The Catiline Conspiracy (2 page)

"Might as well," the boy said. "Everybody else gets pretty loose then."

Just then Minicius came up from the basement, a scandalized look on his face. "You men should be back in your camp!" he said. "Soldiers aren't supposed to be in the city while the
triumphator
is within the
pomerium
!"

"Easy, old fellow," said a hard-faced veteran. "These are the sacred emblems of the legions and we have to see them stored properly."

"We promise not to overthrow the state while we're here," said another.

"Let it go, Minicius," I said. "Our soldiers deserve a little license on their day of triumph." The men saluted and left, respecting my aristocratic grammar if nothing else.

"
Those
are soldiers of Rome?" Minicius said. "I didn't hear a City accent among the lot."

I shrugged. "Except for officers, the legions are all provincials now. They've been that way since Gaius Marius. What City man ever takes service with the eagles any longer?"

"You need to sign for this next load,
Quaestor
," he reminded me. As we walked back toward the basement stair, a group of slaves came in through the front portal and, confused by the sudden dimness, went to the right, toward a low doorway in the wall.

"Not that way, you idiots!" Minicius shouted. "The treasury's this way!" He pointed to the stair that lay almost beneath Saturn's wool-wrapped feet.

"What's through that door?" I asked. I was not terribly familiar with the temple, except for the parts open to the public during festivals.

"Just stairs leading down to some old storerooms," Minicius told me. "Probably haven't been used in a hundred years. We ought to brick it up."

We went down into the basement and I watched while the treasure was put away and then signed for it. When everyone was gone except for Minicius, I locked the iron doors and we went back up the stairs.

Outside, evening was coming on. But the days of summer are long, and it was still bright. The city was still rollicking with its holiday cheer. It was almost time for the banquet to begin, and my stomach was reminding me that I had not eaten all day in anticipation of the feast.

The banquet was to be held in the beautiful garden adjoining the new temple Lucullus was to dedicate the next day. I descended the steps and turned in the direction of the garden. I saw a man walking toward me through the rejoicing throng. He wore a purple-striped senator's tunic and his feet were bare. I groaned. A Senator's tunic coupled with bare feet meant one thing: Marcus Porcius Cato, the most formidably boring man in Roman politics. He attributed all the ills of the day to our failure to live as simply as had our ancestors. He regarded himself as the exemplar and embodiment of antique virtue. The early Romans had not worn shoes, so he didn't either. He had just won election as Tribune for the next year, hinting all the way that it would be unpatriotic and an insult to our ancestors not to vote for him. He gave me a good old-Roman salute.

"Hail,
Quaestor
! It is good to see an official who is ready to look after his duties even on a holiday."

I jerked a thumb over my shoulder in the direction of the temple. "There are about fifty million
sesterces
in there with my name on them. When I'm out of office next year, some fool is sure to prosecute me for embezzlement if I can't account for every last copper
as
."

"Most conscientious," Cato said, utterly immune to irony. "I am on my way to the banquet of Lucullus. Will you accompany me?"

With no graceful way out, I agreed, keeping pace with him in my decadent, degenerate sandals. He stepped out at the standard legionary pace, which was decidedly more vigorous than my customary urban amble.

"It was a splendid triumph, splendid!" Cato said. "I fought tirelessly in the Senate to obtain this honor for Lucullus."

"Your efforts have been an inspiration to us all," I assured him.

"Pompey's supporters have grown insufferable. Did you know that Balbus and Labienus are trying to push through a law that will allow Pompey the right to wear the garments and attributes of a
triumphator
at all public games?"

Hardened cynic that I was, I stumbled at this news. "Are you serious?"

"I am always serious," he said seriously.

"This is going a bit far," I admitted. "Of course, you can expect something like this from a man who named himself 'the Great' when he was barely in his twenties."

"A bit far? It is impious! An affront to the immortal gods! What next? A crown, perhaps?" Cato's face had gone quite red. It looked as if apoplexy might snatch him from our midst, a prospect I was prepared to accept with philosophical resignation.

"Now Lucullus," he said, calming, "is a general of the old Roman type. I cannot condone his taste for luxury, but the way he disciplines his legions is exemplary. His administration of the Asian cities was a model of honesty and efficiency."

I had to agree with that. It was also merciful, but that was not something Cato would have perceived as virtuous. We were walking downhill, toward the river. While Lucullus had waited in his villa outside the city, his agents had purchased a piece of unused, marshy ground that had never produced anything but mosquitoes. They had drained it, laid out and planted the lovely garden, and erected the fine temple to the goddess of wisdom and patroness of craftsmen. At that date, she had not yet fully taken on the attributes of the Greek Athena, to become a patroness of war.

Images of all the state gods had been set up at the entrance to the garden, along with an altar to the unknown god. Cato insisted on stopping before each to toss a pinch of incense onto the coals glowing in braziers beneath them. As we walked into the grove, a leather-lunged herald announced us.

"Senator Marcus Porcius Cato and the
Quaestor
Decius Caecilius Metellus the Younger!" he bellowed. I tipped him and complimented him on his splendid volume.

"You're the second Decius Metellus I've announced, sir," he said.

"Oh, my father is here?"

"Yes, sir, and several of the Quintuses."

Perhaps I should explain here. I come of a pestilentially numerous family, distinguished beyond words, one of the most important families in politics, but dreadfully unimaginative in the way of names. For generations, most of the males have been named Quintus. In that particular year, there were no fewer than five in public life, all named Quintus. Of Quintus Caecilius Metellus Creticus, waiting outside the walls for his triumph, I have already made mention. He was not granted permission until the next May. There was the
Praetor
Quintus Caecilius Metellus Celer. The
Pontifex Maximus
Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius, under whom I had served in Spain, lay on his deathbed; and his adopted son, Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius Scipio Nasica, was also a
pontifex
. Rounding out the lot was Pompey's legate, Quintus Caecilius Metellus Nepos, who had that year returned from Asia and, like Cato, had won election to the next year's Tribunate. For purposes of clarity, I shall henceforth refer to them as Creticus, Celer, Pius, Scipio and Nepos.

I took my leave of Cato and made my way into the crowd. All the most distinguished men in Rome were there, even Lucullus's enemies. A triumph was, after all, a gesture of gratitude to the gods of the state, so it was not considered hypocritical to have a good time at your enemy's victory banquet. Long tables had been set up between the rows of fragrant trees, some of them almost full-grown, that had been brought up the Tiber in barges, their roots balled in great masses of dirt. The planting of this garden had been a logistical feat on a par with building a pyramid.

A large number of women were there as well, many of them as important in the affairs of the city as their husbands, some merely infamous. It was a great time for infamous women. A troop of stately Vestals lent dignity to the occasion, one of them my aunt.

I made no attempt to greet the guests in any orderly fashion, as would have been expected at an ordinary gathering. I did seek out the Consuls. A junior official was expected to be able to find them in any size of crowd. The Consuls for that famous year were, as everyone remembers, even now, Marcus Tullius Cicero and Caius Antonius Hibrida. I found them with Lucullus, greeting some of the throng of foreign ambassadors who always were honored guests at this sort of affair. It was thought a good idea to impress upon foreigners how inevitably preeminent we Romans were in war, and how magnanimous we could be. Some of the guests were former enemies who had surrendered on good terms, rather than prolonging their foolish resistance.

Cicero had achieved the height of his dignity. He was a man who had come from nowhere (that is to say, he was not from Rome but from Arpinum, a town that had enjoyed Roman citizenship for a mere 125 years), and had risen through the world of Roman politics with the speed and force of a stone hurled from a catapult. He was what we called
novus homo
in those days, a "new man" not belonging to one of the old political families. This did not sit well with a good many of his contemporaries, but few men win the consulship without acquiring enemies along the way.

His colleague, Hibrida, had been last among the candidates, but had won through Cicero's support. This was the sort of political deal that went by the wonderfully apt name of
coitio
. As an Antonine, Hibrida had all that family's famous combination of geniality and vicious-ness, of astuteness and childish impulsiveness. This dichotomy was even more pronounced in Caius Antonius than in most of his family. His odd
cognomen
, which refers to the offspring of a domestic sow and a wild boar, was bestowed in recognition of his half-savage nature.

He was in a good mood that evening and took my hand heartily. His face was flushed and he was well on his way to drunkenness, even at that early hour, another Antonine characteristic.

"Good to see you, Decius, my boy. Splendid triumph, today, eh?" I could see that the sight of all that gold had done him good. The Antonines were also famously greedy, although by way of compensation they spent as freely as they stole. They were fearsomely violent and rapacious, but nobody ever said they weren't generous.

"A glorious occasion," I agreed, "and well earned by the
triumphator
." I nodded toward where Lucullus stood, in a plain toga now and with the red paint washed off, amid a crowd of well-wishers.

"It makes me eager to accomplish something of the sort myself," Hibrida admitted. This, I thought, did not bode well for Macedonia, the proconsular province he would govern after his year in office.

Cicero greeted me as warmly, although with somewhat more formality. We had always got along well together, but at this time he had achieved the peak of public service and I was at the bottom. By this time he had acquired the vanity and self-importance that marred his otherwise admirable character. I had liked him better when he was younger.

The smells of the feast-in-preparation made my stomach grumble and I fought down the urge to grab one of the cups being passed so freely about. Brawny slaves strolled about with heavy amphorae balanced on their shoulders, making sure that the cups stayed full. If I were to start drinking too soon, I might not remember the banquet at all.

Standing beneath a lovely cypress was a very unlovely man. A great scar crossed his face, nearly halving his nose. This was my father, Decius Caecilius Metellus the Elder, but known to all and sundry as Cut-Nose, for obvious reasons. He was dressed in a snowy toga and immense dignity. He had recently returned from his proconsular province of transalpine Gaul, and had not yet recovered from the godlike status of that office. I went to speak to him and he greeted me in his usual fashion.

"Still sober, eh? Responsible office must have improved you. How goes it at the treasury?" He took it as a sign of my ineptitude and unpopularity that I hadn't been given one of the better quaestorial assignments. He was right.

"Lucullus should have built us a new temple to Saturn," I replied. "We'll be stacking the loot on the roof soon."

"You'll find out soon enough that it flows out as fast as it comes in. Faster, more often." His look was even more sour than usual, probably because he had never celebrated a triumph and now would probably never have the chance. His proconsulship had been without a decent war. He was scowling at a strange-looking group of men who stood by an ornamental pond, admiring the carp, drinking heavily and appearing uncomfortable. A few were decently shorn and togaed, but most had long hair and mustaches and wore tunics with trousers, vividly colored in patterns of stripes and checks.

"Who are those?" I asked Father.

"Allobroges. They're a pack of savages from the northern part of my former province. They've come to town to complain about extortion on the part of Roman officials. They'll probably get some ambitious lawyer to bring me up on charges."

"Complaining of Roman extortion has become a minor branch of philosophy," I noted. "Any justice on their side?"

"They're just born troublemakers who can't stand to pay their taxes," Father said. "Oh, I won't say the local publicans haven't turned the thumbscrews a bit too tight from time to time, but that's to be expected. It's nothing compared to what their old chiefs used to put them through. They're just sulking because we won't let them fight each other anymore."

"Well, Father, now that you're home," I said, bored with the subject, "what do you plan to do?"

"Do? Why my usual duties as patron and friend, what else?" he said innocently. He looked as innocent as a man with a bloody dagger in his fist.

"There will be an election of Censors next year," I reminded him, as if he needed it. "The office used to be a family tradition. No Metellan has held it in ages."

"And why should I not stand for Consul again?" he said. "I will be eligible in seven years."

"Father," I said, finally taking one of the winecups being offered by the servers, "in seven years, all of our generals will be fighting for that office. They'll have their armies camped outside the gates to remind the citizens how to vote. That's no time for a moderate like you to be standing for Consul. The censorship, now, is the capstone of a political career. How many men have ever held every office, including that one?"