I was not inclined to share my rendition of The Big Green Frog story (see previous blog) with Carti and Tanaquil. I felt it was poorly written and juvenile. But Julia, forge ahead Julia, gave me no choice. "It's not that I'll abandon you if you don't," she said we all drained the wine from our glasses at the same time. "It's that I shall never leave you. Night and day I'll be at the edges of your consciousness, hour after hour, with never any respite." She held out her arms, lowered her head and hugged herself. "So share," she said in what I can only surmise was her 'seduce whomever was listening' voice.
I shared. I shared the story I considered juvenile at best, hackneyed at worst. For some time no one responded. No shrugs, no laughter, no head shaking-- nothing. "See," I said, "it's the pits."
"And what in Hades does "it's the pits" mean?" Julia's voice had an edge I prefer not to describe.
Tanaquil held out a hand, the hand of a Queen seeking silence and attention. "Jewellee is right". After an uncomfortable silence she continued, "and she's wrong. She's wrong in that it's bad. I daresay much worse is published everyday. But she's right when she says we don't need reports of frogs, big ones, green ones, small ones or brown ones. We need to report on real people, people like her, like Carti and Julia, like me. Like anyone who has felt the sting of unwarranted prejudice.
"I remember so well two times I had to cope with irrational, unjustified and painful prejudice. I remember it as if it were yesterday. Tarquinius and I --" She paused, closed her eyes, and shook her head. What has been labeled the illusive inscrutable smile appeared. Finally she said, "Tarquinius was not always Tarquinius. He took that name when we came from Tarquinia to Rome. But that is a story of its own. More of that later. After we settled in Rome which was nothing-- pardon me Julia-- nothing more than a mud hut village. We worked hard to fit in, to serve our new country. And we had glorious success, mostly because of Tarquinius' talent and wealth, and some would say his ruthless ambition. If he was ruthless, it was Rome who profited most. He became King Ancus' closest adviser and the legal guardian of the King's children in case the king died.
"I felt fully accepted when I was befriended by Ancus' wife, Amata. But I was soon to discover I was not as accepted as I thought."
"Ye Gods, Tanaquil," Julia said. "If you have a story that speaks to the Big Green Frog idea, get on with it, or as my father, Augustus, always said, 'As quick as boiIed asparagus' I'm out of here. All of us came after you and we do know the sequence of events."
"I knew," Tanaquil said, ignoring Julia's rants, "I had been accepted when I was invited to participate in the Mater Matuta celebration."
Julia interrupted, "Spare us the vivid description of the celebration. Suffice it to say it was a day of abandonment and unabashed freedom."
Tanaquil's inscrutable smile reappeared as she stared Julia down. "The abandonment, as you call it, was offset by what followed the feast of too much food and too much wine. Tongues loosened by too much wine flapped. And I overheard the cream of Roman female aristocracy in serious conversation. 'Poor Ancus', Amata said to Collina, wife of the elder and priggish Claudius. Don't ask me to explain Claudius just now.'
Julia scowled and Tanaquil smiled. "Amata continued, 'You know how Ancus is. He gets an idea in his head and Jupiter himself could not dislodge it. He's decided his time is nearly up. To hear him tell it he has one foot in the Styx already and will cross it any day now.'
"I watched as Collina leaned in toward the Queen. I inched myself forward to hear. 'You do know, don't you, that everybody-- well nearly everybody -- knows he's made a will naming the Tarquinian guardian of the boys?' Then Collina lowered her voice to a near whisper. 'Most people hope Ancus will leave long for your Tatius to be old enough to succeed him. But if he doesn't, I can't imagine what havoc will be wrought. A Tarquinian. Can you just imagine?'
"I strained to hear. 'I've heard that', Amata said, 'but I choose not to pay attention to idle gossip.' Collina snorted. 'I should pay attention if I were you. The feeling is more than just idle thinking. It's worrisome to a lot of people. You know there are those who think Lucius Tarquinius does all the things he does for the city for one reason and one reason only. He has an eye on the kingship.'
"Collina did not notice me to her back. She continued, 'or buying the kingship is more like it. An Etruscan. Can you imagine the nerve. Take my word for it- we need to stop this alien.' She snorted again. "An Etruscan! How low can we sink?'
"So Ladies ," Tanaquil said, "we don't need frogs of any sort to show the presence of narrow minded prejudice. We just share what we know first hand."
No comments:
Post a Comment