The Judgment of Caesar: A Novel of Ancient Rome

by Steven Saylor

“Let me return to my room and look through my things. An alabaster vial is a common-enough object. Perhaps the one in my room is still there, after all.” I tried to speak with conviction, but the chance seemed far-fetched even to me.

  Caesar, to his credit, allowed me to pursue the possibility. While his men took Meto into custody, another group of soldiers accompanied me back to the mainland, escorted me to my room, and watched as I conducted a futile search of the things in my trunk. The only result had been to give further evidence that Meto must have purloined the poison at some point after he first saw it in my trunk.

  But how had the poison come to be in the wine? And for what purpose? I sat on the bed, numbed by the enormity of what had happened. Was it really possible that my son had attempted to take the life of Julius Caesar?

  My son: The words came to my mind unbidden and remained there, unchallenged. As I had wept for Bethesda, now I wept for Meto, knowing he must surely be lost to me forever. I realized in that moment why I had so steadfastly resisted a reconciliation with Meto since seeing him again in Alexandria. It was not stubborn pride, or an irreconcilable disgust for Meto himself; it was my fear of a moment just such as this. Having lost Bethesda, how could I open myself a second time to the chance of losing the person I loved most in the world? Meto, who lived such a perilous existence, who exposed himself again and again to the dangers of war and espionage, who had bound his fate to the fiery comet of Caesar’s career—since I had at last shut him out from my life, surely it was better to keep him out for good, or else I might face the intolerable prospect sooner or later of losing him altogether. So it had come to pass, despite all I had done to harden my heart against him. What an ill-starred voyage had brought me to Alexandria!

  The soldiers allowed me time to collect myself, but did not withdraw; Caesar had ordered them not to leave my side. Rupa stood before the window, his arms crossed, fretting and frowning. The boys fidgeted, biting their lips and exchanging glances, until at last Mopsus spoke.

  “Master, what’s going on? What’s happened? It’s something to do with Meto, isn’t it?”

  I shook my head. “Boys, boys, it’s of no concern to you—”

  “No, Master, this isn’t right!” Little Androcles stepped forward. “Mopsus and I may be only slaves, and Rupa is—well, he’s just Rupa—but we’re not children any longer. Something terrible has happened. We want to know what it is. We’re clever, Master—”

  “And fearless!” piped up Mopsus.

  And strong! Rupa tacitly added, massing his bull-like shoulders.

  The only occupant of the room who failed to step forward was Alexander the cat, who resettled himself on the windowsill with his back to the room and gazed out at the harbor.

  “Perhaps we can help, Master.”

  I looked at Androcles, manifestly still a child notwithstanding his protestation to the contrary, and I remembered Meto when he was the same age. Between that time and this, Meto had become a man. He had traveled across the world and back, killed other men and very nearly been killed himself, stood beside Caesar and dipped his hands into the tides of history; yet a part of me clung to the absurd notion that Meto was as tender and vulnerable as Androcles, that he was still a boy who needed my protection—and my chiding. In that moment I at last became reconciled to Meto and the man he had chosen to become. I relinquished the false assumption that I had some responsibility for his actions; I acquiesced to his inevitable autonomy; I admitted to myself that I loved him nonetheless. If now he found himself in a dire strait, I would not judge him, and I would do all I could to help him.

  “Meto stands accused of trying to kill his imperator, with a poison he obtained from this trunk,” I said.

  “Oh, no!” said Mopsus.

  “It isn’t true, is it, Master?”

  “The truth, Androcles? I don’t know.”

  “But if Meto did such a thing, Master—”

  “Then I shall throw myself upon Caesar’s mercy. I shall tear my tunic, pull out my hair, beg him shamelessly; surely all my years around advocates like Cicero have taught me some tools of persuasion. I shall use them now on Meto’s behalf.”

  “But surely Meto is innocent, Master!”

  “If he is, Mopsus, then I intend to do everything in my power to absolve him. This is a strange land. Here, justice exists at the whim of those who possess a certain bloodline, and laws are decrees handed down by squabbling rulers. Laws have nothing to do with truth, or justice with proof. Soon it will be the same in Rome, I think; Caesar is taking lessons from these Nile crocodiles and intends to reproduce their habitat along the Tiber. Still, even in Egypt, truth is truth, and proof is proof, and it may be that I can yet do something to save my son.”

  “And we will help you,” insisted Androcles.

  “If the gods allow it,” I said.

  “Did you find it?”

  Caesar stood at the eastern window in his high room, gazing over the rooftops of the Jewish Quarter in the direction of the distant Nile.

  “No, Consul.”

  He nodded. Even with his back turned, I could tell that he took no pleasure in the gesture. He stood with his hands clasped behind his back, nervously turning the alabaster vial between two fingers. He turned to face me.

  “I’ve just received disturbing news. How are your eyes, Gordianus?”

  “I beg your pardon, Consul?” “Stand here and look toward the east, beyond the city, at that blur of desert between here and the Nile. What do you see, Gordianus?”

  “Not much, Consul. A blur, as you say, further obscured by a great cloud of dust.”

  “Exactly. That’s the dust raised by a marching army. According to my intelligence, the whole of Ptolemy’s army has decamped from their fortress in the desert and is now marching this way under the command of a certain Achillas. You’ve met this fellow, I understand?”

  “Not exactly, Consul.”

  “But you’ve observed him at close quarters?”

  “From a considerable distance, I saw him murder Pompey. Later, practically under my nose, I watched him strangle an Egyptian spy with his bare hands.”

  “A murderous brute!”

  “I believe that both acts were committed at the behest of the king, which would make the killing of Pompey an assassination and the killing of the spy an execution—if one believes that some killings are murder and other killings are not.”

  Caesar looked at me askance. “I’ve killed men in battle. Men under my command have caused the death of many others. Would you call me a murderer, Gordianus?”

  “I would never presume to offer such a judgment, Consul.”

  He snorted. “Wriggled out of answering that one, didn’t you? You remind me more and more of Cicero. The word-twisting, the hand-wringing, the endless equivocations—his ways have rubbed off on you over the years, whether you like it or not.”

  I kept my voice steady. “The times we live in have led us all down paths not of our choosing.”

  “Speak for yourself, Gordianus. You spend too much time looking backward. The future lies ahead.”

  “A future that will soon bring Ptolemy’s army to the gates of Alexandria?”

  “So it seems. I never intended for Alexandria to become a battleground. I meant to come here, settle affairs between the king and queen, and be on my way. Instead, I now face the prospect of a full-scale war, and I don’t like the odds. I’ve sent for reinforcements, but who knows when those will arrive? As it stands, their numbers are great, and ours are small. Granted, the forces under Achillas’s command are highly irregular by Roman standards. The core is made up of the legionnaires who arrived here under Gabinius to restore the late king to his throne and to keep the peace. It seems they’ve since forgotten their origins and become Egyptianized, marrying local women and adopting native customs. That one of their number would consent to murder Pompey in cold blood tells us just how far they’ve descended from their honorable beginnings. Added to their ranks are mercenaries, runaway slaves, and for
eign criminals. They’ve no discipline to speak of, and little loyalty; once, when they wanted higher pay, they blockaded the palace to demand it. But they haven’t forgotten how to fight. Under a commander as murderous as they are, they may constitute a formidable foe.”

  He began to pace, turning the alabaster vial in his fingers. It seemed that Meto was far from his thoughts. He spoke again.

  “A moment ago, you said that the killing of Pompey was done at the behest of the king. Do you believe that, Gordianus? Did King Ptolemy himself order the assassination? Is he capable of issuing such a command without Pothinus guiding him?”

  “Surely you’ve come to know the king better than I do, Consul. You must be a better judge of his character and capabilities.”

  “Am I? Do you want the truth, Gordianus? These Ptolemies have me utterly confounded! The two of them have put my head in a spin. It’s absurd. The master strategist, the consummate politician, the conqueror of Gaul, the author of Pompey’s downfall—stumped by two children!”

  I could not restrain a smile. “Cleopatra is hardly a child, Consul, as young as she may seem to men of our years. And—since you asked for my opinion—Ptolemy is no longer a boy. He’s very nearly at that age when a Roman youth puts on the toga of manhood and becomes a citizen. Were you not precocious at fifteen, Consul?”

  “Precocious, perhaps, but I was hardly ready to run a country like Egypt! When I was the king’s age . . .” Caesar’s face softened. “That was about the time I lost my father. It happened one morning while he was putting on his shoes. He was a strong, vigorous man in the prime of life; my mentor, my hero. One moment he was alive, tying the straps of his shoes. The next moment, he gave a lurch and tumbled to the floor, as dead as King Numa. His own father had died the same way—suddenly, in middle age, for no apparent reason. Some flaw passed from father to son, perhaps; in which case, I’m already past the span of my allotted years and living on borrowed time. I could die at any moment; perhaps I’ll drop dead while we stand here talking!” He gazed at the distant cloud of dust and sighed. “I remember my father every day—every time I put on my shoes. It’s a sad thing for a boy on the verge of manhood to lose his father. The same thing happened to Ptolemy, though he was even younger when the Piper died. I think that may be why he craves so strongly the affection and guidance of an older man.”

  I frowned. “You speak of Pothinus?”

  Caesar laughed. “I’ll spare you the predictable joke regarding Pothinus’s manhood. No, Gordianus, I refer to myself. The other day, in the reception hall, when I spoke of the special friendship between the king and myself, I wasn’t just spinning pretty words in the manner of Cicero.”

  “I think I may understand the king’s fascination with Caesar, but I’m not sure I understand . . .”

  “Caesar’s fascination with the king? Ptolemy is intelligent, passionate, willful, convinced of his divine destiny—”

  “Like his sister?”

  “Very much like her, though I’m afraid he lacks Cleopatra’s sense of humor. Such a serious young man—and what a temper! That tantrum he threw the other day, haranguing the crowd and casting off his diadem!” Caesar shook his head. “I acted too quickly, pressing him to make peace with his sister. I should have anticipated his reaction.”

  “It seemed to me that the king was behaving like a jealous lover.” I gazed steadily at Caesar, wondering if I had spoken too candidly.

  He narrowed his eyes. “The intimate relationship between an older man and a youth has always been more warmly regarded in the Greek-speaking world than in our own. Alexander himself had Hephaestion, and then the Persian boy, Bagoas. If the king of Alexander’s city has approached me in the same spirit of manly love, should I not be honored? Young men are naturally susceptible to hero worship. The more ambitious or highborn the young man, the more exalted the older man upon whom the youth desires to model himself.”

  “The king’s attention flatters you?”

  “Yes; and in a way that his sister’s attentions do not.”

  “They say that Caesar set his sights on a king, when he was young.” The steadiness of my voice was inversely proportionate to the recklessness of my words. Everyone knew the rumors about Caesar and King Nicomedes of Bithynia. His political enemies had used the tale to ridicule him—but most of those men were dead now. Caesar’s soldiers cracked jokes about it—but I was not one of Caesar’s comrades in arms. Still, it was Caesar himself who had opened this avenue of conversation.

  His response was surprisingly candid. Perhaps, like me, Caesar had reached that point in life when one’s own past begins to seem like ancient history—more quaint than quarrel provoking. “Ah, Nico! When I put on my shoes, I think of my father; when I take them off, I think of Nico. I was nineteen, serving on the staff of the praetor Minucius Thermus in the Aegean. Thermus required the help of King Nicomedes’s fleet; an emissary was needed to go to the king’s court in Bithynia. Thermus chose me. ‘I think the two of you may hit it off,’ he told me, with a glint in his eye. The old goat was right. Nico and I hit it off so well that I tarried in Bithynia even after Thermus sent a messenger to retrieve me. What a remarkable man Nico was! Born to power, sure of himself, with a voracious appetite for life; a ruler not unlike the one that Ptolemy may yet become. What a lot he had to teach an eager, ambitious young Roman who was no longer a boy but not quite a man. When I think of how naive I was, how wide-eyed and innocent!”

  “It’s impossible to think of you as naive, Consul.”

  “Is it? Alas! The youth whom Nico instructed in the ways of the world has long since vanished—but the man remembers those golden days as clearly as if they just happened. I shut my eyes, and I’m in Bithynia again, without a scar on my flesh and with all my life ahead of me.

  Do you think Ptolemy will remember me that vividly when he grows old, and ruling Egypt has become a tired habit, and that fellow called Caesar has long since turned to dust?”

  “I think the world will remember Caesar long after the Ptolemies have been forgotten.” I said this matter-of-factly, but Caesar mistook my tone. His gentle mood suddenly evaporated.

  “Don’t humor me, Gordianus—you, of all people! The last thing I need right now is another sycophant.”

  The whole time we talked, he had been fiddling with the little vial, turning it over in his hand. Now he gripped it in his fist, so tightly that his knuckles blanched as white as the alabaster. Suddenly he threw it with all his might against the marble wall. Unbroken, the vial ricocheted and struck my leg. The blow was harmless, but still I jumped.

  The gesture expended Caesar’s fury. He drew a deep breath. “Just when I thought I was on the verge of restoring peace between the king and queen, Achillas marches on Alexandria—and someone attempts to poison me.”

  “Perhaps the queen was the intended victim.”

  “Perhaps. But how and when was the wine poisoned, and by whom? We know where the poison came from—and that fact casts a ray of suspicion upon you, Gordianus.”

  “Consul, I didn’t even know the vial was missing—”

  “So you’ve already explained. But the possibility remains that you were in collusion with your son—that you provided him with the poison, knowing how he intended to use it. Did you conspire against me?”

  I shook my head. “No, Consul.”

  “Meto claims to know nothing. The queen advises me to torture him. She doesn’t understand how strong willed he is. I myself trained Meto to endure interrogation. But if I thought that torture would loosen his tongue—”

  “No, Consul! Not that.”

  “The truth must be discovered.”

  “Perhaps . . . perhaps I can do so, Consul. If you’ll allow me—”

  “Why? Meto means nothing to you. In Massilia, you disowned him. I witnessed that moment with my own eyes and ears.”

  “Consul, please! Let me help my son.”

  Caesar gazed at me for a long moment. A shadow seemed to dim the light in his eyes, as if some powe
rful, dark emotion gripped him, but his face remained devoid of expression. At last he spoke. “Over the years, your son has demonstrated great loyalty to me. I’ve rewarded his devotion with a degree of trust I’ve given to very few men. And yet, when that slave girl died today, a part of me was not surprised. The worm of deceit starts small, but grows. I think back, and I perceive that a rift has been growing between myself and Meto for quite some time. The signs have been subtle. He never defies me outright, but on his face I’ve glimpsed a sour, fleeting look; in his voice I’ve heard a faint note of discord. If Meto has betrayed me, he shall be punished accordingly.”

  I bit my lip. “Caesar has a reputation for clemency.”

  “Yes, Gordianus, I’ve shown great clemency to those who’ve fought against me. Even that rat Domitius Ahenobarbus I forgave, only to see him take up arms against me at Massilia and again at Pharsalus. But for a traitor who resorts to lies and poison, there can be no pardon. I tell you this outright, Gordianus, so that if you harbor any notion of pleading for your son’s life, you can spare yourself the indignity. Don’t bother to rip your tunic and weep, like one of Cicero’s guilty clients playing for sympathy in the courts. If Meto did this thing, my judgment will be harsh and irreversible. Do you understand?”

  “Yes, Consul. But what if I can prove to you that he’s innocent?” Again the shadow dimmed his eyes. “If Meto is innocent, then someone else is guilty.”

  “So I would assume, Consul.”

  “In which case, the truth is likely to pose a problem.”

  “I’m not sure I understand.”

  “The poisoner must have come from one of three camps—my own, or that of the queen, or that of the king. Whatever the truth, the revelation is likely to cause yet more . . . complications. Which is why you will report anything you discover directly to me, and to me alone. Do you understand?”

  “Yes, Consul.”

  Caesar strode across the room, stooped, and picked up the alabaster vial. He held it to the light. “What an irony, if the poison intended for Pompey’s widow had taken the life of Pompey’s rival! Do you think our poisoner has a sense of humor, Gordianus?”