The Horse Changer (43 page)

‘Then let him. Peace is what we need.’

‘If I let him strike a private deal with Pompey, I will never be able to sail to Syria. I would not dare, lest they join forces against me.’

‘Strike the deal with Pompey yourself,’ one of his legates offered.

‘At the cost of a war.’

‘It is Caesar who wants war. Give it to him if he insists.’

To this Antony had no answer. I think every man in that room expected war between the Triumvirs. Antony was considering it, of course, but he did not want it. He wanted an end to civil war. His entire adult life had seen infighting and fratricide at a cost that had brought Rome close to economic ruin. Worse still, the constant infighting had finally opened the way for the Parthians to steal the finest real estate in the empire, Anthony’s real estate no less. More fighting in Italy meant the entire orient would eventually collapse.

Before the meal had finished I saw one of my officers reacting to some matter beyond the open doors of the triclinium. A scroll of some kind passed to the guard, who sent one of the servants with it to me. I signalled to one of my men and he came to replace my position behind Antony. The men Antony dined with were old friends, but so were the fellows who had knifed the divine Julius Caesar.

‘For Mark Antony, Dominus,’ the slave whispered.

I read a rather lengthy correspondence quickly and then took it to Antony at once. Antony was in no mood to read the usual reports, though he was curious at my willingness to interrupt his dinner. ‘What is it?’ he asked.

‘Ventidius has killed Labienus, Imperator,’ I answered. ‘The Parthians are in full retreat from Syria.’

‘Ventidius had orders to sit tight!’

‘Imperator,’ I repeated, ‘your legions have recovered Syria.’

I knew Maecenas was at Caesar’s residence and summoned him with a note declaring I had information I thought he would very much like to share with Caesar. I thought Maecenas might refuse me or send a man to take the message, but within a quarter of an hour of receiving my note Maecenas found me in the shadows where I waited for him. ‘Dellius!’ he said, signalling his bodyguards to leave us alone, ‘What is so urgent it cannot wait until tomorrow? And why are we talking in the shadows instead of inside?’

‘Quintus Labienus is dead, sir. Antony’s troops are presently driving the last of his army from Syria.’

‘That is splendid news,’ Maecenas sounded cheerful, but I knew he must be calculating the considerable damage this caused Caesar.

‘Splendid for Antony,’ I said. ‘What victory can Caesar boast?’

‘Agrippa is fighting in Gaul. We have very good reports of his success.’

‘Maecenas, your man needs victory at once. Without it, Antony and Pompey will sail away. With the East suddenly secure, Antony has a great many legions available to turn against Italy. If he tempts Pompey with a full pardon and even gold, there is no reason for them not to form an alliance against Caesar.’

‘He rejected Pompey once.’

‘No longer. I heard the matter being discussed just now. Antony resists it because he does not want war. But if Caesar will not cooperate, Antony must take the opportunity Fortune deals him.’

Next morning, while they waited for Pompey’s flagship to dock, Caesar told Antony he had decided to agree to the emancipation of all runaway slaves presently under Pompey’s protection. He also proposed to Antony that they return fifty percent of the value of the property families had lost due to the proscriptions.

Antony countered this with a suggestion that they require the new property owners to donate twenty-five percent of the property value to the former owner. The payment might be in cash or land and would be based on current value, not the price paid at the time of the auction. In this way, he said, the Triumvirs could retain some measure of control over each exchange. Some men might receive a token repayment of their losses; others would enjoy significant returns. It went without Antony saying it that the adjudicated amount could be affected by bribes, which of course might accrue to the Triumvirs.

Venal though he was, Caesar was not an especially clever lad and had to retreat with Maecenas to discuss Antony’s proposal. Once Maecenas had made it clear to him that they could actually make money by returning property to the men they had robbed, Caesar returned and declared that Antony’s proposal was quite fair to all concerned.

These matters settled, the two men waited in silence until Pompey had docked on his island. Once both parties had submitted to a search for missiles, Antony and Caesar approached their island. Pompey and his guard in the meantime disembarked to their own. Antony let Caesar conduct the negotiations for them, though Caesar’s shrill voice was easily carried off by the wind. Pompey took the new proffers and retreated to his ship to discuss the terms with his staff. An hour later, Pompey returned to his island and asked Nero’s permission to send a slave across the channel.

Nero received permission with a nod of the head from Antony and Caesar and the boy swam to our island, holding a leather tube above the water’s surface. This he eventually handed to Nero’s slave and then returned to Pompey. I did not see the document but eventually learned its contents.

Pompey asked for an appointment in the college of augurs. This was an honorific that recognised Pompey as one of the city’s most prominent men; he was more than a decade away from eligibility for such a position, but of course by then every law concerning the minimum age for a public office holder was thoroughly bent. Pompey also wanted the right to be elected consul in absentia; this was more than a decade sooner than the law permitted, but no one had cared to quibble about such matters when Caesar won his consulship at the age of twenty; so Pompey was confident he would get what he asked for.

Lest anyone imagine Pompey actually considered returning to Rome, Pompey also required a five-year appointment as the Governor of Sicily, Sardinia and the Peloponnese of southern Greece; this amounted to an expansion of his already potent thalassocracy and made Pompey in effect, if not by title, the third Triumvir.

In exchange for these concessions he did not turn over any of his ships. Instead, he simply promised to cease with his blockade. Finally Pompey insisted on amnesty for all the men in Sicily, not just the runaway slaves. This last point was one too many. Caesar agreed to pardon any man so long as he did not have the blood of the divine Julius Caesar on his hands. Amnesty for the assassins, however, was out of the question.

An hour passed, more for show than debate, and Pompey returned, calling across the water that he accepted the accords.

Over the next three nights Antony and Caesar boarded Pompey’s flagship; then Pompey came into the city. There was soon the promise of marriage between certain infant relatives. This is the sort of union that inevitably accompanies new alliances.

Everyone carried daggers – concealed politely – but, for all that, the three men were unusually cheerful. Antony had thwarted a conspiracy; Pompey had at last inherited some piece of his father’s fortune and good name; and Caesar had finished taking his revenge on the assassins. On the second night of their party, Antony announced his victory in Syria. The rebel Quintus Labienus was dead; Syria was again under Roman authority.

At this news, finally made public, Maecenas glanced up at me from his table as he lay beside Caesar. I stood at attention against the wall and refused to meet his gaze, however. That was all Maecenas needed in order to believe I had betrayed Antony. I cannot say if he ever considered the possibility that Antony had sent me on my errand, but this I do know: for the remainder of his life Maecenas always treated me as a close friend.

A day or so later Pompey returned to Sicily, where he proceeded to execute the last of those senators who had murdered the divine Julius Caesar. As for our new Caesar, once he had left the heads of the assassins in the Forum for all to see, he retreated to Gaul, where he might impress Rome with glowing reports of his martial accomplishments. There was, I’m sure, a quite general relief all around when he did not attempt to write a book about it, as his adoptive father had done.

For Antony, the war he had anticipated fighting was now a mopping up operation, something best left to his subordinates. The last thing he needed was to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory – no, he must remain at his court in Athens and let Ventidius recover Syria with the men he presently commanded. Should the Parthians mount a counterattack Antony might then answer with his legions, but only after Ventidius had got in over his head, as he well deserved to do.

Before he departed for Athens, Antony said to me, ‘I suppose you might as well join Herod in Judaea, Dellius – if you still desire it.’

I arranged for my secretary to take Hannibal to the farm of Titus Flavius Petro, a centurion who was then retiring from Antony’s Guard. Petro’s family possessed no property on the morning Julius Caesar had crossed the Rubicon. Ten years later, having fought for Pompey, then Caesar and finally Antony, Petro had saved up enough fortune to buy a farm at auction. His farm manager was presently breeding horses and had acquired a string of broodmares that he typically bred to three or four of the region’s better stallions. With Hannibal at stud we intended to establish a partnership that might earn us both a handsome income.

We had talked about such a venture at some length, but I had no intention of retiring and I was also reluctant to lose Hannibal before a long and dangerous campaign in Syria. Suddenly, however, the idea was quite appealing. I hadn’t time to waste but needed to use relays of horses to get to Brindisi as quickly as possible. So I gave Hannibal an early retirement, while still retaining complete ownership. I then rode to Brindisi at full gallop, changing horses at every post station along the Appian Way. I left an hour before dawn and arrived at midnight. I was at sea next morning.

Once I had crossed to the Peloponnese I bought a horse, which I rode to Sparta. Within a matter of days I had gathered three hundred cavalrymen, all of whom had been previously committed to Antony’s service. In Athens, with a letter from Antony authorising it, I spent a fortnight recruiting an additional thousand auxiliary infantry. While I was doing this, I stayed at Antony’s palace. I had hoped to see Livia before departing for Judaea, but she had sailed for Brindisi at the news of the Treaty of Misenium.