SPQR III: The Sacrilege

by John Maddox Roberts

  “Citizens!” he cried, at the precise moment when his speech would have the greatest dramatic effect. “This street has seen the murder of a noble youth of one of Rome’s most ancient families, a patrician of the Claudii. Was this not enough? Would you anger the gods and bring their curse upon Rome by shedding civil blood before the Pontifex Maximus?” He ignored the minor lake of Nero’s blood that spread over the cobbles. Maybe dried blood didn’t count. People looked abashed, even Clodius’s arena bait.

  “Pontifex,” Clodius said, “we would never offer you disrespect, but my kinsman has been foully murdered and I name him”—he jabbed a finger toward me—“as the guilty party.”

  “Rome is a republic of law,” Caesar proclaimed. “Courts and magistrates and juries decide these questions, not mob action. I order that all here return to their houses. When your passions have calmed and you can behave as citizens should, then will be the time to try this matter publicly. Until that time, depart!” The last word snapped out like one of Jove’s thunderbolts, and some of the Subura’s most bloodstained ruffians fairly scurried to get out of his sight.

  Clodius was so enraged that he was, for once, unable to speak. His face had darkened to crimson, and throbbing veins stood out on his brow. His eyeballs were red as a three-day hangover. If he had just stuck his tongue out, he would have been identical to those gorgons you see painted on old Greek shields. It was a most entertaining spectacle, but it could not last. Beneath Caesar’s glare, Clodius’s extravagant color began to fade. When he was self-possessed once more, he whirled and stalked off, followed by his uneasy entourage.

  Within moments the street was empty except for Caesar. It was the most amazing thing I had seen in a good long while. He turned to where I stood in my gateway.

  “How did this come about, Decius Caecilius?” he asked.

  “Come inside and I’ll tell you, Caius Julius,” I said. Caesar came in. I didn’t tell him everything, naturally, just about how I had met Nero and encountered him again at the herb-woman’s booth and then at the house of Capito. I left out the parts about the attempted poisoning and coming upon the corpse the night before. Since I was as mystified as anyone else, I didn’t need to fake it.

  “None of this seems to make any sense,” Caesar said.

  “I could not agree with you more.”

  “Still, this is a disturbing thing,” he mused. “Two murders, performed identically, and both victims patricians.”

  “Don’t forget Capito’s janitor,” I reminded him. “He wasn’t a patrician.”

  “He probably got a glimpse of the killer’s face,” Caesar said. “He must have been eliminated as a witness.”

  “I agree,” I said. Then I told him what Asklepiodes had said about the wounds. Why was I speaking to Caesar so openly? Partly it was because I suspected him of being involved in some way and I hoped that he would betray complicity. Partly, also, it was because I had been ready for a mortal brawl with Clodius and Caesar had poured water on the fire. In a less frustrated state I might have been more cautious.

  “This is strange indeed. Am I to understand that you have taken upon yourself one of your inimitable investigations?”

  “It helps to pass the time,” I said.

  He grew very serious. “Decius, my friend, I have known many men who courted death for the sake of glory. Others do the same in pursuit of wealth, power or revenge. You are the only man I know who does so as a sort of intellectual exercise.”

  “Every man finds his pleasures where he will,” I said, quoting an old saying I had often seen carved on tombstones.

  “You are an intriguing man, Decius Caecilius. I wish there were more like you in Rome. Most men are boring drudges. My niece told me of your visit yesterday. She was quite taken with you.”

  This surprised me. But I answered without prevarication. “As I was with her.”

  He nodded approvingly. “I am glad to hear it. We must discuss this further at a future date. Just now, though, I am called elsewhere. Good day, Decius.”

  His words rattled me somewhat. Was he suggesting a match? Or was he trying to distract me? If the latter, he did not shake from my head the question that had been there since his appearance.

  “Caius Julius,” I said.

  He turned in the doorway. “Yes?”

  “How did you happen to get here so quickly?”

  He smiled. “Ever the inquirer, eh? As it happened, I was in the Temple of Libitina when Clodius’s servant arrived to summon the undertakers.”

  “I see,” I said. “Pontifical duties?”

  “Arranging for some family obsequies,” Caesar said. “The goddess is an aspect of the ancestress of my house.” Caesar had just begun to stress the divine origins of the Julian clan. He omitted no opportunity to mention it. He left.

  “That’s a man to watch,” said my old retainer Burrus. He had been waiting with the others in the atrium while Caesar and I conversed in my study. Burrus was a former centurion from the legion I had served with in Spain. He was gray as iron and had a face like a soldier’s dolabra.

  “Why do you say that, Burrus?” I knew why I was uneasy about Caesar, but I was curious to know how a man like Burrus would read him.

  “I don’t know the courts and the Senate like you, patron,” he said, “but I know the legions. Give that man command of one or two good legions, and he’ll work miracles.”

  This astonished me. “Why on earth do you say that?”

  “I’ve heard him speak before the Concilium Plebis. You saw him out on the street just now? Well, he’s always like that when addressing the plebs. Soldiers respond to a man who talks like that, sir. If he can soldier like he talks, they’ll do anything for him.”

  I had thought that I knew Rome intimately, but here was something new to me. At the time I dismissed it. Talk was one thing, but the ability to endure the hard privations of a soldier’s life? I knew how much I detested military life. Caesar’s reputation for the love of ease and luxury exceeded my own by a wide margin, and my reputation in that area was by no means small. He could never amount to anything as a general. That was how much I knew.

  Of far more interest to me were his cryptic words about Julia. Was he suggesting a union between our houses? I could think of it in no other terms. Marriages between the great families were always political, but there were gradations of meaning. We Caecilii were an immense gens, but the Julians were tiny. At any given time they had no more than one or two marriageable daughters. Such an offer was serious indeed. If it was an offer. More likely, I thought, it was a distraction. That would mean that Caesar was afraid I would find out something he wanted to remain concealed.

  The whole matter, or rather matters, had grown too confusing. I decided to narrow my attention. I decided that if I were to regain any perspective at all, I would have to grasp my courage in both hands and confront the person in Rome I feared above all others. I would go and question Clodia.

  I dismissed my clients. After the morning’s delays, it would be futile for us all to troop off to attend Celer’s morning call. I was especially courteous in my dismissal, though. These men had stood by me unflinchingly when I was about to go to battle with my mortal foe, even though many of them were too old for a street brawl. It was only a client’s duty, and I was obligated to do the same for them, but an actual instance of fulfillment of the mutual obligation was special, and despite my lifelong reputation for laxness, I have never been accused of ingratitude by my clientela.

  It was a daunting prospect, but I did not need to nerve myself up to the task as I might have on ordinary days. I had faced a death-fight with her brother and bearded Caesar already since breakfast, so a bout with Clodia was not as daunting as it might have been.

  By the time I arrived at Celer’s house he had long since departed for the Curia on public business. The great house was quiet as his household staff busied themselves with their various domestic tasks. I told the majordomo to announce me to the lady Clodia and inform her th
at I requested an interview. He conducted me to a small waiting room off the atrium, and I stood about there for a few minutes until a barefoot slave girl appeared.

  “Please come with me, sir,” the girl said. “My mistress will see you now.” I followed her. She was a slight but beautiful creature, with yellow Gallic hair. Clodia always surrounded herself with beautiful things: slave, freeborn, animal and inanimate.

  She led me to a suite of rooms in a corner of the mansion. These rooms were plainly newer than the rest of the house, and Clodia’s touch was visible everywhere. The walls were painted by masters, mostly landscapes and mythological scenes, and the floors were mosaics of equal quality. Every humblest furnishing was exquisite. The vases and statuary were worth a good-sized town.

  “A private interview, Decius? How brave.”

  I turned from the lamp of Campanian bronze work I had been admiring. Clodia was as beautiful as any of the art in the room, and knew it. She stood in a doorway that opened onto a garden. It was a trick of hers with which I was all too familiar. It allowed light to pass through the sheer garments she favored. This day she had outdone herself. She wore a gown made of the famous, or rather infamous, Coan cloth. It was forbidden by every new pair of Censors, but that just meant that it was inadvisable to wear it in public. Her gown had been dyed purple, a further extravagance. She appeared to be surrounded by a fine violet mist.

  “Why, Clodia,” I said, “I am here on a mission assigned by your husband. I even have his permission to call on you.”

  “How unthinkably proper,” she said. “You are always so dutiful.”

  “Attention to duty is what made Rome great,” I said, quoting my second old saying of the day.

  She smiled. “You know, Decius, every time I’ve counted you out of the game, you show up again with more friends, more influence and just a tiny bit more rank. I won’t say power.”

  “Slowly and steadily,” I said. “That’s the best way to advance.”

  “The safe way.”

  “Safe is the best way to stay alive,” I said. “At least, I’ve always thought so. Lately, someone has been trying to kill me for no reason I can imagine. It wouldn’t be you, would it?”

  “Just because I tried to have you killed before?” She looked truly hurt. “You were in my way then. I’m not frivolous. I don’t try to kill people out of spite. Why do you suspect me?”

  “Your little cousin Appius Nero tried to poison me a few nights back. Afterward he was seen coming here. You and Celer are the only people of consequence in this house, and that narrowed things somewhat.”

  “You’re an idiot. He had no cause to poison you, and he came here because he’d had an argument with my brother and needed a place to stay. They must have patched things up, because I haven’t seen him since yesterday morning.”

  “You won’t be seeing him,” I told her. “Someone killed him right in front of my house last night.”

  Her face froze in mid-smile. “Killed?” she said. Her control was great, but I was sure that she was shocked.

  “Yes. Done in just like Capito.”

  She turned away from me so I couldn’t read her expression. “Well. Poor Nero. I didn’t know him well, but he was a kinsman and rather young.”

  “Old enough to try to poison me,” I said.

  “It’s all distressing, but that isn’t why you came here today, is it?” She turned back, and her mocking face was in place once more.

  “No. What I came to ask about was your brother’s indiscretion at the rites of Bona Dea. The city is shocked. The city is shocked. There must be an accounting.”

  “Oh, you know Clodius. He loves to make fun of our religious guardians. He’s never grown up and loves to make his elders angry.”

  This was an amazing thing to hear from Clodia because it was so perfectly true. Her adulation of her brother was legendary. She had even changed her name when he had changed his. She was often angry with him, but it was unlike her to belittle him in front of an enemy. I was already suspicious. Suspicion was a habit when dealing with Clodia. But this was intriguing. Could she be a bit upset with her beloved brother? Then someone called from another room.

  “Clodia? Who is it?”

  “Am I intruding?” I asked.

  “Yes, but I forgive you. Come, Decius, you must meet Fulvia.”

  “Fulvia? Is she back in Rome?” I knew only one prominent woman of that name, but she had fled Rome after the Catilinarian debacle.

  “No, this is a kinswoman of hers. She’s just come to Rome from Baiae.”

  We went into a bedroom, this one betraying Clodia’s taste for erotic art. It resembled the decor of a brothel in subject matter, but here as elsewhere everything was of highest quality. A young girl sat up in a silk-cushioned bed and I made a formal obeisance, careful to be impassive, because once again Clodia was trying to upset my equanimity.

  The girl was exquisitely beautiful, her hair as blond as a German’s. She was so slight and tiny that she might have been a child, but she wore another of the Coan gowns, and that dispelled any such illusion. Her eyes were huge, her mouth startlingly full-lipped. She appeared to be no more than sixteen, but her face, despite its purity, had that indescribable yet unmistakable stamp that bespoke depthless depravity.

  “My dear,” Clodia said, “this is Decius Caecilius Metellus the Younger, son of the Censor.”

  “I am terribly honored to meet such a distinguished man,” Fulvia said. It was against such a voice that Ulysses had his men stuff their ears with wax. Unlike Ulysses, I was not lashed to a mast, but it required some effort not to leap onto the bed with her.

  “All Rome rejoices to have so lovely a visitor among us,” I said. “Is this just a visit, or can we hope you are here to stay?”

  “Fulvia,” Clodia said, “is betrothed to Clodius.”

  I looked at her with an eyebrow sardonically arched. I could not resist. “Aren’t you jealous?”

  She didn’t flinch. “People such as we have a flexibility you cannot imagine, Decius.”

  She was underestimating my imagination, but I let it pass. “And was young Fulvia in Caesar’s house on the now-infamous evening of the rites?” I asked, dragging her back to the subject at hand.

  “The rites are only for married women, Decius,” Clodia said. “Fulvia accompanied me there, but she could not take part in the rituals.”

  “And how did it come about that Clodius got in?” I demanded. “The mind boggles at the thought of him pretending to be a woman. Whom did he claim to be married to?”

  “I’m sure I don’t know,” Clodia said. “He didn’t tell me he was coming.”

  “I see. And just how was he found out?”

  “Oh, that occurred during a…” She paused. “No, I’m afraid I am forbidden to tell you.”

  “Don’t be absurd. When did you ever care about laws or rules, whether of human or divine origin? The cloak of piety doesn’t fit you well, Clodia.”

  “Who speaks of piety?” she said. “This is a matter of law. Are you not sworn to uphold the laws of the Senate and People of Rome?”

  “That is a debatable point,” I said. On a sudden inspiration, I embroidered upon a recent conversation. “As a matter of fact, I recently was present at a debate involving some of the highest figures of government, where there was some question whether the cult of Bona Dea is of Roman origin at all. It may be that it is lawful to demand testimony concerning the rites.” I had promoted our idle dinner chitchat to the status of senatorial debate, but she didn’t have to know that. A look very much like fear flitted across Clodia’s beautiful face.

  “If that proves to be the case,” Fulvia said, “then Clodius can scarcely face a charge of truly serious sacrilege.”

  I turned to her. “I see that you are as perspicacious as you are lovely.” You meddling little slut, I thought. It hadn’t occurred to me. But when I turned back to Clodia, she still looked upset. Quickly, she composed herself.

  “I believe dear Fulvia is c
orrect. The Censors may frown upon offenses against foreign gods, but the courts surely could not exact stiff penalties in such cases. That is reserved for the gods of the state. I must consult with Cicero on this.”

  “I hadn’t thought that Cicero was kindly disposed toward Clodius,” I said.

  “Oh, but Cicero and I have become great friends lately,” she said, her smile back in place. This was bad news. At first I was not inclined to believe her, but then I remembered Cicero’s recent rather hasty insistence that Clodia could not be involved in the scandal. Why would he say such a thing unless he, too, had fallen to her wiles? I was disappointed in Cicero, but I knew that I was in no position to judge. I had certainly been under Clodia’s spell in the past.

  “Can you go so far as to tell me who it was that discovered your brother?”

  “It was a slave woman from the household of Lucullus. I think I can say that without risking divine wrath.”

  “Slaves attend the rites?” This was news to me.

  “The musicians. I believe it was a harpist who betrayed him.”

  This seemed to me an odd choice of words.

  “I wish I could have seen him,” Fulvia said. She brought her legs from beneath the coverlet and sprawled belly-down on the bed. The Coan gown revealed her dorsal contours to be as shapely as her front. “Achilles was discovered in women’s clothing, you know, and Hercules had to wear women’s garments when he was enslaved to Omphale. She got to wear his lion’s skin and carry his club. I’ve always found that exciting.”

  “You’re very young for such recondite tastes,” I observed.

  “Some of us start earlier than others,” she said. How very true, I thought. Her voice caused an uneasiness in the testicles. Clodia sat beside her and took her hand.

  “Will that be all, Decius? Fulvia and I have things to discuss.”

  “And I would not think of interfering. I shall take my leave and let you ladies get back to … whatever it was. My condolences, Clodia, for your recent loss.”