by Jack Ludlow
‘You must understand, sir, that my father is engaged in what he considers to be his life’s work.’
‘For which all Rome is grateful,’ said Epidaurianus smoothly. Lucius was a hefty benefactor to the various temples, and wisely included that of Aesculapius.
Marcellus smiled, lighting up his otherwise grave face. ‘We could debate that remark for some time, doctor.’
‘Surely there are others who could deputise for him?’ Now Marcellus laughed, which made Epidaurianus drop his sepulchral tone, in fact he spoke quite sharply. ‘As you said, all Rome may not be grateful. After all, someone, as yet unknown, tried to murder him. If you don’t want that section who do admire him to be dressed in mourning, you must stop him working.’
‘Would that I had the power,’ Marcellus replied.
‘Marcellus Falerius, no one knows how much power they have until they attempt to exercise it. You are born to power, now you must ask yourself this. At what point do you wish to come upon your inheritance?’
Marcellus had done his best to look like a fully grown man but there was no disguising his youth. Quintus Cornelius suppressed a smile, noting the way the lad kept his face set, like a Greek thinker in repose, which was quite amusing.
‘We do not yet know who was responsible, which, apart from all the other cares he has, is driving my father to distraction.’
‘We may never know, for certain,’ said Quintus.
‘Please don’t tell him that,’ Marcellus replied hurriedly, dropping his studied demeanour.
‘Lucius Falerius must know that he has many enemies, fellow-senators and knights. Some of our Italian allies would readily commit murder if they thought that by doing so they would gain the citizenship, and we did not entirely satisfy the demands of the Parthian ambassadors, for which he will bear the blame.’ Marcellus was studying Quintus, savouring and testing every word, seeking for any meaning that might be hidden amongst them, but the Cornelii face was like a mask, and his words lacked emphasis. ‘The real question is, having failed, will the people who tried to kill him make a second attempt?’
‘His doctor advised me that he should leave Rome to recuperate.’
That made Quintus sit upright, though he tried to control the movement. He was the acknowledged heir to Lucius’s power, everyone knew that, and like most successors he was eager to grasp power. There was a slightly crafty edge to the voice now. ‘I am troubled by that, Marcellus. Your father has been kind to me, taking me into his confidence. We think as one, and though I am prepared to assume whatever burden he places on me, I confess to a feeling of nervousness.’
‘He won’t go,’ said Marcellus, gratified to see the slight jerk of protest that ran through Quintus’s body. ‘Even if Epidaurianus tells him he will die from overwork.’
‘We must, at all costs, keep him alive.’
The attempt at sincerity left Marcellus wondering just how badly Quintus wanted power — after all, anyone could have hired that assassin. It was not something he, himself, craved, though his father had arranged that he would come upon it in time.
‘I lack the wit to think of a way of moving him, Quintus Cornelius.’ The young man bowed his head slightly. ‘Which is why I’ve come to you.’
The senator sat fingering the edge of his toga, ruminating on those words. He was not fooled; this youngster had the brains to conjure up a solution, he just lacked the stature to enforce it. The question he was posing to Quintus was plain.
‘If he could be persuaded to undertake an important task, one that got him out of Rome…’
‘Yet one that was not too arduous,’ added Quintus, solicitously.
‘A deputy of sufficient stature could do most of the actual work.’
‘I will call upon your father today, Marcellus, at the ninth hour,’ said Quintus. ‘It will be of some benefit if you are present.’
‘You look like a stuffed magistrate,’ said Valeria, under her breath, her hand flicking at his pure white toga.
They were sitting in the garden of her father’s house, with her personal maid less than six feet away. Marcellus, sensing her anger, wanted her more than ever. He had tried to keep his own promise, to stay away, but somehow his resolve always failed. Not that abstinence in regard to Valeria was easy, Gaius being one of his closest friends. Besides that, because patrician Rome was really rather small, they tended to meet at every function or festival. It was always the same for Marcellus: the desire to dominate her, to make her perform as Sosia did, doing everything he commanded, was overwhelming. However, the opposite occurred, often to the point where Valeria delivered a very public humiliation. Only a fool would stand for it, yet, in pursuit of a kind word from this girl, Marcellus had even defied his father by calling at the house each day since the attempted assassination, without first changing. He tried to edge closer, inching along the stone bench, but she moved away.
‘I have not been to the Campus Martius today, Valeria. I had to call on Quintus Cornelius. Are you annoyed that I still came to see you?’
Her head jerked away from him, the nose lifting in the air, which stretched her slim neck. Admiring it, he was wondering if he wanted to caress it with his lips, or squeeze it between his hands.
‘That is something I’ve yet to decide upon, Marcellus Falerius.’
The formality forced him to suppress a curse. He had nearly gone home to change into his fighting clothes before coming here, knowing he was in no danger of a rebuke. While his father had been confined to his bed, Marcellus had done very much as he pleased, but he had decided against it. How could someone who had just called on one of the leading senators of Rome, and been received in his house with honour, humble himself before a mere girl, however much he desired her, by changing into battered old armour and a smelly smock? Some of that feeling still persisted, making him speak more directly than normal.
‘What is wrong with being clean? You make that sound like a crime.’
‘Did I not ask you, Marcellus?’
Valeria had never asked him in so many words, but by hints and the way she reacted he knew that the look of his battered accoutrements, as well as the feel and smell of his exertions, brought the more hair-raising parts of his stories alive. It was as though she was some kind of Amazon, denied her true vocation through being born at the wrong time, who was determined to live her true life, vicariously, through him.
‘My father forbade it, yet I have defied him more than once.’ Marcellus stopped. He had never told anyone about his father’s instruction and the frown on Valeria’s face was evidence that doing so now was winning him no plaudits. He searched his mind for an excuse, aware, as he spoke, of both the lame, illogical words and the equally pusillanimous way he delivered them. ‘I cannot take advantage of his illness. Until he is well enough to conduct his own life again, I must obey him.’
Her eyebrows were now arched up, giving her an aura of heightened beauty. ‘Why did he forbid it?’
‘He said it was undignified, unbecoming of a Falerii.’
‘I suppose it’s all right for a Trebonii?’ Valeria replied sourly, making it plain she had not missed the snobbery, even if Marcellus had not intended it. ‘You choose to please him rather than me?’
Marcellus was genuinely non-plussed by that. ‘He’s my father. I have no choice.’
‘What did you say when he arranged the marriage with the daughter of Appius Claudius?’
‘Say?’
The tone of voice that followed, wheedling and anxious, struck a false note. ‘Do you care anything for me, Marcellus?’
He looked around, partly to avoid an answer, more to make sure that the slave girl had not heard her mistress’s words. The maid seemed to be concentrating very hard on her sewing, as though she had no desire to listen to their conversation.
‘Answer me!’ whispered Valeria, urgently.
‘I don’t know what to say.’
‘It’s very simple, Marcellus. The answer is yes or no!’
They had never
talked of this, though he had often tried to move their conversations in this direction, but he had never insisted, partly because he was unsure if the emotions he felt consisted of love or sheer possessiveness. There was such a lot he disliked about Valeria: her vanity, the way she treated her parents as well as the rest of her family. She was cruel to slaves, in a way that he felt was unbecoming, making them grovel before her over trifling misdemeanours, but most of all he hated the way she behaved with people her own age. She was like a cat with other girls, either seeking to be stroked, or scratching painfully. With boys it was worse, since she could not bear to see them pay court to anyone else. Her coquetry infuriated him, especially when her sole intention seemed to be to make him jealous.
‘Yes,’ he whispered.
‘So what did you say to your father about the betrothal?’
‘I didn’t say anything!’
‘Why not?’ she hissed. ‘If you love me, you should have told him.’
That put Marcellus on the horns of a dilemma. First of all, the question had changed: she had moved effortlessly from the one word, care, to another, love, which was quite substantial. Even Valeria, self-obsessed as she was, must know that no one told Lucius Falerius what to do, least of all his son. Quite apart from that he could hardly admit that he had put forward her name as a tentative suggestion, only to be informed that the Trebonii were not considered good enough to be connected with the Falerii. So he took a deep breath, which puffed out his chest, and replied with the only answer he could think of, unaware, as always, that by adopting such a pose he looked and sounded pompous.
‘My father demands, and deserves, my complete obedience.’
‘Then why, Marcellus, having been forbidden, do you come straight here from the Campus Martius?’ His mouth opened and closed, like a fish breathing in water, but there was really nothing to say. ‘You don’t love me, Marcellus. You want me, that’s all, and what would you do with me once you’re finished?’ The girl stood up suddenly, causing her maid to look up from the garment she was mending, noting that her charge was angry. Valeria was halfway to her bedroom before she called over her shoulder. ‘Marcellus Falerius is leaving now. Please be so good as to show him to the gate!’
Marcellus stood on the other side of the postern, disconsolate and angry, cursing both himself and Valeria. She had made her way to an upstairs room, and was leaning out slightly so that she could watch him. Forced to dodge back to avoid being seen when he finally started walking away, she had caught sight of his furious countenance, which made her laugh so much, she had to lean against the inside wall for support, allowing the cool stone to quell the heat that came from her tingling body.
Quintus Cornelius paced the study, his mind racing as he tried to weigh the advantages to be gained by the absence, from Rome, of Lucius Falerius Nerva, agitated because his appointment was close, leaving him little time to think. The latest despatches were strewn across the table, evidence of his haste as he had sought to find, in them, a solution to the problem of where the older man should go. Not that he would depart willingly; persuasion would be required and that, in turn, meant that the matter had to be important enough to qualify for such elevated scrutiny. Lucius had the power to change whatever he chose, so his presence would not be welcome outside Italy, even by his own appointees.
Not all the scrolls on his desk came from official messengers, some were petitions from the provinces asking for help to contain the rapacity of the Roman proconsuls. There was corruption a’plenty seeking redress, yet that was known to Lucius and considering he had lived with the knowledge up till now, it seemed unlikely that he would relish the concept of heading any commission to bring his peers to a better execution of their responsibilities.
Spain was the logical place for him, since that benighted land caused the Republic more trouble than any other, and the idea of a buffoon like Livius Rutulius going there was risible. Given his nature, and his pea brain, he would court the kind of disaster that Rome had spent years seeking to avoid. Perhaps a man like Lucius could see, as others had not, a way to control this Brennos and nullify the danger presented by dominant hill-forts like Pallentia and Numantia. Was it possible, with his cunning brain, that the leading man in Rome could outwit the ex-Druid priest: either bring peace to the provinces, or establish, once and for all, that nothing could be done? To Quintus, Spain had decided advantages, for at the very rim of Roman power and still involving a sea journey, it would remove the old man from affairs for a very long time, allowing him to enhance his own prestige at Lucius’s expense. Against that was the fact that his mentor would see that as clearly as he.
Then there was this slave revolt in Sicily, which, if Silvanus was to be believed, was rapidly spinning out of control. If it was true, it would be the governor’s own fault. Silvanus, if he supported the Optimates, was a trifle lukewarm. Would the chance to either neutralise him, or bind him closer, tempt Lucius Falerius? The senator left his house for the short walk to the Falerii gate, mentally rehearsing the arguments he would use, well aware that the cunning old fox he was about to visit would sense any disloyalty almost before it was stated. He tried to put to the back of his mind the insistent voice which told him he was engaged on a fool’s errand.
The mere mention of the word Spain produced a look that told Quintus, quite clearly, that further discussion on that score was fruitless, so he quickly substituted his second idea.
‘Sicily?’ said Lucius, still far from pleased. His face looked sour, as though he had just bitten into a lemon.
‘It’s no longer an isolated revolt by a few slaves, Lucius Falerius. Recent reports talk of a slave army.’
‘I have read the reports, Quintus, and dismissed them as exaggerations, which is what you should have done.’
‘I agree, Lucius,’ replied Quintus smoothly, ‘but they would provide a wonderful excuse for you to leave Rome, without really going out of Italy. You could head a commission to enquire into the disturbances. It may be that there is some truth in the rumours. Silvanus is still insisting that we send legions. Nonsense, of course, the day will never come when Rome has to field an army against slaves.’
Lucius glanced at his son, who was attempting to look innocent. ‘I have no desire to leave Rome, Quintus. Just because a few of our fellow-senators ran away, does not mean that I should.’
Several dozen of his peers, all adherents to the Optimates faction, had suddenly found pressing reasons to visit their estates the day after the attempt on his life. They would remain out of the city as long as they thought there was a risk.
‘Why did they try to kill you, father?’ asked Marcellus. All three fell silent. The glare that Lucius aimed at his son spoke volumes, but Marcellus was now too old to be rebuked before an outsider, even one as eminent and close as Quintus. The youngster ignored the look and kept talking. ‘If that assassin had succeeded, the whole of Rome would have been in turmoil. How many senators would have fled if you had actually died?’
‘That I cannot tell,’ Lucius replied, but Marcellus noticed that his father’s look had changed: the glare had been replaced by a rather arch expression of enquiry. He knew his son too well to believe that what he was saying was spontaneous, but he held his tongue, his curiosity being that much greater than his potential wrath.
‘It is my opinion that those opposed to you in the Senate were behind this act.’
‘Senators do not stoop to murder,’ said Quintus, dismissively, a remark which produced a polite cough, as well as a bland look, from Lucius. ‘I’m more inclined to think that the Parthians were responsible. What happened, especially the immediate murder of your assailant, smacks of eastern intrigue. But I think I see what your boy is driving at. You have named me as the heir to your power, and you have informed all your clients that this is the case, yet in the immediate aftermath of a murder, I’m not sure that I could muster all the support we normally hold. What if others, prepared and waiting, chose that moment to cause mayhem?’
‘How
many times have you discussed this?’ said Lucius sharply, looking from one to the other.
Quintus opened his mouth to say never, but the youngster got in first. ‘Once, father, and I would not grace it with the title discussion, just as I will not be chastised for showing concern for your health.’
Lucius was fighting to keep the mask of anger. Failing, he turned to Quintus, lest Marcellus detect a hint of his gratitude. ‘What you are implying, Quintus, is that you need to establish yourself well in advance, so that no one can be in any doubt of your position, should anything happen to me.’
‘Yes!’ replied Quintus, hoping that his attempt to grasp this lifeline wasn’t too obvious.
‘Sicily?’ said Lucius, rolling the word around his mouth.
‘There’s no panic, Lucius. You can take all the time in the world to get there.’
‘Nonsense, Quintus. No one would believe that I would trouble myself unless the matter was serious.’
‘No one will believe that you’ve actually gone, father. They’ll think you’re sitting just outside Rome, waiting to pounce.’
Lucius gave Marcellus a rare smile, wondering if the boy had deliberately set out to warn Quintus, or merely done so by accident.
‘You will need a military legate, Lucius. Might I suggest my brother Titus. His term of office is nearly up.’
‘An excellent notion, Quintus.’
The other man spoke as though he could not believe what he was saying. ‘You agree, then?’
‘I do. You shall have access to all my papers, Quintus. Added to that, you shall be free to act as you see fit. This wound may prove a blessing.’
‘How so?’