Few
veteran privates heard and saw better than we.
When the Imperial cortege arrived and the platform began to fill, we two,
like the men around us and like, I feel sure, the entire gathering, were
amazed to see among the men four women, and Agathemer and I were doubly
amazed to recognize one as Marcia. Agathemer, who knew the former slaves
and present freedwomen of the Palace far better than I, whispered that the
others were the sister and wife of Perennis and the wife of Cleander, like
him a former slave and pampered freedman, and for long his rival.
The platform, of course, was lined and partly filled with aides, lictors,
equerries, pages, and other Imperial satellites before the Emperor rode
up, dismounted and appeared among his retinue. He strode springily to the
front and seated himself on the crimson cushion of the ivory curule seat
which a lictor placed for him. Marcia, to my tenfold amazement, then
seated herself on a not dissimilar maple folding-seat, spread for her by a
page. She was placed at the very front of the platform, next him on his
right. Next her was Cleander's wife, also, to my still greater amazement,
similarly seated, as were the two almost as ornately clad ladies with
Perennis, who sat on his left, he standing to the left of the Emperor, who
was set only a short yard in advance of the row of officials and intimates
who lined the front of the platform.
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