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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 P"
Safe she would have been without any maid to watch her, for old Truttidius adored her. He was a small, hale, merry, wizened man, his seamed and wrinkled face brown as berry in spite of his lifelong habit of indoor labor and comparative inertia. He had more than a little tact and was an excellent listener. Brinnaria was entirely at ease with him.
"Our idea," said Lutorius, "was to arrange that Truttidius be present with a number of horse-hair sieves, practically with his whole stock of his best, and that one of those be chosen before the whole College of Pontiffs, perhaps by your Majesty, perhaps by some one of the altar-boys, blindfolded, if you like that idea, or in any other manner which seems good to you."
Behind the counter was the low stool from which Truttidius rose to chaffer with customers, and on which, when not occupied in trading, he sat at work, his bench and brazier by his side, his tools hanging on the wall by his hand, orderly in their neat racks or on their neat rows of hooks.
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.
"Go down the steps," said Commodus to Brinnaria, "and yourself take the sieve from him." Brinnaria, on the lower step, reached over the water, and grasped the rim of the sieve which Truttidius held out to her. She held it up to the light. Its web was of black and white horse-hair, each thread alternately of a different color.
I have arranged to have Truttidius convey some eighty horse-hair sieves to the water-front of the Marble Quay in a flat-bottomed row-boat, such as are used for bringing vegetables to the quays of the Forum Olitorium.
What was more, not one of their neighbors would impart any information about them. . Brinnaria's curiosity was aroused. She bethought herself of Truttidius, the sieve-maker, and of his intimate knowledge of all the dens and lairs in the city. She asked him. He laughed. "On the Fagutal?" he made sure, "at the second corner beyond the end of the Subura?" He laughed again.
"I don't," Brinnaria proclaimed emphatically, "but I have been thinking about Vestals ever since Daddy threatened me and scared me so; I've been thinking about Vestals and sieves. Did anybody ever really carry water in a sieve, Truttidius?" "Water in a sieve?" the old man exclaimed. "Not anybody that ever I saw. What do you mean?"
"If the excellence of the pastry demonstrates the virtue of the sieve let us consider it proved. I do not see, however, what the cakes have to do with it. But I am entirely willing to agree that Brinnaria is to use a horse-hair sieve made by Truttidius.
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