Masters of Rome Boxset: First Man in Rome, the Grass Crown, Fortune's Favourites, Caesar's Women, Caesar

by Colleen McCullough

  “Does this mean I’ll be packing my trunks with Silanus?” Quintus Cicero asked.

  “I sincerely hope not, Quintus! You’re with me until you ask to go.” His arm tightened, his hand squeezed. “You see, Quintus, I’ve come to think of you as the great Cicero’s big brother. He might fight a superb action in the Forum, but in the field he couldn’t fight his way out of a sack. To each his own. You’re the Cicero I prefer any day.”

  Words which were to stay with Quintus Cicero during the years to come, words which were to cause much pain, greater acrimony, awful rifts within the Tullius Cicero family. For Quintus could never forget them, nor discipline himself not to love the man who said them. Blood ruled. But hearts could ache despite that. Oh, better perhaps that he had never served with Caesar! Yet had he not, the great Cicero would always have dictated his every thought, and Quintus would never have become his own man.

  *

  And so that strife-torn year wore down for Caesar. He put the legions into winter camp very early, two with Labienus in a new camp among the Treveri, two in the lands of the ever-loyal Lingones along the Sequana River, and six around Agedincum, the main oppidum of the Senones.

  He prepared to depart for Italian Gaul, planning to escort Rhiannon and his son as far as her villa outside Arausio, and also planning to find a pedagogue for the boy. What was the matter with him, that he had no interest in the Greeks on the beach at Ilium for ten long years, in the rivalry between Achilles and Hector, in the madness of Ajax, in the treachery of Thersites? Had he asked these things of Rhiannon, she might have answered tartly that Orgetorix was not yet four years old; but as he said nothing of it to her, he went on interpreting the child’s behavior in the light of what he had been at the same age, and didn’t understand that the child of a genius might turn out to be just an ordinary little boy.

  At the end of November he called another pan-Gallic assembly, this one at the Remi oppidum of Durocortorum. The reason for the congress was not discussion. Caesar charged Acco, the leader of the Senones, with conspiring to incite insurrection. He conducted a formal Roman trial in the prescribed manner, though in one hearing only: witnesses, cross-examination of witnesses, a jury composed of twenty-six Romans and twenty-five Gauls, advocates to speak for the prosecution and the defense. Caesar presided himself, with Cotus of the Aedui, who had interceded for the Senones, at his right hand.

  All the Celtae and some of the Belgae came, though the Remi outnumbered all the other delegates (and furnished six of the twenty-five Gallic jurors). The Arverni were led by Gobannitio and Critognatus, their vergobrets, but in the party was—of course, thought Caesar with an inward sigh—Vercingetorix. Who challenged the court immediately.

  “If this is to be a fair trial,” he asked Caesar, “why is there one more Roman juror than Gallic juror?”

  Caesar opened his eyes wide. “There is customarily an odd number of jurors to avoid a drawn decision,” he said mildly. “The lots were cast; you saw them for yourself, Vercingetorix. Besides which, for the purposes of this trial all the jurors are to be regarded as Roman—all have an equal vote.”

  “How can it be equal when there are twenty-six Romans and only twenty-five Gauls?”

  “Would you be happier if I put an extra Gaul on the jury?” asked Caesar patiently.

  “Yes!” snapped Vercingetorix, uncomfortably aware that the Roman legates were laughing at him behind their eyes.

  “Then I will do so. Now sit down, Vercingetorix.”

  Gobannitio rose to his feet.

  “Yes?” asked Caesar, sure of this man.

  “I must apologize for the conduct of my nephew, Caesar. It will not happen again.”

  “You relieve me, Gobannitio. Now may we proceed?”

  The court proceeded through witnesses and advocates (with, noted Caesar, pleased, a wonderful speech in defense of Acco by Quintus Cicero—let Vercingetorix complain about that!) to its verdict, having taken the best part of the day.

  Thirty-three jurors voted CONDEMNO, nineteen ABSOLVO. All the Roman jurors, six Remi and one Lingone had won the day. But nineteen of the Gauls, including the three Aedui on the panel, had voted for acquittal.

  “The sentence is automatic,” said Caesar tonelessly. “Acco will be flogged and decapitated. At once. Those who wish to witness the execution may do so. I sincerely hope this lesson is taken to heart. I will have no more broken treaties.”

  As the proceedings had been conducted entirely in Latin, it was only when the Roman guard formed up on either side of him that Acco truly realized what the sentence was.

  “I am a free man in a free country!” he shouted, drew himself up, and walked between the soldiers out of the room.

  Vercingetorix began to cheer; Gobannitio struck him hard across the face.

  “Be silent, you fool!” he said. “Isn’t it enough?”

  Vercingetorix left the room, left the confines of the hall and strode off until he could neither see nor hear what was done to Acco.

  “They say that’s what Dumnorix said just before Labienus cut him down,” said Gutruatus of the Carnutes.

  “What?” asked Vercingetorix, trembling, face bathed in a chill sweat “What?”

  “ ‘I am a free man in a free country!’ Dumnorix shouted before Labienus cut him down. And now his woman consorts with Caesar. This is not a free country, and we are not free men.”

  “You don’t need to tell me that, Gutruatus. My own uncle, to strike me across the face in front of Caesar! Why did he do this? Are we supposed to shake in fear, get down on our knees and beg Caesar’s forgiveness?”

  “It’s Caesar’s way of telling us that we are not free men in a free country.”

  “Oh, by Dagda and Taranis and Esus, I swear I’ll have Caesar’s head on my doorpost for this!” Vercingetorix cried. “How dare he dress up his actions in such a travesty?”

  “He dares because he’s a brilliant man in command of a brilliant army,” said Gutruatus through his teeth. “He’s walked all over us for five long years, Vercingetorix, and we haven’t got anywhere! You may as well say that he’s finished the Belgae, and the only reason he hasn’t finished the Celtae is that we haven’t gone to war with him the way the Belgae did. Except for the poor Armorici—look at them! The Veneti sold into slavery, the Esubii reduced to nothing.”

  Litaviccus and Cotus of the Aedui appeared, faces grim; Lucterius of the Cardurci joined them, and Sedulius, vergobret of the Lemovices.

  “That’s just the point!” cried Vercingetorix, speaking to his entire audience. “Look at the Belgae—Caesar picked them off one people at a time. Never as a mass of peoples. Eburones one campaign—the Morini another—the Nervii—the Bellovaci—the Atuatuci—the Menapii—even the Treveri. One by one! But what would have happened to Caesar if just the Nervii, the Bellovaci, the Eburones and the Treveri had merged their forces and attacked as one army? Yes, he’s brilliant! Yes, he has a brilliant army! But Dagda he is not! He would have gone down—and never managed to get up again.”

  “What you’re saying,” said Lucterius slowly, “is that we Celtae have to unite.”

  “That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

  Cotus scowled. “And under whose leadership?” he demanded aggressively. “Do you expect the Aedui, for instance, to fight for an Arvernian leader in, for instance, the person of yourself, Vercingetorix?”

  “If the Aedui wish to become a part of the new State of Gallia, yes, Cotus, I expect the Aedui to fight for whoever is made leader.” The dark blue eyes in the skull-like face glowed beneath their strange black brows. “Perhaps the leader would be me, an Arvernian and therefore the traditional enemy of all Aedui. Perhaps the leader might be an Aeduan, in which case I would expect all the Arverni to fight under him, as I would myself. Cotus, Cotus, open your eyes! Don’t you see? It’s the divisions between us, the ancient feuds, will bring us to our knees! There are more of us than of them! Are they braver? No! They’re better organized, that’s all. They work together like som
e vast machine, turning like teeth through a cog—about face, wheel, form square, launch javelins, charge, march in step! Well, that we cannot change. That we have no time to learn to imitate. But we do have the numbers. If we are united, the numbers cannot lose!”

  Lucterius drew a huge breath. “I’m with you, Vercingetorix!” he said suddenly.

  “So am I,” said Gutruatus. He smiled. “And I know someone else who’ll be with you. Cathbad of the Druids.”

  Vercingetorix stared, amazed. “Cathbad? Then talk to him the moment you get home, Gutruatus! If Cathbad would be willing to organize all the Druids throughout all the peoples—to wheedle, cajole, persuade— half our work would be done.”

  But Cotus was looking steadily more frightened, Litaviccus torn, and Sedulius wary.

  “It will take more than Druid talk to budge the Aedui,” said Cotus, swallowing. “We take our status as Friend and Ally of the Roman People very seriously.”

  Vercingetorix sneered. “Hah! Then you’re fools!” he cried. “It isn’t so very many years ago, Cotus, that this selfsame Caesar showered that German swine Ariovistus with expensive gifts and procured him the title of Friend and Ally from the Roman Senate! Knowing that Ariovistus was raiding the Friend and Ally Aedui—stealing their cattle, their sheep, their women, their lands! Did this selfsame Caesar care about the Aedui? No! All he wanted was a peaceful province!” He clenched his fists, shook them at the sky. “I tell you, every time he mouths his sanctimonious promise to protect us from the Germani, I think of that. And if the Aedui had any sense, so would they.”

  Litaviccus drew a breath, nodded. “All right, I’m with you too,” he said. “I can’t speak for Cotus here—he’s my senior, not to mention vergobret next year with Convictolavus. But I’ll work for you, Vercingetorix.”

  “I can’t promise,” said Cotus, “but I won’t work against you. Nor will I tell the Romans.”

  “More than that I don’t ask for the time being, Cotus,” said Vercingetorix. “Just think about it.” He smiled without humor. “There are more ways of hindering Caesar than in battle. He has complete trust in the Aedui. When he snaps his fingers, he expects an Aeduan response—give me more wheat, give me more cavalry, give, me more of everything! I can understand an old man like you not wanting to draw a sword, Cotus. But if you want to be a free man in a free country, you’d better think of other ways to fight Gaius Julius Caesar.”

  “I’m with you too,” said Sedulius, the last to answer.

  Vercingetorix held out his thin hand, palm up; Gutruatus put his hand on top of it, palm up; then Litaviccus; then Sedulius; then Lucterius; and, finally, Cotus.

  “Free men in a free country,” said Vercingetorix. “Agreed?”

  “Agreed,” they said.

  *

  Had Caesar delayed a day or two more, some of this might have come back to him through Rhiannon. But suddenly Gaul of the Long-hairs was the last place he wanted to be. At dawn the next morning he left for Italian Gaul, the hapless Fifteenth Legion at his back, and Rhiannon on her high-stepping Italian horse. She had not seen Vercingetorix at all, nor did she understand what made Caesar so curt, so distant. Was there another woman? Always, with him! But they never mattered, and none of them had borne him a son. Who rode with his nurse in a wagon, clutching as much of his big Trojan Horse as he could. No, he cared nothing for Menelaus or Odysseus, Achilles or Ajax. But the Trojan Horse was the most wonderful beast in the world, and it belonged to him.

  They had not been a day on the road before Caesar had long outdistanced them, flying like the wind in his gig harnessed to four cantering mules, dictating his senatorial dispatch to one green-faced secretary, and a letter to big brother Cicero to the other. Never becoming confused, reinforcing with Cicero the considerably modified senatorial version of Quintus Cicero and the Sugambri; all those fools in the Senate thought he tampered with the truth, but they wouldn’t suspect it of the official version of Quintus Cicero and the Sugambri.

  He dictated on, pausing patiently when one secretary had to lean out of the gig to vomit. Anything to get the memory of that scene in the hall at Durocortorum out of his mind, anything to forget Acco and that cry echoing Dumnorix. He hadn’t wanted to single Acco out as a victim, but how else were they to learn the protocol and etiquette of civilized peoples? Talk didn’t work. Example didn’t work.

  How else can I force the Celtae to learn the lesson I had to teach the Belgae in letters of blood? For I cannot leave with my task undone, and the years wing by. I cannot return to Rome without my dignitas enhanced by total victory. I am a greater hero now than Pompeius Magnus was at the height of his glory, and all of Rome is at my feet. I will do whatever I have to do, no matter the price. Ah, but the remembrance of cruelty is poor comfort in old age!

  ROME

  from JANUARY until

  APRIL of 52 B.C.

  1

  New Year’s Day dawned without any magistrates entering office; Rome existed at the whim of the Senate and the ten tribunes of the plebs. Cato had been true to his word and blocked last year’s elections until Pompey’s nephew, Gaius Memmius, stepped down as a consular candidate. But it was not until the end of Quinctilis that Gnaeus Domitius Calvinus and Messala Rufus the augur were returned as consuls for the five months of the year remaining. Once in office, they held no elections for this year’s men, their reason being the street war which broke out between Publius Clodius and Titus Annius Milo. One, Milo, wanted to be consul, and the other, Clodius, wanted to be praetor; but neither man could condone the presence of his enemy as a fellow senior magistrate. Both Clodius and Milo marshaled their gangs, and Rome erupted into constant violence. Which was not to say that everyday life in most of the city was inconvenienced; the terror was confined to the Forum Romanum and the streets nearest it. So remorseless was the urban conflict that the Senate gave up meeting in its own hallowed chamber, the Curia Hostilia, and meetings of the People and the Plebs in their tribal assemblies were not held at all.

  This state of affairs seriously hampered the career of one of Clodius’s greatest friends, Mark Antony. He was turned thirty and should already have gone into office as a quaestor, which carried automatic elevation to the Senate among its benefits and offered an enterprising man many opportunities to plump out his purse. If he was appointed quaestor to a province, he managed the governor’s finances, usually without supervision; he could fiddle the books, sell tax exemptions, adjust contracts. It was also possible to profit from appointment as one of the three quaestors who remained inside Rome to manage the Treasury’s finances; he could (for a price) alter the records to wipe out someone’s debt, or make sure someone else received sums from the Treasury to which he was not entitled. Therefore Mark Antony, always in debt, was hungry to assume his quaestor ship.

  No one had asked for him by name among the governors, which rather annoyed him when he summoned up the energy to think about it. Caesar, the most open-handed of all governors, was his close cousin and should have asked for him by name. He’d asked for the sons of Marcus Crassus by name, yet the only claim they had on him was the great friendship between their father and Caesar. Then this year Caesar had asked for Servilia’s son, Brutus, by name! And been turned down for his pains, a fact which Brutus’s uncle Cato had trumpeted from one end of Rome to the other. While Brutus’s monster of a mother, who reveled in being Caesar’s mistress, tormented her half brother by feeding the gossip network with delicious little titbits about Cato’s selling of his wife to silly old Hortensius!

  Antony’s uncle Lucius Caesar (invited to Gaul this year as one of Caesar’s senior legates) had refused to ask Caesar to name him as quaestor, so Antony’s mother (who was Lucius Caesar’s only sister) had written instead. Caesar’s reply was cool and abrupt: it would do Marcus Antonius a great deal of good to take his chances in the lots, so no, Julia Antonia, I will not request your precious oldest son.

  “After all,” said Antony discontentedly to Clodius, “I did very well out in Syria with Gabini
us! Led his cavalry like a real expert. Gabinius never moved without me.”

  “The new Labienus,” said Clodius, grinning.

  The Clodius Club still met, despite the defection of Marcus Caelius Rufus and those two famous fellatrices Sempronia Tuditani and Palla. The trial and acquittal of Caelius on the charge of attempting to poison Clodius’s favorite sister, Clodia, had aged that pair of repulsive sexual acrobats so strikingly that they preferred to stay at home and avoid mirrors.

  While the Clodius Club flourished regardless. The members were meeting, as always, in Clodius’s house on the Palatine, the new one he had bought from Scaurus for fourteen and a half million sesterces. A lovely place, spacious and exquisitely furnished. The dining room, where they all lolled at the moment on Tyrian purple couches, was adorned with startlingly three-dimensional panels of black-and-white cubes sandwiched between softly dreamy Arcadian landscapes. Since the season was early autumn, the big doors onto the peristyle colonnade were flung open, allowing the Clodius Club to gaze at a long marble pool decked with tritons and dolphins, and, atop the fountain in the pool’s center, a stunning sculpture of the merman Amphitryon driving a scallop shell drawn by horses with fish’s tails, superbly painted to lifelike animation.

  Curio the Younger was there; Pompeius Rufus, full brother of Caesar’s abysmally stupid ex-wife, Pompeia Sulla; Decimus Brutus, son of Sempronia Tuditani; and a newer member, Plancus Bursa. Plus the three women, of course. All of them belonged to Publius Clodius: his sisters, Clodia and Clodilla, and his wife, Fulvia, to whom Clodius was so devoted he never moved without her.

  “Well, Caesar’s asked me to come back to him in Gaul, and I’m tempted to go,” said Decimus Brutus, unconsciously rubbing salt into Antony’s wounds.