Looking at her beauty, I melt like wax before the fire.

And if she is dusky, what is that to me?

So are the coals, but when we light them,

They shine as bright as roses.

Valens sat down, took the proffered drink. In a crowded room full of good cheer, Iudex alone looked disapproving, as he quietly ate a melon and sipped water.

‘Cheer up, you old bugger,’ Clemens called over. ‘Even stern old Cato said a young man should visit a brothel, as long as he did not – like that whore-chasing Hatrene Hairan – make it his home.’

Iudex stopped eating. With the solemnity of a religious rite, he broke wind loudly.

‘Sanctimonious in public, but we know what your cult gets up to behind closed doors – at it like sparrows.’ Clemens winked, adopting a conspiratorial air. ‘They say you spread a lot of flour over the floor, and hump on top of it. The men pull out, shoot their load, and then you make bread out of the flour.’

‘A foolish calumny.’

‘A calumny? I need a dictionary to talk to you.’

A look of infinite sadness passed across Iudex’s features. ‘The Lord has spoken, but you are deaf. A man loses the divine light through semen. It is the fault of Eve. She was created for a diabolical purpose. When Adam saw her, garlanded and naked, he gave way to lust. From their copulation was born Seth, the ancestor of the sinful race of mankind. Adam repented, tore his hair, beat his breast. Woe to the maker of my body, the chainer of my soul, woe to me who is reduced to servitude!’

Clemens grinned. ‘Old Iudex is always such an adornment at a drinking party.’

All the men laughed, except Decimus. The horse master, becoming maudlin with the drink, did not join their merriment. He was hunched over the table, his gaze fixed on something no one else could see. As men often did in their cups, he too turned to verse.

Women are a curse,

They may be good in bed

But they are better off dead.

‘Gods below,’ Aulus broke in, ‘not more fucking poetry.’ His watery old eyes expressed utter contempt. ‘If a man has something to say, let him say it openly and straightforwardly. Poets are nearly as big liars as philosophers.’

Clemens shook his head. ‘You miserable bastards.’

A group of musicians had arrived, and were tuning their instruments.

Valens turned to Iudex. ‘You never drink?’

‘Wine is the evil bile of daemons.’

‘And I have never seen you eat meat.’

‘It is wrong to butcher animals.’

‘Because they are sacred?’

‘No, because they are filth.’

‘So you will not kill an animal, but a man?’

‘That is different.’ The musicians had started playing, and Iudex looked distracted.

Suddenly he leapt to his feet. Beaming, he placed one of his enormous hands on Valens’s shoulder. ‘Music and dance, nothing is holier in the sight of the Lord.’