Saturnalia

I - A Domus of Death

I

A Domus of Death

The Gods do not demand much of Man. The occasional offering or prayer, a bit of a nod on the appropriate festival day, respect toward their representatives at temples and altars where their own particular rites are performed.

In the broad scheme of this life, the truth is that Man can get away with doing very little. In fact, it is common knowledge that those who do not do honour to the life they have been given, who reign cruelly over others, often get away with it. It is those honest citizens who seem to bear the brunt of others’ actions.

Some might think that the Gods did not exist for all that the wicked run away with…but they would be wrong.

The Gods do indeed take notice. They walk among us…judge us. It might take a lifetime for them to take action, but when they do… Well, it casts a long dark shadow to think on it.

One thing you can be sure of is that when the Gods do take action, they do so with greater cruelty than any mortal is capable of, and it is more often than not the worst of our species upon whom they visit their savage lessons.

I tell you now a tale of a man, the cruellest wretch in all of Rome, and the time, one winter, that he underwent such an ordeal as to s***h the skin from your bones and freeze your marrow.

This man’s name was Catus Pompilius.

It began the year that Emperor Severus was away from Rome, luxuriating in the glow of his home province of Africa Proconsularis and that gem of the South, Leptis Magna.

On the eve of the great festival of Saturnalia, this Catus Pompilius left the east wing of his villa on the Esquiline Hill to begin his daily work of collecting rents, evicting hard-working Romans, and insulting every client who came to his door, a door he shared with his partner in cruelty, Krelis Manvilio. Both men rejected family or anything having to do with warmth and kindness.

They were landlords, Catus and Krelis, and it was their business to lord it over rich and poor alike across all of Rome. There was no building they did not have a stake in, no matter how ornate or humble.

Together, Catus and Krelis had taken this rather large villa on the edges of the gardens of Maecenas from one of their debtors, a merchant who had had some success and soon thereafter decided to build a great villa on that fashionable hill of Rome. Well, Fortuna was not to linger with this merchant, and so his sprawling villa went to the two business partners. It became their domus and place of business all in one.

On the morning of that one eve of Saturnalia, Catus came downstairs to find Krelis lying at the bottom of the stairs in the west wing of the villa which belonged to Krelis.

Catus stood there, his mind calm, calculating the way in which such a thing could have happened.

“Drunk, one last time,” he said to the sprawled body, the corner of one side of his wrinkled and ridged face curling up as if reaching for a smile. “Serves you right. And it serves me just fine.”

Catus stepped over the body, avoiding the pool of blood that had formed around Krelis’ cracked skull, crossed the dark atrium to the latter’s own tablinum, and returned with a heavy wooden chest of denarii which he transferred to his own rooms. After three more such trips, he turned back to the body of his business partner and shook his head.

“You’ve certainly made some work for me now, haven’t you? Now I shall not get as much done today as I had planned.” He looked around the atrium, then to the front door where a stool sat nearby, empty. “Giles!” he yelled for the man who worked for him as a rent collector.

He went angrily to the door and threw it open to look up and down the tree clad street.

In the distance, Catus spotted the brawny figure of the ex-gladiator striding quickly toward the villa. “You’re late!” he hissed at the man.

“Sorry, sir. My little Diana took sick this morning and I had to run for a medicus.”

Catus grabbed hold of the bigger man and jabbed a bony fist into his chest. “Your little family problems are none of my concern! You hear me? You owe me a debt, Giles, and if you’re not careful and attentive to your duty to me, I can have you pay off that debt in the amphitheatre again. It’s only been one year since you left the sands.”

“There’ll be no need for that,” the big man said calmly, his chest rising and falling as he looked down at Catus.

“Good. Now get inside. There’s something you have to take care of.”

Giles walked through the front door into the atrium where the grey morning light lit upon the twisted body and bleeding head of Krelis. He turned round on Catus, shock in his eyes.

“It wasn’t me who did it, you imbecile!”

“I didn’t say it was, sir. But…”

“But what?”

“He was your friend and partner of many years. What a tragedy!” Giles turned back to kneel beside the body, the blank, once-mean eyes now vacant and lonely.

“The only tragedy,” Catus said, “is that I shall have to do double the work and pick up the slack.” His scornful eyes lingered on the body for a moment before he began to walk back to his own tablinum. “Get it out of here, Giles, before the clients begin to arrive.”

“But, sir, shouldn’t we close for the day out of respect for the dead?”

Catus’ form stopped at the threshold to his office on the other side of the atrium. He turned slowly, his eyes black in the shadows.

“Business will continue as usual, Giles.”

“I’ll need money for the undertaker, mourners, and the mason to carve a stele for the necropolis.”

At the mention of the expenditures, Catus’ face contorted in anger, more so than at the death of his business partner, for he valued money above all things, above reason, above comfort, above goodness, and even above life itself. He went into his tablinum and came back with a small leather pouch, the contents of which he poured out into the palm of his hand.

Giles watched as Catus counted out several bronze ases and a few sestercii.

Catus put them back in the pouch, clutching the others tightly in his hand, and then tossed the pouch to Giles.

“Have him burned and the ashes scattered beyond the city walls in the necropolis. I’m not paying for mourners or a monument. His funds shall remain with the business since he had no heirs.”

“And the rites, sir? Surely his shade will rest better if some offerings are made at the temple for him?”

“What need has he for rites in Hades? Were it not illegal, I would simply have you dump his carcass outside the city walls for the dogs and carrion crows.” He pointed at the pouch. “Do not spend all of that!”

“Yes, sir,” Giles looked upon the man with fear then, not of physical retaliation, but for fear of what the Gods might do with one such as Catus, and what being in such close proximity to his employer might do to him.

“And you… After you finish getting rid of Krelis, you will go about your collections this evening as usual. There are many rents to collect.”

“But it’s the eve before Saturnalia, sir.”

Catus stepped forward, his not inconsiderable patience, as he saw it, close to breaking point.

“Do I look like I give a fig leaf for Saturnalia, Giles? Do I?” His hard voice crashed upon the faded walls of the atrium, their once vibrant colour growing even sadder, the painted forest seeming to wilt and brown.

“The Dead to dine on Saturnalia!” he yelled.

Giles nodded, turned back to the body, and went to find an undertaker beneath the low-hanging sky of iron grey.