Caesar's Women (37 page)

It was Caesar's turn to snort. “I'd believe almost anything of Marcus Antonius, but not that! How old is he now, nineteen or twenty? Yet he's got more bastards littered through every stratum of Roman society than anyone else I know.”

“Conceded. But littering Rome with bastards isn't nearly shocking enough. A homosexual affair—particularly between the sons of such pillars of the conservative establishment!—adds a certain luster.”

“So this is the institution to which my wife belongs!” Caesar sighed. “How am I to wean her away, I wonder?''

That was not an idea which appealed to Servilia, who got out of bed in a hurry. “I fail to see how you can, Caesar, without provoking exactly the kind of scandal the Clodius Club adores. Unless you divorce yourself by divorcing her.”

But this suggestion offended his sense of fair play; he shook his head emphatically. “No, I'll not do that without more cause than idle friendships she can't turn into anything worse because my mother keeps too sharp an eye on her. I pity the poor girl. She hasn't a scrap of intelligence or sense.”

The bath beckoned (Caesar had given in and installed a small furnace to provide hot water); Servilia decided to hold her peace on the subject of Pompeia.

Titus Labienus had to wait until the morrow, when he saw Caesar in Caesar's apartment.

“Two items,” said Caesar, leaning back in his chair.

Labienus looked alert.

“The first is bound to win you considerable approval in knight circles, and will sit very well with Magnus.”

“It is?”

“To legislate the return of selection of priests and augurs to the tribes in the Comitia.”

“Including, no doubt,” said Labienus smoothly, “election of the Pontifex Maximus.”

“Edepol, you're quick!”

“I heard Metellus Pius is likely to qualify for a State funeral any time.”

“Quite so. And it is true that I have a fancy to become Pontifex Maximus. However, I do not think my fellow priests want to see me at the head of their College. The electors, on the other hand, may not agree with them. Therefore, why not give the electors the chance to decide who the next Pontifex Maximus will be?”

“Why not, indeed?” Labienus watched Caesar closely. There was much about the man appealed to him strongly, yet that streak of levity which could rise to his surface on scant provocation was, in Labienus's opinion, a flaw. One never really knew just how serious Caesar was. Oh, the ambition was boundless, but like Cicero he could sometimes give off strong signals that his sense of the ridiculous might intervene. However, at the moment Caesar's face seemed serious enough, and Labienus knew as well as most that Caesar's debts were appalling. To be elected Pontifex Maximus would enhance his credit with the usurers. Labienus said, “I imagine you want a lex Labiena de sacerdotiis enacted as soon as possible.”

“I do. If Metellus Pius should die before the law is changed, the People might decide not to change it. We'll have to be quick, Labienus.”

''Ampius will be glad to be of assistance. So will the rest of the tribunician College, I predict. It's a law in absolute accord with the mos maiorum, a great advantage.” The dark eyes flashed. “What else do you have in mind?”

A frown came. “Nothing earthshaking, unfortunately. If Magnus came home it would be easy. The only thing I can think of sure to create a stir within the Senate is to propose a bill restoring the rights of the sons and grandsons of Sulla's proscribed. You won't get it through, but the debates will be noisy and well attended.”

This idea obviously appealed; Labienus was grinning broadly as he rose to his feet. “I like it, Caesar. It's a chance to pull Cicero's jauntily waving tail!”

“It isn't the tail matters in Cicero's anatomy,” said Caesar. “The tongue is the appendage needs amputation. Be warned, he'll make mincemeat of you. But if you introduce the two bills together, you'll divert attention from the one you really want to get through. And if you prepare yourself with great care, you might even be able to make some political capital out of Cicero's tongue.”

The Piglet was dead. Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius Pontifex Maximus, loyal son to Metellus Piggle-wiggle and loyal friend to Sulla the Dictator, died peacefully in his sleep of a wasting disorder which defied diagnosis. The acknowledged leading light of Roman medicine, Sulla's doctor Lucius Tuccius, asked the Piglet's adopted son for permission to do an autopsy.

But the adopted son was neither as intelligent nor as reasonable as his father; the blood son of Scipio Nasica and the elder of Crassus Orator's two Licinias (the younger was his adoptive mother, wife of the Piglet), Metellus Scipio was chiefly famous for his hauteur and sense of aristocratic fitness.

“No one will tamper with my father's body!” he said through his tears, and clutching his wife's hand convulsively. “He will go to the flames unmutilated!”

The funeral was, of course, conducted at State expense, and was as distinguished as its object. The eulogy was given from the rostra by Quintus Hortensius after Mamercus, father of Metellus Scipio's wife, Aemilia Lepida, declined that honor. Everyone was there, from Catulus to Caesar, from Caepio Brutus to Cato; it was not, however, a funeral which attracted a huge crowd.

And on the day after the Piglet was committed to the flames, Metellus Scipio held a meeting with Catulus, Hortensius, Vatia Isauricus, Cato, Caepio Brutus and the senior consul, Cicero.

“I heard a rumor,” said the bereaved son, red-eyed but now tearless, “that Caesar intends to put himself up as a candidate for Pontifex Maximus.”

“Well, that surely can't come as a surprise,” said Cicero. “We all know who pulls Labienus's strings in Magnus's absence, though at this moment I'm uncertain as to whether Magnus even has any interest in who pulls Labienus's strings. Popular election to choose all priests and augurs can't benefit Magnus, whereas it gives Caesar a chance he could never have had when the College of Pontifices chose its own Pontifex Maximus.”

“It never did choose its own Pontifex Maximus,” said Cato to Metellus Scipio. “The only unelected Pontifex Maximus in history—your father—was personally chosen by Sulla, not the College.”

Catulus had a different objection to make against what Cicero said. “How blind you can be about our dear heroic friend Pompeius Magnus!” he threw at Cicero. “No advantage to Magnus? Come, now! Magnus hankers to be a priest or augur himself. He'd get what he hankers after from a Popular election, but never from co-optation within either College.”

“My brother-in-law is right, Cicero,” said Hortensius. “The lex Labiena de sacerdotiis suits Pompeius Magnus very well.”

“Rot the lex Labiena!” cried Metellus Scipio.

“Don't waste your emotions, Quintus Scipio,” said Cato in his harsh and toneless voice. “We're here to decide how to prevent Caesar's declaring his candidacy.”

Brutus sat with his eyes traveling from one angry face to another, bewildered as to why he had been invited to such a senior gathering. He had assumed it was part of Uncle Cato's relentless war against Servilia for control of her son, a war which frightened yet attracted him, the more so as he got older. Of course it did occur to him to wonder if perhaps, thanks to his engagement to Caesar's daughter, they thought to have him there to quiz him about Caesar; but as the discussion proceeded and no one applied to him for information, he was forced eventually to conclude that his presence was indeed simply to annoy Servilia.

“We can ensure your election to the College as an ordinary pontifex easily,” said Catulus to Metellus Scipio, “by persuading anyone tempted to stand against you not to stand.”

“Well, that's something, I suppose,” said Metellus Scipio.

“Who intends to stand against Caesar?” asked Cicero, another member of this group who didn't quite know why he had been invited. He presumed it was at Hortensius's instigation, and that his function might be to find a loophole which would prevent Caesar's candidacy. The trouble was he knew there was no loophole. The lex Labiena de sacerdotiis had not been drafted by Labienus, so much was certain. It bore all the stamps of Caesar's drafting skill. It was watertight.

“I'm standing,” said Catulus.

“So am I,” said Vatia Isauricus, quiet until now.

“Then, as only seventeen of the thirty-five tribes vote in religious elections,” said Cicero, “we will have to rig the lots to ensure both of your tribes are chosen, but that Caesar's tribe is not. That increases your chances.”

“I disapprove of bribery,” said Cato, “but I think this is one time we have to bribe.” He turned to his nephew. “Quintus Servilius, you're by far the richest man here. Would you be willing to put up money in such a good cause?”

Brutus broke out in a cold sweat. So this was why!

He wet his lips, looked hunted. “Uncle, I would love to help you,” he said, voice trembling, “but I dare not! My mother controls my purse strings, not I.”

Cato's splendid nose thinned, its nostrils turned to blisters? “At twenty years of age, Quintus Servilius?” he blared.

All eyes were upon him, amazed; Brutus shrank down in his chair. “Uncle, please try to understand!” he whimpered.

“Oh, I understand,” said Cato contemptuously, and deliberately turned his back. “It seems then,” he said to the rest, “that we will have to find the money to bribe from out of our own purses.” He shrugged. “As you know, mine is not plump. However, I will donate twenty talents.”

“I can't really afford anything,” said Catulus, looking miserable, “because Jupiter Optimus Maximus takes every spare sestertius I have. But from somewhere I will find fifty talents.”

“Fifty from me,” said Vatia Isauricus curtly.

“Fifty from me,” said Metellus Scipio.

“And fifty from me,” said Hortensius.

Cicero now understood perfectly why he was there, and said, voice beautifully modulated, “The penurious state of my finances is too well known for me to think you expect anything more from me than an onslaught of speeches to the electors. A service I am extremely happy to provide.”

“Then there only remains,” said Hortensius, his voice quite as melodious as Cicero's, “to decide which of the two of you will finally stand against Caesar.”

But here the meeting ran into an unexpected snag; neither Catulus nor Vatia Isauricus was willing to stand down in favor of the other, for each believed absolutely that he must be the next Pontifex Maximus.

“Utter stupidity!” barked Cato, furious. “You'll end in splitting the vote, and that means Caesar's chances improve. If one of you stands, it's a straight battle. Two of you, and it becomes a three-way battle.”

“I'm standing,” said Catulus, looking mulish.

“And so am I,” said Vatia Isauricus, looking pugnacious.

On which unhappy note the congress broke up. Bruised and humiliated, Brutus wended his way from the sumptuous dwelling of Metellus Scipio to his betrothed's unpretentious apartment in the Subura. There was really nowhere else he wanted to go, as Uncle Cato had rushed off without so much as acknowledging his nephew's existence, and the thought of going home to his mother and poor Silanus held no appeal whatsoever. Servilia would prise all the details out of him as to where he had been and what he had done and who was there and what Uncle Cato was up to; and his stepfather would simply sit like a battered doll minus half its stuffing.

His love for Julia only increased with the passage of the years. He never ceased to marvel at her beauty, her tender consideration for his feelings, her kindness, her liveliness. And her understanding. Oh, how grateful he was for the last!

Thus it was to her that he poured out the story of the meeting at Metellus Scipio's, and she, dearest and sweetest pet, listened with tears in her eyes.

“Even Metellus Scipio suffered little parental supervision,” she said at the end of the story, “while the others are far too old to remember what it was like when they lived at home with the paterfamilias.”

“Silanus is all right,” said Brutus gruffly, fighting tears himself, “but I am so terribly afraid of my mother! Uncle Cato isn't afraid of anyone, that's the trouble.”

Neither of them had any idea of the relationship between her father and his mother—any more than, indeed, did Uncle Cato. So Julia felt no constraints about communicating her dislike of Servilia to Brutus, and said, “I do understand, Brutus dear.” She shivered, turned pale. “She has no compassion, no comprehension of her strength or her power to dominate. I think she is strong enough to blunt the shears of Atropos.”

“I agree with you,” said Brutus, sighing.

Time to cheer him up, make him feel better about himself. Julia said, smiling and reaching out to stroke his shoulder-length black curls, “I think you handle her beautifully, Brutus. You stay out of her way and do nothing to annoy her. If Uncle Cato had to live with her, he might understand your situation.”

“Uncle Cato did live with her,” said Brutus dolefully.

“Yes, but when she was a girl,” said Julia, stroking.

Her touch triggered an impulse to kiss her, but Brutus did not, contenting himself with caressing the back of her hand as she drew it away from his hair. She was not long turned thirteen, and though her womanhood was now manifested by two exquisite little pointed bumps inside the bosom of her dress, Brutus knew she was not yet ready for kisses. He was also imbued with a sense of honor that had come from all his reading of the conservative Latin writers like Cato the Censor, and he deemed it wrong to stimulate a physical response in her that would end in making life for both of them uncomfortable. Aurelia trusted them, never supervised their meetings. Therefore he could not take advantage of that trust.

Of course it would have been better for both of them had he done so, for then Julia's increasing sexual aversion to him would have surfaced at an early enough age to make the breaking of their engagement an easier business. But because he did not touch or kiss her, Julia could find no reasonable excuse for going to her father and begging to be released from what she knew would be a ghastly marriage, no matter how obedient a wife she forced herself to be.

The trouble was that Brutus had so much money! Bad enough at the time of the betrothal, but a hundred times worse now that he had inherited the fortune of his mother's family as well. Like everyone else in Rome, Julia knew the story of the Gold of Tolosa, and what it had bought for the Servilii Caepiones. Brutus's money would be such a help to her father, of that there could be no doubt. Avia said it was her duty as her father's only child to make his life in the Forum more prestigious, to increase his dignitas. And there was only one way in which a girl could do this: she had to marry as much money and clout as she could. Brutus may not have been any girl's idea of marital bliss, but in respect of money and clout he had no rival. Therefore she would do her duty and marry someone whom she just didn't want to make love to her. Tata was more important.

Thus when Caesar came to visit later that afternoon, Julia behaved as if Brutus were the fiancé of her dreams.

“You're growing up,” said Caesar, whose presence in his home was rare enough these days that he could see her evolving.

“Only five years to go,” she said solemnly.

“Is that all?”

“Yes,” she said with a sigh; “that's all, tata.”

He settled her into the crook of his arm and kissed the top of her head, unaware that Julia belonged to that type of girl who could dream of no more wonderful husband than one exactly like her father: mature, famous, handsome, a shaper of events.

“Any news?” he asked.

“Brutus came.”

He laughed. “That is not news, Julia!”

“Perhaps it is,” she said demurely, and related what she had been told about the meeting at the house of Metellus Scipio.

“The gall of Cato!” he exclaimed when she was done, “to demand large amounts of money from a twenty-year-old boy!”

“They didn't get anywhere, thanks to his mother.”

“You don't like Servilia, do you?”

“I'm in Brutus's shoes, tata. She terrifies me.”

“Why, exactly?”

This she found difficult to elucidate for the benefit of one famous for his love of undeniable facts. “It's just a sort of feeling. Whenever I see her, I think of an evil black snake.”

He shook with mirth. “Have you ever seen an evil black snake, Julia?”

“No, but I've seen pictures of them. And of Medusa.” She closed her eyes and turned her face into his shoulder. “Do you like her, tata?”

That he could answer with perfect truth. “No.”

“Well then, there you are,'' said his daughter.

“You're quite right,” said Caesar. “There indeed I am!”

Naturally Aurelia was fascinated when Caesar recounted the story to her a few moments later.

“Isn't it nice to think that even mutual detestation of you can't obliterate ambition in either Catulus or Vatia Isauricus?” she asked, smiling slightly.

“Cato's right, if they both stand they'll split the vote. And if I have learned nothing else, I now know they'll rig the lots. No Fabian voters in this particular election!”

“But both their tribes will vote.”

“I can deal with that provided that they both stand. Some of their natural partisans will see the strength of an argument from me that they should preserve their impartiality by voting for neither.”

“Oh, clever!”

“Electioneering,” said Caesar pensively, “is not merely a matter of bribery, though none of those hidebound fools can see that. Bribery is not a tool I dare use, even if I had the wish or the money to go in for it. If I am a candidate for an election, there will be half a hundred senatorial wolves baying for my blood—no vote or record or official will go uninvestigated. But there are many other ploys than bribery.”

“It's a pity that the seventeen tribes which will vote will not be chosen until immediately beforehand,” said Aurelia. “If they were selected a few days in advance, you could import some rural voters. The name Julius Caesar means a great deal more to any rural voter than either Lutatius Catulus or Servilius Vatia.”

“Nonetheless, Mater, something can be done along those lines. There's bound to be at least one urban tribe— Lucius Decumius will prove invaluable there. Crassus will enlist his tribe if it's chosen. So will Magnus. And I do have influence in other tribes than Fabia.”