondered if his own slaves ever found their servitude that bitter.
    Menestor was smiling as he arranged things on the desk, relaxed and contented after an enjoyable day. Or was that an illusion? Did the young man ever lie awake, longing for a freedom he had never known?
    Hermogenes thought of Menestor’s parents and the rest of the household in Alexandria, then found himself blinking at an unexpected wave of homesickness. He imagined his daughter receiving the letter he had written that morning, running an ink-stained finger along the words that he had penned for her, smiling, sitting down to produce some badly spelled reply. He wished he could pick her up and hold her, feeling her thin strong arms around his neck and smelling the sweet scent of her hair.
    His wife’s hair had always smelled sweet, too.
    He sighed: Myrrhine and Alexandria were over a thousand miles away, and his wife further, much further still. He had business in Rome. He picked up the jar of wine again and went off to find the dinner party.
    It was a big dinner. Crispus had invited seven of his friends to meet his Alexandrian guest, and had provided a meal of three courses, each consisting of six separate dishes. There were eggs in fennel, olives stuffed with cheese, shellfish in dill sauce, sausages, Parthian-style chicken, ham boiled with figs, pepper-stuffed dates, and so on and on over several hours. The quantities of wine consumed were even greater than the quantities of food. Hyakinthos and his girl partner were kept hard at work filling the cups. Kept busy in other ways, too: by the end of the night Crispus was openly fondling the boy, though he rebuked a guest who let his own hand wander in that direction. The girl was pawed freely without comment from the master of the house. She tolerated it with a glittering false smile, but Hyakinthos had a rictus grin under glazed eyes.
    All the other guests were