I brush aside my irritation at his reminder. The young always advance upon their elders, hands outstretched to take honours for themselves, and I feel a surge of sympathy for Ilicius Tetricus, whose protege has outgrown him.
But such feelings of self-pity hardly suit a Roman consul. I should be thinking instead of men such as Ursus Parthicus, who though young no longer still wins glories to his name.
"I am sure I shall," he answers my jab, "by celebrating the beauty of my wife and the bounty of my household." My blow is turned deftly back upon me. I know I should seek a wife, for word is spreading. Indeed, only the petty scandals of such as Crassipes have kept the rumours of my personal life from spreading.
"Your household is rightly the envy of many," I tell him coolly. "But," he adds after, with an open sort of grin, "I will confess I prefer the feasts of Lady Venus's son to those of his mother."
Sulpicius Allectus is something of a sybarite, it is true, but he does not lack for a certain masculine grace. I understand well what Tetricus sees in the patrician strength of his features. "Cupid's arrows strike too sharply," I tell him lightly, "so that men are deprived of their reason. Even the god himself was not immune, as with Psyche." I smile slyly. "Apollo's affairs suit my own nature more closely."
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But such feelings of self-pity hardly suit a Roman consul. I should be thinking instead of men such as Ursus Parthicus, who though young no longer still wins glories to his name.
"I am sure I shall," he answers my jab, "by celebrating the beauty of my wife and the bounty of my household." My blow is turned deftly back upon me. I know I should seek a wife, for word is spreading. Indeed, only the petty scandals of such as Crassipes have kept the rumours of my personal life from spreading.
"Your household is rightly the envy of many," I tell him coolly. "But," he adds after, with an open sort of grin, "I will confess I prefer the feasts of Lady Venus's son to those of his mother."
Sulpicius Allectus is something of a sybarite, it is true, but he does not lack for a certain masculine grace. I understand well what Tetricus sees in the patrician strength of his features. "Cupid's arrows strike too sharply," I tell him lightly, "so that men are deprived of their reason. Even the god himself was not immune, as with Psyche." I smile slyly. "Apollo's affairs suit my own nature more closely."