3. Fortune's Favorites Page 34

  "Rome now has ten provinces," said Sulla in the House the day after the funeral of his stepdaughter. He was wearing the senatorial mourning, which consisted of a plain white toga and a tunic bearing the thin purple stripe of a knight rather than the senator's broad purple stripe. Had Aemilia Scaura been his blood daughter he could not easily have gone about public business for ten days, but the absence of any close blood relationship obviated that. A good thing; Sulla had a schedule. "Let me list them for you, Conscript Fathers: Further Spain, Nearer Spain, Gaul across the Alps, Italian Gaul, Macedonia together with Greece, Asia, Cilicia, Africa together with Cyrenaica, Sicily, and Sardinia together with Corsica. Ten provinces for ten men to govern. If no man remains in his province for more than one year, that will leave ten men for ten provinces at the beginning of every year two consuls and eight praetors just coming out of office." His gaze lighted upon Lepidus, to whom he appeared to address his next remarks for no better reason, it seemed, than random selection. "Each governor will now routinely be assigned a quaestor except for the governor of Sicily, who will have two quaestors, one for Syracuse and one for Lilybaeum. That leaves nine quaestors for Italy and Rome out of the twenty. Ample. Each governor will also be assigned a full staff of public servants, from lictors and heralds to scribes, clerks, and accountants. It will be the duty of the Senate acting on advice from the Treasury to assign each governor a specific sum to be called the stipend and this stipend will not be added to for any reason during the year. It therefore represents the governor's salary, and will be paid to him in advance. Out of it he must pay his staff and expenses of office, and must present a full and proper accounting of it at the end of his year's governorship, though he will not be obliged to refund any part of it he has not spent. It is his the moment it is paid over to him, and what he does with it is his own business. If he wishes to invest it in Rome in his own name before he leaves for his province, that is permitted. However, he must understand that no more moneys will be forthcoming! A further word of warning is necessary. As his stipend becomes his personal property the moment it is paid over, it can legally be attached by lien if the new governor is in debt. I therefore advise all potential governors that their public careers will be jeopardized if they get themselves into debt. A penniless governor going out to his province will be facing heavy criminal charges when he returns home!" A glare around the chamber, then Sulla went back to business. "I am removing all say in the matters of wars, provinces and other foreign affairs from the Assemblies. From now on the Assemblies will be forbidden to so much as discuss wars, provinces and other foreign affairs, even in contio. These matters will become the exclusive prerogative of the Senate." Another glare. "In future, the Assemblies will pass laws and hold elections. Nothing else. They will have no say in trials, in foreign affairs, or in any military matter." A small murmur started as everyone took this in. Tradition was on Sulla's side, but ever since the time of the Brothers Gracchi the Assemblies had been used more and more to obtain military commands and provinces or even to strip men appointed by the Senate of their military commands and provinces. It had happened to the Piglet's father when Marius had taken the command in Africa off him, and it had happened to Sulla when Marius had taken the command against Mithridates off him. So this new legislation was welcome. Sulla transferred his gaze to Catulus. "The two consuls should be sent to the two provinces considered most volatile or endangered. The consular provinces and the praetorian ones will be apportioned by the casting of lots. Certain conventions must be adhered to if Rome is to keep her good name abroad. If ships or fleets are levied from provinces or client kingdoms, the cost of such levies must be deducted from the annual tribute. The same law applies to the levying of soldiers or military supplies." Marcus Junius Brutus, so long a mouse, took courage. "If a governor is heavily committed to a war in his province, will he be obliged to give up his province at the end of one year?" "No," said Sulla. He was silent for a moment, thinking, then said, "It may even be that the Senate will have no other choice than to send the consuls of the year to a foreign war. If Rome is assailed on all sides, it is hard to see how this can be avoided. I only ask the Senate to consider its alternatives very carefully before committing the consuls of the year to a foreign campaign, or before extending a governor's term of office." When Mamercus lifted up his hand to speak, the senators pricked up their ears; by now he was so well known as Sulla's puppet asker of questions that everyone knew this meant he was going to ask something which Sulla thought best to introduce via the medium of a question. "May I discuss a hypothetical situation?" Mamercus asked. "By all means!" said Sulla genially. Mamercus rose to his feet. As he was this year's foreign praetor and therefore held curule office, he was sitting on the podium at the far end of the hall where all the curule magistrates sat, and so could be seen by every eye when he stood up. Sulla's new rule forbidding men to leave their place when they spoke made the men on the curule podium the only ones who could be seen by all. "Say a year comes along," said Mamercus carefully, "when Rome does indeed find herself assailed on all sides. Say that the consuls and as many of the praetors of the year as can be spared have gone to fight during their tenure of office or say that the consuls of the year are not militarily skilled enough to be sent to fight. Say that the governors are depleted perhaps one or two killed by barbarians, or dead untimely from other causes. Say that among the Senate no men can be found of experience or ability who are willing or free to take a military command or a governorship. If you have excluded the Assemblies from debating the matter and the decision as to what must be done rests entirely with the Senate, what ought the Senate to do?'' "Oh, what a splendid question, Mamercus!" Sulla exclaimed, just as if he hadn't worded it himself. He ticked the points off on his fingers. "Rome is assailed on all sides. No curule magistrates are available. No consulars or ex praetors are available. No senator of sufficient experience or ability is available. But Rome needs another military commander or governor. Is that right? Have I got it right?'' "That is right, Lucius Cornelius," said Mamercus gravely. "Then," said Sulla slowly, "the Senate must look outside its ranks to find the man, must it not? What you are describing is a situation beyond solution by normal means. In which case, the solution must be found by abnormal means. In other words, it is the duty of the Senate to search Rome for a man of known exceptional ability and experience, and give that man all the legal authorities necessary to assume a military command or a governorship." "Even if he's a freedman?" asked Mamercus, astonished. "Even if he's a freedman. Though I would say he was more likely to be a knight, or perhaps a centurion. I knew a centurion once who commanded a perilous retreat, was awarded the Grass Crown, and afterward given the purple bordered toga of a curule magistrate. His name was Marcus Petreius. Without him many lives would have been lost, and that particular army would not have been able to fight again. He was inducted into the Senate and he died in all honor during the Italian War. His son is among my own new senators." But the Senate is not legally empowered to give a man outside its own ranks imperium to command or govern!" objected Mamercus. Under my new laws the Senate will be legally empowered to do so and ought to do so, in fact," said Sulla. "I will call this governorship or military command a 'special commission,' and I will bestow the necessary authority upon the Senate to grant it with whatever degree of imperium is considered necessary! to any Roman citizen, even a freedman." What is he up to?'' muttered Philippus to Flaccus Princeps Senatus. "I've never heard the like!" "I wish I knew, but I don't," said Flaccus under his breath. But Sulla knew, and Mamercus guessed; this was one more way to bind Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus, who had refused to join the Senate, but because of all those veterans of his father's was still a military force to be reckoned with. It was no part of Sulla's plan to allow any man to lead an army on Rome; he would be the last, he had resolved on that. Therefore if times changed and Pompey became a threat, a way had to be open for Pompey's considerable talents to be legally harnessed by the legal body responsible the Senate. Sulla intended to legisla
te what amounted to pure common sense.

  "It remains for me to define treason," the Dictator said a few days later. "Until my new law courts came into being some time ago, there were several different kinds of treason, from perduellio to maiestas minuta big treasons, little treasons, and treasons in between. And what all of these treasons lacked was true specificity. In future all charges of treason will be tried in the quaestio de maiestate, my standing treason court. A charge of treason, as you will shortly see, will be largely limited to men given provincial governorships or commands in foreign wars. If a civilian Roman generates treason within Rome or Italy, then that man will be the object of the only trial process I will allow an Assembly to conduct. Namely, that man will be tried perduellio in the Centuries, and will in consequence face the old penalty death tied to a cross suspended from an unlucky tree." He let that sink in a little, then continued. "Any and all of the following will be treasonable: "A provincial governor may not leave his province. "A provincial governor may not permit his armies to march beyond the provincial frontier. "A provincial governor may not start a war on his own initiative. "A provincial governor may not invade the territory of a client king without formal permission from the Senate. "A provincial governor may not intrigue with a client king or any body of foreign nationals in order to change the status quo of any foreign country. A provincial governor may not recruit additional troops without the consent of the Senate. "A provincial governor may not make decisions or issue edicts within his own province that will alter his province's status without the formal consent of the Senate. "A provincial governor may not remain in his province for more than thirty days after the arrival in that province of his Senate appointed successor. "That is all." Sulla smiled. "On the positive side of things, a man with imperium will continue to hold that imperium until he crosses the sacred boundary of Rome. This has always been so. I now reaffirm it." "I do not see," said Lepidus angrily, "why all these specific rules and regulations are necessary!" "Oh come, Lepidus," said Sulla wearily, "you're sitting here looking straight at me. Me! A man who did almost every 'may not' on my list! I was justified! I had been illegally deprived of my imperium and my command. But I am here now passing laws which will make it impossible for any man to deprive another of his imperium and his command! Therefore the situation I was in cannot happen again. Therefore those men who break any of my 'may nots' will be guilty of treason. No man can be permitted to so much as toy with the idea of marching on Rome or leading his army out of his province in the direction of Rome. Those days are over. And I am sitting here to prove it."

  On the twenty sixth day of October, Sulla's nephew, Sextus Nonius Sufenas (who was Sulla's sister's younger boy) put on the first performance of what were to become annual victory games, the ludi Victoriae; they culminated at the Circus Maximus on the first day of November, which was the anniversary of the battle at the Colline Gate. They were good but not magnificent games, save that for the first time in a dozen decades the Trojan Game was performed. The crowd loved it because of its novelty a complex series of maneuvers on horseback carried out by youths who had to be of noble birth. Greece, however, was not amused. Sufenas had combed Greece for athletes, dancers, musicians and entertainers, so that the Olympic Games in Olympia, celebrated at about the same time of year, were an absolute disaster. And juicy scandal! the younger son of Antonius Orator, Gaius Antonius Hybrida, utterly disgraced himself by driving a chariot in one of the races; if it was a social cachet for a nobleman to participate in the Trojan Game, it was an horrific solecism for a nobleman to drive a chariot. On the Kalends of December, Sulla announced the names of the magistrates for the coming year. He would be senior consul himself, with Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius the Piglet as his junior. Loyalty was rewarded at last. The elder Dolabella received Macedonia as his province, and the younger Dolabella was given Cilicia. Though well provided by the lots with a quaestor in the person of Gaius Publicius Malleolus, the younger Dolabella insisted upon taking none other than Gaius Verres along as his senior legate. Lucullus remained in the east serving under Thermus, the governor of Asia, but Gaius Scribonius Curio came home to a praetorship. It was now time for Sulla to begin the most massive undertaking of all the awarding of land to his veterans. During the next two years the Dictator intended to demobilize one hundred and twenty thousand men belonging to twenty three legions. During his first consulship at the end of the Italian War he had handed over the rebel lands of Pompeii, Faesulae, Hadria, Telesia, Grumentum and Bovianum to his Italian War veterans, but that had been a tiny task compared to the present one. The program was meticulously worked out, and incorporated graduations of reward according to the length of a man's service, his rank, and his personal valor. Primus pilus centurions in his Mithridatic legions (they all had many decorations into the bargain) were each given five hundred iugera of prime land, whereas the ranker soldiers of Carboan legions which had deserted to Sulla received the smallest pensions, ten iugera of less desirable land. He began with the confiscated lands of Etruria in the areas which had belonged to Volaterrae and Faesulae, punished yet again. Because Etruria had by now established what amounted to a tradition of opposition to Sulla, he did not at first concentrate his veterans in enclosed soldier communities; instead he scattered them far and wide, thinking thereby to contain future rebellion. This turned out to be a mistake. Volaterrae rose almost at once, shut its gates after lynching many of Sulla's veterans, and prepared to withstand a siege. As the town lay in a deep ravine yet was raised up on a very high, flat topped hill in the middle of the ravine, Volaterrae looked forward to a long defiance. Sulla went there in person to establish his blockade, stayed for three months, then went back to Rome when he saw how long and wearisome a job reducing Volaterrae was going to be. He learned from this lesson, however, and changed his mind about how his veterans would be settled on their lands; his later colonies were just that, cohesive nuclei of ex soldiers able to stick together in the face of bitter local opposition. His one overseas experiment occurred on Corsica, where he set up two separate soldier colonies, thinking to civilize the place and eliminate the Corsican curse, banditry. A futile hope.

  The new law courts settled down well, providing the perfect arena for a new legal star, the young man Marcus Tullius Cicero. Quintus Hortensius (who had thriven in the trial atmosphere of the Assemblies) took time to telescope his act down to the intimate size of the open air courtroom; whereas Cicero found it ideal. At the end of the old year Cicero appeared alone for the defendant in a preliminary hearing before the younger Dolabella, who was praetor urbanus. The object of the hearing was to decide whether the sum of money known as sponsio should be lodged, or whether the case could proceed without it. Cicero's advocate opponents were formidable Hortensius and Philippus. But he won, Hortensius and Philippus lost, and Cicero embarked upon a forensic career which was to have no equal. It was in June of the year that Sulla was senior consul with Metellus Pius as his junior consul that a twenty six year old nobleman of patrician family, Marcus Valerius Messala Niger, appealed to his good friend, the twenty six year old Marcus Tullius Cicero, to act on behalf of a man who was Niger's friend as well as his client. "Sextus Roscius Junior, from Ameria," said Messala Niger to Cicero. "He's charged with murdering his father." "Oh!" said Cicero, astonished. "You're a good advocate, my dear Niger. Why not defend him yourself? Murder is juicy, but very easy, you know. No political overtones." "That's what you think," said Messala Niger grimly. "This case has more political pitfalls than a ditch has sharpened stakes! There is only one man who has a chance of winning, and that man is you, Marcus Tullius. Hortensius recoiled in horror." Cicero sat up straighter, a gleam of interest in his dark eyes; he used one of his favorite tricks, dipping his head and shooting Messala Niger a keen glance from under his brows. "A murder case so complicated? How?" Whoever takes on the defense of Roscius of Ameria will be taking on Sulla's whole system of proscription," said Messala Niger. "In order to get Roscius off, it will be necessary to prove that Sulla and his pr
oscriptions are utterly corrupt." The generous mouth with the full lower lip pursed into a soundless whistle. "Ye gods!" "Ye gods, indeed. Still interested?" "I don't know...." Cicero frowned, at war with himself; preservation of his skin was mandatory, and yet a case so difficult had the potential to win him legal laurels no other kind of case could. "Tell me about it, Niger. Then I'll see." Niger settled down to tell his story cleverly enough that Cicero's interest would be stimulated further. "Sextus Roscius is my own age, and I've known him since we were at school together. We both served in our six campaigns under Lucius Caesar and then Sulla in Campania. Roscius's father owned most of Ameria, including no less than thirteen river frontage properties along the Tiber fabulously rich! Roscius is his only son. But there are also two cousins, sons of his brother, who are the real villains of the piece. Old Roscius went to Rome on a visit at the beginning of the year, and was murdered in Rome. I don't know whether the cousins did it, nor does Roscius. Probable, but not necessary." Messala Niger grimaced. "The news of the father's murder came to Ameria through an agent of the cousins, certainly. And the most suspicious part about it is that this agent didn't tell poor Roscius at all! Instead he told the cousins, who hatched a plot to filch all the property off my friend Roscius." "I think I begin to see," said Cicero, whose mind was razor keen when it came to the criminal perfidies of men. "Volaterrae had just revolted, and Sulla was there conducting the initial stages of the siege. With him was Chrysogonus." There was no need to inform Cicero who was this Chrysogonus; all of Rome knew the infamous bureaucrat in charge of the lists, the books, and all the data pertaining to Sulla's proscriptions. "The cousins rode to Volaterrae and were granted an interview with Chrysogonus, who was willing to make a deal with them but for a huge price. He agreed to forge Roscius's dead father's name on one of the old proscription lists. He would then 'happen to see' a routine report on the murder, and pretend to 'remember' that this name was a proscribed one. That is what transpired. Roscius's father's properties worth a cool six million were immediately put up for auction by Chrysogonus, who bought them all himself for two thousand, if you please." "I love this villain!" cried Cicero, looking as alert as a huntsman's hound. "Well, I do not! I loathe the man!" said Messala Niger. "Yes, yes, he's loathsome! But what happened next?" All of this occurred before Roscius even knew his father was dead. The first intimation he had was when Cousin Two appeared bearing Chrysogonus's proscription order, and evicted Roscius from his father's properties. Chrysogonus kept ten of the thirteen estates for himself and installed Cousin Two on them as his live in manager and agent. The other three estates Chrysogonus signed over to Cousin One as outright payment. The blow for poor Roscius was a twin one, of course not only did he learn that his father had been proscribed months before, but also that he was murdered." "Did he believe this tissue of lies?" asked Cicero. "Absolutely. Why should he not have? Everyone with two sesterces to rub together expected to find himself named on a proscription list, whether he lived in Rome or in Ameria. Roscius just believed! And got out." "Who smelled the rotten carcass?" "The elders of the town," said Messala Niger. "A son is never as sure of his father's worth and nature as his father's friends are, which is not illogical. A man's friends know him without the concomitant emotional distortions suffered by his son." "True," said Cicero, who didn't get on with his own father. "So the friends of the old man held a conference, and agreed that there had not been a Marian, Cinnan or Carboan bone in the old man's entire body. They agreed to ride to Volaterrae and seek an audience with Sulla himself, beg him to reverse the proscription and allow Roscius to inherit. They gathered up masses of evidence and set off at once." "Accompanied by which cousin?" asked Cicero shrewdly. "Quite correct," said Messala Niger, smiling. "They were joined by Cousin One, who actually had the temerity to assume command of the mission! In the meantime Cousin Two rode at the gallop for Volaterrae to warn Chrysogonus what was in the wind. Thus it was that the deputation never got to see Sulla. It was waylaid by Chrysogonus, who took all the details and all the masses of evidence! from them, and promised them that he would see the Dictator reverse his proscription. Don't worry! was his cry. Everything will be right and Roscius will inherit." Did no one suspect that he was talking to the real owner of ten of the thirteen estates?'' asked Cicero incredulously. "Not a one, Marcus Tullius." "It's a sign of the times, isn't it?" "I fear so." "Go on, please." "Two months went by. At the end of them old man Roscius's friends realized that they had been neatly tricked, for no order rescinding the proscription came through, and Cousin One and Cousin Two were now known to be living on the confiscated property as if they owned it. A few enquiries revealed that Cousin One was the outright owner of three, and Chrysogonus of the other ten. That terrified everyone, as everyone assumed Sulla was a part of the villainy." "Do you believe he was?" asked Cicero. Messala Niger thought long, finally shook his head. No, Cicero, I doubt it." "Why?" asked the born lawyer. "Sulla is a hard man. Frankly, he terrifies me. They say that in his youth he murdered women for their money, that he got into the Senate over their bodies. Yet I knew him slightly when I was in the army too junior to be on close terms, of course, but he was always around, always busy, always in control of the job and he struck me as aristocratically scrupulous. Do you know what I mean by that?" Cicero felt a tinge of red creeping under his skin, but pretended he was at ease. Did he know what the patrician nobleman Marcus Valerius Messala Niger meant by aristocratic scrupulousness? Oh, yes! No one understood better than Cicero, who was a New Man, and envied patricians like Messala Niger and Sulla very much. "I think so," he said. "He has a dark side to him, Sulla. He'd probably kill you or me without a qualm if it suited him. But he would have a patrician's reasons for killing us. He wouldn't do it because he coveted thirteen lush properties on the banks of the Tiber. If it occurred to him to go to an auction of proscribed property and he was able to pick up some very cheap estates, he would. I don't say he wouldn't. But conspire to enrich himself or his freedman in a dishonorable way when nothing as vital as his career was at stake? No. I don't think so. His honor matters to him. I see it in his laws, which I think are honorable laws. I may not agree with him that the tribunes of the plebs must be legislated out of all their power, but he's done it legally and openly. He's a Roman patrician." "So Sulla doesn't know," said Cicero thoughtfully. "I believe that to be the truth." "Pray continue, Marcus Valerius." "About the time that the elders of Ameria began to think that Sulla was a part of the conspiracy, my friend Roscius became more vocal. The poor fellow really was utterly flattened for months, you know. It took a long time for him to say anything. But the moment he did begin to say things, there were several attempts on his life. So two months ago he fled to Rome and sought shelter with his father's old friend, the retired Vestal Metella Balearica. You know, the sister of Metellus Nepos. His other sister was the wife of Appius Claudius Pulcher she died giving birth to that frightful monster of a child, Publius Clodius." "Get on with it, Niger," said Cicero gently. "The fact that Roscius knew such powerful people as Metellus Nepos and a retired Vestal Virgin of the Caecilii Metelli gave the two cousins some sleepless nights, it would appear. They began to believe that Roscius just might manage to see Sulla in person. But they didn't dare murder Roscius, not without risking being found out if the Caecilii Metelli insisted upon an enquiry. So they decided it was better to destroy Roscius's reputation, by fabricating evidence that he had murdered his own father. Do you know a fellow called Erucius?'' Cicero's face twisted in contempt. "Who doesn't? He's a professional accusator." Well, he came forward to charge Roscius with the murder of his father. The witnesses to old Roscius's death were his slaves, and of course they had been sold along with the rest of his estate to Chrysogonus. Therefore there was no likelihood that they would appear to tell the real story! And Erucius is convinced that no advocate of ability will take on Roscius's defense because every advocate will be too afraid of Sulla to dare say damning things about the proscription process." "Then Erucius had better look to his laurels," said Cicero
briskly. "I'll defend your friend Roscius gladly, Niger." "Aren't you worried that you'll offend Sulla?" "Pooh! Rubbish! Nonsense! I know exactly how to do it and do it, I will! I predict, in fact, that Sulla will thank me," said Cicero blithely. Though other cases had been heard in the new Murder Court, the trial of Sextus Roscius of Ameria on a charge of parricide created a huge stir. Sulla's law stipulated that it be presided over by an ex aedile, but in that year it was under the presidency of a praetor, Marcus Fannius. Fearlessly Cicero aired the story of Roscius in his actio prima, and left no juror or spectator in any doubt that his main defense was the corruption behind Sulla's proscriptions. Then came the final day of the trial, when Cicero himself was to give his final address to the jury. And there, seated on his ivory curule chair to one side of the president's tribunal, was Lucius Cornelius Sulla. The presence of the Dictator dismayed Cicero not a jot; instead, it pushed him to hitherto undreamed of heights of eloquence and brilliance. "There are three culprits in this hideous affair," he said, declaiming not to the jury, but to Sulla. "The cousins Titus Roscius Capito and Titus Roscius Magnus are obvious, but actually secondary. What they did, they could not have done without the proscriptions. Without Lucius Cornelius...... Chrysogonus," he said, pausing so long between the second and the third names that even Messala Niger began to think he might say, "Sulla." On went Cicero. "Who exactly is this 'golden child'? This Chrysogonus? Let me tell you! He is a Greek. There is no disgrace in that. He is an ex slave. There is no disgrace in that. He is a freedman. There is no disgrace in that. He is the client of Lucius Cornelius Sulla. There is no disgrace in that. He is rich. There is no disgrace in that. He is powerful. There is no disgrace in that. He is the administrator of the proscriptions. There is no disgrace in that ooops! Ooops, ooops! I beg your collective pardons, Conscript Fathers! You see what happens when one bumps along in a rhetorical rut for too long? I got carried away! I could have gone on saying 'There is no disgrace in that' for hours! And oh, what a rhetorical ravine I would have dug for myself!" Fairly launched, Cicero paused to revel consciously in what he was doing. "Let me say it again. He is the administrator of the proscriptions. And in that there is a monumental, a gigantic, an Olympian disgrace! Do all of you see this splendid man on his curule chair this model of every Roman virtue, this general without rival, this lawmaker who has broken new bounds of statesmanship, this brilliant jewel in the crown of the illustrious gens Cornelia? Do all of you see him? Sitting so calmly, Zeus like in his detachment? Do all of you see him? Then look well!" Now Cicero turned away from Sulla to glare at the jury from under his brows, a rather sticklike figure, so thin was he even in his toga; and yet he seemed to tower, to have the thews of Hercules and the majesty of Apollo. "Some years ago this splendid man bought himself a slave. To be his steward. An excellent steward, as things turned out. When this splendid man's late wife was forced to flee from Rome to Greece, his steward was there to help and console. His steward was there in complete charge of this splendid man's dependents wife and children and grandchildren and servants while our great Lucius Cornelius Sulla strode up the Italian peninsula like a titan. His steward was trusted, and did not betray that trust. So he was freed, and took for himself the first two parts of a mighty name Lucius Cornelius. As is the custom, for his third name he kept his own original name Chrysogonus. The golden child. Upon whose head was heaped honor after honor, trust after trust, responsibility after responsibility. He was now not merely the freedman steward of a great household, but also the director, the administrator, the executor of that process which was designed to fulfill two aims: the first, to see a just and rightful punishment meted out to all those traitors who followed Marius, who followed Cinna, who even followed an insect as small as Carbo; and the second, to use the property and estates of traitors as fuel to fan poor impoverished Rome into the flame of prosperity again." Back and forth across the open space left in front of Marcus Fannius's tribunal did Cicero stride, his left arm raised to hold his toga at its left shoulder, his right arm limply by his side. No one moved. Every eye was fixed upon him, men breathed in shallow gasps thinking they didn't breathe at all. "So what did he do, this Chrysogonus? All the while keeping his oily smiling bland face toward his employer, his patron, he slithered to exact his revenge on this one who had insulted him, on that one who had impeded him he toiled mightily in the secret marches of the night with forger's pen and patron's trust to slip in this name and that name whose property he slavered for, to conspire with worms and vermin to enrich himself at the expense of his patron, at the expense of Rome. Ah, members of the jury, but he was cunning! How he plotted and schemed to cover his tracks, how he smarmed and greased in the presence of his patron, how he manipulated his little army of pimps and panders how industriously he worked to make sure that his noble and illustrious patron could have no idea of what was really going on! For that is what happened. Given trust and authority, he abused both in the vilest and most despicable ways." The tears began to flow; Cicero sobbed aloud, wrung his hands, stood hunched over in a paroxysm of pain. "Oh, I cannot look at you, Lucius Cornelius Sulla! That it should be I a mean and simple man from the Latin countryside a hick, a hayseed, a bucolic shyster that it should have to be I who must draw the wool from your eyes, who must open them to the the what adjective can I find adequate to describe the level of the treachery of your most esteemed client, Lucius Cornelius Chrysogonus? Vile treachery! Disgusting treachery! Despicable treachery! But none of those adjectives is low enough!" The easy tears were dashed away. "Why did it have to be me? Would that it could have been anybody else! Would that it had been your Pontifex Maximus or your Master of the Horse great men both, and hung about with honors! But instead the lot has fallen to me. I do not want it. But I must accept it. Because, members of the jury, which do you think I would rather do? Spare the great Lucius Cornelius Sulla this agony by saying nothing about the treachery of Chrysogonus, or spare the life of a man who, though accused of murdering his own father, has actually done nothing to warrant the charge? Yes, you are right! It must be the embarrassment, the public mortification of an honorable and distinguished and legendary man because it cannot be the unjust conviction of an innocent man." He straightened, drew himself up. "Members of the jury, I now rest my case." The verdict, of course, was a foregone conclusion: ABSOLVO. Sulla rose to his feet and strolled toward Cicero, who found the crowd around him melting away. "Well done, my skinny young friend," the Dictator said, and held out his hand. "What an actor you would have made!" So exhilarated that he felt as if his feet were floating free in air, Cicero laughed, clasped the hand fervently. "What an actor I am, you mean! For what is superlative advocacy except acting out one's own words?" "Then you'll end the Thespis of Sulla's standing courts." "As long as you forgive me for the liberties I had to take in this case, Lucius Cornelius, I will be anything you like." "Oh, I forgive you!" said Sulla airily. "I think I could forgive almost anything if it meant I sat through a good show. And with only one exception, I've never seen a better amateur production, my dear Cicero. Besides, I've been wondering how to get rid of Chrysogonus for some time I'm not entirely a fool, you know. But it can be ticklish." The Dictator looked around. "Where is Sextus Roscius?" Sextus Roscius was produced. "Sextus Roscius, take back your lands and your reputation, and your dead father's reputation," said Sulla. "I am very sorry that the corruption and venality of one I trusted has caused you so much pain. But he will answer for it." "Thanks to the brilliance of my advocate, Lucius Cornelius, it has ended well," said Sextus Roscius shakily. "There is an epilogue yet to play," said the Dictator, jerked his head at his lictors, and walked away in the direction of the steps which led up onto the Palatine. The next day Lucius Cornelius Chrysogonus, who was a Roman citizen of the tribe Cornelia, was pitched headlong from the Tarpeian Rock. "Think yourself lucky," said Sulla to him beforehand. "I could have stripped you of your citizenship and had you flogged and crucified. You die a Roman death because you cared so well for my womenfolk when times were hard. I can do nothing
more for you than that. I hired you originally because I knew you were a toad. What I didn't count on was becoming so busy that I was unable to keep an eye on you. But sooner or later it comes out. Bye bye, Chrysogonus." The two cousins Roscius Capito and Magnus disappeared from Ameria before they could be apprehended and brought to trial; no further trace of them was ever discovered. As for Cicero, he was suddenly a great name and a hero besides. No one else had taken on the proscriptions and won.