1

It was Cicero’s misfortune to enter upon his year as consul in the midst of a severe economic depression, and as economics was not his speciality, he faced his year of office in a rather gloomy mood. Not the sort of consulship he had hoped for! He wanted people to say of him after his year was over that he had given Rome the same kind of halcyon prosperity commonly attributed to the joint consulship of Pompey and Crassus seven years earlier. With Hybrida as his junior colleague, it was inevitable all the credit would go to him, which meant he wouldn’t need to end on bad terms with Hybrida, as Pompey had with Crassus—and vice versa.

Rome’s economic troubles emanated from the East, which had been closed to Roman businessmen for over twenty years. First King Mithridates had conquered it, then when Sulla wrested it off him, Sulla introduced praiseworthy financial regulations there and thus prevented the knight community of Rome from going back to the old days of milking the East dry. Added to which, the problem of piracy on the high seas did not encourage business ventures east of Macedonia and Greece. Consequently those who farmed taxes, lent money, or traded in goods and commodities like wheat, wine and wool kept their capital at home; a phenomenon which increased when the war against Quintus Sertorius broke out in Spain and a series of droughts diminished the harvest. Both ends of Our Sea became risky or impracticable areas for business endeavors.

All of these things had contrived to concentrate capital and investment within Rome and Italy for twenty years. No seductive overseas opportunities presented themselves to Rome’s knight-businessmen, who as a result had little need to find large amounts of money. The borrowing interest rate was low, rents were low, inflation was high, and creditors were in no hurry to call in debts.

Cicero’s misfortune was to be laid entirely at Pompey’s door. First the Great Man had cleaned up the pirates, then he chased Kings Mithridates and Tigranes out of those areas which used to be a part of Rome’s business sphere. He also abolished Sulla’s financial regulations, though Lucullus had persisted in retaining them—the sole reason why the knights had lobbied to remove Lucullus and give his command to Pompey. And so just as Cicero and Hybrida assumed office, a literal wealth of business opportunities was opening up in the East. Where once had been Asia Province and Cilicia were now four provinces; Pompey had added the new provinces of Bithynia-Pontus and Syria to the empire. He set them up the same way as the other two by giving the great companies of publicani based in Rome the right to farm their taxes, tithes and tributes. Private contracts let out by the censors saved the State the burden of gathering taxes and prevented the proliferation of civil servants. Let the publicani have the headaches! All the Treasury wanted was its stipulated share of the profits.

Capital flowed out of Rome and Italy in obedience to the new drive to obtain control of these eastern business ventures. As a result the interest rate went up dramatically, usurers suddenly called in old debts, and credit was hard to come by. In the cities rents soared; in the country farmers were strapped by mortgage repayments. Inevitably the price of grain—even that supplied by the State—increased. Huge amounts of money were pouring out of Rome, and nobody in government knew how to control the situation.

Informed by friends like the knight plutocrat Titus Pomponius Atticus (who had no intention of letting Cicero in on too many commercial secrets) that the money drain was due to resident alien Jews in Rome sending the proceeds home, Cicero quickly brought in a law forbidding the Jews to send any money home. Of course it had little effect, but what else he could do the senior consul did not know—nor was Atticus about to enlighten him.

It was not in Cicero’s nature to turn his year as consul into a mission he now saw would be as vain as it would prove unpopular, so instead he turned his attention toward matters he regarded as well within his sphere of excellence; the economic situation would solve itself given time, whereas laws required a personal touch. His year meant that for once Rome had a legislating consul in office, so he would legislate.

First he attacked the law the consul Gaius Piso had brought in four years earlier against electoral bribery in the consular polls. Himself guilty of massive bribery, Piso had been forced into legislating against it. Perhaps not illogically, what Piso passed leaked in all directions, but after Cicero patched up the worst of the holes it began to look quite presentable.

And where to from that? Ah! Ah yes, men returning from a term governing a praetorian province who had extorted in that province and intended to wriggle out of prosecution by getting elected consul in absentia! Praetors sent out to govern provinces were more likely to extort than consul-governors; there were eight of them and only two consul-governors, which meant that the majority of them knew their only chance to make a fortune governing a province was as a praetor-governor. Yet how, after squeezing his province dry, was a returning praetor-governor to avoid prosecution for extortion? If he was a strong contender for the consulship, then the best way was to petition the Senate to be allowed to stand for the consular elections in absentia. No holder of imperium could be prosecuted. Provided a returning praetor-governor did not cross the sacred boundary into the city of Rome itself, he retained the imperium Rome had given him to govern his province. So he could sit on the Campus Martius just outside the city, imperium intact, petition the Senate to stand for consul in absentia, conduct his campaign from the Campus Martius, and then, if he was lucky enough to be elected consul, he walked straight into a fresh imperium. This ploy meant he managed to elude prosecution for two more years, by which time the wrathful provincials who had originally intended to prosecute him would have given up and gone home. Well, thundered Cicero in the Senate and Comitia, that sort of thing must cease! Therefore he and his junior colleague, Hybrida, proposed to forbid any returning praetor-governor standing for consul in absentia.

Let him come inside Rome, take his chances with prosecution! And as the Senate and People deemed this excellent, the new law passed.

Now what else could he do? Cicero thought of this and that, all useful little laws which would enhance his reputation. Though not, alas, make his reputation. As consul rather than as legal luminary. What Cicero needed was a crisis, and not an economic one.

*

That the second half of his term as senior consul would give him that hungered-for crisis did not occur to Cicero even when the lots gave him the duty of presiding over the elections held in the month of Quinctilis. Nor did he at first fully appreciate the ramifications which were to emerge from his wife’s invasion of his privacy not long before those elections.

Terentia marched into his study with her customary lack of ceremony, and oblivious to the sanctity of his thought processes.

“Cicero, stop that whatever-it-is you’re doing!” she barked.

The pen went down immediately; he looked up without being foolish enough to betray his creative distress. “Yes, my dear, what is it?” he enquired mildly.

She dumped herself down in the client’s chair, looking grim. However, as she always looked grim, he had no idea of the cause of this particular grimness; he just hoped devoutly that it was nothing he had done.

“I had a visitor this morning,” she said.

It was on the tip of his tongue to ask whether having a visitor had tickled her fancy, but he kept that normally unruly organ silent; if no one else had the power to still it utterly, Terentia certainly did. So he merely assumed an air of interest and waited for her to go on.

“A visitor,” she repeated. She then sniffed. “Not one of my circle, I do assure you, husband! Fulvia.”

“Publius Clodius’s wife?” he asked, astonished.

“No, no! Fulvia Nobilioris.”

Which elucidation did not decrease his surprise, as the Fulvia she meant was distinctly shady. Of excellent family, but divorced in disgrace, lacking an income, and currently attached to that Quintus Curius who had been expelled from the Senate in the famous purge of Poplicola and Lentulus Clodianus seven years before. A most inappropriate visitor for Terentia to receive! Terentia was as renowned for her rectitude as she was for her sourness.

“Goodness gracious me! What on earth did she want?”

“I quite liked her, actually,” said Terentia reflectively. “She is no more and no less than a Hapless Victim of Men.”

And how was he expected to answer that? Cicero compromised with an inarticulate bleat.

“She came to see me because that is the correct procedure for a woman to adopt when she wishes to speak to a married man of your prominence.”

And a man married to you, Cicero added silently.

“Naturally you will wish to see her for yourself, but I shall give you what information she gave me,” said the lady whose glance could turn Cicero to stone. “It appears that her—her—her protector, Curius, has been behaving most oddly of late. Since his expulsion from the Senate his financial circumstances have been so embarrassed he can’t even run for the tribunate of the plebs to get back into public life. Yet all of a sudden he’s begun to talk wildly of coming into riches and a high position. This,” Terentia went on in a voice of doom, “appears to stem from his conviction that Catilina and Lucius Cassius will be consuls next year.”

“So that’s the way Catilina’s wind blows, is it? Consul with a fat and torpid fool like Lucius Cassius,” said Cicero.

“Both of them will declare themselves candidates tomorrow when you open the election tribunal.”

“All very well, my dear, but I fail to see how a joint consulship of Catilina and Lucius Cassius can promote Curius to sudden wealth and eminence.”

“Curius is talking of a general cancellation of debts.”

Cicero’s jaw dropped. “They wouldn’t be such idiots!”

“Why not?” asked Terentia, contemplating the matter coolly. “Only consider, Cicero! Catilina knows that if he doesn’t get in this year, his chances are over. It looks like quite a battle if all the men who are thinking of standing do stand. Silanus is much improved in health and will definitely be running, so dear Servilia tells me. Murena is being backed by many influential people, and, so dear Fabia tells me, is using his Vestal connection through Licinia to the maximum. Then there’s your friend Servius Sulpicius Rufus, highly favored by the Eighteen and the tribuni aerarii, which means he’ll poll well in the First Class. What can Catilina and a running partner like Lucius Cassius offer against such an array of solid worth as Silanus, Murena and this Sulpicius? Only one of the consuls can be a patrician, which means the vote for a patrician will be split between Catilina and Sulpicius. If I had a vote, I’d be choosing Sulpicius ahead of Catilina.”

Frowning, Cicero forgot his terror of his wife and spoke to her as he would have to a Forum colleague. “So Catilina’s platform is a general cancellation of debts, is that what you’re saying?”

“No, that’s what Fulvia is saying.”

“I must see her at once!” he cried, getting up.

“Leave it to me, I’ll send for her,” said Terentia.

Which meant, of course, that he would not be permitted to speak to Fulvia Nobilioris alone; Terentia intended to be there hanging on every word—and every look.

The trouble was that Fulvia Nobilioris volunteered very little more than Terentia had already told him, just couched her story in a highly emotional and scatterbrained way. Curius was up to his ears in debt, gambling heavily, drinking a great deal; he was always closeted with Catilina, Lucius Cassius and their cronies, and would return home from one of these sessions promising his mistress all kinds of future prosperity.

“Why are you telling me, Fulvia?” Cicero asked, as much at a loss as she appeared to be, for he couldn’t work out why she was so terrified. A general cancellation of debt was bad news, but—

“You’re the senior consul!” she whimpered, weeping and beating her breast. “I had to tell someone’.”

“The trouble is, Fulvia, that you’ve given me not one iota of proof that Catilina plans a general cancellation of debt. I need a pamphlet, a reliable witness! All you’ve give me is a story, and I can’t go to the Senate with nothing more tangible than a story told to me by a woman.”

“But it is wrong, isn’t it?” she asked, wiping her eyes.

“Yes, very wrong, and you’ve acted very correctly in coming to me. But I need proof,” said Cicero.

“The best I can offer you are some names.”

“Then tell me.”

“Two men who used to be centurions of Sulla’s—Gaius Manlius and Publius Furius. They own land in Etruria. And they’ve been telling people who plan to come to Rome for the elections that if Catilina and Cassius are made consuls, debt will cease to exist.”

“And, how, Fulvia, am I to connect two ex-centurions from Sulla’s legions with Catilina and Cassius?”

“I don’t know!”

Sighing, Cicero rose to his feet. “Well, Fulvia, I do most sincerely thank you for coming to me,” he said. “Keep on trying to find out exactly what’s going on, and the moment you locate real evidence that the scent of the fish markets is stealing onto the Campus Martius at election time, tell me.” He smiled at her, he hoped platonically. “Continue to work through my wife, she will keep me informed.”

When Terentia ushered the visitor from the room, Cicero sat down again to ponder. Not that this luxury was allowed him for very long: Terentia bustled in moments later.

“What do you really think?” she asked.

“I wish I knew, my dear.”

“Well,” she said, leaning forward eagerly because she liked nothing better than to offer her husband political advice, “I’ll tell you what I think! I think Catilina is plotting revolution.”

Cicero gaped. “Revolution?” he squeaked.

“That’s right, revolution.”

“Terentia, it’s a far cry from an electoral policy based in a general cancellation of debt to revolution!” he protested.

“No, it is not, Cicero. How can legally elected consuls initiate a revolutionary measure like a general cancellation of debt? You know well enough that is the ploy of men who overthrow the State. Saturninus. Sertorius. It means dictators and masters of the horse. How could legally elected consuls hope to legislate such a measure? Even if they brought it before the People in their tribes, at least one tribune of the plebs would veto it in contio, let alone in formal promulgation. And do you think those in favor of a general cancellation of debt do not understand all that? Of course they do! Anyone who would vote for consuls advocating such a policy is painting himself in the color of a revolutionary.”

“Which,” said Cicero heavily, “is red. The color of blood. Oh, Terentia, not during my consulship!”

“You must prevent Catilina’s standing,” said Terentia.

“I can’t do that unless I have proof.”

“Then we’ll just have to find proof.” She rose and headed for the door. “Who knows? Perhaps Fulvia and I between us will be able to persuade Quintus Curius to testify.”

“That would be a help,” said Cicero, a little dryly.

*

The seed was sown; Catilina was planning revolution, had to be planning revolution. And though the events of the coming months seemed to confirm this, Cicero was never to know in his heart of hearts whether the concept of revolution occurred to Lucius Sergius Catilina before or after those fateful elections.

The seed being sown, the senior consul went to work to unearth all the information he could. He sent agents to Etruria, and agents to that other traditional nucleus of revolution, Samnite Apulia. And sure enough, they all reported back that it was indeed being bruited about that if Catilina and Lucius Cassius were elected the consuls, they would bring in a general cancellation of debt. As to more tangible evidence of revolution, like the amassing of arms or the covert recruitment of forces, none was forthcoming. However, Cicero told himself, he had enough to try.

The curule elections for consuls and praetors were to be held on the tenth day of Quinctilis; on the ninth day Cicero summarily postponed them until the eleventh, and summoned the Senate into session on the tenth.

The senatorial turnout was splendid, of course; curiosity piqued, all those not prostrated by illness or absent from Rome came early enough to see for themselves that the much-admired Cato really did sit there before a meeting with a bundle of scrolls at his feet and one spread out between his hands, reading slowly and intently.

“Conscript Fathers,” said the senior consul after the rites were concluded and the rest of the formalities over, “I have summoned you here rather than to elections in the saepta to help me unravel a mystery. I apologize to those of you who are thereby inconvenienced, and can only hope that the result of our session enables the elections to proceed tomorrow.”

They were avid for an explanation, so much was easy to see, but for once Cicero was in no mood to toy with his audience. What he hoped to do was to air the thing, make Catilina and Lucius Cassius see that their ploy was futile now that it was generally known, and nip in the bud any plans Catilina might be nourishing. Not for one moment did he truly think there was more to Terentia’s vision of revolution than a lot of idle talk over too many flagons of wine, and some economic measures more usually associated with revolution than with law-abiding consuls. After Marius, Cinna, Carbo, Sulla, Sertorius and Lepidus, even Catilina must surely have learned that the Republic was not so easily destroyed. He was a bad man---everyone knew that—but until he was elected consul he held no magistracy, he was possessed neither of imperium nor a ready-made army, and he had nothing like the number of clients in Etruria of a Marius or a Lepidus. Therefore, what Catilina needed was a fright to bring him into line.

No one, the senior consul thought as his gaze roamed from tier to tier on both sides of the House, no one had any idea what was in the wind. Crassus was sitting impassively, Catulus looked a little old and his brother-in-law Hortensius a little the worse for wear, Cato had his hackles up like an aggressive dog, Caesar was patting the top of his head to make sure his definitely thinning hair did hide his scalp, Murena undoubtedly chafed at the delay, and Silanus was not as fit and spry as his electioneering agents were insisting he was. And there at last among the consulars sat the great Lucius Licinius Lucullus, triumphator. Cicero, Catulus and Hortensius had waxed eloquent enough to persuade the Senate that Lucullus must be allowed his triumph, which meant that the real conqueror of the East was free now to cross the pomerium and take his rightful place in Senate and Comitia.

“Lucius Sergius Catilina,” said Cicero from the cu-rule dais, “I would appreciate it if you would stand up.”

At first Cicero had thought to accuse Lucius Cassius as well, but after deliberation he had decided it was better to focus entirely on Catilina. Who stood now looking the picture of bewildered concern. Such a handsome man! Tall and beautifully built, every inch the great patrician aristocrat. How Cicero loathed them, the Catilinas and the Caesars! What was the matter with his own eminently respectable birth, why did they dismiss him as a pernicious growth on the Roman body?

“I am standing, Marcus Tullius Cicero,” said Catilina gently.

“Lucius Sergius Catilina, do you know two men named Gaius Manlius and Publius Furius?’’

“I have two clients by those names.”

“Do you know where they are at the moment?”

“In Rome, I hope! They should be on the Campus Martius right now voting for me. Instead, I imagine they’re sitting somewhere in a tavern.”

“Whereabouts were they recently?”

Catilina raised both black brows. “Marcus Tullius, I do not require that my clients report their every move to me! I know you’re a nonentity, but do you have so few clients that you have no idea of the protocol governing the client-patron bond?”

Cicero went red. “Would it surprise you to learn that Manlius and Furius have been seen recently in Faesulae, Volaterrae, Clusium, Saturnia, Larinum and Venusia?”

A blink from Catilina. “How could it surprise me, Marcus Tullius? They both have land in Etruria, and Furius has land in Apulia as well.”

“Would it surprise you then to learn that both Manlius and Furius have been telling anyone important enough to have a vote which counts in the Centuriate elections that you and your named colleague, Lucius Cassius, intend legislating a general cancellation of debt once you assume office as consuls?”

That provoked an amazed laugh. When he sobered, Catilina stared at Cicero as if Cicero had suddenly gone mad. “It does indeed surprise me!” he said.

Beginning to stir the moment Cicero had pronounced that awful phrase, a general cancellation of debt, the House now broke into audible murmuring. Of course there were those present who desperately needed such a radical measure now that the moneylenders were pressing for full payment—including Caesar, the new Pontifex Maximus—but few who did not appreciate the horrific economic repercussions a general cancellation of debt entailed. Despite their problems generating a constant cash flow, the members of the Senate were innately conservative creatures when it came to radical change of any kind, including how money was structured. And for every financially distressed senator, there were three who stood to lose far more from a general cancellation of debt than they stood to gain, men like Crassus, Lucullus, the absent Pompeius Magnus. Therefore it was not astonishing that both Caesar and Crassus were now leaning forward like leashed hounds.

“I have been making full enquiries in both Etruria and Apulia, Lucius Sergius Catilina,” said Cicero, “and it grieves me to say that I believe these rumors are true. I believe you do intend to cancel debts.”

Catilina’s response was to laugh and laugh and laugh. The tears poured down his face; he held his sides; he tried valiantly to control his mirth and lost the battle several times. Seated not far away, Lucius Cassius chose red-faced indignation as his reaction.

“Rubbish!” Catilina cried when he could, mopping his face with a fold of toga because he couldn’t command himself enough to locate his handkerchief. “Rubbish, rubbish, rubbish!”

“Will you take an oath to that effect?’’ asked Cicero.

“No, I will not!” snapped Catilina, drawing himself up. “I, a patrician Sergius, to take an oath on the unfounded and malicious yammerings of an immigrant from Arpinum? Just who do you think you are, Cicero?’’

“I am the senior consul of the Senate and People of Rome,” said Cicero with painful dignity. “If you remember, I am the man who defeated you in last year’s curule election! And as senior consul, I am the head of this State.”

Another fit of laughter, then: “They say Rome has two bodies, Cicero! One is feeble and has a moron’s head, the other is strong but has no head at all. What do you think that makes you, O head of this State?’’

“No moron, Catilina, and that is sure! I am Rome’s father and guardian in this year, and I intend to do my duty, even in situations as bizarre as this one! Do you absolutely deny that you plan to cancel all debts?”

“Of course I do!”

“But you will not take an oath to that effect.”

“I most definitely will not.” Catilina drew a breath. “No, I will not! However, O head of this State, your despicable conduct and unfounded accusations this morning would tempt many a man in my shoes to say that if Rome’s strong but headless body were to find a head, it could do worse than to pick mine! At least mine is Roman! At least mine has ancestors! You are setting out to ruin me, Cicero, ruin my chances at what was yesterday a fair and unsullied election! I stand here defamed and impugned, the utterly innocent victim of a presumptuous upstart from the hills, neither Roman nor noble!”

It took a huge effort not to react to these taunts, but Cicero maintained his calm. Did he not, he would lose the encounter. Seeing, as he did from this moment on, that Fulvia Nobilioris was right. That Terentia was right. He could laugh, he could deny it, but Lucius Sergius Catilina was plotting revolution. An advocate who had faced down (and acted for) many a villain could not mistake the face and body language of a man brazening it out, adopting aggression and derision and wounded virtue as the best of all possible defenses. Catilina was guilty, Cicero knew it.

But did the rest of the House know it?

“May I have some comments, Conscript Fathers?”

“No, you may not!” shouted Catilina, leaping up from his place to assume a position in the middle of the black-and-white floor, where he stood and shook his fist at Cicero. Then he strode up the House to the great doors, turned there and faced the ranks of enthralled senators.

“Lucius Sergius Catilina, you are breaking this body’s standing orders!” Cicero cried, suddenly aware that he was about to lose control of the meeting. “Return to your seat!”

“I will not! Nor will I remain here one moment longer to listen to this impudent mushroom with no ancestors accuse me of what I interpret to be treason! And, Conscript Fathers, I serve notice on this House that at dawn tomorrow I will be at the saepta to contest the curule election for consul! I sincerely hope that all of you come to your senses and direct the moronic head of this State to do the duty the lots gave him, and hold the elections! For I warn you, if the saepta is empty tomorrow morning, you had better come there with your lictors, Marcus Tullius Cicero, arrest me and charge me with perduellio! Maiestas will not do for one whose forefathers belonged to the hundred men who advised King Tullus Hostilius!”

Catilina turned to the doors, wrenched them open, disappeared.

“Well, Marcus Tullius Cicero, what do you intend to do now?” asked Caesar, leaning back with a yawn. “He’s right, you know. On the slenderest of pretexts, you have virtually impeached him.”

Vision blurred, Cicero sought a face which said its owner was on his side, its owner believed him. Catulus? No. Hortensius? No. Cato? No. Crassus? No. Lucullus? No. Poplicola? No.

He squared his shoulders; he stood straight. “I will see a division of this House,” he said, voice hard. “All those who think that the curule elections should be held tomorrow and that Lucius Sergius Catilina should be allowed to stand for office as consul, pass to my left. All those who think that the curule elections should be further postponed pending investigation of Lucius Sergius Catilina’s candidacy, pass to my right.”

It was a forlorn hope, despite Cicero’s cunning in putting his motion with the result he wanted to his right; no senator was happy passing to the left, regarded as un-propitious. But for once prudence outweighed superstition. The House passed without a single exception to the left, thereby allowing the election to take place on the morrow, and Lucius Sergius Catilina to stand for the office of consul.

Cicero dismissed the meeting, wanting only to reach home before he broke down and wept.

*

Pride dictated that Cicero should not back down, so he presided over the curule elections with a cuirass beneath his toga after placing several hundreds of young men conspicuously around the vicinity of the saepta to prevent trouble’s breaking out. Among them was Publius Clodius, whose hatred for Catilina was far stronger than the mild irritation Cicero provoked in him. And where Clodius was, naturally, so too were young Poplicola, young Curio, Decimus Brutus, and Mark Antony—all members of the now-thriving Clodius Club.

And, Cicero saw with huge relief, what the senators had not chosen to believe, the whole of the Ordo Equester definitely did. Nothing could be more appalling to a knight-businessman than the specter of a general cancellation of debt, even if he was in debt himself. One by one the Centuries voted solidly for Decimus Junius Silanus and Lucius Licinius Murena as consuls for the next year. Catilina lagged behind Servius Sulpicius, though he did get more votes than Lucius Cassius.

“You malicious slanderer!” snarled one of the present year’s praetors, the patrician Lentulus Sura, as the Centuries broke up after a long day electing two consuls and eight praetors.

“What?” asked Cicero blankly, oppressed by the weight of that wretched cuirass he had chosen to wear, and dying to release a waist grown too thick for armored comfort.

“You heard me! It’s your fault Catilina and Cassius didn’t get in, you malicious slanderer! You deliberately frightened the voters away from them with your wild rumors about debt! Oh, very clever! Why prosecute them and thereby give them a chance to answer? You found the perfect weapon in the political arsenal, didn’t you? The irrefutable allegation! Smear, slur, muddy! Catilina was right about you—you’re an impudent mushroom with no ancestors! And it’s high time peasants like you were put in their place!”

Cicero stood slack-jawed as Lentulus Sura strode away, feeling tears begin to form. He was right about Catilina, he was right! Catilina would end in destroying Rome and the Republic.

“If it’s any consolation, Cicero,” said a placid voice at his elbow, “I shall keep my eyes open and my nose well primed for the next few months. Upon reflection, I think you may well be correct about Catilina and Cassius. They are not pleased this day!”

He turned to see Crassus standing there, and lost his temper at last. “You!” he cried in a voice filled with loathing. “It’s you responsible! You got Catilina off at his last trial! Bought the jury and gave him to understand that there are men inside Rome who’d love to see him title himself Dictator!”

“I didn’t buy the jury,” said Crassus, seeming unoffended.

“Tchah!” spat Cicero, and stormed off.

“What was all that about?’’ asked Crassus of Caesar.

“Oh, he thinks he has a crisis on his hands, and he cannot see why no one in the Senate agrees with him.”

“But I was telling him I did agree with him!”

“Leave it, Marcus. Come and help me celebrate my electoral win at the Domus Publica of the Pontifex Maximus. Such a nice address! As for Cicero, the poor fellow has been dying to sit at the center of a sensation, and now that he thinks he’s found one, he can’t flog up a morsel of interest in it. He would adore to save the Republic,” said Caesar, grinning.

*

“But I am not giving up!” cried Cicero to his wife. “I am not defeated! Terentia, keep in close touch with Fulvia, and do not let go! Even if she has to listen at doors, I want her to find out everything she can—who Curius sees, where he goes, what he does. And if, as you and I think, revolution is brewing, then she must persuade Curius that the best thing he can do is to work in with me.”

“I will, never fear,” she said, face quite animated. “The Senate will rue the day it chose to side with Catilina, Marcus. I’ve seen Fulvia, and I know you. In many ways you are an idiot, but not when it comes to sniffing out villains.”

“How am I an idiot?” he asked indignantly.

“Writing rubbishy poetry, for one. For another, trying to earn a reputation as a connoisseur of art. Overspending, most especially on a parade of villas you’d never have time to live in even if you traveled constantly, which you don’t. Spoiling Tullia atrociously. Sucking up to the likes of Pompeius Magnus.”

“Enough!”

She desisted, watching him through eyes which never lit up with love. Which was a pity, for the truth was that she loved him very well. But she knew all of his many weaknesses, yet had none of her own. Though she had no ambition to be deemed the new Cornelia the Mother of the Gracchi, she owned all the virtues of the Roman matron, which made her extremely difficult to live with for a man of Cicero’s character. Frugal, industrious, cool, hardheaded, uncompromising, outspoken, afraid of no one, and aware she was any man’s equal in mental sinew. That was Terentia, who suffered no fool gladly, even her husband. She didn’t begin to comprehend his insecurity and sense of inferiority, for her own birth was impeccable and her ancestry Roman through and through. To Terentia, he would do best to relax and ride into the heart of Roman society on her trailing skirts; instead, he kept pushing her into domestic obscurity and flying off at a thousand tangents in search of an aristocracy he just couldn’t claim.

“You ought to ask Quintus over,” she said.

But Cicero and his younger brother were as incompatible as Cicero and Terentia, so the senior consul turned down the corners of his mouth and shook his head. “Quintus is as bad as the rest of them, he thinks I’m making a mountain out of a bucket of sand. Though I shall see Atticus tomorrow, he did believe. But then, he’s a knight and has common sense.” He thought for a moment, said, “Lentulus Sura was very rude to me today at the saepta. I cannot begin to understand why. I know a lot of the Senate blames me for ruining Catilina’s chances, but there was something so odd about Lentulus Sura. It seemed to—to matter too much.”

“Him and his Julia Antonia and those frightful lumps of stepsons!” said Terentia scornfully. “A more shiftless lot one would have to look hard to find. I don’t know which of them annoys me more, Lentulus or Julia Antonia or her awful sons.”

“Lentulus Sura’s done well enough, considering the censors expelled him seven years ago,” said Cicero, temporizing. “Got back into the Senate through the quaestor-ship and has done it all over again. He was consul before his expulsion, Terentia. It must be a shocking comedown to have to be praetor again at this time of life.”

“Like his wife, he’s feckless,” said Terentia unsympathetically.

“Be that as it may, today was odd.”

Terentia snorted. “In more ways than just Lentulus Sura.”

“Tomorrow I shall find out what Atticus knows, and that is likely to be interesting,” said Cicero, yawning until his eyes began to water. “I’m tired, my dear. Might I ask you to send our darling Tiro in? I’ll give him dictation.”

“You must be tired! Not like you to prefer someone else doing the scribbling, even Tiro. I will send him in, but only for a little while. You need sleep.”

As she got up from her chair Cicero held out his hand to her impulsively, and smiled. “Thank you, Terentia, for everything! What a difference it makes to have you on my side.”

She took the proffered hand, squeezed it hard, and gave him a rather shy grin, boyish and immature. “Think nothing of it, husband,” she said, then whisked herself off before the mood in the room could become emotionally sloppy.

*

Had someone asked Cicero whether he loved his wife and his brother, he would have answered instantly in the affirmative, and there would have been truth in that answer. But neither Terentia nor Quintus Cicero lay as close to his heart as several other people, only one of them his relation by blood. That of course was his daughter, Tullia, a warm and sparkling contrast to her mother. His son was still too young to have wormed his way into Cicero’s strong affections; perhaps little Marcus never would, as he was more like brother Quintus in nature, impulsive, quick-tempered, strutting, and no prodigy.

Who then were the others?

The name which sprang first to Cicero’s mind would have been Tiro. Tiro was his slave, but also literally a part of his family, as did happen in a society wherein slaves were not so much inferior beings as unfortunates subject to the laws of ownership and status. Because a Roman’s domestic slaves lived in such close—indeed, almost intimate—proximity to the free persons of the household, it was in many ways an extended-family situation, and carried all the advantages and disadvantages of that state. The interweaving of personalities was complex, major and minor storms came and went, power bases existed on both free and servile sides, and it was a hard master who could remain impervious to servile pressures. In the Tullius household Terentia was the one a slave had to look out for, but even Terentia was unable to resist Tiro, who could calm little Marcus down as easily as he could persuade Tullia that her mother was right.

He had come to the Tullius household young, a Greek who had sold himself into bondage as an alternative preferable to stagnation in a poor and obscure Boeotian town. That he would take Cicero’s fancy was inevitable, for he was as tender and kind as he was brilliant at his secretarial work, the sort of person one could not help but love. As Tiro was abidingly thoughtful and considerate, not even the nastiest and most selfish among his fellow slaves in the Tullius household could accuse him of currying favor with the master and mistress; his sweetness spilled over into his relations with his fellow slaves and made them love him too.

However, Cicero’s affection for him outweighed all others. Not only were Tiro’s Greek and Latin superlatively good, but so were his literary instincts, and when Tiro produced a faint look of disapproval at some phrase or choice of adjective, his master paused to reconsider the offending item. Tiro took flawless shorthand, transcribed into neat and lucid writing, and never presumed to alter one word.

At the time of the consulship, this most perfect of all servants had been in the bosom of the family for five years. He was of course already emancipated in Cicero’s will, but in the normal scheme of things his service as a slave would continue for ten more years, after which he would pass into Cicero’s clientele as a prosperous freed-man; his wage was already high, and he was always the first to receive another raise in his stips. So what it boiled down to in the Tullius household was simply, how could it exist without Tiro? How could Cicero exist without Tiro?

Second on the list was Titus Pomponius Atticus. That was a friendship which went back many, many years. He and Cicero had met in the Forum when Cicero had been a youthful prodigy and Atticus training to take over his father’s multiple businesses, and after the death of Sulla’s eldest son (who had been Cicero’s best friend), it was Atticus who took young Sulla’s place, though Atticus was four years the older of the two. The family name of Pomponius had considerable distinction, for the Pomponii were in actual fact a branch of the Caecilii Metelli, and that meant they belonged at the very core of high Roman society. It also meant that, had Atticus wanted it, a career in the Senate and perhaps the consulship were not unattainable. But Atticus’s father had hankered after senatorial distinction, and suffered for it as the factions which controlled Rome during those terrible years had come and gone. Firmly placed in the ranks of the Eighteen—the eighteen senior Centuries of the First Class—Atticus had abjured both Senate and public office. His inclinations went hand in hand with his desires, which were to make as much money as possible and pass into history as one of Rome’s greatest plutocrats.

In those early days he had been, like his father before him, simple Titus Pomponius. No third name. Then in the troubled few years of Cinna’s rule, Atticus and Crassus had formed a plan and a company to mine the taxes and goods of Asia Province, Sulla having wrested it back from King Mithridates. They had milked the necessary capital from a horde of investors, only to find that Sulla preferred to regulate Asia Province’s administration in a way which prevented the Roman publicani from profiting. Both Crassus and Atticus were forced to flee their creditors, though Atticus managed to take his own personal fortune with him, and therefore had the wherewithal to live extremely comfortably while in exile. He settled in Athens, and liked it so well that it ever afterward held first place in his heart.

It was no real problem to establish himself with Sulla after that formidable man returned to Rome as its Dictator, and Atticus (now so called because of his preferences for the Athenian homeland, Attica) became free to live in Rome. Which he did for some of the time, though he never relinquished his house in Athens, and went there regularly. He also acquired huge tracts of land in Epirus, that part of Greece on the coast of the Adriatic Sea to the north of the Gulf of Corinth.

Atticus’s predilection for young male lovers was well known, but remarkably free from taint in such a homophobic place as Rome. That was because he indulged it only when he traveled to Greece, wherein such preferences were the norm, and actually added to a man’s reputation. When in Rome, he betrayed neither by word nor look that he practised Greek love, and this rigid self-control enabled his family, friends and social peers to pretend that there was no different side to Titus Pomponius Atticus. Important too because Atticus had become enormously wealthy and a great power in financial circles. Among the publicani (who were businessmen bidding for public contracts) he was the most powerful and the most influential. Banker, shipping magnate, merchant prince, Atticus mattered immensely. If he couldn’t quite make a man consul, he could certainly go a long way toward visibly assisting that man, as he had Cicero during Cicero’s campaign.

He was also Cicero’s publisher, having decided that money was a little boring, and literature a refreshing change. Extremely well educated, he had a natural affinity for men of letters, and admired Cicero’s way with words as few others could. It both amused and satisfied him to become a patron of writers—and also enabled him to make money out of them. The publishing house which he set up on the Argiletum as a rival establishment to the Sosii thrived. His connections provided him with an ever-widening pool of new talent, and his copyists produced highly prized manuscripts.

Tall, thin and austere looking, he might have passed as the father of none other than Metellus Scipio, though the blood links were not close, as Metellus Scipio was a Caecilius Metellus only by virtue of adoption. The resemblance did mean, however, that all the members of the Famous Families understood his bloodline was unimpeachable and of great antiquity.

He genuinely loved Cicero, but was proof against Ciceronian weaknesses—in which he followed the example set by Terentia, also wealthy, also unwilling to help Cicero out when his finances needed supplementing. On the one occasion when Cicero had drummed up the courage to ask Atticus for a trifling loan, his friend had refused so adamantly that Cicero never asked again. From time to time he half-hoped Atticus would offer, but Atticus never did. Quite willing to procure statues and other works of art for Cicero during his extensive travels in Greece, Atticus also insisted on being paid for them—and for the cost of shipping them to Italy. What he didn’t charge for, Cicero supposed, was his time in finding them. In the light of all this, was Atticus incurably stingy? Cicero didn’t think so, for unlike Crassus he was a generous host and paid good wages to his slaves as well as to his free employees. It was more that money mattered to Atticus, that he saw it as a commodity meriting huge respect, and could not bear to bestow it gratuitously upon those who did not hold it in equal respect. Cicero was an arty fellow, a fritterer, a dilettante, a blower hot and cold. Therefore he did not—could not—esteem money as it deserved.

Third on the list was Publius Nigidius Figulus, of a family quite as old and venerated as Atticus’s. Like Atticus, Nigidius Figulus (the nickname Figulus meant a worker in clay, a potter, though how the first Nigidius to bear it had earned it, the family did not know) had abjured public life. In Atticus’s case, public life would have meant giving up all commercial activities not arising out of the ownership of land, and Atticus loved commerce more than he did politics. In Nigidius Figulus’s case, public life would have eaten too voraciously into his greatest love, which was for the more esoteric aspects of religion. Acknowledged the chief expert on the art of divination as practised by the long-gone Etruscans, he knew more about the liver of a sheep than any butcher or veterinarian. He knew about the flight of birds, the patterns in lightning flashes, the sounds of thunder or earth movements, numbers, fireballs, shooting stars, eclipses, obelisks, standing stones, pylons, pyramids, spheres, tumuli, obsidian, flint, sky eggs, the shape and color of flames, sacred chickens, and all the convolutions an animal intestine could produce.

He was of course one of the custodians of Rome’s prophetic books and a mine of information for the College of Augurs, no member of which was an authority on the subject of augury, as augurs were no more and no less than elected religious officials who were legally obliged to consult a chart before pronouncing the omens auspicious or inauspicious. It was Cicero’s most ardent wish to be elected an augur (he was not fool enough to think he stood a chance of being elected a pontifex); when he was, he had vowed, he would know more about augury than any of the fellows who, whether elected or co-opted, calmly rode into religious office because their families were entitled.

Having first cultivated Nigidius Figulus because of his knowledge, Cicero soon succumbed to the charm of his nature, unruffled and sweet, humble and sensitive. No snob despite his social pre-eminence, he enjoyed quick wit and lively company, and thought it wonderful to spend an evening with Cicero, famous for wit and always lively company. Like Atticus, Nigidius Figulus was a bachelor, but unlike Atticus, he had chosen this state for religious reasons; he firmly believed that to introduce a woman into his household would destroy his mystical connections to the world of invisible forces and powers. Women were earth people. Nigidius Figulus was a sky person. And air and earth never mixed, never enhanced each other any more than they consumed each other. He also had a horror of blood save in a holy place, and women bled. Thus all his slaves were male, and he had put his mother to live with his sister and her husband.

*

Cicero had intended to see Atticus and Atticus only on the day following the curule elections, but family matters intruded. Brother Quintus had been elected a praetor. Naturally that called for a celebration, especially as Quintus had followed his older brother’s example and got himself elected in suo anno, exactly the right age (he was thirty-nine). This second son of a humble squire from Arpinum lived in the house on the Carinae which the old man had bought when he first moved his family to Rome in order to give the prodigy Marcus all the advantages his intellect demanded. So it was that Cicero and his family trudged from the Palatine to the Carinae shortly before the dinner hour, though this fraternal obligation did not negate a talk with Atticus—he would be there because Quintus was married to Atticus’s sister, Pomponia.

There was a strong likeness between Cicero and his brother, but Cicero himself was inarguably the more attractive of the two. For one thing, he was physically much taller and better built; Quintus was tiny and sticklike. For another, Cicero had kept his hair, whereas Quintus was very bald on top. Quintus’s ears seemed to protrude more than Cicero’s, though that was actually a visual illusion due to the massive size of Cicero’s skull, which dwarfed these appendages. They were both brown-eyed and brown-haired, and had good brown skins.

In one other respect they had much in common: both men had married wealthy termagants whose near relations had despaired of ever giving them away in wedlock. Terentia had been justly famous for being impossible to please as well as such a difficult person that no one, however needy, could summon up the steel to ask for her in marriage even if she had been willing. It had been she who chose Cicero, rather than the other way around. As for Pomponia-well, Atticus had twice thrown up his hands in exasperation over her! She was ugly, she was fierce, she was rude, she was bitter, she was truculent, she was vengeful, and she could be cruel. His feet firmly on the commercial ladder thanks to Atticus’s support, her first husband had divorced her the moment he could do without Atticus, leaving her back on Atticus’s doorstep. Though the ground for divorce was barrenness, all of Rome assumed (correctly) that the real ground was lack of desire to cohabit. It was Cicero who suggested that brother Quintus might be prevailed upon to marry her, and he and Atticus between them had done the persuading. The union had taken place thirteen years before, the groom being considerably younger than the bride. Then ten years after the wedding Pomponia gave the lie to barrenness by producing a son, also Quintus.

They fought constantly, and were already using their poor little boy as ammunition in their never-ending struggle for psychic supremacy, pushing and pulling the hapless child from one side to the other and back again. It worried Atticus (this son of his sister’s was his heir) and it worried Cicero, but neither man succeeded in convincing the antagonists that the real sufferer was little Quintus. Had brother Quintus only owned the sense to be a doormat like Cicero, bent over backward to placate his wife and strive never to draw her attention toward himself, the marriage might have worked better than that of Cicero and Terentia, for what Pomponia wanted was simple dominance, whereas what Terentia wanted was political clout. But, alas, brother Quintus was far more like their father than Cicero was; he would be master in his own house no matter what.

The war was going well, so much was plain when Cicero, Terentia, Tullia and two-year-old Marcus entered the house. It was the steward bore Tullia and baby Marcus off to the nursery; Pomponia was too busy screaming at Quintus, and Quintus equally engrossed in shouting her down.

“Just as well,” roared Cicero in his loudest Forum voice, “that the temple of Tellus is right next door! Otherwise there’d be yet more neighbors complaining.”

Did that stop them? Not at all! They continued as if the newcomers didn’t exist, until Atticus too arrived. His technique to terminate the battle was as direct as it was elementary: he simply strode forward, grabbed his sister by the shoulders and shook her until her teeth rattled.

“Go away, Pomponia!” he snapped. “Go on, take Terentia somewhere and pour your troubles out in her ear!”

“I shake her too,” said brother Quintus plaintively, “but it doesn’t work. She just knees me in the you-know-whats.”

“If she kneed me,” said Atticus grimly, “I’d kill her.”

“If I killed her, you’d see me tried for murder.”

“True,” said Atticus, grinning. “Poor Quintus! I’ll have another talk with her and see what I can do.”

Cicero did not participate in this exchange, as he had beaten a retreat before Atticus’s advent, and emerged now from the direction of the study with a scroll opened between his hands.

“Writing again, brother?” he asked, looking up.

“A tragedy in the style of Sophocles.”

“You’re improving, it’s quite good.”

“I hope I’m improving! You’ve usurped the family reputation for speeches and poetry, which leaves me to choose from history, comedy and tragedy. I haven’t the time for the research history demands, and tragedy comes easier to me than comedy, given the kind of atmosphere I live in.”

“I would have thought that called for farce,” said Cicero demurely.

“Oh, shut up!”

“There are always philosophy and natural science.”

“My philosophy is simple and natural science baffling, so it still comes down to history, comedy or tragedy.”

Atticus had wandered off, and spoke now from the far end of the atrium. “What’s this, Quintus?” he asked, a hint of laughter in his voice.

“Oh, bother, you found it before I could show it to you!” cried Quintus, hurrying to join him, Cicero in his wake. “Now I’m a praetor, it’s permitted.”

“Indeed it is,” said Atticus gravely, only his eyes betraying his mirth.

Cicero shoved between them and stood at the proper distance to absorb its glory fully, face solemn. What he gazed at was a gigantic bust of Quintus, so much larger than life that it could never be displayed in a public place, for only the gods might exceed the actual stature of a man. Whoever had done it had worked in clay, then baked it before applying the colors, which made it both good and bad. Good because the likeness was speaking and the colors beautifully tinted, bad because clay-work was cheap and the chances of breakage into shards considerable. None knew better than Cicero and Atticus that Quintus’s purse would not run to a bust in marble or bronze.

“Of course it isn’t permanent,” said Quintus, beaming, “but it will do until I can afford to use it as the mold for a really splendid bronze. I had the man who is making my imago do it—it always seems such a shame to have one’s wax likeness shut up in a cupboard for none to see.” He glanced sideways at Cicero, still staring raptly. “What do you think, Marcus?” he asked.

“I think,” said Cicero deliberately, “that this is the first time in my life that I’ve ever seen the half manage to be bigger than the whole.”

Too much for Atticus, who laughed until he had to sit down on the floor, where Cicero joined him. Which left poor Quintus with only two choices: fly into a monumental huff or join the mockers in their amusement. Since he was not Cicero’s brother for nothing, he selected merriment.

After that it was time for dinner, which a mollified Pomponia attended together with Terentia and the peacemaker Tullia, who dealt with her aunt-by-marriage better than anyone else could.

“So when’s the wedding?” asked Atticus, who hadn’t seen Tullia in so long that her grown-up appearance had come as quite a surprise. Such a pretty girl! Soft brown hair, soft brown eyes, a great look of her father, and a lot of his wit. She had been engaged to young Gaius Calpurnius Piso Frugi for some years, and it was a good match in more ways than merely money and clout; Piso Frugi was by far the most appealing member of a clan more famous for nastiness than niceness, hardness than gentleness.

“Two more years,” Tullia answered with a sigh.

“A long wait,” said Atticus sympathetically.

“Too long,” said Tullia, sighing again.

“Well, well,” from Cicero jovially, “we shall see, Tullia. Perhaps we can move it forward a bit.”

Which reply sent all three ladies back to Pomponia’s sitting room in a fever of anticipation, already planning the wedding.

“Nothing like nuptials to keep women happy,” said Cicero.

“She’s in love, Marcus, and that’s rare in arranged unions. As I rather gather Piso Frugi feels the same way, why not let them set up house together before Tullia turns eighteen?’’ Atticus asked, smiling. “What is she now, sixteen?”

“Almost.

“Then let them marry at the end of this year.”

“I agree,” said brother Quintus gruffly. “It’s nice to see them together. They get on so well that they’re friends.”

Neither of his listeners commented on this remark, but to Cicero it represented the perfect opportunity to change the subject from marriage and women to Catilina—not only more interesting, but also easier to deal with.

“Do you believe that he intended to cancel debts?” he asked Atticus anxiously.

“I’m not sure I believed it, Marcus, but I certainly could not afford to ignore it,” said Atticus frankly. “The accusation is enough to frighten most men in business, especially at the moment, with credit so hard to get and interest rates so high. Oh, there are plenty who would welcome it, but they’re never in the majority, and they’re rarely at the top of the business heap. A general cancellation of debt is most appealing to little men and men without enough liquid assets to maintain a good cash flow.”

“What you’re saying is that the First Class turned away from Catilina and Lucius Cassius from prudence,” said Cicero.

“Absolutely.”

“Then Caesar was right,” Quintus butted in to say. “You virtually impeached Catilina in the House on the slenderest of pretexts. In other words, you started a rumor.”

“No, I did not!” Cicero yelled, pounding the bolster beneath his left elbow. “I did not! I wouldn’t be so irresponsible! Why are you being so dense, Quintus? That pair were planning to overthrow good government, whether they planned to do it as consuls or as revolutionaries! As Terentia correctly said, men do not plan a general cancellation of debt unless they’re wooing the men of Classes lower than the First. It’s the typical ploy of men who want to set up a dictatorship.”

“Sulla was Dictator, but he didn’t cancel debts,” said Quintus stubbornly.

“No, all he did was cancel the lives of two thousand knights!” cried Atticus. “The confiscation of their estates filled the Treasury, and enough newcomers got fat on the proceeds to make other economic measures unnecessary.”

“He didn’t proscribe you,” said Quintus, bristling.

“I should hope not! Sulla was feral, but never a fool.”

“Meaning I am?”

“Yes, Quintus, you are a fool,” said Cicero, saving Atticus the trouble of finding a tactful answer. “Why do you always have to be so aggressive? No wonder you and Pomponia can’t get on—you’re as like as two peas in a pod!”

“Grrr!” snarled Quintus, subsiding.

“Well, Marcus, the damage is done,” said Atticus pacifically, “and there’s every chance that you were right to act before the elections. I think your source of information is suspect because I know the lady a little—but on the other hand, I’d be willing to bet that what she knows about economics could be easily written on the head of a pin. Pluck a phrase like a general cancellation of debt out of thin air? Impossible! No, insofar as it goes, I believe you had sufficient reason to act.”

“Whatever you do,” cried Cicero, suddenly aware that both his companions knew too much about Fulvia Nobilioris, “do not ever mention her name to anyone! Or even hint that I have a spy in Catilina’s camp! I want to go on using her.”

Even Quintus could see the sense in this appeal, and agreed to keep Fulvia Nobilioris to himself. As for Atticus, that eminently logical man was fully in favor of a continued watch on the activities of those around Catilina.

“It may be that Catilina himself isn’t involved” was the last comment from Atticus, “but certainly his circle warrants our attention. Etruria and Samnium have been constantly boiling since the Italian War, and the fall of Gaius Marius only exacerbated the situation. Not to mention Sulla’s measures.”

*

Thus it was that Quintus Cicero escorted the various ladies of both households to the seaside with their offspring in Sextilis, while Marcus Cicero himself remained in Rome to monitor events; the Curius ménage did not have the money for vacations at Cumae or Misenum, so Fulvia Nobilioris had to suffer the summer heat. A burden for Cicero too, but one he suspected would be well worth it.

The Kalends of September came and went with no more than a perfunctory meeting of the Senate, traditionally bound to sit on this day. After which most of the senators went back to the seaside, as the calendar was so far ahead of the season that the hottest weather was yet to come. Caesar stayed in town; so did Nigidius Figulus and Varro, for an identical reason: the new Pontifex Maximus had announced the finding of what he called the Stone Annals and the Commentaries of the Kings. After convoking the College of Priests on the last day of Sextilis to inform them first and give them an opportunity to examine both the tablets and the manuscript, he then used the meeting of the Senate on the Kalends of September to display his discovery. Most people just yawned (even some of the priests), but Cicero, Varro and Nigidius Figulus were among those who thought it thrilling, and spent much of the first half of September poring over these antique documents.

Still mildly besotted with the spaciousness and luxury of his new house, Caesar gave a dinner party on the Ides of that month for Nigidius Figulus, Varro, Cicero and two of the men with whom he had messed as a junior military tribune before the walls of Mitylene, Philippus Junior and Gaius Octavius. Philippus was two years older than Caesar and would be a praetor next year too, but Octavius’s age lay between them, which meant his first chance to become praetor would not fall until the year after; this of course because patrician Caesar could occupy curule office two years earlier than any plebeian.

Old Philippus, malign and amoral, famous chiefly for the number of times he had switched allegiances from one faction to another, was still alive and still occasionally attended meetings of the Senate, but his days as a force in that body were long past. Nor would his son ever replace him, thought Caesar, either for vice or power. “Young” Philippus was too much the Epicurean, too addicted to the exquisitely regulated pleasures of the dining couch and the gentler arts, happy to do his duty in the Senate and ascend the cursus honorum because it was his right, but never in a way likely to breed enmity in any political faction. He could get on with Cato as easily as he got on with Caesar, though he much preferred Caesar’s company to Cato’s. He had been married to a Gellia, and upon her death had chosen not to wed again, preferring not to inflict a stepmother upon his son and daughter.

Between Caesar and Gaius Octavius lay an extra incentive for friendship: after the death of Octavius’s first wife (an Ancharia from the wealthy praetorian family) he had sued for the hand of Caesar’s niece, Alia, daughter of Caesar’s younger sister. Her father, Marcus Atius Balbus, had asked Caesar’s opinion about the alliance because Gaius Octavius was not of a noble family, merely a hugely wealthy one, from Velitrae in the Latin homelands. Remembering Octavius’s loyalty at Mitylene and aware that he loved the beautiful and delightful Alia madly, Caesar advocated the match. There was a stepdaughter, luckily a nice little girl with no malice in her, but no son of that first marriage to spoil the inheritance of any son Alia might have to Octavius. So the deed was done and Alia installed in one of Rome’s loveliest houses, albeit peculiarly situated on the wrong side of the Palatium at the end of a lane called the Ox Heads. And in October of the year before last Atia had borne her first child—alas, a girl.

Naturally the conversation revolved around the Stone Annals and the Commentaries of the Kings, though in deference to Octavius and Philippus, Caesar made considerable efforts to deflect his three more scholarly guests from this marvel.

“Of course you are acknowledged the great authority on ancient law,” said Cicero, prepared to concede superiority in an area he thought of little moment in modern Rome.

“I thank you,” said Caesar gravely.

“A pity there’s not more information about the day-to-day activities of the King’s court,” said Varro, freshly returned from a long period in the East as Pompey’s resident natural scientist and part-time biographer.

“Yes, but between the two documents we now have an absolutely clear picture of the trial procedure for perduellio, and that in itself is fascinating,” said Nigidius Figulus, “considering maiestas.”

“Maiestas was Saturninus’s invention,” said Caesar.

“He only invented maiestas because no one could-get a conviction for treason in the old form,” said Cicero quickly.

“A pity Saturninus didn’t know of the existence of your finds then, Caesar,” said Varro dreamily. “Two judges and no jury makes a big difference to a trial outcome!”

“Rubbish!” cried Cicero, sitting up straight. “Neither the Senate nor Comitia would permit a criminal trial without a jury!”

“What I find most interesting,” said Nigidius Figulus, “is that there are only some four men alive today who could qualify as judges. You, Caesar. Your cousin Lucius Caesar. Fabius Sanga. And Catilina, oddly enough! All the other patrician families were not around when Horatius was tried for the murder of his sister.”

Philippus and Octavius were looking a little lost as well as rather bored, so Caesar made another effort to change the subject.

“When’s the big day?” he asked Octavius.

“About a market interval to go.”

“And will it be a boy or a girl?’’

“We think a boy this time. A third girl between two wives would be a cruel disappointment,” said Gaius Octavius with a sigh.

“I remember that before Tullia was born I was sure she was a boy,” said Cicero, grinning. “Terentia was sure too. As it was, we had to wait fourteen years for my son.”

“That long between tries, was it, Cicero?’’ asked Philippus.

To which Cicero vouchsafed no answer beyond a blush; like most ambitious social-climbing New Men, he was habitually prudish unless a witticism too stunning to resist sprang to mind. The entrenched aristocrats could afford a salty tongue; Cicero could not.

“The woman whose husband caretakes the Old Meeting Houses says it will be a boy,” said Octavius. “She tied Atia’s wedding ring to a thread and held it over Atia’s belly. It rotated rapidly to the right—a sure sign, she says.”

“Well, let’s hope she’s right,” from Caesar. “My older sister threw boys, but girls do run in the family.”

“I wonder,” asked Varro, “how many men were actually tried for perduellio back in the days of Tullus Hostilius?”

Caesar stifled a sigh; to invite three scholars and only two Epicureans to a dinner clearly did not work. Luckily the wine was superlative and so were the Domus Publica cooks.

*

The news from Etruria came not many days after that dinner with the Pontifex Maximus, and was conveyed by Fulvia Nobilioris.

“Catilina has sent Gaius Manlius to Faesulae to recruit an army,” she said to Cicero, perched on the edge of a couch and mopping a forehead dewed with sweat, “and Publius Furius is in Apulia doing the same.”

“Proof?” asked Cicero sharply, his own brow suddenly moist.

“I have none, Marcus Tullius.”

“Did Quintus Curius tell you?”

“No. I overheard him talking to Lucius Cassius last night after dinner. They thought I had gone to bed. Since the elections they’ve all been very quiet, even Quintus Curius. It was a blow to Catilina, and I think he’s taken some time to recover. Last night was the first time I’ve heard a whisper of anything.”

“Do you know when Manlius and Furius began their operations?’’

“No.”

“So you have no idea how far advanced recruitment might be? Would it, for instance, be possible for me to get confirmation if I sent someone to Faesulae?’’

“I don’t know, Marcus Tullius. I wish I did!”

“What of Quintus Curius? Is he keen on outright revolution?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Then try to find out, Fulvia,” Cicero said, careful to keep the exasperation out of his voice and manner. “If we can persuade him to testify before the Senate, its members would have no choice but to believe me.”

“Rest assured, husband, Fulvia will do her best,” said Terentia, and ushered the visitor out.

Positive that all insurgent forces would be willing to recruit slaves, Cicero sent a very sharp and presentable fellow north to Faesulae with instructions to volunteer. Aware that many in the House deemed him gullible and overeager for a crisis to distinguish his consulship, Cicero borrowed this slave from Atticus; the fellow could therefore testify that he was not under obligation to Cicero personally. But, alas, when he returned he had little to offer. Something was definitely going on, and not only in Faesulae. The trouble was that slaves, he had been told when he started to fish for information, did not belong in Etruria, a place of free men owning sufficient free men to serve the interests of Etruria. Just what that answer meant was difficult to say, as of course Etruria was as liberally dowered with slaves as any other place inside or outside Italy. The whole world depended on slaves!

“If it is indeed an uprising, Marcus Tullius,” Atticus’s servant concluded, “then it is an uprising limited to free men.”

“What next?” asked Terentia over dinner.

“I honestly don’t know, my dear. The thing is, do I convene the Senate and try again, or do I wait until I can gather several free-man agents together and produce some hard evidence?”

“I have a feeling that hard evidence is going to be very difficult to find, husband. No one in northern Etruria trusts any outsider, free or servile. They’re clannish and secretive.”

“Well,” said Cicero, sighing, “I shall summon the House into session the day after tomorrow. If it serves no other purpose, it will at least tell Catilina that my eye is still upon him.”

It served no other purpose, exactly as Cicero had foreseen. Those senators not still at the seaside were skeptical at best and downright insulting at worst. Especially Catilina, who was present and vocal but remarkably cool for a man whose hopes for the consulship had been permanently dashed. This time he made no attempt to rant at Cicero or at adversity; he simply sat on his stool and answered patiently, calmly. A good tactic which impressed the skeptics and allowed the partisans to gloat. Little wonder then that what might otherwise have been a rowdy and heated debate gradually dwindled to an inertia leavened only by the sudden eruption of Gaius Octavius through the doors, whooping and dancing.

“I have a son! I have a son!”

Thankful for an excuse to close the meeting, Cicero dismissed his clerks and joined the crowd around Octavius.

“Is the horoscope auspicious?” asked Caesar. “Mind you, they are never not.”

“More miraculous than auspicious, Caesar. If I am to believe what the astrologer fellow says, my son Gaius Octavius Junior will end in ruling the world.” The proud father chuckled. “But I fell for it! Gave the astrologer a bonus as well as a fee.”

“My natal horoscope just had lots to say about mysterious illnesses of the chest, if I am to believe my mother,” said Caesar. “She never will show it to me.”

“And mine said I would never make money,” said Crassus.

“Fortune-telling keeps the women happy,” said Philippus.

“Who intends to come with me to register the birth with Juno Lucina?” Octavius asked, still beaming.

“Who else than Uncle Caesar Pontifex Maximus?” Caesar threw an arm about Octavius’s shoulders. “And after that, I demand to be shown my new nephew.”

*

Eighteen days of October had ground away without significant information from either Etruria or Apulia, nor a word from Fulvia Nobilioris. An occasional letter from the agents both Cicero and Atticus had dispatched held out little hope of hard evidence, though every one of these missives vowed something was definitely going on. The chief trouble seemed to lie in the fact that there was no real nucleus, just stirs and shudders in this village, then in that village, on some Sullan centurion’s foundering farm or in some Sullan veteran’s low tavern. Yet the moment a strange face showed itself, everyone walked about whistling innocently. Inside the walls of Faesulae, Arretium, Volaterrae, Aesernia, Larinum and all the other urban settlements of Etruria and Apulia, nothing was visible save economic depression and grinding poverty. There were houses and farms for sale to cover hopeless debts everywhere, but of their erstwhile owners, not a sign.

And Cicero was tired, tired, tired. He knew it was busily happening under his nose, yet he couldn’t prove it and he was now beginning to believe he never would until the day of revolt arrived. Terentia too was in despair, a state which surprisingly seemed to make her easier to live with; though his fleshly urges were never strong, these days Cicero found himself wanting to retire early and seek a solace in her body which he found as mystifying as it was incongruous.

Both of them were sunk into a deep sleep when Tiro came to wake them shortly after the middle hour of night on that eighteenth day of October.

“Domine, domine!” the beloved slave whispered from the door, his charmingly elfin face above the lamp turned into a visage from the underworld. “Domine, you have visitors!”

“What’s the hour?” Cicero managed, swinging his legs off the bed on one side as Terentia stirred and opened her eyes.

“Very late, domine.”

“Visitors, did you say?’’

“Yes, domine.”

Terentia was struggling to sit up on her side of the bed, but made no move to dress; well she knew that whatever was afoot would not include her, a woman! Nor could she go back to sleep. She would just have to contain herself until Cicero could return to inform her what the trouble was.

“Who, Tiro?’’ asked Cicero, pushing his head into a tunic.

“Marcus Licinius Crassus and two other noblemen, domine.”

“Ye gods!”

No time for ablutions or footwear; Cicero hurried out to the atrium of the house he now felt was too small and too humdrum for one who would from the end of this year call himself a consular.

Sure enough, there was Crassus—accompanied by Marcus Claudius Marcellus and Metellus Scipio, of all people! The steward was busy kindling lamps, Tiro had produced writing paper, pens and wax tablets just in case, and noises from outside indicated that wine and refreshments would appear shortly.

“What’s amiss?” asked Cicero, dispensing with ceremony.

“You were right, my friend,” said Crassus, and held out both hands. His right contained an open sheet of paper; his left held several letters still folded and sealed. He passed the open sheet across. “Read that and you’ll know what’s amiss.”

It was very short, but authored by someone well schooled, and it was addressed to Crassus.

I am a patriot who has by mischance become embroiled in an insurrection. That I send these letters to you rather than to Marcus Cicero arises out of your standing in Rome. No one has believed Marcus Cicero. I hope everyone will believe you. The letters are copies; I could not make off with the originals. Nor dare I tell you any names. What I can tell you is that fire and revolution are coming to Rome. Get out of Rome, Marcus Crassus, and take all who do not wish to be killed with you.

Though he couldn’t compete with Caesar when it came to swift and silent reading, Cicero wasn’t that far behind; in a shorter time than it had taken Crassus to read the note, Cicero looked up.

“Jupiter, Marcus Crassus! How did you come by this?”

Crassus sat down in a chair heavily, Metellus Scipio and Marcellus going together to a couch. When a servant offered him wine, Crassus waved it aside.

“We were having a late dinner at my place,” he said, “and I’m afraid I got carried away. Marcus Marcellus and Quintus Scipio had a scheme in mind to increase their family fortunes, but they didn’t want to break senatorial precedents, so they came to me for advice.”

“True,” said Marcellus warily; he didn’t trust Cicero not to blab about unsenatorial business ventures.

But the last thing on Cicero’s mind was the thin line between proper senatorial practices and illegal ones, so he said, “Yes, yes!” impatiently, and to Crassus, “Go on!”

“Someone hammered on the door about an hour ago, but when my steward went to answer it there was no one outside. At first he didn’t notice the letters, which had been put on the step. It was the noise made by the pile falling over drew his attention to them. The one I’ve opened was addressed to me personally, as you can see for yourself, though I opened it more out of curiosity than from any presentiment of alarm—who would choose such an odd way to deliver mail, and at such an hour?’’ Crassus looked grim. “When I’d read it and shown it to Marcus and Quintus here, we decided the best thing to do was bring everything to you at once. You’re the one who’s been making all the fuss.”

Cicero took the five unopened packets and sat down with an elbow on the peacock-grained citrus-wood table he had paid half a million sesterces for, heedless of its depreciation should he scratch it. One by one he held the letters up to the light, examining the cheap wax closures.

“A wolf seal in ordinary red wax,” he said, sighing. “You can buy them in any shop.” His fingers slipped beneath the edge of the paper of the last in the pile, he tugged sharply and broke the little round wax emblem in half while Crassus and the other two watched eagerly. “I’ll read it out,” he said then, opening the single sheet of paper. “This one isn’t signed, but I see it’s addressed to Gaius Manlius.” He began to pore over the squiggles.

“You will start the revolution five days before the Kalends of November by forming up your troops and invading Faesulae. The town will come over to you in mass, so you have assured us. We believe you. Whatever else you do, make straight for the arsenal. At dawn of this same day your four colleagues will also move: Publius Furius against Volaterrae, Minucius against Arretium, Publicius against Saturnia, Aulus Fulvius against Clusium. By sunset we expect that all these towns will be in your hands, and our army much bigger. Not to mention better equipped from the arsenals.

“On the fourth day before the Kalends, those of us in Rome will strike. An army is not necessary. Stealth will serve us better. We will kill both the consuls and all eight praetors. What happens to the consuls-elect and the praetors-elect depends on their good sense, but certain powers in the business sphere will have to die: Marcus Crassus, Servilius Caepio Brutus, Titus Atticus. Their fortunes will fund our enterprise with money to spare.

“We would have preferred to wait longer, build up our strength and our forces, but we cannot afford to wait until Pompeius Magnus is close enough to move against us before we are ready for him. His turn will come, but first things are first. May the Gods be with you.”

Cicero put the letter down to gaze at Crassus in horror. “Jupiter, Marcus Crassus!” he cried, hands trembling. “It is upon us in nine days!”

The two younger men looked ashen in the flickering light, eyes passing from Cicero to Crassus and back again, minds obviously unable to assimilate anything beyond the word “kill.”

“Open the others,” said Crassus.

But these proved to be much the same as the first, addressed to each of the other four men mentioned by name in Gaius Manlius’s.

“He’s clever,” said Cicero, shaking his head. “Nothing put down in the first person singular for me to level at Catilina, no word of who in Rome is involved. All I really have are the names of his military henchmen in Etruria, and as they’re already committed to revolution, they can’t matter. Clever!”

Metellus Scipio licked his lips and found his voice. “Who wrote the letter to Marcus Crassus, Cicero?” he asked.

“I would think Quintus Curius.”

“Curius? That Curius who was thrown out of the Senate?”

“The same.”

“Then can we get him to testify?” Marcellus asked.

It was Crassus who shook his head. “No, we daren’t. All they’d have to do was kill him and we’d be right back where we are at the moment except that we’d lack an informer at all.”

“We could put him in protective custody even before he testified,” said Metellus Scipio.

“And shut his mouth?” asked Cicero. “Protective custody at any stage is likely to shut his mouth. The most important thing is to push Catilina into declaring himself.”

Whereupon Marcellus said, frowning, “What if the ringleader isn’t Catilina?”

“That’s a point,” said Metellus Scipio.

“What do I have to do to get it through all your thick skulls that the only man it can be is Catilina?” yelled Cicero, striking the precious surface of his table so hard that the gold and ivory pedestal beneath it shivered. “It’s Catilina! It’s Catilina!”

“Proof, Marcus,” said Crassus. “You need proof.”

“One way or another I will get proof,” said Cicero, “but in the meantime we have a revolution in Etruria to put down. I will summon the Senate into session tomorrow at the fourth hour.”

“Good,” said Crassus, lumbering to his feet. “Then I’m for home and bed.”

“What about you?” asked Cicero on the way to the door. “Do you believe Catilina is responsible, Marcus Crassus?”

“Very probably, but not certainly” was the answer.

“And isn’t that typical?” asked Terentia some moments later, sitting up straight. “He wouldn’t commit himself to an alliance with Jupiter Optimus Maximus!”

“Nor will many in the Senate, I predict,” sighed Cicero. “However, my dear, I think it’s time you sought Fulvia out. We’ve heard nothing from her in many days.” He lay down. “Blow out the lamp, I must try to sleep.”

*

What Cicero hadn’t counted on was the full degree of doubt in the Senate’s mind as to Catilina’s masterminding what certainly did appear to be a brewing insurrection. Skepticism he expected, but not outright opposition, yet outright opposition was what he got when he produced and read his letters. He had thought that bringing Crassus into the story would procure a senatus consultant de re publica defendenda—the decree proclaiming martial law—but the House denied him.

“You should have retained the letters unbroken until this body assembled,” said Cato harshly. He was now a tribune of the plebs-elect, and entitled to speak.

“But I opened them in front of unimpeachable witnesses!”

“No matter,” said Catulus. “You usurped the Senate’s prerogative.”

Through all of it Catilina had sat with exactly the right series of emotions reflected on face and in eyes—indignation, calm, innocence, mild exasperation, incredulity.

Tried beyond endurance, Cicero turned to face him. “Lucius Sergius Catilina, will you admit that you are the prime mover in these events?” he asked, voice ringing round the rafters.

“No, Marcus Tullius Cicero, I will not.”

“Is there no man present who will support me?” the senior consul demanded, looking from Crassus to Caesar, Catulus to Cato.

“I suggest,” said Crassus after a considerable silence, “that this House request the senior consul to further investigate all sides of this matter. It would not be surprising if Etruria revolted, I will give you that, Marcus Tullius. But when even your colleague in the consulship says the whole thing is a practical joke and then announces that he’s going back to Cumae tomorrow, how can you expect the rest of us to fly into a panic?’’

And so it was left. Cicero must find further evidence.

“It was Quintus Curius who got the letters to Marcus Crassus,” said Fulvia Nobilioris early the following morning, “but he will not testify for you. He’s too afraid.”

“Have you and he talked?”

“Yes.”

“Then can you give me any names, Fulvia?”

“I can only tell you the names of Quintus Curius’s friends.”

“Who are?”

“Lucius Cassius, as you know. Gaius Cornelius and Lucius Vargunteius, who were expelled from the Senate with my Curius.”

Her words suddenly linked up with a fact buried at the back of Cicero’s mind. “Is the praetor Lentulus Sura a friend?” he asked, remembering that man’s abuse of him at the elections. Yes, Lentulus Sura had been one of the seventy-odd men expelled by the censors Poplicola and Clodianus! Even though he had been consul.

But Fulvia knew nothing about Lentulus Sura. “Though,” she said, “I have seen the younger Cethegus—Gaius Cethegus?—with Lucius Cassius from time to time. And Lucius Statilius and the Gabinius nicknamed Capito too. They are not close friends, mind you, so it’s hard to say if they’re in on the plot.”

“And what of the uprising in Etruria?’’

“I only know that Quintus Curius says it will happen.”

“Quintus Curius says it will happen,” Cicero repeated to Terentia when she returned from seeing Fulvia Nobilioris off the premises. “Catilina is too clever for Rome, my dear. Have you ever in your life known a Roman who could keep a secret? Yet every way I turn, I’m baffled. How I wish I came from noble stock! If my name was Licinius or Fabius or Caecilius, Rome would be under martial law right now, and Catilina would be a public enemy. But because my name is Tullius and I hail from Arpinum—Marius country, that!—nothing I say carries any weight.”

“Conceded,” said Terentia.

Which provoked a rueful glance from Cicero, but no comment. A moment later he slapped his hands upon his thighs and said, “Well, then I just have to keep on trying!”

“You’ve sent enough men to Etruria to sniff something out.”

“One would think. But the letters indicate that rebellion isn’t concentrated in the towns, that the towns are to be taken over from bases outside in the country.”

“The letters also indicate a shortage of armaments.”

“True. When Pompeius Magnus was consul and insisted there must be stocks of armaments north of Rome, many of us didn’t like the idea. I admit that his arsenals are as hard to get into as Nola, but if the towns revolt—well…”

“The towns haven’t revolted so far. They’re too afraid.”

“They’re full of Etrurians, and Etrurians hate Rome.”

“This revolt is the work of Sulla’s veterans.”

“Who don’t live in the towns.”

“Precisely.”

“So shall I try again in the Senate?”

“Yes, husband. You have nothing to lose, so try again.”

*

Which he did a day later, the twenty-first day of October. His meeting was thinly attended, yet one more indication what Rome’s senators thought of the senior consul—an ambitious New Man out to make much from very little and find himself a cause serious enough to produce several speeches worth publishing for posterity. Cato, Crassus, Catulus, Caesar and Lucullus were there, but much of the space of the three tiers on either side of the floor was unoccupied. However, Catilina was flaunting himself, solidly hedged around by men who thought well of him, deemed him persecuted. Lucius Cassius, Publius Sulla the Dictator’s nephew, his crony Autronius, Quintus Annius Chilo, both the sons of dead Cethegus, the two Sulla brothers who were not of the Dictator’s clan but well connected nonetheless, the witty tribune of the plebs-elect Lucius Calpurnius Bestia, and Marcus Porcius Laeca. Are they all in on it? asked Cicero of himself. Am I looking at the new order in Rome? If so, I don’t think much of it. All these men are villains.

He drew a deep breath and began…. “I am tired of saying a mouthful like senatus consultum de re publica defendenda,” he announced an hour of well-chosen words later, “so I am going to coin a new name for the Senate’s ultimate decree, the only decree the Senate can issue as binding on all Comitia, government bodies, institutions and citizens. I am going to call it the Senatus Consultum Ultimum. And, Conscript Fathers, I want you to issue a Senatus Consultum Ultimum.”

“Against me, Marcus Tullius?” Catilina asked, smiling.

“Against revolution, Lucius Sergius.”

“But you have proven neither point, Marcus Tullius. Give us proof, not words!”

It was going to fail again.

“Perhaps, Marcus Tullius, we would be more prepared to take credence of rebellion in Etruria if you would cease this personal attack on Lucius Sergius,” said Catulus. “Your accusations against him have absolutely no basis in fact, and that in turn casts huge shadows of doubt on any unusual state of unrest northwest of the Tiber. Etruria is old hat, and Lucius Sergius clearly a scapegoat. No, Marcus Tullius, we will not believe a word of it without far more concrete evidence than pretty speeches.”

“I have the concrete evidence!” boomed a voice from the door, and in walked the ex-praetor Quintus Arrius.

Knees sagging, Cicero sat down abruptly on his ivory chair of office and gaped at Arrius, disheveled from the road and still clad in riding gear.

The House was murmuring and beginning to look at Catilina, who sat amid his friends seeming stunned.

“Come up on the dais, Quintus Arrius, and tell us.”

“There is revolution in Etruria,” said Arrius simply. “I have seen it for myself. Sulla’s veterans are all off their farms and busy training volunteers, mostly men who have lost their homes or properties in these hard times. I found their camp some miles out of Faesulae.”

“How many men under arms, Arrius?’’ asked Caesar.

“About two thousand.”

That produced a sigh of relief, but faces soon fell again when Arrius went on to explain that there were similar camps at Arretium, Volaterrae and Saturnia, and that there was every chance Clusium also was involved.

“And what of me, Quintus Arrius?” asked Catilina loudly. “Am I their leader, though I sit here in Rome?”

“Their leader, as far as I can gather, Lucius Sergius, is a man called Gaius Manlius, who was one of Sulla’s centurions. I did not hear your name, nor have I any evidence to incriminate you.”

Whereupon the men around Catilina began to cheer, and the rest of the House to look relieved. Swallowing his chagrin, the senior consul thanked Quintus Arrius and asked the House again to issue its Senatus Consultum Ultimum, permit him and his government to move against rebellious troops in Etruria.

“I will see a division,” he said. “All those who approve the issuance of a Senatus Consultum Ultimum to deal with rebellion in Etruria please pass to my right. All those opposed, please pass to my left.”

Everyone passed to the right, including Catilina and all his supporters, Catilina with a look which said, Now do your worst, you Arpinate upstart!

“However,” said the praetor Lentulus Sura after everyone had returned to his place, “troop concentrations do not necessarily mean an uprising is seriously intended, at least for the time being. Did you hear a date of any kind, Quintus Arrius—five days before the Kalends of November, for instance, that being the date in those famous letters sent to Marcus Crassus?”

“I heard no date,” said Arrius.

“I ask,” Lentulus Sura went on, “because the Treasury is not in a position at the moment to find large sums of money for massive recruitment campaigns. May I suggest, Marcus Tullius, that for the present moment you exercise your—er—’Senatus Consultum Ultimum’ in a restrained way?’’

The faces staring at him approved, so much was easy to see; Cicero therefore contented himself with a measure expelling every professional gladiator from Rome.

“What, Marcus Tullius, no directive to issue arms to all this city’s citizens registered to bear them in times of emergency?” asked Catilina sweetly.

“No, Lucius Sergius, I do not intend to order that until I have proven you and yours public enemies!” snapped Cicero. “Why should I hand weapons to anyone I think will end in turning those weapons against all loyal citizens?’’

“This person is pernicious!” cried Catilina, hands stretched out. “He has not one iota of proof, yet still he persists in a malicious persecution of me!”

But Catulus was remembering how he and Hortensius had felt the year before, when they had conspired to exclude Catilina from the chair in which they had virtually installed Cicero as the preferable alternative. Was it possible that Catilina was the prime mover? Gaius Manlius was his client. So was one of the other revolutionaries, Publius Furius. Perhaps it might be wise to discover whether Minucius, Publicius and Aulus Fulvius were also clients of his. After all, none of those who sat around Catilina was a pillar of rectitude! Lucius Cassius was a fat fool, and as for Publius Sulla and Publius Autronius—hadn’t they been stripped of office as consuls before they could take office? And had there not been a wild rumor at the time that they were planning to assassinate Lucius Cotta and Torquatus, their replacements? Catulus decided to open his mouth.

“Leave Marcus Tullius alone, Lucius Sergius!” he commanded wearily. “We may be obliged to put up with a little private war between the pair of you, but we need not put up with a privatus trying to tell the legally elected senior consul how to implement his—er—’Senatus Consultum Ultimum.’ I happen to agree with Marcus Tullius. From now on the troop concentrations in Etruria will be monitored closely. Therefore no one in this city needs to be issued arms at the moment.”

“You’re getting there, Cicero,” said Caesar as the House disbanded. “Catulus is having second thoughts about Catilina.”

“And what about you?”

“Oh, I think he’s a genuine bad man. That’s why I asked Quintus Arrius to do a little investigating in Etruria.”

“You put Arrius up to it?”

“Well, you weren’t managing, were you? I picked Arrius because he soldiered with Sulla, and Sulla’s veterans love him dearly. There are few faces from Rome’s upper echelons capable of lulling suspicion in those discontented veteran farmers, but Arrius’s face is one of them,” said Caesar.

“Then I am obliged to you.”

“Think nothing of it. Like all my kind, I am reluctant to abandon a fellow patrician, but I’m not a fool, Cicero. I want no part of insurrection, nor can I afford to be identified with a fellow patrician who does. My star is still rising. A pity that Catilina’s has set, but it has set. Therefore Catilina is a spent force in Roman politics.” Caesar shrugged. “I can have no truck with spent forces. The same might be said for many of us, from Crassus to Catulus. As you now observe.”

“I have men stationed in Etruria. If the uprising does take place five days before the Kalends, Rome will know within a day.”

*

But Rome didn’t know within a day. When the fourth day before the Kalends of November rolled round, nothing whatsoever happened. The consuls and praetors who according to the letters were to be killed went about their business unmolested, and no word of rebellion came from Etruria.

Cicero existed in a frenzy of doubt and expectation, his mood not helped by Catilina’s constant derision, nor by the sudden coolness he felt emanating from Catulus and Crassus. What had happened? Why did no word come?

The Kalends of November arrived; still no word. Not that Cicero had been entirely idle during those awful days when he had to wait upon events. He hedged the city in with detachments of troops from Capua, posted a cohort at Ocriculum, another at Tibur, one at Ostia, one at Praeneste, and two at Veii; more than that he could not do because more troops ready enough to fight were just not available, even at Capua.

Then after noon on the Kalends everything happened at once. A frantic message for help came from Praeneste, which proclaimed itself under attack. And a frantic message finally arrived from Faesulae, also under attack. The uprising had indeed begun five days earlier, exactly as the letters had indicated. As the sun was setting further messages told of restless slaves in Capua and Apulia. Cicero summoned the Senate for dawn on the morrow.

Astonishing how convenient the process of triumphing could be! For fifty years the presence of a triumphator’s army on the Campus Martius during a time of crisis for Rome had managed to extricate the city from peril. This present crisis was no different. Quintus Marcius Rex and Metellus Little Goat Creticus were both on the Campus Martius awaiting their triumphs. Of course neither man had more than a legion with him, but those legions were veteran. With the full agreement of the Senate, Cicero sent orders to the Campus Martius that Metellus Little Goat was to proceed south to Apulia and relieve Praeneste on the way, and that Marcius Rex was to proceed north to Faesulae.

Cicero had eight praetors at his disposal, though within his mind he had excluded Lentulus Sura; he instructed Quintus Pompeius Rufus to go to Capua and commence recruiting troops from among the many veterans settled on land in Campania. Now, who else? Gaius Pomptinus was a Military Man and a good friend besides, which meant he was best retained in Rome for serious duty. Cosconius was the son of a brilliant general, but not adequate in the field at all. Roscius Otho was a great friend of Cicero’s, but more effective as a favor currier than a general or a recruiter. Though Sulpicius was not a patrician, he seemed nonetheless to sympathize a little with Catilina, and the patrician Valerius Flaccus was another Cicero could not quite bring himself to trust. Which left only the praetor urbanus, Metellus Celer. Pompey’s man and utterly loyal.

“Quintus Caecilius Metellus Celer, I order you to go to Picenum and commence recruiting soldiers there,” said Cicero.

Celer rose, frowning. “Naturally I am glad to do so, Marcus Tullius, but there is a problem. As urban praetor I cannot be out of Rome for more than ten days at a time.”

“Under a Senatus Consultum Ultimum, you can do anything the State instructs you to do without breaking law or tradition.”

“I wish I agreed with your interpretation,” Caesar interrupted, “but I do not, Marcus Tullius. The ultimate decree extends only to the crisis, it does not dislocate normal magisterial functions.”

“I need Celer to deal with the crisis!” snapped Cicero.

“You have five other praetors as yet unused,” said Caesar.

“I am the senior consul, I will send the praetor best suited!”

“Even if you act illegally?”

“I am not acting illegally! The Senatus Consultum Ultimum overrides all other considerations, including ‘normal magisterial functions,’ as you call Celer’s duties!” Face reddening, Cicero had begun to shout. “Would you question the right of a formally appointed dictator to send Celer out of the city for more than ten days at a time?”

“No, I would not,” said Caesar, very cool. “Therefore, Marcus Tullius, why not do this thing the proper way? Rescind the toy you’re playing with and ask this body to appoint a dictator and a master of the horse to go to war against Gaius Manlius.”

“What a brilliant idea!” drawled Catilina, sitting in his customary place and surrounded by all the men who supported him.

“The last time Rome had a dictator, she ended up with his ruling her like a king!” cried Cicero. “The Senatus Consultum Ultimum was devised to deal with civil crises in a way which does not throw one man into absolute control!”

“What, are you not in control, Cicero?” asked Catilina.

“I am the senior consul!”

“And making all the decisions, just as if you were dictator,” gibed Catilina.

“I am the instrument of the Senatus Consultum Ultimum!”

“You’re the instrument of magisterial chaos,” said Caesar. “In not much more than a month, the new tribunes of the plebs take office, and the few days before and after that event require that the urban praetor be present in Rome.”

“There’s no law on the tablets to that effect!”

“But there is a law to say that the urban praetor cannot be absent from Rome for more than ten days at a time.”

“All right, all right!” Cicero yelled. “Have it your own way! Quintus Caecilius Metellus Celer, I order you to Picenum, but require that you return to Rome every eleventh day! You will also return to Rome six days before the new tribunes of the plebs enter office, and remain in Rome until six days after they enter office!”

At which moment a scribe handed the irate senior consul a note. Cicero read it, then laughed. “Well, Lucius Sergius!” he said to Catilina, “another little difficulty seems to be forming for you! Lucius Aemilius Paullus intends to prosecute you under the lex Plautia de vi, so he has just announced from the rostra.” Cicero cleared his throat ostentatiously. “I am sure you know who Lucius Aemilius Paullus is! A fellow patrician, and a fellow revolutionary at that! Back in Rome after some years in exile and well behind his little brother Lepidus in terms of public life, but apparently desirous of showing that he no longer harbors a rebellious bone in his noble body. You would have it that only us jumped-up New Men are against you, but you cannot call an Aemilius jumped up, now can you?”

“Oh, oh, oh!” drawled Catilina, one brow raised. He put out his right hand and made it flutter and tremble. “See how I quake, Marcus Tullius! I am to be prosecuted on a charge of inciting public violence! Yet when have I done that?” He remained seated, but gazed around the tiers looking terribly wounded. “Perhaps I ought to offer myself into some nobleman’s custody, eh, Marcus Tullius? Would that please you?” He stared at Mamercus. “Ho there, Mamercus Aemilius Lepidus Princeps Senatus, will you take me into your house as your prisoner?”

Head of the Aemilii Lepidi and therefore closely related to the returned exile Paullus, Mamercus simply shook his head, grinning. “I don’t want you, Lucius Sergius,” he said.

“Then how about you, senior consul?” Catilina asked Cicero.

“What, admit my potential murderer to my house? No, thank you!” said Cicero.

“What about you, praetor urbanus?”

“Can’t be done,” said Metellus Celer. “I’m off to Picenum in the morning.”

“Then how about a plebeian Claudius? Will you volunteer, Marcus Claudius Marcellus? You were quick enough to follow your master Crassus’s lead a few days ago!”

“I refuse,” said Marcellus.

“I have a better idea, Lucius Sergius,” said Cicero. “Why not take yourself out of Rome and openly join your insurrection?’’

“I will not take myself out of Rome, and it is not my insurrection,” said Catilina.

“In which case, I declare this meeting closed,” said Cicero. “Rome is protected to the best of our abilities. All we can do now is wait and see what happens next. Sooner or later, Catilina, you will betray yourself.”

“Though I do wish,” he said to Terentia later, “that my pleasure-loving colleague Hybrida would return to Rome! Here it is an officially declared state of emergency, and where is Gaius Antonius Hybrida? Still lolling on his private beach at Cumae!”

“Can’t you command him to return under the Senatus Consultum Ultimum?’’ asked Terentia.

“I suppose so.”

“Then do it, Cicero! You may need him.”

“He’s pleading gout.”

“The gout is in his head” was Terentia’s verdict.

*

Some five hours before dawn of the seventh day of November, Tiro again woke Cicero and Terentia from a deep sleep.

“You have a visitor, domina,” said the beloved slave.

Famous for her rheumatism, the wife of the senior consul showed no sign of it as she leaped from her bed (decently clad in a nightgown, of course—no naked sleepers in Cicero’s house!).

“It’s Fulvia Nobilioris,” she said, shaking Cicero. “Wake up, husband, wake up!” Oh, the joy of it! She was in on a war council at last!

“Quintus Curius sent me,” Fulvia Nobilioris announced, her face old and bare because she had not had time to apply makeup.

“He’s come around?” asked Cicero sharply.

“Yes.” The visitor took the cup of unwatered wine Terentia gave her and sipped at it, shuddering. “They met at midnight in the house of Marcus Porcius Laeca.”

“Who met?”

“Catilina, Lucius Cassius, my Quintus Curius, Gaius Cethegus, both the Sulla brothers, Gabinius Capito, Lucius Statilius, Lucius Vargunteius and Gaius Cornelius.”

“Not Lentulus Sura?”

“No.”

“Then it appears I was wrong about him.” Cicero leaned forward. “Go on, woman, go on! What happened?”

“They met to plan the fall of Rome and further the rebellion,” said Fulvia Nobilioris, a little color returning to her cheeks as the wine took effect. “Gaius Cethegus wanted to take Rome at once, but Catilina wants to wait until uprisings are under way in Apulia, Umbria and Bruttium. He suggested the night of the Saturnalia, and gave as his reason that it is the one night of the year when Rome is topsy-turvy, slaves ruling, free households serving, everyone drunk. And he thinks it will take that long to swell the revolt.”

Nodding, Cicero saw the point of this: the Saturnalia was held on the seventeenth day of December, six market intervals from now. By which time all of Italy might be boiling. “So who won, Fulvia?” he asked.

“Catilina, though Cethegus did succeed in one respect.”

“And that is?” the senior consul prompted gently when she stopped, began to shake.

“They agreed that you should be murdered immediately.”

He had known since the letters that he was not intended to live, but to hear it now from the lips of this poor terrified woman gave it an edge and a horror Cicero felt for the first time. He was to be murdered immediately! Immediately! “How and when?” he asked. “Come, Fulvia, tell me! I’m not going to haul you into court, you’ve earned rewards, not punishment! Tell me!”

“Lucius Vargunteius and Gaius Cornelius will present themselves here at dawn with your clients,” she said.

“But they’re not my clients!” said Cicero blankly.

“I know. But it was decided that they would ask to become your clients in the hope that you would support their return to public life. Once inside, they are to ask for a private interview in your study to plead their case. Instead, they are to stab you to death and make their escape before your clients know what has happened,” said Fulvia.

“Then that’s simple,” said Cicero, sighing with relief. “I will bar my doors, set a watch in the peristyle, and refuse to see my clients on grounds of illness. Nor will I stir outside all day. It’s time for councils.” He got up to pat Fulvia Nobilioris on the hand. “I thank you most sincerely, and tell Quintus Curius his intervention has earned him a full pardon. But tell him too that if he will testify to all this in the House the day after tomorrow, he will be a hero. I give him my word that I will not let a thing happen to him.”

“I will tell him.”

“What exactly does Catilina plan for the Saturnalia?”

“They have a large cache of arms somewhere—Quintus Curius does not know the place—and these will be distributed to all the partisans. Twelve separate fires are to be started throughout the city, including one on the Capitol, two on the Palatine, two on the Carinae, and one at either end of the Forum. Certain men are to go to the houses of all the magistrates and kill them.”

“Except for me, dead already.”

“Yes.”

“You’d better go, Fulvia,” said Cicero, nodding to his wife. “Vargunteius and Cornelius may arrive a little early, and we don’t want them to set eyes on you. Did you bring an escort?”

“No,” she whispered, white-faced again.

“Then I will send Tiro and four others with you.”

“A pretty plot!” barked Terentia, marching into Cicero’s study the moment she had organized the flight of Fulvia Nobilioris.

“My dear, without you I would have been dead before now.”

“I am well aware of it,” Terentia said, sitting down. “I have issued orders to the staff, who will bolt and bar everything the moment Tiro and the others return. Now print a notice I can have put on the front door that you are ill and won’t receive.”

Cicero printed obediently, handed it over and let his wife take care of the logistics. What a general of troops she would have made! Nothing forgotten, everything battened down.

“You will need to see Catulus, Crassus, Hortensius if he’s returned from the seaside, Mamercus, and Caesar,” she said after all the preparations were finished.

“Not until this afternoon,” said Cicero feebly. “Let’s make sure first that I’m out of danger.”

Tiro was posted upstairs in a window which gave a good view of the front door, and was able to report an hour after dawn that Vargunteius and Cornelius had finally gone away, though not until they had tried several times to pick the lock of Cicero’s stout front door.

“Oh, this is disgusting!” the senior consul cried. “I, the senior consul, barred into my own house? Send for all the consulars in Rome, Tiro! Tomorrow I’ll have Catilina running.”

Fifteen consulars turned up—Mamercus, Poplicola, Catulus, Torquatus, Crassus, Lucius Cotta, Vatia Isauricus, Curio, Lucullus, Varro Lucullus, Volcatius Tullus, Gaius Marcius Figulus, Glabrio, Lucius Caesar and Gaius Piso. Neither of the consuls-elect nor the urban praetor-elect, Caesar, was invited; Cicero had decided to keep the council of war advisory only.

“Unfortunately,” he said heavily when all the men were accommodated in an atrium too small for comfort—he would have to earn the money somehow to buy a bigger house!—”I can’t prevail upon Quintus Curius to testify, and that means I have no solid case. Nor will Fulvia Nobilioris testify, even if the Senate was to agree to hear evidence from a woman.”

“For what it’s worth, Cicero, I now believe you,” said Catulus. “I don’t think you could have conjured up those names out of your imagination.”

“Why, thank you, Quintus Lutatius!” snapped Cicero, eyes flashing. “Your approbation warms my heart, but it doesn’t help me decide what to say in the Senate tomorrow!”

“Concentrate on Catilina and forget the rest of them’’ was Crassus’s advice. “Pull one of those terrific speeches out of your magic box and aim it at Catilina. What you have to do is push him into quitting Rome. The rest of his gang can stay—but we’ll keep a very good eye on them. Chop off the head Catilina would graft on the neck of Rome’s strong but headless body.”

“He won’t leave if he hasn’t already,” said Cicero gloomily.

“He might,” said Lucius Cotta, “if we can manage to persuade certain people to avoid his vicinity in the House. I’ll undertake to go and see Publius Sulla, and Crassus can see Autronius, he knows him well. They’re by far the two biggest fish in the Catilina pool, and I’d be willing to bet that if they were seen to shun him when they enter the House, even those whose names we’ve heard today would desert him. Self-preservation does tend to undermine loyalty.” He got up, grinning. “Shift your arses, fellow consulars! Let’s leave Cicero to write his greatest speech.”

That Cicero had labored to telling effect was evident on the morrow, when he convened the Senate in the temple of Jupiter Stator on the corner of the Velia, a site difficult to attack and easy to defend. Guards were ostentatiously posted everywhere outside, and that of course drew a large and curious audience of professional Forum frequenters. Catilina came early, as Lucius Cotta had predicted he would, so the technique of ostracizing him was blatant. Only Lucius Cassius, Gaius Cethegus, the tribune of the plebs-elect Bestia and Marcus Porcius Laeca sat by him, glaring furiously at Publius Sulla and Autronius.

Then a visible change swept over Catilina. He turned first to Lucius Cassius, whispered in his ear, then whispered to each of the others. All four shook their heads violently, but Catilina prevailed. Silently they got up and left his vicinity.

Whereupon Cicero launched into his speech, the tale of a meeting at night to plan the fall of Rome, complete with all the names of the men present and the name of the man in whose house the meeting took place. Every so often Cicero demanded that Lucius Sergius Catilina quit Rome, rid the city of his evil presence.

Only once did Catilina interrupt.

“Do you want me to go into voluntary exile, Cicero?” he asked loudly because the doors were open and the crowd outside straining to hear every word. “Go on, Cicero, ask the House whether I should go into voluntary exile! If it says I must, then I will!”

To which Cicero made no answer, just swept on. Go away, leave, quit Rome, that was his theme.

And after all the uncertainty, it turned out to be easy. As Cicero finished Catilina rose and gathered majesty around him.

“I’m going, Cicero! I’m quitting Rome! I don’t even want to stay here when Rome is being run by a lodger from Arpinum, a resident alien neither Roman nor Latin! You’re a Samnite bumpkin, Cicero, a rough peasant from the hills without ancestors or clout! Do you think you have forced me to leave? Well, you haven’t! It is Catulus, Mamercus, Cotta, Torquatus! I leave because they have deserted me, not because of anything you say! When a man’s peers desert him, he is truly finished. That is why I go.” There were confused sounds from outside as Catilina swept through the middle of the Forum frequenters, then silence.

Senators now got up to shift away from those Cicero had named in his speech, even a brother from a brother—Publius Cethegus had clearly decided to divorce himself from Gaius as well as from the conspiracy.

“I hope you’re happy, Marcus Tullius,” said Caesar.

*

It was a victory, of course it was a victory, and yet it seemed to fizzle, even after Cicero addressed the Forum crowd from the rostra the next day. Apparently stung by Catilina’s concluding remarks, Catulus got up when the House met two days after that and read out a letter from Catilina which protested his innocence and consigned his wife, Aurelia Orestilla, to the care and custody of Catulus himself. Rumors began to circulate that Catilina was indeed going into voluntary exile, and had headed out of Rome on the Via Aurelia (the right direction) with only three companions of no note, including his childhood friend Tongilius. This completed the backlash; men now began to swing from believing Catilina guilty to thinking him victimized.

Life might have become steadily more intolerable for Cicero had it not been for independent news from Etruria only a few days later. Catilina had not proceeded into exile in Massilia; instead he had donned the toga praetexta and insignia of a consul, clad twelve men in scarlet tunics and given them fasces complete with the axes. He had been seen in Arretium with a sympathizer, Gaius Flaminius of that decayed patrician family, and he now sported a silver eagle he declared was the original one Gaius Marius had given to his legions. Always Marius’s chief source of strength, Etruria was rallying to that eagle.

That of course terminated the disapproval of consulars like Catulus and Mamercus (Hortensius it seemed had decided that gout at Misenum was preferable to a headache in Rome, but the gout of Antonius Hybrida at Cumae was rapidly becoming an unseemly excuse for staying away from Rome and his duty as junior consul).

However, some of the senatorial smaller fry were still of the opinion that events had been Cicero’s doing all along, that it was actually Cicero’s tireless persecution had pushed Catilina over the edge. Among these was the younger brother of Celer, Metellus Nepos, soon to assume office as tribune of the plebs. Cato, who would also be a tribune of the plebs, commended Cicero—which only made Nepos scream louder, because he loathed Cato.

“Oh, when was an insurrection ever such a contentious and tenuous affair?” cried Cicero to Terentia. “At least Lepidus declared himself! Patricians, patricians! They can do no wrong! Here am I with a pack of villains on my hands and no way to convict them of tinkering with the water adjutages, let alone treason!”

“Cheer up, husband,” said Terentia, who apparently enjoyed seeing Cicero grimmer than she usually was herself. “It has begun to happen, and it will go on happening, you just wait and see. Soon all the doubters from Metellus Nepos to Caesar will have to admit that you are right.”

“Caesar could have helped me more than he has,” said Cicero, very disgruntled.

“He did send Quintus Arrius,” said Terentia, who approved of Caesar these days because her half sister, Fabia the Vestal, was full of praise for the new Pontifex Maximus.

“But he doesn’t back me in the House, he keeps picking on me for the way I interpret the Senatus Consultum Ultimum. It seems to me he still thinks Catilina has been wronged.”

“Catulus thinks that too, yet there’s no love lost between Catulus and Caesar,” said Terentia.

*

Two days later word came to Rome that Catilina and Manlius had finally joined forces, and that they had two full legions of good experienced troops plus some thousands more still in training. Faesulae hadn’t crumbled, which meant its arsenal was intact, nor had any of the other major towns in Etruria consented to donating the contents of their arsenals to Catilina’s cause. An indication that much of Etruria had no faith in Catilina.

The Popular Assembly ratified a senatorial decree and declared both Catilina and Manlius public enemies; this meant they were stripped of their citizenship and its perquisites, including trial for treason if they were apprehended. Gaius Antonius Hybrida having finally returned to Rome—gouty toe and all—Cicero promptly instructed him to take charge of the troops recruited in Capua and Picenum—all veterans of earlier wars—and march to oppose Catilina and Manlius outside Faesulae. Just in case the gouty toe continued to be a handicap, the senior consul had the forethought to give Hybrida an excellent second-in-command, the vir militaris Marcus Petreius. Cicero himself took responsibility for organizing the defenses of the city of Rome, and began now to dole out those armaments—though not to people he or Atticus or Crassus or Catulus (now thoroughly converted) deemed suspect. What Catilina was currently plotting no one knew, though Manlius sent a letter to the triumphator Rex, still in the field in Umbria; it came as a surprise that Manlius would write so, but it could change nothing.

At which point, with Rome poised to repel an attack from the north, and Pompeius Rufus in Capua and Metellus Little Goat in Apulia ready to deal with anything in the south from a force of gladiators to a slave uprising, Cato chose to upset Cicero’s stratagems and imperil the city’s ability to cope after the coming changeover of consuls. November was drawing to an end when Cato got up in the House and announced that he would institute proceedings against the junior consul-elect, Lucius Licinius Murena, for gaining office through bribery. As tribune of the plebs-elect, he shouted, he felt he could not spare the time to run a criminal trial himself, so the defeated candidate Servius Sulpicius Rufus would prosecute, with his son (barely a man) as second prosecutor, and the patrician Gaius Postumius as third. The trial would take place in the Bribery Court, as the prosecutors were all patrician and therefore could not use Cato and the Plebeian Assembly.

“Marcus Porcius Cato, you can’t!” cried Cicero, aghast, and leaping to his feet. “The guilt or innocence of Lucius Murena is beside the point! We have rebellion on our heads! That means we cannot afford to enter the New Year minus one of the new consuls! If you intended to do this, why now, why so late in the year?”

“A man’s duty is his duty,” said Cato, unmoved. “The evidence has only just come to light, and I vowed months ago in this House that if it came to my attention that a consular candidate had bribed, I would personally make sure he was charged and prosecuted. It makes no difference to me what Rome’s situation is at the New Year! Bribery is bribery. It must be eradicated at any cost.”

“The cost is likely to be the fall of Rome! Postpone it!”

“Never!” yelled Cato. “I am not your or anyone else’s puppet on strings! I see my duty and I do it!”

“No doubt you’ll be doing your duty and arraigning some poor wretch while Rome sinks beneath the Tuscan Sea!”

“Until the moment the Tuscan Sea drowns me!”

“May the gods preserve us from any more like you, Cato!”

“Rome would be a better place if there were more like me!”

“Any more like you and Rome wouldn’t work!” Cicero shouted, arms raised, hands clawing at the sky. “When wheels are so clean they squeak, Marcus Porcius Cato, they also seize up! Things run a great deal better with a little dirty grease!”

“And isn’t that the truth,” said Caesar, grinning.

“Postpone it, Cato,” said Crassus wearily.

“The matter is now entirely out of my hands,” said Cato smugly. “Servius Sulpicius is determined.”

“And to think I once thought well of Servius Sulpicius!” said Cicero to Terentia that evening.

“Oh, Cato put him up to it, husband, nothing surer.”

“What does Cato want? To see Rome fall all because justice must be done forthwith? Can’t he see the danger in having only one consul take office on New Year’s Day—and a consul as sick as Silanus into the bargain?” Cicero smacked his hands together in anguish. “I am beginning to think that one hundred Catilinas do not represent the threat to Rome that one Cato does!”

“Well, then you’ll just have to see that Sulpicius doesn’t convict Murena,” said Terentia, ever practical. “Defend Murena yourself, Cicero, and get Hortensius and Crassus to back you.”

“Consuls in office do not normally defend consuls-elect.”

“Then create a precedent. You’re good at that. It’s also lucky for you, I’ve noticed it before.”

“Hortensius is still in Misenum with his big toe padded.”

“Then get him back, if you have to kidnap him.”

“And get the case over and done with. You’re quite right, Terentia. Valerius Flaccus is iudex in the Bribery Court—a patrician, so we’ll just have to hope that he has the sense to see my side rather than Servius Sulpicius’s.”

“He will,” said Terentia, grinning savagely. “It isn’t Sulpicius he’ll blame. It’s Cato, and no patrician really esteems Cato unless he thinks himself cheated out of the consulship, like Servius Sulpicius.”

A hopeful but cunning gleam entered Cicero’s eyes. “I wonder if Murena would be so grateful when I get him off that he’d give me a splendid new house?”

“Don’t you dare, Cicero! You need Murena, not the other way around. Wait for someone considerably more desperate before you demand fees of that kind.”

So Cicero refrained from hinting to Murena that he needed a new house, and defended the consul-elect for no greater reward than a nice little painting by a minor Greek of two centuries ago. Grumbling and moaning, Hortensius was dragged back from Misenum, and Crassus entered the fray with all his thoroughness and patience. They were a triumvirate of defense counsels too formidable for the chagrined Servius Sulpicius Rufus, and managed to get Murena acquitted without needing to bribe the jury—never a consideration, with Cato standing there watching every move.

What else could possibly happen after that? wondered Cicero as he trotted home from the Forum to see whether Murena had sent the painting round yet. What a good speech he had given! The last speech, of course, before the jury gave its verdict. One of Cicero’s greatest assets was his ability to change the tenor of his address after he had gauged the mood of the jury—men he mostly knew well, naturally. Luckily Murena’s jury consisted of fellows who loved wit and loved to laugh. Therefore he had couched his speech humorously, got huge fun out of deriding Cato’s adherence to the (generally unpopular) Stoic philosophy founded by that awful old Greek nuisance, Zeno. The jury were absolutely thrilled, adored every word of it, every nuance—and especially his brilliant impersonation of Cato, from voice to stance to hand aping Cato’s gigantic nose. As for when he managed to wriggle out of his tunic—the entire panel had fallen on the ground in mirth.

“What a comedian we have for senior consul!” said Cato loudly after the verdict came in ABSOLVO. Which only made the jury laugh more, and deem Cato a bad loser.

“Reminds me of the story I heard about Cato in Syria after his brother Caepio died,” said Atticus over dinner that afternoon.

“What story?” asked Cicero dutifully; he really wasn’t at all interested in hearing anything about Cato, but he had cause to be grateful to Atticus, foreman of the jury.

“Well, he was walking down the road like a beggar, three slaves plus Munatius Rufus and Athenodorus Cordylion, when the gates of Antioch loomed in the distance. And outside the city he saw a huge crowd approaching, cheering. ‘See how my fame goes ahead of me?’ he asked Munatius Rufus and Athenodorus Cordylion. ‘The whole of Antioch has come out to do me homage because I am such a perfect example of what every Roman should be—humble, frugal, a credit to the mos maiorum’ Munatius Rufus—he told me the story when we ran into each other in Athens—said he rather doubted this, but old Athenodorus Cordylion believed every word, started bowing and scraping to Cato. Then the crowd arrived, hands full of garlands, maidens strewing rose petals. The ethnarch spoke: ‘And which of you is the great Demetrius, freed-man of the glorious Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus?’ he asked. Whereupon Munatius Rufus and the three slaves fell on the road laughing, and even Athenodorus Cordylion found Cato’s face so funny he joined in. But Cato was livid! Couldn’t see the funny side of it at all, especially since Magnus’s freedman Demetrius was such a perfumed ponce!”

It was a good story, and Cicero laughed sincerely.

“I hear Hortensius hobbled back to Misenum quick-smart.”

“It’s his spiritual home—all those bumbling fish.”

“And no one has surrendered to take advantage of the Senate’s amnesty, Marcus. So what will happen next?”

“I wish I knew, Titus, I wish I knew!”

*

That the next development should emerge from the presence in Rome of a deputation of Allobroges, Gallic tribesmen from far up the Rhodanus in Further Gaul, no one could have predicted. Led by one of their tribal elders known in Latin as Brogus, they had arrived to protest to the Senate against their treatment by a series of governors like Gaius Calpurnius Piso, and by certain moneylenders masquerading as bankers. Unaware of the lex Gabinia which now confined the hearing of such deputations to the month of February, they had not succeeded in getting a dispensation to speed up their petition. So it was either back to Further Gaul, or remain in Rome for two more months spending a fortune on inn charges and bribes to needy senators. They had therefore decided to go home, return at the beginning of February. Nor was the mood a happy one among them, from the meanest Gallic slave all the way up to Brogus. As he said to his best friend among the Romans, the freedman banker Publius Umbrenus, “It seems a lost cause, Umbrenus, but we will return if I can persuade the tribes to be patient. There are those among us who talk of war.”

“Well, Brogus, there is a long Allobrogan tradition of war on Rome,” said Umbrenus, a brilliant idea beginning to blossom in his head. “Look at how you made Pompeius Magnus hop when he went to Spain to fight Sertorius.”

“War with Rome is futile, I believe,” said Brogus gloomily. “The legions are like the millstone, they grind on relentlessly. Kill them in a battle and tell yourself you’ve defeated them, and there they are the next season to do it all over again.”

“What about,” said Umbrenus softly, “if you had Rome’s backing in a war?”

Brogus gasped. “I don’t understand!”

“Rome isn’t a cohesive whole, Brogus, it’s split into many factions. Right at this moment as you know, there is a powerful faction led by some very clever men which has chosen to dispute the rule of the Senate and People of Rome as they exist.”

“Catilina?”

“Catilina. What if I could secure a guarantee from Catilina that after he is Dictator in Rome, the Allobroges are awarded full possession of all the Rhodanus Valley north of, say, Valentia?”

Brogus looked thoughtful. “A tempting offer, Umbrenus.”

“A genuine offer, I do assure you.”

Brogus sighed, smiled. “The only trouble is, Publius, that we have no way of knowing how high you stand in the estimation of a man like the great aristocrat Catilina.”

Under different circumstances Umbrenus might have taken exception to this assessment of his clout, but not now, not while that brilliant idea continued to grow. So he said, “Yes, I see what you mean, Brogus. Of course I see what you mean! Would it allay your fears if I were to arrange that you meet a praetor who is a patrician Cornelius, whose face you know well?’’

“That would allay my fears,” said Brogus.

“Sempronia Tuditani’s house would be ideal—it’s close and her husband is away. But I don’t have time to guide you there, so it had better be behind the temple of Salus on the Alta Semita two hours from now,” said Umbrenus, and ran from the room.

How he managed to get the thing together in those two hours Publius Umbrenus couldn’t recollect later, but get it together he did. It necessitated seeing the praetor Publius Cornelius Lentulus Sura, the senators Lucius Cassius and Gaius Cethegus, and the knights Publius Gabinius Capito and Marcus Caeparius. As the second hour ended, Umbrenus arrived in the alley behind the temple of Salus—a desolate spot—with Lentulus Sura and Gabinius Capito.

Lentulus Sura stayed only long enough to give Brogus a lordly greeting; he was clearly uneasy and very anxious to get away. It was therefore left to Umbrenus and Gabinius Capito to deal with Brogus, Capito acting as spokesman for the conspirators. The five Allobroges listened attentively, but when Capito finally finished the Gauls hedged, looking timid and wary.

“Well, I don’t know…” said Brogus.

“What would it take to convince you we mean what we say?” asked Umbrenus.

“I’m not sure,” Brogus said, looking confused. “Let us think on it tonight, Umbrenus. Could we meet here at dawn tomorrow?”

And so it was agreed.

Back went the Allobroges to the inn on the Forum’s edge, a curious coincidence, for just uphill from it on the Sacra Via was the triumphal arch erected by Quintus Fabius Maximus Allobrogicus, who had (temporarily) conquered this selfsame tribe of Gauls many decades ago, and taken their name to add to his own. Brogus and his fellow Allobroges therefore gazed at a structure which reminded them that they were in the clientele of Allobrogicus’s descendants. Their present patron was Quintus Fabius Sanga, the great-grandson.

“It sounds attractive indeed,” said Brogus to his companions as he stared at the arch. “However, it could also mean disaster. If any of the hotbloods learn about this proposal, they won’t stop to think, they’ll go to war at once. Whereas my bones say no.”

As the deputation contained no hotbloods, the Allobroges decided to see their patron, Quintus Fabius Sanga.

A wise decision, as things turned out. Fabius Sanga went straight to Cicero.

“We have them at last, Quintus Fabius!” cried Cicero.

“In what way?” asked Sanga, who was not bright enough to seek higher office, and in consequence needed to have everything explained.

“Go back to the Allobroges and tell them that they must ask for letters from Lentulus Sura—I was right, I was right!—and from three other high-ranking conspirators as well. They must insist they be taken to see Catilina himself in Etruria—a logical request, considering what they’re being asked to do. It also means a trip out of Rome, and the presence of a guide from among the conspirators.”

“What’s the importance of the guide?” asked Sanga, blinking.

“Only that having one of the conspirators with them will make it more prudent for the party to leave Rome by stealth and in the middle of the night,” said Cicero patiently.

“Is it necessary that they leave by night?”

“Very necessary, Quintus Fabius, believe me! I’ll post men at either end of the Mulvian Bridge, easier to do at night. When the Allobroges and their conspirator guide are on the bridge, my men will pounce. We’ll have hard evidence at last—the letters.”

“You don’t intend to harm the Allobroges?” asked Sanga, quite alarmed at anyone’s pouncing on anyone.

“Of course not! They’ll be party to the plan, and make sure you instruct them not to offer any resistance. You might also tell Brogus to insist he keep the letters himself, and surround himself with his own tribesmen in case any conspirator who goes along tries to destroy my hard evidence.” Cicero looked sternly at Fabius Sanga. “Is it all clear, Quintus Fabius? Can you remember all that without getting muddled?”

“Lead me through it again,” said Sanga.

Sighing, Cicero did so.

And by the end of the following day Cicero heard from Sanga that Brogus and his Allobroges had taken custody of three letters, one from Lentulus Sura, one from Gaius Cethegus, and one from Lucius Statilius. When asked to write, Lucius Cassius had refused and appeared uneasy. Did Cicero think three letters would be enough?

Yes, yes! Cicero sped back by his fleetest servant.

And so in the second quarter of the night a little cavalcade started out of Rome on the Via Lata, which turned into the great north road, the Via Flaminia, after it crossed the Campus Martius on its way to the Mulvian Bridge. With Brogus and the Allobroges traveled their guide, Titus Volturcius of Croton, as well as one Lucius Tarquinius and the knight Marcus Caeparius.

All went well until the party reached the Mulvian Bridge about four hours before dawn, and hastened onto its stone paving. As the last horse trotted onto the bridge proper, the praetor Flaccus at the south end flashed his lamp to the praetor Pomptinus at the north end; both praetors, each backed by a century of good volunteer city militia, moved swiftly to block the bridge. Marcus Caeparius drew his sword and tried to fight, Volturcius gave in, and Tarquinius, a strong swimmer, leaped off the bridge into the darkness of the Tiber. The Allobroges stood obediently in a huddle, the reins of their horses held as firmly as the letters Brogus carried in a pouch at his waist.

*

Cicero was waiting when Pomptinus, Valerius Flaccus, the Allobroges, Volturcius and Caeparius arrived at his house just before dawn. So too was Fabius Sanga waiting—not very bright, perhaps, but exquisitely conscious of his patron’s duty.

“Have you the letters, Brogus?’’ asked Fabius Sanga.

“Four of them,’’ said Brogus, opening his pouch and producing three slender scrolls plus one folded and sealed single sheet.

“Four?” Cicero asked eagerly. “Did Lucius Cassius change his mind?’’

“No, Marcus Tullius, The folded one is a private communication from the praetor Sura to Catilina, so I was told.”

“Pomptinus,” said Cicero, standing straight and tall, “go to the houses of Publius Cornelius Lentulus Sura, Gaius Cornelius Cethegus, Publius Gabinius Capita and Lucius Statilius. Command them to come here to my house at once, but don’t give them any idea why, is that understood? And take your militia with you.”

Pomptinus nodded solemnly; the events of that night seemed almost dreamlike, he hadn’t yet realized what had actually happened when he apprehended the Allobroges on the Mulvian Bridge.

“Flaccus, I need you here as a witness,” said Cicero to his other praetor, “but send your militia to take up station around the temple of Concord. I intend to summon the Senate into session there as soon as I’ve done a few things here.”

All eyes watched him, including, he noticed wryly, Terentia’s from a dark corner. Well, why not? She had stuck by him through all of it; she had earned her backseat at the play. After some thought he sent the Allobroges (save Brogus) to the dining room for food and wine, and sat down with Brogus, Sanga and Valerius Flaccus to wait for Pomptinus and the men he had been ordered to summon. Volturcius was no danger—he huddled in the corner farthest from Terentia and wept—but Caeparius looked as if he might still have some fight left in him. Cicero ended in locking him into a cupboard, wishing he had sent him off under guard—if Rome had only possessed some secure place to put him, that is!

“The truth is,” said Lucius Valerius Flaccus, swinging the cupboard key, “that your impromptu prison is undoubtedly more secure than the Lautumiae.”

Gaius Cethegus arrived first, looking wary and defiant; not very many moments later Statilius and Gabinius Capita came in together, with Pomptinus just behind them. The wait for Lentulus Sura was much longer, but eventually he too came through the door, face and body betraying nothing beyond annoyance.

“Really, Cicero, this is too much!” he cried before he set eyes on the others. His start was minuscule, but Cicero saw it.

“Join your friends, Lentulus,” said Cicero.

Someone began hammering on the outside door. Clad in armor because of their nocturnal mission, Pomptinus and Valerius Flaccus drew their swords.

“Open it, Tiro!” said Cicero.

But it was not danger or assassins in the street; in walked Catulus, Crassus, Curio, Mamercus and Servilius Vatia.

“When we were summoned to the temple of Concord by express command of the senior consul,” said Catulus, “we decided it was better to seek out the senior consul first.”

“You’re very welcome indeed,” said Cicero gratefully.

“What’s going on?” asked Crassus, looking at the conspirators.

As Cicero explained there were more knocks on the door; more senators piled in, bursting with curiosity.

“How does the word get around so quickly?” Cicero demanded, unable to conceal his jubilation.

But finally, the room packed, the senior consul was able to get down to business, tell the story of the Allobroges and the capture at the Pons Mulvius, display the letters.

“Then,” said Cicero very formally, “Publius Cornelius Lentulus Sura, Gaius Cornelius Cethegus, Publius Gabinius Capito and Lucius Statilius, I place you under arrest pending a full investigation of your part in the conspiracy of Lucius Sergius Catilina.” He turned to Mamercus. “Princeps Senatus, I give these three scrolls into your custody and request that you do not break their seals until the entire Senate is assembled in the temple of Concord. It will then be your duty as Princeps Senatus to read them out.” He held up the folded sheet for all to see. “This letter I will open here and now, under all your eyes. If it compromises its author, the praetor Lentulus Sura, then there is nothing to stop our going ahead with our investigation. If it is innocent, then we must decide what we do with the three scrolls before the Senate meets.”

“Go ahead, Marcus Tullius Cicero,” said Mamercus, caught up in this nightmare moment, hardly able to believe that Lentulus Sura, once consul, twice praetor, could really be involved.

Oh, how good it was to be the center of all eyes in a drama as huge and portentous as this one! thought Cicero as, consummate actor that he was, he broke the wax seal everyone had identified as Lentulus Sura’s with a hard, loud crack. It seemed to take him forever to unfold the sheet, glance at it, assimilate its contents before beginning to read it out.

“Lucius Sergius, I beg you to change your mind. I know you do not wish to taint our enterprise with a slave army, but believe me when I say that if you do admit slaves into the ranks of your soldiers, you will have a landslide of men and victory within days. All Rome can send against you are four legions, one each from Marcius Rex and Metellus Creticus, and two under the command of that drone Hybrida.

“It has been prophesied that three members of the gens Cornelia will rule Rome, and I know that I am the third of those three men named Cornelius. I understand that your name, Sergius, is much older than the name Cornelius, but you have already indicated that you would prefer to rule in Etruria than in Rome. In which case, reconsider your stand on slaves. I condone it. Please consent to it.”

He ended in the midst of a silence so profound that it seemed not even a breath disturbed the air of that crowded room.

Then Catulus spoke, hard and angry. “Lentulus Sura, you’re done for!” he snapped. “I piss on you!”

“I think,” said Mamercus heavily, “that you should open the scrolls now, Marcus Tullius.”

“What, and have Cato accuse me of tampering with State’s evidence?” asked Cicero, opening his eyes wide and then crossing them. “No, Mamercus, they stay sealed. I wouldn’t want to annoy our dear Cato, no matter how right an act opening them might be!”

The praetor Gaius Sulpicius was there, Cicero noted. Good! Give him a job too, let it not look as if he played favorites, let there be absolutely nothing for Cato to find fault with.

“Gaius Sulpicius, would you go to the houses of Lentulus Sura, Cethegus, Gabinius and Statilius, and see if they contain any arms? Take Pomptinus’s militia with you, and have them continue the search to Porcius Laeca’s residence—also Caeparius, Lucius Cassius, this Volturcius here, and one Lucius Tarquinius. I say let your men continue the search after you personally have inspected the houses of the senatorial conspirators because I will need you in the Senate as soon as possible. You can report your findings to me there.”

No one was interested in eating or drinking, so Cicero let Caeparius out of the cupboard and summoned the Allobroges from the dining room. What fight Caeparius might have owned before being shut away had quite deserted him; Cicero’s cupboard had proved to be almost airtight, and Caeparius came out of it gibbering.

A praetor holding office yet a traitor! And once a consul too. How to deal with it in a way which would reflect well upon that upstart New Man, that lodger, that resident alien from Arpinum? In the end Cicero crossed the room to Lentulus Sura’s side and took the man’s limp right hand in his own firm clasp.

“Come, Publius Cornelius,” he said with great courtesy, “it is time to go to the temple of Concord.”

“How odd!” said Lucius Cotta as the crocodile of men streamed across the lower Forum from the Vestal Stairs to the temple of Concord, separated from the Tullianum execution chamber by the Gemonian Steps.

“Odd? What’s odd?” asked Cicero, still leading the nerveless Lentulus Sura by the hand.

“Right at this moment the contractors are putting the new statue of Jupiter Optimus Maximus on its plinth inside his temple. Long overdue! It’s nearly three years since Torquatus and I vowed it.” Lucius Cotta shivered. “All those portents!”

“Hundreds of them in your year,” said Cicero. “I was sorry to see the old Etruscan wolf lose her suckling babe to lightning. I used to love the look on her face, so doggy! Giving Romulus her milk, but not a bit concerned about him.”

“I never understood why she didn’t give suck to two babes,” said Cotta, then shrugged. “Oh well, perhaps among the Etrusci the legend only called for one child. The statue certainly predates Romulus and Remus, and we still have the wolf herself.”

“You’re right,” said Cicero as he helped Lentulus Sura mount the three steps to the porch of the very low temple, “it is an omen. I hope orienting the Great God to the east means good!” At the door he came to an abrupt halt. “Edepol, what a crush!”

The word had flown. Concord was bursting at the seams to contain every senator present in Rome, for the sick came too. This choice of venue wasn’t entirely capricious, though Cicero had a tic about concord among the orders of Roman men; no meeting dealing with the consequences of treason was supposed to be held in the Curia Hostilia, and as this treason ran the full gamut of the orders of Roman men, Concord was a logical place to meet. Unfortunately the wooden tiers put inside temples like Jupiter Stator when the Senate assembled there just did not fit inside Concord. Everyone had to stand where he fetched up, wishing for better ventilation.

Eventually Cicero managed to produce some kind of crowded order by having the consulars and magistrates sit on stools in front of the senators of pedarius or minor rank. He sent the curule magistrates to the middle rear, then between the two rows of stools facing each other he put the Allobroges, Volturcius, Caeparius, Lentulus Sura, Cethegus, Statilius, Gabinius Capita and Fabius Sanga.

“The arms were stored in the house of Gaius Cethegus!” said the praetor Sulpicius, entering breathless. “Hundreds and hundreds of swords and daggers. A few shields, no cuirasses.”

“I am an ardent collector of weapons,” said Cethegus, bored.

Frowning, Cicero pondered on another logistical problem this confined space had generated. “Gaius Cosconius,” he said to that praetor, “I hear you’re brilliant at shorthand. Candidly, I can see no room whatsoever in here for half a dozen scribes, so I’ll dispense with the professionals. Choose three pedarii who are also capable of taking down the proceedings verbatim. That divides the task among four of you, and four will have to be enough. I doubt this will be a long meeting, so you’ll have time after it to compare notes and get a draft together.”

“Will you look at him and listen to him?’’ whispered Silanus to Caesar—an odd choice of confidant given the relationship between them, but probably, Caesar decided, there was no one else jammed near Silanus he deemed worth speaking to, including Murena. “In his glory at last!” Silanus made a noise Caesar interpreted as disgust. “Well, I for one find this business unspeakably sordid!”

“Even squires from Arpinum must have their day,” said Caesar. “Gaius Marius started a tradition.”

Finally and fussily Cicero opened his meeting with the prayers and the offerings, the auspices and the salutations. But his prior assessment was right; it was not a protracted affair. The guide Titus Volturcius listened to Fabius Sanga and Brogus testify, then wept and demanded to be allowed to tell all. Which he did, answering every question, incriminating Lentulus Sura and the other four more and more heavily. Lucius Cassius, he explained, had departed very suddenly for Further Gaul, Volturcius guessed on his way to Massilia and a voluntary exile. Others too had fled, including the senators Quintus Annius Chilo, the Brothers Sulla, and Publius Autronius. Name after name tumbled out, knights and bankers, minions, leeches. By the time Volturcius got to the end of his litany, there were some twenty-seven Roman men importantly involved, from Catilina all the way down to himself (and the Dictator’s nephew, Publius Sulla—not named—was sweating profusely).

After which Mamercus Princeps Senatus broke the seals on the letters and read them out. Almost an anticlimax.

Looking forward to playing the role of great advocate in howling chase of the truth, Cicero questioned Gaius Cethegus first. But, alas, Cethegus broke down and confessed immediately.

Next came Statilius, with a similar result.

After that it was Lentulus Sura’s turn, and he didn’t even wait for the questioning to begin before he confessed.

Gabinius Capito fought back for some time, but confessed just as Cicero was getting into stride.

And finally came Marcus Caeparius, who erupted into frenzied weeping and seemed to confess between bouts of sobbing.

Though it came hard to Catulus, when the business was over he moved a vote of thanks to Rome’s brilliant and vigilant senior consul, the words sticking a little, but emerging quite as clearly as Caeparius’s confession.

“I hail you as pater patriae—father of our country!” was Cato’s contribution.

“Is he serious or sarcastic?’’ asked Silanus of Caesar.

“With Cato, who knows?”

Cicero was then given the authority to issue warrants for the apprehension of the conspirators not present, after which it was time to farm out the five conspirators present to senatorial custody.

“I will take Lentulus Sura,” said Lucius Caesar sadly. “He is my brother-in-law. By family he should go to another Lentulus, perhaps, but by right he falls to me.”

“I’ll take Gabinius Capito,” said Crassus.

“And I Statilius,” said Caesar.

“Give me young Cethegus,” said Quintus Cornificius.

“And I’ll have Caeparius,” said old Gnaeus Terentius.

“What do we do with a treasonous praetor in office?” asked Silanus, who looked very grey in that airless atmosphere.

“We command that he doff his insignia of office and dismiss his lictors,” said Cicero.

“I don’t believe that’s legal,” said Caesar, a little wearily. “No one has the power to terminate the office of a curule magistrate before the last day of his year. Strictly, you can’t arrest him.”

“We can under a Senatus Consultum Ultimum!” snapped Cicero, nettled. Why was Caesar always picking fault? “If you prefer, don’t call it a termination! Just think of it as the removal of his curule trappings!”

Whereupon Crassus, fed up with the crush and dying to get out of Concord, interrupted this acrimonious exchange to move that a public thanksgiving be celebrated for the discovery of the plot without bloodshed within the city walls. But he didn’t name Cicero.

“While you’re about it, Crassus, why don’t you vote our dear Marcus Tullius Cicero a Civic Crown?” snarled Poplicola.

“Now that,” said Silanus to Caesar, “is definitely ironic.”

“Oh, the Gods be thanked, he’s finally breaking the meeting up” was Caesar’s reply. “Couldn’t he have thought of a reason why we could meet in Jupiter Stator or Bellona?”

“Here tomorrow at the second hour of day!” cried Cicero to a chorus of groans, then rushed from the temple to mount the rostra and deliver a reassuring speech to the large and expectant crowd.

“I don’t know why he’s in such a tearing hurry,” said Crassus to Caesar as they stood flexing their muscles and breathing deeply of the sweet outside air. “He can’t go home tonight, his wife’s hosting the Bona Dea.”

“Yes, of course,” said Caesar, sighing. “My wife and mother are off there, not to mention all my Vestals. And Julia too, I suppose. She’s growing up.”

“I wish Cicero would.”

“Oh, come, Crassus, he’s in his element at last! Let him have his little victory. It’s not really a very big conspiracy, and it stood about as much chance of succeeding as Pan competing against Apollo. A tempest inside a bottle, no more.”

“Pan against Apollo? He won, didn’t he?”

“Only because Midas was the judge, Marcus. For which he wore a pair of ass’s ears ever after.”

“Midas always sits in judgement, Caesar.”

“The power of gold.”

“Exactly.”

They began to move up the Forum, not the least bit tempted to stop and hear Cicero’s address to the People.

“You’ve family involved, of course,” said Crassus when Caesar ignored the Via Sacra and headed toward the Palatine too.

“Indeed I have. One very silly cousin and her three strapping lout sons.”

“Will she be at Lucius Caesar’s, do you think?”

“Definitely not. Lucius Caesar is too punctilious. He’s got his sister’s husband there in custody. So, with my mother at Cicero’s house celebrating the Bona Dea, I thought I’d look in on Lucius and tell him I’ll go straight over to see Julia Antonia.”

“I don’t envy you,” said Crassus, grinning.

“Believe me, I don’t envy myself!”

*

He could hear Julia Antonia before he knocked on the door of Lentulus Sura’s very nice house, and squared his shoulders. Why did it have to be the Bona Dea tonight? Julia Antonia’s entire circle of friends would be at Cicero’s house, and Bona Dea was not the sort of deity one ignored in favor of a distressed friend.

All three of Antonius Creticus’s boys were ministering to their mother with a degree of patience and kindness Caesar found surprising—which didn’t stop her leaping to her feet and throwing herself on Caesar’s chest.

“Oh, cousin!” she howled. “What am I to do? Where will I go? They’ll confiscate all Sura’s property! I won’t even have a roof over my head!”

“Leave the man alone, Mama,” said Mark Antony, her eldest, pulling her clutching fingers away and escorting her back to her chair. “Now sit there and keep your misery to yourself, it’s not going to help us out of this predicament.”

Perhaps because she had already worn herself into exhaustion, Julia Antonia obeyed; her youngest, Lucius, a rather fat and clumsy fellow, sat on the chair next to her, took her hands in his and began to make soothing noises.

“It’s his turn,” said Antony briefly, and drew his cousin outside into the peristyle, where the middle son, Gaius, joined them.

“It’s a pity the Cornelii Lentuli comprise the majority of Cornelians in the Senate these days,” said Caesar.

“And none of them will be a bit happy to claim a traitor in the bosom of the family,” said Mark Antony grimly. “Is he a traitor?”

“Beyond any shadow of doubt, Antonius.”

“You’re sure?”

“I just said so! What’s the matter? Worried that it will come out you’re involved too?” asked Caesar, suddenly anxious.

Antony flushed darkly, but said nothing; it was Gaius who answered, stamping his foot.

“We’re not involved! Why is it that everyone—including you!—always believes the worst of us?”

“It’s called earning a reputation,” said Caesar patiently. “All three of you have shocking reputations—gambling, wine, whores.” He looked at Mark Antony ironically. “Even the occasional boyfriend.”

“It isn’t true about me and Curio,” said Antony uncomfortably. “We only pretend to be lovers to annoy Curio’s father.”

“But it’s all a part of earning a reputation, Antonius, as you and your brothers are about to find out. Every hound in the Senate is going to be sniffing around your arses, so I suggest that if you are involved, even remotely, you tell me so now.”

All three of Creticus’s sons had long ago concluded that this particular Caesar had the most disconcerting eyes of anyone they knew—piercing, cold, omniscient. It meant they didn’t like him because those eyes put them on the defensive, made them feel less than they secretly believed they were. And he never bothered to condemn them for what they deemed minor failings; he came around only when things were really bad, as now. Thus his appearances were reminiscent of a harbinger of doom, tended to strip them of the ability to fight back, defend themselves.

So Mark Antony answered sulkily, “We’re not even remotely involved. Clodius said Catilina was a loser.”

“And whatever Clodius says is right, eh?’’

“Usually.”

“I agree,” said Caesar unexpectedly. “He’s shrewd.”

“What will happen?” asked Gaius Antonius abruptly.

“Your stepfather will be tried for treason and convicted,” Caesar said. “He’s confessed, had to. Cicero’s praetors caught the Allobroges with two incriminating letters of his, and they’re not forgeries, I can assure you.”

“Mama is right, then. She’ll lose everything.”

“I shall try to see that she doesn’t, and there will be a good number of men who will agree with me. It’s time Rome stopped punishing a man’s family for his crimes. When I’m consul I shall try to put a law on the tablets to that effect.’’ He began to move back toward the atrium. “There’s nothing I can do for your mother personally, Antonius. She needs female company. As soon as my mother comes home from the Bona Dea, I’ll send her over.’’ In the atrium he gazed around. “A pity Sura didn’t collect art, you might have had a few things to salt away before the State arrives to collect. Though I meant what I said, I will do my best to ensure that the little Sura has is not confiscated. I suppose that’s why he joined the conspiracy, to increase his fortune.”

“Oh, undoubtedly,” said Antony, ushering Caesar to the door. “He was forever moaning about how badly expulsion from the Senate had ruined him—and that he’d done nothing to warrant it. He’s always maintained that the censor Lentulus Clodianus had it in for him. Some family squabble going back to when Clodianus was adopted into the Lentuli.”

“Do you like him?” asked Caesar, stepping across the threshold.

“Oh, yes! Sura is a splendid fellow, the best of men!”

And that was interesting, he thought, making his way back to the Forum and the Domus Publica. Not every stepfather would have managed to make himself liked by that trio of young men! They were such typical Antonii. Heedless, passionate, impulsive, prone to indulge their lusts of whatever kind. No political heads on any of those broad shoulders! Massive brutes, all three of them, and ugly in a way that women seemed to find enormously attractive. What on earth would they do to the Senate when they were old enough to stand for quaestor? Provided, that is, that they had the money to stand. Creticus had suicided in disgrace, though no one had moved to indict him posthumously for crimes against the State; he had lacked sense and judgement, not loyalty to Rome. However, his estate was eroded when Julia Antonia married Lentulus Sura, a man without children of his own—but without a large fortune either. Lucius Caesar had a son and a daughter; the Antonii could hope for nothing there. Which meant that it would be up to him, Caesar, to try to improve the Antonian fortune. How he was going to do this he had no idea, but he would do it. Money always appeared when it was desperately needed.

*

The fugitive Lucius Tarquinius who had jumped off the Mulvian Bridge into the Tiber was apprehended on the road to Faesulae and brought to Cicero before the Senate met in Concord the day after the Bona Dea. His house being closed to him, Cicero had spent the night with Nigidius Figulus, who had most thoughtfully asked Atticus and Quintus Cicero to dinner. They had spent a pleasant evening made more pleasant when Terentia sent a message to say that after the fire on the altar to Bona Dea had gone out, a huge flare of flame suddenly roared up, which the Vestals had taken to mean that Cicero had saved his country.

What a delightful thought that was! Father of his country. Savior of his country. He, the lodger from Arpinum.

He was not, however, entirely at ease. Despite his reassuring speech to the People from the rostra, this morning’s clients who had managed to track him down to the house of Nigidius Figulus were edgy, anxious, even afraid. How many ordinary people inside Rome were in favor of a new order—and a general cancellation of debt? Many, it seemed; Catilina might well have been able to take the city from within on the night of the Saturnalia. All those hopes in all those financially distressed breasts were permanently dashed as of yesterday, and those who had harbored those hopes were today aware that there would be no respite. Rome seemed peaceful; yet Cicero’s clients insisted there were violent undercurrents. So did Atticus. And here am I, thought Cicero, conscious of a tiny panic, responsible for arresting five men! Men with clout and clients, especially Lentulus Sura. But Statilius was from Apulia, and Gabinius Capito from southern Picenum—two places with a history of revolt or devotion to an Italian rather than a Roman cause. As for Gaius Cethegus—his father had been known as the King of the Backbenchers! Enormous wealth and clout there. And he, Cicero, the senior consul, was solely responsible for their arrest and detention. For producing the hard evidence which had caused all five to break down and confess. Therefore he would be responsible for their condemnation at trial, and that was going to be a long, drawn-out process during which violent undercurrents might boil to the surface. None of this year’s praetors would want the duty of being president of a specially convened Treason Court—treason trials had been so thin on the ground of late that no praetor had been assigned to it in two years. Therefore his prisoners would continue to live under custody in Rome until well into the New Year, which also meant new tribunes of the plebs like Metellus Nepos yammering that Cicero had exceeded his authority, and other tribunes of the plebs like Cato hovering to pounce on any legal slip.

If only, thought Cicero, conducting his prisoner Tarquinius to the temple of Concord, those wretched men didn’t have to stand trial! They were guilty; everyone knew that from their own mouths. They would be condemned; they could not be acquitted by the most lenient or corrupt jury. And eventually they would be—executed? But the courts couldn’t execute! The best the courts could do was pronounce permanent exile and confiscate all property. Nor could a trial in the Popular Assembly produce a death sentence. To get that would necessitate trial in the Centuries under perduellio, and who was to say what verdict that might bring in, with phrases like “a general cancellation of debt” still passing from mouth to mouth? Sometimes, thought the Champion of the Courts as he plodded along, trials were a wretched nuisance.

Lucius Tarquinius had little new to offer when questioning began in the temple of Concord. Cicero retained the privilege of asking the questions himself, and took Tarquinius through the steps leading up to apprehension at the Mulvian Bridge. After which the senior consul threw questions open to the House, feeling that it might be prudent to allow someone else a little glory.

What he didn’t expect was the answer Tarquinius gave to the first such question, put to him by Marcus Porcius Cato.

“Why were you with the Allobroges in the first place?” Cato asked in his loud, harsh voice.

“Eh?” from Tarquinius, a cheeky fellow with scant respect for his senatorial betters.

“The Allobroges had a guide in the person of Titus Volturcius. Marcus Caeparius said he was present to report the result of the meeting between the Allobroges and Lucius Sergius Catilina back to the conspirators in Rome. So why were you there, Tarquinius?”

“Oh, I really didn’t have much to do with the Allobroges, Cato!” said Tarquinius cheerfully. “I just traveled with the party because it was safer and more amusing than going north on my own. No, I had different business with Catilina.”

“Did you now? And what business was that?” asked Cato.

“I was carrying a message from Marcus Crassus to Catilina.”

The crowded little temple fell absolutely silent.

“Say that again, Tarquinius.”

“I was carrying a message from Marcus Crassus to Catilina.”

A buzz of voices arose, growing in volume until Cicero had to have his chief lictor pound the fasces on the floor.

“Silence!” he roared.

“You were carrying a message from Marcus Crassus to Catilina,” Cato repeated. “Then where is it, Tarquinius?”

“Oh, it wasn’t written down!” chirped Tarquinius, seeming happy. “I had it inside my head.”

“Do you still have it inside your head?” asked Cato, gazing now at Crassus, who sat on his stool looking stunned.

“Yes. Want to hear it?”

“Thank you.”

Tarquinius went up on his toes and jigged. ‘“Marcus Crassus says to be of good cheer, Lucius Catilina. Rome is not fully united against you, there are more and more important people coming over,’ ” chanted Tarquinius.

“He’s as cunning as a sewer rat!” growled Crassus. “Accuse me, and that automatically means that in order to clear myself, I will have to spend a great deal of my fortune getting men like him acquitted!”

“Hear, hear!” cried Caesar.

“Well, Tarquinius, I won’t do it!” said Crassus. “Pick on someone more vulnerable. Marcus Cicero knows well enough that I was the first person in this whole body of men to come to him with specific evidence. And accompanied by two unimpeachable witnesses, Marcus Marcellus and Quintus Metellus Scipio.”

“That is absolutely so,” said Cicero.

“It is so,” said Marcellus.

“It is so,” said Metellus Scipio.

“Then, Cato, do you wish to take this matter any further?’’ asked Crassus, who detested Cato.

“No, Marcus Crassus, I do not. It is clearly a fabrication.”

“Does the House agree?” Crassus demanded.

A show of hands revealed that the House agreed.

“Which means,’’ said Catulus, “that our dear Marcus Crassus is a big enough fish to spit out the hook without even tearing his mouth. But I have the same accusation to level at a much smaller fish! I accuse Gaius Julius Caesar of being party to the conspiracy of Catilina!”

“And I join with Quintus Lutatius Catulus in leveling that accusation!” roared Gaius Calpurnius Piso.

“Evidence?’’ asked Caesar, not even bothering to get up.

“Evidence will be forthcoming,” said Catulus smugly.

“What does it consist of? Letters? Verbal messages? Sheer imagination?”

“Letters!” said Gaius Piso.

“Then where are these letters?” asked Caesar, unruffled. “To whom are they addressed, if I am supposed to have written them? Or are you having trouble forging my handwriting, Catulus?’’.

“It’s correspondence between you and Catilina!” cried Catulus.

“I think I did write to him once,” said Caesar pensively. “It would have been when he was propraetor in Africa Province. But I definitely haven’t written to him since.”

“You have, you have!” said Piso, grinning. “We’ve got you, Caesar, wriggle how you like! We’ve got you!”

“Actually,” said Caesar, “you haven’t, Piso. Ask Marcus Cicero what help I gave his case against Catilina.”

“Don’t bother, Piso,” said Quintus Arrius. “I am happy to tell what Marcus Cicero can confirm. Caesar asked me to go to Etruria and talk to the Sullan veterans around Faesulae. He knew no one else of sufficient standing had their trust, which is why he asked me. I was happy to oblige him, though I kicked my own arse for not thinking of it for myself. I didn’t think. It takes a man like Caesar to see events clearly. If Caesar was a part of the conspiracy, he would never have acted.”

“Quintus Arrius speaks the truth,” said Cicero.

“So sit down and shut up, the pair of you!” Caesar snapped. “If a better man beat you in the election for Pontifex Maximus, Catulus, then accept it! And, Piso, it must have cost you a large fortune to bribe your way out of conviction in my court! But why paint yourselves in shabby colors out of simple spite? This House knows you, this House knows what you’re capable of!”

There might have been more to say on that subject, save that a messenger came sprinting to inform Cicero that a band of freedmen belonging to Cethegus and Lentulus Sura were recruiting through the city with some success, and that when they had sufficient men they intended to attack the houses of Lucius Caesar and Cornificius, rescue Lentulus Sura and Cethegus, set them up as consuls, then rescue the other prisoners and take over the city.

“This kind of thing,” said Cicero, “is going to go on until the trials are over! Months of it, Conscript Fathers, months of it! Start thinking how we can reduce the time, I beg you!”

He dissolved the meeting and had his praetors call up the city militia; detachments were sent to all the houses of the custodians, every important public place was garrisoned, and a group of knights of the Eighteen, including Atticus, went to the Capitol to defend Jupiter Optimus Maximus.

“Oh, Terentia, I don’t want my year as consul to end in uncertainty and possible failure, not after such a triumph!” cried Cicero to his wife when he got home.

“Because while ever those men are inside Rome and Catilina in Etruria with an army, the whole thing still hangs in the balance,” she said.

“Exactly, my dear.”

“And you will end like Lucullus—do all the hard work, then see Silanus and Murena take the credit because they’ll be the consuls when it’s finally concluded.”

Actually that hadn’t occurred to him, but as his wife said it so succinctly, he shuddered. Yes, that was how it would turn out, all right! Cheated by time and tradition.

“Well,” he said, squaring his shoulders, “if you will excuse my absence from the dining room, I think I must retire to my study and lock myself in until I can come up with an answer.”

“You know the answer already, husband. However, I understand. What you need to do is screw up your courage. While you attempt that, keep it in your mind that the Bona Dea is on your side.”

*

“Rot them, I say!” said Crassus to Caesar, quite violently for such a placid man. “At least half of those fellatores sat there hoping Tarquinius would make his charges stick! Lucky for me that it was my doorstep Quintus Curius chose for his batch of letters! Otherwise, today I would have been in serious trouble.”

“My defense was more tenuous,” said Caesar, “but happily so were the accusations. Stupid! Catulus and Piso only got the idea to accuse me when Tarquinius accused you. Had they thought of it last night, they could have forged some letters. Or else they should have said nothing until they managed to forge letters.

“One of the few things which always cheer me up, Marcus, is how thick one’s enemies are! I find it a great consolation that I will never meet an adversary as clever as I am myself.”

Though he was used to Caesar’s making statements like that, Crassus nonetheless found himself staring at the younger man with fascination. Did he never doubt himself? If he did, Crassus had never seen a sign of it. Just as well he was a cool man, Caesar. Otherwise Rome might find herself wishing for a thousand Catilinas.

“I’m not attending tomorrow,” said Crassus then.

“I wish you would! It promises to be interesting.”

“I don’t care if it’s more riveting than two perfectly matched gladiators! Cicero can have his glory. Pater patriae! Tchah!” he snorted.

“Oh, Cato was being sarcastic, Marcus!”

“I know that, Caesar! What annoys me is that Cicero took him literally.”

“Poor man. It must be awful always to have to stand on the outside looking in.”

“Are you feeling all right, Caesar? Pity? You?”

“Oh, I have a streak of pity occasionally. That Cicero rouses it is no mystery. He’s such a vulnerable target.”

*

Despite his having to organize the militia and think of how to extract himself from the dilemma of time, Cicero had also given thought to turning the temple of Concord into a more acceptable venue for the Senate to occupy. Thus when the senators turned up at dawn on the following day, the fifth one of December, they found that carpenters had toiled to some effect. There were three tiers on either side, taller but narrower, and a dais at the end for the curule magistrates, with a bench in front of it for the tribunes of the plebs.

“You won’t be able to sit on your stools, the tiers are too narrow, but you can use the tiers themselves as seats,” said the senior consul. He pointed to the top of the side and end walls. “I’ve also installed plenty of ventilators.”

Perhaps three hundred men had come, a few less than on the earlier days; after a short interval of settling like hens in a roost, the Senate indicated it was ready for the day’s business.

“Conscript Fathers,” said Cicero solemnly, “I have convened this body yet again to discuss something we dare not put off, nor turn away from. Namely, what to do with our five prisoners.

“In many ways the situation resembles the one which existed thirty-seven years ago, after Saturninus and his rebel confederates surrendered their occupation of the Capitol. No one knew what to do with them! No one was willing to take custody of such desperate fellows when the city of Rome was known to harbor many sympathizers—the house of a man agreeing to take custody might burn to the ground, he himself die, his prisoner be freed. So in the end the traitor Saturninus and his fourteen senior henchmen were locked up in our beloved Senate House, the Curia Hostilia. No windows, solid bronze doors. Impregnable. Then a group of slaves led by one Scaeva mounted the roof, tore off the tiles and used them to kill the men inside. A deplorable deed—but a great relief too! Once Saturninus was dead, Rome calmed down and the trouble went away. I admit the presence of Catilina in Etruria is an additional complication, but first and foremost we need to calm the city of Rome!”

Cicero paused, knowing perfectly well that some of the men who listened were among the band Sulla had urged up onto the Curia Hostilia roof, and that no slaves had been among them. The owner of the slave Scaeva had been there, Quintus—Croton?—and after the tumult had died down enough to be deemed well and truly over, Croton had freed Scaeva with lavish public praise for his deed—and thereby shifted the blame. A story Sulla never denied, most especially after he became Dictator. Slaves were so handy!

“Conscript Fathers,” said Cicero sternly, “we are sitting on a volcano! Five men lie under arrest in various houses, five men who in front of you and inside this House broke down and freely confessed to all their crimes. Confessed to high treason! Yes, they convicted themselves out of their own mouths after seeing proof so concrete its mere existence damned them! And as they confessed they also damned other men, men now under warrants for capture whenever and wherever they might be found. Consider then what will happen when they are found. We will have anything up to twenty men in custody in ordinary Roman houses until they have undergone the full and atrociously slow trial process.

“Yesterday we saw one of the evils arising from this awful situation. A group of men banded together and managed to recruit more men so that our self-confessed traitors might be freed from custody, the consuls murdered, and them installed as consuls instead! In other words, the revolution is going to go on while ever self-confessed traitors remain inside Rome and the army of Catilina remains inside Italia. By quick action, I averted yesterday’s attempt. But I will remain consul for less than another month. Yes, Conscript Fathers, the annual upheaval is almost upon us, and we are not in fit condition to deal with a change in magistrates.

“My chief ambition is to depart from office, with the city’s end of this catastrophe properly tidied up, thereby spelling to Catilina the very clear message that he has no allies inside Rome with power enough to help him. And there is a way….”

The senior consul stopped for that to sink in, wishing that his old enemy and friend Hortensius was in the House. Hortensius would see the beauty of the argument, whereas most of the others would see only the expedience. As for Caesar, well… Cicero wasn’t even sure he cared to receive Caesar’s approbation, as lawyer or man. Crassus hadn’t bothered to come, and he was the last of the men Cicero cared to impress with his legal reasoning.

“Until Catilina and Manlius are defeated or surrender, Rome continues to exist under the martial law of a Senatus Consultum Ultimum. Just as Rome still lay under a Senatus Consultum Ultimum when Saturninus and his minions perished in the Curia Hostilia. It meant that no one could be held accountable for taking matters to their inevitable end and executing those rebels. The Senatus Consultum Ultimum extended indemnity to all who participated in the throwing of the tiles, slaves though they were, for a slave’s master is accountable at law for his slave’s actions, therefore all the men who owned those slaves could have faced prosecution for murder. Except for the Senatus Consultum Ultimum. The blanket decree which in a state of emergency the Senate of Rome is authorized to issue in order to preserve the well-being of the State, no matter what it takes to preserve that well-being.

“Consider our self-confessed traitors here in Rome, plus the other traitors we are looking for because they fled before they could be apprehended. All guilty out of the mouths of the five men we have in custody, not to mention the testimony you have heard from Quintus Curius, Titus Volturcius, Lucius Tarquinius and Brogus of the Allobroges. Under the conditions of an existing Senatus Consultum Ultimum, these self-confessed traitors do not have to be tried. Because at present we are in the midst of a dire emergency, this august body of men, the Senate of Rome, has been empowered to do whatever is necessary to preserve the well-being of Rome. To keep these men in custody pending a trial process and then have to air them in the public Forum during that trial is tantamount to stirring up a fresh rebellion! Especially if Catilina and Manlius, formally declared public enemies, are still at liberty in Italia with an army. That army could even descend on our city in an attempt to free the traitors during their trials!”

Did he have them? Yes, decided Cicero. Until he looked at Caesar, who was sitting very straight on the bottom step, mouth thin, two spots of scarlet burning in his pale cheeks. He would meet opposition from Caesar, a very great speaker. Urban praetor-elect, which meant he would speak early unless the order changed.

He had to ram his point home before Caesar spoke! But how? Cicero’s eyes wandered along the back tier behind Caesar until they lighted upon little old Gaius Rabirius, in the Senate for forty years without ever once standing for a magistracy, which meant he was still a pedarius. The quintessential backbencher. Not that Rabirius was the sum of all manly virtues! Thanks to many shady deals and immoralities, Rabirius was little loved by most of Rome. He was also one of that band of noblemen who had sneaked onto the Curia Hostilia roof, torn off the tiles, shelled Saturninus….

“If this body were to decide the fate of the five men in our custody and of those men who fled, its members would be as free from legal blame as—as—why, trying to arraign dear Gaius Rabirius on charges that he murdered Saturninus! Manifestly ridiculous, Conscript Fathers. The Senatus Consultum Ultimum covers all, and allows all too. I am going to advocate that in full debate this House should reach a decision today on the fate of our five self-confessed prisoners, guilty out of their own mouths. To hold them for trial would, in my opinion, be to imperil Rome. Let us debate here today and decide what to do with them under the existing blanket protection of the Senatus Consultum Ultimum! Under that decree we can order them executed. Or we can order them into a permanent exile, confiscate their property, forbid them fire and water within Italia for the rest of their lives.”

He drew a breath, wondering about Cato, also sure to oppose it. Yes, Cato sat rigid and glaring. But as a tribune of the plebs-elect, he was very far down the speaking hierarchy indeed.

“Conscript Fathers, it is not my business to make a decision on this matter. I have done my duty in outlining the legalities of the situation to you, and in informing you what you can do under a Senatus Consultum Ultimum. Personally I am in favor of a decision here today, not a trial process. But I refuse to indicate exactly what this body should do with the guilty men. That is better from some other man than I.”

A pause, a challenging look at Caesar, another at Cato. “I direct that the order of speaking be not in elected magistracy, but in age and wisdom and experience. Therefore I will ask the senior consul-elect to speak first, then the junior consul-elect, after which I will ask an opinion from every consular present here today. Fourteen all told, by my count. After which the praetors-elect will speak, beginning with the urban praetor-elect, Gaius Julius Caesar. Following the praetors-elect, the praetors will speak, then aediles-elect and aediles, plebeian ahead of curule. After which it will be the turn of the tribunes of the plebs-elect, and finally the current tribunes of the plebs. I pend a decision on ex-praetors, as I have already enumerated sixty speakers, though three current praetors are in the field against Catilina and Manlius. Therefore I make it fifty-seven speakers without calling on ex-praetors.”

“Fifty-eight, Marcus Tullius.” How could he have overlooked Metellus Celer, urban praetor?

“Ought you not to be in Picenum with an army?”

“If you recollect, Marcus Tullius, you yourself deputed me to Picenum on the condition that I returned to Rome every eleventh day, and for twelve days around the tribunician changeover.”

“So I did. Fifty-eight speakers, then. That means no one has the time at his disposal to make a reputation as a dazzling orator, is that understood? This debate must finish today! I want to see a division before the sun sets. Therefore I give you fair warning, Conscript Fathers, that I will cut you short if you start to orate.” Cicero looked at Silanus, senior consul-elect.

“Decimus Junius, begin the debate.”

“Mindful of your caution about time, Marcus Tullius, I will be brief,” said Silanus, sounding a little helpless; the man who spoke first was supposed to set the tenor and carry all succeeding speakers his way. Cicero could do it, always. But Silanus wasn’t sure he could, especially because he had no idea which way the House would go on this issue.

Cicero had made it as plain as he dared that he was advocating the death penalty—but what did everybody else want? So in the end Silanus compromised by advocating “the extreme penalty,” which everybody assumed was death. He managed not to mention a trial process in any way whatsoever, which everybody took to mean that there should be no trial process.

Then came Murena’s turn; he too favored “the extreme penalty.”

Cicero of course didn’t speak, and Gaius Antonius Hybrida was in the field. Thus the next in line was the Leader of the House, Mamercus Princeps Senatus, senior among the consulars. Uncomfortably he elected “the extreme penalty.” Then the consulars who had been censors—Gellius Poplicola, Catulus, Vatia Isauricus, a worried Lucius Cotta—”the extreme penalty.” After which came consulars who had not been censors, in order of seniority—Curio, the two Luculli, Piso, Glabrio, Volcatius Tullus, Torquatus, Marcius Figulus. “The extreme penalty.” Very properly, Lucius Caesar abstained.

So far so good. Now it was Caesar’s turn, and since few knew his views as well as Cicero did, what he had to say came as a surprise to many. Including, it was plain to see, Cato, who had not looked for such a disconcerting, unwelcome ally.

“The Senate and People of Rome, who together constitute the Republic of Rome, do not make any allowances for the punishment of full citizens without trial,” said Caesar in that high, clear, carrying voice. “Fifteen people have just advocated the death penalty, yet not one has mentioned the trial process. It is clear that the members of this body have decided to abrogate the Republic in order to go much further back in Rome’s history for a verdict on the fate of some twenty-one citizens of the Republic, including a man who has been consul once and praetor twice, and who actually is still a legally elected praetor at this moment. Therefore I will not waste this House’s time in praising the Republic or the trial and appeal processes every citizen of the Republic is entitled to undergo before his peers can enforce a sentence of any kind. Instead, since my ancestors the Julii were Fathers during the reign of King Tullus Hostilius, I will confine my remarks to the situation as it was during the reign of the kings.”

The House was sitting up straighter now. Caesar went on. “Confession or no, a sentence of death is not the Roman way. It was not the Roman way under the kings, though the kings put many men to death even as we do today—by murder during public violence. King Tullus Hostilius, warlike though he was, hesitated to approve a formal sentence of death. It looked bad, he could see that so clearly that it was he who advised Horatius to appeal when the duumviri damned him for the murder of his sister, Horatia. The hundred Fathers—ancestors of our Republican Senate—were not inclined to be merciful, but they took the royal hint, thereby establishing a precedent that the Senate of Rome has no business doing Romans to death. When Romans are done to death by men in government—who does not remember Marius and Sulla?—it means that good government has perished, that the State is degenerate.

“Conscript Fathers, I have little time, so I will just say this: let us not go back to the time of the kings if that means execution! Execution is no fitting punishment. Execution is death, and death is merely an eternal sleep. Any man must suffer more if he is sentenced to a living exile than if he dies! Every day he must think of his reduction to non-citizen, poverty, contempt, obscurity. His public statues come tumbling down; his imago cannot be worn in any family funeral procession, nor displayed anywhere. He is an outcast, disgraced and ignoble. His sons and grandsons must always hang their heads in shame, his wife and daughters weep. And all of this he knows, for he is still alive, he is still a man, with all a man’s feelings and weaknesses. And all a man’s strengths, now of little use to him save as torment. Living death is infinitely worse than real death. I do not fear death, so long as it be sudden. What I fear is some political situation which could result in permanent exile, the loss of my dignitas. And if I am nothing else, I am a Roman to the tiniest bone, the most minute scrap of tissue. Venus made me, and Venus made Rome.”

Silanus was looking confused, Cicero angry, everyone else very thoughtful, even Cato.

“I appreciate what the learned senior consul has had to say about what he insists on calling the Senatus Consultum Ultimum—that under its shelter all normal laws and procedures are suspended. I understand that the learned senior consul’s chief concern is the present welfare of Rome, and that he considers the continued residence of these self-confessed traitors within our city walls to be a peril. He wants the business concluded as quickly as is possible. Well, so do I! But not with a death sentence, if we must go back to the time of the kings. I do not worry about our learned senior consul, or any of the fourteen brilliant men sitting here who have already been consul. I do not worry about next year’s consuls, or this year’s praetors, or next year’s praetors, or all the men sitting here who have already been praetor and may still hope to be consul.”

Caesar paused, looked extremely grave. “What worries me is some consul of the future, ten or twenty years down the road of time. What kind of precedent will he see in what we do here today? Indeed, what kind of precedent is our learned senior consul taking when he cites Saturninus? On the day when we-all-really-know-who illegally executed Roman citizens without a trial, those self-appointed executioners desecrated an inaugurated temple, for that is what the Curia Hostilia is! Rome herself was profaned. My, my, what an example! But it is not our learned senior consul worries me! It is some less scrupulous and less learned consul of the future.

“Let us keep a cool head and look at this business with our eyes open and our thinking apparatus detached. There are other punishments than death. Other punishments than exile in a luxurious place like Athens or Massilia. How about Corfinium or Sulmo or some other formidably fortified Italian hill town? That’s where we’ve put our captured kings and princes for centuries. So why not Roman enemies of the State too? Confiscate their property to pay such a town extremely well for the trouble, and simultaneously make sure they cannot escape. Make them suffer, yes! But do not kill them!”

When Caesar sat down no one spoke, even Cicero. Then the senior consul-elect, Silanus, got to his feet, looking sheepish.

“Gaius Julius, I think you mistake what I meant by saying ‘the extreme penalty,’ and I think everyone else made the same mistake. I did not mean death! Death is un-Roman. No, I meant much what you mean, actually. Life imprisonment in a house in an impregnable Italian hill town, paid for by property confiscation.”

And so it went, everyone now advocating a stringent confinement paid for by confiscation of property.

When the praetors were finished, Cicero held up his hand. “There are just too many ex-praetors present here to allow everyone to speak, and I did not count ex-praetors in that total of fifty-eight men. Those who wish to contribute nothing new to the debate, please hold up your hands in response to the two questions I will put to you now: those in favor of a death sentence?”

None, as it turned out. Cicero flushed.

“Those in favor of strict custody in an Italian town and complete confiscation of property?’’

All save one, as it turned out.

“Tiberius Claudius Nero, what do you have to say?”

“Only that the absence of the word ‘trial’ from all these speeches today disturbs me greatly. Every Roman man, self-confessed traitor or not, is entitled to a trial, and these men must be tried. But I do not think they should be tried before Catilina is either defeated or surrenders. Let the chief perpetrator stand trial first of all.”

“Catilina,” said Cicero gently, “is no longer a Roman citizen! Catilina is not entitled to trial under any law of the Republic.”

“He should be tried too,” said Claudius Nero stubbornly, and sat down.

Metellus Nepos, president of the new College of Tribunes of the Plebs to go into office in five days’ time, spoke first. He was tired, he was ravenous; eight hours had gone by, which really wasn’t bad considering the importance of the subject and the number of men who had already spoken. But what he dreaded was Cato, who would follow him—when was Cato not long-winded, prolix, awkward and utterly boring? So he rattled off his speech supporting Caesar, and sat down with a glare for Cato.

It never occurred to Metellus Nepos that the only reason Cato stood in the House today a tribune of the plebs-elect was due entirely to him, Metellus Nepos. When Nepos had returned from the East after a delightful campaign as one of Pompey the Great’s senior legates, he traveled in some style. Naturally. He was one of the most important Caecilii Metelli, he was extremely rich and had managed to enrich himself even more since going east, and he was Pompey’s brother-in-law into the bargain. So he had journeyed up the Via Appia at his leisure, well before the elections and well before the summer’s heat. Men in a hurry rode or drove, but Nepos had had enough of hurrying; his choice of locomotion was a huge litter borne by no less than twelve men. In this fabulous equipage he lolled on a down mattress covered in Tyrian purple, and had a servant crouched in one corner to minister to him with food and drink, a chamber pot, reading materials.

As he never stuck his head between the litter’s curtains, he never noticed the humble pedestrians his cavalcade frequently encountered, so of course he never noticed a group of six extremely humble pedestrians headed in the opposite direction. Three of the six were slaves. The other three were Munatius Rufus, Athenodorus Cordylion, and Marcus Porcius Cato, on their way to Cato’s estate in Lucania for a summer of studying and freedom from children.

For a long time Cato simply stood on the side of the road watching the parade amble by, counting the number of people, counting the number of vehicles. Slaves, dancing girls, concubines, guards, loot, cook-wagons, libraries on wheels and wine cellars on wheels.

“Ho, soldier, who travels like Sampsiceramus the potentate?” Cato cried to a guard when the parade had nearly passed.

“Quintus Caecilius Metellus Nepos, brother-in-law of Magnus!” called the soldier.

“He’s in a terrific hurry,” said Cato sarcastically.

But the soldier took the remark seriously. “Yes, he is, pilgrim! He’s running for the tribunate of the plebs in Rome!”

Cato walked on a little way south, but before the sun was halfway down the western sky, he turned around.

“What’s the matter?” asked Munatius Rufus.

“I must return to Rome and stand for the tribunate of the plebs,” said Cato through clenched teeth. “There must be someone in that buffoon’s College to make life difficult for him—and for his all-powerful master, Pompeius Magnus!”

Nor had Cato done badly in the elections; he had come in second to Metellus Nepos. Which meant that when Metellus Nepos sat down, Cato got up.

“Death is the only penalty!” he shouted.

The room froze, every eye turned upon Cato in wonder. He was such a stickler for the mos maiorum that it had occurred to no one to doubt that his speech would follow along the line either of Caesar’s or Tiberius Claudius Nero’s.

“Death is the only penalty, I say! What is all this rubbish about law and the Republic? When has the Republic sheltered the likes of self-confessed traitors under her skirts? No law is ever made for self-confessed traitors. Laws are made for lesser beings. Laws are made for men who may transgress them, but do so with no harm intended to their country, the place which bred them and made them what they are.

“Look at Decimus Junius Silanus, weak and vacillating fool! When he thinks Marcus Tullius wants a death sentence, he suggests ‘the extreme penalty’! Then when Caesar speaks, he changes his mind—what he meant was what Caesar said! How could he ever offend his beloved Caesar? And what of this Caesar, this overbred and effeminate fop who boasts he is descended from Gods and then proceeds to defaecate all over mere men? Caesar, Conscript Fathers, is the real prime mover in this business! Catilina? Lentulus Sura? Marcus Crassus? No, no, no! Caesar! It’s Caesar’s plot! Wasn’t it Caesar who tried to have his uncle Lucius Cotta and his colleague Lucius Torquatus assassinated on their first day in office as consuls three years ago? Yes, Caesar preferred Publius Sulla and Autronius to his own blood uncle! Caesar, Caesar, always and ever Caesar! Look at him, senators! Better than all the rest of us put together! Descended from Gods, born to rule, eager to manipulate events, happy to push other men into the furnace while he skulks in the shade! Caesar! I spit on you, Caesar! I spit!”

And he actually tried to do so. Most of the senators sat with their jaws sagging, so amazing was this hate-filled diatribe. Everyone knew Cato and Caesar disliked each other; most knew Caesar had cuckolded Cato. But this blistering torrent of farfetched abuse? This implication of treason? What on earth had gotten into Cato?

“We have five guilty men in our custody who have confessed to their crimes and to the crimes of sixteen other men not in our custody. Where is the need for a trial? A trial is a waste of time and good State money! And, Conscript Fathers, wherever there is a trial, is also the possibility of bribery. Other juries in other cases quite as serious as this have acquitted in the face of manifest guilt! Other juries have reached out greedy hands to take vast fortunes from the likes of Marcus Crassus, Caesar’s friend and financial backer! Is Catilina to rule Rome? No! Caesar is to rule, with Catilina as his master of the horse and Crassus free to do as he likes in the Treasury!”

“I hope you have proof of all this,” said Caesar mildly; he was well aware that calm drove Cato to distraction.

“I will get proof, never fear!” Cato shouted. “Where there is wrongdoing, one can always find proof! Look at the proof which found five men traitors! They saw it, they heard it, and they all confessed. Now that is proof! And I will find proof of Caesar’s implication in this conspiracy and in the one of three years ago! No trial for the guilty five, I say! No trial for any of them! Nor ought they escape from death! Caesar argues for clemency on philosophical grounds. Death, he says, is merely an eternal sleep. But do we know that for certain? No, we do not! No one has ever come back from death to tell us what happens after we die! Death is cheaper. And death is final. Let the five die today!”

Caesar spoke again, still mildly. “Unless the treason be perduellio, Cato, death is not a legal penalty. And if you do not intend to try these men, how can you decide whether they committed perduellio or maiestas? You seem to argue perduellio, but are you?’’

“This is not the time or the place for legal quibbling, even if you had no other reason behind your drive for clemency, Caesar!” blared Cato. “They must die, and they must die today!”

On he went, oblivious to the passage of time. Cato was in stride, the harangue would continue until he saw to his satisfaction that his sheer grinding monotony had worn everyone down. The House flinched; Cicero almost wept. Cato was going to rant on until the sun set, and the vote would not be taken today.

It wanted an hour before sunset was due when a servant sidled into the chamber and unobtrusively handed Caesar a folded note.

Cato pounced. “Ah! The traitor is revealed!” he roared. “He sits receiving treasonous notes under our very eyes—that is the extent of his arrogance, his contempt for this House! I say you are a traitor, Caesar! I say that note contains proof!”

While Cato thundered, Caesar read. When he looked up his face bore a most peculiar expression—mild anguish? Or amusement!

“Read it out, Caesar, read it out!” screamed Cato.

But Caesar shook his head. He folded the note, got up from his seat, crossed the floor to where Cato sat on the middle tier of the other side, and handed him the note with a smile. “I think you might prefer to keep its contents to yourself,” he said.

Cato was not a good reader. The endless squiggles unseparated save into columns (and sometimes a word would be continued onto the line below, an additional confusion) took a long time to decipher. And while he mumbled and puzzled, the senators sat in some gratitude for this relative silence, dreading Cato’s resumption (and dreading that indeed the note would be construed as treasonous).

A shriek erupted from Cato’s throat; everybody jumped. Then he screwed the piece of paper up and threw it at Caesar.

“Keep it, you disgusting philanderer!”

But Caesar didn’t get the note. When it fell well short of where he sat, Philippus snatched it up—and immediately opened it. A better reader than Cato, he was guffawing within moments; as soon as he finished he handed it on down the line of praetors-elect in the direction of Silanus and the curule dais.

Cato realized he had lost his audience, busy laughing, reading, or dying of curiosity. “It is typical of this body that something so contemptible and petty should prove more fascinating than the fate of traitors!” he cried. “Senior consul, I demand that the House instruct you under the terms of the existing Senatus Consultum Ultimum to execute the five men in our custody at once, and to pass a death sentence on four more men—Lucius Cassius Longinus, Quintus Annius Chilo, Publius Umbrenus and Publius Furius—to become effective the moment any or all of them are captured.”

Of course Cicero was as eager to read Caesar’s note as any other man present, but he saw his chance, and took it.

“Thank you, Marcus Porcius Cato. I will see a division on your motion that the five men in our custody be executed at once, and that the four other men so named be executed immediately after they are apprehended. All those favoring a death sentence, pass to my right. Those not in favor, pass to my left.”

The senior consul-elect, Decimus Junius Silanus, husband of Servilia, got the note just before Cicero put his motion. It said:

Brutus has just rushed in to tell me that my low-life half brother Cato has accused you of treason in the House, even admitting he has absolutely no proof! My most precious and darling man, take no notice. It’s spite because you stole Atilia and put horns upon his head—not to mention that I know she told him he was pipinna compared to you. A fact that I am well able to vouch for myself. The rest of Rome is pipinna compared to you.

Remember that Cato is not so much as the dirt beneath a patrician’s feet, that he is no more than the descendant of a slave and a cantankerous old peasant who sucked up to patricians enough to get himself made censor—whereupon he deliberately ruined as many patricians as he could. This Cato would love to do the same. He loathes all patricians, but you in particular. And did he know what lies between us, Caesar, he would loathe you more.

Keep up your courage, ignore the pernicious weed and all his minions. Rome is better served by one Caesar than half a hundred Catos and Bibuluses. As their wives could all testify!

Silanus looked at Caesar with grey dignity and no other emotion. Caesar’s face was sad, but not contrite. Then Silanus rose and passed to Cicero’s right; he would not vote for Caesar.

Nor did many vote for Caesar, though not everyone passed to the right. Metellus Celer, Metellus Nepos, Lucius Caesar, several of the tribunes of the plebs including Labienus, Philippus, Gaius Octavius, both Luculli, Tiberius Claudius Nero, Lucius Cotta, and Torquatus stood to Cicero’s left, together with some thirty of the pedarii from the back bench. And Mamercus Princeps Senatus.

“I note that Publius Cethegus is among those voting for his brother’s execution,” said Cicero, “and that Gaius Cassius is among those voting for his cousin’s execution. The vote is near enough to unanimous.”

“The bastard! He always exaggerates!” growled Labienus.

“Why not?” asked Caesar, shrugging. “Memories are short and verbatim reports prone to reflect statements like that, as Gaius Cosconius and his scribes are not likely to want to record names.”

“Where’s the note?” asked Labienus, avid to see it.

“Cicero’s got it now.”

“Not for long!” said Labienus, turned, walked up to the senior consul pugnaciously, and wrested it from him. “Here, it belongs to you,” he said, holding it out to Caesar.

“Oh, do read it first, Labienus!” said Caesar, laughing. “I fail to see why you shouldn’t know what everyone else knows, even the lady’s husband.”

Men were returning to their seats, but Caesar stood until Cicero recognized him.

“Conscript Fathers, you have indicated that nine men must die,” said Caesar without emotion. “That is, according to the argument put forward by Marcus Porcius Cato, infinitely the worst punishment the State can decree. In which case, it should be enough. I would like to move that nothing more is done. That no property should be confiscated. The wives and children of the condemned men will never again set eyes on their faces. Therefore that too is punishment enough for harboring a traitor in their bosoms. They should at least continue to have the wherewithal to live.”

“Well, we all know why you’re advocating mercy!” howled Cato. “You don’t want to have to support gutter-dirt like the three Antonii and their trollop of a mother!”

Lucius Caesar, brother of the trollop and uncle of the gutter-dirt, launched himself at Cato from one side, and Mamercus Princeps Senatus from the other. Which brought Bibulus, Catulus, Gaius Piso and Ahenobarbus to Cato’s defense, fists swinging. Metellus Celer and Metellus Nepos joined the fray, while Caesar stood grinning.

“I think,” he said to Labienus, “that I ought to ask for tribunician protection!”

“As a patrician, Caesar, you’re not entitled to tribunician protection,” Labienus said solemnly.

Finding the fight impossible to break up, Cicero decided to break the meeting up instead; he grabbed Caesar by the arm and hustled him out of the temple of Concord.

“For Jupiter’s sake, Caesar, go home!” he begged. “What a problem you can be!”

“That cuts both ways,” said Caesar, glance contemptuous, and made a move to re-enter the temple.

“Go home, please!”

“Not unless you give me your word that there will be no confiscation of property.”

“I give you my word gladly! Just go!”

“I’m going. But don’t think I won’t hold you to your word.”

*

He had won, but that speech of Caesar’s swirled remorselessly through Cicero’s mind as he plodded with his lictors and a good party of militia to the house of Lucius Caesar, where Lentulus Sura still lodged. He had sent four of his praetors to fetch Gaius Cethegus, Statilius, Gabinius Capito and Caeparius, but felt he must collect Lentulus Sura himself; the man had been consul.

Was the price too high? No! The moment these traitors were dead Rome would quieten magically; any thought of insurrection would vanish from all men’s imaginations. Nothing deterred like execution. If Rome executed more often, crime would diminish. As for the trial process, Cato was right on both counts. They were guilty out of their own mouths, so to try them was a waste of State money. And the trouble with the trial process was that it could so easily and deftly be tampered with, provided someone was prepared to put up enough cash to meet the jury’s price. Tarquinius had accused Crassus, and though logic said Crassus could not be involved in any way—it had been he, after all, who gave Cicero the first concrete evidence—the seed was sown in Cicero’s mind. What if Crassus had been involved, then thought better of it, and craftily engineered those letters?

Catulus and Gaius Piso had accused Caesar. So had Cato. None of them with one iota of proof, and all of them Caesar’s implacable enemies. But the seed was sown. What about that item Cato produced about Caesar’s conspiring to assassinate Lucius Cotta and Torquatus nearly three years before? There had been a wild rumor about an assassination plot at the time, though the culprit at the time had been said to be Catilina. Then Lucius Manlius Torquatus had shown his disbelief of the rumor by defending Catilina at his extortion trial. No hint of Caesar’s name then. And Lucius Cotta was Caesar’s uncle. Yet… Other Roman patricians had conspired to kill close relatives, including Catilina, who had murdered his own son. Yes, patricians were different. Patricians obeyed no laws save those they respected. Look at Sulla, Rome’s first true dictator—and a patrician. Better than the rest. Certainly better than a Cicero, a lodger from Arpinum, a mere resident alien, a despised New Man.

He would have to watch Crassus, decided Cicero. But he would have to watch Caesar even more closely. Look at Caesar’s debts—who stood to gain more than Caesar by a general cancellation of debt? Wasn’t that reason enough to back Catilina? How else could he hope to extricate himself from an otherwise inevitable ruin? He would need to conquer vast tracts as yet untouched by Rome, and Cicero for one deemed that impossible. Caesar was no Pompey; he had never commanded armies. Nor would Rome be tempted to endow him with special commissions! In fact, the more Cicero thought about Caesar, the more convinced he became that Caesar had been a part of the Catilinarian conspiracy, if only because victory for Catilina meant that his burden of debt would be removed.

Then as he was returning to the Forum with Lentulus Sura (whom again he led by the hand like a child), another Caesar intruded. Neither as gifted nor as dangerous as Gaius, Lucius Caesar was still a formidable man: consul the year before, an augur, and likely to be elected censor at some time in the future. He and Gaius were close cousins, and they liked each other.

But Lucius Caesar had stopped in his tracks, incredulity written on his face as his eyes took in the sight of Cicero leading Lentulus Sura by the hand.

“Now?” he asked Cicero.

“Now,” said Cicero firmly.

“Without preparation? Without mercy? Without a bath, clean clothes, the right frame of mind? Are we barbarians?”

“It has to be now,” Cicero said miserably, “before the sun sets. Don’t try to obstruct me, please.”

Lucius Caesar stepped out of the way ostentatiously. “Oh, the Gods preserve me from obstructing Roman justice!” he said, sneering. “Have you broken the news to my sister that her husband is to die without a bath, without clean clothes?”

“I haven’t the time!” cried Cicero for something to say. Oh, this was awful! He was only doing his duty! But he couldn’t say that to Lucius Caesar, could he? What could he say?

“Then I had better go to her house while it’s still in Sura’s name!” Lucius Caesar snapped. “No doubt you’ll be convening the Senate tomorrow to dispose of all the property.”

“No, no!” Cicero said, almost weeping. “I’ve given your cousin Gaius my solemn word that there will be no confiscation of property.”

“Big of you,” said Lucius Caesar. He looked at his brother-in-law Lentulus Sura, lips parted as if to say something; then he shut them firmly, shook his head, and turned away. Nothing could help, nor did he think Lentulus Sura capable of hearing. Shock had parted him from his wits.

*

Trembling from that encounter, Cicero proceeded down the Vestal Steps into the lower Forum, which was jammed with people—and not all of them professional Forum frequenters, either. As his lictors pushed a path through those masses of people, Cicero fancied he caught glimpses of faces he knew. Was that young Decimus Brutus Albinus? Surely that wasn’t Publius Clodius! Gellius Poplicola’s outcast son? Why would any of them be mingling cheek by jowl with the ordinary folk of Rome’s back streets?

There was a feeling in the air, and its nature frightened the already shaken Cicero. People were growling, their eyes were dark, their faces sullen, their bodies hard to move aside for Rome’s senior consul and the victim he led by the hand. A frisson of terror flashed up Cicero’s spine, almost caused him to turn about and run. But he couldn’t. This was his doing. He had to see it through now. He was the father of his country; he had single-handedly saved Rome from a nest of patricians.

On the far side of the Gemonian Steps, which led up onto the Arx of the Capitol, lay Rome’s ramshackle, tumbledown (and only) prison, the Lautumiae; its first and most ancient building was the Tullianum, a tiny, three-sided relic of the days of the kings. In the wall facing onto the Clivus Argentarius and the Basilica Porcia was its only door, a thick wooden ugliness always kept closed and locked.

But this evening it stood wide open, its aperture filled by half-naked men, six of them. Rome’s public executioners. They were slaves, of course, and lived in barracks on the Via Recta outside the pomerium together with Rome’s other public slaves. Where their lot differed from the other tenants of that barracks lay in the fact that Rome’s public executioners did not cross the pomerium into the city except to perform their duty. A duty normally confined to putting their big, brawny hands around foreign necks only, snapping them; a duty normally occurring only once or twice in any year, during a triumphal parade. It was a very long time since the necks they would break had belonged to Romans. Sulla had killed many Romans, but never officially inside the Tullianum. Marius had killed many Romans, but never officially inside the Tullianum.

Luckily the physical location of the execution chamber did not permit the entire front of that crowd to witness what happened, and by the time Cicero had assembled his five wretched condemned and placed a solid wall of lictors and militia between them and the masses, there was little indeed to see.

When Cicero mounted the few steps to stand outside the door, the smell hit him. Fierce, foetid, an overwhelming stench of decay. For no one ever cleaned out the execution chamber. A man went in; he approached a hole in the middle of the floor, and descended into the depths below. There some feet down his executioners waited to break his neck. After which his body simply lay there and rotted. The next time the chamber was needed, the executioners shoved the moldering remains into an open conduit which joined the sewers.

Gorge rising, Cicero stood ashen-faced as the five men filed inside, Lentulus Sura first, Caeparius last. None of them so much as spared him a glance, for which he was very grateful. The inertia of shock held them fast.

It took no more than a few moments. One of the executioners emerged from the door and nodded to him. I can leave now, thought Cicero, and walked behind his lictors and militia to the rostra.

From its top he gazed down on the crowd stretching away to the limit of his vision, and wet his lips. He was within the pomerium, Rome’s sacred boundary, and that meant he could not use the word “dead” as part of an official pronunciation.

What could he say instead of “dead”? After a pause he threw his arms wide and shouted, “Vivere!” “They have lived!” Past perfect, over and done with, finished.

No one cheered. No one booed. Cicero climbed down and began to walk in the direction of the Palatine while the crowd dispersed mostly toward the Esquiline, the Subura, the Viminal. When he reached the little round House of Vesta a large group of knights of the Eighteen led by Atticus appeared, torches kindled because it was growing quite dark. And they hailed him as the savior of his country, as pater patriae, as a hero straight out of myth. Balm to his animus! The conspiracy of Lucius Sergius Catilina was no more, and he alone had exposed it, killed it.