by Peter Tonkin
‘Go on through,’ called the gate guard after a cursory search. By the sound of his tone, he was from one of Lepidus’ legions and clearly felt that gate duty was beneath him. And he had a point, thought the secret agent. He was almost certainly a legionary from one of Lepidus’ crack units. Battle-hardened under Divus’ Julius’ banner of the bull – not some stay-at-home civic guard employed by the city fathers. ‘You won’t get such an easy ride when you come back with these amphorae full of wine, though.’ The guards laughed as though they thought they were the first men ever to make this joke.
The driver grunted. He had clearly had this same conversation time and time again. The wagon lurched forward as the carthorse trotted out onto the Appian Way.
***
The Gaul was as good as his word. At the junction where the Via Latina and the Via Appia split, crossed by the beaten mud pathway that led up to the Via Tusculana, stood a tavern. A sizeable place with outhouses and room for dozens of wayfarers. There were seven horses stabled, waiting for them. Under the guard of a couple of the Gaul’s men who recognised and were recognised by the men driving the wagons. Who were apparently to join them on their journey south – in case the roadside bandits were too stupid to tell worthless empty amphorae from priceless full ones.
All seven of the waiting horses were strong and well-tended, with good-quality saddles and capacious saddle-bags. ‘Puteoli is, what, one hundred and twenty military miles south of here?’ said Ferrata as they got ready to ride.
‘We have several hours of daylight left so we can make a good start,’ nodded Artemidorus. ‘Then we should be at Cicero’s villa the day after the day after tomorrow with any luck. Three days’ time. By the kalends of December.’
‘Depending on how hard we push the horses during the day and how long we rest them overnight,’ said the experienced courier Mercury. ‘But we’re going straight down the Via Appia, so it should be an easy ride and we’re not likely to get lost.’
‘The last time we came this far south we travelled by boat,’ said Quintus. ‘Down to Neapolis and on to Pompeii to the villa of that sick nothus bastard Minucius Basilus.’
‘Word is that he’s in his villa in Tibur, getting ready to run,’ said Artemidorus thoughtfully. ‘Though he has another one at Formia. He’s supposed to be richer than Croesus. Like a good number of the really wealthy ones he’s too worried about making sure he takes all his money with him to just drop everything and run.’
‘Too used to his creature comforts,’ suggested Hercules.
‘Too used to surrounding himself with slaves he can torture for his perverted pleasure,’ growled Quintus. Who, like Artemidorus, had witnessed him doing just that. In an orgy attended by his equally perverted friend the late Gaius Trebonius, orchestrated by the treacherous Cyanea.
‘Well,’ said Artemidorus. ‘Let’s move on. Or Cicero will have died of old age long before we get to him! Everyone got their saddlebags full? Right. Mount up.’
As they clattered out onto the Via Appia, Artemidorus fell back beside Mercury. ‘You know this road pretty well,’ he said. ‘You take the lead. Judge when we need to stop at a taberna. I want to be inside some good shelter tonight, probably tomorrow night and maybe the night after, judging by the look of the sky ahead. When I served aboard the galleys, we used to believe clouds like those – that look like fish-scales and horses’ tails - meant a storm was coming.’
‘Will do, Centurion,’ said the widely-travelled messenger, pulling ahead cheerfully and taking Artemidorus’ place at Puella’s side. He was less happy when she pulled back and took up a position so close to Artemidorus that their knees nearly touched.
The spy had made a good decision on several counts. Mercury was an excellent guide. He knew the road well, every tavern on it, and how long it would likely take them to get from one to the next. As the afternoon gathered towards a stormy night and the light really began to fade, Mercury pulled to a halt at the town aptly named Tres Tabernae, a little under half way down the long, straight run of the Via Appia’s northern section. ‘This is a good place to stop,’ he explained as he led them into the stable yard. ‘Good stabling for the horses and excellent food for us. A really early start tomorrow should get us down to the coast at Terracina by nightfall. Then we’ll see how things proceed.’ As he spoke, he looked up at the sky. All during the day the clouds had been thickening and settling lower. The wind was light, the atmosphere brooding. But the unnatural heat that had set Rome sweating was long gone. There was no rain as yet, but Jove was certainly thinking of brewing up a considerable tempest during the next couple of days. Perhaps to welcome December with some really wintery weather.
Twenty-four hours later, exactly as Mercury predicted, they pulled off the road just at the end of the long straight run of the Appian Way and over the hill into the port city of Teracina. Artemidorus was still happy to follow him. Which vindicated his second decision. For no sooner were the horses stabled and the weary travellers welcomed into the fragrant warmth of the tavern’s ample atrium than the storm which had been building yesterday afternoon and threatening mayhem all through today, broke like the crack of doom.
ii
They woke to a tempestuous morning. The rain had eased overnight but there was a gale blowing in from the south-west. They took the twisty coast-road that ran south from Teracina towards Neapolis - and the rich man’s playground of Pompeii just beyond it - in the slowly lightening dawn. This gave them a good view of the grey waters of the great shallow bay to the west. The gale overnight had whipped them into a sinister roiling jumble of waves that rushed here and there without apparent pattern. Their crests blowing forward or back on the stiff south-westerly – depending on whether the waves themselves were running east, west, north or south.
‘Still wishing we were back on that nice, comfortable boat?’ Artemidorus called to Quintus.
The old soldier glared at him for a moment then his face split into a grudging smile. ‘At least my belly doesn’t empty itself just from looking at it!’ he said. ‘But the thought of being out on it...’ He shuddered. And the others joined him in a great bellow of amusement.
Soon enough the road swung inland and although the forested hills through which it wound gave very little protection from the wind, at least they weren’t forced to look at the wild grey sea. Until the Via Appia bought them down into the seaside town of Formia forty miles north of their destination. The road running southward ahead of them again along the inner curve of another wide bay.
Mercury suggested that they should stop here for a prandium midday meal. And Artemidorus was happy to do so, for the weather continued to be foul and the going was tough for horses and riders alike. Furthermore, they needed to agree plans and procedures so that everyone knew what was expected of them when they reached Cicero’s villa in Puteoli. It would be too late to talk tactics and assign tasks when they did so.
Moreover, although both Antony and Caesar were certain Cicero was hiding in his big villa at Puteoli, he had another, smaller one near Formia – as well as yet another near Minucius Basilus’ in Tibur. And Basilus himself also had a villa here. At the sea-side for summer use. And the two of them were by no means alone in that. An innkeeper would be bound to know who of the rich patricians who owned nearby houses was currently in residence.
***
But before he could start questioning either the innkeeper or the pretty waitress serving them, Mercury started speaking. ‘We’re not going to make it to Puteoli today, Centurion. Not at this rate, in this weather. There’s an excellent taberna in Pescopagano half way between here and our destination. It’s just behind the Porta Sibilla Sibylline Gate. There’s a watch–tower there too. If it suits, you can go up and have a good look out to sea if it’s still light when we get there – or in the morning before we leave if not. It’ll give you a really good idea of what shipping is out and about.’
‘None whatsoever, if I’m any judge,’ growled Quintus. ‘Who’d be mad enough to take a bo
at out in this?’
‘Or desperate enough?’ wondered Puella, but the tone of her voice answered her question. Men who knew they had been proscribed would be desperate enough. Even Cicero.
The famula waitress who brought their food was willing enough to linger and gossip. It was early afternoon, but the speculation in her eyes suggested to Artemidorus at least that she served travellers in more ways than one. And, for some unfathomable reason, like Puella in the past, she seemed fascinated by the ruin that was Mercury’s face. With the livid wound from the sword-stroke that had so nearly killed him and certainly scarred him for life. Running as it did from high on the right side of his forehead through his eyebrow then across his right cheekbone, cutting his nose in half to reach right down his left cheek to his jawline. All of it roughly stitched into place by basic battlefield surgery. So the secret agent piled a couple of extra sestertii on the table. ‘One or two questions,’ he said.
She eyed the money, then looked at Mercury once more before turning her attention back to Artemidorus. ‘Anything you want,’ she promised.
Beneath the table, Puella’s hobnailed boot tapped his ankle warningly.
‘There are some rich and famous men living nearby aren’t there?’ asked Artemidorus.
Her eyebrows rose in surprise. This was not the question she was expecting. She leaned forward just enough to display some of her wares. The tapping of Puella’s boot became more pronounced.
‘I hear,’ continued Artemidorus, ‘that the great Marcus Tullius Cicero himself has a villa near here.’
The waitress straightened. Adjusted her apron, put her hands on her hips. The good-looking Centurion clearly had something going with the dark-skinned young soldier at his side. A woman trying to attract him was obviously wasting her time. ‘Yes. He does,’ she answered shortly, her gaze returning to Mercury.
‘Is he in residence at the moment?’
‘No. He’s away down in Puteoli. We haven’t seen him down here for a good few days. Not since he and that brother of his came through heading on south with the nephew Quintus Tullius Cicero Minor. Didn’t stop for long. Grabbed a bite to eat and vanished as though the Friendly Ones were hunting them.’
The Friendly Ones was what the superstitious people called The Furies – in case naming the monsters might summon them, thought Artemidorus. The Ciceros had clearly been in a hurry. And the woman was right. The men Antony, Maecenas and Lepidus sent out might easily be mistaken for The Friendly Ones...
‘And you would see him, would you? If he was back at his villa here?’ He continued.
‘Not me personally. But his villa is too small to have a bath house, so when he’s here for any length of time – overnight, even - he uses the municipal baths in town. We all know when he’s in residence. In any case he keeps some slaves there to look after the place. The atriensis steward is a man named Philologus. If he’s thinking of coming, he usually sends word ahead and Philologus comes into town buying provisions for him. Even when he’s passing through and just stopping there for food.’
‘Do you know where it is?’
‘Of course.’
‘Could you show us?’ Artemidorus dropped another sestertius on the table.
‘I’d have to ask the master, but there’s other slaves for serving and it’s not a busy day as you can see.’
iii
‘This is it?’ Asked Artemidorus.
‘Yes Centurion,’ answered the serving woman, whose name, they discovered, was Caenis. ‘Not huge but by no means modest. Overlooking the bay but not too close to the water. He really does not like the sea. Or boats. Funny for someone with several seaside villas. But this one is well situated, I’d say. On this kind of step in the hillside here. There’s a path down to the town from the far side of the grounds. The baths, the tavern, the market – such as it is – and the docks are all a short walk away. And when the wind is from the east or the north, he’s protected by the hillside up there.’ Caenis turned and gestured. They all looked where she was pointing up a steep, lightly wooded hillside reaching up to a sharp crest outlined against the threatening sky. As they stood staring up, the wind buffeted their backs blowing in, icy and salt-smelling, from the south-west.
‘And that villa up there?’ asked Artemidorus. ‘The big one half hidden by the grove of pines?’
‘That belongs to Minucius Basilus,’ answered Caenis with a shudder. ‘Gossip says he inherited it with all his other villas and a huge fortune...’
‘Have you ever been in it?’
‘NO!’ She shivered again. ‘They say bad things happen to girls who go in there. Some of them never come out...’
‘And Basilus isn’t in residence either?’
‘I don’t think so. But he’s not like Senator Cicero. Basilus keeps himself to himself. I’ve heard Quintus Tullius Cicero Senior visits him there sometimes, too; but as I say he’s in Puteoli with his son and brother Marcus Tullius Cicero. There is some life up there though. Slaves. His own atriensis. Someone in the market says they saw a strange woman shopping a couple of days ago. Bright, bright blue eyes. She might be up there.’
‘Given the sort of thing he probably gets up to in there, I’m not surprised no-one goes close to the place,’ said Quintus forcefully. ‘Seen enough, Septem? We need to press on if we want to make it to Pescopagano tonight.’
Artemidorus tore himself away from his examination of the villa with almost physical force. As though moving a massive weight. Puella closed in on one side of him. Quintus on the other. Ferrata close behind. ‘Why don’t we get back on mission and ask this steward Philologus a question or two?’ Quintus suggested forcefully.
Caenis frowned in confusion. As did Mercury and Furius. Hercules leaned down so that he could whisper in Mercury’s ear as they crossed the Via towards Cicero’s Formian villa. ‘The woman who betrayed him. Cyanea. She had bright blue eyes. And became Basilus’ mistress.’
As he spoke, they marched Artemidorus right across the road and onto the path leading up to the door.
Cicero’s steward Philologus was a plump, soft-skinned man approaching middle years, who met them in the atrium after the janitor grudgingly showed them in. The arrival of the soldiers clearly scared him, but he controlled his fear and answered their questions apparently truthfully. And fully. Though his eyes continually shifted from one to another of his interrogators. Never meeting anyone’s gaze.
‘The master is in Puteoli,’ he explained in a surprisingly cultured voice. ‘He, his brother and his nephew came through a few days ago. He said nothing about when or if he proposed to come back here. They were all very worried about the fact that young Caesar had managed to make himself Consul and was joining forces with Antony. There was talk of a list of names. Men who were involved in the plot to kill Divus Julius or who supported them. I overheard them discussing whether they could hire a boat in Puteoli or aboard a naval vessel in the port of Misenum near Cumae which is just next to it. Get to Athens that way. But then the weather closed in. The storms started. The master hates sailing even when the weather is calm.’
As they left the villa, heading back down to the tavern, their horses and their mission, Quintus said, ‘I wouldn’t want him guarding my back! As far as I could see, Cicero has given that man everything including an education. Clearly hasn’t stinted on the food either. Yet there he was, willing to hand him over – or at least everything he knew about him – before we even got our swords out!’
They all enjoyed a lively discussion about Philologus’ cowardliness. Except for Caenis who continued to make eyes at Mercury – increasingly pointlessly. And except for Artemidorus, who remained broodingly silent even after they had mounted up and moved out. Who kept glancing up at Minucius Basilus’ villa for as long as it remained visible behind them.
***
Mercury was right and it was lucky that the old soldier knew the way so well. He led them into the tavern yard in the harbour town of Pescopagano through the Sibylline Gate and a gathering downpo
ur well after darkness had fallen. They were fortunate in that the tavern had rooms to accommodate them all as well as stalls for their horses. That it had a well-deserved reputation for the quality of its food and wine. And, modest though they were, it had baths.
The modesty stopped at the size of the baths. Not at the people using them – there was no separation of the sexes here. As soon as they were settled, the entire contubernium stripped, gave their sopping clothes to a slave for drying and, together went naked into the frigidarium.
‘Are you sure about this?’ Artemidorus asked his Amazonian lover as she stood like an ebony statue of Venus. And not a Venus Pudica modest Venus either.
‘I fight at your side in battle,’ she answered tartly. ‘I lie by your side in bed. I can sit at your side in a bath!’ The possible arrival of Cyanea at Basilus’ villa had clearly put her on her mettle, thought Artemidorus. She would hardly let him out of her sight now. She spread her legs, put her hands on her hips and looked him straight in the eye.