Legatus Legionis: Book Two in the Gaius Claudius Scaevola Trilogy (17 page)

"Your legion and the seventh must be prepared to march at once," Messala said. "A clear declaration of force, and Claudius will go. The praetorians won't be prepared to fight two legions on his behalf."

"No, but the ambitious amongst the German legions might be prepared to move against Scribonianus."

"They might think twice about moving against you, though," one of the Senators said.

"Your confidence is flattering, but I'm not sure that it's deserved."

"Oh yes it is." Messala said. "Look at your combat decorations. You defeated Parthians with the odds nine to one against. That same reputation will keep the German legions at bay, especially since the Eastern legions would support you."

Gaius was stunned. It was possible that that reputation, together with the friendship he had made with Cinna might persuade the seventh to follow, but he was more sceptical about the German legions, particularly given the egos he knew were there.

"So, can we count on you?" one of the senators asked.

Gaius realized that he had got about as far as he could with this discussion. The problem was, they had told him enough that they could hardly let him get up and walk away, because once he was back with his legion, anything was possible. He had to persuade them that he was at least amenable, and there was one more thing to try: ask for something. "This is one of those things where you have to be all in," Gaius said softly. "It really is a case of death or glory, so, if we suppose this works, let's define the glory."

"What do you mean?" Messala asked.

"I would need a Governorship in the east, and a guaranteed seat in the Senate," Gaius replied. When he saw the stunned looks, he added, "If I don't get the promises now, I'm hardly likely to later, am I?"

"Of course," Messala said, "but only Scribonianus can authorize those things."

"Then I await his response," Gaius nodded towards Messala, and began to get up.

"That's going to take time," Messala said, "and by now you will appreciate that we can't just let you wander off. Until you commit to our cause, we have to assume you could be against us. You'll have to come with us."

The men on either side were already on their feet, and Gaius could feel the points of daggers against his sides.

"You can take your hands off me," Gaius said coldly. "I'm unarmed, and you obviously are not."

"Then follow us," the senator said, "and don't make a fuss."

Gaius nodded, and got to his feet. Any attempt he made to get away had to succeed, because such an attempt would show he was against them. If he did get away, they would be dead men, so they would have no hesitation in killing him. Could he outrun them? Quite possibly, but he was surrounded by them, and it was difficult to see how he could fight his way out of the group before someone could stick a knife in his side.

The wine-shop had been on the outside of the village, and they were now walking along a track through bush, towards a small farm, which, because it was deserted, had been used several times by the legions for exercises. Accordingly, Gaius knew the farmhouse was in reasonable condition. They entered the house, and made their way towards the doorway to the cellar. The door was opened, and one of the Senators offered him a lamp, some papyrus, some ink, a writing implement, and a jar of wine.

"We'll be back in two hours," he said. "By then you should have written orders that are signed that unambiguously commit yourself to our cause. You have to do more than simply say you will get your legion to march, because once you got back to them, you could do anything. You have to be in a position where, if
we
don't succeed, you'll be found guilty of treason."

"And if I don't join you, you'll kill me?"

"No choice," Messala shrugged.

"You'd kill your daughter's husband? What will she think?"

"It's not all bad," Messala shrugged. "We can make out it's an accident, and after all, she'll inherit your estate. She'll be very very rich."

'And you think you will too,' Gaius thought to himself, as he laid the lamp down on a large box. "I'll have something in two hours," he said, "and I promise to honour whatever it is." He then watched the other climb the steps and go out of the cellar, then he heard the door close behind him, followed by a click as the latch was fixed shut from the other side.

Gaius looked around the cellar. There were two bales of straw, and some loose straw in the southwest corner, which was opposite and to the right of the stairs he had climbed down. Apart from that, the cellar seemed empty. Midway along the wall to his left, the eastern wall, there was a trapdoor that led outside, but that would presumably be bolted shut from the outside. Along the western wall there was some substantial shelving, but there was nothing stored there now. There was a space between the top of the shelves and the floor above, and it was not possible to see what was there from the floor.

Gaius sat down on a bale then he put the jar of wine beside him. The last thing he needed now was to dull his reflexes, and it would not have surprised him if there was some sort of potion in it, allegedly to make him more agreeable. He might have to find somewhere to pour much of that out, without leaving a clear trace. Possibly under the straw, but that could be left until later, just in case it had some use.

Could he deceive them, persuade them he was with them? After all, if they wished him to march the legion, he had to get back to it. Once there . . . The problem was, they could see that as clearly as he could, and they must have some plan to get around it. Did they have a good plan? They had already asked him to leave written orders for the legion to march to, say, Northern Italy, while he rode to somewhere like Pannonia to persuade Governor Plautius to do something. Not that they could let him ride to Plautius . . . unless he was in the plot as well. But they would not need him to ride. He merely had to present appropriate written orders. Then the legions would march, and at some time later he would send more written orders telling them to march on Rome and . . .

Probably written orders would fail at this point, but that might be irrelevant. They would be gambling that with the legions on the march the praetorians would see sense and get rid of Claudius. At that point, they would succeed, and unless he had cooperated, he would be disposed of. Assuming they had planned that far ahead!

As a last resort, trying to deceive them might work, but it was more likely to lead to Claudius' overthrow, in which case the deception would be pointless. He might as well join them right now, and that was exactly what he did not intend to do. That meant he had to get out of this cellar, and clearly his first attempt had to work because they would not let him live long enough for there to be a second attempt.

So, how was he going to get out? There were only two ways: the trapdoor and the door. They would probably think the trapdoor was impossible, but if he could get it open he could leap up and he was strong enough to lift himself up and climb out. Before that, though, he should search his cellar more carefully, to see if he had any assets.

He moved the straw bales to see whether there was anything under them, but as he expected there was not. Leaving something there was too obvious. However, the loose straw looked as if it had been left there for a long time, so he ran his hands through it and found a moderate-sized length of timber. When he pulled it out he saw that it had been part of something that had broken under strain, and at one end it finished as a longish splinter. For the first use at least, this might be quite a useful spear, albeit a bit clumsy to wield.

He now made a much closer examination of the shelving, but found nothing of use. However, when he climbed the shelving, he realized he could lie on the top of it, against the wall, and be unseen from below if he kept well back. He pulled himself up, to be sure that the shelving was strong enough. It was.

He now examined the trapdoor. It was held closed by a latch, but the door did not fit very well, and it would be possible with the piece of wood to slip the sharp splinter up and slide the latch across, thus opening the door. Very careless of them to leave him a means of escape!

Or was it? If they wanted to know which side he was on, why wouldn't they leave him a way of escape? Provided they knew when he tried, they could then catch him and kill him. Now, if that were their plan, there would be some form of alarm that would be set off by opening the door. There would be no way he could run faster than men on horseback, and they would presumably watch the horses. And even if he did have this spear, he could never survive against soldiers on horseback with lances and swords.

Simply climbing out the trapdoor would not work, unless they were very very careless, which raised an interesting question: how would they know they had not forgotten something? If he had appeared to escape, what would they do when they could not catch him? They would have to get enough distance between them and the cavalry that they would have a chance, so once they decided he had escaped, they would make their escape as quickly as possible. Perhaps his best chance was to appear to have escaped.

He moved the two straw bales under the trapdoor, and carefully pushed the splinter into the gap beside the latch and began pushing. With a little effort the latch slipped, and in principle, the door could be opened. He now stood the bales end-on and made an impression in them, then after emptying the wine-jar he forced it into the straw, and made it lie such that it looked as if it had been pushed over, but it had not quite fallen. He now blew out the flame and now in the near dark, he lowered the lamp onto the bale and placed it against the wine jar so that it looked as if the lamp was supposed to fall over, but one side of the jar supported it. The impression he hoped to give was that he had climbed out and tried to knock over the jar on which the lamp was balanced in the hope of starting a fire, but it had not worked.

He now took his piece of timber and pushed up on the trapdoor. He got it about halfway open when he felt resistance. When he pushed it further, there was a crashing noise. He left it open, and with his piece of timber he vaulted to the top of the shelving and tucked himself in against the wall.

He heard men running, and the sound of at least two horses.

"Well, we know which side he's on!"

"Where'd he go?"

"Presumably he made it to the woods."

"But how did he get that far so fast?"

"Maybe he slipped around the other side of the farmhouse. He might have been smart enough to know he couldn't cover that much ground after all that noise."

"How'd he know which way we were coming?" Messala's voice.

"He had a choice of two ways," came the scathing voice of one of the soldiers. "He got lucky, and he's going to get luckier still if we don't get after him."

"What's down there?"

"Who cares?" Gaius smiled at this. That was the attitude he wanted to hear.

"It looks like he's tried to start a fire when he left," the other soldier said. "I'll go down and check it out. A lot of smoke right now will bring more soldiers than we need."

That, Gaius thought to himself, was not what he had planned. There was no sign of flame, so how could there be a fire? Another plan that had not worked out, thanks to not making allowance for the stupidity of that soldier.

"Right, spread out and move!"

There was the sound of retreating footsteps, two horses setting off, then silence.

More silence.

Then the sound of the door being opened. One pair of footsteps. Gaius carefully wriggled as silently as he could to get a view. Fortunately, they had forgotten to close the trapdoor, so there was enough light to see with. The head was moving towards the straw. Gaius grasped the timber firmly, wriggled slightly, rolled towards the edge with his feet firmly against the wall, then he uncoiled, thus propelling himself across the space. The soldier turned, to see the splintered end coming directly at him. He tried to evade, but Gaius corrected and drove the wood into his neck. There was a gurgling sound as the soldier fell downwards, followed by a thump as Gaius hit the floor.

Gaius pulled himself to his feet and kicked over the soldier. Blood was oozing from his mouth, and was pouring from his neck. His eyes were furious, but he seemed to be incapable of much movement. His right hand had held a gladius, but that was now lying a foot away from his hand and he seemed incapable of reaching it. Gaius picked it up and put the soldier out of his misery.

Everything might not have worked out exactly as planned, he thought to himself, but perhaps it had turned out better than he could have hoped for. He now had a gladius, one of the soldiers was dead, the other soldiers were out looking for him, and the senators were no threat at all. He paused and listened. Silence. There seemed to have been no back-up for this soldier. Even so, he should be careful.

He then crept up the stairs, as silently as possible, but paused when, near the top, he heard a creak. He heard nothing, and could see nothing through the open trapdoor. He brought his head as close to the door as he could, and could see no sign of anyone. He leaped through the trapdoor, and when all was clear in front of him, he quickly dived to one side and turned. All was still clear, the hallway to the front door empty.

He could hear voices some distance away. He knew that there were two rooms to the north, the far one being accessed through one in between. The conversation continued, but there was no other sound. He entered the first room, and found it empty. As he crossed it, he was clearly getting closer to the conversation, and was vaguely amused to hear they were discussing him, or more specifically his escape, and what they were going to do. He put his hand on the door, but decided to wait and listen to what they thought they had in store for him.

"He'll be caught." The voice of Messala, and, Gaius noted wryly, it did not exude confidence.

"Except they should have caught him by now, and it seems they haven't. What'll we do?"