The Tribune's Curse (25 page)

“Bessas, fetch your master.” The man glared for a moment, then disappeared within.

“Why, Senator Metellus, I was not expecting to see you again so soon. Please, come in.” He smiled, but the smile showed a certain strain. I followed him up the stairs to the roof garden. “May I inquire what brings you back?”

“The other day, after I spoke to you, I visited with Eschmoun and Ariston, and I found them both to be much as you described them: Eschmoun a relatively harmless fraud and Ariston a scholar of high reputation.”

He gave a self-deprecating little bow. “As you see, I am no liar.”

“Today, I went back to the house of Ariston, and he had fled without a trace.”

His eyes went wide. “Can it be that the man has a guilty conscience?”

“That or a wholesome fear of death. Above your door there is a symbol painted—a serpent in the act of swallowing its tail. What does this signify?”

He looked puzzled but did not hesitate. “It is a very common symbol in many parts of the world. It means creation and eternity. I have seen examples in the art of Egypt and Greece, as well as in the East.”

“I see. Ateius Capito wore a ring in that shape. Might he have received this from you?”

“By no means. As a dabbler in mystical things, such a trinket might have caught his eye almost anyplace, even in the jewelers’ stalls here in Rome.”

“That may be it. Now, Elagabal, just before I left here on the occasion of my last visit, you said something: you said that soon I would be an important official—”

“And so you shall be,” he assured me, looking relieved. He thought we were back to negotiating a bribe.

“And you said that you had found that previous acquaintance made such an official more approachable. Had you previous acquaintance of the aedile Marcus Aemilius Scaurus, who was charged with expelling the foreign cults?”

“Why, yes, long before he held that office.”

“Now we’re getting somewhere. When was it?”

“It was about ten years ago, when Aemilius served as proquaestor in Syria under Proconsul Pompey.”

“I see,” I said, hearing one of the names I most feared. “How did you happen to meet him?”

“You must understand, General Pompey was much occupied with affairs in the northern part of his province and with the final stages of the war with Mithridates. The southern part of his dominions he therefore left in the charge of his subordinates. Aemilius Scaurus was charged with settling the dynastic disputes of the princes of Judea. It was said, later, that Aemilius Scaurus—how shall I say—that he allowed certain of these princes to be excessively generous toward him.”

“Took bribes, eh? Well, no surprises there. What was your part in all this?”

“When the proquaestor was in Damascus on his way to Judea, he consulted with me on the very peculiar religion of that
part of the world. I had great difficulty in explaining to him the concept of monotheism.”

“I have problems with that one myself. Doesn’t seem natural. Was Ateius Capito with him?”

“That I could not say. He had a number of wellborn young men on his staff. And at that time, if you will forgive me, Roman names sounded much alike to my untrained ear.”

“That’s odd. They sound very distinctive and individual to us. So, was this the extent of your acquaintance with Aemilius Scaurus?”

He nodded vigorously. “Yes, yes, until I moved to Rome. In the year of his aedileship, when I was unjustly accused of practicing forbidden rites, I went to him and reminded him of how I had aided him when we were in Syria.” Elagabal nodded again. “He was most accommodating.”

“I can well imagine.” I rose to leave. “I have other places to go now. Elagabal, if you have told me the truth, you may expect to find me a friend when I am in office. But this investigation is by no means over. Do not take it into your head to imitate Ariston and leave Rome. He dwelled without the gates, and for him, escaping was easy. I have left word with the gate guards to allow no foreign residents to leave until I am finished.” What a laugh. As if those louts could bestir themselves to stop a blind donkey from wandering out. Besides, they could be bribed with the smallest coins. I suspected that Elagabal was aware of this, but he had the good manners not to smile.

“I wish only to serve you,” he protested, “and to spend the rest of my days in the greatest city in the world, under benevolent administrators.”

I left him with some more important facts in my possession, but they were facts I would almost have preferred not to know. Too many of the wrong people had too much in common: Aemilius Scaurus, Ateius Capito, and Pompey, and all of them were tied
together by Syria, the province just assigned to Crassus. Crassus, who, if he failed, would leave the East wide open to Pompey, who had been there before. Once again, he would have military glory, wealth, and a great army behind him. Caesar would have Gaul and the West, with immense armies of his own. The two of them would be the last players on the big game board, poised for a final, catastrophic civil war. And smack between them: Rome.

I didn’t even want to think about it.

I
T WASN
’
T AS IF IT WAS THE FIRST
time I had suspected Pompey of murder. In fact, I had personal knowledge of his summary disposal of more than one inconvenient person. Men like Pompey and Caesar and their ilk were not the sort to balk at the odd bit of homicide from time to time. Of course, they made their reputations by slaughtering people by the townful, but those weren’t citizens.

But somehow the strange sequence of events seemed unlike Pompey. To put Ateius up to cursing Crassus’s expedition, then kill the man to silence him and divert suspicion at the same time, was ruthless, and Pompey was sufficiently ruthless. But it was also brilliant and subtle, and these were qualities I would never have attributed to Pompey. I had to admit to myself that I had underestimated people before: I would never have guessed what a fine writer Caesar was.

Complex murder plots are more serious than an excellent prose style, though. Caesar was eminently capable of such a
scheme, but he was far away and perfectly happy with conquering Gaul.

Would Pompey have sent the four killers after me? Killing a tribune was a major political crime. Eliminating a minor senator was not a serious matter, given the violent nature of the times. Pompey and I had been at odds before, and my family had resisted his ambitions for years. We had cooperated with Caesar and mended fences with Crassus, but Pompey and the Metelli had never become reconciled. He would kill me without blinking, if it seemed to be to his advantage.

The four killers were a little crude. There were plenty of Pompey’s veterans in the City. A little hint dropped in the right ears, and I would be dead on the cobbles. But his veterans were, naturally, soldiers. The men who attacked me were
sica
-wielding street thugs of a sort that thronged the gangs of Clodius and Milo and lesser gang leaders, but they were men with no interest in serving in the legions.

That, too, could be a way of diverting suspicion from himself, making it look like a common street killing. He would never have contacted the cutthroats personally, of course. He had nail-hard former centurions in his following who would take care of any such chores for him and keep their mouths shut. Every powerful man has such useful henchmen.

These were not comfortable thoughts. Gaul was looking better to me with each passing hour. Maybe I should quietly leave town and go rejoin Caesar. The office of aedile was even more objectionable if I didn’t live to exercise it.

But, no. I had been charged with an investigation, and I would see it through. I was a Roman official, and I had been given this assignment by the Senate, the consul, and the
praetor urbanus
, not to mention the whole Pontifical College and the
virgo maxima
. I would get to the bottom of the matter whatever the cost. It is
with foolish thoughts like these that men frequently deceive themselves into great personal disasters.

The afternoon was drawing to a close, and almost without conscious thought my steps had taken me back to the Forum. I stood amid the monuments of past glory and wondered if I was seeing the end of it. Scipio Aemilianus, it is said, having destroyed Carthage, stood amid its ruins and wept. Not because he had destroyed that magnificent city, but because, surveying the ruin he had wrought, he understood that someday Rome, too, would look like this.

I tried to picture the Forum as a weed-grown field of deserted, roofless hulks, shattered columns, and limbless statues. The very thought was painful, and I tried to shake off the mood. If this was Rome’s eventual destiny, it was the duty of men like me to forestall it as long as possible.

On the steps of the Temple of Vesta, I saw a large group of ladies who carried themselves with unmistakably patrician bearing. I went to the old, round temple and located Julia.

“Practicing for the Vestalia?” I asked her.

She caught my mournful expression. “Yes. You’ve found out something bad, haven’t you?”

“I may have. Come walk with me.”

She took her leave of the other ladies and came down the steps with Cypria close behind. “We are going to excite gossip,” Julia said, not entirely serious.

“Let people talk,” I said scornfully. Of course, I had my hands clasped behind my back. At the time it was considered the absolute depth of bad taste for a husband and wife to display affection in public. Just walking together like this, without a flock of friends and clients, was slightly scandalous.

“Maybe Cato will show up,” I said. “If he does, I’ll kiss you, and we can watch him die of apoplexy.”

“You’re in a wonderful mood,” she said. “What’s happened?”

I told her of the day’s events and what I had found out from the records in the Tabularium. She considered these things for a while as we sauntered northwestward, toward the huge basilicas that dominated that end of the Forum. She did not seem terribly upset, but then Julia rarely got upset. I could see the signs that she was thinking hard, which was something she did well. When she spoke, she did not seem to be addressing the problem at hand.

“It was terrible news out of Egypt this morning.”

“Yes, I believe old Ptolemy’s finally stepped over the line, massacring the Alexandrians like that. This is going to bring us years of trouble.”

“Well, yes, but I was thinking of poor Berenice. I can’t say that I admired the woman, but she was kind to Fausta and me while we were at her court. How can a man put his own daughter to death like that?”

“Dynastic politics is a murderous business,” I told her. “But then, so is republican politics. Tyrants are always afraid, and close family members are the nearest rivals.”

“I don’t think Pompey would try to have you killed,” she said, making what seemed to me an illogical leap.

“Why not?”

“He can’t afford to alienate Caesar just now. Forget about Crassus for the moment. I loathe the man, but I don’t think he’s as stupid as you seem to believe.”

“He wouldn’t alienate your uncle Caius Julius if Caesar never knew about it.”

She looked at me. “Surely you know Caesar better than that. He keeps track of what goes on in Rome. He maintains a huge correspondence with friends and family members, and he has the subtlest mind in the world. He’s as brilliant as Cicero, and unlike Cicero he isn’t blinded by his own importance. He would put together all the little details and come up with the true answer.”

“I suppose you are right,” I said. More than once, Caesar
had sent me off to investigate some matter to which he already knew the answer, just to see if I would arrive at the same solution by different means. But I did not tell her that, if Caesar needed an alliance with Pompey, he would consider my life a minor price to pay for it.

“What bothers me more,” I told her, “was how the”—I lowered my voice to a whisper lest Cypria or some passerby hear “—Secret Name got into it. I mean, Pompey intends to be virtual king of Rome. He’s not especially superstitious, but even he would hesitate to perform an act that would endanger the City itself.”

“Why didn’t Ateius hesitate?” she shot back instantly.

“Why, he—” I paused, realizing that I hadn’t thought about this. When you assume someone to be mad, there is always a tendency to look no further for motive or intention, still less for signs of future plans. “I see what you’re getting at. Pompey said he intended to prosecute Ateius for
perduellio
and
maiestas
and sacrilege. Even if he was bluffing to cover his own complicity, someone else would have done it. There are at least a hundred senators with the legal expertise to bring those multiple charges against him. Any of them would have jumped at the chance.”

“And Ateius must have known it. Before he went up on that gate, he knew that death or exile would be his inevitable reward.”

“So he must have been planning for it. He knew that he would never be able to return to Rome. Julia, this gives me a great deal to think about.”

“It should,” she said complacently. “Think about this: for a Roman politician, what is the ultimate dread?”

“Exile,” I said. “Everyone dies, but to live in exile is unthinkable.” I shuddered at the thought. Even when I was away from Rome for years at a time, I always knew I would return. Everyone knew of the fate of the supporters of Marius, exiled twenty years before by Sulla and never allowed to return. They sought refuge with foreign rulers or joined rebellions like that of
Sertorius. They lived on sufferance, always having to move on as Roman territory expanded, growing ever older. No wonder so many of them chose suicide instead.

“Ateius Capito,” Julia went on, “had been in public service, in one capacity or another, for most of his adult life, you say?”

“It’s a matter of public record, right over there.” I nodded toward the Tabularium, which was visible above the roofs of the Basilica Opimia and the Temple of Saturn, the three structures ascending rather like three uneven steps up the slope of the Capitol.

“So he toiled for fifteen years, serving in the legions and on the staffs of more important men. Finally, he achieved the tribuneship, a truly important office. With a successful tribuneship behind him, he was poised for high office, military command, and prestige. He gave it all up to put a curse on Crassus. Does this make sense to you, Decius?”