"You must have heard the story of Tuccia, the Vestal," Brinnaria wondered, wide-eyed. "She lived ages ago, before Hannibal invaded Italy, when everything was different. They said she was bad and she said it was a lie and they said she could not prove it was a lie and she said she could. She said if she was all she ought to be the G.o.ddess would show it by answering her prayer. And she took a sieve and walked down to the river, right by the end of the Sublician bridge, where the stairs are on the right-hand side. And the five other Vestals, and the flamens, and all the priests, and the Pontifex, and the consuls went with her. And she stood on the lowest step with her toes in the water and prayed out loud to the G.o.ddess to help her and show that she had told the truth and then she stooped over and dipped up water with her sacrificing ladle and poured it into the sieve and it didn't run through, and she dipped up more and more until the sieve was half full of water, as if it had been a pan. And then she hung her ladle at her girdle-hook and took the sieve in both hands and carried the water all the way to the temple. And everybody said that that proved that she had told the truth.

"That's the story. Had you ever heard it?"

"Yes, little lady," Truttidius said, "I have heard it."

"What I want to know," Brinnaria pursued, "is this: Is it a made-up story or is it a true story?"

"Little lady," spoke Truttidius, "it is impious to doubt the truth of pious stories handed down from days of old."

"That isn't answering my question," said the practical Brinnaria. "What I want you to tell me is to say right out plain do you believe it. Did anybody really ever carry water in a sieve?"

"You must remember, dear little lady," the sieve-maker said, "that she was a most holy priestess, most pleasing in the eyes of her G.o.ddess, that she was in dire straits and that she prayed to the G.o.ddess to aid her. The G.o.ddess helped her votary; the G.o.ds can do all things."

"The G.o.ds can do all things," Brinnaria echoed, her eyes flashing, "but the G.o.ds don't do all things, not even for their favorites. There are lots and lots of things no G.o.d ever did for any votary or ever will.

What I want to know is this: Is carrying water in a sieve one of the things the G.o.ds not only can do but do do? Did anybody ever carry water in a sieve truly?"

Truttidius smiled, his wrinkles doubling and quadrupling till his face was all a network of tiny folds of hard, dry skin. He put down his work and regarded his guest, his face serious after the fading of his brief smile. The soft-footed sandalled throng that packed the narrow street shuffled and padded by unnoticed. No customer interrupted them. They might have been alone in a Sibyl's cell on a mountain side.

"Little lady," spoke the sieve-maker, "you are, indeed, very old for your age, not only in height and build, but in heart and mind. What other child would bother her head about so subtle a problem? What other child would perceive the verity at the heart of the puzzle and put it so neatly in so few words? To you an old man cannot help talking as to an experienced matron, because to you an old man can talk as to a woman of sense. You deserve to be answered in the spirit of the question."

He reflected. Brinnaria, fascinated and curious, hardly breathed in her intentness, watching his face and waiting for his answer.

"Little lady," he said, after a long silence, "the G.o.ds can, indeed, do all things. But as you have yourself perceived the G.o.ds do not do all things, even for their favorites. The G.o.ds work miracles to vindicate their votaries, but as you divine, each miracle is the happening by the special ordinance of the G.o.ds of what might happen even without their mandate, but which does not happen because it is only once in countless ages that all the circ.u.mstances necessary to bring about that sort of happening concur to produce so unusual an effect. What folks call a miracle is the occurrence, by the beneficent will of heaven, at just the right time and place, of what might happen anywhere to any one, but almost never does happen anywhere to any one, because it is so unlikely that all things should conspire to bring about so unlikely a result.

"So of carrying water in a sieve.

"Anybody might carry water in a sieve any day. But very seldom, oh, very, very seldom can it come to pa.s.s that the kind of person capable of carrying water in a sieve can be just in the condition of muscle and mood to do so and can at just that moment be in possession of just the kind of sieve that will hold water and not let it through. For an actual breathing woman of flesh and blood to carry water in a real ordinary sieve of rush-fibres, or linen thread or horsehair or metal wire, in such a sieve as pastry-cooks use to sift their finest flour; for that to happen in broad daylight under the open sky before a crowd of onlookers, that requires the special intervention of the blessed G.o.ds, or of the most powerful of them. And not even all of them together could make that happen to a woman of ordinary quality of hand and eye, with a usual sieve, as most sieves are."

"Explain!" Brinnaria half whispered, "what kind of woman could actually carry water in a sieve and in what kind of a sieve, and under what circ.u.mstances?"

"That's three questions," Truttidius counted, "and one at a time is enough.

"In the first place, no G.o.d, not all the G.o.ds together, could give any votary power to carry water in a sieve, be it rush or linen or horse-hair or metal, of which the meshes had been first scrubbed with natron or embalmers' salt or wood-ashes or fullers' earth. Water would run through such a sieve, did even all the G.o.ds will that it be retained. No one ever dipped a sieve into water and brought it up with water in it and saw that water retained by the meshes. Once wet the under side of a sieve and water will run through to the last drop.

"But if a sieve were ever so little greasy or oily, not dripping with oil or clogged with grease, but greasy as a working slave's finger is greasy on a hot day; if such a sieve were free of any drop of water on the underside, if into such a sieve water were slowly and carefully poured, as you say that Tuccia in the story ladled water into her sieve with her libation-dipper, then that water might spread evenly over the meshes to the rim all around, might deepen till it was as deep as the width of two fingers or of three, and might be retained by the meshes even for an hour, even while the sieve was carried over a rough road, up hill and down, through crowded streets.

"But few are the women who could so carry a sieve of water or could even so hold it that the water would not run through at once."

"How could the water be retained at all?" queried Brinnaria the practical. "What is the explanation?"

Truttidius wrinkled up his face in deep thought.

"You have seen wine spilled at dinner," he ill.u.s.trated. "You have seen a drop of it or a splash of it fall on a sofa-cover, and you have seen it soak in and leave an ugly stain?"

"Of course," Brinnaria agreed, "often and often."

"And then again, not very often," the sieve-maker went on, "you see a patch of spilt wine stand up on a perfectly dry fabric and remain there awhile without soaking in, its surface shining wet and its edges gleaming round and smooth and curved, bright as a star. Well, the retaining of water in a sieve by the open meshes is like the momentary holding up of spilt wine on a woven fabric. I can't explain any better, but the two happenings are similar, only the not soaking in of the splashed liquid is far, oh, far more frequent, countless, uncountable times more frequent, than the sustaining of fluid in a sieve. But as the one can happen and does, so the other could happen and might."

"I see," Brinnaria breathed. "You have made me see that. Now, next point: How must the sieve be held?"

The old man smiled again.

"You keep close to the subject," he chuckled. "You talk like a grandmother of consuls. You have a head on your shoulders."

"That does not answer my question," Brinnaria persisted.

"Your question is easily answered," he said. "For the miracle to happen, in fact, the sieve must be held as level as the top rail of a mason's T-shaped plumb-line frame, and as steady as if clamped in a vise. For a woman to carry water in a sieve the weather must be dry, for in damp weather the water would run through the meshes, even if the threads or wires were just oily enough and not too oily, even if the meshes were just the right size to favor the forming in each mesh of a little pocket of water underneath, like the edges of the upstanding drop of wine on a sofa-cushion. I don't know how it comes to pa.s.s, but somehow, if all the conditions are right, little bags of water form on the underside of a sieve, one to each mesh, like drops after a rain hanging from the edge of my shop-shutters, or from the mutules on the cornice of a temple.

They are capable of sustaining one or even two finger-thicknesses of water on the upper side of the sieve-web. But if the sieve-web is unevenly woven or unevenly stretched, it will not retain water an instant, and if the sieve-web bags anywhere the water, even if the rest of the sieve-web promises to retain it, will run through at that point.

And even if the sieve is perfect, the slightest tilt, the very slightest tilt, will cause the little bags of water to break at the lowest point, and so start all the water to running through. I know; I have tried; I have seen the sieve hold up the water for some breaths. But for the marvel to last any length of time, that would require the intervention of the G.o.ds; that would be a miracle. For a woman to hold a sieve so that it would retain water would mean that her hand was as steady as the hand of a sleep-walker or of the priestess of Isis in her trance in the great yearly mystery-festival. That could happen seldom to any woman; such a woman would be rare."

"I see," Brinnaria barely whispered, so intent was she on the old man's words. "Now, what kind of woman could do such a wonder?"

"A very exceptional and unusual kind of woman," the old man declared.

"Women, the run of them, are not steady-handed. Even steady-handed women are easily distracted, their attention is readily called away from any definite task. Even a woman usually steady-handed would find her hand tremble if she were conscious of guilt, even a woman high-hearted with her sense of her own worthiness might glance aside at some one in a great crowd of people about her, might let her thoughts wander.

"That is where the miracle would come in. Only a woman directly favored by the mighty G.o.ds could so ignore the throng about her, could so forget herself, could so concentrate all her faculties on the receptacle she held, could so perfectly control her muscles or could so completely let her muscles act undisturbed by her will, could possess muscles capable of so long tension at so perfect an adjustment."

"I see," Brinnaria sighed. "The thing may have happened in fact, may happen again, but it could happen only once out of ten times ten thousand times ten thousand chances. I understand. It is a possibility in the ordinary course of events. It was a miracle if it ever took place; it will be a miracle if it ever comes to pa.s.s again. It is not impossible, but it's too improbable for anybody to believe it could be, in fact."

"You have it," the sieve-maker a.s.sured her.

"I'm glad I have," she said. "Now it'll go out of my head and quit bothering me. I've thought about it day and night ever since Daddy threatened me. Now I'll forget it and sleep sound."

CHAPTER III - STUTTERING

When Brinnaria returned from her outing she found waiting for her her best friend, chum and crony, Flexinna, a girl four years older, not so tall, decidedly more slender and much prettier. Brinnaria was robustly handsome; Flexinna was delicately lovely, yet they did not differ much in tints of hair, eyes or skin and might have been sisters. In fact, they were not infrequently taken for sisters.

They chatted of their girlish interests and of local gossip and family news, like any pair of girls, until Brinnaria described the escapade that led to her rustication.

Flexinna's eyes were wide and wider as she listened.

"D-d-do-you really m-m-mean," she stuttered, "that you had a c-c-chance to be a V-V-Vestal and d-d-didn't jump at it?"

"Jump at it!" exclaimed Brinnaria. "I jumped away from it! I can't think of anything, except death, that would fill me with more horror than the very idea of being made a Vestal. It makes me shiver now just to speak of it."

"You're a f-f-fool," Flexinna declared, "the f-f-foolest kind of a f-f-fool. This is the f-f-first f-f-foolish thing I ever knew you to d-d-do. I always th-th-thought you s-s-so s-s-sensible, t-t-too.

And you've m-m-missed a ch-ch-chance to be a V-V-Vestal. I've n-n-no p-p-patience with you. Any other g-g-girl would j-j-jump at the ch-ch-chance."

"Jump at it!" cried Brinnaria. "Why?"

"Why?" sneered Flexinna, blazing with excitement. "Why, just think what you've m-m-missed! You're as wild as I am to see g-g-gladiators fight, k-k-keener than I am to see a real horse-race in the circus, and you'll have to wait until you're g-g-grown up, as I'll have to, before you s-s-see either. And you'd have g-g-gone to every spectacle, from the very day you were t-t-taken, and not have m-m-missed one. Think of it!

F-F-Front seats in the circus, front seats in the amphitheatre, all your life, or for thirty years at least, for certain! And you've m-m-missed it. And that's not half. Your lictor to c-c-clear the way for you whenever you g-g-go out and your choice to g-g-go out in your litter with eight b-b-bearers or in your c-c-carriage, your own c-c-carriage, all your own, and the right to d-d-drive any where in the city any d-d-day in the year. Oh, you f-f-fool, you s-s-silly f-f-fool! A ch-ch-chance to be one of the s-s-seven m-m-most imp-p-portant women in Rome, one of the s-s-six who are on a level with the Empress, and you m-m-missed it! Fancy it; to b-b-be mistress of an income so large that it m-m-makes you d-d-dizzy to think of it, and you throw away the ch-ch-chance! To be able the m-m-moment you were taken, to m-m-make your own w-w-will! To have every legacy c-c-cadger in Rome running after you and m-m-making you p-p-presents and d-d-doing you favors and angling for your n-n-notice all your 1-l-life 1-1-long, and you m-m-miss the ch-ch-chance!"

"Yes," Brinnaria admitted, reflectively, "I have missed all that, that's so. But that's not all there is to think of, when you think about being a Vestal. I've missed a lot of fine privileges, mighty valuable to any girl that would care for that sort of thing; but I've escaped a lot of things that would go with those privileges. I love bright colors, I always did and I look ghastly in white--I look like a ghost. And I'd have had to wear white and nothing else, even white flowers, like a corpse. And a Vestal has to keep her eyes on the ground and walk slow and stately and stand straight and dignified, and talk soft and low. I'd suffer, even if I could learn all the tricks they teach them as well as Gargilia has. And I don't believe I ever could. I'd keep my eyes cast down for a month or a year and then, right in the middle of a sacrifice, I'd see something funny, like the gander squawking under the feet of the pall-bearers at poor old Gibba's funeral at the farm last summer, and I'd wink at the head Vestal or roll my eyes at the whole congregation and spoil the prayers; or, after keeping meek and mum for a year or so I'd be so wild to laugh that I'd roar right out and break up the whole service. I think I'm the last girl alive to be a Vestal. A Vestal mustn't answer back or make a pun, no matter how good a chance she gets.

I just can't help cutting in, if I see a chance; the words come out of my mouth before I know it, and, if I trained myself to keep still and look as mild as a lamb, I'd be boiling inside and sometime I'd burst out with a yell just to relieve my feelings or I'd jab a shawl-pin into the Pontifex to see him jump, or put out my toe and trip up somebody just to see him sprawl. I couldn't help it. The more I'd bottle myself up the farther the naughtiness in me would spurt when it burst through the skin. I know. No Vestaling for me! I wasn't born for that trade!"