For a few minutes the garden was filled with chaos. We could not get near our domina—there were too many trying to help her. The drinking contest fell apart as several of the participants raced to Aelia’s aid when they saw her fall. Apicius tried to move toward her, but there were too many people and the wine had clouded his senses. Drusus had thrown an arm around him to hold him up. Apicius called his wife’s name over and over as he struggled to reach her side, drunkenly pushing through the knot of senators and slaves, with Drusus helping to part the way. I left Sotas and followed Ovid, who was also making his way toward Apicius.
“Come now; let us move out of the way. Aelia will be fine.” Ovid’s voice was quiet but commanding. Apicius lifted his head and blearily recognized the poet. “Drusus is a good friend to help you.”
“But he knows nothing about bitter almonds,” Apicius blurted out.
Drusus chuckled a little at the jab. “I feel fine, Apicius.”
“Well, I don’t. I am drunk.”
“You certainly are,” Ovid said, steadying him with a hand to the shoulder.
“You look different.” Apicius lifted a hand to touch the poet’s face. Ovid pulled his head away and Apicius’s hand fell into empty air.
Ovid smacked him across the face. I looked around to see if anyone had noticed, but everyone was attending to Aelia. “Apicius, I need you to stand up straight. Pretend you are sober. You must make us all believe.”
Drusus took his arm away to see if Apicius could stand.
Apicius, to my surprise, straightened, just as the sea of people parted. Livilla and Fannia held up a weary-looking Aelia. Two slaves appeared at their sides, frantically waving sizable palm fans to push away the humid air. I saw Sotas standing in the crowd behind them.
“There you are,” Fannia said loudly to Apicius. “This is no time for games—we must get your wife home to bed!”
“It’s all right, you will be fine. They’ll take you home,” Livilla kept saying to Aelia. “It’s too hot, I know. Look, here’s Apicius. He’ll take you home!”
Apicius managed to walk a few steps without staggering. He pulled Aelia close to him and they wavered a bit. Drusus reached out a hand to steady Aelia, but I knew the effort was made to bolster Apicius.
I was amazed at how Apicius managed to rally to the situation. “Is there a litter?” he asked loudly. Drusus started yelling for the guards to find a litter, taking away some of the focus from my master.
The crowd parted and Caesar appeared with Livia and a tattooed barbarian slave at his heels. Tiberius was behind him, his face etched with annoyance. Octavius followed up at the rear. I thought my heart might leap out of my throat. Oh, Apicius! Do not falter now! He had always desired an audience with Caesar but this was not how either of us had dreamed it—drunk, with his wife feigning an illness in the Imperial gardens.
“Are you all right?” Caesar asked Aelia.
“Yes, it’s the heat, I’m afraid. I think I need to sleep for a while.”
“There are guest chambers where you can rest.” Tiberius waved to his slaves. “Dear lady, please accept my hospitality. My slaves will make sure you are comfortable.”
“Thank you.” Aelia bowed her head. “You are very generous, but I think . . .” She trailed off. If she suggested she return home it could be seen as an insult to both Tiberius and to Caesar.
Ovid came to Aelia’s rescue. “I think what she is trying to say but is far too polite is that sometimes, when one is ill, the best medicine is your own pillow, your own surroundings, and your own medic there to administer to your ills, with your own masseuse there to rub your feet. With your permission, I would be pleased to see them home. I could read to her. I know you understand how the power of words can ease the soul.”
Tiberius nodded. “I do understand. It’s up to you, dear lady, but know you are welcome to all the comforts of my home and the expertise of my doctors.”
“Again, thank you,” she said, feigning weakness. “I believe our poet may also read minds. I do long for the comfort of my own bed.”
Apicius spoke up, but his speech was slow. He was trying not to slur his words. “Thank you, honorable Caesar. But I ask your permission to depart for home as my wife desires.”
“Permission granted,” Augustus said. “May the gods bring you swift healing.” He waved at the slaves to bring the litter, and left with Livia in tow, I noted with no small measure of relief. Octavius lingered, staring at me with a scowl. Then he snapped his fingers at his body-slave and followed Tiberius, Augustus, and his wife.
Livilla and Fannia kissed Aelia good-bye. Drusus and Ovid helped Aelia and Apicius into the litter and we departed, Sotas, Helene, and I walking behind, feeling strangely useless and grateful for it, all at the same time.
PART V
7 C.E. to 9 C.E.
LENTILS WITH CHESTNUTS
Take a new pan and put in carefully thoroughly peeled chestnuts. Add water and a little soda, put it to cook. When it is cooking, put in a mortar pepper, cumin, coriander seed, mint, rue, laser (silphium) root, pennyroyal, and pound them. Pour on vinegar, honey, liquamen; flavor with vinegar and pour it over the cooked chestnuts. Add oil, bring it to heat. When it is simmering well, pound it with a stick as you pound in a mortar. Taste it, if there is anything lacking, add it. When you have put it in the serving dish, add green oil.
—Book 5.2.2, Legumes On Cookery, Apicius
CHAPTER 13
“Tear it all down.” Apicius waved his hand toward the cluster of insulae standing before him. Finding land in the center of Rome was not an easy task, but if you were willing to pay money for prime real estate it was easy to convince a landlord to displace his tenants. Apicius had done just that, looking for the right property, then propositioning its owner. He had been determined to build in the small valley between the Palatine and Caelian Hills, near where the majority of his friends and clients lived and where it would be a short walk from his own villa.
The block was one of the more crowded along the Vicus Cyclopis, the long winding street between the hills that gained its name from a grove said to hold Cyclops many years past. Several tall buildings rose upward in a mess of rough boards, rickety balconies, and torn curtains flapping in the windows. The insulae had been cleared of occupants but remnants of them remained—a tunic left hanging to dry in a window or a child’s ball in one of the doorways. I wondered what had happened to the families who’d lived in those apartments. Housing was difficult to come by in Rome, especially so close to the center of the city. Although it had often been talked about in the Senate, to date there were no laws governing the way occupants were treated when there was a sale. That made it likely Apicius had forced many dozens out of their homes. I winced at the thought.
The foreman to whom Apicius spoke was a sturdy middle-aged man with a big hooked nose and the hint of a country accent. He seemed unfazed by the task before him. “What would you have us do with all of the wood and material from the buildings?”
Apicius shrugged. “I don’t care. Do with it what you will.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “Dominus, that’s a lot of marble, brick, and wood. The profit—”