“The only person who might have been able to enlighten you, Caesar, died in the marketplace of Lampsacus,” said Nicomedes. “There must have been a good reason, at least inside the mind of Philodamus. A vow to some god—a wife and mother determined to keep the child—a self-inflicted pain—who can tell? If we knew all the answers, life would hold no mysteries. And no tragedies.”
“I could have wept when I saw her. Instead I laughed myself sick. She couldn’t tell the difference, but Verres could. So I laughed. He’ll hear it inside his head for years, and fear me.”
“I’m surprised we haven’t seen the man,” said the King.
“You won’t see him,” said Caesar with some satisfaction. “Gaius Verres has folded his tents and slunk back to Cilicia.”
“Why?”
“I asked him to.”
The King decided not to probe this remark. Instead he said, “You wish you could have done something to avert the tragedy.”
“Of course. It’s an actual agony to have to stand back and watch idiots wreak havoc in Rome’s name. But I swear to you, Nicomedes, that I will never behave so myself when I have the age and the authority!”
“You don’t need to swear. I believe you.”
This report had been given before Caesar went to his rooms to remove the ravages of his journey, these being unusually trying. Each of the three nights he had spent in the harborside inn he had woken to find a naked whore astride him and the traitor inside the gates of his body so lacking in discernment that, freed by sleep from his mind’s control, it enjoyed itself immensely. With the result that he had picked up an infestation of pubic lice. The discovery of his crop of tiny vermin had induced a horror and disgust so great that he had been able to keep no food down since, and only a sensible sensitivity about the effects of questionable substances upon his genitalia had prevented his seizing anything offered to kill the things. So far they had defied him by living through a dip in every freezing body of water he had encountered between Lampsacus and Nicomedia, and all through his talk with the old King he had been aware of the dreadful creatures prowling through the thickets of his body hair.
Now, clenching teeth and fists, he rose abruptly to his feet. “Please excuse me, Nicomedes. I have to rid myself of some unwelcome visitors,” he said, attempting a light tone.
“Crab lice, you mean?” asked the King, who missed very little, and could speak freely because Oradaltis and her dog had departed some time before.
“I’m driven mad! Revolting, sickening things!”
Nicomedes strolled from the room with him.
“There is really only one way to avoid picking up vermin when you travel,” said the King. “It’s painful, especially the first time you have it done, but it does work.”
“I don’t care if I have to walk on hot coals, tell me and I’ll do it!” said Caesar with fervor.
“There are those in your peculiar society who will condemn you as effeminate!” Nicomedes said wickedly.
“No fate could be worse than these pests. Tell me!”
“Have all your body hair plucked, Caesar. Under the arms and in the groin, on the chest if you have hair there. I will send the man who attends to me and Oradaltis to you if you wish.”
“At once, King, at once!” Up went Caesar’s hand to his head. “What about my hair hair?”
“Have you visitors there too?”
“I don’t think so, but I itch everywhere.”
“They’re different visitors, and can’t survive in a bed. I wouldn’t think you’ll ever play host to them because you’re so tall. They can’t crawl upward, you see, so the people who pick them up from others are always the same height or shorter than the original host.” Nicomedes laughed. “You’d catch them from Burgundus, but from few others. Unless your Lampsacan whores slept with you head to head.”
“My Lampsacan whores attacked me in my sleep, but I can assure you that they got short shrift the moment I woke!”
An extraordinary conversation, but one Caesar was to thank his luck for many times in the years to come. If plucking out his body hair would keep these clinging horrors away, he would pluck, pluck, pluck.
The slave Nicomedes sent to him was an expert; under different circumstances Caesar would have banished him from such an intimate task, for he was a perfect pansy. Under the prevailing circumstances, however, Caesar found himself eager to experience his touch.
“I’ll just take a few out every day,” lisped Demetrius.
“You’ll take the lot out today,” said Caesar grimly. “I’ve drowned all I could find in my bath, but I suppose their eggs stick. That seems to be why I haven’t managed to get rid of all of them so far. Pah!”
Demetrius squealed, appalled. “That isn’t possible!” he cried. “Even when I do it, it’s hideously painful!”
“The lot today,” said Caesar.
So Demetrius continued while Caesar lay naked, apparently in no distress. He had self-discipline and great courage, and would have died rather than flinch, moan, weep, or otherwise betray his agony. And when the ordeal was over and sufficient time had passed for the pain to die down, he felt wonderful. He also liked the look of his hairless body in the big silver mirror King Nicomedes had provided for the palace’s principal guest suite. Sleek. Unashamed. Amazingly naked. And somehow more masculine rather than less. How odd!
Feeling like a man released from slavery, he went to the dining room that evening with his new pleasure in himself adding a special light to face and eyes; King Nicomedes looked, and gasped. Caesar responded with a wink.
*
For sixteen months he remained in or around about Bithynia, an idyll he was to remember as the most wonderful period of his life until he reached his fifty-third year and found an even more wonderful one. He visited Troy to do homage to his ancestor Aeneas, he went to Pessinus several times, and back to Byzantium, and anywhere, it seemed, save Pergamum and Tarsus, where Claudius Nero and Dolabella remained an extra year after all.
Leaving aside his relationship with Nicomedes and Oradaltis, which remained an enormously satisfying and rewarding experience for him, the chief joy of that time lay in his visit to a man he hardly remembered: Publius Rutilius Rufus, his great—uncle on his mother’s side.
Born in the same year as Gaius Marius, Rutilius Rufus was now seventy—nine years old, and had been living in an honorable exile in Smyrna for many years. He was as active as a fifty-year-old and as cheerful as a boy, mind as sharp as ever, sense of humor as keenly developed as had been that of his friend and colleague, Marcus Aemilius Scaurus Princeps Senatus.
“I’ve outlived the lot of them,” Rutilius Rufus said with gleeful satisfaction after his eyes and mind had approved the look of this fine young great—nephew.
“That doesn’t cast you down, Uncle?”
“Why should it? If anything, it cheers me up! Sulla keeps writing to beg me to return to Rome, and every governor and other official he sends out here comes to plead in person.”
“But you won’t go.”
“I won’t go. I like my chlamys and my Greek slippers much more than I ever liked my toga, and I enjoy a reputation here in Smyrna far greater than any I ever owned in Rome. It’s a thankless and savage place, young Caesar—what a look of Aurelia you have! How is she? My ocean pearl found on the mud flats of Ostia … That was what I always called her. And she’s widowed, eh? A pity. I brought her and your father together, you know. And though you may not know it, I found Marcus Antonius Gnipho to tutor you when you were hardly out of diapers. They used to think you a prodigy. And here you are, twenty-one years old, a senator twice over, and Sulla’s most prized war hero! Well, well!”
“I wouldn’t go so far as to say I’m his most prized war hero,” said Caesar, smiling.
“Oh, but you are! I know! I sit here in Smyrna and hear everything. Sulla writes to me. Always did. And when he was settling the affairs of Asia Province he visited me often—it was I gave him his model for its reorganization. Based
it on the program Scaurus and I evolved years ago. Sad, his illness. But it hasn’t seemed to stop him meddling with Rome!”
He continued in the same vein for many days, hopping from one subject to another with the lightness of an easy heart and the interest of a born gossip, a spry old bird the years had not managed to strip of plumage or the ability to soar. If he had a favorite topic, that was Aurelia; Caesar filled in the gaps in his knowledge of her with gracefully chosen words and evident love, and learned in return many things about her he had not known. Of her relationship with Sulla, however, Rutilius Rufus had little to tell and refused to speculate, though he had Caesar laughing over the confusion as to which of his nieces had borne a red-haired son to a red-haired man.
“Gaius Marius and Julia were convinced it was Aurelia and Sulla, but it was Livia Drusa, of course, with Marcus Cato.”
“That’s right, your wife was a Livia.”
“And the older of my two sisters was the wife of Caepio the Consul, who stole the Gold of Tolosa. You are related to the Servilii Caepiones by blood, young man.”
“I don’t know the family at all.”
“A boring lot no amount of Rutilian blood could leaven. Now tell me about Gaius Marius and the flaminate he wished upon you.”
Intending to remain only a few days in Smyrna, Caesar ended in staying for two months; there was so much Rutilius Rufus wanted to know, and so much Rutilius Rufus wanted to tell. When finally he took his leave of the old man, he wept.
“I shall never forget you, Uncle Publius.”
“Just come back! And write to me, Caesar, do. Of all the pleasures my life still holds, there is none to equal a rich and candid correspondence with a genuinely literate man.”
*
But every idyll must end, and Caesar’s came to a conclusion when he received a letter from Tarsus in April of the year Sulla died; he was in Nicomedia.
“Publius Servilius Vatia, who was consul last year, has been sent to govern Cilicia,” Caesar said to the King and Queen. “He requests my services as a junior legate—it seems Sulla has personally recommended me to him.”
“Then you don’t have to go,” said Oradaltis eagerly.
Caesar smiled. “No Roman has to do anything, and that is really true from highest to lowest. Service in any institution is voluntary. But there are certain considerations which do tend to influence our decisions, voluntary in name though the duty may be. If I want a public career, I must serve in my ten campaigns, or else steadily for a full six years. No one is ever going to be able to accuse me of circumventing our unwritten laws.”
“But you’re already a senator!”
“Only because of my military career. And that in turn means I must continue my military career.”
“Then you’re definitely going,” said the King.
“At once.”
“I’ll see about a ship.”
“No. I shall ride overland through the Cilician Gates.”
“Then I’ll provide you with a letter of introduction to King Ariobarzanes in Cappadocia.”
The palace began to stir, and the dog to mourn; poor Sulla knew the signs that Caesar was about to depart.
And once more Caesar found himself committed to return. The two old people pestered him until he agreed he would, then disarmed him by bestowing Demetrius the hair—plucker upon him.
However, before he left Caesar tried yet again to convince King Nicomedes that the best course for Bithynia after his death would be as a Roman province.
“I’ll think about it” was as far as Nicomedes would go.
Caesar now cherished little hope that the old King would decide in favor of Rome; the events in Lampsacus were too fresh in every non—Roman mind—and who could blame the King if he could not face the idea of bequeathing his realm to the likes of Gaius Verres?
*
The steward Eutychus was sent back to Aurelia in Rome; Caesar traveled with five servants (including Demetrius the hair—plucker) and Burgundus, and traveled hard. He crossed the Sangarius River and rode first to Ancyra, the largest town in Galatia. Here he met an interesting man, one Deiotarus, leader of the segment Tolistobogii.
“We’re all quite young these days,” said Deiotarus. “King Mithridates murdered the entire Galatian thanehood twenty years ago, which left our people without chieftains. In most countries that would have led to the disintegration of the people, but we Galatians have always preferred a loose confederation. So we survived until the young sons of the chieftains grew up.”
“Mithridates won’t trap you again,” said Caesar, who thought this Gaul was as cunning as he was clever.
“Not while I’m here, anyway,” said Deiotarus grimly. “I at least have had the advantage of spending three years in Rome, so I’m more sophisticated than my father ever was—he died in the massacre.”
“Mithridates will try again.”
“I don’t doubt it.”
“You won’t be tempted?”
“Never! He’s still a vigorous man with many years left to rule, but he seems incapable of learning what I know for a fact—that Rome must win in the end. I would rather be in a position where Rome was calling me Friend and Ally.”
“That’s right thinking, Deiotarus.”
On Caesar went to the Halys River, followed its lazy red stream until Mount Argaeus dominated the sky; from here to Eusebeia Mazaca was only forty miles northward across the wide shallow slope of the Halys basin.
Of course he remembered Gaius Marius’s many tales of this country, of the vividly painted town lying at the foot of the gigantic extinct volcano, of the brilliant blue palace and that meeting with King Mithridates of Pontus. But these days Mithridates skulked in Sinope and King Ariobarzanes sat more or less firmly on the Cappadocian throne.
Less rather than more, thought Caesar after meeting him. For some reason no one could discover, the kings of Cappadocia had been as weak a lot as the kings of Pontus had been strong. And Ariobarzanes was no exception to the rule. He was patently terrified of Mithridates, and pointed out to Caesar how Pontus had stripped the palace and the capital of every treasure, down to the last golden nail in a door.
“But surely,” said Caesar to the timid king, a small and slightly Syrian-looking man, “the loss of those two hundred thousand soldiers in the Caucasus will strap Mithridates for many years to come. No proprietor of armies can afford the loss of such a huge number of men—especially men who were not only fully trained, but veterans of a good campaign. For they were, isn’t that right?”
“Yes. They had fought to regain Cimmeria and the northern reaches of the Euxine Sea for Mithridates the summer before.”
“Successfully, one hears.”
“Indeed. His son Machares was left in Panticapaeum to be satrap. A good choice. I believe his chief task is to recruit a new army for his father.”
“Who prefers Scythian and Roxolanian troops.”
“They are superior to mercenaries, certainly. Both Pontus and Cappadocia are unfortunate in that the native peoples are not good soldiers. I am still forced to rely upon Syrian and Jewish mercenaries, but Mithridates has had hordes of warlike barbarians at his disposal now for almost thirty years.”
“Have you no army at the moment, King Ariobarzanes?”
“At the moment I have no need of one.”
“What if Mithridates marches without warning?”
“Then I will be off my throne once more. Cappadocia, Gaius Julius, is very poor. Too poor to afford a standing army.”
“You have another enemy. King Tigranes.”
Ariobarzanes twisted unhappily. “Do not remind me! His successes in Syria have robbed me of my best soldiers. All the Jews are staying home to resist him.”
“Then don’t you think you should at least be watching the Euphrates as well as the Halys?”
“There is no money,” said the King stubbornly.
Caesar rode away shaking his head. What could be done when the sovereign of a land admitted himself beaten
before the war began? His quick eyes noticed many natural advantages which would give Ariobarzanes untold opportunities to pounce upon an invader, for the countryside when not filled with towering snowcapped peaks was cut up into the most bizarre gorges, just as Gaius Marius had described. Wonderful places militarily as well as scenically, yet perceived by the King as no more than ready—made housing for his troglodytes.
“How do you feel now that you’ve seen a great deal more of the world, Burgundus?” Caesar asked his hulking freedman as they picked their way down into the depths of the Cilician Gates between soaring pines and roaring cascades.
“That Rome and Bovillae, Cardixa and my sons are grander than any waterfall or mountain,” said Burgundus.
“Would you rather go home, old friend? I will send you home gladly,” said Caesar.
But Burgundus shook his big blond head emphatically. “No, Caesar, I’ll stay.” He grinned. “Cardixa would kill me if I let anything happen to you.”
“But nothing is going to happen to me!”
“Try and tell her that.”
*
Publius Servilius Vatia was installed in the governor’s palace at Tarsus so comfortably by the time Caesar arrived before the end of April that he looked as if he had always been there.
“We are profoundly glad to have him,” said Morsimus, captain of the Cilician governor’s guard and a Tarsian ethnarch.
Dark hair grizzled by the passage of twenty years since he had accompanied Gaius Marius to Cappadocia, Morsimus had been on hand to welcome Caesar, to whom the Cilician felt more loyalty than ever he could to a mere Roman governor; here was the nephew by marriage of both his heroes, Gaius Marius and Lucius Cornelius Sulla, and he would do whatever he could to assist the young man.
“I gather Cilicia suffered greatly under Dolabella and Verres,” said Caesar.
“Terribly. Dolabella was out of his mind on drugs most of the time, which left Verres to do precisely what he fancied.”
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