‘And why, Festo, is he so tall?’ I once asked.
‘Also because, young master, he is a Celt. Theirs is a land of many rivers and mountains. The people there need to be big to cross and to climb. Why, some of them are taller than the Aventine. They march at great speed round their country, catching animals to eat.’
‘What kind of animals?’
‘Huge shaggy ones called aurochs, and others called bison, ten times bigger than the biggest cow. They kill them with clubs bigger than I am, and then’ – and Festo whispered in my ear – ‘then they eat them raw.’
I remember this conversation because it made me curious. A little scared too, I suppose, but above all curious. Perhaps that was when I developed a love of travel I have never lost. For weeks I dreamed of giant Celts with clubs in wild and wasted lands. But it did me good. I certainly worked harder after that, and never did anything that might annoy Rufustinus.
I thought about what Festo had told me. When Rufustinus wasn’t watching, I looked at him hard. Yes, he was tall, but not all that tall, I decided. So the next time Festo was sent to help me dress, I challenged him. ‘Festo, you said the Celts are very, very tall, and Rufustinus is, certainly. But he’s not all that tall, only two or three hands more than you.’
‘Granted, young master. He was obviously the runt of his litter. Now, your sandals …’ Well, I have known many Celts since then and travelled through their lands. I have never seen a giant. Perhaps I will one day, in my dreams.
Runt or not, I found Rufustinus’ Latin strange at first, guttural and harsh. But he had an excellent reputation – otherwise, of course, my father would not have employed him – and he taught me well. Or, rather, I think he must have done, because I learnt to read and write sooner than was expected of me.
But the truth is that I cannot remember how he taught me. I remember words written down on tablets and placed on or beside the objects they described. Mensa on a table, cathedra on a chair, lucerna by a lamp and so on. In time, I think, Rufustinus began to place the letters in order for me in the alphabet. They came to make a pattern in my head, like a song, and I can sing it still.
I wonder, before battle, before the killing-frenzy comes, when men know they may be about to die, or lose an arm, a leg, an eye, a hand, how many sing under their breath a rhyme they learnt at their mother’s knee or, perhaps, if they are educated, the alphabet. It is not the words that ease their fear, but being safe deep down with sounds, back in themselves at a time when the world was as simple as a-b-c. But no road leads back to that place.
One morning – I must have been five – I opened the door to the schoolroom. Rufustinus was standing by the window. Beside him was my father. I can still see his white toga next to Rufustinus’ brown.
‘Good morning, Publius.’
‘Good morning, Father.’ I didn’t know what to do. This hadn’t happened before.
‘Well, don’t stand there gawking! Sit down!’ my father said.
When I had, he began to walk across the room between my desk and Rufustinus’ table. ‘You are doing well, Rufustinus tells me. Good, good. So well, in fact, that we think you are now ready.’ He smiled at me.
I was puzzled. ‘Ready, Father, for what?’
‘For a new language, Publius. Today you will begin to learn Greek. You will need Greek for the life you will lead.’
‘What life is that, Father?’
He laughed, said, ‘You will find out soon enough,’ patted me on the shoulder and left the room.
I remember feeling scared. Greek? I remember the sweat on my hands. We had a few Greek slaves in the house, but they spoke Latin to us. I overheard them sometimes speaking Greek, and thought it was some kind of music that they played, running like a stream. Yet that day began the best journey I have ever made. Like all such, like true marriage or friendship, it is one that has no end.
* * *
I walked steadily on, north and east. At least there was no shortage of places to sleep, or shelter from the midday sun. There was always a hut or shepherd’s cottage. Bruttium was a green desert, its fields untended, its villages burnt or deserted, testaments of war. I saw no one, only goats roaming wild without a goatherd. This was how Rome had fought on after Cannae, by stripping her larder bare.
Yet I was never hungry. I found enough fruit trees, corn. Early on, when I left the path I was following and went into the bushes to relieve myself, I came upon a rabbit snare. It had caught a rabbit, long ago, and now held only bones, stripped by ants and bleached by sun. I added it to my satchel’s contents, and was to eat much rabbit in the weeks ahead. Bread I missed. I have a weakness for it. But when, I thought, I had it again, I would enjoy it all the more.
Strange eyes in the dark, an amber gleaming. I was half awake. Or was I dreaming? Then I heard the sound, a rapid panting, and the knowledge came. Dogs. Wild dogs. I had gone to sleep in a half-ruined bothy, once a woodman’s, judging by the shavings on which I had made my bed.
I had roasted a rabbit that evening. That must have brought them. I sat up. I heard a menacing growl, saw teeth white in the half-light. I cleared my throat. ‘Go,’ I said quietly. ‘Go on your way. Leave me to mine.’
I lay back, turned on my side and went back to sleep. But in the morning, they were still there, across the clearing, just in the shelter of the trees. I threw the rabbit carcass to them, shouldered my satchel and walked on. There were many wanderers in Italy then.
From the start, Greek was fascinating. First, Rufustinus taught me the alphabet. I loved the look of the letters, the strange shapes of ξ and θ, ι and μ. I practised them alone. He began to teach me Latin and Greek simultaneously. I would translate simple sentences from one into the other. I found the differences between the two languages helped me to learn both. It was all the easier to learn the Greek optative, for example, because Latin did not have one. It seemed less hard to learn the principal parts of Greek irregular verbs when I had mastered some Latin ones – although τίθημι still tricks me, even after fifty years. Words are the most fickle – and fascinating – of things. Like clouds, they change. Like earth, they endure. When a word is said or written, there is nothing you can do to take it back again.
Well, perhaps it was all harder, took much longer. These memories are far away. Some stand out, tall trees in a forest, but most have merged and muddled in my mind.
It was winter, cold and raining. We were going over the imperfects of amo and λύω. I recited them well enough.
‘Now, write them down,’ Rufustinus instructed from high above, handing me a tablet and stylus. He was like a stork, leaning down. His cheeks always seemed puffy and full. I had a chilblain on my index finger. The wax was stiff. I made a mess of λύω. I knew it.
Rufustinus glanced at the tablet, and wiped it clean with his ruler. ‘Again.’
From his third rejection came the only time I crossed him. ‘But that’s the best I can do,’ I whined, looking at my feet, wishing the lesson was over.
‘Publius Cornelius Scipio, I am not interested in your best. Can you build a house without bricks, or a road without stones? No, of course not. That, by the way, was a rhetorical question.’ And Rufustinus then said something I have never forgotten. ‘Never forget, young Publius, potest quia posse videtur – you can because you think you can. Now, try and try again.’
I did not know it, but I was building the foundations of what I am. They have proved deep and strong.
Scipio has been in bed now for two days. He has a mild fever and, while he had anything in his stomach, kept being sick. Aurio and I take turns to sit with him. He dozes. We talk,