“But it is more than four months until lupercalia” I pointed out.
“But that would mean crossing the Alps or traveling by sea in January, and who wants to do that? Besides, some of my Gallic clients are here in the city and need my guidance.”He looked out onto the track. “There are some of mine now.”I looked to see a quadriga of four splendid Gallic bays thundering from the gates, cutting swiftly to the left to put the chariot in the best position next to the spina. It was beautifully done, but in a real race it was a dangerous maneuver, because all four charioteers would be trying for that position. More smash-ups happen during the initial scramble for the spina position than at any other time in a race. The charioteer was a handsome youth with long, yellow Gallic hair streaming from beneath his helmet. There was something familiar about him, but in the moment it took him to flash by us I could not pin it down. We all praised Sanga’s horses and then Aurelia brought up her business with Crassus.
“Marcus Licinius, I belong to the college of priestesses of Ceres. Our temple”—she pointed at the beautiful structure on the hill—”is in need of repair. Will you undertake the needed restorations?” It was customary for rich men to do these things.
“Haven’t the market fines been sufficient this year?” he asked. The plebeian aediles had their offices in the temple, and the fines they collected in the markets were supposed to pay for its upkeep.
“I’m afraid not. The mundus shows signs of collapsing. It could bring down the whole temple.”
“That does sound serious,” he admitted. The mundus was very important to us because it was the only passageway into the underworld. There are others in Italy, but only one in Rome. All those offerings and messages had to reach the underworld gods and our dead somehow, so we couldn’t just let our mundus collapse.
“Restorations are so tedious and complicated,” Crassus said. “Perhaps I should just build you a new temple.”He was not joking. Crassus used to say that a man could not claim to be rich unless he could raise, equip and pay an army out of his own purse. He was that rich.
“Absolutely not!” Aurelia exclaimed. “We want to keep our old temple. Restorations only, if you please, Marcus Licinius.”In this I heartily concurred. I hated the way people were always tearing down our ancient temples so they could build something modern and carve their name all over the pediment in letters three feet high. Not that the Temple of Ceres was all that ancient. It was a bit under four and a half centuries old, making it respectably venerable. At least, when the great Temple of Jupiter had burned twenty years before, Sulla had had the good taste to restore it to its original design and condition. They don’t make tyrants like Sulla anymore.
“Then it shall be done. Report to your sisters that I will send my architect and building manager to make a preliminary survey and report tomorrow.”
She clapped her hands delightedly. “Thank you, Marcus Licinius! The goddess thanks you. Now, you must do me the further favor of accepting an invitation to a reception I am giving for the Parthian ambassador tomorrow evening.”
“I accept with great pleasure,” Crassus said.
“You must come too, Decius,” she said. Attending any sort of event with Crassus was far from my idea of a pleasant evening, but I was willing to endure it for a chance to spend more time with Aurelia.
“You may depend on it,” I told her. “I haven’t met the Parthian ambassador yet.”
“He is a savage, but barbarians are far more amusing than most Roman politicians,” she said.
“I couldn’t agree more,” Crassus put in.
“Excellent. At my mother’s house tomorrow, then.”Catilina and Orestilla had been married by the casual practice of usus. Once, patricians had only married by confarreatio, but marriage customs had broken down in the previous generation. Divorce was far easier with usus and it allowed the woman to keep her property.
I took my leave and hastened away, anxious to be out of Crassus’s sight. There was much that was puzzling about this latest murder, and I did not want to go investigate one of the others just yet, so I walked down to the great pound beyond the starting gates where the horses were walked to cool them after running. I got there just as the young Gaul was descending from his chariot. The attendants loosened the reins from his waist and he pulled off his leather helmet, letting his extravagant hair fly free. Except for his downy mustache, a facial disfigurement I have always considered an abomination, he was an extremely handsome youth, and now I remembered where I had seen him before. He was one of the party of Allobroges who had been hanging about the city for months, complaining of Roman extortion and rapacious publicani squeezing them for tax debt.
“That was splendid driving,” I told him as he was stripping off his leg-pads. He looked up and flashed a big-toothed smile.
“Thank you. My patron’s horses only understand Gallic. These Italians and Numidians and Greeks can never get the best out of them. I saw you up on the loggia speaking with my patron.”Now I remembered that Fabius Sanga was of the branch of the Fabii who were surnamed Allobrogicus. An ancestor of his had soundly thrashed their ancestors and that family of Fabians had thereby become the hereditary patrons of the Allobroges. The worse you beat Gauls and Germans, the more loyal they are to you. At least they are sincere about it. Asiatics, once defeated, kiss your sandals and protest loyalty, then do something treacherous.
“Have you raced in Rome before?” I asked him.
“Not yet. I’ve raced in the circus of Massilia and the one at Cartago Nova. My name is Amnorix, but I race as Polydoxus.”
“I expect to hear great things of you. How do you happen to be with the Allobrogian party?”
“My uncle was chosen by the tribe to come here with the grievance party, and I got him to bring me along for a chance to race in the Circus Maximus.”
“What do you think of it?” I asked.
“I’ve never seen anything so big, but the circuses in Gaul and Spain are built better, and they aren’t cluttered with all this gear for the wild beast fights. It’s the track that counts, though, and this one is well kept. The African sand is the best. But it’s the stables here that are greatest. It seems like half the horses in the world must be here.”
“This is the first circus ever built,” I told him. “The circus has grown as Rome has grown. That’s why it seems rather ramshackle and unplanned. Wait until you see it on a race day.”
“Oh, I’ve attended the races here, although not from the sand. I would not have believed that so many people could be assembled in a single place. The noise is incredible.”He laughed. “They are well behaved compared to a Gallic crowd, I must admit.”
“You’ve never seen a good circus riot, then. Pray you never do.”Now that we had established a sort of friendship between us, I decided to take advantage of it. “When I arrived, your patron and Crassus were arguing about something. Any idea what that was about?”
He frowned. “I don’t know. Crassus has called on the patron several times, lately. Last time he was with that man Valgius. I saw him up on the loggia, too. They meet privately, but the patron always looks upset after Crassus has left.”
This startled me. “Valgius? Are you sure he was with Crassus?”
“He was last time. He stayed out in the atrium with the rest of the clients while Crassus and the patron conferred. He would only talk about the circus, so I held some conversation with him, but he could not hide how much he despises Gauls.”
“I don’t much like him myself. Did you recognize the other bearded man, or the lady who was with me?”
“Never saw either of them before,” he admitted. “She was very beautiful, in the Roman fashion.”
“You see a lot, for a man flashing by in a chariot. I would have thought the quadriga would require all your attention.”
“It was not as if I was racing,” he said. Then his eyes narrowed. “You ask a lot of questions, sir.”
“It is my duty. I am the Quaestor Decius Caecilius Me-tellus and I am on o
fficial business.”
“Oh, I see. Is there any other way 1 may be of service?” Barbarians think that all Roman officials have infinite authority. This is because the ones who show up in their lands seem to act like gods.
“Was there anyone else with Crassus and Valgius?”
He thought for a moment. “No. But later, I think it was a day or two after, a man came up to us in the Forum. He spoke to my uncle and the elders. Then they were taken to the house of Decimus Brutus and we younger men were told to return to the house where we are quartered. That seemed strange to me.”
“Do you know the name of this man?” I asked.
“Umbrenus. Publius Umbrenus. I heard that he is some sort of businessman who has interests in Gaul. I don’t like all this secrecy. We came here to petition the Senate openly, not to conspire.”
“I am glad to hear it. The politics of Rome can get very rough, and you people should not try to get involved. Keep your eyes open and if you see anything suspicious, let me know. I am to be found at the Temple of Saturn, most days.”
“I shall do as you say,” he said. He seemed to be an intelligent and well-spoken youth, for a barbarian. His accent was quite tolerable.
I hurried off to the Forum, where I knew my father was sure to be. He was already canvassing for the next year’s censorship election. I found him standing in the comitium, just about equidistant between the Curia and the Rostra in the midst of a knot of men and speaking, no doubt, with nobility and rectitude. As I went closer I saw that most of the men were important officers of the centuriate assembly, men who would have great influence over the outcome of the upcoming elections. I saluted him as father and patron and he looked at me with his usual expression: annoyance.
“Why aren’t you in the treasury?” he demanded.
“I’ve been out on official business,” I said. “I need some advice involving your recent tenure of office in Gaul.”The other men drew aside to let us speak privately.
“Well, what is it?” Father asked, impatiently. He never liked to be interrupted while politicking.
“What do you know of a man named Publius Umbrenus?”
“Umbrenus?” He glanced at me sharply. “That’s not advice. That’s information.”
“It involves official business on behalf of the Urban Praetor.”
“Celer? What have you to do with him?” He looked disgusted, never much of an effort for him. “Don’t tell me. You’re out conspiracy-hunting again, aren’t you?”
“I have done the state some small service in that capacity before, Father,” I pointed out.
“And come close to being killed doing it.”
“Now, Father,” I chided, “a Roman is not supposed to fear death, only disgrace.”His face grew red, so I appealed to his ever-dominant sense of duty. “There have been murders, Father.”
“Eh? Of course there have been murders. What of it? When did a few equites more or less ever make any difference?”
“Quite aside from obvious criminal activity, I think a very real danger to the state is involved, and Celer concurs. Now, what do you know of Publius Umbrenus?”
“Well, you’re a fool, but Celer isn’t, so maybe there’s something to this after all. Umbrenus is a publican who had sizable dealings in the Gallic communities: horses, slaves and other livestock, grain, that sort of thing. He belonged to a consortium of investors here in Rome and he was their traveling agent in Gaul. The last I heard, they were bankrupt. Like most, they were hurt when Lucullus cut the Asian debt, then they speculated heavily in grain and were wiped out when the Egyptian and African harvests were the best in years and the price of grain plunged. Served them right.”Father detested capitalists. Like most aristocrats, he thought that only income from landed estate was honorable. As long as someone else is doing the farming it suits me too.
“Did he have dealings with the Allobroges?” I asked.
“He must have. They’re the most powerful tribe in the North so he would have had to deal with them. What’s this all about? No, don’t tell me. Bring me hard evidence and keep your foolish suspicions to yourself. Now go be a nuisance somewhere else.”
I visited the baths and returned to my house. There was to be little rest for me, though. Before long, I was interrupted in my letter writing when a delegation of my neighbors called on me. I received them in my atrium and feared the worst when I saw who it was: a collection of shopkeepers, guild officers and free artisans, the typical inhabitants of the extremely raffish district that was my home. Their spokesman was Quadratus Vibius, owner of a bronze foundry and president of a district funeral and burial society. By Subura standards, he was a pillar of the community.
“Quaestor Metellus,” he said, “we your neighbors call upon you as the most distinguished resident of the Subura.”It didn’t take much to be the most distinguished resident of Rome’s greatest slum.
“And I greet you as my friends and neighbors.”This they were. I truly liked living in that slum.
“Sir, as you know, in a few days, on the ides of October, the whole city will be celebrating the festival of the October Horse. We would like for you to represent the Subura, as our leader in the contest after the race.”
My heart sank. “Ah, gentlemen, my friends, I cannot tell you how deeply appreciative I am of the honor you do me. However, the press of office—”
“The dwellers of the Via Sacra won last year, sir,” said a baker who lived down the street. “As a result, no one in the Subura’s had good luck all year. We need our luck back.”
“Truly. But the Subura wins most years, does it not? Because we are better people, as everyone knows. However, my duties—”
“Nobody’ll think much of us if our quaestor doesn’t lead us,” said my tailor, a man who could make my old tunics look almost new. “You’re a man destined for the highest office and the great army commands, sir. Who else should be our representative?”
I could feel my thread being stretched tight on the loom of the Fates. “But surely—”
“Sir,” said a burly water-carrier, “the Via Sacra people are to be led by Publius Clodius this year.”
“Clodius?” I choked out.
The waterman grinned. “Yes, sir. Clodius.”
They had me trapped. If I backed down from a meeting with Clodius, I might as well leave the city for good and go to Rhodes or some such place and study philosophy.
“I shall, of course, be most honored to be your leader on the ides, and we shall return with the Subura’s luck.”At this they all cheered and pounded me on the back and dragged me out to a wineshop where we stuffed ourselves and I got drunk enough to look forward to the festival.
6
PARTH1A WAS A PROBLEM FOR US, and it was sure to become a greater problem now that Mith-ridates and Tigranes were both out of the picture. One of several kingdoms squabbling over control of the old Persian empire, Parthia was in the happy position of sitting smack astride the silk route, and had grown rich thereby. Silk was a great mystery to us. It was the most prized of fabrics, indeed the most prized of substances, more valuable than gold. Light, strong, its dyes unfading, it was so esteemed that from time to time the Censors forbade its wear as an Oriental extravagance. Men and sometimes even women were subject to fine if caught wearing silk in public. Both sexes sometimes took to wearing a silk subligaculum beneath the garments. If one could not have the ostentation of flaunting silk publicly,one could at least enjoy the lubricity of wearing the sensuous fabric in a more intimate fashion.
The kingdom of Parthia was not a central monarchy in the old Egyptian or Persian sense. It was far too primitive for that. Rather, it was a loose confederation of quarreling chieftains, the strongest of whom called himself King of Kings, like the old Persian monarch, and lorded it over the others. In the usual Eastern fashion, the royal families indulged in mutual homicide. The kings bred innumerable sons, which they then felt compelled to murder. If one or more survived to manhood, one of them would sooner or later kill his father
unless the old man managed to eliminate him first. At this time, the king was one Phraates III, who had not one but two grown sons in rebellion against him.
They were little more than primitive tribesmen recently arrived from the great eastern grasslands, and this was the source of their single strength, for they had a most unique method of waging war. Alone of all peoples in the world, the Parthians fought entirely from horseback, and their only weapon was the bow. Devoid of armor and swift as birds, they darted about the battlefield, raining shafts on enemies confined to the speed of a man on foot. They might have been truly formidable had they possessed any sort of organization. It was our own intent to supply them with good Roman organization, whether they wanted it or not. With the rest of the East pacified, Parthia remained as the only decent realm for further conquest.
Pompey had formed an alliance with Parthia when fighting Tigranes, but treaties were never more than a convenience for him, and he had offended Phraates by concluding a treaty with Tigranes without consulting the Parthian. Un doubtedly, this little problem would constitute the greater part of the ambassador’s business in Rome. Much good would it do him.
It offended us that a contemptible pack of horse-eating savages should control so important a commodity as silk. It especially offended us that they should have grown so rich doing it. The answer to all this offense, naturally enough, was to conquer the place, and even now we were searching for an excuse. When we should have conquered Parthia, of course, it would only mean that the next nation to the east would become the one controlling the silk route. There seemed to be quite a lot of land between us and the land of the Seres, where the silk was made. But then, that was how we had built our empire: one nation at a time. Eventually, we would reach the land of the Seres and conquer them as well. We knew nothing about them except that they made silk, but being Asiatics they couldn’t amount to much.
SPQR II: The Catiline Conspiracy Page 11