The Grass Crown (62 page)

She is a beautiful woman, Dalmatica. How she bedeviled me that first time I ran for praetor! Do you remember? Amazing to realize that is now almost ten years in the past. I am turned fifty, Publius Rutilius—and no nearer to being consul, it seems to me, than ever I was back in the days of the Subura. One is tempted to speculate what Scaurus did to her as a result of those idiocies nine years ago. But she hides it well. All I got from her when we met in the dining room was a cold ave and a frigid smile. She wouldn’t meet my eyes. For which I do not blame her. I suppose she was terrified Scaurus would find her conduct reproachable, and acted accordingly. Certainly he could not have done anything other than approve, for once the greetings were over with she sat herself down in her chair with her back to me and never turned round once. Which is more than I can say about our dearest, darlingest Aurelia, who kept all of us dizzy with her turnings and twistings. Well, she’s happy again because Gaius Julius is off on another expedition very shortly. He’s accompanying his brother, Sextus Julius, on a mission to find Rome cavalry in Africa and far Gaul.

I’m not being malicious, though such is my reputation—and deservedly so, by and large. We both know this lady very well, and I can say nothing to you about her that would come as a surprise. There is considerable love between her and her husband, but it is not a happy or comfortable love. He cramps her style, and she resents that. Knowing he’s off again for some months at least, last night she was animated, laughing, lifted out of her normal prosaic self. A mood which did not escape Gaius Julius, next to me on my couch! For, Publius Rutilius, when Aurelia is animated the whole male world is transfixed. Helen of Troy could not have held a candle to her. Imagine if you will the Princeps Senatus behaving like a silly adolescent! Not to mention Scaevola, and even Gaius Marius. Such is the effect she has. None of the other women were plain, several of them were downright beautiful. But even Julia and Dalmatica could not compete with her, a fact Gaius Julius was quick to note. I predict that when they arrived home, there was another quarrel.

Yes indeed, it was a very strange and awkward dinner party. Then why, I hear you ask, was the party given? I am not sure, though I did gain the distinct impression that Gaius Marius had been visited by a presentiment. To the effect that we would never meet again in similar circumstances, those of us in that room. He spoke sadly of you, mourned the fact we could not be complete without you. He spoke sadly of himself. He spoke sadly of Scaurus. Even, it struck me, of Young Marius! As for me—I seemed to inherit the bulk of his sorrow. Though we have moved apart steadily since the death of Julilla, I cannot quite understand this in him. We face what I think is going to be a very difficult war to win, which suggests to me that Gaius Marius and I will work together in all our old accord. The only conclusion I can arrive at with any logic is that he fears for himself. Fears he will not survive this war. Fears that, without the massive column of his presence to support us, all of us will suffer.

True to my bargain with Scaurus, I will not speak of the coming war. However, I do have one extremely interesting snippet to offer you that Scaurus can’t. I had a visit the other day from Lucius Calpurnius Piso Caesoninus, who has been deputed to organize armaments and supplies for our new legions. Isn’t he married to your daughter? Yes, the more I think of it, the more convinced I become that he is. Anyway, he had a curious tale to tell. It is a pity that the Apennines cut us off so completely from Italian Gaul, particularly at its Adriatic end. High time we organized Italian Gaul into a proper province and sent it a governor on a regular basis, and sent another governor regularly to Gaul-across-the-Alps. For the purposes of this war, we have sent a man to govern both the Gauls, but located him in Italian Gaul—the consular Gaius Coelius Caldus. Quintus Sertorius is his quaestor, a most reassuring appointment. There is astonishing military blood in the Marii, I am convinced of it, for Sertorius is a Marius on his mother’s side. And a Sabine into the bargain.

But I am straying from my point. Piso Caesoninus made a quick trip to the north to commission arms and armor for Rome. He started in the customary places, Populonia and Pisae. But there he heard stories of new foundry towns in eastern Italian Gaul, run by a firm based in Placentia. So off he went to Placentia. And got nowhere! Oh, he found the company all right. But a closer-mouthed, more furtive lot you couldn’t imagine. So he went east to Patavium and Aquileia, where he discovered that there’s a whole new industry in that region. He also discovered that these foundry towns have been making arms and armor for the Italian Allies under an exclusive contract for almost ten years! Caesoninus thinks it innocent enough. The smiths were offered an exclusive contract, they were paid promptly, and so—they produced! Though the steelworks are all individually owned, the towns themselves were set up by a landlord who owns everything save the businesses. A landlord who, according to the locals, is a Roman senator! And to make the whole thing even murkier, it seems the smiths thought they had been making arms for Rome, and that the man who had put them under contract was a Roman praefectus fabrum! When Piso Caesoninus pressed them for a description of this mystery man, they painted a likeness of none other than Quintus Poppaedius Silo of the Marsi!

Now how would Silo have known where to go before we in Rome even knew of this eastern steel industry? And a curious answer has occurred to me—one I’ll find difficult to prove, I suspect. Therefore I didn’t mention it to Piso Caesoninus. Quintus Servilius Caepio lived with Marcus Livius Drusus for years, only left when his wife scampered off with Marcus Cato Salonianus. Now about the time that I was canvassing for my first try at the praetorship, Caepio went away—a long trip. You have assured me in earlier letters that the Gold of Tolosa is no longer in Smyrna, that Caepio appeared in Smyrna on this same absence from Rome and removed it, much to the sorrow of the local banks. Now Silo was in that house often. And far friendlier with Drusus than Drusus was with Caepio. What if he heard that Caepio was sinking some of his money into the establishment of foundry towns in eastern Italian Gaul? Silo could then have anticipated Rome, tied up those new towns making arms and armor for his own people before anyone in the area needed to tout for business.

I’m picking that Caepio is the Roman senator landlord, and that the company based in Placentia is his. But I doubt I’ll manage to prove it, Publius Rutilius. Anyway, Piso Caesoninus put some pressure on the steelworkers of the area, with the result that they’ll make no more arms and armor for the Italians. Instead, they will make for us.

Rome readies herself for war. But there is an eerie quality about the process, given who the enemy is. No one feels at ease fighting in Italy, including, I suspect, the enemy. Who could have marched on us three months ago, according to my intelligence reports. Oh, I have neglected to tell you that I am very busy putting together an intelligence network—if in no other way, I swear our information about their movements will be superior to their information about ours.

This section of my letter, by the way, is somewhat later in date than the first. Scaurus’s courier didn’t get away.

For the moment, we have secured Etruria and Umbria. Oh, there are rumbles, but the rumblers cannot gather enough clout to secede. Thanks in large measure to the latifundia economy. Gaius Marius is going everywhere, both recruiting and pacifying—and, to give Caepio his due, he’s been very active in Umbria.

The Conscript Fathers flew into a fine old stew when my intelligence revealed that the Italians have as many as twenty legions already trained and under arms. Since I had evidence to back up my contention, they had to believe. And here are we with six legions! Luckily we have arms and armor for at least ten more legions, thanks to those thrifty fellows we depute to go around battlefields picking up stuff from our own and the enemy dead. As well as the enemy prisoners. It’s stored in Capua in shed after shed after shed. But how we can recruit and train new troops in the time we have is more than anyone knows.

I should tell you that it was resolved in the House late in February that Asculum Picentum must be made an example of, in the mode of Numantia. So there is going to be a northern theater as well as a central theater. The command in the north was given to Pompey Strabo. Who was given his target—Asculum Picentum. And who was told he had to be ready to march on it by May. Still very early spring, as the seasons go at the moment, but at least this year our dilatory Pontifex Maximus has intercalated an extra twenty days at the end of February, which is why the date on this latter half of my letter is still March. I am now, by the way, writing a solo effort—Scaurus says he doesn’t have time! As if I do! No, Publius Rutilius, it is not a burden. Many’s the time in the past you’ve made the difference to me when I’ve been away. I render you no more than your due.

Lupus is the kind of commander who doesn’t do anything he regards as beneath his dignity. So when it was agreed that he and Lucius Caesar would split the four veteran legions of Titus Didius between them, and each take one of the unblooded two legions as well, Lupus didn’t feel in the mood to leave Carseoli (where he has established his headquarters for the central theater campaign) in order to do the drudgery of going to Capua and picking up his half of the troops. He sent Pompey Strabo in his stead. He doesn’t like Pompey Strabo—well, who honestly does?

But Pompey Strabo paid him back! Having collected the two veteran legions and the one unblooded legion from Capua, he got as far as Rome. He had been ordered by Lupus to take the raw legion north with him to Picenum, and deliver the two veteran legions to Lupus in Carseoli. Whereas what he did do had Scaurus laughing for a week. He put the raw legion under the command of Gaius Perperna and sent it to Lupus in Carseoli, while he hied himself up the Via Flaminia with the two veteran legions! Not only that, but when Catulus Caesar got to Capua to take up command of the place, he discovered that Pompey Strabo had also rifled the sheds of stored arms and armor, and removed enough to equip four legions! Scaurus is still laughing. However, I can’t. For what can we do about it now? Nothing! Pompey Strabo bears watching. There’s too much Gaul in him—how’s that for a pun?

When Lupus realized how neatly he’d been tricked, he demanded that Lucius Caesar give him one of his two veteran legions! Naturally Lucius Caesar said no, in words to the effect that if Lupus couldn’t control his own legates, then he’d better not come crying to the senior consul about it. Unfortunately Lupus is taking it out on Marius and Caepio, by flogging them to recruit and train with redoubled vigor. He himself sits in Carseoli and sulks.

Coelius and Sertorius in Italian Gaul are moving mountains to ship arms and armor and troops, and every little steelyard and foundry in Roman territory anywhere in the world is busier than a lone Sardinian capturing a convoy. So I suppose it doesn’t really matter that Caepio’s towns worked for the Italians all those years. We wouldn’t have been bright enough to find work for them anyway. Now they are working for us, and that’s as much as one can hope for.

Somehow before May we have to get sixteen legions into the field. That is, we have to produce ten legions we do not at the moment have. Oh, we’ll do it! If there is one thing Rome excels at, it’s getting the job done when the odds are against her. Volunteers are coming from everywhere and every class, and the Latin Rights people have proven staunch to us. Due to our haste, there has been no attempt to segregate the Latin volunteers from the Roman, so it looks as if some sort of hegemony has been visited upon us involuntarily. What I am trying to say is, there will be no auxiliary legions in this war. They’ll all be classified and numbered as Roman.

Lucius Julius Caesar and I leave for Campania at the start of April, about eight days away. Quintus Lutatius Catulus Caesar is already installed as the commandant of Capua, a job I consider he will do well. I am profoundly glad he won’t be leading any armies. Our legion of raw recruits will be split into two units of five cohorts each—Lucius Caesar and I think it will be necessary to garrison both Nola and Aesernia. These troops can do that, they don’t have to be crown-winners. Aesernia is a real outpost in enemy territory, of course, but it remains loyal to us, that we know. Scipio Asiagenes and Lucius Acilius—both junior legates (and both rather poor quality)—are taking five cohorts to Aesernia at once. The praetor Lucius Postumius is taking the other five cohorts to Nola. For a Postumius, he is a fairly steady sort of fellow. I like him. Is it because he’s not an Albinus, would you say?

And that, dear Publius Rutilius, is all for the moment. Scaurus’s courier is just about knocking on my door. When I have an opportunity I’ll write again, but I fear you’ll have to rely upon your women correspondents for the most regular news. Julia has promised she will write often.

Sulla laid down his pen with a sigh. A very long letter, but something of a catharsis too. Worth the effort, even if it did mean scant sleep. He was aware to whom he was writing, never forgot it, yet he found himself able to say things on his paper that he could never have said to Publius Rutilius Rufus in person. Of course that was because Publius Rutilius Rufus was too far away to represent a threat of any kind.

However, he hadn’t mentioned his sudden elevation in the Senate by Lucius Julius Caesar. That was too new and too delicately poised to risk offending Fortune by talking about it as if it were an established fact. Mere accident had provoked it, of that Sulla was sure; disliking Gaius Marius, Lucius Caesar had looked for someone else to ask. By rights he should have asked Titus Didius or Publius Crassus, or some other triumphator. But his eye had lighted upon Sulla, and his mind decided Sulla would do. Of course he hadn’t expected such a grasp of the situation, but when he got it, Lucius Caesar did a not unusual thing; he singled Sulla out as his in-House expert. To have to consult a Marius or a Crassus did the consul no good—it made the consul look like a tyro having to ask the masters all the time. Whereas to ask a relative nobody like Sulla looked like consular genius. Lucius Caesar could claim to have “discovered” Sulla. And when he leaned upon Sulla, it appeared to be a kind of patronage.