When the children had been sent off with their precious bit of family rope put into a big bag of gold carried by a slave under instructions to deliver everything to their parents, Quintus Sertorius bathed his fawn in the nearby spring and looked it over, crooning and clucking. Whatever the reason for its original disappearance might have been, it had clearly not prospered in the wild. Some large cat had attacked it, for it bore the deep and half—healed marks of vicious claws on both sides of its rump, as if it had been pounced on from behind and dragged down. How it had managed to escape only the Goddess knew—or had contrived at. Its poor little trotters were worn and bloodied, its ears shredded along their edges, its muzzle torn. The children had found it when they took the family sheep out to graze, and it had come straight up to them, put its nose in the girl—child’s grimy hands and sighed in shivering relief.
“Well, Diana,” said Sertorius as he put it into a box upon the tray of a wagon, “I hope you’ve learned that the wilds are for the wild. Did you smell a stag, was that it? Or did the camp dogs bait you? In future, my girl, you’ll travel like this. I can’t bear the thought of losing you again.”
Word had flown swifter than birds on the wing; Diana was back! And so was Quintus Sertorius’s luck.
*
Pompey and Metellus Pius left Valentia behind, continuing north to Saguntum. The food they had plundered from Saetabis (there was nothing else to plunder) was a welcome addition to their dwindling supplies, and so was Pompey’s cache in the disused quarry outside Valentia. They had agreed that both would march together up the east coast to Emporiae, and that Metellus Pius would winter that year in Narbonese Gaul; though his men had not voiced any complaint at their thousand—mile detour to reinforce Pompey, the Piglet thought that another five-hundred-mile walk would do them for the year. Besides, he wanted to be in the thick of the action in the spring, and he knew that the annihilation of the Spanish army would keep the Further province safe from any raiding Lusitani.
Saguntum had sent them an embassage to inform them that it would do whatever possible to assist them, and was still stoutly Roman in sentiment. Not surprising: it had been Saguntum’s Roman (and Massiliote) affiliations which had caused the outbreak of the second Punic war against Carthage a century and a half earlier. Of food, however, the town had little to offer, and this the two generals believed. The harvest was poor because the rains of winter had not come to give the crops their best drink of the growing season, nor had the late spring rains come to send them shooting up heavy with ears of grain.
It was therefore imperative that the two armies move as swiftly as possible to the Iberus, where the harvest was later and richer. If they could reach it by the end of Sextilis it would be theirs, not Sertorius’s. The embassage from Saguntum had therefore been thanked and sent home; Metellus Pius and Pompey would not be staying.
Pompey’s leg wound was healing, but slowly; the barbs of the spear which had inflicted it had torn chunks out of sinews and tendons as well as muscles, and much tissue had to grow and reknit before he would be able to bear any weight on it. The loss of his Public Horse he seemed to feel, thought the Piglet, more than he did the use of his leg or the loss of its beauty. Well, a horse was more beautiful than a man’s leg. Pompey wouldn’t find one to match it this side of the rosea rura in Sabine country. Spanish horses were small and underbred.
His spirits were down again, not unnaturally. Not only had Metellus Pius been the sole reason for the victory on the Sucro, but Metellus Pius had also slaughtered Sertorius’s best general and best army. Even Lucius Afranius, Marcus Petreius and Pompey’s new legate, Lucius Titurius Sabinus, had fared better than poor Pompey himself. All very well to say that it was upon Pompey personally that the brunt of Sertorius’s venom had fallen; Pompey knew he hadn’t met the test. And now, his scouts told him, the renegade Marian was dogging their footsteps as they marched north, no doubt waiting for his next opportunity. His guerrilla units were already in evidence, harrying what foraging parties were sent out, but Pompey had learned as much wisdom as the Piglet in this respect, so the two armies suffered very little. On the other hand, they obtained very little in the way of food.
Then—apparently quite by accident—they ran into the army of Quintus Sertorius on the plains of the coast just after they had passed Saguntum. And Sertorius decided to engage them, making sure that he and his own legions faced Pompey. Pompey was the weak link, not Metellus Pius.
The strategy was a mistake. Sertorius would have done far better to have contained Metellus Pius himself and left Pompey to Perperna; Pompey appeared on the field on his stretcher, unwilling to have it said that, like Achilles, he skulked in his tent while his allies got on with the battle. Hostilities began in the early afternoon, and it was all over by nightfall. Though he had sustained a slight wound on his arm, Metellus Pius had carried the day. He inflicted losses of five thousand upon Perperna but experienced few himself. Poor Pompey’s ill luck continued to dog him; his cavalry was killed to the last man and his casualties stood at six thousand—a legion and a half. That they could claim the engagement as a victory for Rome was due to Perperna’s losses plus the three thousand men who died fighting for Sertorius.
“He’ll be back at dawn,” said the Piglet cheerfully when he came to see how Pompey was.
“He’ll withdraw, surely,” said Pompey. “It didn’t go well for him, but it went disastrously for Perperna.”
“He’ll be back, Gnaeus Pompeius. I know him.”
Oh, the pain! Oh, the gall! The wretched Piglet knew him!
And he was right, of course. Sertorius was back in the morning, determined to win. This time he rectified his mistake and concentrated his own energies upon Metellus Pius, whose camp he attacked as soon as it was light enough to see. But the old woman was ready for him. He had put Pompey and his men in the camp as well, and trounced Sertorius. Looking a lot younger and fitter these days, Metellus Pius chased Sertorius into Saguntum, while Pompey on his stretcher was carried back to his tent.
But the action had brought Pompey a personal grief, despite its success. Gaius Memmius—brother-in-law, friend, quaestor—was killed, the first of Pompey’s legates to perish.
While he wept huddled in the back of a mule—drawn cart, Metellus Pius commanded the march north, leaving Sertorius and Perperna to do whatever they wanted, which was probably to exact reprisals on the inhabitants of Saguntum. They wouldn’t stay long, of that Metellus Pius was sure; Saguntum could hardly feed itself, let alone an army.
*
At the end of Sextilis the two Roman armies reached the Iberus only to find the harvest—such as it was—safely in the granaries of Sertorius’s formidable mountain strongholds, and the earth burned to a uniformly black desert. Sertorius had not stayed long in Saguntum. He had outmaneuvered them and got to the Iberus first, there to wreak devastation.
Emporiae and the lands of the Indigetes were in little better condition; two winters of Pompey’s occupation had made the purses of the people fat, but their harvest was lean.
“I shall send my quaestor Gaius Urbinius to the Further province to recruit enough troops to keep my lands safe,” said the Piglet, “but if we are to break Sertorius’s back, then I have to be close to you in spring. So, as we thought, it will have to be Narbonese Gaul for me.”
“The harvest isn’t good there either.”
“True. But they haven’t had an army quartered on them for many years, so they’ll have enough to spare for me.” The Piglet frowned. “What worries me more is what you’re going to do. I don’t think there’s enough here to fatten your men up—and if you can’t fatten them up in winter, they’ll stay very thin.”
“I’m off to the upper Durius,” said Pompey calmly.
“Ye gods!”
“Well, it’s a good way west of Sertorius’s towns, so it ought to be easier to reduce the local fortresses than it would be places like Calagurris or Vareia. The Iberus belongs to Sertorius from end to end. But the Durius doesn’t.
The few native Spaniards I trust tell me that the country isn’t as high nor the cold as perishing as it is nearer to the Pyrenees.”
“The Vaccei inhabit the region, and they’re warlike.”
“Oh, tell me what Spanish tribe isn’t?” asked Pompey wearily, shifting his aching leg.
The Piglet was nodding thoughtfully. “You know, Pompeius, the more I think about it, the better I like it,” he said. “You go there! Just make sure you start before winter makes it too hard to cross the watershed at the top end of the Iberus.”
“Don’t worry, I’ll beat the winter. But first,” he said grimly, “I have a letter to write.”
“To Rome and the Senate.”
“That’s right, Pius. To Rome and the Senate.” The blue eyes, older and warier these days, stared into the Piglet’s brown ones. “The thing is, will you let me write and speak for you too?’’
“You most definitely can,” said Metellus Pius.
“You’re sure you wouldn’t rather write for yourself?”
“No, it’s better that it comes from you. You’re the one those couch—fat experts gave the special commission. I’m just an ordinary old governor in the throes of a frightful war. They won’t take any notice of me, they know perfectly well that I’m one of the old retainers. It’s you they don’t know, Magnus. You they probably don’t quite trust. You’re not one of them. Write to them! And give them a fright, Magnus!”
“Don’t worry, I will.”
The Piglet got up. “Well, I’ll take myself off to Narbo first thing tomorrow. Every day less I’m here means less of your food I eat.”
“Won’t you at least polish up my prose? Varro used to.”
“No, not I!” said the Piglet, and laughed. “They know my literary style. Give them something they’ve never seen before.”
Pompey gave them something they had never seen before.
To the Senate and People of Rome:
I write this from Emporiae on the Nones of October in the consulship of Lucius Octavius and Gaius Aurelius Cotta. On the Ides of October I commence my march up the Iberus River to the Durius River and its confluence with the Pisoraca River, where there is a town called Septimanca in the middle of a fertile highland. There I hope to winter my men in enough comfort to keep their bellies full. Luckily I do not have nearly as many men as I did two years ago when I arrived in Emporiae. I am down to four legions of less than four thousand men each, and I have no cavalry.
Why do I have to march my fourteen thousand men some five hundred miles through hostile territory to winter them? Because there is nothing to eat in eastern Spain. That is why. Then why do I not buy in food from Gaul or Italian Gaul since the winds at this time of year favor shipping it in my direction? Because I have no money. No money for food and no money for ships. That is why. I have no other choice than to rob food from Spanish tribesmen who will, I hope, prove weak enough to let themselves be robbed by fourteen thousand hungry Roman men. That is why I have to march so far, to find tribesmen I hope will prove weak enough. There is no food to be had on the Iberus without reducing one of Sertorius’s strongholds, and I am not in a position to do that. How long did it take Rome to reduce Numantia? And Numantia is a hen coop of a place compared to Calagurris or Clunia. Nor was Numantia commanded by a Roman.
You know from my dispatches that I have not had a good two years in the field, though my colleague Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius Pontifex Maximus has had more success. Quintus Sertorius takes some getting used to. This is his country. He knows it and he knows the people. I do not. I did my best. I do not believe that anyone else you might have sent could have done better. My colleague Pius took three years to hatch his first victory. I at least have collaborated in two victories in my second year, when my colleague Pius and I combined our forces and beat Sertorius on the Sucre River, then again near Saguntum.
My colleague Pius and I believe we will win. I do not just say that. We will win. But in order to win, we need a bit of help from home. We need more legions. We need money. I do not say “moremoney” because I for one have not received any money at all. Nor I believe has my colleague Pius received any money beyond his stipend for his first year as governor. Yes, I can hear you now: win a few victories and sack a few cities and there is your money. Well, Spain is not like that. There is no money in Spain. The best I or anyone else can hope for when we take a town is a bit of food. There is no money. In case you are having a bit of trouble reading this, I will say that again. THERE IS NO MONEY. When you sent me here you gave me six legions and fifteen hundred cavalry and enough money to pay everyone and find my supplies for about half a year. That was two years ago. My war chest was empty in half a year. That was a year and a half ago. But no more money. No more troops either.
You know—I know you know because my colleague Pius and I both reported it in our dispatches—that Quintus Sertorius has made a pact with King Mithridates of Pontus. He has agreed to confirm King Mithridates in all his conquests and allow Pontus more conquests when he is Dictator of Rome. Now that should tell you that Quintus Sertorius is not going to stop when he is King of Spain. He intends to be King of Rome too, no matter what title he likes to award himself. There are only two people who can stop him. My colleague Pius and I. I say that because we are here on the spot and we have the chance to stop him. But we cannot stop him with what we have. He has all the manpower Spain can offer and he has the Roman skills to turn barbarian Spaniards into good Roman soldiers. If he had not these two things, he would have been stopped years ago. But he is still here and still recruiting and training. My colleague Pius and I cannot recruit in Spain. No one in his right mind would join our armies. We cannot pay our men. We cannot even keep their bellies full. And the gods be my witness, there are no spoils to share.
I can beat Sertorius. If I cannot do it any other way, then I will be the drop of water that wears down the hardest stone to a hollow shell a child can break with a toy hammer. My colleague Pius feels the same. But I cannot beat Sertorius unless I am sent more soldiers and more cavalry AND SOME MONEY. My soldiers here have not been paid in a year and a half, and I owe the dead as well as the living. I did bring a lot of my own money with me, but I have spent it all buying supplies.
I do not apologize for my troop losses. They were the result of a miscalculation not helped by the information I received in Rome. Namely, that six legions and fifteen hundred horse were more than enough to deal with Sertorius. I ought to have had ten legions and three thousand cavalry. Then I would have beaten him in the first year and Rome would be the richer in men and money. You ought to think about that, you miserly lot.
And here is something else for you to think about. If I am not able to stay in Spain and my colleague Pius is therefore unable to come out of his little corner of Spain, what do you think will happen? I will go back to Italy. Dragging Quintus Sertorius and his armies along in my wake like the tail on a comet. Now you think about that long and hard. And send me some legions and some cavalry AND SOME MONEY.
By the way, Rome owes me a Public Horse.
The letter reached Rome at the end of November, a time of flux in Sulla’s reorganized Senate. The consuls of the year were drawing to the end of their tenure in office and the consuls—elect were feeling their coming power. Because of Lucius Octavius’s state of chronic ill health, only one consul, Gaius Aurelius Cotta, occupied the curule chair. Mamercus Princeps Senatus read Pompey’s letter to the silent senators, as this was one privilege Sulla had not stripped from the Leader of the House.
It was Lucius Licinius Lucullus, senior consul—elect for the next year, who rose to reply; his junior colleague was the present consul’s middle brother, Marcus Aurelius Cotta, and neither of the Cottae wanted to answer that bald, comfortless letter.
“Conscript Fathers, you have just listened to a soldier’s report rather than the meretricious missive of a politician.”
“A soldier’s report? I’d rather call it as incompetently written as its author is an incompetent
commander!” said Quintus Hortensius, holding his nose with his fingers as if to shut out a bad smell.
“Oh, pipe down, Hortensius!” said Lucullus wearily. “I do not need to have what I am about to say punctuated by the smart remarks of a stay—at—home general! When you can leap off your dining couch and abandon your pretty fish to outsoldier Quintus Sertorius, I’ll not only give you the floor, I’ll strew rose petals before your pudgy flat feet! But until your sword is as sharp as your tongue, keep your tongue where it belongs—behind your gourmandizing teeth!”
Hortensius subsided, looking sour.
“It is not the meretricious missive of a politician. Nor does it spare us politicians. On the other hand it does not spare its writer either. It isn’t full of excuses, and the statement about battles won and lost is fully supported by the dispatches we have received regularly from Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius.
“Now I have never been to Spain. Some of you sitting here do know the place, but many more of you are in my boat, and know it not at all. In the old days the Further province always had the reputation of being good pickings for a governor—rich, well ordered, peaceful, yet amply provided with barbarians on two frontiers so that the wars a governor might feel free to wage were fairly easily managed. The Nearer province has never enjoyed the same reputation—the pickings are lean and the native peoples in a perpetual state of unrest. Therefore the governor of Nearer Spain could only look forward to an empty purse and much aggravation from the mountain—dwelling tribesmen.
“However, all that changed when Quintus Sertorius arrived. He already knew Spain well, from his missions for Gaius Marius to a military tribunate under Titus Didius—during which, I remind you, he won the Grass Crown, though still a youngster. And when this remarkable and absolutely formidable man arrived back in Spain as a Marian rebel fleeing retribution, the Nearer province became literally ungovernable, and the Further province ungovernable west of the Baetis. As Gnaeus Pompeius’s letter says, it took the excellent governor of Further Spain almost three years to win a battle against one of Sertorius’s adherents, Hirtuleius—not against Sertorius himself. What the letter does not reproach us with is the fact that due to strife inside Italy, we neglected to send Nearer Spain a governor at all for nearly two years. That, Conscript Fathers, was tantamount to handing Sertorius the Nearer province as a gift!”
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