The Tribune's Curse (12 page)

“After the hideous events of two days ago,” she began, “the
rex sacrorum
and I conferred, and we determined that this would be the best place to hold our meeting. It is as holy a place as Rome affords.
Rex sacrorum
, please begin.”

“Some of you,” said Claudius, “already know what I am about to impart. Others are not yet aware of how serious a sacrilege was committed.”

This sounded bad.

“When the unspeakable tribune Ateius Capito pronounced his execration,” Claudius went on, “he departed from the forms generally used in such cases. All were struck by the extreme obscurity of some of the deities upon whom he called. Most of them have not been recognized in Rome since the days of the kings, when the Etruscan influence was very strong in our territory. Others are wholly foreign. But in the midst of them he spoke a name that it is forbidden to pronounce, that is supposed to be known only to a handful of the most deeply consecrated
sacerdotes
of Rome. He spoke—” at this the
rex sacrorum
trembled, and his throat closed up.

My aunt leaned forward, and in a voice that was firm yet tense with emotion, she said: “That monster spoke, aloud and for all to hear, the Secret Name of Rome!”

Metellus Scipio gasped loudly and gripped the front of his robe in palsied fists. I thought that Servilius Vatia, the ancient Censor, would drop dead on the spot. His colleague, Messala Niger, was not taken by surprise, and neither was Sextus Caesar.

As for me, I was as shocked as anyone, although I was too sore for any extravagant demonstrations. The Secret, or Hidden, Name of Rome was an ancient and incredibly potent talisman. Legend had it that Romulus himself, when he marked out the
pomerium
with his plow drawn by a white cow and bull, gave his City this name, which was to be used only during specific rituals. Publicly, it was to be known by a variant of his own name—Rome. Names, as all men know, have power. To know the true name of a thing gives one power over that thing. At least, the superstitious believe this. I am not personally superstitious. Nonetheless, I was trembling like a dog caught in a Gallic rainstorm.

“The incident may not be as catastrophic as it seemed at first,” the
rex sacrorum
assured us, having regained his composure. “He spoke in a number of old, ritual languages. To almost all who
heard, that name was just one more word in a great flood of gibberish, and all but impossible to remember. At least, so we must hope. With the Secret Name of Rome at his disposal, a foreign enemy would have Rome at his mercy.”

“In accordance with practice laid down at the very founding of the Republic,” said the
virgo maxima
, “only six persons are to know that Name, and each is to pass it on only to his successor. These are the three major
flamines
—” she nodded toward Messala and Vatia, “of whom the
martialis
and the
quirinalis
are here with us. Rome has lacked a
dialis
for far too long. The other three are the
rex sacrorum
, the
virgo maxima
, and the
Pontifex Maximus
.”

“How,” said Scipio, “did a wretch like Ateius Capito learn this name?”

“We would very much like to find that out,” said Claudius. “In fact, it is for this reason that we summoned your kinsman, Decius Caecilius.”

I was afraid of that. “Ah, I expect you want me to locate Ateius. That should not be difficult, but he may have fled—”

“While it may be desirable to find Ateius,” said Claudius, “we are far more interested in learning who imparted to him the Secret Name.”

“I see,” I said, trying to think of a way out of this. “It is likely that the only way I can find that out is by interrogating Ateius himself, a man who may not be arrested for nearly two months. And I hope you will forgive me for suggesting it, but the list of likely suspects is rather limited.”

“You mean it was probably someone in this room,” said Claudius. “If so, we must know. Caesar is of course in Gaul. But,” he spread his hands, “I think there may be other possibilities. The lands of Latium, Etruria, Samnium, and Magna Graecia and all the rest of Italy and Sicily are full of ancient cults and priesthoods of an antiquity comparable to our own. It is not impossible that some cult, or some family of sorcerers, at some time in the past
learned the Secret Name and have kept it as a weapon against need.”

“That is, indeed, a possibility,” I admitted. “However, such cults are, by their very nature, rather secretive, and it might be quite difficult to—”

“Nephew,” my aunt interrupted briskly, “we are not asking if you can find time in your busy schedule to assist us in this matter. We are telling you to drop all lesser things and find this offender. It must be done at once!”

“Exactly,” said Claudius.

“Lesser things to include the upcoming election?” I said.

“Don’t worry, Decius,” said Scipio. “You are one of what the citizens are already referring to as the Twenty. You’ll be a hero for weeks to come, until they find someone else to idolize. You couldn’t lose if you set fire to the Temple of Castor and Pollux.”

No way out. Oh, well. “How much of this may I divulge in the course of my investigation?” I asked. “That is to say: who knows about Ateius using the Secret Name, and whom may I inform of this?”

“The members of the Pontifical College who were not summoned to this meeting may be told,” Claudius said. “Beyond those, we do not wish anyone to know that this catastrophe has befallen us.”

“That could hamper my investigation,” I protested. “Should I need the aid of a praetor, for instance—”

“You are not to spread this about,” said Messala. “As Censor I forbid it. The mere rumor of this would be sufficient to panic the citizens, to encourage Rome’s enemies, to bring about chaos. We are engaged in wars at the fringes of the world, but our hold on the peninsula of Italy is not so secure that we can afford to ignore unrest in nearby territories. Most of us remember the Samnite army camped outside the Colline Gate just twenty-seven years ago. The Umbrians, the Lucanians, even the contemptible Bruttians
bide their time, watching for some great disaster to befall Rome and planning to seize upon this to rise in arms once more. None of these peoples are extinct. No, Decius, you must not give these people encouragement.”

I didn’t think much of this line of reasoning, but I was far too lowly to rebuke a Censor, especially in company as exalted as I found myself in that morning.

“You must not waste any time,” Claudius said. “I shudder at the thought of what our foreign enemies might do with the Secret Name.”

“And when I find this excessively knowledgeable person?” I asked.

“He must not be allowed to live, of course,” said Vatia.

“I can’t just kill him!” I protested. “I’m an investigator, not an executioner. The man may be a citizen, and the laws are quite specific concerning who gets to kill citizens. He will have to be tried in a praetor’s court.”

“A trial would be bad,” Claudius said. “Not only would Rome’s honor be besmirched, but the Secret Name might be uttered. No, this will have to be settled in some other fashion.”

They were talking as if sacerdotal courts still had power of life and death, as they had many centuries ago. Yet, with the exception of the
virgo maxima
and the
rex sacrorum
, all of them were Roman politicians of many years’ experience in the Senate, the Assemblies, the courts, and the army. They were certainly not naive. They were playing some deeper game of their own, either collectively or individually. Just my luck.

“To whom do I report?” I asked, knowing I would not be able to weasel out here. I would just have to weasel out somewhere else.

“It would be best if you were to report to the Censors,” Claudius said. “The
virgo maxima
and I are not always approachable. The Censors are men of the highest honor, and one of them is the
Flamen Martialis
. They will in turn report to the rest of us.”

Now for the big question. “Has Pompey been told? And if not, is he to be told?”

“The consul,” my aunt said, “although we esteem and honor him most highly, is an initiate of no priestly order save that of the augurs. He is neither
pontifex
nor
flamen
. He is aware that this extraordinary meeting has been called, but he very wisely did not seek to learn the reason for it.”

There was no love lost between my aunt and Pompey. She was a younger sister of Metellus Pius, who spent years putting down the rebellion of Sertorius in Spain. Pompey, in his usual fashion, mopped up the shattered remnants of the rebel army and then claimed sole credit for winning the war, robbing her brother of his rightful glory.

Claudius stood and bowed toward the
virgo maxima
. “Honored Lady, most of us have duties to perform. The morning sacrifices will begin soon.” Then he turned to me. “You have been charged with your sacred duty. When you have information, report at once to the Censors. If it should be necessary that we all meet again, you shall be informed. I dismiss this meeting.”

Hermes read my expression as I walked down the temple steps.

“Bad?” he asked.

“Hermes, kiss the easy times good-bye. We have work to do.”

O
F COURSE, I TOLD JULIA ALL
about it immediately. We hadn’t been married long, but I had already learned the futility of keeping anything secret from her. We sat in the small garden, and I sent the slaves away, out of earshot, for whatever good that might do. Julia looked somewhat aghast when I told her about the compromising of the Secret Name, but she quickly recovered her patrician aplomb.

“I think it’s very wise of you to tell me this, Decius, even though you were expressly forbidden to do so by such high authority.”

“Of course it’s wise to tell you, my dearest, but I don’t think the matter will remain secret for long, in any case.”

“Why not?”

“Except for my aunt and Claudius, every man there this morning was a senator. There is no way such men will keep a juicy bit of political gossip like that quiet, not if they see the slightest chance of using it to their own political advantage.”

“You have a low opinion of the Senate.”

“I am a senator. I rest my case, my little white Falernian heifer.”

“The mantle of Cynicism sits ill on your shoulders,” she said. “Cynicism is Greek, and you are always saying that you detest Greek philosophy.”

“Even a Greek may be correct once in a while, my little jug of vintage
garum
.”

“And stop devising ridiculous endearments!” she snapped.

“It’s just a sign that I’m deep in thought. This is by far the strangest investigation I have ever been handed. I’m not sure even where to begin. I would like to go and lean on Ateius Capito. His invulnerability is a legal fiction, but the supporters of tribunes can be extremely violent these days.”

“Will the people support him after what he did?”

“Yes, they will. The shock is over, and he will be out of office soon, anyway. The Assemblies have spent the last twenty years fighting tooth and nail to restore the tribunician powers stripped away by Sulla. They’ll rally even to this fool if they see a threat to the institution.”

“Do you think he is in hiding?”

“I don’t know. Supposedly, if he does not keep himself accessible to the plebs, he forfeits his office. But who pays all that much attention to the laws anymore? My guess is, he’s hiding right at home, behind a heavy bodyguard.”

“Leave him alone, then. Milo’s thugs might force you a way in, but a street riot is no way to conduct an investigation.”

“I did not contemplate such a thing. No, I’ll have to be more decorous. I need to find someone not connected with the Senate, who is knowledgeable concerning the old religions, the mystery cults, that sort of thing.”

“A rather large subject,” she said, “but you probably needn’t concern yourself with the Eastern sort, the slave cults, and other
such nonsense. I’ll make inquiries among my friends. Some of them are dreadfully superstitious. They trade the names of their magicians the way they do those of their jewelers or their perfumers. What will you do?”

“I’ll look into the records of the aedile’s office, to begin with. They have the task of expelling magicians from the City. I won’t waste much time with it. I suspect that the bulk of them are nothing but mountebanks, and that goes for the ones your lady friends frequent as well.”

“Do you think I don’t know that? But please recall that some of them are priestesses of very respectable cults and can be expected to know things to which very few men are privy, especially senators, who care far more about war and politics than about religion.”

“I knew being married to you was going to come in handy.”

“Something else strikes me,” she mused. “Crassus himself is a
pontifex
. Do you think he had any idea of what was being used to curse him?”

I thought back over the scene at the gate. “I don’t think so. If he had, he probably would have turned right around and gone home. Surely even his lust for loot has limits.”

“So one would think.”

Soon I was back in the Forum, but this time I wasn’t wearing my
candidus
. Instead, dressed as an ordinary citizen, I went to the end of the Forum where the men standing for the office of quaestor were lounging about, cadging votes. Among them was Faustus Sulla, looking uncomfortable the way an aristocrat always does when he has to go about the low-bred process of vote-grubbing. Near him was the younger Marcus Crassus, who looked much more at home. He grinned engagingly when I walked up. We went through the usual, overdone public greeting.

“Taking the day off, Metellus?”

“Yes, but not willingly. Not much longer until the elections,
anyway. Will you be joining your father in Syria to be his quaestor?” Like me, he was almost certain of election. Nobody could outbribe a Crassus.

“No, I’ll be with Caesar in Gaul. My brother Publius will be leaving Caesar’s army early next year to take some Gallic cavalry to Father’s war with Parthia.”