The Eternal Empire

by Geoff Fabron

Dikouros next turned to the three intelligence officers.

  "Chief Minister Exanzenus has requested an evaluation of the threat from Saxony," he informed them. "I've already informed him that the legions of this army stand ready to repel any aggression from across the Rhine. Produce a report confirming that. You are dismissed."

  Silvanus Anemas and his two centurions saluted and left. Dikouros turned and followed them, but at the door he stopped and turned towards Cornelius.

  "People who cross Demetrius Exanzenus should not expect any co-operation. I suggest you remember that."

  Tiberius drove Cornelius back to Colonia Agrippina and dropped him off near the bridge over the Rhine into Saxony. As he got out his uncle spoke to him.

  "If I hear anything of interest, I'll try and let you know. Being out of favour with the chief minister doesn't change the fact that you are a first class analyst as well as being my favourite nephew."

  "Thank you uncle, I'll also keep in touch," said Cornelius gratefully.

  As Tiberius drove off to inspect one of his cohorts nearby, Cornelius made his way towards a small tavern and sat down at a table outside. He had a couple of hours free before he had to cross the bridge to catch his train to Minden. It was a pleasant day, so he called a waitress and ordered coffee and some pastries whilst he relaxed in the spring sunshine watching the ships and barges ply their trade up and down the Rhine. It was sad to think that this mighty river could be the cause of conflict between the Empire and Saxony, thought Cornelius. The Saxons would not pay to use a river that they regarded as much theirs as ours.

  Cornelius was on his third cup of coffee when he was startled out of his reverie by a familiar voice.

  "Well there you are, I've found you at last Cornelius Petronius!"

  Cornelius nearly spilt the hot drink over himself as he turned to face his unexpected visitor.

  "Fulvia! What are you doing here?"

  "I've been following you around for the last twenty four hours trying to catch up with you!"

  She sat down at the table and ordered a glass of white wine. Cornelius asked her why she was chasing after him.

  "Because our mothers want me to marry you, why do you think!" she said drawing a laugh from Cornelius. "I was in Colonia Agrippina last night," explained Fulvia more serious now, "and had a letter from your father to Uncle Tiberius. I was told that he was at his villa with his nephew from Minden, so this morning I drove down to the villa, only to find that you had gone to Augusta Treverorum."

  "And in Augusta Treverorum," added Cornelius, trying to keep a straight face, "you found that we had returned to Colonia Agrippina."

  "I finally caught up with Uncle Tiberius where I had started from and he told me where he had left you."

  Cornelius raised his cup in salute. "Well done Fulvia. Heaven help the man you do want to marry, he doesn't stand a chance of getting away!"

  Fulvia made a face at him and helped herself to one of his pastries.

  "So, how are you then?" she asked relaxing back into her chair.

  Cornelius gave Fulvia a brief summary of his activities since he had left Minden for Constantinople, the turmoil caused by the new trade policies and his unsuccessful meeting with Exanzenus.

  "The new trade laws are affecting us as well," added Fulvia when Cornelius had finished. "I've just returned from Thuringa and the anti-Roman sentiment is so strong that we have had to abandon our latest sales promotion and close down our shops."

  Cornelius was interested in what she said. Thuringa was one of the 'Duchies' along the upper Rhine. Although sovereign states in their own right, they had always been under the shadow of their two large neighbours. After the last war, Saxony had been forced to renounce any military treaties with them, and the Duchies, whose troops had fought with the Saxons, had had to accept imperial control over their foreign policy. It was a sore point with the Saxons and an obvious place for them to stir up trouble.

  "What form did this anti-Roman feeling take," he asked her, "apart from refusing to buy your father's overpriced dresses?"

  She frowned in response to the jib.

  "Signs have gone up in shops and taverns saying that Romans are not welcome, and anti-Empire slogans have been daubed on walls. Demonstrations occur outside our embassy and some Roman owned businesses, like ours, have had their windows smashed. When people find out you are a Roman citizen they become surly and rude."

  "What about the official reaction?" Cornelius continued.

  "Old Duke Wilhelm is fully supportive of the Empire. The only newspaper in Thuringa has editorials rationalising the new trade laws and explaining that they are good in the long term."

  "Sounds like they were written in the Constantinople," observed Cornelius. "In fact," he added quickly, "they probably were. Duke Wilhelm does whatever the Roman ambassador tells him."

  Cornelius thought for a few moments before questioning Fulvia further. "Would you say that Thuringa is unstable at the moment?"

  "I'm not sure that I'm qualified to give an opinion on that," she replied thoughtfully, "but the atmosphere is certainly very tense. People there are angry and they don't think much of Duke Wilhelm whom they regard as a Roman puppet."

  Cornelius thanked her for her comments. He would have to look into the situation in Thuringa in more detail when he got back to Minden.

  "Anyway," said Fulvia, "enough of this dreary talk. Tell me all about Minden. What have you been doing?" She leaned closer to him and whispered conspiratorially, "and I want to know everything, Cornelius. So don't hold out on me!"

  Cornelius knew that when it came to extracting information from him, even of the most intimate kind, Fulvia was an expert. She had known him for too long for him to be able to keep anything from her, so he told her about Katherine.

  "She sounds very nice," said Fulvia sincerely, "certainly has a bit of spirit. Unlike some of those girls you used to see."

  "Come on now Fulvia," said Cornelius defensively, "they weren't all that bad. Besides, “he added with resignation, "I never had great success with women. I had to take what I could get."

  "Stop putting yourself down Cornelius," she said firmly. "You're just too shy. There were a number of girls in Milan who had their eye on you."

  "Really?" said Cornelius, "like who?"

  "Julia Sabreva for one."

  "Why didn't you say," demanded Cornelius, "she was gorgeous!"

  "I'm your best friend Cornelius, not your matchmaker. If you had wanted to seduce Julia you should have done something about it yourself! Anyway, she's married with three children now, so you've missed out. Let's concentrate on Katherine shall we? I hope you've bought her a present."

  Cornelius gave her a big grin and pulled a coloured box from his bag. Fulvia opened it and carefully took the silk scarf out.

  "It's lovely Cornelius," she said with approval, "your taste is definitely getting better with age."

  Fulvia refolded the scarf and put it back in the box. She saw that Cornelius was really pleased that she approved of his choice.

  "You really like her don't you?"

  "Yes, I do. I think I may be in love with her."

  "Knowing you Cornelius, if you think you are, then you probably are." She took his hand in hers.

  "All this trouble must be really tearing you up inside," she added softly. "I know how much you hate the thought of war, but it must be a lot worse when the person you love is likely to be on the other side."

  "She hates war even more than I do."

  "It doesn't matter," said Fulvia sadly, "once the shooting starts, it's too late."

  Cornelius sat silently for a while whilst Fulvia looked at him. Then she stood up. "Come on Cornelius, we're going shopping. That scarf is beautiful, but it's not enough for the girl you love. I hope you still have plenty of money on you?"

  Cornelius knew that she was trying to cheer him up, but he was glad of it anyway. Better to wander around the shops with Fulvia than to just sit around. Besides, Fulvia had exquisite taste and kne
w exactly what a woman wants from a man.

  Chapter Nine

  23rd April 1920

  Minden, Saxony

  On his return to Minden, Cornelius had found the Roman embassy in a state of siege. Crowds of local tradesmen and students from the university had gathered outside the main gates to protest against the new trade laws. One of the Saxon policemen on regular duty outside the embassy recognised Cornelius as he was walking towards the entrance and guided him to a side gate.

  The ambassador was rarely at the embassy. He spent most of his time with senior Saxon Nobles trying to present the new imperial policy in a good light. The few occasions that Cornelius had been able to see him, he had come away from the meeting with an increased sense of foreboding. The Saxons were in no mood to acquiesce over the new trade laws, especially the waterways issue, and had already responded to the additional customs duty by increasing the tax on Roman goods entering their country.

  Being relieved of his responsibilities for trade, Cornelius spent all his time analysing military data. Some of his sources of information had dried up once the embassy had come under close observation, but thanks to the ambassador providing some extra funds, Cornelius was able to keep most of the intelligence network operating. In that respect he was better off than his military counterparts in Augusta Treverorum.

  He could find nothing particularly worrying in the data that he was receiving. A heightened level of security, training stepped up, additional movements of heavy equipment around the country - but nothing particularly unusual under the circumstances. No massive build-up of troops along the frontier, no mobilisation of reservists. Yet there was something bothering Cornelius, and he could not put his finger on it.

  A number of small units had been moved from their normal bases but had not turned up anywhere else. The foundry for casting naval guns was working around the clock in spite of there being no ships waiting for guns to be fitted. The railway yards were virtually empty of cargo trucks. A number of Saxon aircraft squadrons had been re-deployed from their eastern border, but to the coast, not to the Rhine frontier.

  Cornelius could not fit these facts into his analysis and although he knew that there were times when the military of every nation did things which defied logical explanation, there was something about this information that worried him. Try as he could he could not see a pattern. All that he could do was to demand more information from his sources and to dig deeper into the ambassadors’ discretionary funds.

  Although the embassy staff had been restricted to the compound due to the mounting animosity of the local population, Cornelius did manage to slip out and meet Katherine a few times. She would pick him up in her motor carriage early in the morning while the streets were still deserted and they would drive out to some quiet spot in the country.

  Their first meeting had been quite emotional, and once they were alone they had just held each other tightly for what seemed like an eternity. They both professed how much they had missed the other and how they feared they would never see each other again. But despite the feelings which he had confessed to Fulvia in Colonia Agrippina, Cornelius could not bring himself to tell Katherine that he loved her. He sensed that his feelings were returned by her but he still held back. He was worried by the threat of war and did not want to complicate their relationship any more than it already was. He was also afraid that she would reject him and deep inside he wondered if that was the real reason.

  Katherine was thrilled with the gifts that Cornelius had given her. She put on the scarf immediately. He was tempted to tell her that the earrings and necklace had been chosen by Fulvia, but had decided to follow her parting advice to 'keep your mouth shut and take the credit'.

  Alone in the countryside, they would sit on a hillside and talk about their past, growing up in Saxony or the Empire, their friends and their family. Occasionally they would talk about the current crisis and the stupidity of it. It was during one of these discussions that Katherine mentioned her younger brothers 'strange' behaviour.

  "He almost seems happy," she had said. "he's very busy, going from one end of Saxony to the other, and I rarely ever see him at home, but when I do he looks so smug!"

  Cornelius had never mentioned his 'other job' at the embassy and had scrupulously avoided using his relationship with Katherine to find out information. However her comments about Franz rang alarm bells in his head. He spoke to Katherine slowly and with a sense of concern in his voice.

  "Katherine, why do you think Franz is feeling so pleased? Please think carefully. What could have happened to bring about this change?"

  She looked at him, disconcerted by his change of mood. "I don't know Cornelius," she said defensively, "he doesn't confide in me. All he cares about is the army and his work at the staff school....", she stopped suddenly and went pale.

  "You don't think that they are planning a war."

  "They are always planning for a war," said Cornelius, "that's the job of an army staff. What I'm worried about is whether they are planning to actually start one."

  12th may 1920

  Londinium, Britannia

  The elections for the provincial assembly went very much as expected. The Radicals and Federals formed an election pact that maximised their vote and gave them a total of forty six of the seventy five seats in the local assembly. Their joint manifesto called for Britannia to be declared a 'special trade province' within the Empire, exempt from the provisions of the new trade laws.

  A week after the new assembly had been sworn in and the new administration had taken office, the governor had summoned Sextus to his office.

  He waved a handful of papers at Sextus as he entered. "They want to implement the plans for this 'special trade' idea of theirs as soon as possible," said Romanus Philokates. He read from the top sheet, "in order to 'prevent a complete breakdown in the commercial life of the province'. They've sent me the draft legislation which they plan to put to the assembly next week."

  "I can understand that sir," said Sextus, "trade has already seen a significant down turn and the ports are laying off thousands of workers."

  Philokates nodded and smiled kindly. "Yes Sextus, I'm aware of the situation. Our new administration wants Britannia to become economically independent of the Empire whilst still remaining a loyal part of it"

  At the governors invitation Sextus sat down.

  "This proposed legislation will declare every port in the province to be a 'Free Trade Area' and ships may land and off load there without having to worry about paying any duty. Only when the goods move out of these areas to be sold in the province will they be subject to the new duty, but," the governor raised a finger to emphasise the next point, "if they are loaded onto another vessel to be transported to another country, such as the United Provinces or the Aztec Empire, they will not have to pay any imperial duty!"

  Sextus grasped the point immediately, "that way the ports stay busy and the warehouses stay full. Very clever sir."

  "Yes it is," agreed Philokates happily, "and what's more, according to my legal staff, it's within the law. There are a number of precedents allowing the governor of a province to approve the setting up of these 'Free Trade Areas'."

  "But what about the tariff for using the Oceanus Britannicus?" asked Sextus.

  "That," said the Governor ominously, "is another matter."

  He stood up and signalled Sextus to follow him over to a map which was mounted on the wall on the other side of his office. He pointed to the ports along the coast.

  "The other part of their legislation states that a foreign vessel will be considered exempt from the new tariff if it is carrying goods for sale within the Empire. They argue that the new waterways tariff is aimed at those vessels that use the waters around the empire but contribute nothing to the upkeep of the forces and facilities that make them safe to use."

  "Like the ships going directly from Scandia to the United Provinces'" said Sextus.

  "Exactly," said Philokates, "so, their argument
continues, it's unfair to tax a ship coming into an imperial port to deliver goods since their cargo is to be taxed as well."

  Sextus thought about this for a while before shaking his head. "The tax procurator will never buy that," he said glumly, "for a start, a provincial assembly has no power to interpret imperial tax laws."

  "I have to agree with you there Sextus," said Philokates. "If Britannia could get away with that, every province in the empire would follow our example." He gave Sextus a grin, "and I don't think that chief minister Exanzenus would be terribly pleased, do you?"

  "No governor," agreed Sextus smiling, "I'm sure he wouldn't."

  "However," said Philokates, "I think that the assembly will be satisfied with the Free Trade Areas for the moment while I try and work out something on the waterways issue."

  "You're going to approve the first part of the legislation."

  "Yes I am. It's within my power and I believe it's the right thing to do. It will defuse a lot of the tension in the province at the moment and will give us all some breathing space. I'm going to meet with the leaders of the Radical and Federal parties at my country villa this evening and I expect that they'll agree with my compromise. They don't want any more riots - it's bad for business."

  12th May 1920

  Outside Londinium, Britannia

  The leader of the group walked over to the men preparing the explosives. He watched as they worked by torch light, carefully setting up the charges by the side of the road and then laying the wires up the steep slope of the embankment. Four times they had had to stop their work and take cover as the lookout signalled the approach of a vehicle, but now they were ready.

  The man responsible for the explosives came over to the leader and reported that all was ready. In reply the leader slapped him hard across the face, knocking the man back several paces.

  "Latin!" hissed the leader, "we only use Latin. Do not forget!"

  The man nodded an apology, in Latin, and returned to his position. The leader took out his watch and checked the time using his torch. Good, he thought, there is time for one more inspection before the target was due.