As Larius preceded me up to our room, he turned back to whisper thoughtfully, 'He can't have a girlfriend, not with his family here. So who is he picking flowers for?'
'Arria Silvia?' I suggested, trying to sound neutral. Then my nephew (who was growing in sophistication daily) squinted down at me sideways, in a way that had me snorting with helpless laughter all up the stairs.
Arria Silvia was asleep. Through the tangled spread of her hair on the pillow her face looked flushed. She was breathing with the deep contentment of a woman who had been wined and dined, then walked home through the summer night and warmed up again afterwards by a husband who was famous for his thoroughness. Beside her bed she had a large bunch of dog roses, stuck in a dead fish-pickle jar.
As he came upstairs later we could hear Petronius humming to himself.