The Roman by Mika Waltari Read Free Book Online Page B

childhood and youth.� We arrived at the city on foot, for vehicles are forbidden in Rome in the daytime. Otherwise, communication would become impossible because of the overcrowding. For my sake, and perhaps also for his own, my father chose a roundabout route across the forum to Palatine, so that we had Palatine hill on our left and the Capitoline in front of us. Then we took the old Etruscan road
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    to get up to Palatine, alongside the great circus. My head swung from side to side as my father patiently enumerated the temples and buildings, and Barbus gaped in wonder at the vast new apartments on the forum which had not been there in his day. My lather was sweating and breathing heavily as he walked. I thought compassionately that he was an old man although he was not yet fifty But my father did not stop to draw breath until we came to the round temple of Vesta. Through the opening in its roof rose the thin spiral of smoke from the sacred lire of Rome, and my father promised that the next day, if I wished, I could go with l3arbus to look at the cave where the she-wolf had suckled Romulus and Remus and which the god Augustus had preserved as a spectacle for the whole world. The sacred tree of the wolf-brothers still grew in front of the cave. For me,� said my father, �the smell of Rome is an unforgettable scent of roses and salves, of clean linen and scrubbed stone floors, a smell which cannot be found elsewhere in the world, for the smell and soil of Rome itself has its own contribution to make. But the very thought of this smell makes me so melancholy that I can hardly bear to walk through these memorable streets once again. Let us not stop then, so that I shall not be too moved and lose the self-control which I have practiced for over fifteen years.� But Barbus objected pitifully. �Experience of a lifetime has taught me,� he said, �that a few gulps of wine are enough for my mind and for the whole of my being to take in smells and noises more clearly. Nothing has ever tasted so good in my mouth as the small spiced sausages one can get sizzling hot in Rome. Let us at least stop long enough to taste some.� My father was forced to laugh. We stopped at the market and went into a small inn which was so old that its floor lay well below street level. Both Barbus and I eagerly sniffed the air. �Blessed be Hercules I� cried Barbus in delight. �A bit of the old days is left of Rome after all. I remember this place, even if in my memory it was considerably larger and more spacious than it is now. Take a deep breath, Minutus, you who are younger than I. Perhaps you can smell the smell of fish and mud, of reeds and manure, of sweaty bodies and the incense shops of the circus.�
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    He rinsed his mouth, spat out an offering on to the floor, and then stuffed his mouth with sausage, chewing and smacking his lips, his head to one side. Finally he said, �Something old and forgotten is in fact returning to my mind. But perhaps my mouth has also grown too old, for I can no longer feel the same sensual bliss as before with sausage in my mouth and a goblet of wine in my hand.� The tears rose in his old eyes and he sighed. �I am indeed like a ghost from the past,� he said, �now that the centenary is to be celebrated. I don�t know a single person here, neither a relation nor a protector. A new generation has replaced mine and it knows nothing of the past, so the spiced sausage has lost its flavor and the wine is diluted. I had hoped to come across an old comrade-in-arms among the Emperor�s Praetors, or at least in the Fire Brigade of Rome, but now I wonder whether we�d even recognize each other. Woe to the conquered. I am like Priam in the ruins of Troy.� The innkeeper hurried up, his face shining with grease, and asked what the matter was. He assured us that in his house one could find horsemen from the circus, officials of the State archives, actors, and architects who were putting Rome�s sights in