Two cohorts of troops were camped in a field on the outskirts of the city, all veterans not yet incorporated into legions, having enlisted too late or come too far to reach Capua before the legions left. Whatever military tribune was in charge of them had abandoned them to their own devices, which in weather like this consisted of dice, knucklebones, board games and talk; wine was off legionary menus since the Tenth and Twelfth had mutinied. These men, who had belonged to the old Thirteenth, had no sympathy with mutiny and had only enlisted again because they loved Caesar and fancied a good long campaign against the Parthians. Having heard of his awful death, they grieved, and wondered what was going to happen to them now. No expert on legionary dispositions, the rather small, hooded and caped visitor had to enquire of the sentries whereabouts the primipilus centurion lived, then trudged down the rows of wooden huts to knock on the door of a somewhat larger structure. The noise of voices inside ceased; the door opened. Octavian found himself looking up at a tall, burly fellow who wore a red, padded tunic. Eleven other men sat around a table, all in the same gear, which meant that the visitor surveyed the entire centurion complement of two cohorts. "Shocking weather," said the door opener. "Marcus Coponius at your service." Engaged in doffing his sagum, Octavian didn't reply until he was done, then stood in his trim leather cuirass and kilt, mop of golden hair damp but not wringing wet. There was something about him that brought the eleven other centurions to their feet, quite why they didn't know. "I'm Caesar's heir, so my name is Gaius Julius Caesar," said Octavian, big grey eyes welcoming their hard-bitten faces, a smile on his lips that was hauntingly familiar. A collective gasp went up, the men stiffened to attention. "Jupiter! You look just like him!" Coponius breathed. "A smaller edition," Octavian said ruefully, "but I hope I still have some growing to do." "Oh, it's terrible, terrible!" said one at the table, tears gathering. "What will we do without him?" "Our duty to Rome," said Octavian, matter-of-fact. "That's why I'm here, to ask you to do a duty for Rome." "Anything, young Caesar, anything," said Coponius. "I have to get the war chest out of Brundisium as soon as I possibly can. There won't be any campaign to Syria, I'm sure you realize that, but so far the consuls haven't indicated what's going to happen to the legions over the waves in Macedonia or men like you, still waiting to be shipped. My job is to collect the war chest on behalf of Rome. My adjutant, Marcus Agrippa, is rounding up the wagons and oxen that carry the war chest, but I need loading labor, and I don't trust civilians. Will your men put the money on board the wagons for me?" "Oh, gladly, young Caesar, gladly! There's nothing worse than wet weather without no work to do." "That's very kind of you," said Octavian with the smile so reminiscent of Caesar's. "I'm the closest thing Brundisium has to a commanding officer at the moment, but I wouldn't like you to think that I have imperium, because I don't. Therefore I ask humbly, I don't command that you help me." "If Caesar made you his heir, young Caesar, and gave you his name, there's no need to command," said Marcus Coponius.
With a thousand men at his beck and call, many more than one of the sixty wagons were loaded simultaneously. Caesar had devised a knacky way to carry his money it was money, not unminted sows. Each talent, in the form of 6,250 denarii, was stored in a canvas bag equipped with two handles, so that two soldiers could easily carry a one-talent bag between them. Swiftly loading while the rain poured down unabated and all Brundisium remained indoors, even on this usually busy street, the wagons moved onward steadily to a timber yard where sawn planks were carefully placed over the bags to look as if sawn planks were all the wagons carried. "It's sensible," said Octavian glibly to Coponius, "to disguise the cargo, because I don't have the imperium to order a military escort. My adjutant is hiring drivers, but we won't let them know what we're really hauling, so they won't get here until after you're gone." He pointed to a hand cart that held a number of smaller linen bags. "This is for you and your men, Coponius, as a token of my thanks. If you spend any of it on wine, be discreet. If Caesar can help you in any way in the future, don't hesitate to ask." So the thousand soldiers pushed the hand cart back to their camp, there to discover that Caesar's heir had gifted them with two hundred and fifty denarii for each ranker, one thousand for each centurion, and two thousand for Marcus Coponius. The unit for accounting was the sestertius, but the denarius was far more convenient to mint, at four sesterces to the denarius. "Did you believe all that, Coponius?" asked one of the very gratified centurions. Coponius eyed him in scorn. "What d'you take me for, an Apulian hayseed? I don't have no idea what young Caesar's up to, but he's his tata's son, that's for sure. A thousand miles ahead of the opposition. And whatever he's up to ain't none of our business. We're Caesar's veterans. As far as I'm concerned, for one, anything young Caesar does is all right." He put his right index finger to the side of his nose and winked. "Mum's the word, boys. If someone comes asking, we don't know nothing, because we was never out in the rain." Eleven heads nodded complete agreement. So the sixty wagons rolled out in the pouring rain on the deserted Via Minucia almost to Barium, then set off cross-country on hard, stony ground toward Larinum, with Marcus Agrippa in civilian dress shepherding this precious load of timber planks. The drivers, who walked alongside their leading beasts rather than sat holding reins, were being paid very well, but not so excessively that they were curious; they were simply glad for the work at this slack season. Brundisium was the busiest harbor in all Italy, cargo and armies came and went incessantly.
Octavian left Brundisium a full nundinum later and took the Via Minucia to Barium. There he left it to join the wagons, still plodding north in the direction of Larinum at surprising speed considering that they hadn't used a road since before Barium. When he found them, he learned that Agrippa had been pushing them along while ever there was a moon to see by, as well as all day. "It's flat ground without hazards. It won't be so easy once we get into the mountains," Agrippa said. "Then follow the coast, don't turn inland until you see an unsealed road ten miles south of the road to Sulmo. You'll be safe enough on that road, but don't use any others. I'm going ahead to my lands to make sure there are no chattering locals and a good but accessible hiding place." Luckily chattering locals were few and far between, for the estate was forest in a land of forests. Having discovered that Quintus Nonius, his father's manager, still occupied the staff quarters of the comfortable villa where Atia used to bring her ailing son for a summer in mountain air, Octavian decided that the wagons would be safe in a clearing several miles beyond the villa. Logging, said Nonius, was going on in a different area, and people didn't prowl; there were too many bears and wolves.
Even here, Octavian was astonished to learn, people already knew that Caesar was dead and that Gaius Octavius was Caesar's heir. A fact that delighted Nonius, who had loved the quiet, sick little boy and his anxious mother. However, few if any of the locals knew who owned these timber estates, still referred to as "Papius's place" after their original Italian owner. "The wagons belong to Caesar, but people who aren't entitled to them will be looking for them everywhere, so no one must know that they're here on Papius's place," he explained to Nonius. "From time to time I may send Marcus Agrippa you'll meet him when the wagons arrive to pick up one or two of them. Dispose of the oxen as you think best, but always have twenty beasts on hand. Luckily you use oxen to tow logs to Ancona, so the presence of oxen won't seem unusual. It's important, Nonius so important that my life may depend upon your and your family's silence." "Don't you worry, little Gaius," said the old retainer. "I'll look after everything." Convinced that Nonius would, Octavian backtracked to the junction of the Via Minucia and the Via Appia at Beneventum, picked up the Via Appia there and resumed his journey to Neapolis, where he arrived toward the end of April to find Philippus and his mother in a fever of worry. "Where have you been?" Atia cried, hugging him to her and watering his tunic with tears. "Laid low with asthma in some mean inn on the Via Minucia," Octavian explained, removing himself from his mother's clutches, feeling an irritation he was at some pains to hide. "No, no, leave m
e be, I'm well now. Philippus, tell me what's happened, I've had no news since your letter to Brundisium." Philippus led the way to his study. A man of high coloring and considerable good looks, he seemed to his stepson's eyes to have aged a great deal in two months. Caesar's death had hit him hard, not least because, like Lucius Piso, Servius Sulpicius and several others among the thin ranks of the consulars, Philippus was trying to steer a middle course that would ensure his own survival no matter what happened. "Gaius Marius's so-called grandson, Amatius?" Octavian asked. "Dead," said Philippus, grimacing. "On his fourth day in the Forum, Antonius and a century of Lepidus's troops arrived to listen. Amatius pointed at him and screamed that there stood the real murderer of Caesar, whereupon the troops took Amatius into custody and marched him off to the Tullianum." Philippus shrugged. "Amatius never emerged, so the crowd eventually went home. Antonius went straight to a meeting of the Senate in Castor's, where Dolabella asked him what had happened to Amatius. 'I executed him, said Antonius. Dolabella protested that the man was a Roman citizen and ought to have been tried, but Antonius said Amatius wasn't a Roman, he was an escaped Greek slave named Hierophilus. And that was the end of it." "Which rather indicates what kind of government Rome has," Octavian said thoughtfully. "Clearly it isn't wise to accuse dear Marcus Antonius of anything." "So I think," Philippus agreed, face grim. "Cassius tried to bring up the subject of the praetors' provinces again, and was told to shut up. He and Brutus tried to occupy their tribunals several times, but desisted. Even after Amatius was executed, the crowd didn't welcome them, though their amnesty holds up. Oh, and Marcus Lepidus is the new Pontifex Maximus." "They held an election?" Octavian asked, surprised. "No. He was adlected by the other pontifices." "That's illegal." "There's no definition of legal anymore, Octavius." "My name isn't Octavius, it's Caesar." "That is still undecided." Philippus got up, went to his desk and withdrew a small object from its drawer. "Here, this has to go to you for the time being only, I hope." Octavian took it and turned it over between trembling hands, awed. A singularly beautiful seal ring consisting of a flawless, royally purple amethyst set in pink gold. It bore a delicately carved intaglio sphinx and the word CAESAR in mirrored capitals above the sphinx's human head. He slipped it on to his ring finger, to find that it fitted perfectly. The bigger Caesar's fingers had been slender, his own were shorter, thicker, more spatulate. A curious feeling, as if its weight and the essence of Caesar it had drawn into itself were suffusing into his own body. "An omen! It might have been made for me." "It was made for Caesar by Cleopatra, I believe." "And I am Caesar." "Defer that decision, Octavius!" Philippus snapped. "A tribune of the plebs the assassin Gaius Casca and the plebeian aedile Critonius took Caesar's Forum statues from their plinths and pedestals and sent them to the Velabrum to be broken up. The crowd caught them at it, went to the sculptor's yard and rescued them, even the two that had already been attacked with mallets. Then the crowd set fire to the place, and the fire spread into the Vicus Tuscus. A shocking conflagration! Half the Velabrum burned. Did the crowd care? No. The intact statues were put back, the two broken ones given to another sculptor to repair. Then the crowd started to roar, demanding that the consuls produce Amatius. Of course that wasn't possible. A terrible riot erupted the worst I ever remember. Several hundred citizens and fifty of Lepidus's soldiers were killed before the mob was dispersed. A hundred of the rioters were taken prisoner, divided into citizens and non-citizens, then the citizens were thrown from the Tarpeian Rock, and the non-citizens were flogged and beheaded." "So to demand justice for Caesar is treason," Octavian said, drawing in a breath. "Our Antonius is showing his true colors." "Oh, Octavius, he's just a brute! I don't think it occurs to him that some might interpret his actions as anti-Caesar. Look at what he did in the Forum when Dolabella was deploying his street gangs. Antonius's answer to public violence is slaughter because it's his nature to slaughter." "I think he's aiming to take Caesar's place." "I disagree. He abolished the office of dictator." "If 'rex' is a simple word, so too is 'dictator.' So I take it that no one dares to laud Caesar, even the crowd?" Philippus laughed harshly. "Antonius and Dolabella should hope! No, nothing deters the common people. Dolabella had the altar and column removed from the place where Caesar burned when he discovered that people were openly calling Caesar 'Divus Julius.' Can you imagine that, Octavius? They started worshiping Caesar as a god before the very stones where he burned were cold!" "Divus Julius," Octavian said, smiling. "A passing phase," said Philippus, misliking that smile. "Perhaps, but why can't you see its significance, Philippus? The people have started worshiping Caesar as a god. The people! No one in government started it in fact, everyone in government is doing his best to stamp it out. The people loved Caesar so much that they cannot bear to think of him gone, so they have resurrected him as a god someone they can pray to, look to for consolation. Don't you see? They're telling Antonius, Dolabella and the Liberators pah, how I hate that name! and everyone else at the top of the Roman tree that they refuse to be parted from Caesar." "Don't let it go to your head, Octavius." "My name is Caesar." "I will never call you that!" "One day you will have no choice. Tell me what else goes on." "For what it's worth, Antonius has betrothed his daughter by Antonia Hybrida to Lepidus's eldest boy. As both children are years off marriageable age, I suspect it will last only as long as their fathers are holding each other's pricks to piss. Lepidus went to govern Nearer Spain and Narbonese Gaul over two nundinae ago. Sextus Pompeius is now fielding six legions, so the consuls decided that Lepidus had better contain his Spanish province while he could. Pollio is still holding Further Spain in good order, so we hear. If we can believe what we hear." "And that wonderful pair, Brutus and Cassius?" "Have quit Rome. Brutus has given the urban praetor's duties to Gaius Antonius while he er recovers from severe emotional stress. Whereas Cassius can at least pretend to continue his foreign praetor's duties as he wafts around Italy. Brutus took both Porcia and Servilia with him I hear that the battles between the two women are Homeric teeth, feet, nails. Cassius gave out that he needs to be nearer to his pregnant Tertulla in Antium, but no sooner did he leave Rome than Tertulla arrived back in Rome, so who knows what the true story is in that marriage?" Octavian cast his stepfather an unsettlingly shrewd glance. "There's trouble brewing all over the place and the consuls aren't handling it skillfully, are they?" A sigh from Philippus. "No, they're not, boy. Though they're getting along better together than any of us believed possible." "And the legions, with regard to Antonius?" "Are being brought back from Macedonia gradually, I hear, apart from the six finest, which he's keeping there for when he goes to govern. The veterans still waiting for their land in Campania are growing restless because the moment Caesar died " " was murdered " Octavian interrupted. " died, the land commissioners stopped allocating the parcels to the veterans and packed up their booths. Antonius has been obliged to go to Campania and get the land commissioners back to work. He's still there. Dolabella is in charge of Rome." "And Caesar's altar? Caesar's column?" "I told you, gone. Just where is your mind going, Octavius?" "My name is Caesar." "Having heard all this, you still believe you'll survive if you take up your inheritance?" "Oh, yes. I have Caesar's luck," said Octavian with a very secretive smile. Enigmatic. If one's seal ring bore a sphinx, to be an enigma was mandatory.
Octavian went to his old room to find that he had been promoted to a suite. Even if Philippus did intend to talk him out of taking up his inheritance, that arch-fence-sitter was clever enough to understand that one didn't put Caesar's heir in accommodations fit for the master's stepson. His thoughts were disciplined, even if they were fantastic. The rest of what Philippus had had to say was interesting, germane to how he conducted himself in the future, but paled before the story of Divus Julius. A new god apotheosized by the people of Rome for the people of Rome. In the face of obdurate opposition from the consuls Antonius and Dolabella, even at the cost of many lives, the people of Rome were insisting that they be allowed to worship Divus Julius. To Octavian, a beacon luring him on.
To be Gaius Julius Caesar Filius was wonderful. But to be Gaius Julius Caesar Divi Filius the son of a god was miraculous. But that is for the future. First, I must become known far and wide as Caesar's son. Coponius the centurion said I was his image. I am not, I know that. But Coponius looked at me through the eyes of pure sentiment; the tough, aging man he had served under and probably never seen at really close quarters was golden-haired and light of eye, was handsome and imperious. What I have to do is convince people, including Rome's soldiers, that when he was my age, Caesar looked just like me. I can't cut my hair that short because my ears are definitely not Caesar's, but the shape of my head is. I can learn to smile like him, walk like him, wave my hand exactly as he used to, radiate approachability and careless consciousness of my exalted birth. The ichor of Mars and Venus flows in my veins too. But Caesar was very tall, and in my heart I know that I have scant growing left to do. Perhaps another inch or two, but that will still fall far short of his height. So I will wear boots with soles four inches thick, and to make the device look less obvious, they will always be proper boots, closed at the toe. At a distance, which is how the soldiers will see me, I will tower like Caesar still not nearly as tall, but close enough to six feet. I will make sure that the men around me are all short. And if my own Class laughs, let them. I will eat the foods that Hapd'efan'e said elongate the bones meat, cheese, eggs and I will exercise by stretching. The high boots will be difficult to walk in, but they will give me an athletic gait because walking in them will require great skill. I will pad the shoulders of my tunics and cuirasses. It's Caesar's luck that Caesar was not a hulk like Antonius; all I have to be is an actor. Antonius will try to block my inheriting. The lex curiata of adoption won't come quickly or easily, but a law doesn't really matter as long as I behave like Caesar's heir. Behave like Caesar himself. And the money will be difficult to lay my hands on too because Antonius will block probate. I have plenty of my own, but I may need far more. How fortunate that I appropriated the war chest! I wonder when that oaf Antonius will remember that it exists, and send for it? Old Plautius lives in blissful ignorance, and while Oppius's manager will say that Caesar's heir collected it, I shall deny that. Protest that someone very clever impersonated me. After all, the appropriation happened the day after I arrived from Macedonia how could I have done it so swiftly? Impossible! I mean, an eighteen-year-old think of something so audacious, so breathtaking? Ha ha ha, what a laugh! I am an asthmatic, and I had a sick headache too. Yes, I will feel my way and keep my counsel. Agrippa I can trust with my very life; Salvidienus and Maecenas, less so, but they'll prove good helpmates as I tread this precarious path in my high-soled boots. First and foremost, emphasize the likeness to Caesar. Concentrate on that ahead of anything else. And wait for Fortuna to toss me my next opportunity. She will.
6. The October Horse: A Novel of Caesar and Cleopatra Page 63