For some time the party sat chatting in the dusk; then two slaves came in with torches and lighted the lamps of the twelve statues; two others lighted up the arcades so that the painted walls and their purplish backgrounds were visible far across the court-yard. A flute-player from Cumae now played to them in a tender mode; she stood in the entrance, dressed in the Greek fashion, with her abundant hair gathered into a knot and her slender fingers gliding up and down the stops of the instrument. Her features were sweet and pleasing, her manner soft and harmonious; only from time to time a strange expression of weariness and absence of mind passed over her face. When she had done playing, she was conducted by Baucis to the back gate. She took the piece of silver which she received in payment with an air of indifference, and then bent her way down the hill towards Cumae, which already lay in darkness.
“Allow me to ask,” said Herodianus to Quintus, “what is the name of this tunefully-gifted damsel?”
“She is called Euterpe, after the muse who presides over her art.”
“Her name is Arachne,” added Lucilia, “but Euterpe sounds more poetical.”
“Euterpe!” breathed the worthy Herodianus. “Heavenly consonance! Is she a Greek?”
“She is from Etruria, and was formerly the slave of Marcus Cocceius Nerva, who freed her. She married in Cumae not long since.”
“As strictly historical as the annals of Tacitus,” laughed Claudia.
“I heard it all from Baucis.”
“Wretched old magpie!” exclaimed Quintus, intentionally raising his voice. “If she could not gossip, she would lose the breath of life.”
“By all the gods, my lord!” exclaimed Baucis, laying her hands on her heart, “you are calumniating me greatly—do you grudge me a little harmless chat? All-merciful Isis! am I to close my lips with wax? No, by Typhon[84] the cruel! Besides, I must instruct the daughters of the house; it is for that that I eat the bitter crust of dependence in my old age. Oh! Baucis knows her duties; have I not taught Claudia to sing and play the cithara? Have I not taught Lucilia more than a dozen Egyptian formulas and charms? and now I add to this a little sprinkling of knowledge of the world and of men—and you call it gossip! You young men of the present day are polite, I must say!”