Catilina's riddle rsr-3

by Steven Saylor

  There was no talk of Cicero or Catilina, no mention of elections or of bodies without heads. For this I was glad.

  After the rest of the household went to bed, I was wakeful and restless and went to the garden instead. The yellow canopy had been removed and the garden was filled with bright moonlight. I listened to the soft splashing of the fountain and studied the broken moon and wavering stars reflected in the black water. The moonlight turned the hard paving stones to shimmering silver and seemed to cover the flowers with a soft coating of grey ash.

  How many nights had I found peace and escape from the cares of the city in this garden? In a way I felt as far from the turmoil of the Forum in this place as I did at the farm in Etruria; in some ways I felt even safer and more removed. I sat on a stone bench beside the fountain and leaned against a pillar. I gazed up at the moon and the dome of stars all around it.

  I heard the sound of bare feet from the portico, so familiar that I did not have to look. 'Meto,' I said quietly.

  'Papa.' He stepped into the garden. His toga had been put away, and he wore only a loincloth about his hips. He stepped nearer and I indicated that he should sit beside me, but instead he sat on a bench a few feet away, facing me.

  'Can't you sleep, Meto? Or is it too hot?'

  'No, it's not the heat.' The angle of the moonlight obscured his face, casting his eyes in shadow, glancing off his nose and making his cheeks and lips look as if they were carved from marble.

  'The excitement of the day, then,' I suggested.

  He was silent for a long moment 'Papa, I'm a man now.'

  'I know, Meto.'

  'I'm not a boy any longer.'

  'Yes, Meto, I know.'

  'Then why do you still treat me like a boy?' 'Because — what do you mean?'

  ‘You hide things from me. You talk behind my back. You tell Eco everything; you share everything with him.' 'Because Eco is…'

  'Because Eco is a man, and I am a boy.'

  'No, Meto, it's not that.'

  'Because Eco was born free and I wasn't.'

  'Not that, either,' I said, wearily shaking my head.

  ‘But I am a man, Papa. The law says so, and so do the gods. Why don't you believe it?'

  I looked at his smooth, unblemished cheeks, the colour of white roses in the moonlight, which the barber had shaved for the first time that day. I looked at his slender arms and narrow chest, as smooth and hairless as a girl's. But his arms were not really as slender as I had thought; in a year's time the work of the farm had put some muscle into them. Nor was his chest any longer the flat, narrow chest of a child; it had begun to broaden and take shape. The moonlight clearly etched the square prominence of his pectorals and the ridges of his belly. His legs were still long for his body, but they were not spindly; his calves and thighs were hard with muscle.

  When had this happened? It was as if I gazed at a stranger beneath the moonlight, or as if the moon itself had transformed him in that moment before my eyes.

  'You treat me like a child, Papa. You know this is true. This whole matter of not wanting me to go inside the Senate House—'

  "That had nothing to do with you, Meto. It was my own aversion.'

  'But what about the body we found in the stables? You treated me the same way you treated Diana.'

  'I did not. I sent her away, but to you I showed what one could learn from observing the corpse — although, as I remember, you were almost too squeamish to look.'

  'But I did look! And I'm not talking about letting me study the body with you. I'm talking about afterwards, when you began to brood over it. You never confided in me. You sent for Eco to come all the way from Rome so that you could share your thoughts with him.'

  ‘I didn't send for Eco.'

  "That's not what he says.'

  'Oh, I see, the two of you have been talking behind my back.' 'Confiding in each other, Papa, as brothers should. And as I wish you would confide in me. Because I am a man now.

  Because you need me, to help protect you and Mother and Diana—'

  'Protect me!’ The image of the little boy I met in Baiae protecting me from some hulking assassin was so absurd that I shook my head. It was my duty to protect him, as I always had. Of course, he was not really so little any more. But I was still stronger than he was, at least I thought so, though he might be faster, and his stamina might be greater than mine.

  'Your body has changed, Meto, that's true, but in other ways—'

  'In other ways I'm still a child. I know that's what you think, but where is your evidence?' These words rang strangely in my ears. Where had he picked them up? 'It's just not true, Papa. You don't know what sort of things I think about when I'm alone. I worry, too, about the body we found, and Catilina coming to our house, and the terrible things happening in Rome. I saw Marcus Caelius talking to you at the party today. I saw the look on your face. What were you talking about? What did he want? Why don't you tell me, so that I can help? You'll tell Eco, won't you?'

  'Oh, Meto, how can I ask for your help when I don't know myself what needs to be done?'

  'But that's just it, Papa Perhaps ‘ might think of something.'

  He lifted his face into the moonlight-and in that moment he no longer looked transformed at all. He was a mere child again, gangly and awkward, earnest and innocent and eager to please. I could barely resist an urge to reach out and tousle his hair. How could I treat him as something he was not?

  'Papa, I ask for your respect. Whatever danger faces us, I want to know about it. I want to do my part. I want to be included. I have the right to expect that, now that I'm a man. Can't you understand?'

  'Yes, Meto, I understand.'

  'And you'll treat me differently in the future?'

  I took a deep breath. 'I shall try.'

  'Good. Then we can begin by going to see the election tomorrow.' 'Oh, Meto,' I groaned.

  'But, Papa, how can I learn if I can't see with my own eyes? That's why today was so extraordinary. Going into the Senate House, hearing him speak — I shall never forget it!'

  'Hearing Cicero?'

  'No, Catilina! It meant even more to me than the ceremony at the

  Auguraculum. I must see what happens tomorrow.' He lowered his eyes. 'I could go alone—'

  'Never! Gangs, knives, riots—'

  'Then we shall go together?'

  I wrinkled my brow. 'I shall sleep on it.'

  'Papa…'

  'Oh, very well.' I sighed. 'If you must see Rome at her worst…'

  "Thank you, Papa!' He gripped my hands in his and then departed for bed. A few moments later I did the same, since I would not be sleeping late after all.

  When I was a boy, the northwestern portion of the city outside the Servian Wall, called the Field of Mars, was still largely undeveloped. Chariot racers trained their horses and military units practised their drills on the unobstructed plain, with so much room that they did not even have to breathe one another's clouds of dust. At the far end of the Field, above a sweeping bend in the River Tiber, are the medicinal hot springs at Tarentum, where my father liked to go to ease his joints; I remember walking to the springs through wooded areas where goats chewed the grass alongside the road, with hardly a house in sight, as if one were in the country. Perhaps my boyish eyes exaggerated these pastoral expanses.

  Of course, the southern portion of the Field of Mars nearest the Servian Wall has long been built up. The morning shadows of the Capitoline Hill have for many years fallen across warehouses and wharves on the Tiber, the teeming vegetable markets of the Forum Holitorium, crowded tenements, and the cluster of shops and baths around the Circus Flaminius, still the most conspicuous structure anywhere outside the Servian Wall. Even so, in my lifetime I have seen the entire Field of Mars become much more developed — more warehouses have gone up on the river, new and taller tenements have been squeezed between the old ones, the few remaining groves have been cleared and built over, new roads have been laid out. The chariot racers and drilling soldiers
have been pressed closer together, so that their clouds of dust mingle in the air. The road to Tarentum is no longer like a brief respite in the countryside, but is surrounded by city all the way. There are even rumours that Pompey, having secured a large tract of public land in the heart of the Field of Mars, is planning to build a great theatre of stucco and marble. This has excited great controversy, for if built, the structure will be the first permanent theatre in Rome, a city where makeshift stages erected for festivals have always been deemed more proper than the temple-like theatres of the decadent, drama-worshipping Greeks.

  Because it lies outside the city walls, and because of its flat expanse (as compared to the city's seven hills and the valleys between them), the Field of Mars has from very early days been the gathering place for assemblies too large (and often too unruly) to be accommodated in the Forum. From the time of the founding of the Republic, Romans have gathered there to do their voting.

  So it was, very early the next morning, that Meto and I set out for the Field of Mars. I decided to take Belbo with us; if Cicero was right in his prediction of violence, I wanted a bodyguard. We ate a hurried but extravagant breakfast of leftovers from the party and took a bundle of food and a skin of watered wine with us. The sky was pale with dawn as we made our way through the Subura towards the Fontinal Gate. There were already groups of men in the street, all heading in the same direction. We were just passing through the gate when I heard the trumpets being blown to call the people to assemble.

  Just off the Flaminian Way, between the built-up, southern area of the Field of Mars and the more open spaces to the north, is the Villa Publica. The walled enclosure is very old, as are the buildings within. Besides housing the offices of the census takers, who keep the registries of voters, the Villa Publica serves the city of Rome as a vestibule or foyer serves a house; foreign ambassadors are lodged there, as are Roman generals who must reside outside the city before making their triumphal entries. It is also the place where candidates withdraw to await the election results.

  Adjoining the Villa Publica is another walled enclosure called, without ostentation, the Sheep Pen. On election day ropes are stretched across its length to split the space into aisles. To cast their ballots the voters are guided through the Pen like sheep through a run. It does not require a great wit to extrapolate the metaphors.

  Under the rising sun citizens thronged to the open fields around the Villa Publica. Roman voters are split into various classes according to their wealth, and within those classes are assigned to voting units, or centuries. Organizers within each century were working doggedly to gather their members together; many of the centuries obviously had predetermined meeting places, but in such a vast crowd there was still considerable confusion. Compounding this was the weather.

  It had not rained for several days, and there was a great deal of dust in the air. The morning was already warm and likely to get much warmer. The atmosphere was not unlike that of a great feedlot on a hot summer day.

  It did not take long for me to see signs of outright bribery. I recognized a number of disreputable types in the crowd and I watched them move among the century leaders, smiling and clasping hands and brazenly handing out small, lumpy sacks that could only have been filled with coins. A few of these agents I recognized as henchmen of Crassus, and at least one of them I had noticed in Caesar's retinue the day before, but there were many more whose allegiance I did not know.

  There were a few scattered instances of violence, but no general disruptions. We saw a country farmer and his sons beaten and run off by a gang of youths. We watched two red-faced, grey-haired Optimates engaged in a blustering fistfight with each other (one supported Murena, the other Silanus — who but an Optimate could tell the difference?); their attendant slaves stood back helplessly and looked on, variously appalled, alarmed, and amused. We came upon the aftermath of a duel with knives that ended with both parties being carried off, bleeding and moaning, by their friends. All in all, it was a more peaceful crowd than I had expected. Of course, these were only the violent episodes that we happened to witness; within the great milling throng there must have been many more.

  A tumult of shouting moved towards us through the crowd, and I turned to see that Cicero and his fellow consul Gaius Antonius were arriving. Cicero was surrounded by his armed bodyguard and wore his toga open to show the breastplate across his chest, a last reminder to the voters of the presumed treachery of Catilina. They disappeared within the gates of the Villa Publica and eventually reappeared at the podium built into the wall. Antonius announced that the auspices had been duly observed by the augurs in the Villa Publica and had been declared acceptable. Without an earthquake and with a blue sky above, it could hardly have been otherwise, I thought, especially since the Senate had made its desires in the matter very clear on the previous day. The election could proceed.

  Shortly thereafter the candidates arrived. Each was attended by a long retinue of supporters who pushed and shoved their way through the crowd. Each made an appearance on the podium before disappearing into the Villa Publica. There were mingled hisses and cheers for Murena and Silanus, the Optimate favourites, who appeared one after the other.

  As the candidates left the podium, the grey-haired fistfighters, who had called a truce while their favourites were on stage, fell to cursing and striking each other again.

  A number of other candidates paraded across the podium, none of them eliciting more than a smattering of applause or angry catcalls. Then Catilina arrived.

  We heard his approach long before we saw him. It began with a roar of sound that seemed to come all the way from the Fontinal Gate and grew louder and louder at it approached the Villa Publica. The sound was like a wall, palpable and impenetrable, as if one might be crushed beneath it. What it was made of was hard to tell at first — the aggregate of booing, hissing, cheering, applauding, jeering, cursing was blended into a single roar. Nor was the physical reaction of the crowd easy to determine. When the retinue passed by, men opened their mouths to shout, but were they cursing or cheering? They thrust their arms into the air, but did a clenched fist signal hatred or support? Through the throng I glimpsed Catilina himself, and from the smile on his face one might have thought that every voice was cheering and every upraised fist was his to command.

  When he stood upon the podium, the uproar was deafening. The crowd began to chant his name: 'Catilina! Catilina!' Around me young men jumped up and down, waving their arms. It seemed to me that the whole crowd adored him, and that all their jeering and cursing must have been not for Catilina, but for his enemies. Cicero, meanwhile, withdrew to the farthest corner of the podium and turned his face away.

  Catilina withdrew into the Villa Publica with his rivals, and the voting commenced. The wealthier classes, which vote first, had already gathered outside the Sheep Pen. At the entrance each voter was given a wooden tablet and a stylus with which to write the name of his candidate; the styluses and tablets were gathered up at the end of each roped aisle and the tablets deposited in an urn for counting after the entire century had voted; the overall choice of each century counted for a single vote. In all, there are just under two hundred centuries, of which the two very wealthiest classes claim over a hundred. The lower classes have many more individual voters, but control far fewer centuries. The very poorest class, who might arguably make up a majority of Romans, have only five centuries among them. Often, by the time their turn to vote arrives, the outcome has already been decided and they are not allowed to vote at all; not surprisingly, they come to the elections more to view the spectacle than to vote, if they come at all.

  We had found a shady spot and were sitting against the west wall of the Villa Publica, where I was explaining these matters to Meto, when Belbo, scratching his straw-coloured hair, asked, 'And what class do you belong to, Master?'

  I looked askance at his bovine race, but Meto pressed the question. 'Yes, Papa, what class? You've never told me.'

  'Because I haven't bot
hered to vote for a very long time.'

  'But you must know.'

  'Actually, yes. We changed classes this year, thanks to my inheritance from Lucius Claudius. Where before we were members of the Fifth Class — which is to say just above the poor — we are now members of the Third Class, just below the rich, along with most other families who own a single farm and a dwelling in the city.'

  'And which century do we vote with?'

  'If we voted, we would gather with those of the Second Century of the Third Class.'

  'And I would be able to vote as well?' I made a face. ‘You would if—' 'I want to see it.' To see what?'

  'The Second Century of the Third Class. The other voters of our century.' 'But why?’

  'Papa…' He had only to speak with a certain inflection to remind me of our conversation of the night before.

  'Very well. But there's no hurry. It's not quite noon, and the first two classes can't have completed their voting yet. And after them, the equestrians, who have their own special class of eighteen centuries, will vote, and then the Third Class. We'll have some wine and a bite to eat, and then we shall go find our fellow voters. The crowd will have shrunk by then; people will start to leave from the heat and the dust and the boredom'

  Which was not true, for when we rejoined the crowd, it seemed, if anything, to have grown. Nor was there a feeling of boredom in the air, but rather a charge of excitement, like the rush of wind before a thunderstorm. Men moved about restlessly, with the hush of anticipation in their voices.

  At length the Third Class was called upon to vote. A large group of men, better dressed than most but not with the polished look of patricians or the ostentation of equestrian landowners or merchants, gathered outside the Sheep Pen. The First Century filed into the first aisle, the Second Century into the second aisle, and so on.