The Grass Crown (26 page)

After bathing her mistress, Livia Drusa’s maid reported the extent of the damage in the slave quarters, face terrified.

“Covered in huge red welts!” she said to the steward, Cratippus. “Bleeding! And the bed covered in blood! Poor thing, poor thing!”

Cratippus wept desolately, powerless to help himself—but did not weep alone, for there were many among the household servants who had known Livia Drusa since early childhood, had always pitied her, cared about her. And when these old retainers set eyes upon her that morning they wept again; she moved at the pace of a snail, and looked as if she wanted to die. But Caepio had been cunning, even in the midst of his engorged fury. Not a mark showed on arms, face, neck, feet.

For two months the situation continued unchanged, save that Caepio’s beatings—administered at intervals of about five days—altered in pattern; he would concentrate upon one specific area of his wife’s body, thus permitting other areas time to heal. The sexual stimulus he found irresistible, the sense of power fantastic; at last he understood the wisdom of the old ways, the reasons behind the paterfamilias. The true purpose of women.

Livia Drusa said nothing to anyone, even the maidservant who bathed her—and now dressed her wounds as well. The change in her was patent, and worried Drusus and his wife a great deal; all they could put it down to was her return to Rome, though Drusus, remembering how she had resisted marriage to Caepio, also found himself wondering whether it was the presence of Caepio at base of her dragging footsteps, her haggard face, her utter quietness.

Inside herself, Livia Drusa felt hardly anything beyond the physical agony of the beatings and their aftermath. Perhaps, she would find herself wondering dully, this was a punishment; or perhaps in so much actual pain the loss of her beloved Cato was made bearable; or perhaps the gods were really being kind to her, for she had lost the three-month child Caepio would certainly have known he hadn’t fathered. In the shock of Caepio’s sudden return that complication hadn’t risen to the surface of her mind before it ceased to be a complication. Yes, that must be it. The gods were being kind. Sooner or later she would die, when her husband forgot to stop. And death was infinitely preferable to life with Quintus Servilius Caepio.

The entire atmosphere within the house had changed, a fact Drusus for one fretted about; what should have occupied his thoughts was his wife’s pregnancy, a most unexpected and joyous gift they had long despaired of receiving. Yet Servilia Caepionis fretted too, as blighted by this inexplicable pall of darkness as was Drusus. What was the matter? Could one unhappy wife truly generate so much general gloom? His servants were so silent and serious, for one thing. Normally their noisy progress about his house was a perpetual minor irritation, and he had been used since childhood to being wakened occasionally by a huge burst of hilarity from the quarters below the atrium. No more. They all crept round with long faces, answered in monosyllables, dusted and polished and scrubbed as if to tire themselves out because they couldn’t sleep. Nor was that veritable tower of strong composure, Cratippus, acting like himself.

As dawn broke at the end of the old year, Drusus caught his steward before Cratippus could instruct the door warden to admit the master’s clients from the street.

“Just a moment,” said Drusus, pointing toward his study. “I want to see you.”

But after he closed the room to all other comers, he found himself unable to broach the subject, and walked up and down, up and down, while Cratippus stood in one place and looked steadfastly at the floor. Finally Drusus stopped, faced his steward.

“Cratippus, what is the matter?” he asked, his hand extended. “Have I offended you in some way? Why are the servants so unhappy? Is there some terribly important thing I have overlooked in my treatment of you? If there is, please tell me. I wouldn’t have any slave of mine rendered miserable through my fault, or the fault of anyone else among my family. But especially I wouldn’t want you made miserable. Without you, the house would fall down!”

To his horror, Cratippus burst into tears; Drusus stood for a moment without the slightest idea what to do, then instinct took over and he found himself seated with his steward on the couch, his arm about the heaving shoulders, his handkerchief put into service. But the kinder Drusus became, the harder Cratippus wept. Close to tears himself, Drusus got up to fetch wine, persuaded Cratippus to drink, soothed and hushed and rocked until finally his steward’s distress began to die down.

“Oh, Marcus Livius, it has been such a burden!”

“What has, Cratippus?”

“The beatings!”

“The beatings?”

“The way she screams, so quietly!” Cratippus wept anew.

“My sister, you mean?” asked Drusus sharply.

“Yes.”

Drusus could feel his heart accelerating, his face grow dark with blood, his hands begin to tremble. “Tell me! In the name of our household gods, I command you to tell me!”

“Quintus Servilius. He will end in killing her.”

The trembling had become visible shaking, it was necessary to draw a huge breath. “My sister’s husband is beating her?”

“Yes, domine, yes!” The steward struggled to compose himself. “I know it is not my place to comment, and I swear I would not have! But you asked me with such kindness, such concern—I—I—”

“Calm yourself, Cratippus, I am not angry with you,” said Drusus evenly. “I assure you, I am intensely grateful to be informed of this.” He got to his feet, and helped Cratippus up gently. “Go to the door warden now, and have him make my excuses to my clients. They will not be admitted today, I have other things to do. Then I want you to ask my wife to go to the nursery and remain there with the children because I have need to send every servant down to the cellar to do some special work for me. You will make sure that every servant goes to quarters, and you will then do so yourself. But before you leave, make your last task a request to Quintus Servilius and my sister to come here to my study.”

In the moments Drusus had to himself, he disciplined his body to stillness and his anger to detachment, for he told himself that perhaps Cratippus was overreacting, that things might not be as bad as the servants obviously thought.

One unblinkered look at Livia Drusa told him no one had exaggerated, that it was all true. She came through the door first, and he saw the pain, the depression, the fear, an unhappiness so deep it had no end. He saw the deadness in her. Caepio entered in her wake, more intrigued than worried.

Standing himself, Drusus asked no one to sit down. Instead, he stared at his brother-in-law with loathing, and said, “It has come to my attention, Quintus Servilius, that you are physically assaulting my sister.”

It was Livia Drusa who gasped. Caepio braced himself and assumed an expression of truculent contempt.

“What I do to my wife, Marcus Livius, is no one’s business except my own,” he said.

“I disagree,” said Drusus as calmly as he could. “Your wife is my sister, a member of a great and powerful family. No one in this house beat her before she was married. I will not permit you or anyone else to beat her now.”

“She is my wife. Which means she is in my hand, not yours, Marcus Livius! I will do with her whatever I will.”

“Your connections to Livia Drusa are by marriage,” said Drusus, face hardening. “My connections are blood. And blood matters. I will not permit you to beat my sister!”

“You said you didn’t want to know about my methods of disciplining her! And you were right. It’s none of your business.”

“Wife-beating is everybody’s business. The lowest of the low.” Drusus looked at his sister. “Please remove your clothes, Livia Drusa. I want to see what this wife-beater has done.”

“You will not, wife!” cried Caepio in righteous indignation. “Display yourself to one not your husband? You will not!”

“Take off your clothes, Livia Drusa,” said Drusus.

Livia Drusa made no move to obey, did not speak.

“My dear, you must do this thing,” said Drusus gently, and went to her side. “I have to see.”

When he put his arm about her she cried out, pulling away; keeping his touch as light as possible, Drusus unfastened her robe at its shoulders.

No greater contempt did a man of senatorial class have than for a wife-beater. Yet, knowing this, Caepio found himself without the courage to stop Drusus unveiling his work. Then the gown was hanging below Livia Drusa’s breasts, and there, marring their beauty, were scores of old welts, lividly purple, sulphurously yellow. Drusus untied the girdle. Both gown and undergarment fell about his sister’s feet. Her thighs had taken the most recent assault and were still swollen, the flesh scarlet, crimson, broken. Tenderly Drusus pulled dress and undergarment up, lifted her nerveless hands, placed their fingers around her clothes. He turned to Caepio.

“Get out of my house,” he said, face rigidly controlled.

“My wife is my property,” said Caepio. “I am entitled at law to treat her in any way I deem necessary. I can even kill her.”

“Your wife is my sister, and I will not see a Livius Drusus abused as I would not abuse the most stupid and intractable of my farm animals,” said Drusus. “Get out of my house!”

“If I go, she goes with me,” said Caepio.

“She remains with me. Now leave, wife-beater!”

Then a shrill little voice screamed from behind them in venomous outrage: “She deserves it! She deserves it!” The child Servilia went straight to her father’s side and looked up at him. “Don’t beat her, Father! Kill her!”

“Go back to the nursery, Servilia,” said Drusus wearily.

But she clutched at Caepio’s hand and stood defying Drusus with feet apart, eyes flashing. “She deserves to be killed!” the child shrieked. “I know why she liked living in Tusculum! I know what she did in Tusculum! I know why the boy is red!”

Caepio let go her hand as if it burned, enlightenment dawning. “What do you mean, Servilia?” He shook her mercilessly. “Go on, girl, say what you mean!”

“She had a lover—and I know what a lover is!” cried his daughter, lips peeled back from her teeth. “My mother had a lover! A red man. They met every single morning in a house on his estate. I know—I followed her! I saw what they did together on the bed! And I know his name! Marcus Porcius Cato Salonianus! The descendant of a slave! I know, because I asked Aunt Servilia Caepionis!” She turned to gaze up at her father, face transformed from hatred to adoration. “Tata, if you won’t kill her, leave her here! She’s not good enough for you! She doesn’t deserve you! Who is she, after all? Only a plebeian—not patrician like you and me! If you leave her here, I’ll look after you, I promise!”

Drusus and Caepio stood turned to stone, whereas Livia Drusa came at last to life. She fastened her gown and her girdle, and confronted her daughter.

“Little one, it isn’t as you think,” she said, very gently, and reached out to touch her daughter’s cheek.

The hand was struck away fiercely; Servilia flattened herself against her father. “I know what to think! I don’t need you to tell me! You dishonored our name—my father’s name! You deserve to die! And that boy isn’t my father’s!”

“Little Quintus is your father’s,” said Livia Drusa. “He is your brother.”

“He belongs to the red man, he’s the son of a slave!” She plucked at Caepio’s tunic. “Tata, take me away, please!”

For answer, Caepio took hold of the child and pushed her away from him so roughly that she fell. “What a fool I’ve been,” he said, low-voiced. “The girl is right, you deserve to die. A pity I didn’t use my belt harder and more often.” Fists clenched, he rushed from the room with his daughter running after him calling for him to wait for her, howling noisy tears.

Drusus and his sister were alone.

His legs didn’t seem to want to hold him up; he went to his chair, sat down heavily. Livia Drusa! Blood of his blood! His only sister! Adultress, meretrix. Yet until this hideous interview he had not understood how much she meant to him; nor could he have known how deeply her plight would touch him, how responsible he felt.

“It’s my fault,” he said, lip quivering.

She sank down on the couch. “No, my fault,” she said.

“It’s true? You do have a lover?”

“I had a lover, Marcus Livius. The first, the only one. I haven’t seen or heard from him since I left Tusculum.”

“But that wasn’t why Caepio beat you.”

“No.”

“Why, then?”

“After Marcus Porcius, I just couldn’t keep up the pretense,” said Livia Drusa. “My indifference angered him, so he beat me. And then he discovered he liked beating me. It—it excited him.”

For a brief moment Drusus looked as if he would vomit; then he lifted his arms and shook them impotently. “Ye gods, what a world we live in!” he cried. “I have wronged you, Livia Drusa.”

She came to sit in the client’s chair. “You acted according to your lights,” she said gently. “Truly, Marcus Livius, I came to understand that years ago. Your many kindnesses to me since then have made me love you—and Servilia Caepionis.”

“My wife!” Drusus exclaimed. “What might this do to her?”

“We must keep as much as possible from her,” said Livia Drusa. “She’s enjoying a comfortable pregnancy, we can’t jeopardize it.”

Drusus was already on his feet. “Stay there,” he said, moving to the door. “I want to make sure her brother doesn’t say anything to upset her. Drink some wine. I’ll be back.”

But Caepio hadn’t even thought of his sister. From Drusus’s study he had rushed to his own suite of rooms, his daughter crying and clinging to his waist until he slapped her across the face and locked her in his bedroom. There Drusus found her huddled on the floor in a corner, still sobbing.

The servants had been summoned back to duty, so Drusus helped the little girl up and ushered her outside to where one of the nurserymaids hovered doubtfully in the distance. “Calm down now, Servilia. Let Stratonice wash your face and give you breakfast.”

“I want my tata!”

“Your tata has left my house, child, but don’t despair. I’m sure that as soon as he’s organized his affairs he’ll send for you,” Drusus said, not sure whether he was thankful Servilia had blurted out all the truth or whether he disliked her for it.