Half-way down the estate road I saw Pertinax. He was schooling his horses on the riding range; even at a distance he looked thoroughly absorbed. He had both the racers out. He kept one in the shade while he was galloping the other. It was far more deliberate than the young men's light recreation for which that tree-shaded area had been first designed. He was working them professionally. He knew exactly what he was doing; the procedure was a joy to watch.
Little Sweetheart was snuffling in the grass for poisonous plants that would give him belly ache. Pertinax was on the champion, Ferox. If he had been alone, I would have fought him then and settled everything, but Bryon was with him.
Bryon, who was leaning on a post eating figs, stared at me curiously but with his master there I did not speak. Pertinax ignored me. The sombre skill with which he was galloping Ferox seemed to emphasize the advantages he would always have over me.
There was fresh mule dung under the cypress trees, but the two animals I found there last night had gone. I had a feeling I would soon see them again.
I had marched all the way to the high road before a boy caught up with me.
He only had to run as far as the herm. I was sitting on a boulder, cursing myself for quarrelling with Helena, cursing her, cursing him… desperately worrying.
'Didius Falco!'
The lad had fish pickle spilt down his tunic, a skin problem it was better not to think about, and badly grazed, dirty knees. But if he had been fainting on a podium in the slave market I would have mortgaged my life to save him from cruelty.
He handed me a waxed tablet. The writing was new to me, though my heart leapt. It was short, and I could hear Helena's aggravated tone in every word:
He never hit me; though I always felt he might. What makes you think I could choose someone like that, after I had known you? Don't fall in any water. HJ
Back at home on the Aventine I sometimes found love letters lying on my door-mat. I never kept incriminating correspondence. But I had the feeling that in forty years' time when my pale-faced executors were sorting through my personal effects, this was a letter they would find wrapped in linen, tucked down the side of my stylus box among the sealing wax.