The Eternal Empire (26 page)

"The new trade laws are affecting
us as well," added Fulvia when Cornelius had finished. "I've just
returned from Thuringa and the anti-Roman sentiment is so strong that we have
had to abandon our latest sales promotion and close down our shops."

Cornelius was interested in what she
said. Thuringa was one of the 'Duchies' along the upper Rhine. Although
sovereign states in their own right, they had always been under the shadow of
their two large neighbours. After the last war, Saxony had been forced to
renounce any military treaties with them, and the Duchies, whose troops had
fought with the Saxons, had had to accept imperial control over their foreign
policy. It was a sore point with the Saxons and an obvious place for them to
stir up trouble.

"What form did this anti-Roman
feeling take," he asked her, "apart from refusing to buy your
father's overpriced dresses?"

She frowned in response to the jib.

"Signs have gone up in shops and
taverns saying that Romans are not welcome, and anti-Empire slogans have been
daubed on walls. Demonstrations occur outside our embassy and some Roman owned
businesses, like ours, have had their windows smashed. When people find out you
are a Roman citizen they become surly and rude."

"What about the official
reaction?" Cornelius continued.

"Old Duke Wilhelm is fully
supportive of the Empire. The only newspaper in Thuringa has editorials
rationalising the new trade laws and explaining that they are good in the long
term."

"Sounds like they were written in
the Constantinople," observed Cornelius. "In fact," he added
quickly, "they probably were. Duke Wilhelm does whatever the Roman
ambassador tells him."

Cornelius thought for a few moments
before questioning Fulvia further. "Would you say that Thuringa is
unstable at the moment?"

"I'm not sure that I'm qualified
to give an opinion on that," she replied thoughtfully, "but the
atmosphere is certainly very tense. People there are angry and they don't think
much of Duke Wilhelm whom they regard as a Roman puppet."

Cornelius thanked her for her comments.
He would have to look into the situation in Thuringa in more detail when he got
back to Minden.

"Anyway," said Fulvia,
"enough of this dreary talk. Tell me all about Minden. What have you been
doing?" She leaned closer to him and whispered conspiratorially, "and
I want to know everything, Cornelius. So don't hold out on me!"

Cornelius knew that when it came to
extracting information from him, even of the most intimate kind, Fulvia was an
expert. She had known him for too long for him to be able to keep anything from
her, so he told her about Katherine.

"She sounds very nice," said
Fulvia sincerely, "certainly has a bit of spirit. Unlike some of those
girls you used to see."

"Come on now Fulvia," said
Cornelius defensively, "they weren't all that bad. Besides, “he added with
resignation, "I never had great success with women. I had to take what I
could get."

"Stop putting yourself down
Cornelius," she said firmly. "You're just too shy. There were a
number of girls in Milan who had their eye on you."

"Really?" said Cornelius,
"like who?"

"Julia Sabreva for one."

"Why didn't you say,"
demanded Cornelius, "she was gorgeous!"

"I'm your best friend Cornelius,
not your matchmaker. If you had wanted to seduce Julia you should have done
something about it yourself! Anyway, she's married with three children now, so
you've missed out. Let's concentrate on Katherine shall we? I hope you've
bought her a present."

Cornelius gave her a big grin and
pulled a coloured box from his bag. Fulvia opened it and carefully took the
silk scarf out.

"It's lovely Cornelius," she
said with approval, "your taste is definitely getting better with
age."

Fulvia refolded the scarf and put it
back in the box. She saw that Cornelius was really pleased that she approved of
his choice.

"You really like her don't
you?"

"Yes, I do. I think I may be in
love with her."

"Knowing you Cornelius, if you
think you are, then you probably are." She took his hand in hers.

"All this trouble must be really
tearing you up inside," she added softly. "I know how much you hate
the thought of war, but it must be a lot worse when the person you love is
likely to be on the other side."

"She hates war even more than I
do."

"It doesn't matter," said
Fulvia sadly, "once the shooting starts, it's too late."

Cornelius sat silently for a while
whilst Fulvia looked at him. Then she stood up. "Come on Cornelius, we're
going shopping. That scarf is beautiful, but it's not enough for the girl you
love. I hope you still have plenty of money on you?"

Cornelius knew that she was trying to
cheer him up, but he was glad of it anyway. Better to wander around the shops
with Fulvia than to just sit around. Besides, Fulvia had exquisite taste and
knew exactly what a woman wants from a man.

23rd
April 1920

Minden,
Saxony

On his return to Minden, Cornelius had
found the Roman embassy in a state of siege. Crowds of local tradesmen and
students from the university had gathered outside the main gates to protest
against the new trade laws. One of the Saxon policemen on regular duty outside
the embassy recognised Cornelius as he was walking towards the entrance and
guided him to a side gate.

The ambassador was rarely at the
embassy. He spent most of his time with senior Saxon Nobles trying to present
the new imperial policy in a good light. The few occasions that Cornelius had
been able to see him, he had come away from the meeting with an increased sense
of foreboding. The Saxons were in no mood to acquiesce over the new trade laws,
especially the waterways issue, and had already responded to the additional
customs duty by increasing the tax on Roman goods entering their country.

Being relieved of his responsibilities
for trade, Cornelius spent all his time analysing military data. Some of his
sources of information had dried up once the embassy had come under close
observation, but thanks to the ambassador providing some extra funds, Cornelius
was able to keep most of the intelligence network operating. In that respect he
was better off than his military counterparts in Augusta Treverorum.

He could find nothing particularly
worrying in the data that he was receiving. A heightened level of security,
training stepped up, additional movements of heavy equipment around the country
- but nothing particularly unusual under the circumstances. No massive build-up
of troops along the frontier, no mobilisation of reservists. Yet there was
something bothering Cornelius, and he could not put his finger on it.

A number of small units had been moved
from their normal bases but had not turned up anywhere else. The foundry for
casting naval guns was working around the clock in spite of there being no
ships waiting for guns to be fitted. The railway yards were virtually empty of
cargo trucks. A number of Saxon aircraft squadrons had been re-deployed from
their eastern border, but to the coast, not to the Rhine frontier.

Cornelius could not fit these facts
into his analysis and although he knew that there were times when the military
of every nation did things which defied logical explanation, there was
something about this information that worried him. Try as he could he could not
see a pattern. All that he could do was to demand more information from his
sources and to dig deeper into the ambassadors’ discretionary funds.

Although the embassy staff had been
restricted to the compound due to the mounting animosity of the local
population, Cornelius did manage to slip out and meet Katherine a few times.
She would pick him up in her motor carriage early in the morning while the
streets were still deserted and they would drive out to some quiet spot in the
country.

Their first meeting had been quite
emotional, and once they were alone they had just held each other tightly for
what seemed like an eternity. They both professed how much they had missed the
other and how they feared they would never see each other again. But despite
the feelings which he had confessed to Fulvia in Colonia Agrippina, Cornelius
could not bring himself to tell Katherine that he loved her. He sensed that his
feelings were returned by her but he still held back. He was worried by the
threat of war and did not want to complicate their relationship any more than
it already was. He was also afraid that she would reject him and deep inside he
wondered if that was the real reason.

Katherine was thrilled with the gifts
that Cornelius had given her. She put on the scarf immediately. He was tempted
to tell her that the earrings and necklace had been chosen by Fulvia, but had
decided to follow her parting advice to 'keep your mouth shut and take the
credit'.

Alone in the countryside, they would
sit on a hillside and talk about their past, growing up in Saxony or the
Empire, their friends and their family. Occasionally they would talk about the
current crisis and the stupidity of it. It was during one of these discussions
that Katherine mentioned her younger brothers 'strange' behaviour.

"He almost seems happy," she
had said. "he's very busy, going from one end of Saxony to the other, and
I rarely ever see him at home, but when I do he looks so smug!"

Cornelius had never mentioned his
'other job' at the embassy and had scrupulously avoided using his relationship
with Katherine to find out information. However her comments about Franz rang
alarm bells in his head. He spoke to Katherine slowly and with a sense of
concern in his voice.

"Katherine, why do you think Franz
is feeling so pleased? Please think carefully. What could have happened to
bring about this change?"

She looked at him, disconcerted by his
change of mood. "I don't know Cornelius," she said defensively,
"he doesn't confide in me. All he cares about is the army and his work at
the staff school....", she stopped suddenly and went pale.

"You don't think that they are
planning a war."

"They are always planning for a
war," said Cornelius, "that's the job of an army staff. What I'm
worried about is whether they are planning to actually start one."

12th
may 1920

Londinium,
Britannia

The elections for the provincial
assembly went very much as expected. The Radicals and Federals formed an
election pact that maximised their vote and gave them a total of forty six of
the seventy five seats in the local assembly. Their joint manifesto called for
Britannia to be declared a 'special trade province' within the Empire, exempt
from the provisions of the new trade laws.

A week after the new assembly had been
sworn in and the new administration had taken office, the governor had summoned
Sextus to his office.

He waved a handful of papers at Sextus
as he entered. "They want to implement the plans for this 'special trade'
idea of theirs as soon as possible," said Romanus Philokates. He read from
the top sheet, "in order to 'prevent a complete breakdown in the
commercial life of the province'. They've sent me the draft legislation which
they plan to put to the assembly next week."

"I can understand that sir,"
said Sextus, "trade has already seen a significant down turn and the ports
are laying off thousands of workers."

Philokates nodded and smiled kindly.
"Yes Sextus, I'm aware of the situation. Our new administration wants
Britannia to become economically independent of the Empire whilst still remaining
a loyal part of it"

At the governors invitation Sextus sat
down.

"This proposed legislation will
declare every port in the province to be a 'Free Trade Area' and ships may land
and off load there without having to worry about paying any duty. Only when the
goods move out of these areas to be sold in the province will they be subject
to the new duty, but," the governor raised a finger to emphasise the next
point, "if they are loaded onto another vessel to be transported to
another country, such as the United Provinces or the Aztec Empire, they will
not have to pay any imperial duty!"

Sextus grasped the point immediately,
"that way the ports stay busy and the warehouses stay full. Very clever
sir."

"Yes it is," agreed
Philokates happily, "and what's more, according to my legal staff, it's
within the law. There are a number of precedents allowing the governor of a
province to approve the setting up of these 'Free Trade Areas'."

"But what about the tariff for
using the Oceanus Britannicus?" asked Sextus.

"That," said the Governor
ominously, "is another matter."

He stood up and signalled Sextus to
follow him over to a map which was mounted on the wall on the other side of his
office. He pointed to the ports along the coast.