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

by Colleen McCullough

  “I still think you should write,” Porcia persisted.

  “Perhaps,” said Calpurnia, rolling one kitten over. “And yet, Porcia, that would be an intrusion. He is so busy. I don’t understand any of it, and I never will. I just make offerings to keep him safe.”

  “So do we all for our men,” said Marcia.

  Old Eutychus staggered in with steaming hot sweet wine and a plate loaded with goodies; no one save he was allowed to wait on this last living one of the beloved Domus Publica ladies.

  The kittens were returned to the padded box with their mother, which opened its green eyes wide and looked at Calpurnia reproachfully.

  “That was unkind,” said Porcia, sniffing the mulled wine and wondering why Bibulus’s staff never thought of it on these cold, misty days. “Poor mama cat was enjoying a little peace.”

  The last word fell, echoed, lay between them.

  Calpurnia broke off a piece of the best-looking honey-cake and took it across to the shrine of the Lares and Penates.

  “Dear Gods of the Household,” she prayed, “grant us peace.”

  “Grant us peace,” prayed Marcia.

  “Grant us peace,” prayed Porcia.

  THE WEST,

  ITALIA AND ROME,

  THE EAST

  from APRIL 6 of 49 B.C. until

  SEPTEMBER 29 of 48 B.C.

  1

  Because the winter in the Alps was a snowy one, Caesar marched his legions to the Province along the coast road, and moved with his customary speed. Having left Rome on the fifth day of April, he arrived outside Massilia on the nineteenth day. The distance covered on that tortuously winding road was closer to six than to five hundred miles.

  But he marched in a mood of profound gladness; the years away from home had been too many, and the difficulties when he finally returned home too exasperating. On the one hand he could see how desperately a strong and autocratic hand was needed. The city itself was more sloppily governed than ever—not enough notice or respect was given to the commercial sector—not enough had been done to safeguard, let alone improve, everything from the grain supply to the grain dole. Were it not for his own many building projects, Rome’s workmen would have gone wanting. Temples were shabby, the cobbles of city streets were lifting, no one was regulating the chaotic traffic, and he suspected that the State granaries along the cliffs below the Aventine were rat infested and crumbling. The public moneys were being hoarded, not spent. On the other hand he didn’t honestly welcome the job of putting it all to rights. Thankless, mined with obstacles, an intrusion into duties more properly those of other magistrates—and Rome the city was a minute problem compared to Rome the institution, Rome the country, Rome the empire.

  He was not, Caesar reflected as the miles strode by, a city-bound man by temperament. Life on the road at the head of a fine strong army was infinitely preferable. How wonderful, that he had been able to assure himself in all truth that he couldn’t afford to waste time in Rome, that Pompey’s army in the Spains had to be contained and rendered ineffectual very quickly! There was no life like it, marching at the head of a fine army.

  The only true city between Rome and the Spains was located on a superb harbor about forty miles to the east of the Rhodanus delta and its marshes: Massilia. Founded by the Greeks who had roamed Our Sea establishing colonies centuries before, Massilia had maintained its independence and its Greekness ever since. It had treaties of alliance with Rome, but governed its own affairs—had its own navy and army (purely for defense, said the treaty) and sufficient of the hinterland to supply itself with produce from market gardens and orchards, though it bought in grain from the Roman Province, which surrounded its borders. The Massiliotes guarded their independence fiercely, despite the fact that they could not afford to offend Rome, that upstart interloper in the previously Greek and Phoenician world.

  Hastening out of the city to Caesar’s camp (carefully sited on unused ground), the Council of Fifteen which governed Massilia sought an audience with the man who had conquered Gallia Comata and made himself the master of Italia.

  Caesar received them with great ceremony, clad in the full regalia of the proconsul, and wearing his corona civica upon his head. Aware too that in all his time in Further Gaul, he had never been to Massilia nor intruded upon Massiliote affairs. The Council of Fifteen was very cold and very arrogant.

  “You are not here legally,” said Philodemus, leader of the Council, “and Massilia’s treaties are with the true government of Rome, as personified in Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus and those individuals who were forced to flee at your advent.”

  “In fleeing, Philodemus, those individuals abrogated their rights,” said Caesar evenly. “I am the true government of Rome.”

  “No, you are not.”

  “Does this mean, Philodemus, that you will give aid to Rome’s enemies in the persons of Gnaeus Pompeius and his allies?”

  “Massilia prefers to give aid to neither side, Caesar. Though,” said Philodemus, smiling complacently, “we have sent a delegation to Gnaeus Pompeius in Epirus confirming our allegiance to the government in exile.”

  “That was impudent as well as imprudent.”

  “If it was, I don’t see what you can do about it,” Philodemus said jauntily. “Massilia is too strongly defended for you to reduce.”

  “Don’t tempt me!” said Caesar, smiling.

  “Go about your business, Caesar, and leave Massilia alone.”

  “Before I can do that, I need better assurances that Massilia will remain neutral.”

  “We will help neither side.”

  “Despite your delegation to Gnaeus Pompeius.”

  “That is ideological, not practical. Practically speaking, we will maintain absolute neutrality.”

  “You had better, Philodemus. If I see any evidence to the contrary, you’ll find yourself under siege.”

  “You can’t afford to besiege a city of one million people,” said Philodemus smugly. “We are not Uxellodunum or Alesia.”

  “The more mouths there are to feed, Philodemus, the more certain it is that any place will fall. You’ve heard, I’m sure, the story of the Roman general besieging a town in Spain. It sent him a gift of food, with the message that it had sufficient in store to eat for ten years. The general sent a message back thanking its people for their candor, and informing them that he would take it in the eleventh year. The town surrendered. They knew he meant every word. Therefore I warn you: do not aid my enemies.”

  Two days later Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus arrived with a fleet and two legions of Etrurian volunteers. The moment he hove to off the harbor, the Massiliotes removed the great chain which barred the entrance and permitted him to sail in.

  “Fortify everything,” said the Council of Fifteen.

  Sighing, Caesar resigned himself to besieging Massilia, a delay which was by no means as disastrous as Massilia clearly thought it was; winter would make the Pyrenees difficult to cross for Pompey’s troops as much as for his own, and contrary winds would prevent their leaving Spain by sea.

  *

  The best part about it all was that Gaius Trebonius and Decimus Brutus arrived at the head of the Ninth, Tenth and Eleventh Legions.

  “I left the Fifth on the Icauna behind massive fortifications,” said Trebonius, gazing at Caesar with an almost bemused fondness. “The Aedui and the Arverni have fallen nicely into line, and have good Roman-style troops available if the Fifth needs strengthening. I can tell you that the news of your victory in Italia was all any of the Gallic tribes needed to fall into docile torpor. Even the Bellovaci, who still mutter. They’ve tasted your mettle, and Italia proves it. I predict that Gallia Comata will lie very low this year.”

  “Good, because I can’t afford to garrison it with more men than the Fifth,” said Caesar. He turned to his other loyalest legate. “Decimus, I’m going to need a good fleet if we’re to beat Massilia into submission. You’re the naval man. According to my cousin Lucius, Narbo has developed an excellen
t shipbuilding industry and is dying to sell us a few stout decked triremes. Go there now and see what’s available. And pay them well.” He laughed soundlessly. “Would you believe that Pompeius and the consuls forgot to empty the Treasury before they scuttled off?”

  Trebonius and Decimus Brutus gaped.

  “Ye Gods!” said Decimus Brutus, to whom the question had been directed. “I couldn’t even contemplate fighting alongside anyone but you anyway, Caesar, but that news makes me religiously glad I know you! The fools!”

  “Yes, but what it really tells us is how confused and ill prepared they are to wage any sort of war. They strutted, postured, waved their fists in my face, insulted me, thwarted me—yet all the time, I realize now, they didn’t believe for one moment that I would march. They have no strategy, no real idea what to do. And no money to do it with. I’ve left instructions with Antonius not to impede the sale of any of Pompeius’s properties, nor to prevent the money’s going out of Italia.”

  “Should you do that?” asked Trebonius, looking as worried as ever. “Surely cutting Pompeius off from any source of funding is one way to win bloodlessly.”

  “No, it would be a postponement,” said Caesar. “What Pompeius and the others sell to finance their war can’t go back to them. Our Picentine friend is one of the two or three wealthiest men in the whole country. Ahenobarbus would be in the top six or seven. I want them bankrupted. Penniless great men have clout—but no power.”

  “I think,” said Decimus Brutus, “that you’re really saying you don’t intend to kill them when it’s over. Or even exile them.”

  “Exactly, Decimus. I won’t be apostrophized as a monster like Sulla. No one on either side is a traitor. We simply see Rome’s future course in different ways. I want those I pardon to resume their positions in Rome and give me a few challenges. Sulla was wrong. No man functions at his best without opposition. I truly cannot bear the thought of being surrounded by sycophants! I’ll be the First Man in Rome the proper way—by constantly striving.”

  “Do you consider us sycophants?” asked Decimus Brutus.

  That provoked a laugh. “No! Sycophants don’t lead legions capably, my friend. Sycophants lie on couches and trumpet fulsome praise. My legates aren’t afraid to tell me when I’m wrong.”

  “Was it very hard, Caesar?” asked Trebonius.

  “To do what I warned you I would? To cross the Rubicon?”

  “Yes. We wondered and worried.”

  “Hard, yet not hard. I have no wish to go down in the history books as one of a series of men who marched on their homeland. Simply, I had no option. Either I marched, or I retired into a permanent exile. And had I done the latter, Gaul would have been in a ferment of rebellion within three years, and Rome would have lost control of all her provinces. It’s high time the Claudii, the Cornelii and their ilk were prevented at law from raping their provinces. Also the publicani. Also men like Brutus, who hides his commercial doings behind a wall of senatorial respectability. I’m necessary to institute some badly needed reforms, after which I intend to march for the Kingdom of the Parthians. There are seven Roman Eagles in Ecbatana. And a great, misunderstood Roman to avenge. Besides which,” said Caesar, “we have to pay for this war. I don’t know how long it will last. Reason says a few months only, but instinct says much longer. I’m fighting fellow Romans—stubborn, persistent, pigheaded. They won’t go down any easier than the Gauls, though I hope with less bloodshed.”

  “You’ve been mighty continent in that respect so far,” said Gaius Trebonius.

  “And I intend to remain so—without going down myself.”

  “You’ve got the contents of the Treasury,” said Decimus Brutus. “Why worry about paying for the war?”

  “The Treasury belongs to the People of Rome, not the Senate of Rome. This is a war between factions in the Senate, having little to do with the People save those who are called upon to fight. I have borrowed, not taken. I will continue to do that. I can’t let my troops plunder, there will be no booty. Which means I’ll have to recompense them from my own funds. Extremely considerable funds. However, I’ll still have to pay the Treasury back. How? You can bet Pompeius is busy squeezing the East dry to fund his side of things, so I’ll find nothing there. Spain is penniless aside from its metals, and the profits from those will be going to Pompeius. Not to Rome. Whereas the Kingdom of the Parthians is immensely wealthy. One place we’ve never managed to tap. I will tap it, I promise you.”

  “I’ll go with you,” said Trebonius quickly.

  “And I,” said Decimus Brutus.

  “But in the meantime,” said Caesar, very pleased, “we have to deal with Massilia and Spain.”

  “And Pompeius,” said Trebonius.

  “First things first,” said Caesar. “I want Pompeius ejected from the West completely. To do that is to take money from him.”

  *

  Very well fortified and defended—particularly now that Ahenobarbus had arrived to swell its naval and military resources—Massilia held out easily against Caesar’s land blockade because it still dominated the seas. Its granaries were full, perishable foods were brought in by water, and so confident of Caesar’s inability to win were the other Greek colonies along the Province coast that they hastened to supply Massilia.

  “I wonder why it is that none of them think I can beat a tired old man like Pompeius?” asked Caesar of Trebonius at the end of May.

  “The Greeks have never been good judges of generals,” said Trebonius. “They don’t know you. Pompeius is an enduring legend because of his campaign against the pirates, I think. This entire coast sampled his activities and talents at that time.”

  “My conquest of Gallia Comata wasn’t very far away.”

  “Yes, Caesar, but they’re Greeks! Greeks never have warred with barbarians; they’ve always preferred to enclose themselves in coastal cities and avoid the barbarian inland. That’s as true of their colonies in the Euxine as it is in Our Sea.”

  “Well, they are about to learn that they’ve backed the wrong side,” said Caesar, nettled. “I’m leaving for Narbo in the morning. Decimus ought to be on his way back with a fleet. He’s in charge on the sea, but you’re in overall command. Push them hard and don’t give too much quarter, Trebonius. I want Massilia humbled.”

  “How many legions?”

  “I’ll leave you the Twelfth and the Thirteenth. Mamurra tells me there’s a new Sixth freshly recruited in Italian Gaul—I’ve instructed him to send it to you. Train it, and if possible blood it. Far better to blood it on Greeks than Romans. Though actually that’s one of my great advantages in this war.”

  “What?” asked Trebonius, bewildered.

  “My men are from Italian Gaul, and a great many of them from across the Padus. Pompeius’s soldiers are properly Italian save for the Fifteenth. I realize Italians look down on Italian Gauls, but Italian Gauls absolutely loathe Italians. No brotherly love.”

  “Come to think of it, a good point.”

  *

  Lucius Caesar had gone native, regarded Narbo as his home; when Cousin Gaius arrived at the head of four legions—the Ninth, the beloved Tenth, the Eighth and the Eleventh—he found the Province’s governor so well ensconced that he had three mistresses, a brace of superb cooks and the love of all of Narbo.

  “Have my cavalry arrived?” Caesar asked, eating with relish for once. “Oh, I had forgotten how deliciously light and tasty—how digestible—the dug-mullets of Narbo are!”

  “That,” said Lucius Caesar smugly, “is because I’ve taken to doing them the Gallic way—fried in butter rather than in oil. Oil’s too strong. The butter comes from the lands of the Veneti.”

  “You’ve degenerated into a Sybarite.”

  “But kept my figure.”

  “A family trait, I suspect. The cavalry?”

  “All three thousand you called up by name are here, Gaius. I decided to pasture them south of Narbo around the mouth of the Ruscino. On your way, so to speak.”
r />   “I gather Fabius is sitting at Illerda.”

  “With the Seventh and the Fourteenth, yes. I sent several thousand Narbonese militia with him to force passage across the Pyrenees, but when you reach him I’d appreciate your returning them. They’re good and loyal, but not citizens.”

  “And are Afranius and Petreius still facing him?”

  “Across the Sicoris River. With five legions. The other two are still in Further Spain with Varro.” Lucius Caesar grinned. “Varro isn’t quite as confident as everyone else that you’ll lose, so he hasn’t done much to bestir himself. They’ve been spending a cozy winter in Corduba.”

  “A long march from Illerda.”

  “Precisely. I think all you have to worry about are the five legions with Afranius and Petreius. Do try the oysters.”

  “No, I prefer the dug-mullets. How clever of your cook to bone them so thoroughly.”

  “An easy fish to bone, as a matter of fact. They’re so flat.” Lucius Caesar looked up. “What you may not know,” he said, “is that Pompeius sent from Epirus and borrowed heavily from the men of his Spanish legions. They gave him everything they had and agreed to waive pay until you’re defeated.”

  “Ah! Pompeius is feeling the pinch.”

  “He deserves to, forgetting to empty the Treasury.”

  Caesar’s shoulders shook with silent laughter. “He’ll never manage to live that down, Lucius.”

  “I hear my son has elected Pompeius.”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  “He never was very bright.”

  “Speaking of brightness, I met a remarkable member of the family in Formiae,” said Caesar, transferring his attention to the cheeses. “All of thirteen years old.”

  “Who’s that?”

  “Atia’s son by Gaius Octavius.”

  “Another Gaius Julius Caesar in the making?”

  “He says not. No military talent, he informed me. A very cold fish, but a very bright one.”