Empire (78 page)

As grand as they were, none of these buildings approached the height of the column. From the topmost scaffold, Apollodorus and Marcus stepped onto the top of the column. Their view of the city in all directions was virtually unimpeded; only the Temple of Jupiter atop the Capitoline loomed higher. Turning slowly, Marcus saw his father’s house and the sprawling House of the People on the Palatine, the Flavian Amphitheater and the towering statue of Sol at the far end of the Forum, the cluttered tenements of the Subura, the Hill of Gardens, and the vast expanse of the Field of Mars with the bend of the Tiber beyond.

The only man-made object that reached to their level was an enormous crane situated just beyond the Greek wing of the library. Apollodorus pointed to it with a satisfied nod.

“I reworked the last of the calculations last night. Everything is ready. We’ll lift the statue into place today.”

Marcus gazed down at the workmen who surrounded the statue of Trajan that was to be placed atop the column. The men were securing the statue with padded chains and ropes connected to the crane. “How soon?”

“As soon as I can get all the workmen in place. Here, we’ll go down using the stairway inside the column. You can observe as I give my final instructions. Come along, Pygmalion.”

Long ago, from the emperor himself, Apollodorus had learned that Pygmalion had once been Marcus’s name. To Marcus, the name was a
reminder of his years as a slave, but when Apollodorus first used it as a pet name for him, he had been too intimidated to object. Apollodorus clearly intended no malice; he seemed to think that the name was a compliment, an acknowledgment of Marcus’s skill as a sculptor.

As they descended, Marcus counted each of the 185 steps. He always did this. All the artisans and workmen practiced similar rituals—always tying an odd number of knots, or using an even number of nails, or stepping onto a scaffold with their right foot first.

They walked to the crane and stood before the gilded bronze statue of Trajan. Apollodorus had executed the basic design, but Marcus had sculpted most of the finer details, including Trajan’s face and hands. This had meant spending long stretches of time with the emperor, who listened to reports and dictated correspondence while Marcus observed him and sculpted his likeness, first making preliminary models and then working on the full-scale statue. Marcus vividly remembered his first meeting with Trajan thirteen years ago, when his father had petitioned the emperor to recognize Marcus’s status as a freeborn citizen. Trajan had seemed larger than life to Marcus then, and he still did.

Far more accessible was the emperor’s protégé, Hadrian, who had often been present when Marcus was sculpting Trajan’s likeness; perhaps Marcus found the man more approachable because he was closer to Marcus’s own age. Hadrian had distinguished himself in the Dacian wars, commanding the First Legion Minerva, but he also had an avid interest in all things artistic and had strong opinions about everything from the poetry of Pindar (“incomparably beautiful”) to Trajan’s collection of silver Dacian drinking cups (“unspeakably hideous; they should be melted down”). He was known even to dabble in architecture, though none of his fanciful drawings had ever resulted in an actual building.

Hadrian joined them as Apollodorus and Marcus were making a final inspection to see that the statue was securely fitted for lifting.

“Is the operation on schedule?” asked Hadrian.

“We’ll begin at any moment,” said Apollodorus. “Will the emperor be present?”

“He intended to be here, but affairs of state preclude his presence,” said Hadrian. He cracked a smile and lowered his voice. “Actually, I suspect he’s a bit unnerved by the whole thing. I don’t think he fancies the
idea of seeing himself being hoisted a hundred feet in the air and dangling from a chain.”

“Perhaps it’s better that he’s not here,” said Apollodorus. “His presence might make the men nervous.”

Hadrian slowly circled the statue, then nodded. “What a clever idea you came up with, Marcus Pinarius, to slightly exaggerate and elongate the emperor’s features, so as to make them appear more natural when viewed by spectators on the ground. What’s the word for that?”

“It’s a trick of perspective called foreshortening,” said Marcus. “I’m grateful that you supported my idea.”

“Let’s hope it works. Caesar was certainly skeptical when he saw the result. Horrified, actually. ‘No man’s nose is that long, not even mine!’ he said. It does look a bit of a caricature when seen this close. But at a distance of a hundred feet and from a low angle, I suspect that nose will actually flatter him.”

The workmen assigned to stand atop the column and guide the placement of the statue were in place; they called and waved to Apollodorus to signal their readiness. The workmen who would operate the various hoists and pulleys of the crane were also at their stations, as were the slaves who would supply the labor to pull the ropes, turn the winches, and steady the counterweights. The statue was ready to be lifted. Apollodorus closed his eyes and muttered a prayer. Marcus touched the fascinum at his breast.

Apollodorus gave the signal for the operation to begin. With a great groaning noise, the various parts of the crane began to move. The statue cleared the ground and began to ascend.

The statue rose to half the height of the column, and then higher still, until it dangled above the column. Apollodorus peered at all the various mechanisms in play, and suddenly seemed nervous. “Marcus, run up to the top of the column,” he said. “See that everything is done correctly.”

Marcus ran to the column, stepped inside, and bounded up the steps. He was so intent on reaching the top that he forgot to count them.

The workmen atop the column stood in a circle, ready to guide the statue into the spot intended for it, the outline of which had been drawn with chalk. Each of the men wore a rope around his waist that was secured to an iron pin driven into the marble, to catch them should they fall. Marcus was not wearing a rope.

The statue seemed to float on the air nearby, twisting slightly so that the gilding reflected sparkles of sunlight. Then it began slowly to move toward them, until it appeared just above their heads. The men reached up and touched the base of the statue, which then began very slowly to descend. Their foreman shouted instructions, making sure the orientation of the statue remained true as it was lowered into place. Marcus stayed out of the way, crouching to keep his balance.

The statue was still two feet above the top of the column when Marcus heard a sharp noise. Somewhere, a chain had snapped.

He looked at the statue, which swayed a bit. He looked at the crane, which also seemed to sway very slightly. Then the crane began to tilt to one side.

“Numa’s balls!” cried the foreman. “The statue’s coming down, right now! Keep it steady!”

The workmen grabbed hold of the statue, but they were powerless to guide it any longer as it swung one way and then the other. With a tremendous cracking noise, part of the crane collapsed. As he strove to keep his balance and stay clear of the statue, Marcus saw in glimpses that a section of the crane was falling and men on the ground were scrambling to get out of the way. He experienced a moment of vertigo in which it seemed that the huge statue was stationary while everything else—earth, sky, and the column under his feet—was spinning off-kilter.

The statue bumped one of the workmen. The movement was relatively small, but the weight of the statue lent tremendous force to the slight contact. The workman went tumbling backward, paddling his arms in the air. He stepped off the column and onto the topmost scaffold, but couldn’t regain his balance and kept staggering backward. Marcus waited for the man’s safety rope to stop his fall, but the knot at his waist had been poorly tied. The man slipped free from the rope and went flying off the scaffold, somersaulting backward. His scream pierced the air as he plummeted to the ground. There was a sickening sound of impact, then a moment of silence, then a tremendous crash as the broken section of the crane fell onto the Greek wing of the library.

Marcus experienced a moment of sheer panic. He imagined the statue swinging ever more wildly out of control, knocking off more and more of
the workman, until it actually struck the column, dislodging the top drum, throwing the whole column out of balance and causing it to topple over.

But that was not what happened.

The statue twisted one way, then the other, then suddenly dropped and landed with a jarring thud atop the column. None of the workmen was harmed, and when they took a closer look, they were amazed to see that the statue had landed precisely within the chalk outline. Despite the broken crane, the outcome could not have been more perfect.

For Marcus, the earth and the sky gradually stopped spinning and all was still. He realized that he was clutching the fascinum with his right hand. His knuckles were bone white. As he slowly unclenched his fist, he stepped onto the scaffolding and took stock of the damage below.

The crane was ruined beyond repair. One end of the Greek wing of the library was destroyed, but that part of the building was unfinished and the repairs would be relatively minor. The body of the man who had fallen lay twisted on the paving stones below, surrounded by a pool of blood. As Marcus watched, Apollodorus and Hadrian approached the lifeless body. Apollodorus gazed down at the corpse for a moment, then up at Marcus. His face was ashen.

Marcus, too stunned to speak, extended his arm and turned his thumb upward to signal that all was well atop the column. Apollodorus looked as if he might faint with relief.

Hadrian took a step back to avoid the spreading pool of blood, then stared up at Marcus, or rather, beyond him, at the towering statue of Trajan. “The nose!” he shouted.

What was Hadrian talking about? Marcus craned his neck to peer up at the statue. The gilding reflected the sunlight so brightly that he was blinded. He looked down at Hadrian and made a quizzical gesture.

Hadrian smiled broadly. He cupped his hands to his mouth and shouted. “The nose . . . looks . . . perfect!”

A month later, Lucius Pinarius hosted a small dinner party in honor of his son.

The Column would soon be officially dedicated, and in the various celebrations the emperor and his chief architect would be the focus of all attention. Before that happened, Lucius wanted to acknowledge his son’s accomplishments and tremendous hard work. The dinner party was to be a major event for the Pinarius household, which seldom saw guests outside the small circle of Lucius’s friends, most of whom were advanced in years and fellow followers of Apollonius of Tyana—not a group much given to traditional feasting, since they ate no meat and drank no wine.

No meat had been cooked or served in Lucius’s house for many years, and he could not bring himself to include any sort of flesh, fowl, or fish on the menu; his cook assured him that no one would even notice the omission among the highly spiced delicacies and sumptuous sweets that would be offered. But for a dinner party that included a member of the imperial household—Hadrian had accepted an invitation—there would have to be wine. Lucius never drank wine, but Marcus occasionally did, and Lucius had no objection to serving it to his guests. If they should be disappointed by the absence of meat, he was determined that they would have no cause to be disappointed with the wine; he had stocked a variety of what a reputable merchant assured him were the very finest vintages, both Greek and Italian.

For such an occasion, his son informed him, there must be a scurra among the guests; no memorable social occasion could take place among the elite of the city without a scurra to amuse them. Apparently there existed an entire class of such persons in the city, men who literally made their way by their wit. A scurra cadged dinner invitations to the homes of the wealthy and in return shared gossip, told jokes, injected double entendres into the conversation, flattered the host, and gently mocked the guests.

“And where on earth will I find such a person?” Lucius had asked his son, quite certain there were no scurras among the staid acolytes of the Teacher.

“Apollodorus says he’ll bring someone, a fellow named Favonius,” said Marcus. Apollodorus had also invited the director of the imperial archives, a man in his forties named Gaius Suetonius, who had learned that the elder Pinarius had known Nero and his long-vanished circle and was eager to meet him.

After many days of preparation, the appointed hour arrived. The guests appeared in quick succession and were shown to their dining couches. The house was filled with the steady hum of conversation and laughter.

The scurra showed his worth early on. Favonius had frizzled red hair, plump cheeks, and a peculiar nose that skewed to one side; from his protruding belly, it appeared that he loved food and seldom missed a meal. When it became evident that no meat would be served, Favonius pretended to pout. “I see we’re to be served a gladiators’ diet tonight: no meat, just barley and beans! Ah, well, thank the gods that gladiators are allowed to drink wine.” Both Lucius and Marcus were taken aback by the man’s rudeness, but everyone else laughed, and not another word was said all night about the lack of meat or fish; the scurra’s blatant complaint forestalled any further grumbling. Instead, the guests vied with one another to praise the cook’s skill and ingenuity.