The Tribune's Curse (3 page)

“Join me, Publius,” I said, wiping my hands on my tunic. It is unwise to have greasy fingers if you have to go for your dagger. “There’s more here than I can eat.”

“Gladly.” He sat by me and took a handful of the fragrant bread and bit into it. “Ah, Nonnia’s. I was just by her booth, but she was sold out. Your cup looks dry.” He snapped his fingers, and one of his lackeys hustled forward with a skin to fill my beaker.

I took a gulp and winced. It was crude Vatican from the third-rate vineyards right across the river.

“Publius, you can afford to bathe in Caecuban. Why do you drink this foul stuff? My slaves complain when I bring it home.”

He sneered. “Frivolous trappings of
nobilitas
. I have no use for such things, Decius. It’s all outdated, anyway. This whole nonsense of patrician and plebeian would have been swept away long ago if it hadn’t been for Sulla. We’re embarking on a new age, my friend.”

“I don’t see what that has to do with drinking decent wine,” I protested, drinking the foul stuff anyway. “Besides, when you took up the cause of the common man, you didn’t renounce your wealth, I notice.”

He smiled conspiratorially. “What could be more common and vulgar than wealth?”

“I wouldn’t know. Such vulgarity as I’ve achieved has been in spite of my poverty.”

He laughed heartily, a real feat for a man with no sense of humor. “But money is very necessary. We must have money if the Republic is to live. We need money to buy votes in the Assemblies and to bribe the juries in our lawsuits. You’re embarked upon a
tenure of the most costly of offices. And you have a new, patrician wife. You’ll find that they have expensive tastes.”

I took another swallow of his wine, which was tasting better as I drank. Everything he’d said was damnably true. “I get the impression that you’re leading up to something, Publius.”

“Just that there is no need for you to suffer unduly for your service to the State. I think it’s disgraceful that citizens should be enslaved to moneylenders.”

“You’ll never lose votes by flogging the moneylenders,” I said. “But I don’t see how that affects my case.”

“Don’t be dense, Decius. Wouldn’t you rather owe one man who will never come dunning you for payment than be beholden to fifty little bankers? I know some of the men in your family are willing to ease the burden, but relatives are worse than usurers when it comes to lending money.”

“I know you aren’t speaking on your own behalf, Publius. You aren’t that rich. In fact, there is only one man in Rome who has both the money and the interest to assume my debts so casually.”

“I knew you were only pretending to be dense.”

I sighed. “You weren’t always a friend to Crassus.”

“Nor am I now. But Caesar, Pompey, and Crassus have an agreement. Caesar, your new uncle by marriage, wants me to give Crassus every assistance in getting his Parthian war under way. That means smoothing his relations with the Senate, the tribunes, and the Assemblies.”

It was beginning to make sense. “And a large bloc of the Senate and the Assemblies would cease to give him trouble if the Caecilian clan were to drop their opposition.”

He beamed. “There you are!”

“Does Crassus fully understand in what minuscule esteem my family holds me? Does he really believe that I can sway them?”

“The prospect of not having to help pay for your Games could
improve their disposition immensely.” He refilled my cup. “I hear that you will be celebrating the
munera
for Metellus Celer. He was a great man. People must expect a celebration commensurate with his prominence.”

The very thought could still make me gasp. “Publius, you are ruining what began as an extraordinarily splendid day.”

“It could be the most important day of your life, Decius. Just come over to Crassus’s side and clear all your debts. He’ll give you liberal terms.”

“He’ll want far more than you are saying for that much aid I’ll be his lackey for life.”

“And what of that? He’s old, Decius; he can’t live much longer. Even if his war is successful, he’ll probably keel over and croak during his triumph from the sheer excitement.”

“But,” I said, growing more and more exasperated because the prospect was so tempting, “I abhor the whole idea of this war, as does my family!”

“Be realistic, Decius! There is nothing you can do about it. Crassus has his war. The Senate has given him permission to make war on Parthia, he already has his own army, and the Assemblies aren’t stopping him. Only some die-hard tribunes and recalcitrant senators are making a fuss. He would much rather not be embarrassed by this opposition, and he doesn’t want people here working against him while he is out of the City. Give him your support. You lose nothing by it, and you gain everything.”

“I must consider it,” I said, stalling. “I will confer with my family.” I had no intention of supporting Crassus, but I had enough political experience to know that a flat no would be unwise. A conditional no was always better.

He nodded. “Do that. And avoid those fools, Gallus and Ateius. They are beginning to stir up serious trouble. They should be arrested as a menace to public order.” Hearing Clodius say something like that was worth putting up with his company. With
a hearty, hypocritical clap on my shoulder, Clodius took his leave and went off to find someone he could bully and intimidate.

I refused to let him cast a shadow over my excellent day. With the wine buzzing pleasantly in my head, I repaired to the Aemilian Baths. This was a very imposing establishment, built upon a block of ground near the Forum that had been conveniently cleared by a catastrophic fire two years previously. It was completed and dedicated the year before by the praetor Marcus Aemilius Scaurus to the glory of his ancestors. It was the first of the really huge baths to be built in Rome, and included exercise yards, lecture halls, a small library, and a gallery for paintings and sculpture, all of it surrounding a main hot pool big enough for a battle between triremes. I pitied Sardinia, which Scaurus had been sent to govern, if he was using the opportunity to recoup his expenses on the place.

I was just dozing off on the massage table when a vaguely familiar man flopped onto the one next to mine. The Nubian assigned to that table commenced his ministrations, but the familiar slap of cupped palms was in this case somewhat muffled because the man was as furry as a bear. He had a wide, coarse-featured face that was just then smiling at me, showing big, yellow teeth through broad lips.

“Good day, Senator,” he said. “I don’t believe we have met. I am Caius Sallustius Crispus.”

“Decius Caecilius Metellus the Younger,” I said, extending a hand. “I’ve seen your name on the roll of the magistrates. One of the year’s quaestors, aren’t you?”

“That is correct. I’m assigned to the Grain Office.” I saw now that he was perhaps in his late twenties. His crude visage and hirsuteness had given the impression of an older man.

“I’ve missed the last few elections,” I admitted. “I’ve been with Caesar in Gaul.”

“I know. I’ve been following your career.”

“Oh? Why is that? It hasn’t been very distinguished so far.” In fact, I wasn’t much interested. I didn’t like the look of the man. I’ve always found ugliness to be an excellent reason for disliking someone.

“I am of a literary turn of mind,” he explained. “I intend to write a comprehensive history of our times.”

“My part in the affairs of Rome has been modest beyond words,” I assured him. “I can’t imagine what you’d find to write about me.”

“But you were involved in Catilina’s failed coup,” he said, still smiling. “On both sides, I’m given to understand. That calls for a rare political dexterity.”

I didn’t like the insinuating tone that he disguised with disingenuous friendliness. And I disliked discussing that ugly incident that had killed so many, ruined careers, and destroyed reputations and that still caused hard feelings after eight years.

“I was, as always, on the side of the Senate and People,” I told him. “And too much is made of the disgraceful business as it is.”

“But I hear Cicero is writing his own history of the rebellion.”

“As is his right. He was the central figure, and his actions preserved the Republic at the cost of his reputation and his career.” Cicero had been exiled for the execution without trial of the chief conspirators. Even at that time he was not truly safe in Rome despite the protection of Milo’s thugs. Much as it pains me to say anything good about Cato, his exertions on Cicero’s behalf had been heroic and made him even more unpopular than he had been, which is saying something.

“But he will naturally slant the facts in his own favor,” Sallustius said. “A more balanced account will be needed.”

“You are welcome to try your hand at it,” I said, sure that,
like the scribblings of most amateur historians, his would not outlast his own lifetime.

“These are such lively times,” he mused, apparently determined to cheat me of my nap. “Caesar’s war in Gaul, Gabinius campaigning in Syria and Egypt, Crassus’s upcoming war against the Parthians—it seems almost a shame to stay here in Rome with all that going on.”

“You can have it all,” I told him. “Barbarians and Eastern despots hold no interest for me. If it were up to me, I would stay right here for the rest of my days and putter around in the government offices and doze off during Senate debates.”

“That doesn’t sound like a Metellus to me,” he said. “Your family is famed for its devotion to high office, not to mention the high-handed wielding of power.” His tone was chaffing, but I detected a griping undertone of envy. It was not the first time I’d heard it. This was another nobody from an undistinguished family who begrudged my family connections and the all-but-unquestioned access they gave me to the pursuit of higher office.

“I don’t claim to be a typical member of the
gens
. I have no desire to conquer foreigners or give Rome more desert and forest to garrison.”

“I can understand that it’s a daunting tradition to live up to. Why, within the memory of living Romans the
gens
Caecilia has added Numidia and Crete to the Empire.”

“Wonderful. The Numidians are rebellious savages, and the Cretans are the most notoriously shiftless pack of lying, conniving pseudo-Greeks the world has to offer.” I wasn’t truly so contemptuous of my family’s accomplishments, but something in me wanted to contradict everything the man said.

“Do you think we shouldn’t add Parthia to the lot?”

Everybody wants to talk about Crassus today
, I thought. Well, nobody was talking about much else that year.

“Everybody has had a try at taking that part of the world,”
I said. “Nobody’s had much satisfaction out of it. It’s mostly plains and grassland, a natural land for horsemen, not foot-slogging legionaries. You know as well as I that we Romans are wretched cavalry.”

“I hear that Caesar is giving Crassus several wings of Gallic cavalry he does not need at the moment.”

I groaned. This was the first I’d heard of it. I thought of the splendid young Gallic horsemen I’d commanded in the Northern war, their lives to be expended foolishly in some unspeakable Asiatic desert so that Marcus Licinius Crassus could have glory to match Pompey’s.

“Is something wrong?” Sallustius asked.

“Nothing,” I said, sitting up. “They’re just more barbarians.” I walked toward the
frigidarium
, feeling the need of cold water to wake me up and clear my head. Then I turned back. “But no army ever knew anything but disaster when a foolish old man was in charge. Good day to you.”

I left him there and plunged into the cold pool, a jolting torment that I usually dread but that came as a relief after talking with Sallustius Crispus. When I climbed out, Hermes helped me dry off and dress. The cold water had cleared the wine fumes and sleepiness from my head. Thinking clearly, I wondered whether I might not have made a serious mistake in calling Crassus a foolish old man in front of that hairy little weasel.

D
INNER AT FAUSTA
’
S!
”
JULIA SAID
, still delighted with the prospect. “You haven’t wasted your day entirely if you’ve arranged that!” She sat at her vanity table while her handmaid, a sly, devious girl named Cypria, applied her cosmetics.

“We were invited by Milo,” I reminded her, nettled as always that she barely tolerated my old friend, who had been a humble galley rower, while Fausta was a patrician of the Cornelians, the equal of the Julians. “And he’s the most important man in Rome.” The consuls that year were busy with their other projects, leaving the
praetor urbanus
the man with the real power.

“For this year only,” she said, reminding me that a magistracy is for a year, while noble birth is forever.

“You’re being uncommonly snobbish today,” I said.

She swiveled on her stool, and Cypria began arranging her hair. “Only because I think this friendship between you and Milo will lead to disaster. He may be a successful politician, but he is
a criminal and a thug no better than Clodius, and he will get you killed, disgraced, or exiled someday.”

“He has saved my life many times,” I protested.

“After putting it in danger most of those times. He’s a jumped-up nobody and a danger to everyone who has anything to do with him, and I don’t know why Fausta ever married him. I admit he’s handsome, and he can be charming enough when he has a use for you, but that is purely in service of his ambitions.”

“As opposed to your glorious uncle, who has nearly got me killed at least twenty times in the last two years alone?”

She admired herself in her silver mirror. “The dangers of war are honorable, and Caesar wars on behalf of Rome.” Like everybody else, she had taken to calling him by his
cognomen
alone, as if he were a god or something.

“We’ll discuss this later,” I said, stalking out. I loved Julia dearly, but she worshiped her uncle and wouldn’t recognize his self-seeking, dictatorial ambitions. Also, like most patricians, she talked in front of her slaves as if they weren’t there.

Cato and Cassandra, my own aged slaves, stood in the atrium clucking. I went to investigate. They weren’t much use anymore, but I’d known them all my life. They stood in the door looking out into the street, shaking their heads.