ODE TO A BANKER

Even after they vanished, we did not go straight back across to the Clivus Publicius. I'm not stupid. It was far too hot to flog all the way back to the city, and during the siesta there was no hope of finding any witnesses. Besides, this was a rare chance of solitude with my girl.

XXV

THE STUPID bastards were still working their way one at a time in order down the visitors' list. The epic poet had his turn with me next.

I rather liked him. Euschemon had called him dull. Maybe his work was, but luckily I was not obliged to read it. One of life's odd quirks: authors you warm to as people somehow cannot see where their strength lies, but will insist on pouring out scroll after lifeless scroll of tedium.

It was early evening. Rome shimmering after a long hot day. People coming alive after feeling utterly drained. Smoke from the bathhouse furnaces creating a haze that mingled with scented oven fumes. Flautists practising. Men in shop doorways greeting each other with a grin that meant they had been up to no good or were planning it for later. Women shrieking at children in upper rooms. Really old women, who no longer had children to keep in order, now standing at their windows to spy on the men who were up to no good.

I had reached the dogleg of the Clivus Publicius alone. Helena had gone to Maia's house to fetch Julia. We had been close for long enough not to want to part. But work had called.

Now I was in a quiet mood. After loving the same woman for a period of years I had gone past both the panic that she might reject me and the crass exultancy of conquest. Helena Justina was the woman whose love could still move me. Afterwards, I bathed at an establishment where I was not known, unwilling to engage in conversation. Communicating with the Chrysippus writing circle held no real charm for me either. Still, it had to be done.

It was a welcome surprise, therefore, to, discover that the next of the hacks bothered to turn up for an interview, and that I took to him.

Constrictus was older than the previous group, in his late fifties at least. Still, he looked spry and bright-eyed – more so than I expected since he had been accused by Scrutator of draining too many amphorae.

Of course the flamboyant Scrutator, with his fund of off-colour stories, had carried his own traces of debauchery.

`Come in.' I decided not to complain that he should have turned up this morning. `I'm Falco, as I'm sure you know.' If Turius and the other two had warned Constrictus that I was a bastard to deal with, he hid his terror bravely. `You're the epic poet?'

`Oh not only epic. I'll try anything.'

`Promiscuous, eh?'

`To earn a living by writing you have to sell whatever you can.'

`What happened to write from your own experience?'

`Pure self-indulgence.'

`Well, I was told that the big historical pageant is your natural genre.'

`Too hackneyed. No untapped source material left,' he groaned. I had already observed this as a problem with Rutilius Gallicus and his heroic banalities. `And, frankly,' confided Constrictus, `I throw up when I'm constantly trumpeting that our ancestors were perfect pigs in an immaculate sty. They were idle shits like us.' He looked earnest. `I really want to produce love poetry.'

`Source of contention with Chrysippus?'

`Not really. He would have loved to discover the new Catullus. The problem is, Falco, finding a suitable woman to address. It's either a prostitute – and who wants to be afflicted with helpless infatuation for any of those these days? Prostitutes are not what they were. You'll never find a modern version of sweet Ipsiphyle.'

`The whores have deteriorated just like the heroes?' I sympathised. `Sounds a good lament!'

`Or the alternative is to fall obsessively for a highly-placed, beautiful amoral bitch who attracts scandal and has dangerous, powerful relatives.'

'Clodia's long gone.' Catullus' famous high-born hag with the dead pet sparrow was another generation's scandal. `For the best, some would say. With special thanks that Rome is free of her brother, that rich gangster thug. Are today's senatorial families too refined to produce such a bad girl?'

`Jupiter, yes!' the poet lamented. `Even good-time girls are not what they were. And if you do strike it lucky, the bloody women won't co-operate. I found a playmate, Melpomene by name, lovely creature; I could have devoted my all to her. We were magic in bed. Then, when I explained that she needed to dump me or it was no good for my work, she burst out wailing. What does she come out with – listen to this, Falco! She said she really loved me, and couldn't bear to lose me, and why was I being so cruel to her?'

I nodded, more or less with sympathy, though I assumed he was being humorous. `Hard to work up a metaphorical sweat over honest loyalty.'

Constrictus exploded with actual disgust. `Jove, imagine it: an eclogue to a nymph who wants you, an ode about sharing your life.'