The October Horse: A Novel of Caesar and Cleopatra Read online

  Octavius answered obliquely. “It’s said in the family, Uncle Gaius, that when you were about ten years old you acted as a kind of nurse-companion to Gaius Marius while he was recovering from a stroke. And that he talked, you listened. That you learned much about waging war from listening.”

  “I did indeed. However, Octavius, I still betrayed my talent for waging war, I am not sure how. Perhaps I listened too hard, and he sensed qualities in me I didn’t know I had.”

  “He was jealous,” Octavius said flatly.

  “Very perceptive! Yes, he was jealous. His day was clearly over, mine hadn’t begun. Old men struck down can be nasty.”

  “Yet though his day was clearly over, he returned to public life. His jealousy of Sulla was greater.”

  “Sulla was old enough to have demonstrated his ability. And Marius took care of my pretensions with remarkable cunning.”

  “By appointing you the flamen Dialis and marrying you to Cinna’s tiny daughter. A lifelong priesthood that forbade you to touch a weapon of war or witness death.”

  “That is so.” Caesar grinned at his great-nephew. “But I wriggled out of the priesthood—with Sulla’s connivance. Sulla didn’t like me at all, but though Marius was long dead by then, he still loathed Marius—oh, almost to mania. So he freed me to spite a dead man.”

  “You didn’t try to wriggle out of the marriage. You refused to divorce Cinnilla when Sulla commanded it.”

  “She was a good wife, and good wives are rare.”

  “I shall remember that.”

  “Have you many friends, Octavius?”

  “No. I’m tutored at home, I don’t meet many other boys.”

  “You must meet them on the Campus Martius when you go there for the boys’ military drills and exercises, surely.”

  The brown skin flushed crimson; Octavius bit his lip. “I hardly ever go to the Campus Martius.”

  “Does your stepfather forbid it?” Caesar asked, astonished.

  “No, no! He’s very good to me, very kind. I just—I just don’t get to the Campus Martius often enough to make friends.”

  Another Brutus? Caesar was asking himself, dismayed. Does this fascinating boy avoid his military duties? During our conversation at Misenum he said he didn’t have any military talent. Can that be it, a reluctance to betray his ineptitude? Yet he doesn’t have the smell of a Brutus about him, I’d swear he isn’t craven or uninterested.

  “Are you a good student?” he asked, leaving sensitive subjects alone. There was time to investigate further.

  “At mathematics, history and geography, very good, I think,” Octavius said, regaining his composure. “It’s Greek I can’t seem to master. No matter how much Greek I read, write, or speak, I can never manage to think in it. So I have to think in Latin and then translate.”

  “That’s interesting. Perhaps later, after six months living in Athens, you’ll learn to think in Greek,” Caesar said, hardly able to credit that anyone suffered this inability. He thought automatically in whichever language he was speaking.

  “Yes, perhaps,” Octavius said rather neutrally.

  Caesar settled deeper into the couch, aware that Lucius was eavesdropping shamelessly. “Tell me, Octavius, how far do you want to rise?”

  “To the consulship, returned by every Century.”

  “Dictator, even?”

  “No, definitely, definitely not.” This didn’t sound critical.

  “Why so emphatic?”

  “Ever since they forced you to cross the Rubicon, Uncle Gaius, I’ve watched and listened. Though I don’t know you well, I think that to be the dictator was the last thing you wanted.”

  “Rather any office than that,” said Caesar grimly, “but rather that office than undeserved exile and ignominy.”

  “I shall offer regularly to Jupiter Optimus Maximus that I am never faced with that alternative.”

  “Would you dare it if you had to?”

  “Oh, yes. In my heart I am a Caesar.”

  “A Gaius Julius Caesar?”

  “No, merely a Julian of the Caesares.”

  “Who are your heroes?”

  “You,” Octavius said simply. “Just you.” He slid off the back of the couch. “Please excuse me, Uncle Gaius, Cousin Lucius. My mother made me promise that I’d go home early.”

  The two men left on the lectus medius watched the slight figure leave the room without drawing attention to himself.

  “Well, well, well,” drawled Lucius.

  “What do you think of him, Lucius?”

  “He’s a thousand years old.”

  “Give or take a century or two, yes. Do you like him?”

  “It’s plain you do, but do I? Yes—with reservations.”

  “Expatiate.”

  “He’s not a Julian of the Caesares, much though he may think he is. Oh, there are echoes of the old Patriciate, but also echoes of a mind never shaped in the patrician mold. I can’t catalogue his style, yet I know he has one. It may well be that Rome hasn’t seen his style before.”

  “You’re saying he’s going to go far.”

  The vivid blue eyes twinkled. “A fool I am not, Gaius! If I were you, I’d take him as my personal contubernalis the moment he turns seventeen.”

  “So I thought when I met him at Misenum a few years ago.”

  “One thing I’d watch.”

  “What?”

  “That he doesn’t grow too fond of arses.”

  The paler blue eyes twinkled. “A fool I am not, Lucius!”

  3

  The storm brewing in the legionary camps around Capua tossed its first thunderbolt the day after Caesar’s dinner party, at the very end of October. A letter came from Mark Antony.

  Caesar, there’s trouble. Big, big trouble. The really veteran veterans are wild with rage, and I can’t reason with them—or rather, with their elected representatives. It’s the Tenth and Twelfth are the worst. Surprised? Well, I was surprised, at any rate.

  The pot boiled over when I issued orders that the Seventh, the Eighth, the Ninth, the Tenth, the Eleventh, the Twelfth, the Thirteenth and the Fourteenth were to pull stakes and march for Neapolis and Puteoli. I had all their elected representatives on my doorstep in Herculaneum (I’m living in Pompeius’s villa there), telling me that no one was going anywhere until after they’d been formally notified about things like their date of discharge, their plots of land, their bounties and bonuses for this extra campaign—that’s what they call it, an “extra campaign.” Not usual duty. And they want to be paid.

  They were set on seeing you, so they weren’t too happy when I had to tell them that you’re too busy in Rome to come to Campania. The next thing I knew, the Tenth and Twelfth went crazy, started looting and wrecking all the villages around Abella, where they’re camped.

  Caesar, I can’t handle them anymore. I suggest you come yourself. Or, if you really can’t come, send someone important to see them. Someone they know and trust.

  Here it is, and it’s too soon. Oh, Antonius, will you never learn patience? You’ve so much riding on this, yet you’ve just made a clumsy move, you’ve betrayed your insincerity. The only clever part, which is acting now rather than later, is simply due to your impatience. No, I can’t leave Rome, as you well know! Though not for the reasons you think. I daren’t leave Rome until I’ve held my elections, is the true reason. Have you divined why? I don’t think so, despite your acting now. You’re too unsubtle.

  Use the tactics of delay, Caesar. Postpone the reckoning until after the elections, no matter whom you have to sacrifice.

  He sent for one of his loyalest and most competent military men, Publius Cornelius Sulla. Sulla’s nephew.

  “Why not send Lepidus?” Publius Sulla asked.

  “He hasn’t enough clout with old warhorses like the Tenth and Twelfth,” Caesar said curtly. “Better to send a man they know from Pharsalus. Explain that their land is on my agenda, Publius, but that the debt legislation has to come first.”

 
; “Do you want me to take the pay wagons, Caesar?”

  “I think not. I have my reasons. The boil is coming to a head, balm like pay might cause it to subside untimely. Just do your best with the paltry ammunition I’ve given you,” said Caesar.

  Publius Sulla returned four days later, cut and bruised on face and arms. “They stoned me!” he snarled, stiff with fury. “Oh, Caesar, grind their faces into the dust!”

  “The faces I want to grind into the dust are those belonging to whoever is working on them,” Caesar said grimly. “The men are idle and more or less permanently drunk, I suspect—discipline hasn’t been kept up either. That means they’ve been extended a lot of credit with the tavern keepers, and their centurions and tribunes are even drunker than the rankers. For all his continuous presence in Campania for months on end, Antonius has let this happen. Who else is going guarantor for so much wine on credit?”

  Publius Sulla shot Caesar a look of sudden comprehension, but said not a word.

  Next Caesar summoned Gaius Sallustius Crispus, a brilliant orator. “Choose two of your fellow senators, Sallustius, and try to make the cunni see sense. As soon as the elections are over, I’ll see them in person. Just hold the fort for me.”

  The Centuriate Assembly finally met on the Campus Martius to vote for two consuls and eight praetors; no one was surprised when Quintus Fufius Calenus was elected senior consul and Publius Vatinius junior consul. Every candidate for praetor whom Caesar had personally recommended was also voted in.

  It was done! Now he could deal with the legions—and with Marcus Antonius.

  Shortly after dawn two days later Mark Antony rode into Rome, his German troopers escorting a litter strapped between a pair of mules. In it was a badly injured Sallust.

  Antony was nervous and on edge. Now that his big moment had arrived, he was fretting about how exactly he should conduct himself during his interview with Caesar. That was the trouble in dealing with someone who’d kicked your arse when you were twelve years old and been metaphorically kicking it ever since. Gaining the advantage was difficult.

  So he went about it aggressively, left Poplicola and Cotyla outside holding his Public Horse, barged into the Domus Publica and walked straight to Caesar’s study.

  “They’re on their way to Rome,” he announced as he strode in.

  Caesar put down his beaker of vinegar and hot water. “Who?”

  “The Tenth and the Twelfth.”

  “Don’t sit down, Antonius. You’re on report. Stand in front of my desk and report to your commander. Why are two of my oldest veteran legions on their way to Rome?”

  His neckerchief wasn’t covering a patch of skin where the gold chain holding his leopard cloak suddenly began to pinch; Antony reached up and tugged at the scarlet neckerchief, conscious of a slight patina of cold sweat. “They’ve mutinied, Caesar.”

  “What happened to Sallustius and his companions?”

  “They tried, Caesar, but—”

  The voice became glacial. “I’ve known times, Antonius, when you could summon words. This had better be one of them, for your own sake. Tell me what happened, if you please.”

  The “if you please” was worst. Concentrate, concentrate! “Gaius Sallustius called the Tenth and Twelfth to an assembly. They came in a very ugly mood. He started to say that everybody would be paid before embarkation for Africa and the land was under review, but Gaius Avienus intervened—”

  “Gaius Avienus?” Caesar asked. “An unelected tribune of the soldiers from Picenum? That Avienus?”

  “Yes, he’s one of the Tenth’s representatives.”

  “What did Avienus have to say?”

  “He told Sallustius and the other two that the legions were fed up, that they weren’t willing to fight another campaign. They wanted their discharges and their land right that moment. Sallustius shouted that you were willing to give them a bonus of four thousand if they’d just get on their ships—”

  “That was a mistake,” Caesar interrupted, frowning. “Go on.”

  Feeling more confident, Antony ploughed on. “Some of the worst hotheads shoved Avienus aside and started pelting stones. Well, rocks, actually. The next thing the air was full of them. I did manage to save Sallustius, but the other two are dead.”

  Caesar reared in his chair, shocked. “Two of my senators, dead? Their names?”

  “I don’t know,” said Antony, sweating again. He searched wildly for something exculpatory, and blurted, “I mean, I haven’t attended any meetings of the Senate since I’ve been back. I’ve been too busy as Master of the Horse.”

  “If you saved Sallustius, why isn’t he here with you now?”

  “Oh, he’s flat out, Caesar. I carted him back to Rome in a litter. Terrible head injury, but he’s not paralyzed or having seizures or anything. The army surgeons say he’ll recover.”

  “Antonius, why did you let matters come to this? I feel I should ask you, give you the opportunity to explain.”

  The reddish-brown eyes widened. “It’s not my fault, Caesar! The veterans came back to Italy so discontented that nothing I did or said pacified them. They’re mortally offended that you gave all the work in Anatolia to ex-Republican legions, and they don’t approve of the fact that you’re giving them land on retirement.”

  “Now you tell me. What do you think the Tenth and Twelfth intend to do when they reach Rome?”

  Antony rushed to answer. “That’s why I hustled myself back, Caesar! They’re in the mood for murder. I think you should get out of the city for your own protection.”

  The lined, handsome face looked fashioned from flint. “You know perfectly well that I would never leave Rome in a situation like this, Antonius. Is it I they’re in the mood to murder?”

  “They will if they find you,” Antony said.

  “You’re sure of that? You’re not exaggerating?”

  “No, I swear it!”

  Caesar drained the beaker and rose to his feet. “Go home and change, Antonius. Into a toga. I’m summoning the Senate to meet in Jupiter Stator’s on the Velia in one hour. Kindly be there.” He went to the door and thrust his head around it. “Faberius!” he called, then glanced back at Antony. “Well, why are you standing there like a cretin? Jupiter Stator’s in one hour.”

  Not too bad, thought Antony, emerging on to the Sacra Via, where his friends were still waiting.

  “Well?” asked Lucius Gellius Poplicola eagerly.

  “He’s summoned the Senate to meet in an hour, though what good he thinks that will do, I have no idea.”

  “How did he take it?” asked Lucius Varius Cotyla.

  “Since he always listens to bad news with the same expression as the Tarpeian Rock, I don’t know how he took it,” Antony said impatiently. “Come on, I have to get home to my old place and try to find a toga. He wants me at the meeting.”

  Their faces fell. Neither Poplicola nor Cotyla was a senator, though both were ostensibly eligible. That they were not lay in their social unacceptability; Poplicola had once tried to murder his father, the Censor, and Cotyla was the son of a man convicted and sent into exile by his own court. When Antony returned to Italy, they had tied their careers to his rising star, and looked forward to great advancement once Caesar was out of the way.

  “Is he leaving Rome?” Cotyla asked.

  “Him, leave? Never! Rest easy, Cotyla. The legions belong to me now, and in two days the old boy will be dead—they’ll tear him apart with their bare hands. Which will throw Rome into tumultus, and I, as Master of the Horse, will assume the office of dictator.” He stopped in his tracks, struck by amazement. “You know, I can’t think why we didn’t work out that this was what to do ages ago!”

  “It wasn’t easy to see a clear path until he came back to Italy,” said Poplicola, and frowned. “One thing worries me…”

  “What’s that?” asked Cotyla apprehensively.

  “He’s got more lives than a cat.”

  Antony’s mood was soaring; the more he thought
about that interview with Caesar, the more convinced he became that he’d won his way through. “Even cats run out of lives sooner or later,” he said complacently. “At fifty-three, he’s past it.”

  “Oh, it will give me great satisfaction to proscribe that fat slug, Philippus!” Poplicola gloated.

  Antony pretended to look scandalized. “Lucius, he’s your half brother!”

  “He cut our mother out of his life, he deserves to die.”

  Attendance in the temple of Jupiter Stator was thin; yet one more thing to do, plump out the Senate, thought Caesar. When he entered behind his twenty-four lictors, his eyes searched in vain for Cicero, who was in Rome and had been notified that there was an urgent meeting of the Senate. No, he couldn’t attend Caesar’s Senate! That would be seen as giving in.

  The Dictator’s ivory curule chair was positioned between the ivory curule chairs of the consuls on a makeshift dais. Since the people had burned the Curia Hostilia down with Clodius’s body inside it, Rome’s oligarchic senior governing institution was obliged to meet in temporary premises. The place had to be an inaugurated temple, and most were too small for comfort, though Jupiter Stator was adequate for the mere sixty men gathered there.

  Mark Antony was present in a purple-bordered toga that looked the worse for wear—crumpled, marred by stains. Can Antonius not even control his own servants? Caesar asked himself, irritated.

  As soon as Caesar entered, Antony came bustling up. “Where does the Master of the Horse sit?” he asked.

  “You sound like Pompeius Magnus when he was consul for the first time,” Caesar said acidly. “Have someone write you a book on the subject. You’ve been in the Senate for six years.”

  “Yes, but hardly ever in it physically except when I was a tribune of the plebs, and that was only for three nundinae.”

  “Put your stool in the front row where I can see you and you can see me, Antonius.”

  “Why on earth did you bother electing consuls?”

  “You’re about to find out.”

  The prayers were said, the auspices taken. Caesar waited then until everyone had seated himself.