SPQR VIII: The River God's Vengeance

by John Maddox Roberts

  “You’re learning to think like a criminal, Hermes, but I suppose it must come naturally to you. Now I am wondering who the man in the hooded cloak might have been and why Lucilius went up to that room with Galatea.”

  “The man in the hood was probably Folius,” Hermes said. “The girl and the big slave were his property. And as for going upstairs with Galatea, I know why I’d have been going up there with her.”

  “No doubt. But you shouldn’t always jump at the easiest answer. There are too many people involved in this.”

  “What, then?”

  “I was thinking about Lucilius’s dying words.” Ahead of us I could see the torches burning along the parapets of the Sublician Bridge. Beneath them people were still watching the ominous rise of the river.

  “You mean ‘?lthy dog?’ What—oh, I see what you mean.”

  The boy still had much to learn. It had just occurred to him what had occurred to me the moment Asklepiodes had said it. The Greek physician, whose ear for Latin was not as perfect as he liked to think, had heard the gritted, dying words of Lucilius incorrectly.

  He hadn’t been saying canis. He had been saying Caninus.

  11

  WAIT,” I SAID AS HERMES WAS about to set his foot on the bridge.

  He turned. “What?”

  “Go upriver. We’re going to cross at the Cestian Bridge.”

  “We’re going to the Island?”

  “Well, I suppose we could jump into the river instead, but ordinarily if you cross the Cestian, you end up at the Island.” The long, puzzling, fatiguing day had reduced me to second-rate sarcasm.

  “Whatever you say.” He turned left and preceded me along the embankment, which on this side of the river was well above the waterline. As Ogulnius had told me, the current was far slower and less destructive here on the inner curve of the river bend than on the opposite bank. I do not know why this should be, but perhaps it is rather like the way the hub of a chariot seems to be turning rather slowly, while the rim, which is still part of the same wheel, is turning furiously. I decided I would have to ask a philosopher about this sometime.

  Whatever the reason, the water that fiowed by below us was almost tranquil, while that in the center of the stream had grown turbulent. Light from the moon and the torches on the bridges revealed a good deal of wrack from the fiooding upstream. I saw no full-grown trees, but there was a fair amount of brush and what appeared to be drowned animals. Once, we saw a straw hut, such as shepherds use, fioat by, bottom up, like some bizarre boat.

  You would have expected a great deal of noise to accompany such a spectacle, but that was not the case. Father Tiber worked to accomplish his mysterious purpose rather quietly. There was a mild, pleasant murmur of rushing water at the points of the breakwaters that protected the upstream sides of the bridges and an occasional scrape as a fioating log struck a bridge or embankment; otherwise, it was almost as quiet as a normal night.

  It took us only a few minutes to walk the distance between the Sublician and Aemilian bridges, the whole way passing sightseers and fishermen who were still dragging their boats to safety. Ordinarily, the bulk of the population went to bed as soon as it was dark, but not on this night.

  Past the Aemilian, the river took a sharp turn leftward, to the west. Here the two branches of the Tiber rejoined after splitting around the Island. It was a somewhat longer walk to the Cestian Bridge, which joined the Island to the west bank as the new Fabrician joined it to the eastern one. This stretch was lonelier, with little but open fields to our left, since that area had yet to be developed. Farmers still kept market gardens there.

  The Island devoted to the God of Healing rode like an oversized ship in the middle of the fiood, and that is not just a fanciful simile. The gigantic retaining walls and breakwaters at the ends of its elliptical length were constructed in the shape of a galley, with the prow facing upstream. With the Tiber now foaming over its huge, marble ram, it gave the incredible impression of speeding away from us.

  The uncanny sight seemed to fill Hermes with superstitious dread. “Should we go over there?”

  “It’s just an illusion,” I assured him, a little unsettled myself. “That island’s not going anywhere. It was right in that spot before Romulus showed up, without all the fancy stonework, of course. If it were really moving, it would be tugging at the bridges, wouldn’t it?” I slapped a parapet, almost as much to reassure myself as him. “See? Perfectly solid. Now, come on.”

  “I didn’t really think it was moving,” he muttered under his breath.

  As we climbed the steps of the temple, I admired the fires blazing in the new, bronze braziers before the doors. I could tell from the brightness of the fiames and the thin smoke that they were burning high-quality wood. Even as we passed by, an elderly slave tossed a split log into one of them, sending a column of glittering sparks skyward.

  Inside the temple, the statue of the benign god Aesculapius stood vigil over a small crowd of sufferers. Most of them lay on pallets spread on the fioor, although a few wealthy patients had brought proper beds with them and were attended by slaves. Others, unable to sleep, sat on their blankets, hunched into knots of abject misery. All these unfortunates would sleep before the god in hope that he would send them dreams indicating a cure for their ailments. The priests were expected to be expert in interpreting these dreams.

  I found the high priest, Gavius, in consultation with some of the others before the statue. All wore their full vestments, as if for a nighttime ceremony. Aesculapius was a god associated with both the upper world through his father, Apollo, and with the lower through his tutelary serpent, so he was accorded both daytime and nighttime services and both white and black animals were sacrificed to him, usually cocks. All over the walls were hung models, usually clay, of hands, feet, eyes, and various other members and organs. These were dedicated to the god in thanks for cures to the represented parts. Every few years all this clutter had to be cleared out, and the offerings were cast into a special, sanctified pit.

  “Aedile!” Gavius said, when he saw me. “We hardly expected to see you here at this hour.” He was a very dignified old man, whose obscure but patrician family had supplied priests for the temple since its founding. Even before Aesculapius arrived in Italy, they had been priests of an earlier healing god. “We were just consulting about what measures to take should the river rise high enough to swamp the Island.”

  “Has that ever happened before?” I asked him.

  “No, but who are we to tell Father Tiber how high he may rise?”

  “That is very true.”

  He shook his head sadly. “Many of us feel that we are overdue for a chastening from the gods, with so much sacrilege and uncleanness in the City. And what god is closer to Rome than Tiberinus? He was ancient when Romulus reared the first walls here. The other gods have many worshippers throughout Italy and the world. Father Tiber is ours alone.”

  “A very pertinent point,” I said. “Actually, I am here to speak with the slave-priest Harmodias. Could you have him summoned?”

  “I would be most happy to.” He beckoned for an acolyte and whispered something in his ear. The boy dashed off on silent, bare feet. “Might I inquire what this concerns?”

  “I left a slave here in his care. The man was a survivor of the insula collapse three nights ago.”

  “Oh, yes, I heard of the matter. The unfortunate fellow died and was taken away, I understand.”

  “Exactly. There are some circumstances of his death I need to know about.”

  It seemed that we had a little wait, and something the dutiful old priest had said was beginning to blossom in my mind. “Revered Gavius, you spoke of the ritual pollution of the City a moment ago.”

  “Oh, yes, a most serious matter.”

  “I agree, and I think something needs to be done about it. If I were to go to the Senate and propose that a special court be held to prosecute those responsible for this terrible state of affairs, would you and the other
high priests and ?amines be willing to back me on this?”

  “I think it is a splendid idea. Now, the Pontifex Maximus is away from Rome—”

  “I think Julius Caesar, my uncle by marriage,” throwing that in for effect, “will approve. I’ll send a messenger to him at first light.”

  “Then as soon as the condition of the City permits, I will call for a meeting of the priesthoods to discuss this matter. It is customary to convene such a meeting following a disaster anyway, since we must know how we have offended the gods.”

  “Venerable Gavius, my report will detail exactly how we have offended Father Tiber.”

  The boy returned, and Gavius bent low while the acolyte whispered in his ear. Everyone spoke quietly in this temple. The old man straightened. “This is strange. I am told that Harmodias went out to the fields on the west bank to find some healing herbs he required. He has not been seen since.”

  “When was this?”

  “Yesterday afternoon.”

  “That is most odd,” I said, thinking that it was not odd in the least. He had fied right after I’d spoken with him, afraid to be exposed for his part in the killing of the slave. I took my leave of the old man and went out through the broad front doors.

  For a while I stood on the fine porch at the top of the steps. There were times when I found it difficult to believe in the gods, when they seemed like the childish creation of frightened peasants, trying desperately to control forces they did not understand. There were other times when the gods seemed very close. The river in this condition made them seem very close indeed.

  I wondered what the gods wanted of us, and whether they were really pleased with the bribes we offered them: all those bulls and boars, the rams and horses and birds, the occasional dog. Did they really find this pleasing, or was it just blood and feathers and smoke?

  Each May, the Vestals cast twenty-four straw mannikins off the Sublician Bridge as an offering to Tiberinus, imploring him not to fiood. Once, those had been human sacrifices. Maybe, I thought, we should go back to human sacrifice. I could think of several candidates to go into the first batch of twenty-four.

  A sudden noise shook me from my reverie. The old slave had tossed another log into one of the bronze baskets. Again the plume of sparks rushed skyward.

  “Why are you burning so much expensive wood, old man?” Hermes asked him. “There’s hardly anyone here to see it.”

  “The man who restored the temple and donated these fine braziers here paid to have first-rate firewood burned in them all night for five years.”

  “That’s extravagant,” I commented. “Is this to honor the god? Was the man granted a cure here?”

  The old slave gave me a gap-toothed smile. It was the utterly cynical smile of the true Roman. “If you ask me, the rich bugger just wants to make sure everyone can read his name no matter what time it is.”

  He jerked a thumb upward and the two of us raised our gazes. On the broad, low-peaked triangle of the pediment, surrounded by ornamental carving and smaller inscriptions, beautifully illuminated by the fiames was a name. It was spelled out in huge letters, as is the right of a man who has restored a public building:

  M. VAL. MESSALA.

  This explained a few things. Messala, the great benefactor of the temple, would have had the run of the place. No difficulty then to suborn as many low-level priests as he needed to carry out a murder in the temple and dispose of the body afterward.

  We paused on the Island side of the Fabrician Bridge.

  “What was that business about a special court?” Hermes wanted to know.

  “If I can’t get them before a praetor’s court, if the corruption runs too deep to prosecute them successfully before a jury, then I’ll denounce them before a religious court. The charges are as binding as they are in any civil matter, and the punishments are far worse, no slap-on-the-wrist fines or temporary banishments. Cato’s beloved ancestors set down some genuinely barbarous sentences for offenses that could anger the gods against the whole Roman people.

  “This fiood is going to be truly disastrous, and the Assemblies are sure to demand blood to pay for their suffering.”

  “That’s going to call for some crowd-pleasing speeches,” Hermes said doubtfully. “Caesar is good at that sort of thing. So is Clodius. It’s not your style.”

  “Cato was a popular tribune of the people, and he is a demagogue to match the best of them. He’ll support me. He loves this sort of thing.”

  Hermes nodded, lighting another torch with the dying fiickers of the last. “It could work. There’s one thing you’ve got to do first, though.”

  “What is that?”

  “Live long enough to pull it off.”

  “There is that little problem,” I allowed.

  “Maybe we shouldn’t try to return to your house tonight. They’ll be out to kill you for sure, now. You have been asking too many questions about too many important people. There’s no way to keep that quiet in a city like Rome. Their best place to ambush you is in the street leading to your door.”

  He spoke with some authority. We had fought our way through more than one such ambush on that street. “You may be right,” I acknowledged. “Let’s see what it looks like on the other end of this bridge; then perhaps I can find a friend I can cadge a night’s lodging from, somebody I don’t owe too much money to.”

  “That narrows the list,” he said, and I could hear the smirk in his voice.

  “Watch your mouth. I’ve been allowing you too much familiarity lately. It’s time I shortened your leash.” He made no smart reply, so I decided he was learning.

  The top of the embankment on the eastern side of the river was still dry; but a few steps down its landward side, the water started. Either the river had overfiowed its banks farther upstream, perhaps in the Campus Martius, and then fiowed down here, or, as I judged more likely, all the sewers had backed up and water was surging up through the drains.

  “Needing a ride, neighbors?” The speaker was a boatman who was poling his little craft toward us. From the prow of his boat thrust a long pole with a torch burning on its end, identifying the man as a night fisherman. Ordinarily, he would be out on the river at this hour, where the torch would lure fish near the surface to be caught by his cast net.

  “Yes, but we don’t know exactly where we are going,” I told him. “What’s still above water?”

  “The whole Forum Boarium is awash,” he said. “So is the Valley of Murcia,” this being the old name of the depression in which lay the Circus Maximus. “The Forum was wet, but not much higher than your ankles, just awhile ago. Might be deeper now.” The area near the Forum was densely populated, though not as densely as the Subura, where I lived.

  I looked up to our left, where the Capitol rose in splendor, crowned by the great Temple of Jupiter. Uphill and to our right was the Temple of Ceres on the lower slope of the Aventine Hill, where I had what was termed, sarcastically, my headquarters as aedile. I pointed toward it.

  “We could go up there. I have a right to use the place at any hour. The slaves will find couches for us. They hold feasts there, so there must be some sort of furniture.”

  “Probably no food, though, or any other comforts,” Hermes said. “You have friends over there on the Palatine.” He nodded toward the hill that rose to the east above the Circus Maximus. “It’s not so far.”

  “The problem is,” I said quietly, “I don’t know who my friends are anymore.”

  I negotiated with the boatman until we agreed on his fare, and we boarded the boat.

  It was a strange, dreamlike experience drifting slowly southward in this place where I had walked all my life. We passed silent buildings, and the water was alive with the rats fiushed from their cellars. We passed other boats and barges as people were ferried to and fro. The boatmen called out to each other, using the peculiar jargon of their trade. The moon was bright, spreading a silvery light over the strange scene. It might have been almost pleasant, except for on
e thing.

  “What a stench!” Hermes said, gagging. Owing to some trick of the still air, the smell had been nearly unnoticeable from atop the embankment; but here, just a few feet from its surface, the foul reek was all but visible, making my eyes water. I had been right. It was the sewers backing up, fiushing years of neglected corruption right back into the City.

  “It’s ripe,” the boatman agreed. Neither the smell nor the situation seemed to upset him. “I wish there was money in rat fishing. I’d get my nets out and be a rich man by sunup. It’s certain that there’s no fishing to be done on the river this night or for a good many nights to come.” He shook a couple of rats off his pole to emphasize his point. When he pushed it back in, I could see that the water was no more than knee-deep, but it might as well have been deeper than Oceanus, as far as I was concerned. There was no way I would ever wade through that water.

  We poled across the Forum Boarium, now as bereft of occupants as it had been before the Aborigines came to Italy. We drifted past the towering chariot gate end of the Circus, and I decided that some work would be called for before I could hold my races there. The condition of the track would have to be horrendous after this.

  Eventually, we nosed ashore at the base of the Aventine. Even before Hermes and I could disembark, a couple rushed down the gentle slope, calling for the boatman to wait. He was in for a busy, profitable night even without any money to be had from rat fishing.

  “Take us to the Palatine at once, good man!” said a haughty female, and somewhat familiar, voice. I went impolitely close and stooped, squinting, toward the patrician features beneath the shawl that covered the woman’s head. The light of the boat’s torch and the much smaller one carried by Hermes revealed an unmistakable face, which glared at me like a Gorgon.

  “Why, revered Lady Cornelia! I scarcely expected to see you here so late.”

  “Why are you here, Aedile Metellus?” she spat out. “No doubt out carousing late as usual, with the City in a state of emergency!”