the story's just as true and it tells more about Lesbia than all that crowing about aqueducts and roads.'
'Tell me.'
Catullus paused to hold out his cup to the serving slave, but provided such a wobbly target that the wine spilled all over the floor. 'Perhaps you've had enough,' I said. 'Perhaps you're right.' 'What I need is a bed under my back.' Catullus burped and nodded. 'Me, too.' 'Where are you staying in the city?'
'I keep some rooms in a place up on the Palatine. Just a bed and some books. Do you want to go there?' 'You'd share your bed with me?'
'You wouldn't be the first!' Catullus laughed. 'Bring along your slave to play watchdog. He can sleep on the floor in the anteroom and start barking if he hears you cry 'rape!' '
Catullus's place on the Palatine was as sparsely furnished as he had said. Against one wall was a large sleeping couch. Against the other was a pigeonhole bookcase filled with scrolls.
He saw me squinting at the little tags in the dim lamplight. 'Greek poetry, mostly,' he explained, taking off his toga. 'Books and bed. All a man needs. Anything more would only distract from the experience.'
'Of reading the books?'
'Or using the bed.' He slipped into a tunic and fell back onto the sleeping couch. 'Come on, there's room enough for two. Though I warn you, I'm drunk enough that I might attack you.'
'I'm an old man with stiff joints and a grizzled beard.'
'Yes, but you smell irresistible.'
'What?'
'You smell of her perfume.'
'And you stink of wine, Catullus. Better than urine, I suppose.'
'What?'
I told him briefly of my encounter with Egnatius, thinking it would amuse him that I had been able to use something from his poem for my own parting shot, not realizing until I was well into the story that telling it was a mistake.
'Then he's with her right now,' he said, gritting his teeth. 'Egnatius and Lesbia. Damn them both!'
'You started telling me a story at the tavern,' I said, thinking to distract him.
'A story?'
'A scandal about one of her ancestors. An Appius Claudius. Not the builder of the temple, or the aqueduct-'
'Oh yes, the one who tried to rape Verginia. The only ancestor they don't like to talk about. Yet he exemplifies the current generation better than any of those virtuous paragons on their pedestals. You asked me if she would do something as mad as poisoning herself, just to spite a lover. Of course she would. It's in her blood.'
'Her blood?'
'Here, I'll tell you the story. This was long ago, in the first days of the republic, after the kings had been thrown down but before the patricians and plebeians found a way to live together in peace. The chronology's rather vague to me-I'm a poet, not a historian! — but at some point a group of ten strongmen managed to seize control of the state. The called themselves decemvirs and set off a reign of terror. For the good of Rome, of course-to solve the current crisis, in response to the growing emergency, et cetera, et cetera.'
'And Appius Claudius was one of these decemvirs?'
'Yes. Now there was also in Rome at this time a beautiful young girl named Verginia, the daughter of Verginius. She was a virgin, betrothed to a rising young politician. But one day Appius Claudius happened to see her on her way to the girls' school in the Forum and fell head over heel in lust for her. He followed her everywhere, in the streets and markets, trying to lure her away from the watchful eyes of her nurse, determined to seduce her. But Verginia was a virtuous girl and wanted nothing to do with the lecher. She spurned him outright, but the more she rejected him, the more determined he was to have her.
'Finally he hatched a scheme to get his hands on her, if only for long enough to give her a poke. He waited until her father was away on military duty, then gave instructions to one of his lackeys, a man named Marcus. One morning, when Verginia was entering the Forum with her nurse to attend the girls' school, Marcus and some of his men seized her. The people around were shocked and wanted to know what was happening. Marcus said that the girl was his slave and he was reclaiming her. People knew perfectly well that Verginia was the daughter of Verginius, but they also knew that Marcus was Appius Claudius's lackey and they were afraid of him, so when he made such a show of blustering about justice and the law and his rights they allowed him to take Verginia off to the tribunal to decide the matter legally.
'Of course the sole presiding judge was none other than the decemvir Appius Claudius. His lackey Marcus recited a preposterous story that Verginia was not Verginius's daughter at all-she was actually the daughter of one of his own slaves and had been stolen from his house as an infant and palmed off on Verginius as his own flesh and blood. Marcus claimed he could produce the evidence for all this later. The point was that the girl was actually a slave, his slave, and he was reclaiming her as was his legal right.
'Up on the tribunal, Appius Claudius pretended to consider all this as if he'd just heard it for the first time, when of course he was the author of the plot. You can imagine him moving his lips along with Marcus as the man recited the lines Appius had written for him! Finally he declared that only a formal hearing could determine the girl's status. Virginia's friends explained that her father was away on military duty, but could be back in Rome the next day. Appius Claudius agreed to hear the case then. In the meantime, he ruled, the girl would remain in the custody of Marcus. Verginia shrieked! The crowd shouted in protest and the girl's nurse fainted dead away, but Appius Claudius pointed out that according to the law Marcus couldn't be made to hand the girl over to the custody of anyone but her father, and since Verginius was not present, she would therefore have to remain in Marcus's custody until such time as her father arrived to claim her. Verginia would be in Marcus's hands- in Appius Claudius's power- for the whole night to come. Can't you see the fox licking his chops up on the tribunal, playing with himself beneath his toga?
'The ruling was crazy, and there was plenty of muttering and indignation, but nobody ventured to speak openly against it. That's how cowed the people were under the rule of the decemvirs. Marcus started to leave the court, hustling the weeping Verginia along with him.
At this point Verginia's betrothed young lover, the rising politician, arrived on the scene, and delivered an outraged speech about how Appius Claudius was using the law to make slaves of everyone in Rome just for the purpose of satisfying his own lust. He would die himself, the young man vowed, before he would let his betrothed spend a night away from her father's house. The girl was a virgin, and it was a virgin he intended to marry.
'He stirred the crowd to a frenzy. Appius Claudius called for armed lictors to keep order, and threatened to have the young orator arrested for starting a riot. But to keep the situation from getting completely out of hand, Appius Claudius agreed to let the girl go home with her uncle for the night and made the man post a huge bond in silver to make sure Verginia would show up for her hearing.
'At dawn the next morning the city woke in a fever of excitement. Verginius, back from his military duty, appeared in the Forum leading his daughter by the hand — he in mourning, she in rags, followed by all the women of the family making lamentations. There was a trial, or something resembling a trial, with each of the sides presenting arguments and Appius Claudius presiding as sole judge. Evidence and common sense counted for nothing. The verdict was decided before the trial began. As soon as the arguments were finished, Appius Claudius announced that Verginia was the slave of Marcus, not the daughter of Verginius. Marcus was free to claim his property.
'The crowd was stupefied. Nobody uttered a word. Marcus began pushing his way through the crowd, heading for Verginia. The women around her burst into tears. Verginius shook his fist at Appius and cried out, 'I meant my daughter for a bridal bed, not for your brothel! No man who owns a sword will put up with this sort of outrage!'
'Appius Claudius was prepared for this. He'd received alarming reports of an uprising being planned against the decemvirs, he claimed, and so just happened to have a troop of armed lictors on hand to keep order. He called them out and told them to draw their swords and clear the way so that Marcus could claim his property. Anyone who obstructed this act of justice would be killed on the spot as a disturber of the peace. Marcus strode forward through the cordon of steel and laid his hands on Verginia.
'Verginius finally seemed to lose heart. With tears in his eyes he called to Appius Claudius: 'Perhaps I have
