The Saint's Mistress (7 page)

hung in front of the forum.

Aurelius was at the fountain waiting for me the next afternoon. He sprang up and waved when

he spotted me, the setting sun glowing orange behind him.

“Are you all right?” he asked me as we started our walk towards Urbanus’ town house.

I nodded, embarrassed and awkward. I sensed in him the same awkwardness and tension I had

felt for the past two days. All other days, we chatted about the previous day’s lesson – Horace,

Ovid, Cicero – Aurelius explaining to me in rapid Berber where I was deficient and how I could

improve. Today, neither of us spoke at first.

“Where were you yesterday?” he asked finally. “I waited for you.”

I took a deep breath. “My brother died in the riot.”

He stopped walking and put his hands on my arms. “I’m sorry. Do you have to go right

home?”

“I don’t know.”

“I mean, does your family have some ritual or..?”

“I don’t know.”

“How can you not know?”

“Can we just go to the garden?”

We let ourselves into the garden and sat on our usual bench. Aurelius looked at me

expectantly. I suddenly felt tired and irritable and I hardly knew where to begin. “Maron died in

the riots day before yesterday. I saw him, just for a minute, while I was looking for Peter, and he

had a club. We knew he was in with the hut people, but what we didn’t know, well, at least the

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priest claims, that he was a Christian. So, the Donatist priest and my father had a big argument

about what should be done with the body. He was one of the ones hanging there outside the

forum.” I took a breath.

“I’m sorry,” Aurelius said, and patted my shoulder awkwardly.

I went on. “So, the priest and my father had an argument about whether Maron should be

burned, buried or left to hang there and rot, and, I guess the priest won, because his body’s not

there any more. I don’t know if the Christians made a deal with the governor or if they just sent

their thugs in to cut them down in the middle of the night or what, but there are four missing

now. I guess they’re going to bury him no matter what my father says. And I guess I should go

home. I don’t know how my father’s going to react, and I shouldn’t leave Numa and Tito to face

him alone.”

“Sure. Sure. I understand,” Aurelius said, but he looked into my eyes and drew me to him and

kissed me. My heart rose with joy, as if this was what I had been waiting for all day. The nervous

rapping my heart had been doing for two days changed to a full-blooded pounding, and the space

between my legs swelled and moistened, began to feel heavy. I forgot Maron, put Tito and Numa

and my father from my mind.

After a few minutes of kissing, Aurelius rose, took my hand and led me to a corner of the

garden which was screened by rose bushes. He lifted my tunic over my head and then removed

his own, and stood for a moment looking at me. I loved the avid look in his eyes, loved the

feeling of being worshipped. We laid down and kissed some more, and then he entered me, all in

silence again. I was still too shy to look down and take a good look at his male parts, but it didn’t

hurt so much this time, and once again it was over quickly.

After, he laid on top of me, balanced on his elbows, and looked down at me, smiling slightly,

saying nothing.

“What?” I asked. My blood felt thick, my limbs heavy.

“Well, I broke my vow for you.”

“What vow?”

“To not know a woman until I was 18.”

“Should I apologize?”

“No.” He rolled over onto his back beside me and stared at the fading sky, eyes wide, smiling

full now. “No. The ascetics are all wrong. The love between a man and a woman is the best thing

in the world.” He rolled onto his side and propped himself on one elbow, looking down at me

again. “I love you, Leona. Do you love me?”

“Yes,” I answered, and at the time it was only because I didn’t know what else to say.

“Can we keep meeting every day?”

“Yes.”

“We’ll still read, too, of course.”

“I’ll insist on it.”

He trailed his finger along the side of my breast and down my waist, over my belly, to the tuft

of fur at the top of my legs. I shivered, he bent to kiss me, and we started all over again.

For the next month, I lived in a world suddenly brighter and fresher. Lovers sometimes say

the moments drag until they are together again, but this was not so for me. I woke in the morning

with joy in my heart because I would see Aurelius later, and the rest of the day was a golden road

to our time together. The white sun exploding over the purple-and-gold mountains in the

distance, the soft dust beneath my feet as Numa and I walked to town in the morning, the tangy

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white cheese I ate with my bread and olives for lunch, all seemed suddenly more precious to me

because they were part of a life which included him. I waited on customers in the shop with

enthusiasm and good cheer. All of Miriam’s cloth was beautiful, the colors brighter now, the

weave smoother and softer.

Our daily time together was short. My father, surlier than ever since Maron’s death and the

kidnapping of his body by the Christians, believed I was learning weaving, and Numa kept my

secret, but I was still expected home before dark. We met in the square every afternoon just as

before, and let ourselves into Urbanus’ garden. Aurelius would sometimes have a treat for me:

pears or dates or little spice cakes sweetened with honey.

I came to know his body as intimately as I knew my own: the black hair on his thighs, coarse

and sparse like boar’s bristles, the white scar on his forearm from his fall from a tree as a small

boy, his ears large but so close to the head, unusual in a man, and his manhood, which I had first

been afraid to look at, and now couldn’t stop looking at and touching, with my hands, my mouth

and tongue; even once, squeezing my small breasts together to make a home for it. We made

love, laid in our hiding place whispering and caressing each other, and then made love again. I

forgot that our original plan was for me to read Latin.

I could see in their eyes that both Miriam and Numa guessed my secret, but neither of them

questioned me. Miriam was especially friendly and gentle, taking the time to teach me a little

weaving when the shop was quiet and the children were occupied. She would let her hand linger

on mine longer than needed, and smile at me, but with a sad tightness around her eyes.

Numa had become distant. We used to chatter the whole way to and from town, but now she

looked down at her feet, or off towards the mountains or the shops and wells in town, and

answered briefly if I spoke to her.

“Are you angry with me for something?” I asked one morning on our way into town.

She stopped and looked at me, the corners of her lips turned down. “It all has to do with you,

doesn’t it, Leona? Nobody can have problems of their own. It all has to be about Leona.”

I felt guilty and asked, “Numa, do you have a problem? I’m sorry. Tell me.”

She waved a hand and started walking again, leaving me behind. “Never mind. What do you

care?”

I shrugged. It wasn’t my fault if she wasn’t happy, was it? I had found happiness for myself; it

would be just as easy for her; if she wouldn’t do it, that wasn’t my problem, was it?

And then came the night when I looked out my window at the full white moon and realized

that a moon and a half passed since my last bleeding.

No, that couldn’t be right. I frantically tried to remember. The moon had been at half when I

last bled, but was it the waning or waxing half? It was waxing, wasn’t it? That would be only

three weeks, not five. And then I remembered, with a plunging heart, that I had not bled in the

whole month since Aurelius and I had been lovers.

A week late, I tried to convince myself, was not proof of anything, but in my heart I knew. I

was never late, and I had not been hungry the past few mornings.

I got up and walked outside, dizzy with terror, needing a breath of fresh air. I paced the hard-

baked dirt around our hut, meaning to think, but instead just revisiting the horror.

I didn’t sleep at all that night. Eventually, I stopped pacing our small yard and climbed back

into bed beside Numa, but I lay there, rigid, staring straight up at the ceiling, while my blank

horror slowly formed itself into well-defined fears: I would grow swollen and grotesque and

Aurelius wouldn’t want me anymore. I would never find a husband. My family would disown

me. I would have to become a beggar or a prostitute. I squeezed my eyes against the tears that

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ran down my cheeks and into my ears. Finally, a solution began to present itself. There were

ways of getting rid of babies, I had heard. But who could help me discover how to do it? My

mind kept pushing aside the obvious answer, but by morning I was reconciled to confiding in

Miriam, enduring her disappointment, and pleading for her help. She would know where I should

go and what I should do, or she would know how to find out.

I waited all morning for my opportunity and finally said while the children were downstairs

fetching our lunch, “I have a friend who has a problem.”

“Mmm,” Miriam responded, not looking at me, frowning over the cloth that had slowly been

growing on her loom.

“She’s pregnant and not married and needs to know how to— ” I hesitated and squirmed.

“—take care of it.”

Miriam glanced at me sharply, then looked away and started turning the crank that scrolled

her cloth the beam. “And how far along does your friend think she is?”

“A month perhaps.” I picked up a shuttle and starting winding purple thread on it so I

wouldn’t have to look at her.

“I see. And does she love the boy?”

“Yes.”

“And does he know about the baby yet?”

“No.”

“Then it seems to me she should confide in him and get his thoughts on what should be

done.”

“She’s afraid - ” I started, and felt tears rising. I continued, “She’s afraid he won’t love her

any more.” I lowered my face into my hands and let flow the tears I’d been too numb to shed

through the long night.

Miriam left her loom and hugged me. “There, there,” she consoled, rubbing my back. “You’re

not the first or the last girl this has happened to.” She sighed, still rubbing my back, “Oh, Leona,

I was afraid of this. I suppose your father doesn’t know?”

I widened my eyes and shook my head. Was she crazy? My father would be the very last

person I would tell.

“Nor Numa?”

“Numa doesn’t like me anymore,” I confessed through my tears and my fingers.

“And you want to get rid of the child if you can.”

I nodded.

She tilted my chin so I was looking at her. “Listen to me. You must tell him first. There are

ways to dispose of a child, but they don’t always work and they aren’t always safe. He may

surprise you. Maybe he wants it, Leona. He can’t marry you, but maybe he wants the child and

will set you up a little household. His family’s rich.”

“Not as rich as you think. His mother can’t afford to send him to school in Carthage. Urbanus

is sending him.”

“Still. That only proves he has a powerful patron, and that may help you. Tell him, Leona.

Promise me this, and if he doesn’t want the child, I’ll help you get rid of it, may God forgive

me.”

I nodded.

28

Of all days, Aurelius was late to our meeting in the square that day. I stood in the late

afternoon sun, sweating and cranky, and as the hour grew later, a stone of panic began to lodge

itself in my throat. Maybe he was already finished with me, child or no. But, finally, I saw him

striding into the square from the direction of Urbanus’ house. He raised a hand in greeting as he

approached. I nearly fainted with relief.

“Wonderful news,” he said. “I’m all set for school in Carthage. I leave in three weeks.”

“Wonderful,” I agreed faintly.

“What’s wrong? I thought you’d be happy.”

“The heat,” I said, “it’s just bothering me today.”

“We’ll get you some wine. Come on.”

We walked the blocks to Urbanus’ house in silence, and Aurelius had one of the slaves bring

me a goblet of watered-down wine. As I sipped, I felt life flowing back into me and gained my

courage. I might as well just come out with it. “I’m with child,” I blurted.

“What? How could that have happened?”

I looked at him.

“I just mean that’s terrible. I’m going to Carthage and – well, aren’t there ways of stopping

it?” He stood and walked a few steps, running a hand through his hair.

Although “stopping it” had been my first thought, too, I was angry. “Yes, there are ways of

stopping it. But Miriam thought you’d want to know first. She thought you might have another

idea.”

“Well, what else can we do? I don’t see what else we can do.” He stepped back towards me

now, with his hand still worrying his thick hair.

“Of course. You’re right. I’m sorry I bothered you with it.” I stood and set my wine goblet on