The Unwilling Vestal Part 26

"With her Cappadocian bearers?" queried Brinnaria.

"Eighteen, of them," said Flexinna; "two extras."

"How on earth did you come to do that?" Brinnaria wondered.

"I had a notion," Flexinna explained, "of trying to get to the G-G-Grove by the Lake b-b-before the fight. I thought p-p-perhaps Almo would listen to me if I c-c-could see him in t-t-time."

"Did you tell Quintus?" Brinnaria demanded.

"Of c-c-course," said Flexinna. "He wanted to go alone, b-b-but I said Almo would not listen to him, so I p-p-persuaded him to let me t-t-try.

I c-c-couldn't think of riding, of c-c-course, as I am. He wouldn't even hear of my d-d-driving, said I might as well hang myself and be d-d-done with it as risk the jar of a t-t-travelling c-c-carriage. I said I'd use my litter. He said our b-b-bearers c-c-could never g-g-get there in t-t-time for me to hope to d-d-do any g-g-good. I said I'd b-b-borrow Nemestronia's fastest gang. He said he c-c-could g-g-go and c-c-come b-b-back on a horse quicker than any litter c-c-could reach the G-G-Grove. I repeated that Almo would certainly p-p-pay no attention to him, b-b-but might listen to me. So I b-b-borrowed Nemestronia's litter.

Shall I g-g-go? Shall I start at once?"

"No!" Brinnaria cut her off. "Let me think. Sixteen miles? They could do it in a little over five hours, if everything went just right. They'd take at least eight hours for the return journey. You wouldn't be back at the Appian gate before sunrise. It would be a hungry job."

"I thought of that," Flexinna informed her. "I'm always ravenous when I'm this way* and c-c-can never g-g-go from one meal to the next. I had a k-k-kid-skin of wine p-p-put in the litter and b-b-bread and cheese and fruit."

*In other words, she's pregnant. --PG ed.

"You did!" cried Brinnaria. "Where is Vocco?"

"On horseback b-b-beside the litter," said Flexinna, "waiting for your d-d-decision."

"I've made it," Brinnaria proclaimed.

"Shall I g-g-go t-t-try?" enquired Flexinna.

"No!" Brinnaria fairly shouted, pulling off her headdress.

"What shall I d-d-do then?" Flexinna queried.

"Undress," Brinnaria ordered, "undress quick!" Flexinna stared at her, horrified.

"What for?" she quavered.

"Undress first and ask afterwards," Brinnaria commanded. "Undress, woman, undress!" She was tearing off her clothes as she talked.

"Can't you see, you fool!" she hissed. "The G.o.ds have made it all easy.

The densest fog Rome ever saw and all over the country-side, a curtained litter with the fastest bearers alive right at my door, my best friend on horseback beside it, drink and food enough and to spare, me off duty till to-morrow noon and you here to change clothes with me. I put on your clothes and go save Almo."

"You'll be outside Rome all night," Flexinna objected. "That's sacrilege."

"Not a bit of it," Brinnaria retorted. "I know a regulation from a taboo. When the Gauls captured Rome the Flamen of Jupiter went up into the Capitol with the garrison. He might not leave Rome, it would have been impious. But the other flamens nd the Vestals left Rome, the Vestals were months at Caere. It is not impiety for a Vestal to be outside the city walls over night, it is merely forbidden by the rules.

I'm going."

"You might as well g-g-go b-b-bury yourself alive and b-b-be d-d-done with it," Flexinna protested. "You're certain to b-b-be found out. It's sure d-d-death for you."

"Hang the risk!" Brinnaria snarled. "I never realized how much I loved Almo till you brought this news. I don't care whether I live or die or what death I die, if I can only save him.

"And the risk is too small to think of. All you have to do is to stay abed and keep still. Utta will never tell and she won't let anyone in. Numisia will not suspect anything: any Vestal has the right to twenty-four hours abed and no questions asked, Meffia spent one day out of ten in bed. Manlia takes a day's rest a dozen times a year. Even I have done it several times, when I was sore all over with jolting too long at full gallop over our so-called perfect roads. I was abed all day about a month ago, and certainly I rove hard enough and long enough yesterday and I was in the Temple half the night. I'll be back here long before noon to-morrow.

"Don't you see how easy it is? Flexinna has called on Brinnaria to-day, as usual, except the hour. And Flexinna often calls on Brinnaria at odd hours. Flexinna makes a short call and goes out to her litter. Flexinna makes an excursion into the country in a litter with drawn curtains, her husband riding by it. n.o.body can take any notice of that. Flexinna returns from her outing, calls at once on Brinnaria, pays a brief call, goes out, gets into her litter and goes home. Brinnaria, refreshed by twenty-four hours abed, goes about her duties. The plan simply can't fail." She had on all Flexinna's clothes by the end of her explanation and was adjusting er two veils, one over her face, the other tied over the broad-brimmed travelling-hat, so that the edges of the brim, drawn down on either side, almost met under her chin and her face was lost in it.

Flexinna continued to protest feebly, but Brinnaria made her compose herself in the bed.

"You can have anything you want to eat," she reminded her, "and as much as you want, any time."

Utta came at the first signal.

"Now listen," Brinnaria instructed her, "I am in that bed and I am going to stay there until the lady who has just called on me comes back. That will be tomorrow morning. I am tired and need rest, the same as I did the day after the axle broke and I barked my knee in the gravel. I am not going out now; oh, no the lady going out is the lady who called on me. Do you understand?"

Utta understood.

Flexinna, quaking in the bed, prayed under her breath.

"For Castor's sake," was her farewell, "d-d-don't forget to s-s-stutter." In a fas.h.i.+onable costume of brilliant pink silk with pearly gray tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs, feeling horribly conspicuous, but unaccosted and, as far as she could judge, unnoticed, Brinnaria descended the stairs, traversed the courtyard and pa.s.sed the portal. Just outside, in the nook left by the angle of the wall enclosing the Temple, she found the litter set down clear of the throng that surged and jostled ceaselessly up and down the Holy Street. The bearers stood about it, one holding Vocco's horse; all, like the street-crowd, vague and unreal in the fog. Through the fog Vocco strode towards her and checked, amazed. She put her fingers to the folds of the veil over her lips.

"C-C-Careful," she warned him, laboriously stuttering. "I am Flexinna come back. Now for Aricia, as fast as the b-b-bearers can hoof it."

Vocco, dazed, helped her into the litter, gave the order and mounted his horse.

Composed in her litter, Brinnaria's sensations were all of the strangeness of the outlook; fog blurring the outlines of familiar buildings; fog hiding the landmarks she looked for, fog wrapping her round till she could hardly see the front pair of carriers tramping ahead or even Vocco beside her on his horse; fog concealing all the wide prospect of the levels south of Rome, fog so thick that they positively groped their way through the towns along the road, fog so dense that she could not discern the gradations by which afternoon melted into evening and dusk into darkness.

When they were clear of the city Vocco ranged his horse alongside the litter and expostulated with Brinnaria, talking Greek that the bearers might not understand.

"The best thing you can do," he said, "is to give up this harebrained adventure and merely swing round through the suburbs for some hours and return to the Atrium by some other gate."

"Not I," she replied in her hardest tone.

"How do you expect to succeed in speaking to Almo?" he asked.

"I leave that to you," she said; "you must manage to see the Dictator of Aricia and tell him that you have with you a lady in a litter who must speak to the challenger before the fight."

"I'll attempt the commission," said Vocco, "and I'll do my utmost, but I hold it impossible."

"In any case," spoke Brinnaria, "I keep on even if I have to expose myself and be recognized in Aricia."

Vocco gave up the effort to influence her.

The roads joining the Appian Way were paved with similar blocks of the same sort of stone. In the fog they went wrong three several times where side-roads branched off at a thin angle. In each case they failed to discover their mistake until they had gone on for some distance; in each case they had to retrace their steps for fear of getting wholly lost if they tried a cross-road; in each case they wasted much time.

Twice the leading bearers were all but trampled on by the recklessly driven horses of careless drivers. Both times the mix-up delayed them.

Just beyond Bovillae they had a third collision, in which one pole of the litter was snapped and two of the bearers injured. It barely missed resulting in a free-fight. All of Vocco's tact was needed to allay the feelings on both sides. By great good luck he succeeded in getting a subst.i.tute litter-pole from a near-by inn without too much publicity.

The delays caused by missing the road and by collisions had cut down the margin of time they had hoped for at Aricia. This last misfortune delayed them so much that it seemed unlikely that they could reach the Grove until midnight.

In fact, before they reached Aricia, the road was alive with parties of celebrants, men and women, but no children, every man carrying a lighted torch, nearly every man accompanied by a slave with an armful or a back-load of spare torches, all moving in the same direction with them.