Master and God (51 page)

‘I assume you approve, Clodianus?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Well, let’s be open about all this. The Abascantus initiative continues and I believe our involvement needs to continue with it. Either the Guards can limit their service to a simple role as bodyguards, or we aim for the survival of Rome. Are you with me?’ he checked again.

‘I think so, sir.’ Gaius was always amazed how much a chief-of-staff was taken into his superiors’ confidence.

‘The days of an armed insurrection are past.’

Luckily Gaius had just swallowed, so he did not splutter his wine. Now he knew that the so-called career discussions Secundus had been holding had a specific purpose: to sound out his officers’ opinions, in preparation for a coup.

When Secundus was frank, he pushed the boat out: ‘It may have worked for Caligula, but trapping Our Master and God in a tunnel with a bloody stabbing organised by us is just not on.’

‘Really, sir?’

‘The field army love him far too much. He has endeared himself to the troops by his personal presence on the Rhine and Danube. An uprising back home would be very unpopular. The legions would never wear it.’ Gaius had to remind himself this man came up by the civil route; his colleague Norbanus would not have spoken so regretfully about the army. And ‘an uprising at home’ must mean, by the Praetorians. ‘There would be civil war throughout the Empire all over again; we had enough of that in the Year of the Four Emperors. What is necessary now is a smooth transfer of power. As I see it –’ Secundus paused.

‘Hypothetically?’ Gaius prompted. He was always considerate.

‘Oh good man! All of this is
sub rosa
. You know the risks. Anybody asks us, we both deny everything . . . Clearly, any move would necessitate the Senate, the Guards and the imperial staff all working together. In this scenario, you realise, the Guards’ role would be background support.’

‘We won’t
do
anything, but if somebody else tries it we refrain from intervention?’ Gaius felt he had abruptly ended up with his toes on the edge of a very deep trench; he was struggling to hold his balance, about to topple forwards and fall in.

‘A bugger, isn’t it?’ Secundus asked confidingly. He drained his glass in one relieved gulp. ‘Well, I’m glad we had this little chat. Just wanted you to know, any problems, anything at all, my door is always open.’

Gaius could now extract himself. He stood up to leave. ‘We all know we can rely on you,’ smiled the Prefect. ‘Your watching brief is vital. You won’t let us down, I know.’

Gaius reached the door. He turned back. ‘Just one query, sir, if you don’t mind. How do you see the position of your colleague Norbanus?’

‘Good question! Could be tricky. Don’t worry; no hiccup. If and when things ever kick off, you can leave Norbanus to me.’

‘Good to know that, sir.’

Jupiter Optimus bloody Maximus!

Gaius walked next door to his own office. A couple of clerks looked up, but read his expression and decided not to engage with him.

There was one rather unpleasant possibility, as Gaius was fully aware: his conversations with Norbanus and Secundus could be a cheat. Perhaps one, or both, was attempting to draw out their chief-of-staff’s opinions in order to report him for treason.

That was how people thought in Rome. Domitian had had that dire effect.

He went into his private area, where he sat sweating for some time.
You worked with Abascantus, so you understand what he was trying to do
. . .

He had been a fool. He had entirely missed the point.

Even while Petronius Secundus hedged and hinted about a transfer of power, the cornicularius had quaked at the implications. There
was
a plot. Officials were themselves running it. Everyone who mattered was supposed to know all about it already. Even people like Norbanus, who was unsympathetic and had not been invited, suspected what was going on. Of course it was not signalled. Nobody was going to have a big sign up on his door saying ‘Conspirators, Enquire Within’, were they?

Now as Gaius pondered in amazement, he saw that the Abascantus ‘initiative’ was extremely clever – no less devious than he would expect. No one became a disgraced civil servant without expertise in double-dealing. It was simple. All the safety committee members, other than him, were insiders. They were hidden from notice by meeting in plain sight. The people being canvassed for support were a much wider group than had turned up at meetings to munch almond biscuits.
The Senate, the Guards and the staff . . .
Most of Rome, apparently.

As for him, Abascantus had requested someone from the Guards, and Casperius Aelianus, a loyalist and a man who had missed the point, just sent along someone who enjoyed bureaucracy. Now Norbanus assumed Gaius was spying; Secundus assumed Gaius was plotting. Jupiter, what was he supposed to do?

Abascantus made him nervous: there could be a reason why Abascantus was so suddenly dismissed. Some whisper had reached the Emperor. That was seriously bad news for everyone involved. Even poor idiots like Gaius who had had no idea of anything.

Still, he knew now. Now he would have to make choices. Either he went along with this, or he must do what he had thought he was there for in the first place: observe the conspirators – the
real
ones – and eventually report on them. At least he had two different superiors assuring him he was their man. That ought to guarantee protection!

Once again in his life Vinius Clodianus felt that other people were pushing him into something. He had acquired a dangerous level of involvement without even understanding that.

He knew how things worked; if people were exposed for plotting, he would probably go down with them.

When he talked it all through with Lucilla at home, he managed to convince himself that until an assassination attempt was imminent, which might be never, this could not be problematical. But he felt dispirited. Nothing was clear-cut, and to Gaius that meant there was a very high chance all this would go wrong.

If he needed reassurance, it came in the absence of action from Parthenius. If the banished Abascantus really had passed a torch to the chamberlain, Parthenius must have immediately doused it. Nothing happened. There were no further meetings.

Domitian meanwhile grew more unpredictable. Nobody knew the rules. People were lazy and wanted no trouble. They would knuckle under to any system, even bad ones, provided they could understand what was expected of them. With a ruler who was mentally disturbed, quiet periods lulled them into hoping everything had settled down, but then he offended them with some new outrage. They could not even rely on previous behaviour as an index. He would go back on himself, reviewing past incidents and reaching newly disturbing conclusions. It left everyone hysterical.

A case in point was Epaphroditus. Epaphroditus had not only survived being close to Nero, Domitian too had accepted him as a secretary for years. When he suddenly banished the man, that was perturbing. Now he brooded again and suddenly recalled Epaphroditus from exile. As the freedman hobbled back to Rome, it was nearly three decades since his first master Nero committed suicide. Everyone knew that Epaphroditus helping him had been at the cowardly Nero’s own request. A loyal act, simple compassion.

That did not stop Domitian deciding he would now make an example of his elderly secretary. He wanted others to see that causing the death of an emperor, even if he asked you, was a crime.

Epaphroditus was executed.

Worse followed. Domitian suddenly turned on Flavius Clemens. Even before his cousin’s consulship ended in April, there was a mysterious charge of ‘atheism’. Clemens and Domitilla were said to have engaged in ‘Jewish practices’. What these practices were remained obscure. When Vespasian and Titus returned from their conquest of Judaea they had brought many Jewish prisoners, so some of the war booty slaves may have ended up in the Clemens household; if so, none were specifically accused of converting their master. Christians, too, would subsequently claim the couple as saints, yet there was no evidence there either.

The nebulous charge seemed to derive from Domitian’s own twisted imagination. Families tend to speak their minds. Perhaps at some private family occasion his cousins had scoffed at Domitian’s interpretation of himself as a god on earth. To them he was just a very tedious relative. Whatever Flavius Clemens did, or whether his mere existence as a potential rival coloured Domitian’s fears, the usual men with swords arrived one day, and that was the end of him.

As soon as Lucilla heard, she rushed to Flavia Domitilla. Although the poor woman had been living in dread for months, Lucilla found her in a complete daze. The couple had been married over thirty years. There was no trial; there had been no time to get used to the possibility of losing her husband. This was hideous, far worse than illness or a fatal accident.

There would be no public funeral. Certainly no interment in the great new Flavian mausoleum that had once been Clemens’ family home. Arrangements had to be scrimped and secretly conducted; Domitilla’s steward, Stephanus, arranged it.

Domitilla had nobody to turn to. A woman who lost her husband ought to rely on family support, but Domitian was now her only adult male relative; he was also her terrifying enemy.

Domitilla’s household staff were appalled. They clustered around her, most in tears. She was not condemned to death, but the Emperor had ordered that she should be taken from Rome to exile on the Island of Pandateria. Anyone who thought about it realised he could still change his mind and give worse orders. Even if not, Pandateria had a terrible reputation.

While hasty preparations for this unsought journey were made by distraught slaves, Domitilla gave tremulous instructions for the welfare of her children, whom she had to leave. She was given no time even to explain the situation to them. No one could guess what fate lay ahead for the two sons Domitian had previously named as his heirs, though it seemed unlikely he would continue to view them in any friendly light. They and the five other distressed children were orphans in a harsh world. No one who feared Domitian would dare to show them kindness.

Coming from outside, Flavia Lucilla had a clearer head than many. She discovered that although her heart was racing, she could stay calm in an emergency. She buckled to, helping Stephanus make rushed arrangements. An escort of soldiers arrived, while Lucilla was comforting her patroness; they were from the Urban Cohorts, none of them men she recognised. They were fairly polite, all awkward at having to give orders to an imperial lady, but there was underlying menace.

A small group could travel with Domitilla to the coast. Stephanus insisted on going. A couple of hastily selected maids were taken. When the party set off, Domitilla seemed to welcome Lucilla’s presence, so she volunteered to go too. She had not thought about this in advance. She had no time to notify Gaius properly, though she sent him a message, keeping it vague so as not to implicate him in Domitilla’s disgrace.

The journey to the coast took a couple of days, although the troops hurried them. Pandateria was a tiny volcanic island thirty miles off the fashionable Bay of Naples resorts of Baiae and Cumae. This remote dot in the Tyrrhenian Sea had long been a favourite location for imprisoning disgraced imperial women. The island hosted several of the Julio-Claudian family, some of whom had died there of deliberate starvation; others had been sent surprise executioners. Hardly any survived to leave. Few ships called there. The inhabitants must be accustomed to seeing themselves as jailers, jailers from whom cruelty would be welcomed by the authorities. Flavia Domitilla could only view her lonely incarceration with horror.

She was to be transferred to the inhospitable caldera by a navy ship from the fleet at Puteoli; its oars were already manned in readiness. Stephanus was forbidden to accompany her. The loyal freedman tried to insist but was dragged back. As distraught farewells were said on the quayside, Lucilla was horrified that only pallid little slaves were to be companions for their mistress. She herself abruptly offered to continue to the island. She meant it; nevertheless she was relieved when Domitilla turned her down, telling her to enjoy her life instead. So they parted.

Flavia Domitilla looked suddenly older. Despite her pampered prior existence, during the journey to Puteoli her face had acquired the lines of an elderly woman; even her hair, simply wound by Lucilla in an old-fashioned style today, seemed to have greyed, thinned and faded. Though widowed and torn from her children, she was still the granddaughter of the Divine Vespasian; she walked unaided up a narrow gangplank to be received by a naval captain who looked shamefaced. She spoke to him graciously. She never looked back.

Lucilla waited with Stephanus on the quay until the ship had sailed out to sea so far they could no longer see it. Even when travellers are expected to return, the slow dwindling of a vessel into the far distance is a mournful sight. Lucilla knew she would never see Flavia Domitilla again.

On their journey together back to Rome she and Stephanus spoke little. They were both raging at the injustice, but under Domitian no one openly showed such feelings if they wanted to survive. By the time they reached Rome, nonetheless, they had a shared understanding.

Hurrying to Plum Street, even though it was late, Lucilla could tell Gaius was at home. They normally slept in her bed, but she found him in his old room, with the dog on his feet, forcing him to curl up. She crept into bed behind him. Gaius greeted her only with a bad-tempered grunt and did not turn around.

Pressing her face between his shoulder-blades, Lucilla murmured pleas against his unresponsive back. ‘I am sorry. Please don’t be angry. I was her freedwoman. I discovered that it meant something.’

Gaius, a free citizen from birth, had spent the best part of a week depressed. He knew freed slaves had an obligation, but until now its importance to Lucilla had escaped him. He was jealous, he knew it. Lucilla heard his misery: ‘I thought you had left me.’

‘Don’t; please don’t upset yourself. I am here. I would have gone as her companion,’ Lucilla admitted. ‘But she knew you had a claim on me. I am so glad she said no. I wanted to come home to you.’