The Grass Crown

by Colleen McCullough

  "Only if the House gives it to me by a clear majority, Quintus Lutatius. Not otherwise," said Sulla.

  "Then let there be a division," said Flaccus Princeps Senatus.

  Only three men stood in opposition when the senators trooped from their makeshift places in this makeshift meeting chamber—Gaius Marius, Lucius Cornelius Cinna, and the tribune of the plebs Publius Sulpicius Rufus.

  "I don't believe it!" muttered the censor Crassus to his colleague, Lucius Caesar. "Sulpicius?"

  "He's been acting most peculiarly ever since the news of the massacre came," said Lucius Caesar. "Keeps saying—well, you've heard him!—that Mithridates made no distinction between Romans and Italians. I imagine he's now regretting the fact that he was one who never wanted to see the Italians enfranchised."

  "Why should that prompt him to stand with Gaius Marius?"

  Lucius Caesar shrugged. "I don't know, Publius Licinius! I really don't know."

  Sulpicius stood with Marius and Cinna because they stood against the Senate. For no other reason. When he had heard the news from Rutilius Rufus in Smyrna, Sulpicius had undergone a profound change, and had not managed since to live without pain. Without guilt. Without an agonized confusion of mind that could get little further than one fact: a foreign king had made no distinction between the men of Rome and the men of Italy. And if a foreign king lumped Romans and Italians together, then in the eyes of the rest of the world there was no difference between them. The nature and activities of the one were the same as the other.

  An ardent patriot and intensely conservative, when the war against the Italians had broken out Sulpicius had espoused the Roman cause with all his considerable heart. A quaestor in the year Drusus had died, he had found himself entrusted with increasingly responsible duties—and had acquitted himself brilliantly. Thanks to his own efforts, many Italians had died. Thanks to his consenting to it, the inhabitants of Asculum Picentum had suffered more terribly than barbarians deserved to suffer. Those thousands of little Italian boys who had walked in Pompey Strabo's triumphal parade, and then been ejected from the city without food, clothing, or money, to live or to die according to the strength of will in their immature bodies. Who did Rome think she was, to inflict such terrible punishment upon people who were kinsfolk? How did Rome truly differ from the King of Pontus? His attitude at least was unequivocal! He at least had not shrouded his motives in righteousness and superiority. Nor for that matter had Pompey Strabo. It was the Senate had equivocated.

  Oh, what was right? Who was right? If one Italian man, one Italian woman, one Italian child had managed to survive the massacre and turned up in Rome, how could he, Publius Sulpicius Rufus, ever look that poor survivor in the face?

  How did he, Publius Sulpicius Rufus, truly differ from King Mithridates? Had he not killed many thousands of Italians? Had he not been a legate under Pompey Strabo, and consented to that man's atrocities?

  But amid all this pain and confusion inside Sulpicius's mind there were also coherent thoughts—or rather, thoughts he felt were coherent, valid, logical.

  Rome was not really to blame. The Senate was. The men of his own class, including himself. In the Senate—in himself!—lay the wellsprings of Roman exclusivity. The Senate had murdered his friend Marcus Livius Drusus. The Senate had stopped giving out the Roman citizenship in the aftermath of the war against Hannibal. The Senate authorized the destruction of Fregellae. The Senate, the Senate, the Senate ... The men of his own class. Including himself.

  Well, they would now have to pay. Including himself. It was time, decided Sulpicius, that the Senate of Rome ceased to be. No more ancient ruling families, no more wealth and power concentrated in the hands of so few that injustices as monumental as the Italian injustice could be perpetrated to an ultimate end. We are wrong, he thought. We must pay. The Senate has to go. Rome must be handed over to the People, who are our pawns, for all that we insist they are sovereign. Sovereign? Not while there's a Senate! While there is ever a Senate, the People's sovereignty is in name only. Not the Head Count, of course. The People. The men of the Second and Third and Fourth Classes, who are by far the largest bulk of Romans, yet have the least power. The truly wealthy and powerful knights of the First Class are indistinguishable from the Senate in every way. So they too must go.

  Standing with Marius and Cinna (Why was Cinna in opposition? What tied him to Gaius Marius all of a sudden?), Sulpicius looked at the packed mass of senators facing him. There stood his good friends Gaius Aurelius Cotta (appointed a senator at twenty-eight because the censors had taken Sulla's words to heart and were trying to fill that exclusive body, the Senate, with appropriate men) and the junior consul, Quintus Pompeius Rufus, dutifully clustered with the rest—couldn't they see their guilt? Why did they stare at him as if he were the guilty one? But he was! He was! He knew it. They had absolutely no idea.

  And if they do not understand, thought Sulpicius, then I will bide my time until this new war—oh, why are we always at war?—is organized. Men like Quintus Lutatius and Lucius Cornelius Sulla will be a part of it, they will not be in Rome to oppose me. I will wait. I will bide my time. And kill the Senate. Kill the First Class.

  "Lucius Cornelius Sulla," said Flaccus Princeps Senatus, "take command of the war against Mithridates in the name of the Senate and the People of Rome."

  "Only where are we to find the money?" asked Sulla later over dinner in his new house.

  With him were the Brothers Caesar, the flamen Dialis Lucius Cornelius Merula, the censor Publius Licinius Crassus, the banker and merchant Titus Pomponius, the banker Gaius Oppius, Quintus Mucius Scaevola Pontifex Maximus, and Marcus Antonius Orator, just returned to the Senate after a protracted illness. Sulla's guest list was designed to answer his question—if it could be answered at all.

  "Is there nothing in the Treasury?" asked Antonius Orator, unable to believe this. "I mean, we all know how the urban quaestors and the tribunes of the Treasury behave— they're forever insisting that the place is empty when there's actually plenty."

  "Believe it, Marcus Antonius, there is nothing," said Sulla firmly. "I've been to the Treasury myself several times—and I've been very careful not to let anyone know I was coming."

  "What about the temple of Ops?" asked Catulus Caesar.

  "Empty too."

  "Well," said Scaevola Pontifex Maximus, "there is the gold hoarded by the Kings of Rome against just such an emergency."

  "What gold?" asked several in chorus, including Sulla.

  "I didn't know about it myself until I became Pontifex Maximus, honestly!" said Scaevola defensively. "It's in the basement of the temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus— about—oh, something under two hundred talents."

  "Wonderful!" said Sulla ironically. "No doubt when Servius Tullius was King of Rome, that was enough to fund the war to end all wars. Nowadays it's about enough to keep four legions in the field for six months. I'd better hurry!"

  "It's a start," said Titus Pomponius comfortably.

  "Why can't you bankers lend the State a couple of thousand talents?" asked Crassus Censor, who loved money dearly, but had not nearly as much of it as he wanted—just the tin concessions across Spain, and he'd been too busy to police those as closely as they needed.

  "Because we don't have it to lend," said Oppius patiently.

  “Also, most of us use banks in Asia Province for housing our surplus reserves—which means, I have no doubt, that Mithridates is now the owner of our reserves," said Titus Pomponius, and sighed.

  "You must have money here!" said Crassus Censor, snorting.

  "We do. But not enough to lend the State," maintained Oppius.

  "Res facta or res ficta?”

  "Fact, Publius Licinius, truly."

  "Does everyone here agree that this present crisis is even more serious than the Italian crisis?'' asked Lucius Cornelius Merula, priest of Jupiter.

  "Yes, yes!" snapped Sulla. "Having interviewed the man in person once, flamen Dialis, I can assure you that if M
ithridates is not stopped, he will crown himself King of Rome!"

  "Then since we would never get permission from the People to sell off the ager publicus, there's only one more way to raise money short of imposing new taxes," said Merula.

  "What?"

  "We can sell all the property the State still owns in the vicinity of the Forum Romanum. We don't have to go to the People to do that."

  An appalled silence descended.

  "We couldn't be selling the State's assets at a worse time," said Titus Pomponius mournfully. "It's a buyer's market."

  "I'm afraid I don't even know what land the State owns around the Forum except for the priests' houses," said Sulla, "and we can't possibly sell them."

  "I agree, to sell them would be nefas," said Merula, who lived in one of the State Houses. "However, there is other property. The slopes of the Capitol inside the Fontinalis Gate, and also facing the Velabrum. Prime land for big houses. There is also a large tract which includes the general market and the Macellum Cuppedenis. Both areas could be subdivided."

  "I refuse to countenance the sale of everything," said Sulla strongly. "The market areas, yes. They're just markets and a playing field for the College of Lictors. Some of the Capitol—facing the Velabrum west of the Clivus Capitolinus—and from the Fontinalis Gate down as far as the Lautumiae. But nothing on the Forum itself, and nothing on the Capitol facing the Forum itself.''

  "I'll buy the markets," said Gaius Oppius.

  "Only if no one offers more," said Pomponius, whose mind had been running the same way. "To be fair about it—and to get the best price—everything will have to be auctioned."

  "Perhaps we should try to keep the general market area and sell only the Cuppedenis market," said Sulla, who found himself loathing the need to auction off such wonderful assets.

  "I think you're right, Lucius Sulla," said Catulus Caesar.

  "I agree with that," said Lucius Caesar.

  "If we sell the Cuppedenis, I suppose that will mean increased rents for the spice and flower merchants," said Antonius Orator. "They won't thank us!"

  But Sulla had thought of another alternative. "How about we borrow the money?" he asked.

  "Where?" asked Merula suspiciously.

  "From the temples of Rome. Pay them back out of the spoils. Juno Lucina, Venus Libitina, Juventas, Ceres, Juno Moneta, Magna Mater, Castor and Pollux, both Jupiter Stators, Diana, Hercules Musarum, Hercules Olivarius— they're all rich."

  "No!" cried Scaevola and Merula together.

  A quick glance from face to face told Sulla he would get no support from anyone. "All right, then, if you won't let Rome's temples pay for my campaign, would you object to the temples of Greece?" he asked.

  Scaevola frowned. “Nefas is nefas, Lucius Sulla. The gods are the gods, in Greece or in Rome."

  "Yes, but Greece's gods are not Rome's gods, now are they?"

  "Temples are sacrosanct," said Merula stubbornly.

  Out leaped the other creature inside Sulla; it was the first time some of those present had seen it, and it terrified them. "Listen," he said, teeth showing, "you can't have it all ways, and that goes for the gods too! I'll grant you the gods of Rome, but there's not one man here who doesn't understand how much it costs to keep legions in the field! If we can scrape two hundred talents of gold together, I can get six legions as far as Greece. That's a pretty paltry force to pit against a quarter of a million Pontic soldiers—and I would remind you that a Pontic soldier is not a naked German barbarian! I've seen the troops of Mithridates, and they are armed and trained much like Roman legionaries. Not as good, I imagine, but far better than naked German barbarians if only because they are protected by armor and trained to discipline. Like Gaius Marius in the field, I intend to keep my men alive. And that means money for forage and money for the upkeep of all equipment. Money we don't have—money you won't allow the gods of Rome to give me. So I am warning you—and I mean every word!— when I reach Greece, I take the money I need from Olympia, Dodona, Delphi, and anywhere else I can find it. Which means, flamen Dialis, Pontifex Maximus, that you'd better put in some hard work with our Roman gods, and hope that these days they have more clout than the Greek gods!"

  No one said a word.

  The creature disappeared. "Good!" said Sulla cheerfully. "Now I have more happy news for you, just in case you think that's the end of it."

  Catulus Caesar sighed. "I am all agog, Lucius Cornelius. Pray tell us."

  "I shall take my own four legions with me, plus two of the legions Gaius Marius trained and Lucius Cinna is presently using. The Marsi are a spent force, Cinna doesn't need troops. Gnaeus Pompeius Strabo will do whatever he wants to do, and as long as he refrains from sending in wages bills, I for one do not intend to waste time arguing with him. That means there are still some ten legions to demobilize—and pay out. With money we certainly will not have," said Sulla. "For that reason, I intend to legislate to pay out these soldiers with land in Italian areas whose populations we have virtually extirpated. Pompeii. Faesulae. Hadria. Telesia. Grumentum. Bovianum. Six empty towns surrounded by reasonable farming land. Districts which will belong to the ten legions I have to discharge."

  "But that's ager publicus!" cried Lucius Caesar.

  "Not yet, it isn't. Nor is it going to become public land," said Sulla. "It's going to the soldiers. Unless, that is, you intend to change your pious and devout minds about the temples of Rome?" he asked sweetly.

  "We cannot," said Scaevola Pontifex Maximus.

  “Then when my legislation is promulgated you had better swing both the Senate and the People on my side," said Sulla.

  "We will uphold you," said Antonius Orator.

  "And, while we're on the subject of ager publicus," Sulla went on, "don't start declaring it while I'm away. When I come back with my legions, I will want more deserted Italian districts to settle them on."

  In the end, Rome's finances did not stretch to six legions. Sulla's army was determined at five legions and two thousand horse, not a man or an animal more. When all the gold was put together it weighed nine thousand pounds—not even two hundred talents. A pittance indeed, but the best a bankrupt Rome could do. Sulla's war chest didn't even extend to the commissioning of one single fighting galley; it would barely cover the cost of hiring transports to get his men to Greece, the destination he thought he would prefer to western Macedonia. Not, however, that he intended to make settled plans until he heard more about the situation in Asia Minor and Greece. His mind inclined the way it did because in Greece lay the richest temples.

  And at the end of September, Sulla was finally able to leave Rome to join his legions in Capua. He had interviewed his trusted and devoted military tribune, Lucius Licinius Lucullus, and asked him if he would be willing to stand for election as a quaestor if Sulla asked for his services by name. Delighted, Lucullus indicated that he would, whereupon Sulla sent him ahead to Capua as his deputy until he could come himself. Mired down in auctioning State property and in organizing his six soldier colonies, it seemed throughout the month of September that Sulla would never manage to get away. That he did was due to iron will and ruthless driving of his senatorial colleagues, all of whom were fascinated; somehow Sulla had always escaped their attention as a potential high leader.

  "Overshadowed by Marius and Scaurus," said Antonius Orator.

  "No, he just didn't have a reputation," said Lucius Caesar.

  "And whose fault was that?" sneered Catulus Caesar.

  "Mostly Gaius Marius's, I suppose," said his brother.

  "He certainly knows what he wants," said Antonius Orator.

  "That he does," said Scaevola, and shivered. "I would hate to get on the wrong side of him!"

  Which was exactly what Young Caesar was thinking as he lay in his ceiling hiding place and watched and listened to his mother and Lucius Cornelius Sulla talking.

  "I'm off tomorrow, Aurelia, and I don't like going away without seeing you," he said.

  "I don't like your
going without seeing me," she answered.

  "No Gaius Julius?"

  "He's off with Lucius Cinna among the Marsi."

  "Picking up the pieces," nodded Sulla.

  "You're looking very well, Lucius Cornelius, in spite of all your difficulties. I take it this marriage is turning out happily."

  "Either that, or I'm becoming more uxorious."

  "Rubbish! You'll never be uxorious."

  "How is Gaius Marius taking his defeat?"

  Aurelia pursed her lips. "Not without much grumbling to the family," she said. "You are not terribly popular with him."

  "I didn't expect to be. But he surely admits that I acted in a temperate way, didn't chase after the command with slavering tongue and frenzied lobbying."

  "You didn't need to," said Aurelia, "and that's why he's so upset. He isn't used to Rome's having an alternative war leader. Until you won the Grass Crown, he was always the only one. Oh, his enemies in the Senate were very powerful and thwarted him most of the time, but he knew he was the only one. He knew in the end they would have to use him. Now he's old and sick, and there's you. He's afraid you'll take away his support among the knights."

  "Aurelia, he's finished! Not without honor, not without great fame. But it's over for him. Why can't he see that?"

  "I suppose were he younger and in better mental condition, he would see it. The trouble is that his strokes have affected his mind—or so Julia thinks."

  "She'd know more surely and sooner than anyone else," said Sulla, and rose to go. "How is your family?"

  "Very well."

  "Your boy?"

  "Irrepressible. Unquenchable. Indomitable. I try to keep his feet on the earth, but it's very difficult," said Aurelia.

  But my feet are on the ground, Mama! thought Young Caesar, wriggling out of his nest as soon as Sulla and Aurelia disappeared. Why is it that you always think me a feather, a crystal dandelion ball floating in the wind?

  2

  Thinking that Sulla would not waste time getting himself and his troops across the Adriatic ahead of winter's unfavorable winds, Publius Sulpicius struck his first blow against the established order of things halfway through October. Of preparation he had little save within his own mind; for someone without love for demagogues, it was impossible to cultivate the art of the demagogue. He had, however, taken the precaution of seeking an interview with Gaius Marius and asking for Marius's support. No lover of the Senate, Gaius Marius! Nor was Sulpicius disappointed in his reception. After listening to what Sulpicius proposed to do, Marius nodded.