He didn't return to Rome until the end of April. Dropping Metrobius off at Scylax's elegant ground-floor apartment on the Caelian Hill outside the Servian Walls, he then drove down into the Vallis Camenarum to surrender the gig and mules he had hired from a stable there. Having paid the bill, he slung his saddlebags over his left shoulder and set out to walk into Rome. No servant had traveled with him; he and Metrobius had made do with the staff of the various inns and posting houses they had stayed in up and down the peninsula. As he trudged up the Via Appia to where the Capena Gate interrupted the twenty-foot-high masonry of Rome's ramparts, the city looked very good to him. Legend had it that Rome's Servian Walls had been erected by King Servius Tullus before the Republic was established, but like most noblemen, Sulla knew these fortifications, at least, had not existed until three hundred years ago when the Gauls had sacked the city. The Gauls had poured down in teeming hordes from the western Alps, spreading across the huge valley of the Padus River in the far north, gradually working their way down peninsular Italy on both east and west. Many settled where they fetched up, especially in Umbria and Picenum, but those who came down the Via Cassia through Etruria headed purposely toward Rome and having reached Rome, almost wrested the city permanently off her rightful owners. It was only after that the Servian Walls went up, while the Italian peoples of the Padus Valley, all Umbria, and northern Picenum mingled their blood with the Gauls, became despised half-castes. Never again had Rome suffered its walls to lapse into disrepair; the lesson had been a hard one, and the fear of barbarian invaders could still provoke horrified chills in every Roman. Though there were a few expensive insula apartment towers on the Caelian Hill, the scene in the main was pastoral until Sulla reached the Capena Gate; the Vallis Camenarum outside it was given over to stockyards, slaughterhouses, smokehouses, and grazing fields for the animals sent to this greatest market in all Italy. Inside the Capena Gate lay the real city. Not the congested jumble of the Subura and the Esquiline, yet urban nonetheless. He strolled up along the Circus Maximus and took the Steps of Cacus onto the Germalus of the Palatine, after which it was only a short distance to the house of Clitumna. Outside its door he took a deep breath, then sounded the knocker. And entered a world of shrieking women. That Nicopolis and Clitumna were delighted to see him was very plain. They wept and whinnied, draped themselves about his neck until he pushed them off, after which they kept circling close about him and would not leave him in peace. "Where do I sleep these days?" he asked, refusing to hand his saddlebags to the servant itching to take them. "With me," said Nicopolis, glittering triumphantly at the suddenly downcast Clitumna. The door to the study was tightly shut, Sulla noted as he followed Nicopolis out onto the colonnade, leaving his stepmother standing in the atrium wringing her hands. "I take it Sticky Stichy's well ensconced by now?" he asked Nicopolis as they reached her suite of rooms. "Here," she said, ignoring his question, so bursting was she to show him his new quarters. What she had done was to yield up her very spacious sitting room to him, leaving herself with a bedroom and a much smaller chamber. Gratitude filled him; he looked at her a little sadly, liking her in that moment more than he ever had. "All mine?" he asked. "All yours," she said, smiling. He threw the saddlebags down on his bed. "Stichus?" he asked, impatient to know the worst. Of course she wanted him to kiss her, make love to her, but she knew him well enough to understand that he was in no need of sexual solace simply because he had been away from her and Clitumna. The lovemaking would have to wait; sighing, Nicopolis reconciled herself to the role of informant. "Stichus is very well entrenched indeed," she said, and went over to the saddlebags to unpack for him. He put her aside firmly, dropped the saddlebags down behind one of the clothes chests, and moved to his favorite chair, which stood behind a new desk. Nicopolis sat on his bed. "I want all the news," he said. "Well, Stichy's here, sleeping in the master's cubicle and using the study, of course. It's been better than expected in one way, really, because Stichy at close quarters every day is hard to take, even for Clitumna. A few more months, and I predict she'll throw him out. It was clever of you to go away, you know." Her hand smoothed the stack of pillows beside her absently. "I didn't think so at the time, I admit, but you were right and I was wrong. Stichy entered the place like a triumphing general, and you weren't here to dim his glory. Oh, things sailed around, I can tell you! Your books went into the rubbish bin it's all right, the servants rescued them and whatever else you left in the way of clothing and personal stuff went into the rubbish bin after the books. Since the staff like you and loathe him, nothing of yours was lost it's all here in this room somewhere." His pale eyes traveled around the walls, across the lovely mosaic floor. "This is nice," he said. And then, "Continue." "Clitumna was devastated. She hadn't counted on Stichy's throwing your things out. In fact, I don't think she ever really wanted him to move in, but when he said he wanted to, she couldn't find a way to refuse. Blood and the last of her line and all the rest of it. Clitumna's not very bright, but she knew perfectly well his only reason for demanding to move in here was to get you moving in the direction of the street. Stichy's not hard up. But when you weren't even here to see your stuff being thrown out, it rather took the edge off Stichy's pleasure. No quarrels, no opposition, no presence. Just a passively surly staff, a very weepy Auntie Clittie, and me well, I just look through him as if he isn't there." The little servant girl Bithy came sidling through the door bearing a plate of assorted buns, pasties, pies, and cakes, put it down on the corner of the desk with a shy smile for Sulla, and spied the leather band connecting the two saddlebags, poking up from behind the clothes chest. Off she went across the room to unpack. Sulla moved so quickly Nicopolis didn't see him intercept the girl; one moment he was leaning back comfortably in his chair, the next the girl was being moved gently away from the clothes chest. Smiling at her, Sulla pinched Bithy gently on the cheek and thrust her out the door. Nicopolis stared. "My, you are worried about those bags!" she said. "What's in them? You're like a dog guarding a bone." "Pour me some wine," he said, sitting down again, and selecting a meat pasty from the plate. She did as he asked, but she was not about to let go of the subject. "Come, Lucius Cornelius, what's in those bags that you don't want anyone to see?" A cup of unwatered wine was put in front of him. Down went both corners of his mouth; he threw out his hands in a gesture indicating growing exasperation. "What do you think? I've been away from both my girls for almost four months! I admit I didn't think of you all the time, but I did think of you! Especially when I saw some little thing I thought might please one or the other of you." Her face softened, glowed; Sulla was not a gift giver. In fact, Nicopolis could never remember his presenting her or Clitumna with a single gift, even of the cheapest kind, and she was a wise enough student of human nature to know this was evidence of parsimony, not of poverty; the generous will give, even when they have nothing to give. "Oh, Lucius Cornelius!" she exclaimed, beaming. "Truly? When may I see?" "When I'm good and ready," he said, turning his chair to glance through the big window behind him. "What's the time?" "I don't know about the eighth hour, I think. Dinner isn't due yet, anyway," she said. He got up, went across to the clothes chest, and hooked the saddlebags out from behind it, slinging them over his shoulder. "I'll be back in time for dinner," he said. Jaw dropped, she watched him go to the door. "Sulla! You are the most annoying creature in the entire world. I swear it! Just arrived home, and you're off somewhere! Well, I doubt you need to visit Metrobius, since you took him with you!" That arrested his progress. Grinning, he stared at her. "Oh, I see! Scylax came a-calling to complain, did he?" "You might say. He arrived like a tragedian playing Antigone, and left like a comedian playing the eunuch. Clitumna certainly put a squeak in his voice!" She laughed at the memory. "Serves him right, the old whore. Do you know he'd deliberately prevented the boy's learning to read and write?" But the saddlebags were gnawing again. "Don't trust us enough to leave them behind while you go out?" she asked. "I'm not a fool," he said, and departed. Female curiosity. He was a fool, to have overlooked it. So down to the Great Market he took himself and his saddlebags, and in the course of the next hour went on a concentrated shopping spree with the last of his thousand silver denarii, that remnant he had thought to save for the future. Women! Nosy, interfering sows! Why hadn't he thought of it? The saddlebags weighed down with scarves and bangles, frivolous Eastern slippers and gewgaws for the hair, he was let back into Clitumna's house by a servant who informed him the ladies and Master Stichus were in the dining room, but had elected to wait a while before eating. "Tell them I'll be there shortly," he said, and went to Nicopolis's suite.
There didn't seem to be anyone about, but to make sure, he closed the shutters on his window and then bolted his door. The hastily purchased presents he heaped on the desk, some new book rolls alongside them. The left-hand bag he ignored; the top layer of clothes in the right-hand bag he dumped out on the bed. Then from the depths of the right-hand bag he drew forth two pairs of rolled-up socks, and fiddled with them until they yielded two small bottles whose stoppers were heavily sealed with wax. Next emerged a plain wooden box, small enough to fit in his hand easily; as if unable to help himself, he lifted its lid, which fitted closely. The contents were uninspiring: just a few ounces of a sluggish off-white powder. Down went the lid; his fingers tamped it firmly into place. Then he looked around the room, frowning. Where? A row of decrepit little wooden cupboards shaped like models of temples occupied the top of a long, narrow sideboard table: the relics of the House of Cornelius Sulla. All he had inherited from his father, all his father couldn't sell for wine, more likely for lack of a buyer than lack of the will to sell. Five cupboards, each a cube two feet by two feet by two feet; each had painted wooden doors in its front between an outer stand of columns; each had a pediment decorated with carved temple figures at apex and ends; and on the simple entablature running below the pediment, each had a man's name inscribed. One was the original ancestor common to all seven branches of the patrician House of Cornelius; one was Publius Cornelius Rufinus, consul and dictator over two hundred years earlier; one was his son, twice consul and once dictator during the Samnite wars, then expelled from the Senate for hoarding silver plate; one was the first Rufinus to be called Sulla, priest of Jupiter all his life; and the last was his praetor son, Publius Cornelius Sulla Rufinus, famous for his founding of the ludi Apollinares, the Games of Apollo. It was the cupboard of the first Sulla which Sulla opened, very delicately, for the wood had been neglected for many years, and had grown frail. Once the paint had been bright, the tiny relief figures clearly outlined; now they were faded, chipped. One day he intended to find the money to restore his ancestral cupboards, and have a house with an imposing atrium in which he could display his cupboards proudly. However, for the moment it seemed appropriate to hide his two little bottles and his box of powder in the cupboard of Sulla the flamen Dialis, most sacred man in the Rome of his day, serving Jupiter Optimus Maximus. The interior of the cupboard was filled with a life-size bewigged wax mask, exquisitely lifelike, so well had the tints been applied to it. Eyes glared out at Sulla, blue rather than his own palest grey; the skin of Rufinus was fair, but not so fair as Sulla's; and the hair, thick and curling, was a carrot-red rather than a golden-red. Sufficient space lay around the mask to permit its removal, for it was fixed to a wooden head-shaped block from which it could be detached. The last time it had come out was at his father's funeral, which Sulla had paid for in a painful series of encounters with a man he detested. Lovingly Sulla closed the doors, then plucked at the steps of the podium, which looked smooth and seamless. But, like a real temple, the podium of this ancestral cupboard was hollow; Sulla found the right spot, and out of the front steps there slid a drawer. It was not intended as a hiding place, but as a safe receptacle in which to store the written record of the ancestor's deeds, as well as a detailed description of his size, gait, posture, physical habits, and bodily distinguishing marks. For when a Cornelius Sulla died, an actor would be hired to don the mask and imitate the dead ancestor so accurately that he might be supposed to have come back to see this later scion of his noble house ushered out of the world he himself had once adorned. The documents relating to Publius Cornelius Sulla Rufinus the priest were inside the drawer, but there was plenty of room for the bottles and the box; Sulla slipped them in, then pushed the drawer shut and made sure the closure was undetectable. His secret would be safe with Rufinus. Feeling easier, Sulla opened up the window shutters and unbolted his door. And gathered up the heap of fripperies lying all over his desk, with a malicious grin at the scroll he also picked out from among the others stacked there. Of course Lucius Gavius Stichus was occupying the host's place on the left-hand end of the middle couch; this was one of the few dining rooms where the women reclined rather than sat on upright chairs, since neither Clitumna nor Nicopolis was ruled by old-fashioned shibboleths. "Here you are, girls," said Sulla, tossing his armful of gifts at the two adoring female faces following his progress into the room like flowers the sun. He had chosen well, things which might indeed have come from elsewhere than a market inside Rome, and things which neither woman would be ashamed to wear. But before he slid artfully between Clitumna and Nicopolis on the first couch, he slapped the rolled-up book he was holding down in front of Stichus. "A little something for you, Stichus," he said. While Sulla settled himself between the two women, who responded with giggles and purrs, Stichus, startled at being the recipient of a gift, untied the tapes holding the book together, and unfurled it. Two scarlet spots flared in his sallow acne-pocked cheeks as his goggling eyes took in the beautifully drawn and painted male figures, penises erect as they performed all manner of athletic feats with each other upon the unsuspecting papyrus. With shaking fingers he rolled the thing up and tied it, then had of course to pluck up the courage to look at his benefactor. Sulla's frightful eyes were gleaming at him over the top of Clitumna's head, speaking silent volumes of contempt. "Thank you, Lucius Cornelius," Stichus squeaked. "You're very welcome, Lucius Gavius," said Sulla from the bottom of his throat. At which moment the gustatio the first course came in, hastily augmented, Sulla suspected, in honor of his return; for besides the normal fare of olives, lettuce salad, and hard-boiled eggs, it contained some little pheasant sausages and chunks of tunnyfish in oil. Enjoying himself hugely, Sulla tucked in, sliding wicked sidelong glances at Stichus, alone on his couch while his aunt applied as much of her side to Sulla's side as she possibly could, and Nicopolis caressed Sulla's groin shamelessly. "Well, and what's the news on the home front?" he asked as the first course was cleared away. "Nothing much," said Nicopolis, more interested in what was happening under her hand. Sulla turned his head toward Clitumna. "I don't believe her," he said, as he picked up Clitumna's hand and began to nibble its fingers. Then when he saw the look of distaste upon Stichus's face, he began to lick the fingers voluptuously. "Tell me, love" lick "because I refuse to believe" lick "nothing's happened." Lick, lick, lick. Luckily the fercula the main courses arrived at that moment; greedy Clitumna snatched her hand away and stretched it out to grab at the roast mutton with thyme sauce. "Our neighbors have been busy," she said between swallows, "to make up for how quiet we've been while you were away." A sigh. "Titus Pomponius's wife had a little boy in February." "Ye gods, another boring money-hungry merchant banker for the future!" was Sulla's comment. "Caecilia Pilia is well, I trust?" "Very! No trouble at all." “And on the Caesar side?'' He was thinking of delectable Julilla and the grass crown she had given him. "Big news there!" Clitumna licked her own fingers. ' They had a wedding quite a society affair.'' Something happened to Sulla's heart; it actually seemed to drop like a stone to the bottom of his belly, and sit there churning amid the food. The oddest sensation. "Oh, really?" He kept his tone disinterested. "Indeed! Caesar's elder daughter married none other than Gaius Marius! Disgusting, isn't it?" "Gaius Marius..." "What, don't you know him?" Clitumna asked. "I don't think so. Marius... He must be a New Man." "That's right. He was praetor five years ago, never made it to the consulship, of course. But he was governor of Further Spain, and made an absolute fortune out there. Mines and the like," said Clitumna. For some reason Sulla remembered the man with the mien of an eagle at the inauguration of the new consuls; he had worn a purple-bordered toga. "What does he look like?" "Grotesque, my dear! The most enormous eyebrows! Like hairy caterpillars." Clitumna reached for the braised broccoli. "He's at least thirty years older than Julia, poor dear.'' "What's so unusual about that?" demanded Stichus, feeling it time he had something to say. "At least half the girls in Rome marry men old enough to be their fathers." Nicopolis frowned. "I wouldn't go so far as to say half, Stichy," she said. "A quarter would be more like it." "Disgusting!" said Stichus. "Disgusting, rubbish!" said Nicopolis vigorously, sitting up so she could glare at him more effectively. "Let me tell you, fart-face, that there's a lot to be said for older men as far as a young girl is concerned! At least older men have learned to be considerate and reasonable! My worst lovers were all under twenty-five. Think they know it all, but know nothing. Erk! Like being hit by a bull. Over before it starts.'' Since Stichus was twenty-three years old, he bridled. "Oh, you would! Think you know it all, don't you?" he sneered. The look he got was level. "I know more than you do, fart-face," she said. "Now, now, let's be happy tonight!" cried Clitumna. "Our darling Lucius Cornelius is back." Their darling Lucius Cornelius promptly grabbed his stepmother and rolled her over on the couch, tickling her ribs until she screeched shrilly and kicked her legs in the air. Nicopolis retaliated by tickling Sulla, and the first couch became a melee. This was too much for Stichus; clutching his new book, he slid off his couch and stalked out of the room, not sure they even noticed his going. How was he going to dislodge that man? Auntie Clittie was besotted! Even while Sulla was away, he had not managed to persuade her to send Sulla packing. She just wept that it was a pity her two darling boys couldn't get on. Though he had eaten hardly anything, Stichus wasn't upset by the fact, for in his study he kept an interesting array of comestibles a jar of his favorite figs in syrup, a little tray of honeyed pastry the cook was under orders to keep filled, some tongue-cloying perfumed jellies which came all the way from Parthia, a box of plumply juicy raisins, honey cakes, and honeyed wine. Roast mutton and braised broccoli he could live without; every tooth in his head was a sweet one. Chin on his hand, a quintuple lamp chasing away the beginnings of evening, Lucius Gavius Stichus munched syruped figs while he carefully perused the illustrations of the book Sulla had given him, and read the short accompanying Greek text. Of course he knew the present was Sulla's way of saying he didn't need such books, because he'd done it all, but that couldn't stifle his interest; Stichus was not endowed with so much pride. Ah! Ah ah ah! Something was happening under his embroidered tunic! And he dropped his hand from chin to lap with a furtive innocence quite wasted upon its only audience, the jar of syruped figs. * * *
Yielding to an impulse he despised himself for feeling, Lucius Cornelius Sulla walked next morning across the Palatine to the spot on the Palatium where he had encountered Julilla. It was high spring now, and the patches of parkland sported flowers everywhere, narcissus and anemone, hyacinths, violets, even an occasional early rose; wild apples and peaches were in full blossom, white and pink, and the rock upon which he had sat in January now was almost hidden by lushly green grass. Her servant girl in attendance, Julilla was there, looking thinner, less honey-colored. And when she saw him, a wild triumphant joy suffused her from eyes to skin to hair so beautiful! Oh, never in the history of the world had any mortal woman been so beautiful! Hackles rising, Sulla stopped in his tracks, filled with an awe akin to terror. Venus. She was Venus. Ruler of life and death. For what was life except the procreative principle, and what was death save its extinction? All else was decoration, the furbelows men invented to convince themselves life and death must mean more. She was Venus. But did that make him Mars, her equal in godhead or was he merely Anchises, a mortal man she stooped to fancy for the space of one Olympian heartbeat? No, he wasn't Mars. His life had equipped him for pure ornamentation, and even that of the cheapest gimcrack kind; who could he be but Anchises, the man whose only real fame lay in the fact that Venus stooped to fancy him for a moment? He shook with anger, directed his hateful frustration at her, and so pumped venom into his veins, creating an overwhelming urge to strike at her, reduce her from Venus to Julilla. "I heard you came back yesterday," she said, not moving toward him. "Got your spies out, have you?" he asked, refusing to move closer to her. "That isn't necessary in our street, Lucius Cornelius. The servants know everything," she said. "Well, I hope you don't think I came here looking for you today, because I didn't. I came here for a little peace." Her beauty actually increased, though he hadn't thought it possible. My honey-girl, he thought. Julilla. It dropped like honey off the tongue. So did Venus. "Does that mean I disturb your peace?" she asked, very sure of herself for one so young. He laughed, contriving to make it sound light, amused, trifling. "Ye gods, baby girl, you have a lot of growing up to do!" he said, and laughed again. "I said I came here for peace. That means I thought I'd find it here, doesn't it? And by logical progression, the answer must be that you don't disturb my peace one iota." She fought back. "Not at all! It might simply indicate that you didn't expect to find me here." "Which leads straight back to indifference," he said. It was an unequal contest, of course; before his eyes she was shrinking, losing her luster, an immortal turned mortal. Her face puckered, but she managed not to cry, just gazed at him bewildered, not able to reconcile how he looked and what he said with the true instinct of her heart, which told her in every beat that she had caught him in her toils. "I love you!" she said, as if it explained everything. Another laugh. "Fifteen! What would you know of love?" "I'm sixteen!" she said. "Look, baby girl," Sulla said, his tone cutting, "leave me alone! Not only are you a nuisance, you're rapidly becoming an embarrassment." And turned, and walked away without once looking back. Julilla didn't collapse in floods of tears; it would have been better for her future welfare had she. For a passionate and painful bout of tears might have convinced her that she was wrong, that she stood no chance to capture him. As it was, she walked across to where Chryseis, her servant girl, was standing pretending to be absorbed in the prospect of an empty Circus Maximus. Her chin was up; so was her pride. "He's going to be difficult," she said, "but never mind. Sooner or later I shall get him, Chryseis." "I don't think he wants you," said Chryseis. "Of course he wants me!" said Julilla scornfully. "He wants me desperately]" Long acquaintance with Julilla put a curb on Chryseis's tongue; instead of trying to reason with her mistress, she sighed, shrugged. "Have it your own way," she said. "I usually do," answered Julilla. They began to walk home, the silence between them unusual, for they were much of an age, and had grown up together. But when they reached the great temple of Magna Mater, Julilla spoke, voice determined. "I shall refuse to eat," she said. Chryseis stopped. "And what do you think that's going to do?" she asked. "Well, in January he said I was fat. And I am." "Julilla, you're not!" "Yes, I am. That's why I haven't eaten any sweetmeats since January. I'm a little thinner, but not nearly thin enough. He likes thin women. Look at Nicopolis. Her arms are like sticks." "But she's old!" Chryseis said. "What looks good on you wouldn't look good on her. Besides, you'll worry your parents if you stop eating they'll think you're sick!" "Good," said Julilla. "If they think I'm sick, so will Lucius Cornelius. And he'll worry about me dreadfully." Better and more convincing arguments Chryseis could not produce, for she was neither very bright nor very sensible. So she burst into tears, which pleased Julilla enormously.
Four days after Sulla returned to Clitumna's house, Lucius Gavius Stichus came down with a digestive disorder which prostrated him; alarmed, Clitumna called in half a dozen of the Palatine's most fashionable doctors, all of whom diagnosed an attack of food poisoning. "Vomiting, colic, diarrhoea a classic picture," said their spokesman, the Roman physician Publius Popillius. "But he hasn't eaten anything the rest of us haven't!" protested Clitumna, her fears unallayed. "In fact, he isn't eating nearly as well as the rest of us, and that's what's worrying me most!" "Ah, domina, I think you are quite wrong," lisped the nosiest of them, Athenodorus Siculus, a practitioner with the famous Greek investigative persistence; he had wandered off and poked into every room opening off the atrium, then into the rooms around the peristyle-garden. "Surely you are aware that Lucius Gavius has half a sweetmeat shop in his study?" "Pish!" squeaked Clitumna. "Half a sweetmeat shop, indeed! A few figs and pastries, that's all. In fact, he hardly ever touches them." The six learned medical men looked at each other. ' 'Domina, he eats them all day and half the night, so your staff tell me," said Athenodorus the Greek from Sicily. "I suggest you persuade him to give up his confectioneries. If he eats better foods, not only will his digestive troubles clear up, but his general level of health will improve." Lucius Gavius Stichus was privy to all this, lying on his bed too weak from the violence of his purging to defend himself, his slightly protruding eyes jumping from one face to another as the conversation jumped from one speaker to another. "He has pimples, and his skin is a bad color," said a Greek from Athens. "Does he exercise?" "He doesn't need to," said Clitumna, the first hint of doubt appearing in her tone. "He rushes about from place to place in the course of his business, it keeps him constantly on the run, I do assure you!" "What is your business, Lucius Gavius?" asked the Spaniard. "I'm a slaver," said Stichus. Since all save Publius Popillius had started life in Rome as slaves, more jaundice appeared suddenly in their eyes than they could find in Lucius Gavius's, and they moved away from his vicinity under pretext that it was time to leave. "If he wants something sweet, then let him confine himself to the honeyed wine," said Publius Popillius. "Keep him off solid foods for a day or two more, and then when he's feeling hungry again, let him have a normal diet. But mind I said normal, domina! Beans, not sweetmeats. Salads, not sweetmeats. Cold collations, not sweetmeats." Stichus's condition did improve over the next week, but he never got fully well. Eat nothing but nourishing and wholesome foods though he did, still he suffered from periodic bouts of nausea, vomiting, pain, and dysentery, none as severe as his initial attack, all debilitating. He began to lose weight, just a little at a time, so that no one in the house really noticed. By the end of summer he couldn't drag himself as far as his office in the Porticus Metelli, and the days he fancied lying on a couch in the sun grew fewer and further apart. The fabulous illustrated book Sulla had given him ceased to interest him, and food of any kind became an ordeal to consume. Only the honeyed wine could he tolerate, and not always even that. By September every medical practitioner in Rome had been called to see him, and many and varied were the diagnoses, not to mention the treatments, especially after Clitumna began to resort to quacks. "Let him eat what he wants," said one doctor. "Let him eat nothing and starve it out," said another. "Let him eat nothing but beans," said a doctor of the Pythagorean persuasion. "Be consoled," said the nosy Greek doctor, Athenodorus Siculus. "Whatever it is, it's obviously not contagious. I believe it is a malignancy in the upper bowel. However, make sure those who come in physical contact with him or have to empty his chamber pot wash their hands thoroughly afterward, and don't let them near the kitchen or the food." Two days later, Lucius Gavius Stichus died. Beside herself with grief, Clitumna fled Rome immediately after the funeral, begging Sulla and Nicopolis to come with her to Circei, where she had a villa. But though Sulla escorted her down to the Campanian seashore, he and Nicopolis refused to leave Rome. When he returned from Circei, Sulla kissed Nicopolis and moved out of her suite of rooms. "I'm resuming tenancy of the study and my own sleeping cubicle," he said. "After all, now that Sticky Stichy is dead, I'm the closest thing she has to a son." He was sweeping the lavishly illustrated scrolls into a burning bucket; face twisting in disgust, he held up one hand to Nicopolis, who was watching from the doorway of the study. "Look at that! Not an inch of this room that isn't sticky!" The carafe of honeyed wine stood in a caked ring on the priceless citrus-wood console against one wall. Lifting it, Sulla looked down at the permanently ingrained mark amid the exquisite whorls of the wood, and hissed between his teeth. "What a cockroach! Goodbye, Sticky Stichy!" And he pitched the carafe through the open window onto the peristyle colonnade. But it flew farther than that, and broke into a thousand shards on the plinth of Sulla's favorite statue, Apollo pursuing the dryad Daphne. A huge star of syrupy wine marred the smooth stone, and began to trickle down in long runnels which soaked into the ground. Darting to the window to look, Nicopolis giggled. "You're right," she said. "What a cockroach!" And sent her little serving maid Bithy to clean the pedestal with rag and water. No one noticed the traces of white powder adhering to the marble, for it too was white. The water did its work: the powder vanished. "I'm glad you missed the actual statue," said Nicopolis, sitting on Sulla's knee, both of them watching Bithy as she washed away. "I'm sorry," said Sulla, but looked very pleased. "Sorry? Lucius Cornelius, it would have ruined all that wonderful paintwork! At least the plinth is plain marble." His upper lip curled back to show his teeth. "Bah! Why is that I seem permanently surrounded by tasteless fools?" he asked, tipping Nicopolis off his lap. The stain was completely gone; Bithy wrung out her rag and emptied her basin into the pansies. "Bithy!" Sulla called. "Wash your hands, girl, and I mean wash them properly! You don't know what Stichus died of, and he was very fond of honeyed wine. Go on, off you go!" Beaming because he noticed her, Bithy went.
7
"I discovered a most interesting young man today," said Gaius Marius to Publius Rutilius Rufus. They were sitting in the precinct of the temple of Tellus on the Carinae, for it lay next door to Rutilius Rufus's house, and on this windy autumn day it offered some welcome sun. "Which is more than my peristyle does," Rutilius Rufus had explained as he conducted his visitor toward a wooden bench in the grounds of the spacious but shabby-looking temple. "Our old gods are neglected these days, especially my dear neighbor Tellus," he meandered on as they settled themselves. "Everyone's too busy bowing and scraping to Magna Mater of Asia to remember Rome is better served by her own earth goddess!" It was to avert the looming homily upon Rome's oldest, most shadowy and mysterious gods that Gaius Marius chose to mention his encounter with the interesting young man. His ploy worked, of course; Rutilius Rufus was never proof against interesting people of any age or either sex. "Who was that?" he asked now, lifting his muzzle to the sun in shut-eyed pleasure, old dog that he was. "Young Marcus Livius Drusus, who must be all of oh, seventeen or eighteen?" "My nephew Drusus?" Marius turned his head to stare. "Is he?" "Well, he is if he's the son of the Marcus Livius Drusus who triumphed last January and intends to seek election as one of the censors for next year," said Rutilius Rufus. Marius laughed, shook his head. "Oh, how embarrassing! Why don't I ever remember such things?" "Probably," said Rutilius Rufus dryly, "because my wife, Livia who, to refresh your bucolic memory, was the sister of your interesting young man's father has been dead these many years, and never went out, and never dined with me when I entertained. The Livius Drususes have a tendency to break the spirits of their womenfolk, unfortunately. Nice little thing, my wife. Gave me two fine children, but never an argument. I treasured her." "I know," said Marius uncomfortably, disliking being caught out would he never get them all straight? But old friend though Rutilius Rufus was, Marius couldn't remember ever meeting his shy little wife. "You ought to marry again," he said, very enamored of marriage these days. "What, just so you don't look so conspicuous? No, thank you! I find sufficient outlet for my passions in writing letters." One dark blue eye came open, peered at Marius. "Anyway, why do you think so highly of my nephew Drusus?" "In the last week I've been approached by several groups of Italian Allies, all from different nations, and all bitterly complaining that Rome is misusing their soldier levies," said Marius slowly. "In my opinion they have good grounds for complaint. Almost every consul for a decade and more has wasted the lives of his soldiers and with as little concern as if men were starlings, or sparrows! And the first to perish have been Italian Allied troops, because it's become the custom to use them ahead of Romans in any situation where lives are likely to be lost. It's a rare consul who genuinely appreciates that the Italian Allied soldiers are men of property in their nations and are paid for by their nations, not by Rome." Rutilius Rufus never objected to a roundabout discussion; he knew Marius far too well to assume that what he spoke of now bore no relationship to the nephew Drusus. So he answered this apparent digression willingly. "The Italian Allies came under Rome's military protection to unify defense of the peninsula," he said. "In return for donating soldiers to us, they were accorded special status as our allies and reaped many benefits, not the least of which was a drawing-together of the nations of the peninsula. They give their troops to Rome so that we all fight in a common cause. Otherwise, they'd still be warring one Italian nation against another and undoubtedly losing more men in the process than any Roman consul has lost." "That is debatable," said Marius. "They might have combined and formed one Italian nation instead!" "Since the alliance with Rome is a fact, and has been a fact for two or three hundred years, my dear Gaius Marius, I fail to see where you're going at the moment," Rutilius said. "The deputations who came to see me maintain that Rome is using their troops to fight foreign wars of absolutely no benefit to Italy as a whole," Marius said patiently. "The original bait we dangled before the Italian nations was the granting of the Roman citizenship. But it's nearly eighty years since any Italian or Latin community has been gifted with the citizenship, as you well know. Why, it took the revolt of Fregellae to force the Senate to make concessions to the Latin Rights communities!" "That is an oversimplification," said Rutilius Rufus. "We didn't promise the Italian Allies general enfranchisement. We offered them gradual citizenship in return for consistent loyalty Latin Rights first." "Latin Rights mean very little, Publius Rutilius! At best, they offer a rather tawdry second-class citizenship no vote in any Roman elections." "Well, yes, but in the fifteen years since Fregellae's revolt, you must admit things have improved for those with the Latin Rights," Rutilius Rufus said stubbornly. "Every man holding a magistracy in a Latin Rights town now automatically gains the full Roman citizenship for himself and his family." "I know, I know, and that means there is now a considerable pool of Roman citizens in every Latin Rights town an ever-growing pool, at that! Not to mention that the law provides Rome with new citizens of exactly the right type men of property and great local importance men who can be trusted to vote the right way in Rome," jeered Marius. Up went Rutilius Rufus's brows. "And what's wrong with that?" he asked. "You know, Publius Rutilius, open-minded and progressive though you are in many ways, at heart you're as stuffy a Roman nobleman as Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus!" snapped Marius, still hanging on to his temper. "Why can't you see that Rome and Italy belong together in an equal union?" "Because they don't," said Rutilius Rufus, his own sense of placid well-being beginning to fray. "Really, Gaius Marius! How can you sit here inside the walls of Rome advocating political equality between Romans of Rome and Italians? Rome is not Italy! Rome didn't stumble by accident into first place in the world, nor did she do it on Italian troops! Rome is different." "Rome is superior, you mean," said Marius. "Yes!" Rutilius Rufus seemed to swell. "Rome is Rome. Rome is superior." "Hasn't it ever occurred to you, Publius Rutilius, that if Rome admitted the whole of Italy even Italian Gaul of the Padus too! into its hegemony, Rome would be enhanced?" Marius asked. "Rubbish! Rome would cease to be Roman," said Rutilius. "And therefore, you imply, Rome would be less." "Of course." "But the present situation is farcical," Marius persevered. "Italy is a checkerboard! Regions with the full citizenship, regions with the Latin Rights, regions with mere Allied status, all jumbled up together. Places like Alba Fucentia and Aesernia holding the Latin Rights completely surrounded by the Italians of the Marsi and the Samnites, citizen colonies implanted in the midst of the Gauls along the Padus how can there be any real feeling of unity, of oneness with Rome?" "Seeding Roman and Latin colonies through the Italian nations keeps them in harness to us," said Rutilius Rufus. "Those with the full citizenship or the Latin Rights won't betray us. It wouldn't pay them to betray us, considering the alternative." "I think you mean war with Rome," said Marius. "Well, I wouldn't go so far as to say that," Rutilius Rufus said. "More that it would entail a loss of privilege the Roman and Latin communities would find insupportable. Not to mention a loss of social worth and standing." "Dignitas is all," said Marius. "Precisely." "So you believe the influential men of these Roman and Latin communities would carry the day against the thought of alliance with the Italian nations against Rome?" Rutilius Rufus looked shocked. "Gaius Marius, why are you taking this position? You're no Gaius Gracchus, and you are certainly no reformer!" Marius got to his feet, paced up and down in front of the bench several times, then swung to direct those fierce eyes beneath their even fiercer brows upon the much smaller Rutilius, huddled in a distinctly defensive pose. "You're right, Publius Rutilius, I'm no reformer, and to couple my name with that of Gaius Gracchus is laughable. But I am a practical man, and I have, I flatter myself, more than my fair share of intelligence. Besides which, I am not a Roman of the Romans as everyone who is a Roman of the Romans is at great pains to point out to me. Well, it may be that my bucolic origins endow me with a kind of detachment no Roman of the Romans can ever own. And I see trouble in our checkerboard Italy. I do, Publius Rutilius, I do! I listened to what the Italian Allies had to say a few days ago, and I smelled a change in the wind. For Rome's sake, I hope our consuls in the next few years are wiser in their use of Italian troops than the consuls of the previous decade." "So do I, if not for quite the same reasons," said Rutilius Rufus. "Poor generalship is criminal, especially when it ends in wasting the lives of soldiers, Roman or Italian." He looked up at the looming Marius irritably. "Do sit down, I beg you! I'm getting a pain in the neck." "You are a pain in the neck," said Marius, but sat down obediently, stretching his legs out. "You're gathering clients among the Italians," said Rutilius Rufus. "True." Marius studied his senator's ring, made of gold rather than of iron, for only the oldest senatorial families kept up the tradition of an iron ring. "However, I'm not alone in that activity, Publius Rutilius. Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus has enlisted whole towns as his clients, mainly by securing remissions of their taxes." "Or even securing removal of their taxes, I note." "Indeed. Nor is Marcus Aemilius Scaurus above client gathering among the Italians of the north," said Marius. "Yes, but admit he's less feral than Gnaeus Domitius," Rutilius Rufus objected; he was a Scaurus partisan. "At least he does good works for his client towns drains a swamp, or erects a new meeting-house." "I concede the point. But you mustn't forget the Caecilius Metelluses in Etruria. They're very busy." Rutilius Rufus sighed a long-suffering sigh. "Gaius Marius, I wish I knew exactly what you're taking such an inordinately long time to say!" "I'm not sure myself," said Marius. "Only that I sense a groundswell among the Famous Families, a new awareness of the importance of the Italian Allies. I don't think they're conscious of this importance in any way spelling danger to Rome, only acting on some instinct they don't understand. They smell something in the wind?" "You certainly smell something in the wind," said Rutilius Rufus. "Well, you're a remarkably shrewd man, Gaius Marius. And anger you though I may have done, I have also taken due note of what you've said. On the surface of it, a client isn't much of a creature. His patron can help him far more than he can help his patron. Until an election, or a threatened disaster. Perhaps he can assist only by refusing to support anyone acting against the interests of his patron. Instincts are significant, I agree with you. They're like beacons: they light up whole fields of hidden facts, often long before logic can. So maybe you're right about the groundswell. And maybe to enlist all the Italian Allies as clients in the service of some great Roman family is one way of dealing with this danger you insist is looming. I don't honestly know." "Nor do I," said Marius. "But I'm gathering clients." "And gathering wool," said Rutilius Rufus, smiling. "We started out, as I remember, to discuss my nephew Drusus." Marius folded his legs beneath his knees and pushed himself to his feet so quickly the action startled Rutilius Rufus, who had resumed his shut-eyed repose. "That we did! Come, Publius Rutilius, we may not be too late for me to show you an example of the new feeling about the Italian Allies among the Famous Families!" Rutilius got up. "I'm coming, I'm coming! But where?" "To the Forum, of course," said Marius, setting out down the slope of the temple precinct toward the street. As they walked, Marius spoke. "There's a trial in progress, and if we're lucky we'll arrive before it ends." "I'm surprised you noticed," said Rutilius Rufus dryly; Marius was not usually prone to pay attention to Forum trials. "I'm surprised you haven't been attending it every day," Marius countered. "After all, it's the debut of your nephew Drusus as an advocate." "No!" said Rutilius Rufus. "He made his debut months ago, when he prosecuted the chief tribune of the Treasury for recovery of certain funds which had mysteriously gone missing." "Oh." Marius shrugged, speeded up his pace. "Then that accounts for what I thought was your delinquency. However, Publius Rutilius, you really ought to follow young Drusus's career more closely. If you had, my remarks about the Italian Allies would have made more sense to you." "Enlighten me," said Rutilius Rufus, beginning to labor just a little; Marius always forgot his legs were longer. "I noticed because I heard someone speaking the most beautiful Latin in an equally beautiful voice. A new orator, I thought, and stopped to see who it was. Your young nephew Drusus, no less! Though I didn't know who he was until I asked, and I'm still embarrassed that I didn't associate the name with your family." "Who's he prosecuting this time?" asked Rutilius Rufus. "That's the interesting thing, he's not prosecuting," said Marius. "He's defending, and before the foreign praetor, if you please! It's an important case; there's a jury." "Murder of a Roman citizen?" "No. Bankruptcy." "That's unusual," panted Rutilius Rufus. "I gather it's some sort of example," said Marius, not slowing down: "The plaintiff is the banker Gaius Oppius, the defendant a Marsic businessman from Marruvium called Lucius Fraucus. According to my informant a real professional court-watcher Oppius is tired of bad debts among his Italian accounts, and decided it was time he made an example of an Italian here in Rome. His object is to frighten the rest of Italy into keeping up what I suspect are exorbitant interest payments." "Interest," huffed Rutilius Rufus, "is set at ten percent." "If you're a Roman," said Marius, "and preferably a Roman of the upper economic classes." "Keep on going, Gaius Marius, and you'll wind up like the Brothers Gracchi very dead." "Rubbish!" "I would much rather go home," said Rutilius Rufus. "You're getting soft," said Marius, glancing down at his trotting companion. "A good campaign would do wonders for your wind, Publius Rutilius." "A good rest would do wonders for my wind." Rutilius Rufus slowed down. "I really don't see why we're doing this." "For one thing, because when I left the Forum your nephew still had a good two and a half hours left in which to sum up his case," said Marius. "It's one of the experimental trials you know, to do with changing trial procedures. So the witnesses were heard first, then the Prosecution was allowed two hours to sum up, and the Defense three hours, after which the foreign praetor will ask the jury for its verdict." "There's nothing wrong with the old way," said Rutilius. "Oh, I don't know, I thought the new way made the whole process more interesting for the spectators," said Marius. They were descending the slope of the Clivus Sacer, the lower Forum Romanum just ahead, and the figures in the foreign praetor's court had not changed their distribution while Marius had been away. "Good, we're in time for the peroration," said Marius. Marcus Livius Drusus was still speaking, and his audience was still listening in rapt silence. Obviously well under twenty years of age, the shaveling advocate was of average height and stocky physique, black-haired and swarthy of complexion: not an advocate who would transfix by sheer physical presence, though his face was pleasant enough. "Isn't he amazing?" asked Marius of Rutilius in a whisper. "He's got the knack of making you think he's speaking to you personally, not to anyone else." He had. Even at the distance for Marius and Rutilius Rufus stood at the back of the large crowd his very dark eyes seemed to look deeply into their eyes, and into their eyes alone. "Nowhere does it say that the fact a man is a Roman automatically puts him in the right," the young man was saying. "I do not speak for Lucius Fraucus, the accused I speak for Rome! I speak for honor! I speak for integrity! I speak for justice! Not the kind of lip-service justice which interprets a law in its most literal sense, but the kind of justice which interprets a law in its most logical sense. The law should not be a huge and weighty slab which falls upon a man and squashes him into a uniform shape, for men are not uniform. The law should be a gentle sheet which falls upon a man and shows his unique shape beneath its blanketing sameness. We must always remember that we, the citizens of Rome, stand as an example to the rest of the world, especially in our laws and our courts of law. Has such sophistication ever been seen elsewhere? Such drafting? Such intelligence? Such care? Such wisdom? Do not even the Greeks of Athens admit it? Do not the Alexandrians? Do not the Pergamites?" His rhetorical body language was superb, even with the severe disadvantages of his height and physique, neither lending itself to the toga; to wear the toga superlatively, a man had to be tall, wide of shoulder, and narrow of hip, and move with consummate grace. Marcus Livius Drusus did not qualify on any point. And yet he worked wonders with his body, from the smallest wiggle of a finger to the largest sweep of his whole right arm. The movements of his head, the expressions on his face, the changes in his walk everything so good! "Lucius Fraucus, an Italian from Marruvium," he went on, "is the ultimate victim, not the perpetrator. No one including Lucius Fraucus! disputes the fact that this very large sum of money advanced by Gaius Oppius is missing. Nor is it disputed that this very large sum of money must be restored to Gaius Oppius, together with the interest the loan has incurred. One way or another, it will be repaid. If necessary, Lucius Fraucus is willing to sell his houses, his lands, his investments, his slaves, his furniture all he possesses! More than enough to constitute restitution!" He walked up to the front row of the jury and glared at the men in its middle ranks. "You have heard the witnesses. You have heard my learned colleague the Prosecutor. Lucius Fraucus was the borrower. But he was not the thief. Therefore, say I, Lucius Fraucus is the real victim of this fraud, not Gaius Oppius, his banker. If you condemn Lucius Fraucus, conscript members of the jury, you subject him to the full penalty of the law as it applies to a man who is not a citizen of our great city, nor a holder of the Latin Rights. All of Lucius Fraucus's property will be put up for forced sale, and you know what that means. It will fetch nowhere near its actual value, and indeed might not even fetch enough to make restitution of the full sum." This last was said with a most speaking glance toward the sidelines, where the banker Gaius Oppius sat on a folding chair, attended by a retinue of clerks and accountants. "Very well! Nowhere near its actual value! After which, conscript members of the jury, Lucius Fraucus will be sold into debt-bondage until he has made up the difference between the sum demanded and the sum obtained from the forced sale of all his property. Now, a poor judge of character in choosing his senior employees Lucius Fraucus may be, but in the pursuit of his business, Lucius Fraucus is a remarkably shrewd and highly successful man. Yet how can he ever make good his debt if, propertyless and disgraced, he is handed over into bondage? Will he even be of use to Gaius Oppius as a clerk?'' The young man was now concentrating every scrap of his vigor and will upon the Roman banker, a mild-looking man in his fifties, who seemed entranced by what the young man said. "For a man who is not a Roman citizen, conviction upon a criminal charge leads to one thing before all others. He must be flogged. Not chastised by the rods, as a Roman citizen is a little sore, perhaps, but chiefly injured in his dignity. No! He must be flogged! Laid about with the barbed whip until nothing of skin and muscle is left, and he is maimed for life, scarred worse than any mine slave." The hairs stood up on the back of Marius's neck; for if the young man was not looking straight at him one of the biggest mine owners in Rome then his eyes were playing tricks. Yet how could young Drusus have found a latecomer at the very back of such a huge crowd? "We are Romans!" the young man cried. "Italy and its citizens are under our protection. Do we show ourselves to be mine owners of men who look to us as an example? Do we condemn an innocent man on a technicality, simply because his is the signature on the document of loan? Do we ignore the fact that he is willing to make complete restitution? Do we, in effect, accord him less justice than we would a citizen of Rome? Do we flog a man who ought rather to wear a dunce's cap upon his head for his foolishness in trusting a thief? Do we create a widow of a wife? Do we create orphans of children with a loving father? Surely not, conscript members of the jury! For we are Romans. We are a better brand of men!" With a swirl of white wool the speaker turned and quit the vicinity of the banker, thus establishing an instant in which all eyes left the banker to follow, dazzled; all eyes, that is, save those of several jurymen in the front row, looking no different from the rest of the fifty-one members of the panel. And the eyes of Gaius Marius and Publius Rutilius Rufus. One juror gazed woodenly at Oppius, drawing his forefinger across the base of his throat as if it itched. The response followed instantly: the faintest shake of the great banker's head. Gaius Marius began to smile. "Thank you, praetor peregrinus," said the young man as he bowed to the foreign praetor, suddenly seeming stiff and shy, no longer possessed by whatever invaded him when he orated. "Thank you, Marcus Livius," said the foreign praetor, and directed his glance toward the jury. "Citizens of Rome, please inscribe your tablets and permit the court your verdict." There was a general movement throughout the court; the jurors all produced small squares of pale clay and pencils of charcoal. But they didn't write anything, instead sat looking at the backs of the heads in the middle of their front row. The man who had ghosted a question at Oppius the banker took up his pencil and drew a letter upon his clay tablet, then yawned mightily, his arms stretched above his head, the tablet still in his left hand, the multiple folds of his toga falling back toward his left shoulder as the arm straightened in the air. The rest of the jurors then scribbled busily, and handed in their tablets to the lictors who were going among them. The foreign praetor did the counting himself; everyone waited, scarcely breathing, for the verdict. Glancing at each tablet, he tossed it into one of two baskets on the desk in front of him, most into one, a few into the other. When all fifty-one had been dealt with, he looked up. "ABSOLVO." he said. "Forty-three for, eight against. Lucius Fraucus of Marruvium, citizen of the Marsic nation of our Italian Allies, you are discharged by this court, but only on condition that you make full restitution as promised. I leave you to arrange matters with Gaius Oppius, your creditor, before this day is over." And that was that. Marius and Rutilius Rufus waited for the crowds to finish congratulating the young Marcus Livius Drusus. Finally only the friends of Drusus were left clustered about him, very excited. But when the tall man with the fierce eyebrows and the little man everyone knew to be Drusus's uncle bore down on the group, everyone melted away bashfully. "Congratulations, Marcus Livius," said Marius, extending his hand. "I thank you, Gaius Marius." "Well done," said Rutilius Rufus. They turned in the direction of the Velia end of the Forum and began to walk. Rutilius Rufus left the conversation to Marius and Drusus, pleased to see his young nephew was maturing so magnificently as an advocate, but well aware of the shortcomings beneath that stolidly stocky exterior. Young Drusus, thought his Uncle Publius, was a rather humorless pup, brilliant but oddly blighted, who would never have that lightness of being which could discern the shape of coming grotesqueries, and so as his life went on would fail to sidestep much of life's pain. Earnest. Dogged. Ambitious. Incapable of letting go once his teeth were fixed in a problem. Yes. But, for all that, Uncle Publius told himself, young Drusus was an honorable pup. "It would have been a very bad thing for Rome if your Italian client had been convicted," Marius was saying. "Very bad indeed. Fraucus is one of the most important men in Marruvium, and an elder of his Marsic nation. Of course he won't be nearly so important once he's paid back the money he owes Gaius Oppius, but he'll make more," said Drusus. They had reached the Velia when "Do you ascend the Palatine?" young Drusus asked, pausing in front of the temple of Jupiter Stator. "Certainly not," said Publius Rutilius Rufus, emerging from his thoughts. "Gaius Marius is coming home to dine with me, nephew." Young Drusus bowed to his seniors solemnly, then began to ascend the slope of the Clivus Palatinus; from behind Marius and Rutilius Rufus emerged the unprepossessing form of Quintus Servilius Caepio Junior, young Drusus's best friend, running to catch up with young Drusus, who must have heard him, but didn't wait. "That's a friendship I don't like," said Rutilius Rufus, standing watching the two young men dwindle in size. "Oh?" "They're impeccably noble and terrifically rich, the Servilius Caepios, but as short on brains as they're long on hauteur, so it's not a friendship between equals," said Rutilius Rufus. "My nephew seems to prefer the peculiar style of deference and sycophancy young Caepio Junior offers to a more stimulating not to mention deflating! kind of fellowship with others among his peers. A pity. For I fear, Gaius Marius, that Caepio Junior's devotion will give young Drusus a false impression of his ability to lead men." "In battle?" Rutilius Rufus stopped in his tracks. "Gaius Marius, there are other activities than war, and other institutions than armies! No, I was referring to leadership in the Forum." Later in that same week Marius came again to call upon his friend Rutilius Rufus, and found him distractedly packing. "Panaetius is dying," explained Rutilius, blinking back his tears. "Oh, that's too bad!" said Marius. "Where is he? Will you reach him in time?" "I hope so. He's in Tarsus, and asking for me. Fancy his asking for me, out of all the Romans he taught!" Marius's glance was soft. "And why shouldn't he? After all, you were his best pupil." "No, no," said the little man, seeming abstracted. "I'll go home," said Marius. "Nonsense," said Rutilius Rufus, leading the way to his study, a hideously untidy room which seemed to be overfilled with desks and tables piled high with books, most of them at least partially unrolled, some anchored at one end and cascading onto the floor in a welter of precious Egyptian paper. "Garden," said Marius firmly, perceiving no place to roost amid the chaos, but well aware that Rutilius Rufus could put his hand on any book he owned in scant moments, no matter how buried it appeared to the uninitiated eye. "What are you writing?'' he asked, spotting a long screed of Fannius-treated paper on a table, already half-covered with Rutilius Rufus's unmistakable hand, as neat and easy to read as his room was disorganized. "Something I'll have to consult you about," said Rutilius, leading the way outside. "A manual of military information. After our talk about the inept generals Rome has been fielding of late years, I thought it was time someone competent produced a helpful treatise. So far it's been all logistics and base planning, but now I move on to tactics and strategy, where you shine far brighter than I do. So I'm going to have to milk your brains." "Consider them milked." Marius sat down on a wooden bench in the tiny, sunless, rather neglected garden, on the weedy side and with a fountain that didn't work. "Have you had a visit from Metellus Piggle-wiggle?" he asked. "As a matter of fact, I have, earlier today," said Rutilius, coming to rest on a bench opposite Marius's. "He came to see me this morning too." "Amazing how little he's changed, our Quintus Caecilius Metellus Piggle-wiggle," laughed Rutilius Rufus. "If there'd been a pigsty handy, or my fountain was worthy of its name, I think I might have tossed him in all over again.'' "I know how you feel, but I don't think that's a good idea," said Marius. "What did he have to say to you?" "He's going to stand for consul." "If we ever have any elections, that is! What on earth possessed those two fools to try to stand a second time as tribunes of the plebs when even the Gracchi came to grief?" "It shouldn't delay the Centuriate elections or the People's elections, for that matter," said Rutilius Rufus. "Of course it will! Our two would-be second-termers will cause their colleagues to veto all elections," said Marius. "You know what tribunes of the plebs are like once they get the bit between their teeth, no one can stop them." Rutilius shook with laughter. "I should think I do know what tribunes of the plebs are like! I was one of the worst. And so were you, Gaius Marius." "Well, yes___" "There'll be elections, never fear," said Rutilius Rufus comfortably. "My guess is that the tribunes of the plebs will go to the polls four days before the Ides of December, and all the others will follow just after the Ides." "And Metellus Piggle-wiggle will be consul," said Marius. Rutilius Rufus leaned forward, folding his hands together. "He knows something." "You are not wrong, old friend. He definitely knows something we don't. Any guesses?" "Jugurtha. He's planning a war against Jugurtha." "That's what I think too," said Marius. "Only is he going to start it, or is Spurius Albinus going to?" "I wouldn't have said Spurius Albinus had the intestinal fortitude. But time will tell," Rutilius said tranquilly. "He offered me a job as senior legate with his army." "He offered me the same position." They looked at each other and grinned. "Then we'd better make it our business to find out what's going on," said Marius, getting to his feet. "Spurius Albinus is supposed to arrive here any day to hold the elections, no one having told him there aren't going to be any elections for some time to come." "He'd have left Africa Province before the news could have reached him, anyway," said Rutilius Rufus, bypassing the study. "Are you going to accept Piggle-wiggle's offer?" "I will, if you will, Gaius Marius." "Good!" Rutilius opened the front door himself. "And how is Julia? I won't have a chance to see her." Marius beamed. "Wonderful beautiful glorious!" "You silly old geezer," said Rutilius, and pushed Marius into the street. "Keep your ear to the ground while I'm away, and write to me if you hear any martial stirrings." "I will. Have a good trip." "In autumn? It'll be a charnel house on board ship and I might drown." "Not you," said Marius, grinning. "Father Neptune wouldn't have you, he wouldn't be game to spoil Piggle-wiggle's plans."
Julia was pregnant, and very pleased to be so; the only stress she suffered was Marius's henlike concern for her. "Truly, Gaius Marius, I am perfectly well," she said for the thousandth time; it was now November, and the baby was due about March of the next year, so she was beginning to look pregnant. However, she had bloomed the traditional prospective mother's bloom, untroubled by sickness or swelling. "You're sure?" her husband asked anxiously. "Go away, do!" she said, but gently, and smilingly. Reassured, the fatuous husband left her with her servants in her workroom, and went to his study. It was the one place in the huge house where Julia's presence wasn't felt, the one place where he could forget her. Not that he tried to forget her; rather, there were times when he needed to think of other things. Like what was happening in Africa. Sitting at his desk, he drew paper forward and began to write in his bald unvarnished prose to Publius Rutilius Rufus, safely arrived in Tarsus after a very speedy voyage.
I am attending every meeting of both Senate and Plebs, and it finally looks as if there will be elections in the near future. About time. As you said, four days before the Ides of December. Publius Licinius Lucullus and Lucius Annius are beginning to collapse; I don't think they'll succeed in standing for second terms as tribunes of the plebs. In fact, the general impression now is that they plotted to have everyone think it only in order to bring their names more forcibly before the eyes of the electors. They're both consul material, but neither managed to make a splash while tribune of the plebs not surprising, considering they're not reformers. So what better way to make a splash than to inconvenience all of voting Rome? I must be turning into a Cynic. Is that possible for an Italian hayseed with no Greek? As you know, things have been very quiet in Africa, though our intelligence sources report that Jugurtha is indeed recruiting and training a very large army and in Roman style! However, things were far from quiet when Spurius Albinus came home well over a month ago to hold the elections. He gave his report to the Senate, this including the fact that he had kept his own army down to three legions, one made up of local auxiliaries, one of Roman troops already stationed in Africa, and one he had brought with him last spring from Italy. They are yet to be blooded. Spurius Albinus is not martially inclined, it would seem. I cannot say the same for Piggle-wiggle. But what riled our venerable colleagues of the Senate was the news that Spurius Albinus had seen fit to appoint his little brother, Aulus Albinus, governor of Africa Province and commander of the African army in his absence! Imagine! I suppose if Aulus Albinus had been his quaestor it might have passed scrutiny in the Senate, but as I know you know, but I'm telling you again anyway quaestor wasn't grand enough for Aulus Albinus, so he was put on his big brother's staff as a senior legate. Without the approval of the Senate! So there sits our Roman province of Africa, being governed in the governor's absence by a thirty-year-old hothead owning neither experience nor superior intelligence. Marcus Scaurus was spitting with rage, and served the consul a diatribe he won't forget in a hurry, I can tell you. But it's done. We can but hope Governor Aulus Albinus conducts himself properly. Scaurus doubts it. And so do I, Publius Rutilius.
That letter went off to Publius Rutilius Rufus before the elections were held; Marius had intended it to be his last, hoping that the New Year would see Rutilius back in Rome. Then came a letter from Rutilius informing him that Panaetius was still alive, and so rejuvenated at sight of his old pupil that he seemed likely to live for several months longer than the state of his malignancy had at first suggested. "Expect me when you see me, some time in the spring just before Piggle-wiggle embarks for Africa," Rutilius's letter said. So Marius sat down again as the old year dwindled away, and wrote again to Tarsus.
Clearly you had no doubt Piggle-wiggle would be elected consul, and you were correct. However, the People and the Plebs got their share of the elections over before the Centuries polled, neither body producing any surprises. So the quaestors entered office on the fifth day of December and the new tribunes of the plebs on the tenth day the only interesting-looking new tribune of the plebs is Gaius Mamilius Limetanus. Oh, and three of the new quaestors are promising our famous young orators and forensic stars Lucius Licinius Crassus and his best friend, Quintus Mucius Scaevola, are two of them, but the third I find more interesting still: a very brash and abrasive fellow of a recent plebeian family, Gaius Servilius Glaucia, whom I'm sure you'll remember from his court days it's being said these days that he's the best legal draftsman Rome has ever produced. I don't like him. Piggle-wiggle was returned first in the Centuriate polls, so will be the senior consul for next year. But Marcus Junius Silanus was not far behind him. The voting was conservative all the way, as a matter of fact. No New Men among the praetors. Instead, the six included two patricians and a patrician adopted into a plebeian family none other than Quintus Lutatius Catulus Caesar. As far as the Senate is concerned, it was therefore an excellent vote and promises well for the New Year. And then, my dear Publius Rutilius, the thunderbolt fell. It seems Aulus Albinus was tempted by rumors that a huge hoard of treasure was stored in the Numidian town of Suthul. So he waited just long enough to make sure his brother the consul was irrevocably on his way back to Rome to hold the elections, and then invaded Numidia! At the head of three paltry and inexperienced legions, if you please! His siege of Suthul was unsuccessful, of course the townspeople just shut their gates and laughed at him from the top of their walls. But instead of admitting that he wasn't capable of waging a little siege, let alone a whole campaign, what did Aulus Albinus do? Return to the Roman province? I hear you ask, eminently sensible man that you are. Well, that may have been the choice you would have made were you Aulus Albinus, but it wasn't Aulus Albinus's choice. He packed up his siege and marched onward into western Numidia! At the head of his three paltry and inexperienced legions. Jugurtha attacked him in the middle of the night somewhere near the town of Calama, and defeated Aulus Albinus so badly that our consul's little brother surrendered unconditionally. And Jugurtha forced every Roman and auxiliary from Aulus Albinus on down to pass beneath the yoke. After which, Jugurtha extracted Aulus Albinus's signature upon a treaty giving himself everything he hadn't been able to get from the Senate! We got the news of it in Rome not from Aulus Albinus but from Jugurtha, who sent the Senate a copy of the treaty with a covering letter complaining sharply about Roman treachery in invading a peacefully intentioned country that had not lifted so much as a warlike finger against Rome. When I say Jugurtha wrote to the Senate, I actually mean that, he had the gall to write to his oldest and best enemy, Marcus Aemilius Scaurus, in Scaurus's role as Princeps Senatus. A calculated insult to the consuls, of course, to choose to address his correspondence to the Leader of the House. Oh, was Scaurus angry! He summoned a meeting of the Senate immediately, and compelled Spurius Albinus to divulge much that had been artfully concealed, including the fact that Spurius was not quite as ignorant of his little brother's plans as he at first protested. The House was stunned. Then it turned nasty, and the Albinus faction promptly changed sides, leaving Spurius on his own to admit that he had heard the news from Aulus in a letter he received several days earlier. From Spurius we learned that Jugurtha had ordered Aulus back to Roman Africa and forbidden Aulus to put a toenail across the Numidian border. So there waits greedy young Aulus Albinus, petitioning his brother for a directive as to what to do.
Marius sighed, flexed his fingers; what was a joy for Rutilius Rufus was a chore for him, no letter writer. "Get on with it, Gaius Marius," he said to himself. And got on with it.
Naturally what hurt the most was Jugurtha's forcing the Roman army to pass under the yoke. It happens rarely, but it never fails to stir up the whole city, from highest to lowest this being my first experience with it, I found myself as stirred, as humiliated, as devastated as the most Roman Roman. I daresay it would have been equally painful for you, so I am glad you weren't here to witness the scenes, people in dark clothes weeping and tearing their hair, many of the knights without the narrow stripe on their tunics, senators wearing a narrow stripe instead of the wide one, the whole of Enemy Territory outside the temple of Bellona piled high with offerings to teach Jugurtha a lesson. Fortune has dropped a beautiful campaign into Piggle-wiggle's lap for next year, and you and I will have a field day provided, that is, that we can learn to get along with Piggle-wiggle as our commanding officer! The new tribune of the plebs Gaius Mamilius is in full cry after Postumius Albinus blood he wants brother Aulus Albinus executed for treason, and brother Spurius Albinus tried for treason as well, if only for being stupid enough to appoint Aulus governor in his absence. In fact, Mamilius is calling for the institution of a special court, and wants to try every Roman who has ever had doubtful dealings with Jugurtha, from the time of Lucius Opimius on, if you please. Such is the mood of the Conscript Fathers of the Senate that he is likely to get his way. It's the passing under the yoke. Everyone agrees the army and its commander should have died where they fought sooner than submit their country to abject humiliation. In that I disagree, of course, as I think would you. An army is only as good as its commander, no matter how great its potential. The Senate drafted and dispatched a stiff letter to Jugurtha, informing him that Rome could not and would not recognize a treaty extracted from a man who had no imperium and therefore no authority from the Senate and People of Rome to lead an army, govern a province, or make a treaty. And, last but not least, Publius Rutilius, Gaius Mamilius did obtain a mandate from the Plebeian Assembly to set up a special court in which all those who have had or are suspected to have had dealings with Jugurtha are to be tried for treason. This is a postscript, written on the very last day of the old year. The Senate for once heartily endorsed the plebeian legislation, and Scaurus is busy compiling a list of the men who will face trial. Gleefully aided by Gaius Memmius, vindicated at last. What's more, in this special Mamilian court the chances of securing treason convictions are much greater than if it were done the traditional way, in trials conducted by the Centuriate Assembly. So far the names of Lucius Opimius, Lucius Calpurnius Bestia, Gaius Porcius Cato, Gaius Sulpicius Galba, Spurius Postumius Albinus, and his brother have come up for discussion. Blood tells, however. Spurius Albinus has assembled a formidable array of advocates to argue in the Senate that whatever his little brother, Aulus, may or may not have done, he cannot legally stand trial because he never legally possessed imperium. From that you gather that Spurius Albinus is going to assume Aulus's share of the guilt, and will certainly be convicted. I find it odd that if things go as I confidently expect they will, the prime mover, Aulus Albinus, will emerge from his passage beneath the yoke with his career unimpaired! Oh, and Scaurus is to be one of the three presidents of the Mamilian Commission, as they are calling this new court. He accepted with alacrity. And that is that for the old year, Publius Rutilius. A momentous year, all told. After hope was gone, my head has popped above the surface of Rome's political waters, buoyed up by my marriage to Julia. Metellus Piggle-wiggle is actually courting me, and men who never used to notice I was standing there are speaking to me as to an equal. Look after yourself on the voyage home, and make it soon.
THE SECOND YEAR (109 B.C.) IN THE CONSULSHIP OF QUINTUS CAECILIUS METELLUS AND MARCUS JUNIUS SILANUS
Panaetius died in Tarsus halfway through February, which left Publius Rutilius Rufus little time to get home before the start of the campaigning season; originally he had planned to make the bulk of his journey overland, but urgency compelled him now to take his chances upon the sea. "And I've been downright lucky," he said to Gaius Marius the day after he arrived in Rome, just before the Ides of March. "For once the winds blew in the direction I wanted." Marius grinned. "I told you, Publius Rutilius, even Father Neptune wouldn't have the courage to spoil Piggle-wiggle's plans! Actually you've been lucky in more ways than that if you'd been in Rome, you'd have had the unenviable task of going among the Italian Allies to persuade them to hand over troops." "Which is what you've been doing, I take it?" "Since early January, when the lots gave Metellus charge of the African war against Jugurtha. Oh, it wasn't difficult to recruit, not with all Italy burning to avenge the insult of passing beneath the yoke. But men of the right kind are getting very thin on the ground," said Marius. "Then we had better hope that the future doesn't hold any more military disasters for Rome," said Rutilius Rufus. "Indeed we had." "How has-Piggle-wiggle behaved toward you?" "Quite civilly, all considered," said Marius. "He came to see me the day after he was inaugurated, and at least did me the courtesy of being blunt about his motives. I asked him why he wanted me and you, for that matter when we had made such a fool of him in the old days at Numantia. And he said he didn't care a fig for Numantia. What concerned him was winning this present war in Africa, and he couldn't think of a better way to do that than to avail himself of the services of the two men in all the world best equipped to understand Jugurtha's strategy." "It's a shrewd idea," Rutilius Rufus said. "As the commander, he'll reap the glory. What matters who wins the war for him, when it's he who'll ride in the triumphal chariot and gather in all the accolades? The Senate won't offer you or me the new last name of Numidicus; they'll offer it to him." "Well, he needs it more than we do. Metellus Piggle-wiggle is a Caecilius, Publius Rutilius! Which means his head rules his heart, especially where his skin is concerned." "Oh, very aptly put!" said Rutilius Rufus appreciatively. "He's already lobbying to have the Senate extend his command in Africa into next year," Marius said. "Which just goes to show that he got sufficient of Jugurtha's measure all those years ago to realize beating Numidia into submission won't be easy. How many legions is he taking?" "Four. Two Roman, two Italian." "Plus the troops already stationed in Africa say, two more legions. Yes, we ought to do it, Gaius Marius." "I agree." Marius got up from behind his desk and went to pour wine. "What's this I hear about Gnaeus Cornelius Scipio?" asked Rutilius Rufus, accepting the goblet Marius held out to him just in time, for Marius shouted with laughter and spilled his own drink. "Oh, Publius Rutilius, it was wonderful! Honestly, I never cease to be amazed at the antics of the old Roman nobles. There was Scipio, respectably elected a praetor, and awarded the governorship of Further Spain when the lots were drawn for the praetor's provinces. But what does he do? He gets up in the Senate and solemnly declines the honor of governing Further Spain! 'Why?' asks Scaurus, astonished he supervised the drawing of the lots. 'Because,' says Scipio with an honesty I found quite endearing, 'I would rape the place.' It brought the House down cheers, howls of mirth, feet stamping, hands clapping. And when the noise died down at last, Scaurus simply said, 'I agree, Gnaeus Cornelius, you would rape the place.' So now they're sending Quintus Servilius Caepio to govern Further Spain in Scipio's stead." "He'll rape the place too," said Rutilius Rufus, smiling. "Of course, of course! Everyone knew that, including Scaurus. But Caepio at least has the grace to pretend he won't, so Rome can turn a blind eye Spainward and life can go on in the usual way," said Marius, back behind his desk. "I love this place, Publius Rutilius, I really do." "I'm glad Silanus is being kept at home." "Well, luckily someone has to govern Rome! What an escape! The Senate positively scrambled to prorogue Minucius Rufus's governorship of Macedonia, I can assure you. And that niche being filled, nothing was left for Silanus except Rome, where things are more or less self-perpetuating. Silanus at the head of an army is a prospect to make Mars himself blanch." "Absolutely!" said Rutilius Rufus fervently. "It's a good year so far, actually," Marius said. "Not only was Spain saved from the tender mercies of Scipio, and Macedonia from the tender mercies of Silanus, but Rome herself is considerably the lighter of villains, if I may be excused calling some of our consulars villains." "The Mamilian Commission, you mean?" "Precisely. Bestia, Galba, Opimius, Gaius Cato, and Spurius Albinus have all been condemned, and there are more trials scheduled, though no surprises. Gaius Memmius has been most assiduous in assisting Mamilius in gathering evidence of collusion with Jugurtha, and Scaurus is a ruthless president of the court. Though he did speak in defense of Bestia then turned round and voted to condemn him." Rutilius Rufus smiled. "A man has to be flexible," he said. "Scaurus had to acquit himself of his duty toward a fellow consular by speaking up for him, but it wouldn't swerve him from his duty toward the court. Not Scaurus." "No, not Scaurus!" "And where have the condemned gone?" Rutilius Rufus asked. "Quite a few seem to be choosing Massilia as their place of exile these days, though Lucius Opimius went to western Macedonia." "But Aulus Albinus survived." "Yes. Spurius Albinus took all the blame, and the House voted to permit him," said Marius, and sighed. "It was a nice legal point."
* * *
Julia went into labor on the Ides of March, and when the midwives informed Marius that it was not going to be an easy birth, he summoned Julia's parents immediately. "Our blood is too old and too thin," said Caesar fretfully to Marius as they sat together in Marius's study, husband and father bound together by a mutual love and fear. "My blood isn't," said Marius. "But that can't help her! It may help her daughter if she has one, and we must be thankful for that. I had hoped my marrying Marcia would infuse a little plebeian strength into my line but Marcia is still too noble, it seems. Her mother was patrician, a Sulpicia. I know there are those who argue that the blood must be kept pure, but I have noticed time and time again that the girls of ancient family have a tendency to bleed in childbirth. Why else is the death rate among the girls of ancient family so much higher than it is among other girls?'' And Caesar ran his hands through his silver-gilt hair. Marius couldn't sit any longer; he got to his feet and began to pace up and down. "Well, she does have the best attention money can buy," he said, nodding in the direction of the confinement room, from which no noises of distress had yet begun to emanate. "They couldn't save Clitumna's nephew last autumn," said Caesar, yielding to gloom. "Who? Your unsatisfactory next-door neighbor, you mean?" "Yes, that Clitumna. Her nephew died last September after a protracted illness. Only a young fellow, seemed healthy enough. The doctors did everything they could think of doing, but he died anyway. It's preyed on my mind since." Marius stared at his father-in-law blankly. "Why on earth should it prey on your mind?" he asked. "What possible connection is there?" Caesar chewed at his lip. "Things always happen in threes," he said cheerlessly. "The death of Clitumna's nephew was a death in close proximity to me and mine. There have to be two more deaths." "If so, then the deaths will occur in that family." "Not necessarily. There just have to be three deaths, all connected in some way. But until the second death happens, I defy a soothsayer to predict what the connection will be." Out went Marius's hands, half in exasperation, half in despair. "Gaius Julius, Gaius Julius! Try to be optimistic, I beg of you! No one has yet come to say Julia is in danger of dying, I was simply told that the birth wouldn't be easy. So I sent for you to help me blunder through this awful waiting, not to make me so downcast I can't see a trace of light!" Ashamed, Caesar made a conscious effort. "As a matter of fact, I'm glad Julia's time is here," he said more briskly. "I haven't wanted to bother her of late, but once she's over her delivery I'm hoping she will be able to spare the time to talk to Julilla." Privately Marius considered what Julilla needed was a sore bottom from an unsparing parental hand, but he managed to look interested; after all, he had never been a parent himself, and now that (all going well) he was about to become a parent, he ought to admit to himself that he might turn out to be as doting a tata as Gaius Julius Caesar. "What's the matter with Julilla?" he asked. Caesar sighed. "She's off her food. We've had some difficulty in making her eat for a long time, but during the last four months it's worsened. She's lost pounds and pounds! And now she's prone to fainting fits, drops like a stone in her tracks. The doctors can find nothing wrong with her.'' Oh, will I really get like this? Marius asked himself; there is nothing wrong with that spoiled young lady that a good dose of indifference wouldn't cure! However, he supposed she was something to talk about, so he tried to talk about her. "I gather you'd like Julia to get to the bottom of it?" "Indeed I would!" "She's probably in love with someone unsuitable," said Marius, utterly ignorant, but totally correct. "Nonsense!" said Caesar sharply. "How do you know it's nonsense?" "Because the doctors thought of that, and I made full inquiries," said Caesar, on the defensive. "Who did you ask? Her?" "Naturally!" "It might have been more practical to ask her girl." "Oh, really, Gaius Marius!" "She's not pregnant?" "Oh, really, Gaius Marius!" "Look, Father-in-law, there's no use starting to view me as an insect at this stage of things," said Marius unfeelingly. "I'm a part of the family, not an outsider. If I, with my extremely limited experience of young ladies of sixteen, can see these possibilities, so too ought you, and even more so. Get her girl into your study and wallop her until you get the truth out of her I guarantee she's in Julilla's confidence, and I guarantee she'll break down if you question her properly torture and death threats!" "Gaius Marius, I couldn't do that!" said Caesar, aghast at even the thought of such Draconian measures. "You wouldn't need to do more than cane her," said Marius patiently. "A smarting pair of buttocks and the mere mention of torture will produce everything she knows." "I couldn't do that," Caesar repeated. Marius sighed. "Have it your own way, then. But don't assume you know the truth just because you've asked Julilla." "There has always been truth between me and mine," said Caesar. Marius didn't answer, merely looked skeptical. Someone knocked at the study door. "Come!" called Marius, glad of the interruption. It was the little Greek physician from Sicily, Athenodorus. "Domine, your wife is asking to see you," he said to Marius, ' 'and I think it would do her good if you came.'' Down hurtled the contents of Marius's chest into his belly; he drew a sobbing breath, his hand going out. Caesar had jumped to his feet, and was staring at the doctor painfully. "Is she is she ?" Caesar couldn't finish. "No, no! Rest easy, domine, she's doing well," said the Greek soothingly. Gaius Marius had never been in the presence of a woman in labor, and now found himself terrified. It wasn't hard to look on those killed or maimed in battle; they were comrades of the sword, no matter which side they belonged to, and a man always knew he might but for Fortune be one of them. In Julia's case the victim was dearly beloved, someone to be shielded and protected, spared all possible pain. Yet now Julia was no less his victim than any enemy, put into her bed of pain because of him. Disturbing thoughts for Gaius Marius. However, all looked very normal when he walked into the confinement chamber. Julia was indeed lying in a bed. The childing stool the special chair on which she would be seated when she went into the final stage of her labor was decently covered up in a corner, so he didn't even notice it. To his vast relief, she didn't look either worn out or desperately ill, and the moment she saw him she smiled at him radiantly, holding out both hands. He took them and kissed them. "Are you all right?" he asked, a little foolishly. "Of course I am! It's just going to take a long time, they tell me, and there's a bit of bleeding. But nothing to be worried about at this stage." A spasm of pain crossed her face; her hands closed on his with a strength he hadn't known she possessed, and clung there for perhaps a minute before she began to relax again. "I just wanted to see you," she resumed, as if there had been no interruption. "May I see you from time to time, or will it be too distressing for you?" "I would much rather see you, my little love," he said, bending to kiss the line where brow and hair met, and a few fine, fluffy curls clustered. They were damp, his lips informed him, and her skin was damp too. Poor, sweet darling! "It will be all right, Gaius Marius," she said, letting go of his hands. "Try not to worry too much. I know everything will be all right! Is tata still with you?" "He is." Turning to leave, he encountered a fierce glare from Marcia, standing off to one side in the company of three old midwives. Oh, ye gods! Here was one who wouldn't forgive him in a hurry for doing this to her daughter! "Gaius Marius!" Julia called as he reached the door. He looked back. "Is the astrologer here?" she asked. "Not yet, but he's been sent for." She looked relieved. "Oh, good!"
* * *
Marius's son was born twenty-four hours later, in a welter of blood. He almost cost his mother's life, but her will to survive was very strong, and after the doctors packed her solid with swabs and elevated her hips the haemorrhaging slowed down, and eventually stopped. "He will be a famous man, dominus, and his life will be full of great events and great adventures," said the astrologer, expertly ignoring those unpalatable aspects the parents of new sons never wished to hear about. "Then he will live?" asked Caesar sharply. "Undoubtedly he will live, dominus." One long and rather grimy finger rested across a major Opposition, blocking it from sight. "He will hold the highest office in the land it is here in his chart for all the world to see." Another long and grimy finger pointed to a Trine. "My son will be consul," said Marius with huge satisfaction. "Assuredly," said the astrologer, then added, "But he will not be as great a man as his father, says the Quincunx." And that pleased Marius even more. Caesar poured two goblets of the best Falernian wine, unwatered, and gave one to his son-in-law, beaming with pride. "Here's to your son and my grandson, Gaius Marius," he said. "I salute you both!" Thus, when at the end of March the consul Quintus Caecilius Metellus sailed for the African province with Gaius Marius, Publius Rutilius Rufus, Sextus Julius Caesar, Gaius Julius Caesar Junior, and four promising legions, Gaius Marius could sail in the happy knowledge that his wife was out of all danger, and his son was thriving. Even his mother-in-law had deigned to speak to him again! "Have a talk to Julilla," he said to Julia just before he departed. "Your father's very worried about her." Feeling stronger and bursting with joy because her son was a magnificently large and healthy baby, Julia mourned but one thing: she was not yet well enough to accompany Marius to Campania, to have a few more days with him before he quit Italy. "I suppose you mean this ridiculous starvation business," said Julia, leaning more comfortably into Marius's embrace. "Well, I don't know any more than your father told me, but I did gather it was about that," said Marius. "You'll have to forgive me, I'm not really interested in young girls." His wife, a young girl, smiled secretly; she knew he never thought of her as young, but rather as a person of his own age, equally mature and intelligent. "I'll talk to her," said Julia, lifting her face for a kiss. "Oh, Gaius Marius, what a pity I'm not well enough to try for a little brother or sister for Young Marius!"
But before Julia could gird herself to talk to her ailing sister, the news of the Germans burst upon Rome, and Rome flew into a gabbling panic. Ever since the Gauls had invaded Italy three hundred years before, and almost vanquished the fledgling Roman state, Italy had lived in dread of barbarian incursions; it was to guard against them that the Italian Allied nations had chosen to link their fates to Rome's, and it was to guard against them that Rome and her Italian Allies fought perpetual border wars along the thousand miles of Macedonian frontier between the Adriatic Sea and the Thracian Hellespont. It was to guard against them that Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus had forged a proper land route between Italian Gaul and the Spanish Pyrenees a mere ten years ago, and subdued the tribes which lived along the river Rhodanus with a view to weakening them by exposing them to Roman ways and putting them under Roman military protection. Until five years ago, it was the barbarian Gauls and Celts had loomed largest in Roman fears; but then the Germans first came on the scene, and suddenly by comparison the Gauls and Celts seemed civilized, tame, tractable. Like all bogeys, these fears arose not out of what was known, but out of what was not known. The Germans had popped out of nowhere (during the consulship of Marcus Aemilius Scaurus), and after inflicting a hideous defeat upon a huge and superbly trained Roman army (during the consulship of Gnaeus Papirius Carbo) disappeared again as if they had never been. Mysterious. Incalculable. Oblivious to the normal patterns of behavior as understood and respected by all the peoples who dwelled around the margins of the Middle Sea. For why, when that ghastly defeat had spread the whole of Italy out before them as helpless as a woman in a sacked city, did the Germans turn away, disappear? It made no sense! But they had turned away, they had disappeared; and as the years since Carbo's hideous defeat accumulated, the Germans became little more than a Lamia, a Mormolyce a bogey to frighten children. The old, old fear of barbarian invasion lapsed back into its normal condition, somewhere between a shiver of apprehension and a disbelieving smile. And now, out of nowhere again, the Germans were back, pouring in their hundreds of thousands into Gaul-across-the-Alps where the river Rhodanus flowed out of Lake Lemanna; and the Gallic lands and tribes which owed Rome tribute the lands of the Aedui and the Ambarri were awash in Germans, all ten feet tall, pallidly pale, giants out of legends, ghosts out of some northern barbarian underworld. Down into the warm, fertile valley of the Rhodanus the Germans spilled, crushing every living thing in their way, from men to mice, from forests to ferns, as indifferent to crops in the field as they were to birds on the wing. The news reached Rome just days too late to recall the consul Quintus Caecilius Metellus and his army, already landed in Africa Province. Thus, fool though he was, the consul Marcus Junius Silanus, kept in Rome to govern there where he could do least harm, now became the best the Senate could produce under the twin weights of custom and law. For a consul in office could not be passed over in favor of some other commander, if he indicated he was willing to undertake a war. And Silanus expressed himself delighted to undertake a war against the Germans. Like Gnaeus Papirius Carbo five years before him, Silanus envisioned German wagons loaded down with gold, and coveted that gold. After Carbo had provoked the Germans into attacking him and gone down to crushing defeat, the Germans had failed to pick up the arms and armor the vanquished Romans had left behind, on their dead, or abandoned by those still living to accelerate the pace of their flight. Thus canny Rome rather than the oblivious Germans sent teams to collect every vestige of arms and gear, and bring it all back to Rome and store it. This military treasure trove still lay in warehouses all over the city, waiting to be used. The limited resources of manufactories to supply arms and gear at the start of the campaigning season had been exhausted by Metellus and his African expedition, so it was lucky indeed that Silanus's hastily levied legions could be equipped from this cache; though of course the recruits lacking arms and a set of armor had to buy them from the State, which meant that the State actually made a little profit from Silanus's new legions. Finding troops to give Silanus was far more difficult. The recruiters labored mightily, and under an oppressive sense of urgency. Often the property qualifications were winked at; men anxious to serve who didn't own quite enough to qualify were hastily enlisted, their inability to arm and protect themselves rectified from Carbo's old cache, its cost deducted from their absentee compensation pay. Veterans who had retired were lured out of bucolic inertia mostly with little trouble, as bucolic inertia did not suit many of the men who had done their ten seasons under the colors and therefore could not be called up again. And finally it was done. Marcus Junius Silanus set off for Gaul-across-the-Alps at the head of a splendid army a full seven legions strong, and with a large cavalry arm of Thracians mixed with some Gauls from the more settled parts of the Roman Gallic province. The time was late May, a bare eight weeks after the news of the German invasion had reached Rome; in that time Rome had recruited, armed, and partially trained an army of fifty thousand men including the cavalry and noncombatants. Only a bogey as enormous as the Germans could have stimulated such a heroic effort. "But nonetheless it's living proof of what we Romans can do when we've the will to do it," said Gaius Julius Caesar to his wife, Marcia, on their return; they had journeyed out to see the legions start their march up the Via Flaminia toward Italian Gaul, a dazzling sight, and a cheering one. "Yes, provided Silanus can do the job," said Marcia, a true senator's wife, actively interested in politics. "You don't think he can," said Caesar. "Nor do you, if you'd only admit it. Still, watching so many booted feet march across the Mulvian Bridge made me very glad that we have Marcus Aemilius Scaurus and Marcus Livius Drusus as censors now," Marcia said with a sigh of satisfaction. "Marcus Scaurus is right the Mulvian Bridge is tottering, and won't survive another flood. Then what would we do if all of our troops were south of the Tiber and needed to march north in a hurry? So I'm very glad he was elected, since he's vowed to rebuild the Mulvian Bridge. A wonderful man!" Caesar smiled a little sourly, but said, trying to be fair, "Scaurus is becoming an institution, damn him! He's a showman, a dazzling trickster and three parts sham. However, the one part which isn't sham just happens to be worth more than any other man's whole and for that I must forgive all, I suppose. Besides which, he's right we do need a new program of public works, and not only to keep employment levels up. All these penny-pinching perusers of the senatorial rolls we seem to have endured as censors for the last few years are hardly worth the cost of the paper they scribble out the census on! Give Scaurus his due: he intends to see to some items I know should have been attended to long ago. Though I cannot condone his draining of the fens around Ravenna, or his plans for a system of canals and dikes between Parma and Mutina." "Oh, come now, Gaius Julius, be generous!" said Marcia a little sharply. "It's terrific that he's going to curb the Padus! With the Germans invading Gaul-across-the-Alps, we don't need to find our armies cut off from the alpine passes by the Padus in full spate!" "I've already said I agree it's a good thing," said Caesar, then added with stubborn disapproval, "Yet I find it fascinating that on the whole he's managed to keep his program of public works firmly in those parts where he has clients galore and is likely to sextuple their numbers by the time he's finished. The Via Aemilia goes all the way from Ariminum on the Adriatic to Taurasia in the foothills of the western Alps three hundred miles of clients packed as solid as the paving stones in it!" "Well, and good luck to him," said Marcia, equally stubborn. "I suppose you'll find something to deride about his surveying and paving the west coast road too!" "You forgot to mention the branch to Dertona that will link up the west coast road with the Via Aemilia," gibed Caesar. "And he gets his name on the whole lot into the bargain! The Via Aemilia Scauri. Tchah!" "Sourpuss," said Marcia. "Bigot," said Caesar. "There are definitely times when I wish I didn't like you so much," said Marcia. "There are times when I can say the same," said Caesar. At which point Julilla drifted in. She was extremely thin, but not quite skeletal, and had remained in much the same state now for two months. For Julilla had discovered an equilibrium which allowed her to look pitiable yet prevented her dropping to a point where death became a strong possibility, if not from pure starvation, then certainly from disease. Death was not part of Julilla's master plan, nor was her spirit troubled. She had two objectives: one was to force Lucius Cornelius Sulla to admit he loved her, and the other was to soften up her family to breaking point, for only then, she knew, did she stand the remotest chance of securing her father's permission to marry Sulla. Very young and very spoiled though she was, she hadn't made the mistake of overestimating her power when compared to the power vested in her father. Love her to distraction he might, indulge her to the top limit of his monetary resources he might; yet when it came to deciding whom she would marry, he would follow his own wishes without regard for hers. Oh, if she was tractable enough to approve of his choice of a husband for her as Julia had done he would glow with a natural and simple pleasure, and she knew too that he would look for someone he felt sure would take care of her, love her, always treat her well and respectfully. But Lucius Cornelius Sulla as her husband? Never, never, never would her father consent to it, and no reason she or Sulla could put forward would change her father's mind. She could weep, she could beg, she could protest undying love, she could turn herself inside out, and still her father would refuse to give his consent. Especially now that she had a dowry of some forty talents a million sesterces in the bank, which made her eligible, and marred Sulla's chances of ever persuading her father that he wished to marry her for herself alone. That is, when he admitted that he wished to marry her. As a child Julilla had never displayed any sign that she owned a streak of enormous patience, but now, when it was needed, she had it to hand. Patient as a bird hatching a sterile egg, Julilla embarked upon her master plan fully aware that if she was to get what she wanted a marriage to Sulla she must outwait and outendure everyone else she knew, from her victim, Sulla, to her controller, Gaius Julius Caesar. She was even aware of some of the pitfalls littering her path to success Sulla, for instance, might marry elsewhere, or move away from Rome, or fall ill and die. But she did what she could to avert these possibilities, chiefly by using her apparent illness as a weapon aimed at the heart of a man she knew full well would not consent to see her. How did she know that? Because she had tried to see him many times during the first few months after he returned to Rome, only to suffer one rebuff after another, culminating in his informing her hidden as they were behind a fat pillar in the Porticus Margaritaria that if she didn't leave him alone, he would quit Rome forever. The master plan had evolved slowly, its nuclear germ the result of that first meeting, when he had derided her puppy fat and shooed her away. She had ceased to gobble sweeties, and lost a little weight, and had no reward from him for her pains. Then when he came back to Rome and was even ruder to her, her resolve had hardened, and she began to forsake food. At first it had been very difficult, but then she discovered that when she adhered to this semistarvation for long enough without once succumbing to the urge to stuff herself, her capacity to eat diminished, and the hunger pangs entirely went away. So by the time that Lucius Gavius Stichus had died of his lingering illness eight months ago, Julilla's master plan was more or less fully evolved; there remained only irritating problems to solve, from devising a way to keep herself in the forefront of Sulla's mind to discovering a way to maintain herself in a weight equilibrium which would allow her to live. Sulla she dealt with by writing him letters.
I love you, and I shall never tire of telling you so. If letters are the only way I can make you hear me, then letters there will be. Dozens. Hundreds. Thousands, if the years mount up. I will smother you in letters, drown you in letters, crush you in letters. What more Roman way is there than the writing of letters? We feed on them, as I feed upon writing to you. What does food mean, when you deny me the food my heart and spirit crave? My crudest, most merciless, and un-pitying beloved! How can you stay away from me? Break down the wall between our two houses, steal into my room, kiss me and kiss me and kiss me! But you will not. I can hear you saying it as I lie here too weak to leave my awful and hateful bed. What have I done to deserve your indifference, your coldness? Surely somewhere inside your white, white skin there curls the smallest of womannikins, my essence given into your keeping, so that the Julilla who lives next door in her awful and hateful bed is only a sucked-out and dried-up simulacrum growing steadily shadowier, fainter. One day I shall disappear, and all that will be left of me is that tiny womannikin under your white, white skin. Come and see me, look upon what you have done? Kiss me and kiss me and kiss me. For I love you.
The food equilibrium had been more difficult. Determined not to gain weight, she kept on losing it in spite of her efforts to remain static. And then one day the whole gang of physicians who had over the months paraded through the house of Gaius Julius Caesar, trying vainly to cure her, went to Gaius Julius Caesar and advocated that she be force-fed. But in the way of physicians, they had left it up to her poor family to do their dirty work. So the whole house had gathered up its courage and prepared itself for the effort, from the newest slave to the brothers, Gaius and Sextus, and Marcia, and Caesar himself. It had been an ordeal no one cared to remember afterward Julilla screaming as if she were being murdered rather than resurrected, struggling feebly, vomiting back every mouthful, spitting and gagging and choking. When Caesar finally ordered the horror abandoned, the family had gone into council and agreed without one dissenting voice that no matter what might happen to Julilla in the future, force-fed she was not going to be. But the racket Julilla had made during the attempt to force-feed her had let the cat out of the Caesar bag; the whole neighborhood now knew of the Caesar troubles. Not that the family had concealed its troubles from shame, only that Gaius Julius Caesar loathed gossip, and tried never to be a cause of it. To the rescue came none other than Clitumna from next door, armed with a food she guaranteed Julilla would voluntarily ingest, and which would stay down once it was ingested. Caesar and Marcia welcomed her fervently, and sat listening fervently as she talked. "Find a source of cow's milk," said Clitumna importantly, enjoying the novel experience of being the center of Caesarean attention. "I know it's not easy to come by, but I believe there are a couple of fellows out in the Camenarum Valley who do milk cows. Then for each cup of milk you break in one hen's egg and three spoons of honey. You beat it up until there's a froth on top, and add half a cup of strong wine right at the end. If you put the. wine in before you beat it up, you won't get a nice froth on top. If you have a glass goblet, give it to her in that, because the drink's very pretty to look at quite a rich pink, with a nice yellow top of froth. Provided she can keep it down, it will certainly keep her alive and fairly healthy," said Clitumna, who vividly remembered her sister's period of starvation after she had been prevented from marrying a most unsuitable fellow from Alba Fucentia a snake charmer, no less! "We'll try it," said Marcia, eyes full of tears. "It worked for my sister," said Clitumna, and sighed. "When she got over the snake charmer, she married my dear, dear Stichus's father." Caesar got up. "I'll send someone out to the Camenarum at once," he said, disappearing. Then his head came round the door. "What about the hen's egg? Ought it to be a tenth egg, or will an ordinary one do?" he asked. "Oh, we just used ordinary ones," said Clitumna comfortably, relaxing in her chair. "The extra-large variety might upset the balance of the drink." "And the honey?" Caesar persisted. "Ordinary Latin honey, or should we try to get Hymettan, or at any rate smokeless?" "Ordinary Latin honey is quite good enough," said Clitumna firmly. "Who knows? Maybe it was the smoke in the ordinary honey that did the trick. Let us not depart from the original recipe, Gaius Julius." "Quite right." Caesar disappeared again. "Oh, if only she can tolerate it!" said Marcia, her voice shaking. "Neighbor, we are at our wits' end!" "I imagine you are. But don't make such a fuss about it, at least not in Julilla's hearing," advised Clitumna, who could be sensible when her heart wasn't involved, and would cheerfully have let Julilla die had she only known of those letters piling up in Sulla's room. Her face puckered. "We don't want a second death in these two houses," she said, and sniffled dolefully. "We most certainly don't!" cried Marcia. Her sense of social fitness coming to the fore, she said delicately, "I do hope you're over the loss of your nephew a little, Clitumna? It's very difficult, I know." "Oh, I manage," said Clitumna, who did grieve for Stichus on many levels, but upon one vital level had found her life a great deal easier without the friction between the deceased Stichus and her dear, darling Sulla. She heaved a huge sigh sounding much like Julilla, had she only known it. That encounter had proved to be the first of many, for when the drink actually worked, the Caesar household lay under a massive obligation to their vulgar neighbor. "Gratitude," said Gaius Julius Caesar, who took to hiding in his study whenever he heard Clitumna's shrill voice in the atrium, "can be a wretched nuisance!" "Oh, Gaius Julius, don't be such a curmudgeon!" said Marcia defensively. "Clitumna is really very kind, and we can't possibly hurt her feelings which is what you're in danger of doing when you avoid her so persistently." "I know she's terribly kind!" exclaimed the head of the household, goaded. "That's what I'm complaining about!"
* * *
Julilla's master plan had complicated Sulla's life to a degree which would have afforded her great satisfaction, had she only known. But she did not, for he concealed his torment from everyone save himself, and feigned an indifference to her plight which completely fooled Clitumna, always full of news about the situation next door now that she had donned the mantle of lifesaving miracle worker. "I do wish you'd pop in and say hello to the poor girl," Clitumna said fretfully about the time that Marcus Junius Silanus led his seven magnificent legions north up the Via Flaminia. "She often asks after you, Lucius Cornelius." "I've got better things to do than dance attendance on a female Caesar," said Sulla harshly. "What arrant nonsense!" said Nicopolis vigorously. "You're as idle as any man could possibly be." "And is that my fault?" he demanded, swinging round on his mistress with a sudden savagery that made her draw back in fright. "I could be busy! I could be marching with Silanus to fight the Germans." "Well, and why didn't you go?" Nicopolis asked. "They've dropped the property qualifications so drastically that I'm sure with your name you could have managed to enlist." His lips drew back from his teeth, revealing the overlong and sharply pointed canines which gave his smile a feral nastiness. "I, a patrician Cornelius, to march as a ranker in a legion?" he asked. "I'd sooner be sold into slavery by the Germans!" "You might well be, if the Germans aren't stopped. Truly, Lucius Cornelius, there are times when you demonstrate only too well that you yourself are your own worst enemy! Here you are, when all Clitumna asked of you was a miserable little favor for a dying girl, grizzling that you have neither the time nor the interest really, you do exasperate me!" A sly gleam crept into her eyes. "After all, Lucius Cornelius, you must admit your life here is vastly more comfortable since Lucius Gavius so conveniently expired." And she hummed the tune of a popular ditty under her breath, a song with words to the effect that the singer had murdered his rival in love and got away with it. "Con-veeeeeeniently ex-piiiiiiired!" she warbled. His face became flinty, yet oddly expressionless. "My dear Nicopolis, why don't you stroll down to the Tiber and do me the enormous favor of jumping in?" The subject of Julilla was prudently dropped. But it was a subject which seemed to crop up perpetually, and secretly Sulla writhed, aware of his vulnerability, unable to display concern. Any day that fool girl of Julilla's could be caught out carrying one of the letters, or Julilla herself caught in the deed of writing one and then where would he be? Who would believe that he, with his history, was innocent of any kind of intrigue? It was one thing to have an unsavory past, but if the censors deemed him guilty of corrupting the morals of a patrician senator's daughter he would never, never be considered for membership of the Senate. And he was determined he was going to reach the Senate. What he yearned to do was to leave Rome, yet he didn't dare what might the girl do in his absence? And, much though he hated having to admit it, he couldn't bring himself to abandon her while she was so ill. Self-induced her illness might be, but it was nonetheless a serious illness. His mind circled inside itself like a disorientated animal, unable to settle, unable to discipline itself to a sensible or logical path. He would drag the withered grass crown out from its hiding place in one of his ancestral cupboards and sit holding it between his hands, almost weeping in a frenzy of anxiety; for he knew where he was going and what he intended to do, and that wretched girl was an unbearable complication, and yet that wretched girl was the start of it all, with her grass crown what to do, what to do? Bad enough to have to pick his way unerringly through the morass of his coming intentions, without the additional strain of Julilla. He even contemplated suicide, he who was the last person in the world likely to do that deed a fantasy, a delicious way out of everything, the sleep which has no end. And then back his thoughts would go to Julilla, always back to Julilla why? He didn't love her, he wasn't capable of loving. Yet there were times when he hungered for her, craved to bite her and kiss her and impale her until she screamed in ecstatic pain; and there were other times, especially when he lay wakeful between his mistress and his stepmother, that he actively loathed her, wanting the feel of her skinny throat between his hands, wanting to see her empurpled face and goggling eyes as he squeezed the last vestige of her life out of her starving lungs. Then would come another letter why didn't he just throw them away, or carry them to her father with a fierce look on his face and a demand that this harassment cease? He never did. He read them, those passionate and despairing pleas her girl kept slipping into the sinus of his toga in places too public to draw attention to her action; he read each one a dozen times, then put it away in his ancestral cupboards with the others. But he never broke down in his resolve not to see her. And spring turned into summer, and summer into the dog days of Sextilis, when Sirius the Dog Star shimmered sullenly over a heat-paralyzed Rome. Then, as Silanus was marching confidently up the Rhodanus toward the churning masses of the Germans, it began to rain in central Italy. And kept on raining. To the denizens of sunny Rome, a worse fate than the Sextilian dog days. Depressing, highly inconvenient, a worry in case of flood, a nuisance on all fronts. The marketplaces couldn't hope to open, political life was impossible, trials had to be postponed, and the crime rate soared. Men discovered their wives in flagrante delicto and murdered them, the granaries leaked and wetted the wheat stored therein, the Tiber rose just enough to ensure that some of the public latrines backfilled and floated excrement out of their doors, a vegetable shortage developed when the Campus Martius and the Campus Vaticanus were covered with a few inches of water, and shoddily built high-rise insulae began to crumble into total collapse or suddenly manifested huge cracks in walls and foundations. Everyone caught cold; the aged and infirm began to die of pneumonia, the young of croup and quinsy, all ages of that mysterious disease which paralyzed the body and, if survived, left an arm or a leg shriveled, wasted. Clitumna and Nicopolis began to fight every day, and every day Nicopolis would remark to Sulla in a whisper how very convenient Stichus's death had been for him. Then, after two full weeks of remorseless rain, the low clouds hauled their last tatters over the eastern horizon, and the sun came out. Rome steamed. Tendrils of vapor curled off the paving stones and roof tiles; the air was thick with it. Every balcony, loggia, peristyle-garden, and window in the city burgeoned with mouldy washing, contributing to the general fug, and houses where small babies dwelled like the one of the merchant banker Titus Pomponius suddenly found their peristyle-gardens filled with line upon line of drying diapers. Shoes had to be divested of mildew, every book in every literate house unrolled and inspected minutely for insidious fungus, the clothes chests and cupboards aired. But there was one cheering aspect to this foetid dampness; mushroom season arrived with a phenomenal surplus. Always avid for the fragrant umbrellas after the normal summer dry, the whole city gobbled mushrooms, rich and poor alike. And Sulla was once again loaded down with Julilla's letters, after a wonderful wet two weeks which had prevented Julilla's girl from finding him to drop them into his toga. His craving to quit Rome escalated until he knew if he didn't shake Rome's vaporous miasma off himself for the space of one little day, he would truly go mad at last. Metrobius and his protector, Scylax, were vacationing in Cumae, and Sulla didn't want to spend that day of respite alone. So he resolved that he would take Clitumna and Nicopolis on a picnic to his favorite spot outside the city. "Come on, girls," he said to them on the third fine dawn in a row, "put on your glad rags, and I'll take you on a picnic!" The girls neither feeling at all girlish looked at him with the sour derision of those in no mood to be jollied out of their doldrums, and declined to budge from the communal bed, though the humid night had left it sweatily soaked. "You both need some fresh air," Sulla persisted. "We are living on the Palatine because there is nothing wrong with the air up here," said Clitumna, turning her back. "At the moment the air on the Palatine is no better than any other air in Rome it's full of the stink of drains and washing," he said. "Come on, do! I've hired a carriage and we'll head off in the direction of Tibur lunch in the woods see if we can catch a fish or two or buy a fish or two, and a good fat rabbit straight out of the trap and come home before dark feeling a lot happier." "No," said Clitumna querulously. Nicopolis wavered. "Well..." That was enough for Sulla. "Get ready, I'll be back in a few moments," he said, and stretched luxuriantly. "Oh, I am so tired of being cooped up inside this house!" "So am I," said Nicopolis, and got out of bed. Clitumna continued to lie with her face to the wall, while Sulla went off to the kitchen to command a picnic lunch. "Do come," he said to Clitumna as he donned a clean tunic and laced on open boots. She refused to answer. "Have it your own way, then," he said as he went to the door. "Nicopolis and I will see you this evening." She refused to answer. Thus the picnic party consisted only of Nicopolis and Sulla and a big hamper of goodies the cook had thrown together at late notice, wishing he could go along himself. At the foot of the Steps of Cacus an open two-wheeled gig was waiting; Sulla helped Nicopolis up into the passenger's seat, then hoisted himself into the driver's seat. "Away we go," he said happily, gathering in the reins and experiencing an extraordinary spurt of lightheartedness, a rare sense of freedom. He confessed to himself that he wasn't sorry Clitumna had declined to come. Nicopolis was company enough. "Gee up, you mules!" he cried. The mules geed up nicely; the gig rattled down the Valley of Murcia in which the Circus Maximus lay, and left the city through the Capena Gate. Alas, the view at first was neither interesting nor cheering, for the ring road Sulla took in heading east crossed the great cemeteries of Rome. Tombstones and more tombstones not the imposing mausolea and sepulchra of the rich and noble which flanked every arterial road out of the city, but the gravestones of simpler souls. Every Roman and Greek, even the poorest, even the slaves, dreamed that after his going he would be able to afford a princely monument to testify that he had once existed. For that reason, both poor and slaves belonged to burial clubs, and contributed every tiny mite they could afford to the club funds, carefully managed and invested; embezzlement was rife in Rome as in any place of human habitation, but the burial clubs were so jealously policed by their members that their executives had no choice save to be honest. A good funeral and a lovely monument mattered. A crossroads formed the central point of the huge necropolis sprawled over the whole Campus Esquilinus, and there at the crossroads stood the massive temple of Venus Libitina, in the midst of a leafy grove of sacred trees. Inside the temple's podium lay the registers in which the names of Rome's dead citizens were inscribed, and there too lay chest after chest of money paid in over the centuries to register each citizen death. In consequence the temple was enormously rich, the funds belonging to the State, yet never touched. The Venus was that Venus who ruled the dead, not the living, that Venus who presided over the extinction of the procreative force. And her temple grove was the headquarters of Rome's guild of undertakers. Behind the precinct of Venus Libitina was an area of open space on which the funeral pyres were built, and beyond that was the paupers' cemetery, a constantly changing network of pits filled with bodies, lime, soil. Few, citizens or noncitizens, elected to be inhumed, apart from the Jews, who were buried in one section of the necropolis, and the aristocrats of the Famous Family Cornelius, who were buried along the Via Appia; thus most of the monuments transforming the Campus Esquilinus into a crowded little stone city housed urns of ashes rather than decomposing bodies. No one could be buried within Rome's sacred boundary, not even the greatest. However, once the gig passed beneath the arches of the two aqueducts which brought water to the teeming northeastern hills of the city, the vista changed. Farmlands stretched in all directions, market gardens at first, then grass pastures and wheat fields. Despite the effect the downpour had had on the Via Tiburtina (the densely packed layer of gravel, tufa dust, and sand on top of the paving stones had been eroded), the two in the gig were thoroughly enjoying themselves. The sun was hot but the breeze cooling, Nicopolis's parasol was large enough to shade Sulla's snow-white skin as well as her own olive hide, and the mules turned out to be a willingly tractable pair. Too sensible to force the pace, Sulla let his team find their own, and the miles trotted by delightfully. To go all the way to Tibur and back was impossible in one day, but Sulla's favorite spot lay well short of the climb up to Tibur itself. Some distance out of Rome was a forest that stretched all the way into the ranges which rose, ever increasing in height, to the massif of the Great Rock, Italy's highest mountain. This forest cut diagonally across the route of the road for perhaps a mile before wandering off crosscountry; the road then entered the Anio River valley, most fertile, eminently arable. However, the mile or so of forest was harder ground, and here Sulla left the road, directing the mules down an un-paved wagon track which dived into the trees and finally petered out. "Here we are," said Sulla, jumping down and coming round to help Nicopolis, who found herself stiff and a little sore. "I know it doesn't look promising, but walk a little way further with me and I'll show you a place well worth the ride." First he unharnessed the mules and hobbled them, then he shoved the gig off the track into the shade of some bushes and took the picnic hamper out of it, hoisting it onto his shoulder. "How do you know so much about dealing with mules and harness?" Nicopolis asked as she followed Sulla into the trees, picking her way carefully. "Anyone does who's worked in the Port of Rome," said Sulla over his unburdened shoulder. "Take it slowly, now! We're not going far, and there's no hurry." Indeed, they had made good time. Since the month was early September, the twelve hours of daylight were still on the long side at sixty-five minutes each; it still wanted two hours before noon when Sulla and Nicopolis entered the woods. "This isn't virgin forest," he said, "which is probably why no one logs in it. In the old days this land was given over to wheat, but after the grain started coming from Sicily and Sardinia and Africa Province, the farmers moved into Rome and left the trees to grow back, for it's poor soil." "You're amazing, Lucius Cornelius," she said, trying to keep up with Sulla's long, easy strides. "How is it that you know so many things about the world?'' "It's my luck. What I hear or read, I remember." They emerged then into an enchanting clearing, grassy and filled with late-summer flowers pink and white cosmos, great blooming jungles of pink and white rambling roses, and lupines in tall spikes, pink and white. Through the clearing flowed a stream in full spate from the rain, its bed filled with jagged rocks which divided its waters into deep still pools and foaming cascades; the sun glittered and flashed off its surface, amid dragonflies and little birds. "Oh, how beautiful!" cried Nicopolis. "I found it last year when I went away for those few months," he said, putting the hamper down in a patch of shade. "My gig cast a wheel right where that track runs into the forest, and I had to put Metrobius up on one of the mules and send him to Tibur for help. While I waited, I explored." It gave Nicopolis no satisfaction to know that the despised and feared Metrobius had undoubtedly been shown this special place first, but she said nothing, simply flopped down in the grass and watched Sulla take a big skin of wine from the interior of the hamper. He immersed the wineskin in the stream where a natural fence of rocks anchored it, then took off his tunic and removed his open boots, all he wore. Sulla's lighthearted mood still lay inside his bones, as warming as the sun upon his skin; he stretched, smiling, and looked about the glade with an affection which had nothing to do with Metrobius or Nicopolis. Simply, his pleasure came from a divorcement from the predicaments and frustrations which so hedged his normal life around, a place where he could tell himself that time did not move, politics did not exist, people were classless, and money an invention for the future. His moments of pure happiness were so few and dispersed so thinly along the route march of his life that he remembered every single one of them with piercing clarity the day when the jumble of squiggles on a piece of paper suddenly turned into understandable thoughts, the hour in which an enormously kind and thoughtful man had shown him how perfect the act of love could be, the stunning emancipation of his father's death, and the realization that this clearing in a forest was the first piece of land he had ever been able to call his own, in that it belonged to no one who cared enough to visit it except for him. And that was all. The sum total. None was founded in an appreciation of beauty, or even of the process of living; they represented the acquisition of literacy, erotic pleasure, freedom from authority, and property. For those were the things Sulla prized, the things Sulla wanted. Fascinated, Nicopolis watched him without even beginning to understand the source of his happiness, marveling at the absolute whiteness of his body in full sun a sight she had never seen before and the fiery gold of head and chest and groin. All far too much to resist; she doffed her own light robe and the shift she wore beneath it, its long back tail caught between her legs and pinned in front, until she too was naked and could relish the kiss of the sun. They waded into one of the deep pools, gasping with the cold, stayed there long enough to warm up while Sulla played with her erect nipples and her beautiful breasts, then clambered out upon the thick soft grass and made love while they dried off. After which they ate their lunch, breads and cheeses and hard-boiled eggs and chicken wings, washed down with the chilly wine. She made a wreath of flowers for Sulla's hair, then made another for her own, and rolled over three times from the sheer voluptuous gratification of being alive. "Oh, this is wonderful!" she sighed. "Clitumna doesn't know what she's missing." "Clitumna never knows what she's missing," said Sulla. "Oh, I don't know," said Nicopolis idly, the mischief-bee back buzzing inside her mind. "She's missing Sticky Stichy." And she began to hum the ditty about murder until she caught the flickering end of a glance from him that told her he was becoming angry. She didn't honestly believe Sulla had contrived at Stichus's death, but when she implied for the first time that Sulla had, she picked up interesting echoes of alarm from Sulla, and so kept it up from sheer idle curiosity. Time to stop it. Leaping to her feet, she held out her hands to Sulla, still lying full length. "Come on, lazybones, I want to walk under the trees and cool off," she said. He rose obediently, took her hand, and strolled with her under the eaves of the forest, where no undergrowth marred the carpet of sodden leaves, warm after the day's perfect portion of sun. Being barefoot was a treat. And there they were! A miniature army of the most exquisite mushrooms Nicopolis had ever seen, every last one unmarked by insect hole or animal paw, purest white, fat and fleshy of canopy yet nicely slender of stalk, and giving off a heady aroma of earth. "Oh, goody!" she cried, dropping to her knees. Sulla grimaced. "Come on," he said. "No, don't be mean just because you dislike mushrooms! Please, Lucius Cornelius, please! Go back to the hamper and find me a cloth I'm going to take some of these home for my supper," said Nicopolis, voice determined. "They mightn't be good ones," he said, not moving. "Nonsense, of course they're good! Look! There's no membrane covering up the gills, no spots, no red color. They smell superb too. And this isn't an oak, is it?" She looked up at the tree in the base of which the mushrooms were growing. Sulla eyed is* deeply scalloped leaves and experienced a vision of the inevitability of fate, the pointing finger of his lucky goddess. "No, it's not an oak," he said. "Then please! Please?" she wheedled. He sighed. "All right, have it your own way." A whole miniature army of mushrooms perished as Nicopolis selected her treasure trove, then wrapped it in the napkin Sulla had brought her and carefully laid it in the bottom of the hamper, where it would be protected from the heat as they drove home. "I don't know why you and Clitumna don't like mushrooms," she said after they were ensconced in the gig again, and the mules were trotting eagerly in the direction of their stables. "I never have liked them," said Sulla, not interested. "All the more for me," she said, and giggled. "What's so special about this lot, anyway?" Sulla asked. "At the moment you can buy mushrooms by the ton in the markets, and dirt-cheap too." "These are mine," she tried to explain. "I found them, I saw how absolutely perfect they were, I picked them. The ones in the markets are any old how full of grubs, holes, spiders, the gods know what. Mine will taste much better, I promise you." They did taste better. When Nicopolis brought them into the kitchen the cook handled them suspiciously, but had to admit he couldn't fault them with eyes or nose. "Fry them lightly in a little oil," said Nicopolis. As it happened, the vegetable slave had brought home a huge basket of mushrooms from the markets that morning, so cheap that the entire staff was allowed to gorge on them, and had been doing so all day. Therefore no one was tempted to steal a few of the new arrivals; the cook was able to fry all of them just long enough to soften them and heat them through, then tossed them in a dish with a little freshly ground pepper and a squeeze of onion juice, and sent them to the dining room for Nicopolis. Who ate of them ravenously, her appetite sharpened by the day out and by Clitumna's monumental fit of the sulks. For, of course, the moment it was too late to send a servant to catch them, Clitumna had regretted her decision not to go on the famous picnic. Subjected to a paean on the subject throughout dinner, she reacted badly, and ended her day by announcing that she would sleep alone. It was eighteen hours later before Nicopolis experienced a pain in her belly. She became nauseated and was a little sick, but had no diarrhoea, and admitted the pain was bearable, she'd known worse. Then she urinated a small volume of fluid red with blood, and panicked. Doctors were summoned at once; the household ran about distractedly; Clitumna sent servants out to look for Sulla, who had gone out early in the day without leaving any word of his destination. When Nicopolis's heart rate went up and her blood pressure fell, the doctors looked grave. She had a convulsion, her respiration grew slow and shallow, her heart began to fibrillate, and she passed inexorably into coma. As it happened, no one even thought of mushrooms. "Kidney failure," said Athenodorus of Sicily, now the most successful medical practitioner on the Palatine. Everyone else concurred. And about the time that Sulla came rushing home, Nicopolis died from a massive internal haemorrhage the victim, said the doctors, of a complete systemic collapse. "We should perform an autopsy," said Athenodorus. "I agree," said Sulla, who didn't mention mushrooms. "Is it catching?" asked Clitumna pathetically, looking old and ill and desperately alone. Everyone said no.
The autopsy confirmed the diagnosis of renal and hepatic failure: kidneys and liver were swollen, congested, and full of haemorrhages. The envelope around Nicopolis's heart had bled, as had the linings of her stomach, her small intestine, and her colon. The innocent-looking mushroom called The Destroyer had done its subtle work well. Sulla organized the funeral (Clitumna was too prostrated) and walked in the procession as chief mourner, ahead of the stars of the Roman comedic and mimetic theaters; their presence assured a good attendance, which would have pleased Nicopolis. And when Sulla returned to Clitumna's house afterward, he found Gaius Julius Caesar waiting for him. Throwing off his dark mourning toga, Sulla joined Clitumna and her guest-in her sitting room. On few occasions had he set eyes on Gaius Julius Caesar, and knew the senator not at all; that the senator would visit Clitumna because of the untimely death of a Greek strumpet struck Sulla as very odd, so he was on his guard and punctiliously correct as he was introduced. "Gaius Julius," he said, bowing. "Lucius Cornelius," said Caesar, bowing also. They did not shake hands, but when Sulla sat down, Caesar resumed his own seat with apparent tranquillity. He turned to the weeping Clitumna and spoke kindly. "My dear, why stay?" he asked. "Marcia is waiting next door for you. Have your steward take you to her. Women stand in need of women's company in times of grief." Without a word Clitumna rose and tottered to the door, while the visitor reached into his dark toga and produced a small roll of paper, which he then laid on the table. "Lucius Cornelius, your friend Nicopolis had me draw up her will and lodge it with the Vestals a long time ago. The lady Clitumna is aware of its contents, which is why she did not need to stay to hear me read it." "Yes?" asked Sulla, at a loss. He could rind nothing further to say, and so sat dumbly, gazing at Caesar rather blankly. Caesar moved to the crux of the matter. "Lucius Cornelius, the lady Nicopolis made you her sole heir." Sulla's expression remained blank. "She did?" "She did." "Well, I suppose if I'd thought about it, I would have known she'd be bound to do that," said Sulla, recovering. "Not that it matters. Everything she had, she spent." Caesar looked at him keenly. "She didn't, you know. The lady Nicopolis was quite wealthy." "Rubbish!" said Sulla. "Truly, Lucius Cornelius, she was quite wealthy. She owned no property, but she was the widow of a military tribune who did extremely well out of booty. What he left her, she invested. As of this morning, her estate is in excess of two hundred thousand denarii," said Caesar. There could be no mistaking the genuineness of Sulla's shock. Whatever Caesar might have thought of him until that moment, he knew he was now looking at a man who possessed no inkling of this information; Sulla sat stupefied. Then he sank back in his chair, put shaking hands up to his face, shuddered, and gasped. "So much! Nicopolis?" "So much. Two hundred thousand denarii. Or eight hundred thousand sesterces, if you prefer. A knight's portion." Down came Sulla's hands. "Oh, Nicopolis!" he said. Caesar got to his feet, extending his hand. Sulla took it dazedly. "No, Lucius Cornelius, don't get up," said Caesar warmly. "My dear fellow, I cannot tell you how delighted I am for you. I know it's difficult to salve your grief at this early stage, but I would like you to know that I've often wished with all my heart that one day you would better your fortune and your luck. In the morning I'll commence probate. You had better meet me in the Forum at the second hour. By the shrine of Vesta. For now, I bid you good day." After Caesar had gone, Sulla sat without moving for a long time. The house was as silent as Nicopolis's grave; Clitumna must have stayed next door with Marcia, and the servants were creeping about. Perhaps as many as six hours went by before he finally got up, stiff and sore, and stretched a little. The blood began to flow, his heart to fill with fire. "Lucius Cornelius, you are on your way at last," he said, and began to laugh. Though it started very softly, his laughter swelled and rolled into a shriek, a roar, a howl of mirth; the servants, listening terrified, debated among themselves as to which one was going to venture into Clitumna's sitting room. But before they could reach a decision, Sulla stopped laughing.
Clitumna aged almost overnight. Though her years numbered only fifty, the death of her nephew had kicked the ageing process into a gallop; now the death of her dearest friend and her lover compounded her devastation. Not even Sulla had the power to jolly her out of her megrims. Not mime nor farce could lure her out of the house, nor could her regular visitors Scylax and Marsyas provoke a smile. What appalled her was the shrinking world of her intimates as well as her own encroaching dotage; if Sulla should abandon her for his inheritance from Nicopolis had freed him from economic dependence upon her she would be completely alone. A prospect she dreaded. Soon after Nicopolis died, she sent for Gaius Julius Caesar. "One cannot leave anything to the dead," she said to him, "and so I must alter my will yet again." The will was altered forthwith, and taken back to repose in the Vestal pigeonholes. Still she moped. Her tears dropped like rain, her once restless hands were folded in her lap like two unbaked leaves of pastry waiting for the cook to fill them. Everyone worried; everyone understood there was nothing to be done save wait for time to heal. If there was time. For Sulla it was time. Julilla's latest missive said:
I love you, even though the months and now the years have shown me how little my love is returned, how little my fate matters to you. Last June I turned eighteen, by rights I should be married, but I have managed to postpone that evil necessity by making myself ill. I must marry you, you and no one but you, my most beloved, my dearest Lucius Cornelius. And so my father hesitates, unable to present me to anyone as a suitable or desirable bride, and I shall keep it that way until you come to me and say that you will marry me. Once you said I was a baby, I would grow out of my immature love for you, but surely so long after it is almost two years I have proven my worth, I have proven that my love for you is as constant as the return of the sun from the south each spring. She is gone, your thin Greek lady I hated with every breath I drew, and cursed, and wished dead dead dead. You see how powerful I am, Lucius Cornelius? Why then do you not understand that you cannot escape me? No heart can be as full of love as mine and not generate reciprocation. You do love me, I know you love me. Give in, Lucius Cornelius, give in. Come and see me, kneel down beside my bed of pain and sorrow, let me draw down your head onto my breast, and offer me your kiss. Don't sentence me to die! Choose to let me live. Choose to marry me.
Yes, for Sulla it was time. Time to end many things. Time to slough off Clitumna, and Julilla, and all those other dreadful human commitments which tied his spirit down and cast such eerie shadows into the corners of his mind. Even Metrobius must go. Thus midway through October Sulla went to knock on Gaius Julius Caesar's door at an hour when he could confidently expect the master of the house to be at home. And confidently expect that the women of the house would be banished to their quarters; Gaius Julius Caesar was not the kind of husband or father to permit his womenfolk to rub shoulders with his clients or his men friends. For though a part of his reason for knocking on Gaius Julius Caesar's door was to rid himself of Julilla, he had no wish to set eyes on her; every part of him, every thinking component, every source of energy, must be focused on Gaius Julius Caesar and what he had to say to Gaius Julius Caesar. What he had to say must be said without arousing any suspicion or mistrust. He had already gone with Caesar to have Nicopolis's will probated, and come into his inheritance so easily, so free from reproach, that he was doubly wary. Even when he had presented himself to the censors, Scaurus and Drusus, everything went as smoothly as a well-orchestrated theatrical production, for Caesar had insisted upon going with him, and stood guarantor for the authenticity of all the papers he had had to produce for censorial scrutiny. At the end of it all, none other than Marcus Livius Drusus and Marcus Aemilius Scaurus had risen to their feet and shaken him by the hand and congratulated him sincerely. It was like a dream but was it possible he would never again have to wake? So, without the slightest need to contrive it, imperceptibly he had slipped into an acquaintance with Gaius Julius Caesar that ripened into a rather distant kind of friendly tolerance. To the Caesar house he never went; the acquaintance was pursued in the Forum. Both Caesar's sons were in Africa with their brother-in-law, Gaius Marius, but he had come to know Marcia a little in the weeks since Nicopolis had died, for she had made it her business to visit Clitumna. And it had not been hard to see that Marcia eyed him askance; Clitumna, he suspected, was not as discreet as she might have been about the bizarre relationship among Sulla and herself and Nicopolis. However, he knew very well that Marcia found him dangerously attractive, though her manner gave him to understand that she had classified his attractiveness somewhere between the alien beauty of a snake and a scorpion. Thus Sulla's anxieties as he knocked on Gaius Julius Caesar's door halfway through October, aware that he did not dare postpone the next phase of his plans any further. He must act before Clitumna began to cheer up. And that meant he had to be sure of Gaius Julius Caesar. The lad on door duty opened to him immediately, and did not hesitate to admit him, which indicated to Sulla that he had been placed on Caesar's list of those he was prepared to see anytime he was home. "Is Gaius Julius receiving?" he asked. "He is, Lucius Cornelius. Please wait," said the lad, and sped off toward Caesar's study. Prepared to wait for a little while, Sulla strolled into the modest atrium, noting that this room, so plain and unadorned, contrived to make Clitumna's atrium look like the anteroom to an Eastern potentate's harem. And as he debated the nature of Caesar's atrium, Julilla walked into it. For how long had she persuaded every servant likely to be given door duty that she must be told the moment Lucius Cornelius came to call? And how long would it be before the lad sped where he ought to have sped in the beginning, to tell Caesar who had come to call? These two questions flew into Sulla's mind faster than it took a flicker of lightning to extinguish itself, faster than the responses of his body to the shock of the sight of her. His knees gave way; he had to put out a hand to grab at the first object it could find, which happened to be an old silver-gilt ewer standing on a side table. Since the ewer was not anchored to the table, his frantic clutching at it unseated it, and it fell to the floor with a ringing, clanging crash just as Julilla, hands over her face, ran out of the room again. The noise echoed like the interior of the Sibyl's cave at Cumae, and brought everyone running. Aware that he had lost every last vestige of what little color he owned, and that he had broken out in a chilling sweat of fear and anguish, Sulla elected to let his legs buckle completely, slid down the length of his toga to the floor, and sat there with his head between his knees and his eyes fast closed, trying to blot out the image of the skeleton wrapped in Julilla's golden skin. When Caesar and Marcia got him to his feet and assisted him to walk into the study, he had reason to be thankful for the grey tinge in his face, the faint blueness about his lips; for he really did present the picture of a man genuinely ill. A draft of unwatered wine brought him to a semblance of normality, and he was able to sit up on the couch with a sigh, wiping his brow with one hand. Had either of them seen? And where had Julilla gone? What to say? What to do? Caesar looked very grim. So did Marcia. "I'm sorry, Gaius Julius," he said, sipping again at the wine. "A faintness I don't know what came over me." "Take your time, Lucius Cornelius," said Caesar. "I know what came over you. You saw a ghost." No, this was not the man to cheat at least not blatantly. He was far too intelligent, far too perceptive. "Was it the little girl?" he asked. "Yes," said Caesar, and nodded a dismissal to his wife, who left at once, and without a look or a murmur. . "I used to see her several years ago around the Porticus Margaritaria in the company of her friends," said Sulla, "and I thought she was oh, everything a young Roman girl should be always laughing, never vulgar I don't know. And then once on the Palatium I was in pain a pain of the soul, you understand " "Yes, I think I do," said Caesar. "She thought I was ill, and asked if she could help me. I wasn't very nice to her all I could think was that you wouldn't want her striking up an acquaintance with the likes of me. But she wouldn't be put off, and I just couldn't manage to be rude enough. Do you know what she did?" Sulla's eyes were even stranger than usual, for the pupils had dilated and now were huge, and around them were two thin rings of pallid grey-white, and two rings of grey-black outside of that; they gazed up at Caesar a little blindly, and did not look human. "What did she do?" asked Caesar gently. "She made me a grass crown! She made me a grass crown and she put it on my head. Me! And I saw I saw something!" A silence fell. Because neither man could fathom how to break it, it lingered for many moments, moments during which each man assembled his thoughts and circled warily, wondering if the other was an ally or an adversary. Neither wanted to force the issue. "Well," said Caesar finally, sighing, "what did you come to see me about, Lucius Cornelius?" It was his way of saying that he accepted the fact of Sulla's innocence, no matter what interpretation he might have put upon the conduct of his daughter. And it was his way of saying that he wished to hear no more on the subject of his daughter; Sulla, whose thoughts had dwelled upon bringing up Julilla's letters, decided not to. His original purpose in coming to see Caesar now seemed very far away, and quite unreal. But Sulla squared his shoulders and got off the couch, seated himself in the more manly chair on the client's side of Caesar's desk, and assumed the air of a client. "Clitumna," he said. "I wanted to talk to you about her. Or it might be that I should talk to your wife about Clitumna. But the proper person to start with is you, certainly. She's not herself. Well, you're aware of that. Depressed weepy uninterested. Not at all the sort of behavior I'd call normal. Or even normal in this time of grief. The thing is, I don't know what to do for the best." He filled his chest with air. "I owe her a duty, Gaius Julius. Yes, she's a poor silly vulgar sort of woman and not exactly an adornment to the neighborhood, but I do owe her a duty. She was good to my father, and she's been good to me. And I don't know what to do for the best about her, I really don't." Caesar sat back in his chair, conscious that something about this petition jarred. Nothing did he doubt in Sulla's story, for he had seen Clitumna himself, and listened often enough to Marcia on the subject. No, what perturbed him was Sulla's coming to him seeking advice; not in character for Sulla, thought Caesar, who very much doubted that Sulla was experiencing any uncertainty what to do about his stepmother, who gossip said was his mistress as well. About that, Caesar wasn't prepared to hazard a guess; if his coming here to seek help was any indication, it was probably a distorted lie, typical Palatine gossip. Just as was the rumor that Sulla's stepmother had been sexually involved with the dead woman, Nicopolis. Just as was the rumor that Sulla had been sexually involved with both of them and at the same time, no less! Marcia had indicated that she thought there was something fishy about the situation, but, when pressed, hadn't been able to produce any concrete evidence. Caesar's disinclination to believe these rumors was not mere naiveté; it was due more to a personal fastidiousness which not only dictated his own behavior, but reflected itself in his beliefs about the behavior of others. Proof positive was one thing, hearsay quite another. In spite of which, something did not ring true about Sulla's coming here today to seek advice. It was at this point that an answer occurred to Caesar. Not for one moment did he think there was anything established between Sulla and his younger daughter but for a man of Sulla's character to faint upon seeing a starved-looking young girl incredible! Then had come that odd story about Julilla's fashioning him a grass crown. Caesar of course understood the significance of that completely. Perhaps their congress had been limited to a very few times, and mostly in passing; but, decided Caesar, there was definitely something between them. Not shabby, not shoddy, not shifty either. Just something. Something worth watching carefully. Naturally he could not condone a relationship of any kind between them. And if they had an affinity for each other, that was too bad. Julilla must go to a man able to hold his head up in the circles to which the Caesars belonged. While Caesar leaned back in his chair and considered these things, Sulla leaned back in his chair and wondered what was going through Caesar's mind. Because of Julilla, the interview had not gone according to plan, even remotely. How could he have had so little self-control? Fainting! He, Lucius Cornelius Sulla! After betraying himself so obviously, he had had little choice save to explain himself to this watchful father, and that in turn had meant telling a part of the truth; had it helped Julilla, he would have told all of the truth, but he didn't think Caesar would relish perusing those letters. I have made myself vulnerable to Gaius Julius Caesar, thought Sulla, and disliked the sensation very much. "Have you any course of action in mind for Clitumna?" asked Caesar. Sulla frowned. "Well, she has a villa at Circei, and I wondered if it might not be a good idea to persuade her to go down there and stay for a while," he said. "Why ask me?" The frown deepened; Sulla saw the gulf open beneath his feet, and endeavored to leap it. "You are quite right, Gaius Julius. Why ask you? The truth is, I'm caught between Scylla and Charybdis, and I was hoping you'd extend me an oar and rescue me." "In what way can I rescue you? What do you mean?" "I think Clitumna is suicidal," said Sulla. "Oh." "The thing is, how can I combat it? I'm a man, and with Nicopolis dead, there is literally no woman of Clitumna's house or family or even among her servants in a position of sufficient trust and affection to help Clitumna through." Sulla leaned forward, warming to his theme. "Rome isn't the place for her now, Gaius Julius! But how can I send her down to Circei without a woman to rely on? I'm not sure that I'm a person she wants to see at the moment, and besides, I I I have things to do in Rome at the moment! What I was wondering was, would your wife be willing to accompany Clitumna down to Circei for a few weeks? This suicidal mood won't last, I'm sure of that, but as of this moment, I'm very worried. The villa is very comfortable, and even though it's turning cold, Circei is good for the health at any time of the year. It might benefit your wife to breathe a bit of sea air." Caesar visibly relaxed, looking as if an enormous load had suddenly vanished from his bowed back. "I see, Lucius Cornelius, I see. And I understand better than you think. My wife has indeed become the person Clitumna depends upon most. Unfortunately, I cannot spare her. You have seen Julilla, so you do not need to be told how desperate our situation is. My wife is needed at home. Nor would she consent to leave, fond of Clitumna though she is." Sulla looked eager. "Well, why couldn't Julilla go down to Circei with them? The change might work wonders for her!" But Caesar shook his head. "No, Lucius Cornelius, I am afraid it's out of the question. I myself am fixed in Rome until the spring. I could not countenance the absence of my wife and daughter from Rome unless I could be with them, not because I am selfish enough to deny them a treat, but because I would worry about them all the time they were away. If Julilla was well, it would be different. So no." "I understand, Gaius Julius, and I sympathize." Sulla got up to go. "Send Clitumna to Circei, Lucius Cornelius. She'll be all right." Caesar walked his guest to the front door, and opened it himself. "Thank you forbearing with my foolishness," said Sulla. "It was no burden. In fact, I'm very glad you came. I think I can deal better with my daughter now. And I confess I like you the better for this morning's events, Lucius Cornelius. Keep me informed about Clitumna." And, smiling, Caesar held out his hand. But the moment he closed the door behind Sulla, Caesar went to find Julilla. She was in her mother's sitting room, weeping desolately, her head buried in her arms as she slumped against the worktable. One hand to her lips, Marcia rose as Caesar appeared in the doorway; together they crept out and left her weeping. "Gaius Julius, it is terrible," said Marcia, lips tight. "Have they been seeing each other?" A burning blush ran up under Marcia's pale-brown skin; she shook her head so savagely that the pins holding her hair in a prim bun loosened, and the bun dangled half-unrolled on the nape of her neck. "No, they haven't been seeing each other!" She struck her hands together, wrung them. "Oh, the shame of it! The humiliation!" Caesar possessed himself of the writhing hands and held them gently but firmly still. "Calm yourself, wife, calm yourself! Nothing can possibly be so bad that you drive yourself into an illness. Now tell me." "Such deceit! Such indelicacy!" "Calm yourself. Start at the beginning." "It's had nothing to do with him, it's all her own doing! Our daughter, Gaius Julius, has spent the last two years shaming herself and her family by by throwing herself at the head of a man who is not only unfit to wipe the mud off her shoes, but who doesn't even want her! And more than that, Gaius Julius, more than that! She has tried to capture his attention by starving herself and so forcing a guilt upon him he has done nothing to earn! Letters, Gaius Julius! Hundreds of letters her girl has delivered to him, accusing him of indifference and neglect, blaming him for her illness, pleading for his love the way a female dog grovels!" Marcia's eyes poured tears, but they were tears of disillusionment, of a terrible anger. "Calm yourself," Caesar repeated yet again. "Come, Marcia, you can cry later. I must deal with Julilla, and you must see me deal with her." Marcia calmed herself, dried her eyes; together they went back to her sitting room. Julilla was still weeping, hadn't noticed that she was alone. Sighing, Caesar sat in his wife's favorite chair, hunting in the sinus of his toga as he did so, and finally bringing out his handkerchief. "Here, Julilla, blow your nose and stop crying, like a good girl," he said, thrusting the cloth under her arm. "The waterworks are wasted. It's time to talk." Most of Julilla's tears had their source in terror at being found out, so the reassuringly strong firm impartial tone of her father's voice enabled her to do as she was told. The waterworks turned off; she sat with her head down, her frail body shaken by convulsive hiccoughs. "You have been starving yourself because of Lucius Cornelius Sulla, is that right?" her father asked. She didn't answer. "Julilla, you cannot avoid the question, and you'll get no mercy by maintaining silence. Is Lucius Cornelius the cause of all this?" "Yes," she whispered. Caesar's voice continued to sound strong, firm, impartial, but the words it framed burned into Julilla all the deeper for its level tone; so did he speak to a slave who had done him some unpardonable wrong, never did he speak to his daughter thus. Until now. "Do you even begin to understand the pain, the worry, the fatigue you have caused this entire family for the past year and more? Ever since you began to waste away, you have been the pivot around which every one of us has turned. Not only me, your mother, your brothers, and your sister, but our loyal and admirable servants, our friends, our neighbors. You have driven us to the edge of dementia. And for what? Can you tell me for what?" "No," she whispered. "Nonsense! Of course you can! You've been playing a game with us, Julilla. A cruel and selfish game, conducted with a patience and intelligence worthy of a nobler purpose. You fell in love at sixteen years of age! with a fellow you knew was unsuitable, could never meet with my approval. A fellow who understood his unsuitability, and gave you absolutely no kind of encouragement. So you proceeded to act with deceit, with cunning, with an aim so manipulatory and exploitative ! Words fail me, Julilla," said Caesar unemotionally. His daughter shivered. His wife shivered. "It seems I must refresh your memory, daughter. Do you know who I am?" Julilla didn't answer, head down. "Look at me!" Her face came up at that; drowned eyes fixed themselves on Caesar, terrified and wild. "No, I can see that you don't know who I am," said Caesar, still in conversational voice. "Therefore, daughter, it behooves me to tell you. I am the paterfamilias, the absolute head of this household. My very word is law. My actions are not actionable. Whatever I choose to do and say within the bounds of this household, I can do and I can say. No law of the Senate and People of Rome stands between me and my absolute authority over my household, my family. For Rome has structured her laws to ensure that the Roman family is above the law of all save the paterfamilias. If my wife commits adultery, Julilla, I can kill her, or have her killed. If my son is guilty of moral turpitude, or cowardice, or any other kind of social imbecility, I can kill him, or have him killed. If my daughter is unchaste, Julilla, I can kill her, or have her killed. If any member of my household from my wife through my sons and my daughters to my mother, to my servants transgresses the bounds of what I regard as decent conduct, I can kill him or her, or have him or her killed. Do you understand, Julilla?" Her eyes had not swerved from his face. "Yes," she said. "It grieves me as much as it shames me to inform you that you have transgressed the bounds of what I regard as decent conduct, daughter. You have made your family and the servants of this household above all you have made its paterfamilias your victim. Your puppet. Your plaything. And for what? For self-gratification, for personal satisfaction, for the most abominable of motives yourself alone." "But I love him, tata!" she cried. Caesar reared up, outraged. "Love? What do you know of that peerless emotion, Julilla? How can you besmirch the word 'love' with whatever base imitation you have experienced? Is it love, to make your beloved's life a misery? Is it love, to force your beloved to a commitment he doesn't want, hasn't asked for? Well, is any of it love, Julilla?" "I suppose not," she whispered, and then added, "but I thought it was." The eyes of her parents met above her head; in both lay a wry and bitter pain as they finally understood Julilla's limitations, their own illusions. "Believe me, Julilla, whatever it was you felt that made you behave so shabbily and dishonorably, it was not love," said Caesar, and stood up. "There will be no more cow's milk, no more eggs, no more honey. You will eat whatever the rest of your family eats. Or you will not eat. It is a matter of no moment to me. As your father and as paterfamilias, I have treated you from the time of your birth with honor, with respect, with kindness, with consideration, with tolerance. You have not thought well enough of me to reciprocate. I do not cast you off. And I am not going to kill you, or have you killed. But from this time on, whatever you make of yourself is entirely on your own head. You have injured me and mine, Julilla. Perhaps even more unpardonably, you have injured a man who owes you nothing, for he does not know you and is not related to you. Later on, when you are less appalling to look at, I shall require that you apologize to Lucius Cornelius Sulla. I do not require an apology from you for any of the rest of us, for you have lost our love and respect, and that renders apologies valueless." He walked out of the room. Julilla's face puckered; she turned instinctively toward her mother, and tried to hurl herself into her mother's arms. But Marcia drew back as if her daughter wore a poisoned robe. "Disgusting!" she hissed. "All that for the sake of a man who isn't fit to lick the ground a Caesar walks on!" "Oh, Mama!" "Don't 'oh, Mama!' me! You wanted to be grown up, Julilla; you wanted to be woman enough to marry. Now live with it." And Marcia too walked out of the room. Wrote Gaius Julius Caesar some days later to his son-in-law, Gaius Marius:
And so, the unhappy business is finally wearing itself down. I wish I could say that Julilla has learned a lesson, but I very much doubt it. In later years, Gaius Marius, you too will face all the torments and dilemmas of parenthood, and I wish I could offer you the comfort of saying that you will learn by my mistakes. But you will not. For just as each and every child born into this world is different, and must be handled differently, so too is every parent different. Where did we go wrong with Julilla? I do not honestly know. I do not even know if we went wrong at all. Perhaps the flaw is innate, intrinsic. I am bitterly hurt, and so too is poor Marcia, as best evidenced by her subsequent rejection of all Julilla's overtures of friendship and regret. The child suffers terribly, but I have had to ask myself whether we owe it to her to maintain our distance for the present, and I have decided we must do so. Love we have always given her, an opportunity to discipline herself we have not. If she is to gain any good out of all this, she must suffer. Justice forced me to seek out our neighbor Lucius Cornelius Sulla, and tender him a collective apology which will have to do until Julilla's looks have improved and she can apologize to him in person. Though he didn't want to hand them over, I insisted that he return all of Julilla's letters one of the few times being paterfamilias has had real value. I made Julilla burn them, but not until she had read every one of the silly things out to me and her mother. How awful, to have to be so hard upon one's own flesh and blood! But I very much fear that only the most personally galling of lessons will sink into Julilla's self-centered little heart. There. Enough of Julilla and her schemes. Far more important things are happening. I may actually turn out to be the first to send this news to Africa Province, as I have a firm promise that this will go on a fast packet leaving Puteoli tomorrow. Marcus Junius Silanus has been shockingly defeated by the Germans. Over thirty thousand men are dead, the rest so demoralized and poorly led that they have scattered in all directions. Not that Silanus seems to care, or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that he seems to value his own survival ahead of his troops'. He brought the news to Rome himself, but in such a toned-down version that he stole a march on public indignation, and by the time that all the truth was known, he had stripped the disaster of much of its shock value. Of course what he's aiming for is to wriggle out of treason charges, and I think he'll succeed. If the Mamilian Commission were empowered to try him, a conviction might be possible. But a trial in the Centuriate Assembly, with all those antiquated rules and regulations, and so many jurors? It's not worth the effort of initiating proceedings, and so most of us feel. And, I hear you ask, what of the Germans? Are they even now pouring down toward the coast of the Middle Sea, are the inhabitants of Massilia packing up in panic? No. For would you believe it, having annihilated Silanus's army, they promptly turned around again and went north. How can one deal with an enemy so enigmatic, so utterly unpredictable? I tell you, Gaius Marius, we shiver in our boots. For they will come. Later rather than sooner, it now seems, they will come. And we have no better commanders to oppose them than the likes of Marcus Junius Silanus. As usual these days, the Italian Allied legions took the brunt of the losses, though many Roman soldiers fell too. And the Senate is having to deal with a stream of complaints from the Marsi and the Samnites, and a host of other Italian nations. But to finish on a lighter note, we are currently having a hilarious battle with our esteemed censor Marcus Aemilius Scaurus. The other censor, Marcus Livius Drusus, died very suddenly three weeks ago, which brought the lustrum of the censors to an abrupt end. Scaurus of course is obliged to stand down. Only he won't! And therein lies the hilarity. As soon as the funeral of Drusus was over, the Senate convened and directed Scaurus to lay aside his censorial duties so that the lustrum could be officially closed in the customary ceremony. Scaurus refused. "I was elected censor, I'm in the middle of letting contracts for my building programs, and I cannot possibly abandon my work at this juncture," he said. "Marcus Aemilius, Marcus Aemilius, it isn't up to you!" said Metellus Dalmaticus Pontifex Maximus. "The law says that when one censor dies in office, the lustrum is at an end, and his fellow censor must resign immediately." "I don't care what the law says!" Scaurus replied. "I cannot resign immediately, and I will not resign immediately." They begged and they pleaded, they shouted and they argued, all to no avail. Scaurus was determined to create a precedent by flouting convention and remaining censor. So they begged and they pleaded, they shouted and they argued all over again. Until Scaurus lost patience and temper. "I piss on the lot of you!" he cried, and went right on with his contracts and his plans. So Dalmaticus Pontifex Maximus called another meeting of the Senate, and forced it to pass a formal consultum calling for Scaurus's immediate resignation. Off went a deputation to the Campus Martius, and there interviewed Scaurus as he sat on the podium of the temple of Jupiter Stator, which edifice he had chosen for his office because it's right next door to the Porticus Metelli, where most of the building contractors have their headquarters. Now as you know, I am not a Scaurus man. He's as crafty as Ulysses and as big a liar as Paris. But oh, I do wish you could have seen him make mincemeat out of them! How such an ugly, skinny, undersized specimen as Scaurus can do it, I do not know he hasn't even got a hair left on his head! Marcia says it's his beautiful green eyes and his even more beautiful speaking voice and his wonderful sense of humor. Well, I will admit the sense of humor, but the charms of his ocular and vocal apparatus escape me. Marcia says I'm a typical man, though what her point about that is, I do not know. Women tend to seek refuge in such remarks when pinned down to logic, I have found. But there must also be some obscure logic to his success, and who knows? Perhaps Marcia has the right of it. So there he sat, the little poseur, surrounded by all the utter magnificence of Rome's first marble temple, and those glorious statues of Alexander the Great's generals all mounted on horseback that Metellus Macedonicus pillaged from Alexander's old capital of Pella. Dominating the lot. How can that be possible, a hairless Roman runt outclassing Lysippus's quite superbly lifelike horses? I swear every time I see Alexander's generals, I expect them to step down from their plinths and ride away, each horse as different as Ptolemy is from Parmenion. I digress. Back to business, then. When Scaurus saw the deputation he shoved contracts and contractors aside and sat spear-straight on his curule chair, toga perfectly draped, one foot extended in the classic pose. "Well?" he asked, addressing his question to Dalmaticus Pontifex Maximus, who had been appointed the spokesman. "Marcus Aemilius, the Senate has formally passed a consultum commanding that you resign your censorship at once," said this unhappy man. "I won't do it," said Scaurus. "You must!" bleated Dalmaticus. "I mustn't anything!" said Scaurus, and turned his shoulder on them, beckoning the contractors to draw close again. "Now what was I saying before I was so rudely interrupted?" he asked. Dalmaticus tried again. "Marcus Aemilius, please!" But all he got for his pontificial pains was an "I piss on you! Piss, piss, piss!" The Senate having shot its bolt, the whole problem was referred to the Plebeian Assembly, thereby making the Plebs responsible for a matter it hadn't created, considering that it is the Centuriate Assembly, a more exclusive body by far than the Plebeian Assembly, that elects the censors. However, the Plebs did hold a meeting to discuss Scaurus's stand, and handed its College of Tribunes one last duty for their year in office. They were instructed to remove Marcus Aemilius Scaurus from office as censor, one way or another. So yesterday, the ninth day of December, saw all ten tribunes of the plebs march off to the temple of Jupiter Stator, Gaius Mamilius Limetanus in their lead. "I am directed by the People of Rome, Marcus Aemilius, to depose you from office as censor," said Mamilius. "As the People did not elect me, Gaius Mamilius, the People cannot depose me," said Scaurus, his hairless scone shining in the sun like a polished old winter apple. "Nonetheless, Marcus Aemilius, the People are sovereign, and the People say you must step down," said Mamilius. "I won't step down!" said Scaurus. "In that case, Marcus Aemilius, I am authorized by the People to arrest you and cast you into prison until you formally resign," said Mamilius. "Lay one hand on me, Gaius Mamilius, and you will revert to the soprano voice of your boyhood!" said Scaurus. Whereupon Mamilius turned to the crowd which had naturally gathered to see the spectacle, and cried out to it, "People of Rome, I call you to witness the fact that I hereby interpose my veto against any further censorial activity by Marcus Aemilius Scaurus!" he declared. And that of course was the end of the matter. Scaurus rolled up his contracts and handed everything over to his clerks, had his chair slave fold up his ivory seat, and stood bowing in all directions to the applauding throng, which loves nothing better than a good confrontation between its magistrates, and adores Scaurus wholeheartedly because he has the kind of courage all Romans admire in their magistrates. Then he strolled down the temple steps, gave Perdiccas's roan horse a pat in passing, linked his arm through Mamilius's, and left the field wearing all the laurels.
Caesar sighed, leaned back in his chair, and decided that he had better comment upon the news Marius by no means such a wordy correspondent as his father-in-law had sent from the Roman African province, where Metellus, it appeared, had succeeded in bogging the war against Jugurtha in a mire of inconsistent activity and poor generalship. Or at least that was Marius's version, though it did not tally with the reports Metellus kept sending the Senate.
You will shortly hear if you have not heard already that the Senate has prorogued Quintus Caecilius's command of the African province and the Jugurthine war. It will not in any way surprise you, I am sure. And I expect that, having leaped this biggest hurdle, Quintus Caecilius will step up his military activity, for once the Senate has prorogued a governor's command, he can be sure to retain that command until he considers the danger to his province over. It is a shrewd tactic to be inert until the consulship year is over and proconsular imperium is bestowed. But yes, I do agree that your general was shockingly dilatory in not even starting his campaign until summer was almost over, especially considering that he arrived in early spring. But his dispatches say his army needed thorough training, and the Senate believes them. And yes, it escapes me as to why he appointed you, an infantryman, to lead his cavalry arm, just as it seems a waste of Publius Rutilius's talents to use him as praefectus fabrum when he would serve better in the field than running round dealing with supply columns and artillery repairs. However, it is the prerogative of the general to use his men as he likes, from his senior legates all the way down to his auxiliary rankers. All Rome was delighted when the news of the capture of Vaga came, though I note your letter said the town surrendered. And if you will forgive my playing Quintus Caecilius's advocate I fail to see why you are so indignant at the appointment of Quintus Caecilius's friend Turpillius as the commander of the Vaga garrison. Is it important? I am far more impressed with your version of the battle at the river Muthul than I am with the version contained-in Quintus Caecilius's senatorial dispatch, which should console you somewhat for my hint of skepticism, and reassure you that I do indeed remain on your side. And I'm sure you're right in telling Quintus Caecilius that the best way to win the war against Numidia is to capture Jugurtha himself, for, like you, I believe him to be the fountainhead of all Numidian resistance. I'm sorry this first year has been so frustrating for you, and that Quintus Caecilius has apparently decided he can win without properly using either your talents or those of Publius Rutilius. It will make your attempt to be elected consul the year after next much harder if you do not receive an opportunity to shine in the coming Numidian campaigns. But, Gaius Marius, I do not expect that you will take such cavalier treatment lying down, and I'm sure you'll find a way to shine in spite of the very worst Quintus Caecilius can do. I shall close with one further Forum item. Due to the loss of Silanus's army in Gaul-across-the-Alps, the Senate has nullified one of the last surviving laws of Gaius Gracchus, namely the one limiting the number of times a man can enlist. Nor does he have to be seventeen anymore, nor do ten years under the colors exclude him from the levies anymore, nor do six campaigns exclude him anymore. A sign of the times. Both Rome and Italy are rapidly becoming denuded of men for the legions. Do look after yourself, and write as soon as my mild attempts to play advocate for Quintus Caecilius have faded enough to allow you to think of me with affection. I am still your father-in-law, and I still think very well of you.
And that, decided Gaius Julius Caesar, was a letter well worth the sending, full of news and good advice and comfort. Gaius Marius would have it before the old year expired.
In the end it was almost halfway through December before Sulla escorted Clitumna down to Circei, all solicitude and tender kindness. Though he had worried that his plans might go awry because time would improve Clitumna's mood, the extraordinary change in his luck continued to bless him, for Clitumna remained deeply depressed, as Marcia would be bound to report to Caesar. As villas on the Campanian coast went, Clitumna's version was not overlarge, but even so, it was far bigger than the house on the Palatine; vacationing Romans able to afford the luxury of owning country villas liked to feel surrounded by space. Standing atop a volcanic headland and having its own private beach, the villa lay some distance south of Circei, and had no close neighbors. One of the many speculation builders who frequented the Campanian coast had put it up during the course of the winter three years before, and Clitumna had bought it the moment she discovered the builder had a genius for plumbing, and had installed a shower bath as well as a proper bathing tub. Thus the first thing Clitumna did after she arrived was to have a shower bath, after which she dined, after which she and Sulla went to bed in separate rooms, and alone. He remained at Circei for two days only, devoting all his time to Clitumna, who continued to be cheerless, though she didn't want Sulla to leave. "I have a surprise for you," he said to her as he walked with her in the grounds of the villa early in the morning of the day he returned to Rome. Even that hardly evoked a response. "Yes?" she asked. "On the first night of the full moon you will receive your surprise," he said seductively. "Night?" she asked, becoming the slightest bit interested. "Night, and full moon! That is, provided it's a fine clear night and you can see the full moon." They were standing beneath the tall front facade of the villa, which like most was built upon sloping ground, with a loggia atop the front section, where the villa dweller could sit to take in the view. Behind this narrow front facade was a vast peristyle-garden, and behind the peristyle-garden lay the villa proper, in which the bulk of the rooms were situated. The stables were located on the ground level of the front facade, with living quarters for the stable staff above, and the loggia above that again. The land in front of Clitumna's villa sloped away in grass and tangles of rambling roses to the cliff top, and was most artfully planted on either flank with a grove of trees which ensured privacy should another villa go up on the next block of land. Sulla pointed to the large clump of salt pines and pencil cypresses on their left. "It's a secret, Clitumna," he said in what she called his "growly voice," always a sign of prolonged and particularly delicious lovemaking. "What is a secret?" she asked, beginning to be eager. "If I told you, it wouldn't be a secret any longer," he whispered, nibbling her ear. She squirmed a little, cheered up a little. "Is the secret the same as the surprise on the night of the moon?" "Yes. But you must keep everything a secret, including my promising you a surprise. Swear?" "I swear," she said. "What you must do is sneak out of the house at the beginning of the third hour of darkness, eight days from last night. You must come down here absolutely on your own, and hide in that grove of trees," said Sulla, stroking her flank. Her listlessness was gone. "Oooooooooh! Is it a nice surprise?" she asked, squeaking on the last word. "It will be the biggest surprise of your entire life," said Sulla, "and that's not an idle promise, darling. But I do require a couple of conditions." She wrinkled her nose girlishly and simpered, looking very silly. "Yes?" "First of all, no one must know, not even little Bithy. If you do take anyone into your confidence, your chief surprise will be disappointment. And I will be very, very angry. You don't like it when I'm very, very angry, do you, Clitumna?" She shivered. "No, Lucius Cornelius." "Then keep our secret. Your reward will be amazing, a completely new and different kind of experience," he whispered. "In fact, if you can manage to seem specially downcast from now until you receive your surprise, it will turn out even better, I promise you." "I'll be good, Lucius Cornelius," she said fervently. He could see the way her mind was working, and knew that she had decided the surprise was a new and delectable companion female, attractive, sexually willing, compatible, and a cozy gossipy talker for the passing of the long days between the lovely nights. But she knew Sulla well enough to understand that she must abide by his conditions, or he was just as likely to take whoever it was away again forever perhaps install her in an apartment of her own, now that he had Nicopolis's money. Besides which, no one defied Sulla when he spoke in earnest, a reason why the servants of Clitumna's household held their tongues about what had gone on between Clitumna and Nicopolis and Sulla, and if they ever said anything at all, did so in a fear which robbed their words of much of their normal impact. "There's a second condition," he said. She snuggled against him. "Yes, darling Lucius?" "If the night is not fine, the surprise cannot come. So you will have to respect the weather. If the first night is wet, wait for the next dry one." "I understand, Lucius Cornelius."
Thus Sulla drove off to Rome in a hired gig leaving Clitumna faithfully hugging her secret, and trying assiduously to present a picture of acute depression. Even Bithy, with whom Clitumna had taken to sleeping, believed her mistress desolate. Upon reaching Rome, Sulla summoned the steward of Clitumna's house on the Palatine; he was one staff member not relocated to Circei, as the villa there had its own steward, who acted as caretaker in his mistress's absence and cheated her very cleverly. So did the steward of her Palatine house. "How many servants did the mistress leave here, Iamus?" asked Sulla, sitting at his desk in the study; he was evidently making out some kind of list, for it lay beneath his hand. "Just myself, two house boys, two house girls, a market boy, and the undercook, Lucius Cornelius," said the steward. "Well, you're going to have to hire some extra help, because four days from now, Iamus, I am going to throw a party." Sulla flapped his list at the astonished steward, who didn't know whether to protest that the lady Clitumna had given him no word of a party in her absence, or to go along with the idea and pray there were no ructions later, when the bills came in. Then Sulla relieved his mind. "It's my show, so I'm paying for it," said Sulla, "and there'll be a big bonus in it for you on two conditions one, that you co-operate fully in helping me put on the party, and two, that you make no mention of it to the lady Clitumna after she returns home, whenever that may be. Is that clear?" "Fully, Lucius Cornelius," said Iamus, bowing deeply; largesse was a subject every slave risen high enough to be a steward understood almost as well as he understood how to doctor the household account books. Off went Sulla to hire dancers, musicians, tumblers, singers, magicians, clowns, and other acts. For this was going to be the party to end all parties, one he intended would be heard far and wide across the Palatine. His last stop was the flat of Scylax the comedic actor. "I want to borrow Metrobius," he said, erupting into the room Scylax had preferred to set up as a sitting room rather than as a study. It was the apartment of a voluptuary, redolent with incense and cassia wood, tapestried to death, overfurnished with couches and pouffes all stuffed with the finest wool. Scylax sat up indignantly at the same moment Sulla was sinking into one of the sybaritically cushioned couches. "Honestly, Scylax, you're as soft as custard-pudding and as decadent as a Syrian potentate!" said Sulla. "Why don't you get a bit of ordinary horsehair furniture? This stuff makes a man feel as if he's sinking into the arms of a gigantic whore! Ugh!" "I piss on your taste," lisped Scylax. "As long as you hand over Metrobius, you can piss on anything you like." "Why should I, you you savage?" Scylax ran his hands through his carefully arranged, dyed golden locks; he fluttered his long lashes, darkened with stibium, and rolled his eyes between them. "Because the boy's not yours body and mind," said Sulla, testing a pouffe with his foot to see if it was less yielding. "He is mine body and mind! And he hasn't been the same since you stole him from me and took him all over Italy with you, Lucius Cornelius! I don't know what you did to him, but you certainly spoiled him for me!" Sulla grinned. "Made a man out of him, did I? Doesn't like eating your shit anymore, eh? Aaaaaaaah!" With which sound of disgust, Sulla lifted his head and roared, "Metrobius!" The lad came flying through the door and launched himself straight at Sulla, covering his face with kisses. Over the black head Sulla opened one pale eye at Scylax, and wiggled one ginger brow. "Give up, Scylax, your bum-boy just likes me better," he said, and demonstrated the truth of this by lifting the boy's skirt to display his erection. Scylax burst into tears, streaking his face with stibium. "Come on, Metrobius," said Sulla, struggling to his feet. At the door he turned back to flip a folded paper at the blubbering Scylax. "Party at Clitumna's house in four days," he said. "It's going to be the best one ever, so swallow your spleen and come. You can have Metrobius back if you do."
Everyone was invited, including Hercules Atlas, who was billed as the world's strongest man, and hired himself out to fairs and fetes and festivals from one end of Italy to the other. Never seen outside his door unless wearing a moth-eaten lion skin and toting an enormous club, Hercules Atlas was a bit of an institution. However, he was rarely asked as a guest to the parties where he entertained with his strongman act, for when the wine flowed down his throat like water down the Aqua Marcia, Hercules Atlas became very aggressive and bad-tempered. "You're touched in the head, to ask that bull!" said Metrobius, playing with Sulla's brilliant curls as he leaned over Sulla's shoulder to peer at yet another list. The real change in Metrobius that had occurred while he was away with Sulla was his literacy; Sulla had taught the lad to read and write. Willing to teach him every art he knew from acting to sodomy, Scylax had yet been too crafty to endow him with something as emancipating as letters. "Hercules Atlas is a friend of mine," said Sulla, kissing the lad's fingers one by one with a great deal more pleasure than ever he felt kissing Clitumna's. "But he's a madman when he's drunk!" Metrobius protested. "He'll tear this house apart, and very likely two or three of the guests as well! Hire his act by all means, but don't have him present as a guest!" "I can't do that," said Sulla, seeming unworried. He reached up and pulled Metrobius down across his shoulder, settling the boy in his lap. And Metrobius wound his arms about Sulla's neck and lifted his face: Sulla kissed his eyelids very slowly, very tenderly. "Lucius Cornelius, why won't you keep me?" Metrobius asked, settling against Sulla's arm with a sigh of utter content. The kisses ceased. Sulla frowned. "You're far better off with Scylax," he said abruptly. Metrobius opened huge dark eyes, swimming with love. "But I'm not, truly I'm not! The gifts and the acting training and the money don't matter to me, Lucius Cornelius! I'd much rather be with you, no matter how poor we were!" "A tempting offer, and one I'd take you up on in a trice if I intended to remain poor," said Sulla, holding the boy as if he cherished him. "But I am not going to remain poor. I have Nicopolis's money behind me now, and I'm busy speculating with it. One day I'll have enough to qualify for admission to the Senate." Metrobius sat up. "The Senate!" Twisting, he stared into Sulla's face. "But you can't, Lucius Cornelius! Your ancestors were slaves like me!" "No, they weren't," said Sulla, staring back. "I am a patrician Cornelius. The Senate is where I belong." "I don't believe it!" "It's the truth," said Sulla soberly. "That's why I can't avail myself of your offer, alluring though it is. When I do qualify for the Senate, I'm going to have to become a model of decorum no actors, no mimes and no pretty-boys." He clapped Metrobius on the back, and hugged him. "Now pay attention to the list, lad and stop wriggling! It's not good for my concentration. Hercules Atlas is coming as a guest as well as performing, and that's final." In fact, Hercules Atlas was among the first guests to arrive. Word of the revels to come had got out all up and down the street, of course, and the neighbors had steeled themselves to endure a night of howls, shrieks, loud music, and unimaginable crashes. As usual, it was a costume affair. Sulla had tricked himself out as the absent Clitumna, complete with fringed shawls, rings, and hennaed wig convoluted with sausagelike curls, and he constantly emitted uncanny imitations of her titters, her giggles, her loud whinnies of laughter. Since the guests knew her well, his performance was deeply appreciated. Metrobius was equipped with wings again, but this night he was Icarus rather than Cupid, and had cleverly melted his large feathered fans along their outer edges, so that they drooped, and looked half-finished. Scylax came as Minerva, and contrived to make that stern, tomboyish goddess look like an old and over-made-up whore. When he saw how Metrobius hung all over Sulla, he proceeded to get drunk, and soon forgot how to manage his shield, his distaff, his stuffed owl, and his spear, and eventually tripped over them into a corner, where he wept himself to sleep. Thus Scylax failed to see the endless succession of party turns, the singers who commenced with glorious melodies and stunning trills, and ended in warbling ditties like
My sister Piggy Filler Got caught with Gus the Miller A-grinding of her flower Beneath the miller's tower. "Enough of this," said our dad. "It's clear that you've been had. Married you'd better be quick Or your arse will feel my stick!" which were far more popular with the guests, who, knew the words, and could sing along. There were dancers who stripped to the buff with exquisite artistry, displaying pubes devoid of the smallest hair, and a man whose performing dogs could dance almost as well if not as lubriciously and a famous animal act from Antioch which consisted of a girl and her donkey very, very popular with the audience, the male half of which was too intimidated by the donkey's endowments to proposition the girl afterward. Hercules Atlas did his turn last of all, just before the party segregated into those too drunk to be interested in sex, and those drunk enough to be interested in nothing else. The revelers gathered around the colonnades of the peristyle-garden, in the midst of which Hercules Atlas had set himself up on a very sturdy dais. After warming up by bending a few iron bars and snapping a few thick logs like twigs, the strong man picked up squealing girls by the half dozen, piling them on his shoulders, on his head, and under each arm. Then he lifted an anvil or two in his hands and began to roar lustily, more fearsome than any lion in any arena. Actually he was having a wonderful time, for the wine was flowing down his throat like water down the Aqua Marcia, and his capacity to guzzle was as phenomenal as his strength. The trouble was, the more anvils he picked up, the more uncomfortable the girls became, until their squeals of joy became squeals of terror. Sulla strolled out into the middle of the garden and tapped Hercules Atlas politely on his knee. "Here, old fellow, do drop the girls," he said in the most friendly way. "You're squashing them with lumps of iron." Hercules Atlas dropped the girls immediately. But he picked up Sulla instead, his hair-trigger temper let loose. "Don't you tell me how to do my act!" he bellowed, and spun Sulla around his head like a priest of Isis his wand; wig, shawls, draperies fell from Sulla in a cascade. Some of the party goers began to panic; others decided to help by venturing out into the garden and pleading with the demented strong man to put Sulla down. But Hercules Atlas solved everyone's dilemma by shoving Sulla under his left arm as casually as a shopper a parcel, and leaving the festivities. There was no way he could be stopped. Ploughing through the bodies hurling themselves at him as if they were a cloud of gnats, he gave the door servant a shove in the face that sent him halfway across the atrium, and disappeared into the lane, still toting Sulla. At the top of the Vestal Steps he halted. "All right? Did I do all right, Lucius Cornelius?" he asked, setting Sulla down very gently. "You did perfectly," said Sulla, staggering a little because he was dizzy. "Come, I'll walk home with you." "Not necessary," said Hercules Atlas, hitching up his lion skin and starting down the Vestal Steps. "Only a hop and a skip away from here, Lucius Cornelius, and the moon's just about full." "I insist," said Sulla, catching him up. "Have it your own way," shrugged Hercules Atlas. "Well, it's less public if I pay you inside than out in the middle of the Forum," said Sulla patiently. "Oh, right!" Hercules Atlas clapped a hand to his well-muscled head. "I forgot you haven't paid me yet. Come on, then." He lived in four rooms on the third floor of an insula off the Clivus Orbius, on the fringes of the Subura, but in a better neighborhood by far. Ushered in, Sulla saw at a glance that his slaves had seized their opportunity and taken the night off, no doubt expecting that when their master came in, he would be in no state to take a head count. There did not seem to be a woman of the house, but Sulla checked anyway. "Wife not here?" he asked. Hercules Atlas spat. "Women! I hate 'em," he said. A jug of wine and some cups stood on the table at which the two men seated themselves. Sulla pulled a fat purse from where he had secreted it inside a linen band around his waist. While Hercules Atlas poured two cups full of wine, Sulla loosened the strings holding the mouth of the purse shut, and deftly palmed a plump screw of paper he fished out of its interior. Then he tipped the purse up and sent a stream of bright silver coins tumbling across the tabletop. Too quickly; three or four rolled all the way to the far edge and fell to the floor, tinkling tinnily. "Oh, hey!" cried Hercules Atlas, getting down on all fours to retrieve his pay. While he was occupied in crawling about the floor, Sulla, taking his time, untwisted the paper he had palmed and tipped the white powder it contained into the further of the two cups; for want of any other instrument, he stirred the wine with his fingers until Hercules Atlas finally lumbered up from all fours to hind legs, and sat down. "Good health," said Sulla, picking up the nearer cup and tipping it at the strong man in the friendliest manner. "Good health and thanks for a terrific night," said Hercules Atlas, tilting his head back and his cup up, and draining it without pausing for breath. After which he refilled the cup and tossed a second drink back, it seemed on the same lungful of air. Sulla got up, pushed his own cup under the strong man's hand, and took the other cup away, tucking it inside his tunic. "A little souvenir," he said. "Good night." And slipped out the door quietly. The insula was asleep, its open concrete walkway around the central courtyard heavily screened to prevent refuse being tipped down the light well, and deserted. Very quickly and without making a sound, Sulla stole down three flights of stairs, and stepped into the narrow street unnoticed. The cup he had purloined went between the bars of a gutter drain; Sulla listened until he heard it splash far below, then thrust the screw of paper after it. At the Well of Juturna beneath the Vestal Steps he paused, dipped his hands and arms to the elbows in its still waters, and washed, and washed, and washed. There! That ought to rinse off whatever white powder might have adhered to his skin while he handled the paper and stirred the wine Hercules Atlas had devoured so satisfactorily. But he didn't go back to the party. He bypassed the Palatine completely, heading up the Via Nova toward the Capena Gate. Outside the city he entered one of the many stables in the vicinity that hired out horses or vehicles to those resident inside Rome; few Roman houses kept mules, horses, transport. It was cheaper and easier to hire. The stable he chose was good and reputable, but its idea of security was lax; the only groom in attendance was sound asleep in a mound of straw. Sulla assisted him into a far deeper sleep with a rabbit punch behind one ear, then took his time cruising up and down until he found a very strong-looking, amiable mule. Never having saddled a mount in his life, it took him some time to work out precisely what to do, but he had heard of an animal's holding its breath while the girth was being strapped tight, so he waited patiently until he was sure the mule's ribs were normal, then swung himself up into the saddle and kicked the beast gently in the flanks. Though he was a novice rider, he wasn't afraid of horses or mules, and trusted to his luck in managing his mount. The four horns one on each corner of the saddle kept a man fairly securely upon the beast's back provided it wasn't prone to buck, and mules were more docile than horses in this respect. The only bridle he had managed to persuade the mule to take had a plain snaffle bit, but his steed seemed comfortable and placid chewing on it, so he headed down the moonlit Via Appia with every confidence in his ability to get quite a long way before morning. It was about midnight. He found the ride exhausting, not being used to the activity. Ambling along beside Clitumna's litter was one thing, this hurried progress quite another. After a few miles his legs ached intolerably from hanging down unsupported, and his buttocks squirmed with the effort of keeping him straight in the saddle, and his balls felt every little jolt. However, the mule was a willing goer, and he got as far as Tripontium well before dawn. From here he left the Via Appia and cut across country toward the coast, for there were a few rough roads traversing the bogs of the outer Pomptine Marshes, and it was much shorter as well as much less public than following the Via Appia down to Tarracina and then backtracking north to Circei. In a stand of trees some ten miles into the wilderness he stopped, for the ground felt dry and hard, and there didn't seem to be any mosquitoes. Tethering the mule on a long halter he had thought to purloin, he put the saddle down as a pillow under the shade of a pine, and slept dreamlessly. Ten short daylight hours later, after giving himself and the mule a long drink in a nearby stream, Sulla resumed his ride. Covered from the gaze of any who might chance to see him by a hooded cloak he'd taken from the stable, he pattered along with considerably more grace than earlier, despite the ghastly ache in his spine and the deep soreness in rump and balls. So far he had eaten nothing, but felt no hunger; the mule had grazed on good grass, so was content enough, and remarkably fresh. And at dusk he came to the promontory on which sat Clitumna's villa, dismounting then with real relief. Once more he divested the mule of saddle and bridle; once more he tethered it so it could graze. But this time he left it by itself to rest. His luck had held. The night was perfect, still and starry, not a cloud to be seen anywhere in the cold indigo vault. And then as the second hour of night began to drip away, the full moon rose over the hills far in the east and slowly drenched the landscape with its strange luminosity, a light which gave the eyes power to see, yet was of itself utterly invisible. And the sense of his own inviolability swelled within Sulla, banished fatigue and pain, quickened the flow of his chilly blood and set his mind, curiously peacefully engaged, into a phase of sheer enjoyment. He was felix; he was lucky. Everything was going beautifully, and would continue to go beautifully. And that meant he could idle his way through in a haze of well-being; he could really enjoy himself. When the chance to rid himself of Nicopolis had presented itself so suddenly, so unexpectedly, there hadn't been time to enjoy it, only to make a lightning decision and wait out the hours. His investigations during his holiday with Metrobius had revealed The Destroyer to him, but Nicopolis it had been who chose the fashion of her own demise; he was involved only as catalyst. Luck had put her there. His luck. But tonight brain had put him where he was; luck would carry him through. As for fear what was there to be afraid of? Clitumna was there, waiting in the shadows of the salt pines, not yet impatient, but readying herself to turn impatient if her surprise was late. However, Sulla did not announce himself immediately; first he inspected the entire area to make sure she hadn't brought anyone with her. And yes, she was quite alone. Even the untenanted stables and rooms below the loggia were devoid of people, interested or uninterested. As he approached her, he made enough noise to reassure her. Thus when she saw him emerge from the darkness she was prepared for it to be him, and held out her arms. "Oh, it's just as you said!" she whispered, giggling into his neck. "My surprise! Where's my surprise?" "A kiss first?" he asked, white teeth showing whiter than his skin for once, so strange was the moonlight, so magical the spell which bound him. Starved for him, Clitumna offered her lips greedily. And was standing, her mouth glued to his, her feet up on their toes, when he broke her neck. It was so easy. Snap. Probably she never even knew, for he could see no hint of knowledge in her staring eyes when his hand pushed her head back to meet his other hand keeping her back straight, a movement as fast as a blow. Easy. Snap. The sound traveled, it was so sharp, so clear-cut on its edges. And as he released her, expecting her to sink to the ground, she rose up even higher on her toes and began to dance for him, arms akimbo, head lolling obscenely, jerks and hops and staccato heaves which culminated in her twirling round and round before she fell in a tangle of elbows and knees, ugly, utterly ungainly. The warm acrid smell of voided urine curled up to meet his distended nostrils then, and after it, the heavier stench of voided bowels. He didn't scream. He didn't leap away. He enjoyed it all immensely, and while she danced for him, he watched in fascination, and when she fell, he watched in revulsion. "Well, Clitumna," he said, "you died no lady." It was necessary that he lift her, even though that meant he would be soiled, stained, smeared. There must be no marks in the tender moon-dewed grass, no sign of a body's being dragged the main reason why he had stipulated that it be a fine night. So he lifted her, excrement and all, and carried her in his arms the short distance to the top of the cliff, her draperies gathered close to keep in the excrement, for he didn't want a trail of faeces across the grass either. He had already found the right spot, and went to it without faltering because he had marked it with a pale stone days before, when he first brought her down. His muscles bunched, spasmed; in one beautiful drapery tracery he rejected her forever, threw her out and away in a flapping ghost-bird plummet all the way down to the rocks. There she spread herself, a shapeless drift of something the sea might have washed up beyond the reach of all but the wildest storms. For it was vital that she be found; he wanted no estate in limbo. As at dawn, he had tethered the mule near running water, but before he went to bring it to drink, he waded into the stream fully clad in his woman's tunic, and washed away the last traces of his stepmother, Clitumna. After which there was one more thing to do, which he did the moment he left the water. On his belt was a small dagger in a sheath; using its pointed tip, he cut a very small gash in the skin of his left forehead about an inch below the hairline. It began to bleed immediately, as scalp cuts do, but that was only the start. Nothing about it could look neat or even. So he got the middle and ring fingers of each hand on either side of the nick and pulled until the flesh parted raggedly, considerably enlarging the wound. His bleeding increased dramatically, spattering his filthy, running-wet party garb in huge drops and runs that spread through the soaked fabric in a wonderfully gory way. There! Good! Out of his belt pouch he took a prepared pad of white linen and jammed it down hard on the tear in his brow, then bound it tightly with a ribbon of linen. Blood had run down into his left eye; he wiped it away with one hand, blinking, and then went to find the mule. All through the night he rode, kicking the mule ruthlessly onward whenever it faltered, for it was very tired. However, it knew it was heading home to its stall, and, like all its kind, had a better heart and stouter sinews than a horse. It liked Sulla; that was the secret of its gallant response. It liked the comfort of the snaffle bit in a mouth more used to the pain of curbs; it liked his silence and economy; it liked his peacefulness. So for his sake it trotted, cantered, fell to a walk, picked up its stride again as soon as it was able, the steam rising from its shaggy coat in little trails that drifted behind them. For it knew nothing of the woman lying, neck broken ahead of her fall, on the cruel rocks below the great white villa. It took Sulla as it found him, and it found him interestingly kind.
A mile from the stables Sulla dismounted and removed the tack from the mule, throwing it aside into some bushes; then he smacked the animal on its rump and shooed it in the direction of its stables, sure it would find its way home. But when he began to plod toward the Capena Gate the mule followed him, and he was forced in the end to shy stones at it before it took the hint, swished its meager tail, and made off. Muffled in his hooded cloak, Sulla entered Rome just as the eastern sky was pearling; in nine hours of seventy-four minutes each he had ridden from Circei to Rome, no mean feat for a tired mule and a man who had only really learned to ride on the journey. The Steps of Cacus led from the Circus Maximus up onto the Germalus of the Palatine, and were surrounded by the most hallowed ground the spirit of Romulus's original city lived thereabouts, and a small uninspiring cavelet and spring in the rock was the place where the she-wolf had suckled the twins Romulus and Remus after they had been abandoned. To Sulla, this seemed a fitting place to abandon his trappings, so the cloak and the bandage were carefully tucked into a hollow tree behind the monument to the Genius Loci. His wound immediately began to bleed again, but sluggishly; and thus those in Clitumna's street who were out and about early were stunned to see the missing man come staggering along in a bloodied woman's tunic, filthy and mauled. Clitumna's household was astir, not having been to bed all at once since Hercules Atlas had blazed his way out of the place some thirty-two hours before. When the door servant admitted Sulla, looking ghastly, people flew from all directions to succor him. He was put to bed, bathed and sponged, none other than Athenodorus of Sicily was summoned to inspect his wounded head, and Gaius Julius Caesar came from next door to ask him what had happened, for the whole of the Palatine had been searching for him. "Tell me what you can," said Caesar, sitting by his bed. Sulla looked totally convincing. There was a blue shade of pain and weariness about his lips, his colorless skin was even paler than usual, and his eyes, glazed with exhaustion, were red-rimmed and bloodshot. "Silly," he said, slurring his words. "I shouldn't have tried to interfere with Hercules Atlas. But I'm strong, and I can look after myself. I just never counted on any man's being as strong as he turned out to be I thought he'd got a good act together, was all. He was roaring drunk, and he he just carried me away with him! I couldn't do a thing to stop him. Somewhere or other he put me down. I tried to get away, and he must have clouted me, I really don't know. But I came to in some alley in the Subura. I must have lain there, out to it, for at least a whole day. But you know what the Subura's like everyone left me to it. When I could move, I came home. That's all, Gaius Julius." "You're a very lucky young man," said Caesar, lips tight. "Had Hercules Atlas carried you back to his flat, you might have shared his fate." "His fate?" "Your steward came to see me yesterday when you didn't come home, and asked me what he should do. After I learned the story, I took some hired gladiators to the strong man's lodgings, and found an absolute shambles. For whatever reason, Hercules Atlas had wrecked the place splintered every piece of furniture, broken great holes in the walls with his fists, terrified the other residents of his insula so much that none of them had gone near. He was lying in the middle of the living room, dead. My personal belief is that he ruptured a blood vessel in his brain, and went mad with the agony of it. Either that, or some enemy poisoned him." An expression of distaste hovered on Caesar's face, and was resolutely ironed away. "He'd made a disgusting mess in dying. I think his servants found him first, but they'd gone long before I arrived. As we found no money whatsoever in the place, I presume they took whatever they could carry with them, and have run away. Did he, for instance, have a fee from your party? If so, it wasn't in the flat." Sulla closed his eyes, not needing to feign tiredness. "I had paid him in advance, Gaius Julius, so I can't tell you if he had money there." Caesar got to his feet. "Well, I have done all that I can." He looked down on the immobile figure in the bed sternly, knowing his look was wasted, for Sulla's eyes remained closed. "I do pity you deeply, Lucius Cornelius," he said, "but this conduct cannot go on, you know. My daughter nearly starved herself to death because of an immature emotional attachment to you, and has not even now recovered from that attachment. Which makes you a considerable nuisance to me as a neighbor, though I have to acquit you of encouraging my daughter, and must be fair enough to admit that she has made a considerable nuisance of herself to you. All of which suggests to me that you would do better if you lived elsewhere. I have sent to your stepmother in Circei and informed her what has transpired in her absence. I also informed her that she has long outworn her welcome in this street, and she might be more comfortable housed on the Carinae or the Caelian. We are a quiet body of people hereabouts. It would pain me to have to lodge a complaint and a suit with the urban praetor to protect our entitlement to peace, quiet, and physical well-being. But pain or no, I am prepared to lodge that suit if I have to, Lucius Cornelius. Like the rest of your neighbors, I have had enough." Sulla didn't move, didn't open his eyes; as Caesar stood wondering how much of this homily had sunk in, his ears heard a snore. He turned at once and left. But it was Sulla who got a letter from Circei first, not Gaius Julius Caesar. The next day a messenger came bearing a missive from Clitumna's steward, informing Sulla that the lady Clitumna's body, had been found at the base of the cliff bordering her estate. Her neck had been broken in the fall, but there were no suspicious circumstances. As Sulla knew, said the steward, the lady Clitumna's mental state had been extremely depressed of late. Sulla swung his legs out of bed and stood up. "Run me a bath, and set out my toga," he said. The little wound on his brow was healing nicely, but its edges were livid and swollen still; aside from that, there was nothing left to suggest his condition of the day before. "Send for Gaius Julius Caesar," he said to Iamus the steward when he was dressed. On this coming interview, Sulla understood with perfect clarity, all of his future hinged. Thank the gods that Scylax had taken Metrobius home from the party, protest though the lad did that he wanted to see what had happened to his beloved Sulla. That, and Caesar's early arrival on the scene, represented the only flaws in Sulla's plans. What an escape! Truly his luck was in its ascendancy! The presence of Metrobius in Clitumna's house when Caesar had been summoned by the worried Iamus would have cooked Sulla's goose forever. No, Caesar would never damn Sulla on hearsay, but the evidence of his own eyes would have put an entirely different complexion upon the situation. And Metrobius would not have been backward in coming forward. I am treading on eggshells, said Sulla to himself, and it is high time I stopped. He thought of Stichus, of Nicopolis, of Clitumna, and he smiled. Well, now he could stop. He received Caesar looking every inch the patrician Roman, immaculate in white, the narrow knight's stripe adorning the right shoulder of his tunic, his magnificent head of hair cut and combed into a manly yet becoming style. "I apologize for having to drag you here yet again, Gaius Julius," said Sulla, and handed Caesar a small roll of paper. "This has just arrived from Circei, and I thought you ought to see it at once." Without a change of expression Caesar read it very slowly, his lips moving, but the sound of the words he said over to himself very quiet. He was weighing, Sulla knew, each and every word as he separated it from the uninterrupted flow of letters on the paper. Done, he laid the sheet down. "It is the third death," said Caesar, and actually seemed happy about that fact. "Your household is sadly diminished, Lucius Cornelius. Please accept my condolences." "I presumed that you had made Clitumna's will for her," Sulla said, standing very straight, "otherwise I assure you that I would not have bothered you." "Yes, I have made several wills for her, the last one just after Nicopolis died." His handsome face, his direct blue eyes, everything about Caesar was carefully, legally noncommittal. "I would like you to tell me, Lucius Cornelius, what exactly you felt for your stepmother.'' Here it was, the frailest eggshell yet. He must tread as surely and delicately as a cat on a windowsill strewn with broken shards a full twelve floors above the pavement. "I remember saying something to you before, Gaius Julius," he said, "but I'm glad to have the opportunity to speak at greater length about her. She was a very silly and stupid and vulgar woman, but as it happens, I was fond of her. My father" and Sulla's face twisted "was an incurable drunkard. The only life I ever remember with him and for some years with my older sister too, until she married and escaped was a nightmare. We were not impoverished gentry, Gaius Julius. We didn't live in a style in any way reminiscent of our origins. We were so poor we had no slave, not one. If it hadn't been for the charity of an old marketplace teacher, I, a patrician of the gens Cornelius, would not even have learned to read and write. I have never done my basic military training on the Campus Martius, nor learned to ride a horse, nor been the pupil of some advocate in the law courts. Of soldiering, of rhetoric, of public life, I know nothing. Such did my father do to me. And so I was fond of her. She married my father, and she took him and me to live with her, and who knows? Perhaps, had my father and I gone on living in the Subura, I would one day have gone quite mad, and murdered him, and offended the gods beyond mercy. As it was, until he died she took the brunt of him, and I was liberated. Yes, I was fond of her." "She was fond of you too, Lucius Cornelius," said Caesar. "Her will is simple and straightforward. It leaves everything she had to you." Easy, easy! Not too much joy, but not too much grief either! The man he was facing was very intelligent and must have great experience of men. "Did she leave me enough to enter the Senate?'' he asked, looking into Caesar's eyes. "More than enough." Sulla visibly sagged. "I can't believe it!" he said. "Are you sure? I know she had this house and the villa at Circei, but I didn't think there was much else." "On the contrary, she was an extremely wealthy woman money invested, stocks and interests in all kinds of companies, as well as in a dozen merchant ships. I advise you to divest yourself of the ships and the company shares, and use the funds they realize to buy property. You'll need to have your affairs in exquisite order to satisfy the censors." "It's a dream!" said Sulla. "I can understand that you must find it so, Lucius Cornelius. But rest assured, it's all real enough." Caesar sounded tranquil, not repelled by Sulla's reaction, nor suspicious of feigned grief his common sense would have told him a Lucius Cornelius Sulla could never feel for a Clitumna, no matter how kind to his father she might have been. "She might have gone on for years and years," said Sulla, voice wondering. "Mine is a happy fate after all, Gaius Julius. I never thought to be able to say that. I shall miss her. But I hope that in the years to come, the world will say that the greatest contribution she made to it was in her dying. For I intend to be an ornament to my class and to the Senate." Did that sound all right? Did it imply what he intended it to imply? "I agree, Lucius Cornelius, that it would make her happy to think you used her bequest fruitfully," said Caesar, taking what Sulla said exactly the right way. "And I trust there will be no more wild parties? No more dubious friends?" "When a man can espouse the life his birth entitles him to, Gaius Julius, there is no need for wild parties or dubious friends." Sulla sighed. "They were a way of passing the time. I daresay that must seem inexplicable to you. But the life I have lived for over thirty years has hung on my neck like a huge millstone." "Of course it has," said Caesar. A horrifying thought occurred to Sulla. "But there are no censors! What can I do?" "Well, though there is no need to elect more until four more years have elapsed, one of the conditions Marcus Scaurus put upon his voluntary resignation such as it was was that new censors be elected next April. You will just have to contain yourself until then," Caesar said comfortably. Sulla girded himself, drew a deep breath. "Gaius Julius, I have one further request to make of you," he said. The blue eyes held an expression Sulla found impossible to fathom, as if Caesar knew what was coming yet how could that be, when the idea had just popped into his mind? The most brilliant idea yet, the luckiest. For if Caesar consented, Sulla's application to the censors would have far greater weight than mere money, far greater effect than the claim of birth, marred as it was by the kind of life he had led. "What request is that, Lucius Cornelius?" asked Caesar. "That you consider me as a husband for your daughter Julilla," he said. "Even after she injured you so?" "I love her," said Sulla, and believed he meant it. "At the moment Julilla is nowhere near well enough to contemplate marriage," said Caesar, "but I will take note of your request, Lucius Cornelius." He smiled. "Perhaps you deserve each other, after so much trouble." "She gave me a grass crown," said Sulla. "And do you know, Gaius Julius, it was only after that my luck turned?" "I believe you." Rising, he prepared to go. "Nonetheless, for the moment we will say nothing to anyone of your interest in marrying Julilla. Most particularly, I charge you to stay away from her. However you feel about her, she is still trying to find her way out of her predicament, and I want no easy solution presented to her." Sulla accompanied Caesar to the door, and there held out his hand, smiling with his lips closed; for no one knew the effect of those overlong and oversharp canines better than their owner. Not for Gaius Julius Caesar any nasty chilling grins. No, Caesar was to be treasured and courted. Ignorant of the proposition Caesar had once put to Gaius Marius about a daughter, Sulla had come to the same conclusion. What better way to endear himself to the censors and the electorate than to have a Julia as his wife? Especially when there was one so close to hand she had nearly died for him. "Iamus!" Sulla called when he had shut the door. "Lucius Cornelius?" "Don't bother with dinner. Put the house into mourning for the lady Clitumna, and see to the return of all her servants from Circei. I'm leaving at once to see to her funeral." And, thought Sulla, packing quickly, I shall take young Metrobius with me, and say goodbye. Goodbye to every last trace of the old life, goodbye to Clitumna. None of it will I miss save Metrobius. And him I will miss. Badly.
THE THIRD YEAR (108 B.C.) IN THE CONSULSHIP OF SERVIUS SULPICIUS GALBA AND QUINTUS HORTENSIUS
With the coming of the winter rains, the war such as it had been so far against Numidia ground to a cheerless halt, neither side able to deploy its troops. Gaius Marius received his letter from his father-in-law, Caesar, and thought about what it contained, and wondered if the consul Quintus Caecilius Metellus Piggle-wiggle knew that he would become proconsul when the New Year arrived, his command successfully prorogued, a future triumph assured. Nor did anyone in the governor's headquarters at Utica mention the defeat of Marcus Junius Silanus by the Germans, or the loss of all those troops. Which didn't mean, thought Marius resentfully, that these items were not known to Metellus; only that, as usual, his senior legate Gaius Marius would be the last man to be told. Poor Rutilius Rufus had been given the job of supervising the winter border garrisons, which put him out of touch with any developments short of the renewal of war; and Gaius Marius, recalled to duty in Utica, found himself the subordinate of Metellus Piggle-wiggle's son! That young man, all of twenty years old and a cadet in his father's personal train, enjoyed the task of commanding Utica's garrison and defenses, so that in any matter to do with Utica's military dispositions, Marius had to defer to the insufferably arrogant Piglet, as he soon came to be called and not by Marius alone. Utica as a fortress aside, Marius's duties involved doing all the chores the governor didn't want to do duties more suited to a quaestor than a senior legate. Feelings in consequence were running high, and Marius's self-control was rapidly eroding, especially when Metellus Piglet amused himself at Marius's expense, something he liked to do now that his father had indicated it amused him too. The near defeat on the river Muthul had provoked both Rutilius Rufus and Marius into angry criticism of the general, and led Marius to tell him that the best way to win the war against Numidia was to capture Jugurtha himself. "How can I do that?" Metellus had asked, sufficiently chastened by his first battle to listen. "By subterfuge," Rutilius Rufus had said. "What kind of subterfuge?" "That," said Gaius Marius in conclusion, "you will have to work out for yourself, Quintus Caecilius." But now that everyone was safely back in Africa Province enduring the boredom of wet days and routine tasks, Metellus Piggle-wiggle kept his own counsel. Until, that is, he made contact with a Numidian nobleman named Nabdalsa, and was obliged to call Marius into his interview with the man. "Why?" asked Marius bluntly. "Can't do your own dirty work, Quintus Caecilius?" "Believe me, Gaius Marius, if Publius Rutilius were here, I wouldn't be using you!" snapped Metellus. "But you know Jugurtha where I don't, and presumably that means you know a little more than I do about how Numidian minds work! All I want you to do is sit and watch this Nabdalsa, and tell me afterward what you think." "I'm surprised you trust me enough to think I'll give you an honest opinion," said Marius. Metellus raised his brows, genuinely taken aback. "You are here to fight against Numidia, Gaius Marius, why shouldn't you give me an honest opinion?" "Then bring the fellow in, Quintus Caecilius, and I'll do my best to oblige." Marius knew of Nabdalsa, though he had never met him; he was an adherent of the legitimate claimant to the Numidian throne, Prince Gauda, who was at present living in quasi-regal state not far from Utica, in the flourishing township which had grown up on the site of Old Carthage. Thus Nabdalsa had come from Prince Gauda in Old Carthage, and was received by Metellus in frosty audience. Metellus explained himself; the best and quickest way to solve the Numidian question and put Prince Gauda on the throne was to effect the capture of Jugurtha himself. Did Prince Gauda or Nabdalsa have any idea how the capture of Jugurtha might be effected? "Through Bomilcar, dominus, definitely," said Nabdalsa. Metellus stared. "Bomilcar? But he's Jugurtha's half brother, his loyalest baron!" "At the moment relations between them are rather strained," said Nabdalsa. "Why?" asked Metellus. "It's a question of the succession, dominus. Bomilcar wants to be designated regent in the event that anything should happen to Jugurtha, but Jugurtha refuses to consider it." "Regent, not heir?" "Bomilcar knows he could never be heir, dominus. Jugurtha has two sons. However, they are very young." Frowning, Metellus tried to plumb the thought processes of alien minds. "Why is Jugurtha opposed? I should have thought that Bomilcar would represent an ideal choice." "It is the bloodline, dominus," said Nabdalsa. "Baron Bomilcar is not descended from King Masinissa, so does not belong to the royal house." "I see." Metellus straightened. "Very well, then, see what you can do to persuade Bomilcar that he ought to ally himself with Rome." He turned to Marius. "How amazing! One would have thought that a man not noble enough to claim the throne would be the ideal choice for a regent." "In our kind of society, yes," said Marius. "In Jugurtha's it's an invitation to murder of his sons. For how else could Bomilcar ascend the throne than by killing Jugurtha's heirs and founding a new dynasty?" Metellus turned back to Nabdalsa. "I thank you, Baron Nabdalsa. You may go." But Nabdalsa was not ready to go. "Dominus, I crave a small favor," he said. "What?" asked Metellus, none too pleased. "Prince Gauda is anxious to meet you, and wonders why he has not yet been offered the opportunity. Your year as governor of Africa Province is almost over, yet still Prince Gauda waits for an invitation to meet you." "If he wants to meet me, what's to stop him?" asked the governor blankly. "He cannot just present himself, Quintus Caecilius," said Marius. "You must extend a formal invitation." "Oh! Well, if that's all there is to it, an invitation will be extended," said Metellus, hiding his smile. And, the invitation duly extended the very next day, so that Nabdalsa could bear it back personally to Old Carthage, Prince Gauda came to call on the governor. It was not a happy meeting; two more different men than Gauda and Metellus scarcely lived. Weak and sickly and not very bright, Gauda behaved in the manner he considered proper, and Metellus considered atrociously high-handed. For, having learned that an invitation must be extended before the royal guest in Old Carthage could come calling, Metellus assumed his visitor would be humble, even obsequious. Far from it. Gauda started proceedings off by flying into a temper when Metellus didn't rise to greet him, and ended the audience not many moments later by stalking out of the governor's presence. "I am royalty]" Gauda bleated to Nabdalsa afterward. "Everyone knows that, your Highness," soothed Nabdalsa. "However, the Romans are very odd about royalty. They regard themselves as superior to it because they deposed their kings many hundreds of years ago, and have chosen ever since to rule themselves without benefit of kings." "I don't care if they worship shit!" said Gauda, his lacerated feelings still smarting. "I am my father's legitimate son, where Jugurtha is his bastard! And when I appear among these Romans, they should rise to greet me, they should bow down before me, they should give me a throne to sit on, and they should cull their soldiers for the hundred finest specimens and give them to me as a bodyguard!" "True, true," said Nabdalsa. "I will see Gaius Marius. Perhaps Gaius Marius will be able to bring Quintus Caecilius to his senses." Everyone Numidian knew about Gaius Marius and Publius Rutilius Rufus, for Jugurtha had spread their fame in the days when he had first returned from Numantia, and had seen both of them frequently during his recent visit to Rome. "Then see Gaius Marius," said Gauda, and retired in a monumental huff back to Old Carthage, there to brood upon the wrongs done him by Metellus in Rome's name, while Nabdalsa unobtrusively sought an interview with Gaius Marius. "I'll do what I can, Baron," said Marius, sighing. "I would appreciate it, Gaius Marius," said Nabdalsa with feeling. Marius grinned. "Your royal master taking it out on you, is he?" Nabdalsa's answer was a speaking look. "The trouble is, my friend, that Quintus Caecilius considers himself infinitely better born than any Numidian prince. I very much doubt that anyone, especially I, could convince him to change his tune. But I'll try, because I want you free to seek out Bomilcar. That's a lot more important than squabbles between governors and princes," said Marius. "The Syrian prophetess says that the family Caecilius Metellus is riding for a fall," said Nabdalsa thoughtfully. "Syrian prophetess?" "A woman called Martha," said the Numidian. "Prince Gauda found her in Old Carthage, where it seems she was abandoned some years ago by a sea captain who believed she had successfully put a curse upon his ship. At first only the humble consulted her, but now her fame is very large, and Prince Gauda has taken her into his court. She has prophesied that Prince Gauda will indeed become King of Numidia, after the fall of Jugurtha. Though that fall, she says, will not be yet." "And what about the family Caecilius Metellus?" "She says the whole family Caecilius Metellus is past the zenith of its power, and will grow less in number and less in wealth, surpassed by among others you yourself, dominus." "I want to see this Syrian prophetess," said Marius. "It can be arranged. But you must come to Old Carthage, for she will not leave Prince Gauda's house,” said Nabdalsa. An audience with Martha the Syrian prophetess involved an audience with Prince Gauda first; resignedly Marius listened to the litany of complaints about Metellus, and made promises he hadn't the faintest idea how he was going to keep. "Rest assured, your Highness, that when I am in a position to do so, I will make sure you are treated with all the respect and deference to which your birth entitles you," he said, bowing as low as even Gauda could have wished. "That day will come!" said Gauda eagerly, grinning to reveal very bad teeth. "Martha says you will be the First Man in Rome, and before very long. For that reason, Gaius Marius, I wish to enroll myself among your clients, and I will make sure that my supporters in the Roman African province also enroll themselves as your clients. What is more, when I am King of Numidia, the whole of Numidia will be in your clientship." To this Marius listened amazed; he, a mere praetor, was being offered the kind of clients even a Caecilius Metellus might long for in vain! Oh, he had to meet this Martha, this Syrian prophetess! Not many moments later he was given the chance, for she had asked to see him, and Gauda had him conducted to her apartments within the huge villa he was using as a temporary palace. A cursory glance was enough to assure Marius, bidden wait in her sitting room, that she was indeed held in high esteem, for the apartment was fabulously furnished, its walls painted with some of the finest murals he had ever been privileged to see, and its floors paved with mosaics equally as good as the murals. When she came in she was wearing purple, another signal honor not normally accorded to one whose birth was not royal. And royal she certainly was not. A little, shriveled, skinny old lady who stank of stale urine and whose hair hadn't been washed in what Marius suspected were literal years. She looked foreign, great beaky thin-bladed nose dominating a face of a thousand wrinkles, and a pair of black eyes whose light was as fierce and proud and vigilant as any eagle's. Her breasts had sagged like two empty socks with toes full of pebbles, and swung visibly beneath the thin Tyrian purple shift which was all she wore above the waist. A Tyrian purple shawl was tied about her hips, her hands and feet were almost black with henna, and she tinkled when she walked from a myriad of bells, bracelets, rings, and trinkets, all of solid gold. Secured by a solid gold comb, a gauze veil of Tyrian purple covered the back of her head and fell over her spine like a windless flag. "Sit down, Gaius Marius," she said, pointing at a chair with one long-taloned finger, its gnarled length glittering from the many rings adorning it. Marius did as he was told, unable to take his eyes from her ancient brown face. "Prince Gauda tells me that you have said I will be the First Man in Rome," he said, and was forced to clear his throat. "I would like to hear more." She actually began to cackle a classic crone's cackle, revealing gums toothless save for one yellowed incisor in her upper jaw. "Oh, yes, I'm sure you would," she said, and clapped her hands for a servant. "Bring us an infusion of the dried leaves and some of those little cakes I like," she ordered. Then to Gaius Marius she said, "It won't be long. When it comes, we will talk. Until then, we will sit in silence." Not willing to offend her, he sat as he was bidden in silence and, when the steaming brew came, sipped at the cup of it she gave him, his nose suspicious, his instincts wary. It didn't taste too bad, but as he wasn't used to hot drinks, he burned his tongue and put the cup aside. She, clearly an expert, took birdlike sips at her own cup, downing each one with an audible gulp of pleasure. "Delicious stuff, though I daresay you'd prefer wine." "No, not at all," he murmured politely. "Have a cake," she mumbled, mouth full. "Thank you, but no." "All right, all right, I can take a hint!" she said, and rinsed her mouth with another draft of the hot liquid. Out came one claw imperiously. "Give me your right hand." He gave. She took. "Yours is a great destiny, Gaius Marius," she said, eyes devouring the multiplicity of creases in his palm. "What a hand! It shapes whatever it puts itself to. And what a head line! It rules your heart, it rules your life, it rules everything except the ravages of time, Gaius Marius, for those no one can withstand. But you will withstand much that other men cannot. There is a terrible illness... But you will overcome it the first time it appears, and even the second time... There are enemies, enemies by the score... But you will overcome them... You will be consul the year after this one just beginning, which is to say, next year… And after that, you will be consul six more times... Seven times in all will you be consul, and you will be called the Third Founder of Rome, for you will save Rome from the greatest of all her perils!" He was conscious of his face burning, burning, hot as a spear thrust into the fire. And of a whirling roaring inside his head. Of his heart pounding away like a hortator drumming at ramming speed. Of a thick red veil in front of his eyes. For she spoke the truth. He knew it. "You have the love and respect of a great woman," Martha went on, pawing now at the minor folds in his skin, "and her nephew will be the greatest of all the Romans for all time." "No, that's me," he said at once, his bodily responses calming into normality at this less palatable piece of news. "No, it's her nephew," said Martha stubbornly. "A much greater man than you, Gaius Marius. He has the same first name as you, Gaius. But his family is her family, not yours." The fact was filed; he would not forget it. "What of my son?" he asked. "Your son will be a great man too. But not as great as his father, nor will he live nearly as long in the number of his years. However, he will still be alive when your time comes." She pushed his hand away and tucked her dirty bare feet toes a-tinkle with bells, ankles a-clash with bracelets under her on the couch where she sat. "I have seen all there is to see, Gaius Marius," she said, leaned back, and closed her eyes. "I thank you, Martha Prophetess," he said, getting to his feet and pulling out his purse. "How much ... ?" She opened her eyes, wickedly black, evilly alive. "For you there is no fee. It is enough to be in the company of the truly great. Fees are for the likes of Prince Gauda, who will never be a great man, though he will be a king." Came the cackle again. "But you know that, Gaius Marius, as surely as I do, for all that you have no gift to look into the future. Your gift is to see into the hearts of men, and Prince Gauda has a small heart." "Then once again I must thank you." "Oh, I do have a favor to ask of you," she called to his back as he went to the door. He turned immediately. "Yes?" "When you are consul for the second time, Gaius Marius, bring me to Rome and treat me with honor. I have a wish to see Rome before I die." "You shall see Rome," he said, and left her. Consul seven times! The First Man in Rome! The Third Founder of Rome! What greater destiny could there be than that? How could another Roman surpass that? Gaius .. . She must mean the son of his younger brother-in-law, Gaius Julius Caesar Junior. Yes, his son would be Julia's nephew the only one to be named Gaius, certainly. "Over my dead body," said Gaius Marius, and climbed on his horse to ride back to Utica.
He sought an interview with Metellus the next day, and found the consul poring over a sheaf of documents and letters from Rome, for a ship had come in overnight, long delayed by stormy seas. "Excellent news, Gaius Marius!" said Metellus, for once affable. "My command in Africa is prorogued, with proconsular imperium, and every likelihood of continued prorogation should I need more time." That sheet of paper was dropped, another picked up, both for show, since he had obviously read them before Marius arrived; no one just scanned words on paper in silence and with a lightning glance of comprehension, for they had to be disentangled from each other and read aloud to aid the disentanglement process. "It is just as well my army is intact, because it seems the general shortage of manpower in Italy has become acute, thanks to Silanus in Gaul. Oh, you don't know about that, do you? Yes, my consular colleague was defeated by the Germans. Shocking loss of life." He grabbed at another roll, held it up. "Silanus writes that there were upward of half a million German giants on the field." Down went the scroll, the one he still held was brandished at Marius. "Here is the Senate notifying me that it has nullified the lex Sempronia of Gaius Gracchus limiting the numbers of campaigns a man must complete. High time! We can call up thousands of veterans if ever we need them." Metellus sounded pleased. "That is a very bad piece of legislation," said Marius. "If a veteran wishes to retire, after ten years or six full campaigns, he should be entitled to do so without fear that he will ever again be mustered under the colors. We are eroding the smallholders, Quintus Caecilius! How can a man leave his little farm for what might now be twenty years of service in the legions, and expect to see it prosper in his absence? How can he sire sons to take his place, both on his little farm and in our legions? More and more it has become the duty of his barren wife to oversee their land, and women do not have the strength, the foresight, or the aptitude. We should be looking elsewhere for our soldiers and we should be protecting them against bad generalship!" Metellus had pokered up, lips thin. "It is not your place, Gaius Marius, to criticize the wisdom of the most illustrious governing body in our society!" he said. "Just who do you think you are?" "I believe you once told me who I was, Quintus Caecilius, very many years ago. As I remember, an Italian hayseed with no Greek was how you put it. And that may be true. But it does not disqualify me from commenting upon what I still deem a very bad piece of legislation," said Marius, keeping his voice even. "We and by 'we' I mean the Senate, of which illustrious body I am no less a member than you! are allowing a whole class of citizens to die out because we haven't got the courage or the presence of mind to put a stop to all these so-called generals we've been fielding now for years! The blood of Roman soldiers is not for wasting, Quintus Caecilius, it's for living and healthy use!" Marius got to his feet, leaning across Metellus's desk, and continued his diatribe. "When we originally designed our army, it was for campaigns within Italy, so that men could go home again each winter, and manage their farms, and sire their sons, and supervise their women. But when a man enlists or is levied nowadays, he's shipped overseas, and instead of a campaign lasting a single summer, it runs into years during which he never manages to go home, so that his six campaigns might take him twelve or even fifteen years to complete in some place other than his homeland! Gaius Gracchus legislated to try to curtail that, and to stop the smallholdings of Italy becoming the prey of big-time speculating graziers!" He drew a sobbing breath, eyed Metellus ironically. "Oh, but I forgot, didn't I, Quintus Caecilius? You're one of those big-time speculating graziers yourself, aren't you? And how you do love to see the smallholdings fall into your grasp because the men who ought to be home running them are dying on some foreign field through sheer aristocratic greed and carelessness!" "Aha! Now we come to it!" cried Metellus, jumping to his feet and thrusting his face into Marius's. "There it is! Aristocratic greed and carelessness, eh? It's the aristocrat sticks in your craw, isn't it? Well, let me tell you a thing or two, Gaius Marius Upstart! Marrying a Julia of the Julians can't turn you into an aristocrat!" "I wouldn't want it to," snarled Marius. "I despise the lot of you save for the single exception of my father-in-law, who by some miracle has managed to remain a decent man in spite of his ancestry!" Their voices had risen to shouts long since, and in the outer office all ears were turned their way. "Go to it, Gaius Marius!" said a tribune of the soldiers. "Hit him where it hurts, Gaius Marius!" said another. "Piss all over the arrogant fellator, Gaius Marius!" said a third, grinning. Which made it manifest that everyone liked Gaius Marius a great deal more than they liked Quintus Caecilius Metellus, all the way down to the ranker soldiers. But the shouting had penetrated even further than the outer office; when the consul's son, Quintus Caecilius Metellus Junior, burst in, the consul's staff tried to look all efficiency and busy activity. Without sparing them a glance, Metellus Piglet opened the door to his father's room. "Father, your voices can be heard for miles!" said the young man, casting a glare of loathing at Marius. He was very like his father physically, of average height and size, brown-haired, brown-eyed, modestly good-looking in a Roman way, and having nothing about him to make him stand out in a Roman crowd. The interruption sobered Metellus, though it did little to diminish Marius's rage. Neither of the antagonists made any move to sit down again. Young Metellus Piglet stood to one side, alarmed and upset, passionately devoted to his father but out of his depth, especially when he bethought himself of the indignities he had heaped upon the head of Gaius Marius ever since his father had appointed him commander of the Utica garrison. For he now saw for the first time a different Gaius Marius: physically enormous, of a bravery and courage and intelligence beyond the capacity of any Caecilius Metellus. "I see no point in continuing this conversation, Gaius Marius," said Metellus, hiding the trembling of his hands by pressing them, palms down, on the desk. "What did you come to see me about, anyway?" "I came to tell you that I intend to leave service in this war at the end of next summer," Marius said. "I'm going back to Rome to seek election as consul." Metellus looked as if he couldn't believe his ears. "You are what?” "I'm going to Rome to contest the consular elections." "No, you are not," said Metellus. "You signed on as my senior legate and with a propraetor's imperium at that! for the duration of my term as governor of Africa Province. My term has just been extended. Which means so has yours." "You can release me." "If I wish to release you. But I do not wish to," said Metellus. "In fact, if I had my way, Gaius Marius, I'd bury you here in the provinces for the rest of your life!" "Don't make me do anything nasty, Quintus Caecilius," Marius said, in quite a friendly voice. "Make you do anything what? Oh, get out of here, Marius! Go and do something useful stop wasting my time!" Metellus caught his son's eye and grinned at him like a conspirator. "I insist that I be released from service in this war so that I may stand for consul in Rome this coming autumn." Emboldened by his father's growing air of lordly and indifferent superiority, Metellus Piglet began to break into muffled giggles, which fueled his father's wit. "I tell you what, Gaius Marius," he said, smiling, "you are now almost fifty years of age. My son is twenty. Might I suggest that you stand for election as consul in the same year he does? By then you might just have managed to learn enough to pass muster in the consul's chair! Though I'm sure my son would be delighted to give you a few pointers.'' Young Metellus burst into audible laughter. Marius looked at them from under his bristling eyebrows, his eagle's face prouder and haughtier by far than theirs. "I will be consul," he said. "Rest assured, Quintus Caecilius, that I will be consul not once, but seven times." And he left the room, leaving the two Metelluses gazing after him in mingled puzzlement and fear. Wondering why they could find nothing amusing in that preposterous statement. The next day Marius rode back to Old Carthage and sought an audience with Prince Gauda. Admitted into the princely presence, he went down on one knee and pressed his lips to Gauda's clammy limp hand. “Rise, Gaius Marius!'' cried Gauda delightedly, charmed by the sight of this magnificent-looking man doing him homage in such a genuinely respectful, admiring way. Marius began to rise, then sank down on both knees, his hands outstretched. "Your royal Highness," he said, "I am not worthy to stand in your presence, for I come before you as the most humble of petitioners." "Rise, rise!" squealed Gauda, more delighted still. "I will not hear of your asking me for anything on your knees! Here, sit by me and tell me what it is you want." The chair Gauda indicated was indeed by him but one step lower than the princely throne. Bowing deeply all the way to the chair, Marius seated himself on its very edge, as if awed into discomfort by the radiance of the only being comfortably seated, namely Gauda himself. “When you enrolled yourself as my client, Prince Gauda, I accepted the amazing honor you did me because I felt that I would be able to advance your cause in Rome. For I had intended to seek election as consul in the autumn." Marius paused, sighed profoundly. "But, alas, it is not to be! Quintus Caecilius Metellus remains in Africa Province, his term as governor prorogued which means that I, as his legate, may not leave his service without his permission. When I told him I wished to seek election as consul, he refused to allow me to leave Africa one day ahead of himself.'' The noble scion of the Numidian royal house went rigid with the easy rage of a pampered invalid; well did he remember Metellus refusing to rise to greet him, refusing to bow low to him, refusing to permit him a throne in the governor's presence, refusing him a Roman escort. "But this is beyond all reason, Gaius Marius!" he exclaimed. "How may we force him to change his mind?" "Sire, your intelligence your grasp of the situation I am awed!" cried Marius. "That is exactly what we have to do, force him to change his mind." He paused. "I know what you are going to suggest, but perhaps it might be better coming from my lips than yours, for it is a sordid business. So do, I beg you, allow me to say it!" "Say it," said Gauda loftily. "Your royal Highness, Rome and the Senate, even the People through their two Assemblies, must be swamped with letters! Letters from you and from every single burgher, pastoralist, grain grower, merchant, and broker in the entire Roman African province letters informing Rome how inefficient, how grossly incompetent Quintus Caecilius Metellus's conduct of this war against the Numidian enemy has been, letters explaining that the few successes we have enjoyed have all been my doing, not Quintus Caecilius Metellus's. Thousands of letters, my prince! And not just written once, but written over and over again, until Quintus Caecilius Metellus relents, and grants me leave to go to Rome to seek election as consul." Gauda whinnied blissfully. "Isn't it simply astonishing, Gaius Marius, how much in concert our two minds are? Letters are exactly what I was going to suggest!" "Well, as I said, I knew that," said Marius deprecatingly. "But is it possible, sire?" "Possible? Of course it's possible!" said Gauda. "All it takes is time and influence and money and I think, Gaius Marius, that between the two of us we can get together a great deal more time and influence and money than Quintus Caecilius Metellus, don't you?" "I'm certainly hoping so," said Marius. Of course Marius didn't leave it there. He went in person to every Roman, Latin, and Italian man of note from one end of Africa Province to the other, pleading his duties on Metellus's behalf as his reason for needing to travel so far afield, so constantly. With him he carried a secret mandate from Prince Gauda, promising all sorts of concessions in Numidia once he was its king. And asking everyone to enroll as a client of Gaius Marius's. Rain and mud and rivers overflowing their banks couldn't stop Gaius Marius; he went on his way enlisting clients and gathering promises of letters, letters, and more letters. Thousands upon thousands of letters. Letters enough to sink Quintus Caecilius Metellus's ship of state to the bottom of the sea of political extinction.
By February the letters from the Roman African province to every important man or body of men in Rome began to arrive, and continued to arrive by every ship thereafter. Said one of the early ones, from Marcus Caelius Rufus, Roman citizen owner of hundreds of iugera of land in the Bagradas River valley, producer of 240-fold wheat crops for the Roman market:
Quintus Caecilius Metellus has done very little in Africa save look after his own interests. It is my considered opinion that his intention is to prolong this war to increase his own personal glory and further his craving for power. Last autumn he gave out that it was his policy to weaken King Jugurtha's position by burning Numidian crops and raiding Numidian towns, especially those containing treasure. As a result, my lands and the lands of many other Roman citizens in this province have been placed in jeopardy, for Numidian raiding parties are now retaliating inside the Roman province. The entire Bagradas Valley, so vital to Rome's grain supply, lives in fear and trembling from one day to the next. Furthermore, it has come to my ears, as it has to many others, that Quintus Caecilius Metellus cannot even manage his legates, let alone his army. He has deliberately wasted the potential of men as senior and capable as Gaius Marius and Publius Rutilius Rufus, putting the one to commanding his unimportant cavalry unit, and the other to work as his praefectus fabrum. His behavior toward Prince Gauda, regarded by the Senate and People of Rome as the rightful ruler of Numidia, has been insufferably arrogant, thoughtless, and sometimes cruel. In conclusion, may I say that what little success last year's campaigns produced is purely due to the efforts of Gaius Marius and Publius Rutilius Rufus. I am aware that they have been accorded no credit or thanks for their endeavors. May I recommend Gaius Marius and Publius Rutilius Rufus to your notice, and condemn most strongly the conduct of Quintus Caecilius Metellus?
This missive was addressed to one of the largest and most important grain merchants in Rome, a man whose influence among senators and knights was legion. Naturally, once he was apprised of Metellus's shameful conduct of the war, his indignation waxed loud; his voice dinned in all sorts of interesting ears, with immediate effect. And as the days went by and the spate of letters kept coming, his voice was joined by many other voices. Senators began to flinch when they saw a merchant banker or maritime plutocrat coming their way, and the complacent satisfaction of the enormously powerful Caecilius Metellus clan was rapidly tumbling into dismay. Off went letters from the Caecilius Metellus clan to its esteemed member Quintus Caecilius, proconsul of Africa Province, begging that he tone down his arrogance toward Prince Gauda, treat his senior legates with more consideration than he did his son, and try to drum up a couple of really impressive victories in the field against Jugurtha. Then there broke the scandal of Vaga, which, having surrendered to Metellus in the late autumn, now rebelled and executed most of its Italian businessmen; the revolt had been fomented by Jugurtha with the connivance of none other than Metellus's personal friend, the garrison commander Turpilius. Metellus made the mistake of defending Turpilius when Marius demanded loudly that he be court-martialed for treason, and by the time the story reached Rome via hundreds of letters, it appeared that Metellus himself was as guilty of treason as was Turpilius. Off went more letters from the Caecilius Metellus clan to their esteemed Quintus Caecilius in Utica, begging that he choose his friends better, if he was going to insist upon defending them on treason charges. Many weeks passed before Metellus could be brought to believe that Gaius Marius was the author of the Roman letter campaign; and even when he was forced to believe it, he was slow to understand the significance of this epistolary war and even slower to counter it. He, a Caecilius Metellus, brought into disrepute in Rome on the word of a Gaius Marius and a sniveling pretender and a few vulgar colonial merchants? Impossible! Rome didn't work that way. Rome belonged to him, not to Gaius Marius. Once every eight days, regular as the calendar, Marius presented himself to Metellus and demanded to be released from service at the end of Sextilis; just as regularly, Metellus turned him down. In all fairness to Metellus, he had other things on his mind than Marius and a few paltry letters turning up in Rome; most of his energies were taken up with Bomilcar. It had taken Nabdalsa many days to arrange an interview between himself and Bomilcar, then many more days to set up a secret meeting between Bomilcar and Metellus. But late in March the latter finally happened, in a small annex attached to the governor's residence in Utica, to which Bomilcar was smuggled. They knew each other fairly well, of course, for it was Metellus who had kept Jugurtha informed through Bomilcar during those last despairing days in Rome, Bomilcar rather than his king who had availed himself of Metellus's hospitality, contained as it had been within the city's pomerium. However, there were few social niceties about this new meeting; Bomilcar was edgy, afraid his presence inside Utica would be detected, and Metellus was uncertain of himself in this new role of spymaster. So Metellus didn't mince matters. "I want to conclude this war with as few losses in men and materiel as possible, and in as short a time as possible," he said. "Rome needs me elsewhere than an outpost like Africa." "Yes, I heard about the Germans," said Bomilcar smoothly. "Then you understand the haste," said Metellus. "Indeed I do. However, I fail to see what I personally can do to shorten the hostilities here." "I have been led to believe and after considerable thought, I find myself convinced that the quickest and best way to decide the fate of Numidia in a way favorable to Rome is to eliminate King Jugurtha," the proconsul said. Bomilcar considered the proconsul thoughtfully. No Gaius Marius, he knew well; not even a Rutilius Rufus. Prouder, haughtier, far more conscious of his station, yet not as competent or detached. As always to a Roman, Rome mattered. But the concept of Rome cherished by a Caecilius Metellus was very different from the concept of Rome cherished by Gaius Marius. What puzzled Bomilcar was the difference between the old Metellus of days in Rome and the Metellus who governed Africa Province; for though he knew about the letters, he had no appreciation of their importance. "It's true that Jugurtha is the wellhead for Numidian resistance to Rome," Bomilcar said. "However, you may not be aware of the unpopularity of Gauda within Numidia. Numidia will never consent to be ruled by Gauda, legitimate or not." At the mention of Gauda's name, an expression of distaste appeared on Metellus's face. "Faugh!" he exclaimed, waving one hand. "A nothing! An apology for a man, let alone a ruler." His light brown eyes dwelled shrewdly upon Bomilcar's heavy face. "If anything should happen to King Jugurtha, I and Rome, of course was thinking more along the lines of putting a man on the Numidian throne whose good sense and experience have taught him to believe that Numidia's interests are best served in a dutiful client kingship to Rome." "I agree; I think Numidia's interests are best served in that way." Bomilcar paused, wet his lips. "Would you consider me a possible King of Numidia, Quintus Caecilius?" "Most definitely!" said Metellus. "Good! In that case I shall happily work toward the elimination of Jugurtha." "Soon, I hope," said Metellus, smiling. "As soon as may be. There is no point in an assassination attempt. Jugurtha is too careful. Besides, he has the total loyalty of his royal guard. Nor do I think a coup would succeed. Most of the nobility are well satisfied with the way Jugurtha has ruled Numidia and with his conduct of this war. If Gauda were a more attractive alternative, things might be different. I" Bomilcar grimaced "do not have the blood of Masinissa in my veins, which means I will need all of Rome's support to ascend the throne successfully." "Then what is to be done?" demanded Metellus. "I think the only way to do it is to maneuver Jugurtha into a situation where he can be captured by a Roman force I don't mean in a battle, I mean in an ambush. Then, you can kill him on the spot, or take him into custody and do what you like with him later," said Bomilcar. "All right, Baron Bomilcar. I take it you'll get word to me in plenty of time to set up this ambush?" "Of course. Border raids are the ideal opportunity, and Jugurtha plans to lead many of them as soon as the ground is dry enough. Though be warned, Quintus Caecilius. You may fail several times before you succeed in capturing someone as wily as Jugurtha. After all, I cannot afford to jeopardize my own survival I am no use to Rome or myself if I'm dead. Rest assured, eventually I'll manage to lead him into a good trap. Not even Jugurtha can lead a charmed life forever."
All in all, Jugurtha was well satisfied with the way things were going. Though he had suffered considerably from Marius's raids into the more settled parts of his realm, he knew none better that the sheer size of Numidia was his greatest advantage and protection. And the settled parts of Numidia, unlike other nations, mattered less to the King than the wilderness. Most of Numidia's soldiers, including the light-armed cavalry so famous throughout the world, were recruited among the peoples who lived a seminomadic existence far within the interior of the country, even on the far side of the mighty mountains in which the patient Atlas held up the sky on his shoulders; these peoples were known as Gaetuli and Garamantes; Jugurtha's mother belonged to a tribe of the Gaetuli. After the surrender of Vaga, the King made sure he kept no money or treasure in any town likely to be along the line of a Roman route march; everything was transferred to places like Zama and Capsa, remote, difficult to infiltrate, built as citadels atop unscalable peaks and surrounded by the fanatically loyal Gaetuli. And Vaga turned out to be no Roman victory; once again Jugurtha had bought himself a Roman, the garrison commander, Turpilius. Metellus's friend. Ha! However, something was changed. As the winter rains began to dwindle, Jugurtha became more and more convinced of this. The trouble was, he couldn't put his finger on what was changed. His court was a mobile affair; he moved constantly from one citadel to another, and distributed his wives and concubines among all of them, so that wherever he went, he could be sure of loving faces, loving arms. And yet something was wrong. Not with his dispositions, nor with his armies, nor with his supply lines, nor with the loyalty of his many towns and districts and tribesmen. What he sensed was little more than a whiff, a twitch, a tingling sensation of danger from some source close to him. Though never once did he associate his premonition with his refusal to appoint Bomilcar regent. "It's in the court," he said to Bomilcar as they rode from Capsa to Cirta at the end of March, walking their horses at the head of a huge train of cavalry and infantry. Bomilcar turned his head and looked straight into his half brother's pale eyes. "The court?" "There's mischief afoot, brother. Sown and cultivated by that slimy little turd Gauda, I'd be willing to bet," said Jugurtha. "Do you mean a palace revolution?" "I'm not sure what I mean. It's just that something is wrong. I can feel it in my bones." "An assassin?" "Perhaps. I really don't honestly know, Bomilcar! My eyes are going in a dozen different directions at once, and my ears feel as if they're rotating, they're so busy yet only my nose has discovered anything wrong. What about you? Do you feel nothing?" he asked, supremely sure of Bomilcar's affection, trust, loyalty. "I have to say I feel nothing," said Bomilcar. Three times did Bomilcar maneuver the unwitting Jugurtha into a trap, and three times did Jugurtha manage to extricate himself unharmed. Without suspecting his half brother. "They're getting too clever," said Jugurtha after the failure of the third Roman ambush. "This is Gaius Marius or Publius Rutilius at work, not Metellus." He grunted. "I have a spy in my camp, Bomilcar." Bomilcar managed to look serene. "I admit the possibility. But who would dare?" "I don't know," said Jugurtha, his face ugly. "But rest assured, sooner or later I will know." At the end of April, Metellus invaded Numidia, persuaded by Rutilius Rufus to content himself at first with a slighter target than the capital, Cirta; the Roman forces marched on Thala instead. A message came from Bomilcar, who had lured Jugurtha in person to Thala, and Metellus made a fourth attempt to capture the King. But as it wasn't in Metellus to go about the storming of Thala with the speed and decision the job needed, Jugurtha escaped, and the assault became a siege. A month later Thala fell, and much to Metellus's gratified surprise, yielded a large hoard of treasure Jugurtha had brought to Thala with him, and had been obliged to leave behind when he fled. As May slid into June, Metellus marched to Cirta, where he received another pleasant surprise. For the Numidian capital surrendered without a fight, its very large complement of Italian and Roman businessmen a significantly pro-Roman force in town politics. Besides which, Cirta did not like Jugurtha any more than he liked Cirta. The weather was hot and very dry, normal for that time of the year; Jugurtha moved out of reach of the slipshod Roman intelligence network by going south to the tents of the Gaetuli, and then to Capsa, homeland of his mother's tribe. A small but heavily fortified mountain citadel in the midst of the Gaetulian remoteness, Capsa contained a large part of Jugurtha's heart, for it was here his mother had actually lived since the death of her husband, Bomilcar's father. And it was here that Jugurtha had stored the bulk of his treasure. It was here in June that Jugurtha's men brought Nabdalsa, caught coming away from Roman-occupied Cirta after Jugurtha's spies in the Roman command finally obtained enough evidence of Nabdalsa's treachery to warrant informing the King. Though always known as Gauda's man, Nabdalsa had not been prevented from moving freely within Numidia; a remote cousin with Masinissa's blood in him, he was tolerated and considered harmless. "But I now have proof," said Jugurtha, "that you have been actively collaborating with the Romans. If the news disappoints me, it's chiefly because you've been fool enough to deal with Metellus rather than Gaius Marius." He studied Nabdalsa, clapped in irons upon capture, and visibly wearing the signs of harsh treatment at the hands of Jugurtha's men. "Of course you're not in this alone," he said thoughtfully. "Who among my barons has conspired with you?" Nabdalsa refused to answer. "Put him to the torture," said Jugurtha indifferently. Torture in Numidia was not sophisticated, though like all Eastern-style despots, Jugurtha did avail himself of dungeons and long-term imprisonment. Into one of Jugurtha's dungeons, buried in the base of the rocky hill on which Capsa perched, and entered only through a warren of tunnels from the palace within the citadel's walls, was Nabdalsa thrown, and there the subhumanly brutish soldiers who always seemed to inherit such positions applied the torture. Not very long afterward, it became obvious why Nabdalsa had chosen to serve the inferior man, Gauda; he talked. All it had taken was the removal of his teeth and the fingernails of one hand. Summoned to hear his confession, the unsuspecting Jugurtha brought Bomilcar with him. Knowing that he would never leave the subterranean world he was about to enter, Bomilcar gazed into the illimitable heights of the rich blue sky, sniffed the sweet desert air, brushed the back of his hand against the silky leaves of a flowering bush. And strove to carry the memories with him into the darkness. The poorly ventilated chamber stank; excrement, vomitus, sweat, blood, stagnant water, and dead tissue clubbed together to form a miasma out of Tartarus, an atmosphere no man could breathe without experiencing fear. Even Jugurtha entered the place with a shiver.
The inquisition proceeded under terrible difficulties, for Nabdalsa's gums continued to bleed profusely, and a broken nose prevented attempts to stanch the haemorrhage by packing the mouth. Stupidity, thought Jugurtha, torn by a mixture of horror at the sight of Nabdalsa and anger at the thoughtlessness of his brutes, beginning in the one place they ought to have kept free and clear of their attentions. Not that it mattered a great deal. Nabdalsa uttered the one vital word on Jugurtha's third question, and it was not too difficult to understand as it was mumbled out through the blood. "Bomilcar." "Leave us," said the King to his brutes, but was prudent enough still to order them to remove Bomilcar's dagger. Alone with the King and the half-conscious Nabdalsa, Bomilcar sighed. "The only thing I regret," he said, "is that this will kill our mother." It was the cleverest thing he could have said under the circumstances, for it earned him a single blow from the executioner's axe instead of the slow, lingering dying his half brother the King yearned to inflict upon him. "Why?" asked Jugurtha. Bomilcar shrugged. "When I grew old enough to start weighing up the years, brother, I discovered how much you had cheated me. You have held me in the same contempt you might have held a pet monkey." "What did you want?" Jugurtha asked. "To hear you call me brother in front of the whole world." Jugurtha stared at him in genuine wonder. "And raise you above your station? My dear Bomilcar, it is the sire who matters, not the dam! Our mother is a Berber woman of the Gaetuli, and not even the daughter of a chief. She has no royal distinction to convey. If I were to call you brother in front of the whole world, all who heard me do so would assume that I was adopting you into Masinissa's line. And that since I have two sons of my own who are legal heirs would be imprudent, to say the very least." "You should have appointed me their guardian and regent," said Bomilcar. "And raise you again above your station? My dear Bomilcar, our mother's blood negates it! Your father was a minor baron, a relative nobody. Where my father was Masinissa's legitimate son. It is from my father I inherit my royalty." "But you're not legitimate, are you?" "I am not. Nevertheless, the blood is there. And blood tells." Bomilcar turned away. "Get it over and done with," he said. "I failed not you, but myself. Reason enough to die. Yet beware, Jugurtha." "Beware? Of what? Assassination attempts? Further treachery, other traitors?" "Of the Romans. They're like the sun and the wind and the rain. In the end they wear everything down to sand." Jugurtha bellowed for the brutes, who came tumbling in ready for anything, only to find nothing untoward, and stood waiting for orders. "Kill them both," said Jugurtha, moving toward the door. "But make it quick. And send me both their heads." The heads of Bomilcar and Nabdalsa were nailed to the battlements of Capsa for all to see. For a head was more than a mere talisman of kingly vengeance upon a traitor; it was fixed in some public place to show the people that the right man had died, and to prevent the appearance of an imposter. Jugurtha told himself he felt no grief, just felt more alone than ever before. It had been a necessary lesson: that a king could trust no man, even his brother. However, the death of Bomilcar had two immediate results. One was that Jugurtha became completely elusive, never staying more than two days in any one place, never informing his guard where he was going next, never allowing his army to know what his plans for it were; authority was vested in the person of the King, no one else. The other result concerned his father-in-law, King Bocchus of Mauretania, who had not actively aided Rome against his daughter's husband, but had not actively aided Jugurtha against Rome either; the feelers went out from Jugurtha to Bocchus at once, and Jugurtha put increased pressure upon Bocchus to ally himself with Numidia, eject Rome from all of Africa.
By the end of summer, Quintus Caecilius Metellus's position in Rome had been totally undermined. No one there could find a kindly word to say about him or his conduct of the war. And still the letters kept coming, steady, relentless, influential in the extreme. After the capture of Thala and the surrender of Cirta, the Caecilius Metellus faction had managed to gain some ground among the knights' lobbies, but then came further news from Africa that made it clear neither Thala nor Cirta would ensure an end to the war; and after that came reports of endless, pointless skirmishes, of advances further into the Numidian west achieving nothing, of funds misused and six legions kept in the field at huge cost to the Treasury and with no end to the expense in sight. Thanks to Metellus, the war against Jugurtha would certainly drag on for at least another year. The consular elections were scheduled for mid-October, and Marius's name now on everyone's lips was constantly bruited about as a candidate. Yet time went on, and still he didn't appear in Rome. Metellus remained obdurate. "I insist upon going," said Marius to Metellus for what must have been the fiftieth time. "Insist all you like," said Metellus. "You're not going." "Next year I will be consul," said Marius. "An upstart like you consul? Impossible!" "You're afraid the voters would elect me, aren't you?" asked Marius smugly. "You won't let me go because you know I will be elected." "I cannot believe any true Roman would vote for you, Gaius Marius. However, you're an extremely rich man, and that means you can buy votes. Should you ever at any time in the future be elected consul and it won't be next year! you may rest assured that I will gladly expend every ounce of energy I possess in proving in a court of law that you bought office!" "I don't need to buy office, Quintus Caecilius, I never have bought office. Therefore feel free to try," said Marius, still annoyingly smug. Metellus tried a different tack. "I am not letting you go reconcile yourself to that. As a Roman of the Romans, I would betray my class if I did let you go. The consulship, Gaius Marius, is an office far above anyone of your Italian origins. The men who sit in the consul's ivory chair must fit it by birth, by the achievements of their ancestors as much as by their own. I would rather be disgraced and dead than see an Italian from the Samnite borderlands a semi-literate boor who ought never even have been praetor! sit in the consul's ivory chair! Do your worst or do your best! It makes not one iota of difference to me. I would rather be disgraced and dead than give you permission to go to Rome." "If necessary, Quintus Caecilius, you will be both," said Marius, and left the room. Publius Rutilius Rufus attempted to bring both men to reason, his motives concern for Rome as well as for Marius. "Leave politics out of it," he said to them. "The three of us are here in Africa to beat Jugurtha, but neither of you is interested in devoting your energies to that end. You're more concerned with getting the better of each other than you are of Jugurtha, and I, for one, am fed up with the situation!" "Are you accusing me of dereliction of duty, Publius Rutilius?" asked Marius, dangerously calm. "No, of course I'm not! I'm accusing you of withholding that streak of genius I know you to possess in warfare. I am your equal tactically. I am your equal logistically. But when it comes to strategy, Gaius Marius the long-term look at war you have no equal at all anywhere. Yet have you devoted any time or thought to a strategy aimed at winning this war? No!" "And where do I fit into this paean of praise for Gaius Marius?" asked Metellus, tight-lipped. "For that matter, where do I fit into this paean of praise for Publius Rutilius Rufus? Or am I not important?" "You are important, you unmitigated snob, because you are the titular commander in this war!" snapped Rutilius Rufus. "And if you think you're better at tactics and logistics than I, or better at tactics and logistics and strategy than Gaius Marius, do not feel backward at coming forward about it, I beg you! Not that you would. But if it's praise you want, I am prepared to give you this much you're not as venal as Spurius Postumius Albinus, nor as ineffectual as Marcus Junius Silanus. Your main trouble is that you're just not as good as you think you are. When you displayed sufficient intelligence to enlist me and Gaius Marius as your senior legates, I thought the years must have improved you. But I was wrong. You've wasted our talents as well as the State's money. We're not winning this war, we're engaged in an extremely expensive impasse. So take my advice, Quintus Caecilius! Let Gaius Marius go to Rome, let Gaius Marius stand for consul and let me organize our resources and devise our military maneuvers. As for you devote your energies to undermining Jugurtha's hold over his people. You are welcome to every scrap of public glory as far as I'm concerned, provided that within these four walls you're willing to admit the truth of what I'm saying." "I admit nothing," said Metellus. And so it went on, all through late summer and well into autumn. Jugurtha was impossible to pin down, indeed seemed to have disappeared from the face of the earth. When it became obvious even to the least ranker legionary that there was not going to be a confrontation between the Roman army and the Numidian army, Metellus withdrew from far western Numidia and went into camp outside Cirta. Word had come that Bocchus of Mauretania had finally yielded to Jugurtha's pressure tactics, formed up his army, and marched to join his son-in-law somewhere to the south; united, rumor had it, they planned to move on Cirta. Hoping to join battle at last, Metellus made his dispositions and listened with more interest than usual to Marius and Rutilius Rufus. But it was not to be. The two armies lay some miles apart, with Jugurtha refusing to be drawn. Impasse descended again, the Roman position too strongly defended for Jugurtha to attack, and the Numidian position too ephemeral to tempt Metellus out of his camp.
And then, twelve days before the consular elections in Rome, Quintus Caecilius Metellus Piggle-wiggle formally released Gaius Marius from his service as senior legate in the campaign against Jugurtha. "Off you go!" said Metellus, smiling sweetly. "Rest assured, Gaius Marius, that I will make all of Rome aware that I did release you before the elections." "You think I won't get there in time," said Marius. "I think nothing, Gaius Marius." Marius grinned. "That's true enough, at any rate," he said, and snapped his fingers. "Now where's the piece of paper that says I'm formally released? Give it to me." Metellus handed over Marius's marching orders, his smile somewhat fixed, and as Marius reached the door he said, not raising his voice, "By the way, Gaius Marius, I have just had some wonderful news from Rome. The Senate has extended my governorship of Africa Province and my command in the Numidian war into next year." "That's nice of the Senate," said Marius, and vanished. "I piss on him!" Marius said to Rutilius Rufus moments later. "He thinks he's cooked my goose and saved his own. But he's wrong. I'm going to beat him, Publius Rutilius, you wait and see! I'm going to be in Rome in time to stand for consul, and then I'm going to have his prorogued command torn off him. And have it given to myself." Rutilius Rufus eyed him thoughtfully. "I have a great deal of respect for your ability, Gaius Marius," he said, "but in this case, time is going to prove Piggle-wiggle the winner. You'll never make it to Rome for those elections." "I will," said Marius, sounding supremely confident. He rode from Cirta to Utica in two days, pausing to snatch a few hours' sleep en route, and ruthlessly commandeering a fresh horse at every opportunity. Before nightfall of the second day he had hired a small, fast ship he found in Utica harbor. And at dawn of the third day he set sail for Italy, having offered a costly sacrifice to the Lares Permarini on the seashore just as light began to filter into the eastern rim of the world. "You sail to an unimaginably great destiny, Gaius Marius," said the priest who made the offering to the gods who protect all those who voyage on the sea. "I have never seen better omens than today." His words were no surprise to Marius. Ever since Martha the Syrian prophetess had told him what his future held, he had remained unshaken in his conviction that things would turn out just as she predicted. So as the ship crept from Utica harbor, he leaned tranquilly on the rail and waited for a wind. It came out of the southwest at a steadily brisk twenty sea miles, and it blew the ship from Utica to Ostia in just three days, a perfect following wind in a perfect following sea, no need to hug the coast, no need to put in anywhere for shelter or provisions. All the gods were on his side, as Martha had foretold. News of the miraculous voyage beat him into Rome, even though he delayed in Ostia only long enough to pay for his ship and reward its captain generously; so when he rode into the Forum Romanum and dismounted before the consul Aurelius's electoral table, a crowd had gathered. A crowd which cheered and applauded him wildly, and gave him to understand that he was the hero of the hour. Surrounded by people clapping him on the back, beaming at his magical appearance, Marius stepped up to the consul suffectus who had taken the place of Servius Sulpicius Galba, condemned by the Mamilian Commission, and laid Metellus's letter down on the table. "If you will excuse the fact that I have not waited to change into the whitened toga, Marcus Aurelius," he said, "I am here to lodge my name as a candidate in the consular contest." "Provided you can prove that Quintus Caecilius has freed you from your obligation to him, Gaius Marius, I will accept your name gladly," said the suffect consul, stirred by the crowd's welcome and aware that the most influential knights in the city were hurrying from every basilica and porticus around as the news of Marius's unexpected arrival spread. How Marius had grown! How wonderfully substantial he looked as he stood half a head taller than those around him, smiling his fierce smile! How wide his shoulders, to take the burden of the consulship upon them! For the first time in his long career the Italian hayseed with no Greek experienced genuine political adulation; not the wholesome faithful esteem of soldiers, but the fickle self-serving adoration of the Forum masses. And Gaius Marius loved it, not because his image of himself needed it, but because it was so alien, so tainted, so inexplicable. He plunged into the five most hectic days of his life, with neither the time nor the energy to give Julia more than a quick hug, and never home at an hour when his son might have been shown to him. For that hysterical welcome when he declared his candidacy was not an indication that he could win; the enormously influential Caecilius Metellus faction joined hands with every other aristocratic faction, patrician and plebeian, in a last-ditch effort to keep the Italian hayseed with no Greek out of the consul's ivory curule chair. His strength lay among the knights, thanks to his Spanish connections and to Prince Gauda's promises of coming concessions in a Gaudane Numidia, but there were many knights whose ties were to the various factions allied against him. And people talked, people argued, people questioned, people debated: would it truly be a good thing for Rome to elect the New Man Gaius Marius consul? New Men were a risk. New Men didn't know the noble life. New Men made mistakes noblemen did not. New Men were New Men were New Men... Yes, his wife was a Julia of the Julians. Yes, his military record was an adornment to Rome. Yes, he was so rich he could confidently be expected to keep himself above corruption. But who had ever seen him in the law courts? Who had ever heard him speak about laws and lawmaking? Wasn't it true that he had been a disruptive element in the College of Tribunes of the Plebs all those years ago, with his defiance of those who knew Rome and Rome's needs better than he, and that obnoxious law which had narrowed the voting bridges in the saepta? And look at his age! He would be a full fifty years old if he became consul, and old men made poor consuls. And over and above all these speculations and objections, the Caecilius Metellus faction made meaty capital out of the most repellent aspect of Gaius Marius as consul. He was not a Roman of the Romans. He was an Italian. Was Rome so devoid of suitable Roman noblemen that the consulship should go to an Italian New Man? Surely among the candidates were half a dozen men more worthy than Gaius Marius! Romans all. Good men all. Of course Marius spoke, to small groups and to large ones, in the Forum Romanum, in the Circus Flaminius, from the podiums of various temples, in the Porticus Metelli, in all the basilicae. And he was a good speaker, well trained in rhetoric, though he had not used his skills until after he entered the Senate. Scipio Aemilianus had seen to his oratical polish. He held his audiences; no one walked away or dismissed him as a poor sort of speaker, though he couldn't rival Lucius Cassius or Catulus Caesar. Many were the questions thrown at him, some from those who simply wanted to know, some from those he himself had put up to ask, some from those his enemies had put up to ask, and some from those who were interested to hear the differences between his answers and Metellus's reports to the Senate. The election itself was a quiet and orderly one, held in the voting grounds out on the Campus Martius, at the place called the saepta. Elections in the thirty-five tribes could be called in the well of the Comitia in the Forum Romanum, for it was easy to organize tribal voters in a relatively confined space; but the elections of the Centuriate Assembly were massively unwieldy in size, requiring as they did the deployment of the Centuries in the Five Classes. As the vote of each century was called, starting with the First Century of the First Class, the pattern began to emerge: Lucius Cassius Longinus was going to be the choice of every century, but their choices of the second consul were rich and varied. Sure enough, the First and Second Classes voted so solidly for Lucius Cassius Longinus that he was returned in first place without missing a century, and so was designated the senior consul, who held the fasces for the month of January. But the name of the junior consul wasn't known until almost the end of the Third Class, so close was the contest between Gaius Marius and Quintus Lutatius Catulus Caesar. And then it happened. The successful candidate for junior consul was Gaius Marius. The Caecilius Metelluses were still able to influence Centuriate voting but not enough to keep Gaius Marius out. And that could be classified as a great triumph for Gaius Marius, the Italian hayseed with no Greek. He was a genuine New Man, the first of his family to hold a seat in the Senate, the first of his family to make his home inside the city of Rome, the first of his family to make a huge fortune, the first of his family to make a mark in the army.
* * *
Late in the afternoon of election day, Gaius Julius Caesar held a celebratory dinner, a family affair. His contact with Marius had been confined to a quick handshake in the Forum and another quick handshake on the Campus Martius when the centuries had assembled, so desperate had Marius's five-day election campaign been. "You've had unbelievable luck," said Caesar, leading his guest of honor to the dining room while his daughter Julia went off to find her mother and younger sister. "I know it," said Marius. "We're very thin as to men today," Caesar went on, "with both my sons still in Africa, but I can offer you one more man as moral support, so we do equal the women." "I have letters from Sextus and Gaius Julius, and plenty of news about their exploits," Marius said as they arranged themselves comfortably on the couch. "Later will do." The promised third man entered the dining room, and Marius started in surprise; for he recognized the young yet mature man who had been standing among the knights almost three years before while the sacrificial bull of the new consul Minucius Rufus had so fought its dying. How could one forget that face, that hair? "Gaius Marius," said Caesar with a little constraint, "I would like you to meet Lucius Cornelius Sulla, not only my next-door neighbor, but also my fellow senator, and soon to be my other son-in-law." "Well!" exclaimed Marius, extending his hand and shaking Sulla's with great warmth. "You're a lucky man, Lucius Cornelius." "I'm well aware of it," said Sulla with feeling. Caesar had chosen to be a trifle unorthodox in his dining arrangements, keeping the top couch for himself and Marius, and relegating Sulla to the second couch; not an insult, as he was careful to explain, but to make the group look a little larger, and give everyone plenty of room. How interesting, thought Marius with a mental frown; I have never before seen Gaius Julius Caesar feeling at a disadvantage. But this oddly beautiful fellow upsets him in some way, throws him off balance.... And then the women came in, seated themselves on straight chairs opposite their partners, and the dinner got under way. Try as he would not to present the picture of a doting elderly husband, Marius found his eyes constantly drawn to his Julia, who had grown in his absence into a ravishing young matron, gracious, unafraid of her new responsibilities, an excellent mother and chatelaine and the most ideal of wives. Whereas, decided Marius, Julilla had not grown up satisfactorily at all. Of course he had not seen her in the worst throes of her wasting illness which had ceased to plague her some time before, yet had left her with what he could only call a thin attitude to life thin of body, thin of intellect, thin of experience, thin of contentment. Feverish in her talk, fluttery in her manner, she was prone to jump from fright, and could not stay settled on her chair; nor could she restrain herself from dominating her betrothed's attention, so that he often found himself excluded from the conversation between Marius and Caesar. He bore it well, Marius noted, and seemed genuinely devoted to Julilla, fascinated no doubt by the way she focused her emotions upon him. But that, the practical Marius decided, would not last beyond six months of marriage. Not with a Lucius Cornelius Sulla the bridegroom! Nothing about him suggested a natural preference for female company, or an uxorious inclination. At the end of the meal Caesar announced that he was taking Gaius Marius off to his study for a private talk. "Stay here if you like, or go about your various ways," he said calmly. "It is too long since Gaius Marius and I have met." "There have been changes in your household, Gaius Julius," said Marius as they got comfortable in the tablinum. "Indeed there have and therein lies most of my reason for wanting to get you on your own without delay." "Well, I'm consul on New Year's Day next, and that's my life disposed of tidily," said Marius, smiling. "I owe it all to you and not the least do I owe you the happiness of a perfect wife, an ideal partner in my enterprises. I've had little time to give her since my return, but now that I am elected, I intend to rectify that. Three days from now I'm taking Julia and my son to Baiae, and we're going to forget the whole world for a month." "It pleases me more than you can know to hear you speak with such affection and respect of my daughter.'' Marius leaned back a little more comfortably in his chair. "Very well. Now to Lucius Cornelius Sulla. I remember some words you had to say about an aristocrat without the money to take up the life his birth entitled him to, and the name was his, your son-in-law to be. What happened to change things?" "According to him, luck. He says if it goes on the way it has since he met Julilla, he's going to have to add a second nickname Felix to the name he inherited from his father. Who was a drunkard and a wastrel, but who married the wealthy Clitumna fifteen years ago or more, and died not long after: Lucius Cornelius met Julilla on New Year's Day almost three years ago, and she gave him a grass crown without knowing the significance of what she had done. He maintains that from that moment, his luck changed. First Clitumna's nephew died, who was her heir. Then a woman called Nicopolis died and left Lucius Cornelius a small fortune she was, I gather, his mistress. And not many moons after that, Clitumna committed suicide. Having no heirs of her own blood, she left her whole fortune the house next door, a villa at Circei, and some ten million denarii to Lucius Cornelius." "Ye gods, he does deserve to add Felix to his name," said Marius, rather dryly. "Are you being naive about this, Gaius Julius, or have you proved to your satisfaction that Lucius Cornelius Sulla didn't help any of the dead into Charon's ferry across the Styx?" Caesar acknowledged the shaft with a raised hand, but grinned. "No, Gaius Marius, I assure you I have not been naive. I cannot implicate Lucius Cornelius in any of the three deaths. The nephew expired after a long bowel and stomach disorder, where the Greek freedwoman Nicopolis died of massive kidney failure within I don't know, a day, two days, certainly no longer. Both were autopsied, and nothing suspicious was found. Clitumna was morbidly depressed before she killed herself. It happened at Circei, at a time when Lucius Cornelius was most definitely here in Rome. I've subjected all Clitumna's household slaves, both here and in Circei, to exhaustive questioning, and it is my considered opinion that there is nothing more to know about Lucius Cornelius Sulla.'' He grimaced. “I have always been against torturing slaves to find evidence of crime because I don't think evidence produced by torture is worth a spoonful of vinegar. But I genuinely do not believe Clitumna's slaves would have a tale to tell even if they were tortured. So I elected not to bother." Marius nodded. "I agree with you, Gaius Julius. Slave testimony is of value only if it is freely given and is as logical as it is patently truthful." "So the upshot of all this was that Lucius Cornelius went from abject poverty to decent wealth over the course of two months," Caesar went on. "From Nicopolis he inherited enough to be admitted to the knights' census, and from Clitumna enough to be admitted to the Senate. Thanks to Scaurus's fuss about the absence of censors, a new pair were elected last May. Otherwise Lucius Cornelius would have had to wait for admission to the Senate for several years." Marius laughed. "Yes, what did actually happen? Didn't anyone want the censors' jobs? I mean, to some extent Fabius Maximus Eburnus is logical, but Licinius Getha? He was thrown out of the Senate by the censors eight years ago for immoral behavior, and only got back into the Senate by getting himself elected a tribune of the plebs!" "I know," said Caesar gloomily. "No, I think what happened was that everyone was reluctant to stand for fear of offending Scaurus. To want to be censor seemed like a want of respect and loyalty for Scaurus, so the only ones who stood were quite incapable of that kind of sensitivity. Mind you, Getha's easy enough to deal with he's only in it for the status and a few silver handshakes from companies bidding for State contracts. Where Eburnus well, we all know he's not right in the head, don't we, Gaius Marius?" Yes, thought Gaius Marius, we do indeed! Immensely old and of an aristocracy surpassed only by the Julius clan, the Fabius Maximus line had died out, and was kept going only by a series of adoptions. The Quintus Fabius Maximus Eburnus who had been elected censor was an adopted Fabius Maximus; he had sired only one son, and then five years earlier, he had executed this one son for unchastity. Though there was no law to prevent Eburnus from executing his son when acting as paterfamilias, the execution of wives or children under the protective shelter of family law had long fallen into disuse. Therefore, Eburnus's action had horrified the whole of Rome. "Mind you, it's just as well for Rome that Getha has an Eburnus as his colleague," said Marius thoughtfully. "I doubt he'll get away with much, not with Eburnus there." "I'm sure you're right, but oh, that poor young man, his son! Mind you, Eburnus is really a Servilius Caepio, and the Servilius Caepio lot are all rather strange when it comes to sexual morality. Chaster than Artemis of the Forest, and vocal about it too. Which really makes one wonder." "So which censor persuaded which to let Lucius Cornelius Sulla into the Senate?" asked Marius. "One hears he hasn't exactly been a pillar of sexual morality, now that I can associate his name with his face." "Oh, I think the moral laxity was mostly boredom and frustration," said Caesar easily. "However, Eburnus did look down his knobby little Servilius Caepio nose and mutter a bit, it's true. Where Getha would admit a Tingitanian ape if the price was right. So in the end they agreed Lucius Cornelius might be enrolled but only upon conditions." "Oh?" "Yes. Lucius Cornelius is conditionally a senator he has to stand for election as a quaestor and get in the first time. If he fails, then he's no longer a senator." "And will he get in?" "What do you think, Gaius Marius?" "With a name like his? Oh, he'll get in!" "I hope so." But Caesar looked dubious. Uncertain. A little embarrassed? He drew a breath and leveled a straight blue gaze at his son-in-law, smiling ruefully. "I vowed, Gaius Marius, that after your generosity when you married Julia, I would never ask you for another favor. However, that's a silly sort of vow. How can one know what the future will need? Need. I need. I need another favor from you." "Anything, Gaius Julius," said Marius warmly. "Have you had sufficient time with your wife to find out why Julilla nearly starved herself to death?" asked Caesar. "No." The stern strong eagle's face lit up for a moment in pure joy. "What little time we've had together since I returned home hasn't been wasted in talking, Gaius Julius!" Caesar laughed, sighed. "I wish my younger daughter was cast in the same mould as my older! But she isn't. It is probably my fault, and Marcia's. We spoiled her, and excused her much the three older children were not excused. On the other hand, it is my considered opinion that there is an innate lack in Julilla as well. Just before Clitumna died, we found out that the silly girl had fallen in love with Lucius Cornelius, and was trying to force him or us or both him and us it is very difficult to know just what she intended, if ever she really knew herself anyway, she wanted Lucius Cornelius, and she knew I would never give my consent to such a union." Marius looked incredulous. "And knowing there was a clandestine relationship between them, you've allowed the marriage to go ahead?" "No, no, Gaius Marius, Lucius Cornelius was never in any way implicated!" Caesar cried. "I assure you, he had nothing to do with what she did." "But you said she gave him a grass crown two New Years ago," Marius objected. "Believe me, the meeting was innocent, at least on his part. He didn't encourage her in fact, he tried to discourage her. She brought disgrace upon herself and us, because she actually attempted to suborn him into declaring feelings for her which he knew I would never condone. Let Julia tell you the whole story, and you'll see what I mean," said Caesar. "In which case, how is it they're getting married?" "Well, when he inherited his fortune and was able to take up his proper station in life, he asked me for Julilla's hand. In spite of the way she had treated him." "The grass crown," said Marius thoughtfully. "Yes, I can understand how he'd feel bound to her, especially when her gift changed his luck." "I understand it too, which is why I have given my consent." Again Caesar sighed, more heavily. "The trouble is, Gaius Marius, that I feel none of the liking for Lucius Cornelius that I do for you. He's a very strange man there are things in him that set my teeth on edge, and yet I have no idea in the world what those things are. And one must always strive to be fair, to be impartial in judgments." "Cheer up, Gaius Julius, it will all turn out well in the end," said Marius. "Now what can I do for you?" "Help Lucius Cornelius get elected quaestor," said Caesar, speech crispening now he had a man's problem to deal with. "The trouble is that no one knows him. Oh, everyone knows his name! Everyone knows he's a genuine patrician Cornelius. But the cognomen Sulla isn't one we hear of these days, and he never had the opportunity to expose himself in the Forum and the law courts when he was a very young man, nor did he ever do military service. In fact, if some malicious noble chose to make a fuss about it, the very fact that he's never done military service could keep him out of office and out of the Senate. What we're hoping is that no one will ask too closely, and in that respect this pair of censors are ideal. It didn't occur to either of them that Lucius Cornelius was not able to train on the Campus Martius or join the legions as a junior military tribune. And luckily it was Scaurus and Drusus who enrolled Lucius Cornelius as a knight, so our new censors simply assume the old censors went into everything a great deal more thoroughly than they actually did. Scaurus and Drusus were understanding men, they felt Lucius Cornelius should be given his chance. And besides, the Senate wasn't in question at the time." “Do you want me to bribe Lucius Cornelius into office?'' Marius asked. Caesar was old-fashioned enough to look shocked. “Most definitely not! I can see where bribing might be excusable if the consulship was the prize, but quaestor! Never! Also, it would be too risky. Eburnus has his eye on Lucius Cornelius, he'll be watching for any opportunity to disqualify him and prosecute him. No, the favor I want is far different and less comfortable for you if he turns out to be hopeless. I want you to ask for Lucius Cornelius as your personal quaestor give him the accolade of a personal appointment. As you well know, once the electorate realizes a candidate for the quaestorship has already been asked for by a consul-elect, he is certain to be voted in." Marius didn't answer immediately; he was busy digesting the implications. No matter really whether Sulla was innocent of any complicity in the deaths of his mistress and his stepmother, his testamentary benefactresses. It was bound to be said later on that he had murdered them if he made sufficient political mark to be consular material; someone would unearth the story, and a whispering campaign that he had murdered to get his hands on enough money to espouse the public career his father's poverty had denied him would be a gift from the gods in the hands of his political rivals. Having a daughter of Gaius Julius Caesar to wive would help, but nothing would scotch the slur entirely. And in the end there would be many who believed it, just as there were many who believed Gaius Marius had no Greek. That was the first objection. The second lay in the fact that Gaius Julius Caesar couldn't quite bring himself to like Sulla, though he had no concrete grounds for the way he felt. Was it a matter of Smell rather than Thought? Animal instincts? And the third objection was the personality of Julilla. His Julia, he knew now, would never have married a man she considered unworthy, no matter how desperate the Julius Caesar financial plight. Where Julilla had shown that she was flighty, thoughtless, selfish the kind of girl who couldn't pick a worthy mate if her life depended upon it. Yet she had picked Lucius Cornelius Sulla. Then he let his mind go far from the Caesars, cast it back to that early drizzly morning on the Capitol when he had covertly watched Sulla watching the bulls bleed to death. And then he knew what was the right thing to do, what he was going to answer. Lucius Cornelius Sulla was important. Under no circumstances must he be allowed to slide back into obscurity. He must inherit his birthright. "Very well, Gaius Julius," he said without the slightest hesitation in his voice, "tomorrow I shall request the Senate to give me Lucius Cornelius Sulla for my quaestor.'' Caesar beamed. "Thank you, Gaius Marius! Thank you!" "Can you marry them before the Assembly of the People meets to vote for the quaestors?" he asked. "It shall be done," said Caesar.
* * *