The Roman sotk-2

by Mika Waltari

  It was daylight and the garden slaves were already at work when I finally staggered to my sedan, my head whirling and my knees shaking, wondering whether I could stand so much love for fifteen years until you received your man-toga.

  In any case, I was now deeply involved in the Pisonian conspiracy and had sworn with a thousand kisses to do my best to acquire a position in which I could do my best for Antonia. I think I even promised to murder Nero myself if necessary. But Antonia did not think it necessary for me to risk my valuable head. She explained pedantically that it would not be suitable for a future Emperor’s father personally to take part in the murder of an Emperor. It was a bad precedent and might be fateful for you one day, my son.

  I was probably happier that hot spring than I had ever been before in my life. I was well, strong, and by Roman standards relatively uncor-rupted, and I could enjoy my passion to the full. It was also as if everything I undertook succeeded and bore rich harvests, as happens only once in a man’s life. I lived in a dream and the only thing that disturbed me was Claudia’s insistent curiosity about where I was going and from where I had come. I did not like always lying to her, especially as women are often instinctively perceptive in these matters.

  I got in touch with Fenius Rufus at first, for I had befriended him in connection with my grain deals. One could call our friendship a golden mutual society. Hesitantly, he revealed that he was bound to the Pisonian conspiracy and listed the names of the Praetorians, tribunes and centurions who had sworn an oath to obey him and him alone after Nero had been disposed of.

  Rufus was obviously relieved to notice that I had found out about the conspiracy on my own. He apologized several times and assured me that he had been bound by his oath not to tell me before. He promised to put a word in for me with Piso and the other leaders of the conspiracy. It was not Rufus’ fault that the arrogant Piso and other Calpurnians treated me with superiority. I should have been offended had I been more sensitive.

  They did not even bother about the money I offered to put at the disposal of the conspiracy, but said that they already had enough. Neither did they fear I would denounce them, so certain were they of victory. Indeed, Piso himself said in his insolent way that he knew me and my reputation sufficiently well to guess that I was going to keep quiet to save my own skin. My friendship with Petronius and young Lucanus helped a little, and I was allowed to take the oath and meet Epicharis, that secretive Roman woman whose influence and part in the conspiracy I did not then fully realize.

  When I had gone so far, one day to my surprise, Claudia brought the matter up. In a roundabout and involved way she questioned me until she at least realized that I was not going to run straight to Nero to report what she had to say. She was both relieved and surprised when

  I smiled pityingly and told her that I had long since taken an oath to overthrow the tyrant for the sake of the freedom of the fatherland.

  “I can’t imagine why they took a man like you,” said Claudia. “They had better act quickly or their plans will be known everywhere. It’s the worst thing I’ve ever heard. I’d never have believed it, even of you. Are you really prepared to betray Nero just like that, when he’s done so much for you and regards you as his friend?”

  Retaining my dignity, I remarked gendy that it had been Nero’s own conduct that had made me think of the common good rather than of a friendship which had injured me in many ways. Personally I had not suffered much from the monetary reforms, thanks to my own watchfulness. But the weeping of widows and orphans echoed in my ears, and when I thought of the miseries of the country people and the small craftsmen I was prepared to sacrifice my honor if necessary on the altar of the fatherland, for the good of all the Roman people.

  I had kept my opinions from Claudia because I had been afraid that she would try to stop my fearlessly risking my life for freedom. Now I hoped that she would at last understand that I had kept silent about my activities to avoid dragging her into these dangerous conspiracies.

  Claudia was still suspicious, for she knew me well. But she had to admit I had done the right thing. After hesitating for a long time, she herself had thought of persuading me, if necessary even of forcing me, to join the conspiracy for the sake of my own and your future.

  “You must have noticed that I have not bothered you with the Christians for a long time,” said Claudia. “There is no longer any reason why they should be allowed to meet secretly in our house. They have their own safe places, so it is not necessary to expose my son Clement to that danger, even if I myself am not afraid to admit I am a Christian. And the Christians have shown themselves to be weak and indecisive. To get rid of Nero would be to their advantage and would at the same time be a kind of Christian vengeance for his evil deeds. But just imagine, they won’t have anything to do with the conspiracy, although it looks as if it could not fail. I don’t understand them any longer. They just say one must not kill and that revenge is not theirs.”

  “Good god of Hercules,” I said in astonishment. “Are you mad? Only a woman would take it into her head to involve the Christians in something in which there are already too many contributors. No one would want them in anyhow, I can assure you. That would force the new Emperor to promise them privileges beforehand. The independent position of the Jews is more than enough already.”

  “One can always ask,” snapped Claudia. “It would do no harm. But they say that they have never become involved in politics before and are thinking of obeying the legal ruler in the future, whoever he is. They have their own kingdom which will come, but I’m beginning to tire of waiting for it. As a daughter of Claudius and the mother of my son, I must think a little about the earthly powers too. I think Cephas is cowardly, always going on about obedience and keeping out of State affairs. The invisible kingdom is a fine and good thing. But since becoming a mother, I have become remote from it and feel more like a Roman than a Christian. These confusing circumstances offer us the best possible chance to change the world, now that everyone wants nothing but peace and order.”

  “What do you mean by changing the world?” I asked distrustfully. “Are you bravely prepared to hurl thousands, perhaps millions of people into starvation, misery and violent death just to create a favorable political climate for your son until he receives his toga?”

  “The republic and freedom are values for which many brave men have been prepared to sacrifice their lives,” said Claudia. “My father Claudius often spoke with great respect of the republic and had been prepared to bring it back if only it had been possible. He said so many a time in his long speeches in the Curia when he complained of the heavy burden of an absolute ruler.”

  “You yourself have many a time said that your father was a crazy, unjust and cruel old man,” I said angrily. “Remember the first time we met, when you spat on his statue in the library? To reinstate the republic is an impossible idea. It hasn’t enough support. The question is only who shall be Emperor. Piso thinks I’m much too insignificant and no doubt you think so too. Whom had you thought of?”

  Claudia stared thoughtfully at me.

  “What do you say to Seneca?” she said, with feigned innocence.

  At first the idea dumbfounded me.

  “What good would it do to exchange a cittern-player for a philosopher?” I asked. But when I thought about it further, I realized that it was a clever suggestion. Both the people and the provinces agreed that Nero’s first five years, when Seneca had ruled, were the happiest Rome had ever known. It still stands out as a golden time, now when we have to pay taxes even to sit in public privies.

  Seneca was immensely rich-three hundred million sesterces was most people’s guess. I thought I knew better. And best of all, Seneca was already sixty years old. Thanks to his Stoic way of life, he would easily live for another fifteen years. Even if he did live out in the country, keeping away from the Senate for health reasons and but seldom visiting the city, all this was nothing but a pretext to calm Nero.

  In fact the diet
he had had to keep to because of his stomach complaint had done him good. He had grown thinner and become more energetic, no longer panting as he walked, nor did he have those fat pendulous cheeks, so unsuited to a philosopher, any longer. He might rule well, persecuting no one, and as an experienced businessman could put Rome’s economic life back on its feet and fill the State treasury instead of wasting it. When his time came, he might even voluntarily hand over power to some youth who had been brought up in his own spirit.

  Seneca’s mild disposition and love of mankind did not differ greatly from the Christian teaching. In a work on natural history he had just completed, he had implied that there are secret forces hidden in nature and the universe which are above human understanding so that the lasting and the visible are really like a thin veil hiding something invisible.

  When I had got so far with my thoughts, I suddenly clapped my hands together in surprise.

  “Claudia!” I cried. “You’re a political genius and I apologize for my unpleasant words.”

  Naturally I did not tell her that by suggesting Seneca and then supporting him, I could then acquire the key position I needed in the conspiracy. Later I could be sure of Seneca’s gratitude and I was in some ways one of his old pupils, and also in Corinth I had been tribune under his brother and enjoyed his complete confidence in secret affairs of State. Seneca’s cousin, young Lucan, had been one of my best friends ever since I had praised his poems. I am no poet myself.

  We talked about this together in the greatest harmony, Claudia and I. We both found more and more good points to our case and became more and more delighted with it as we drank some wine together. Claudia fetched the wine quite of her own accord and did not reprove me for drinking deeply in my excitement. Finally we went to bed and for the first time in a long while I fulfilled my marital duties toward her, to calm finally any suspicions she might have.

  When I awoke later at her side, my head hot with enthusiasm and wine, I thought almost with sorrow how I should one day have to free myself of your mother for your sake. An ordinary divorce would not do for Antonia. Claudia would have to die. But there were ten or fifteen years until then, and much could happen. Many spring floods would flow beneath the bridges of the Tiber, I said to myself consolingly. There were epidemics, plagues, unexpected accidents and above all the Parcae guiding the fates of mankind. I had no need to grieve beforehand for the inevitable and how it would happen.

  Claudia’s plan was so self-evident and excellent that I did not consider it necessary to tell Antonia about it. We were forced to meet seldom and in secret so that there would be no malicious talk which might arouse the suspicions of Nero who, of course, had to keep an eye on Antonia.

  I went to see Seneca at once on the pretext that I had business to see to in Praeneste and was simply making a courtesy visit on my way. For safety’s sake I arranged to have something to do in Praeneste.

  Seneca received me in a most friendly manner. I could see he was living a luxurious and comfortable life in the country with his wife, who was half his age. At first he muttered about the pains of old age and so on, but when he realized I really had an errand to carry out, the old fox took me to a distant summerhouse where he retreated from the world to dictate his books to a scribe and to lead the life of an ascetic.

  As evidence of this and of other things too, he showed me a stream from which he could scoop running drinking water with his cupped hand, and some fruit trees from which he could choose what he ate, and he also told me how his wife Paulina had learned to grind their corn with a handmill and make his bread herself. I recognized these signs and realized he lived in constant fear of being poisoned. In his need for money, Nero might be tempted by his old tutor’s property and even find it politically necessary to rid himself of him. Seneca still had many friends who respected him as a philosopher and a statesman, but for safety’s sake he seldom received guests.

  I came straight to the point and asked whether Seneca would be willing to receive the Imperial office after Nero and bring peace and order back to the country. He need not be involved in Nero’s death. All he need do was be present in the city on a certain day, prepared to go to the Praetorians with his money bags ready. I had reckoned that thirty million sesterces would be enough, if every man, for instance, received two thousand and tribunes and centurions in equivalent grades more according to rank and position.

  Fenius Rufus did not want any payment. All he asked was that the State should compensate him later for the losses he had suffered in the grain trade through Nero’s caprices. In that case, it would be enough that his debts were paid within a reasonable time. I hurriedly added that I should be prepared to raise some of the money if Seneca did not wish to provide the entire sum for financial reasons.

  Seneca straightened up and looked at me with frighteningly cold eyes containing not an iota of love of mankind.

  “I know you inside out, Minutus,” he said. “So my first thought was that Nero had sent you here to test my loyalty in some cunning manner, since you are the most suitable of all his friends for that purpose. But you obviously know much too much about the conspiracy since you can repeat so many names. If you were an informer, then several heads would already have rolled. I am not asking you for your motives, but only who has given you the authority to turn to me.”

  I told him that no one had done so. Indeed, this was completely my own idea, for I regarded him as the best and noblest man to rule over Rome and thought I could find widespread support for him among the conspirators if I received his approval to it. Seneca calmed down a little.

  “Don’t think you are the first to turn to me in this matter,” he said. “Piso’s nearest man, Antonius Natalis, whom you know, was here quite recently to inquire after my poor health and why I refused so definitely to receive Piso and deal with him openly. But I have no reason to support a man like Piso. So I replied that middlemen are evil and personal contact less suitable, but that my own life after this would be dependent on Piso’s safety. And so it is. If the conspiracy is exposed, from which may the inexplicable God protect us all, then a careless visit to me would alone be enough to doom me to destruction.

  “The murder of Nero is more than just contemplated,” he went on thoughtfully. “Piso would find his best opportunity at his villa in Baiae. Nero often visits it without a guard, to bathe and amuse himself. But Piso says hypocritically that he cannot violate the sanctity of a meal and the rules of hospitality by murdering a guest, as if a man like Piso ever worshiped any gods. In fact Nero’s murder would give offense in many quarters. Lucius Silanus, for instance, has wisely refused to approve such a fearful crime as murdering the Emperor. Piso himself has passed over Consul Atticus Vestinus because Vestinus is an industrious man who might really try to reinstate the republic. As Consul he would have good opportunities to take over power after a murder.”

  I realized that Seneca knew more about the conspiracy than I did, and that as an experienced statesman he had carefully weighed the situation. So I apologized to him for having disturbed him, however well-meaningly, and I assured him that in any case he need not worry where I was concerned. I had business to do in Praeneste and it was only natural for an old pupil to make a diversion to inquire after his former tutor’s health.

  I was given the impression that Seneca was not pleased when I referred to myself as a former pupil. But he looked at me with compassion when he spoke again.

  “I shall say to you,” he said, “the same as I tried to teach Nero. One can hide one’s real characteristics for a while with dissimulation and servility. But in the end the act is always exposed and the sheepskin falls from the wolf. Nero has wolf blood in his veins, however much of an actor he is. So have you, Minutus, but of a more cowardly wolf.”

  I did not know whether to feel proud or offended by his words. I asked in passing whether he believed that Antonia was involved in the conspiracy and was supporting Piso. Seneca shook his rumpled head warningly.

  “If I were you,” he
said, “I should never trust Aelia Antonia in anything. The name alone is frightening. In her is united the tainted blood of two ancient and dangerous families. I know things about her youth of which I do not wish to speak. I am simply warning you. In the name of all the gods, don’t let her join the conspiracy. You are mad if you do. She is more ambitious for power than Agrippina, who did have her good sides despite what she did.”

  Seneca’s warning struck me, but I was dazzled by love and thought he was speaking from envy. A statesman who has been prematurely thrust to one side is usually bitter toward everyone. As a philosopher too, Seneca might be considered a disappointed man. In his heyday he had not been at all as prominent as he had led people to believe. I thought he was the right man to talk of dissimulation, for he himself was master of this.

  As we parted, Seneca admitted that he did not believe his chances were great if a coup came about, but he was prepared to arrive in Rome on a certain day to be present and if necessary give his support to Piso, for he was sure that Piso in his vanity and extravagance would soon make things impossible. Perhaps then the time would be favorable for Seneca.

  “I live in daily danger of my life anyhow,” he said with a bitter smile, “so have nothing to lose by showing myself. If Piso gains power, then I’ve shown my support for him. If the conspiracy is exposed, a frightening prospect, then I shall die all the same. But the wise man does not fear death. It is the debt which mankind has to pay some day. It is not very important whether it happens now or later.”

  For me this was what was important. So I went to Praeneste in a downhearted mood, pondering his ill-omened words. I thought I had better take some precautions in case the conspiracy was exposed. A wise man does not put all his eggs in one basket.