Sarum - Edward Rutherfurd [180]
In the Orpheus room, Constantius Porteus had been drinking ever since dusk; it was now the early hours of the morning, but surprisingly he was neither tired nor drunk. He was brooding on the events of the day.
Suddenly he saw the form of his son quietly crossing the open doorway on his way to the courtyard. He started violently and rubbed his eyes. The boy was covered in blood.
For a moment even his anger was forgotten. What could have happened? Had the German mercenaries attacked him? Stumbling up, he moved with surprising speed out of the room and caught Petrus before he disappeared.
“My dear son,” he cried, “are you hurt?”
Petrus turned. To his father’s astonishment he wore on his face a look of calm serenity that he had never seen before. He smiled at his father. His eyes, instead of being filled with their customary hostility, were kindly. He cheerfully dropped his bombshell.
“Not hurt, father, purified.”
Constantius’s mouth dropped open. What could the boy mean?
“I am tauroboliatus, father. I am returning Sarum to the ancient gods.”
Before Constantius could say a word, he was gone.
For several minutes he stood there, stupefied. His son not only disobedient but a pagan? He wondered if it was a dream, pinched himself, but knew that it was not.
A few minutes later he burst into his wife’s room.
Placidia was not asleep when he came in, and as she looked up she could see by the lamplight that Constantius was very pale, through apparently sober.
He stood in the doorway; it had long been an unspoken rule that he did not enter her bedroom; though after the events of the day, she had nearly, out of simple compassion, invited him in; now, as he stood there, he looked so woebegone that she motioned him to enter.
“What is the matter, Constantius?” she asked quietly.
He made a gesture of desperation and told her briefly about Petrus.
“The taurobolium!” he concluded dismally. “A monstrous heathen rite.” He wiped his hand across his eyes. “Did you know that our son was a secret pagan?”
She considered. “I did not know.”
He stared at her.
“Did you suspect?”
“Perhaps.”
He shook his head in disbelief.
“And you said nothing?”
She sat up slowly, pulled a cushion behind her and lay back, allowing her hands to fall palm upward beside her.
“I only suspected. Something about him – secretive. And he is close to Tarquinus, you know.”
“I should have sent that cowherd away,” Constantius moaned.
His wife’s calmness about this terrible business baffled him. As he continued speaking, it was almost to himself.
“This is a Christian house. First heathen Germans, now this.” He looked miserably at Placidia. “What are we to do?”
Poor man. At times, even now, she still loved him; if only he could be wise.
As for Petrus, she did not take this latest enthusiasm very seriously.
“We should do nothing. Petrus is impulsive, but he has a good heart. We must just be patient.”
Perhaps, since the boy was almost all she had, she was too indulgent towards him. But she was far too sensible a woman to be blind to his faults; she knew very well that it was only her balance and good sense, and the hard work of Numincus the steward, that held the household and the estate together. Petrus with his obsessive enthusiasms was very like his father, and her secret fear was that if he failed to achieve anything and did not find a good wife to steady him, he would degenerate just as Constantius had done, despite her own unsuccessful efforts to strengthen him.
But none of these thoughts was apparent to Constantius. Although he had come to her instinctively for guidance, her calmness was beginning to irritate him.
“You seem unconcerned,” he said bitterly. “Perhaps you approve.”
“You know very well that I do not. I am a Christian.”
In truth, she supposed that with her stern and practical attitude to life, touched, she knew, with more than a tinge of resignation, she was nearer to being a stoic than a true Christian. But she was content to be a Christian in name and had little use for heathen magic and the pagan gods.