Fortune's Favorites

by Colleen McCullough

  "Terentia," said her cousin deliberately, "is ugly, sour, cantankerous and parsimonious. She is now twenty-one years old, and still single. I know girls are supposed to obey their paterfamilias and marry whomsoever they are told to marry, but there is no man-alive or dead!-who could order Terentia to do anything she didn't want to do."

  "And poor Varro Lucullus is such a nice man," said Sulla, highly entertained.

  "Precisely."

  "So Terentia met Cicero?"

  "She did indeed. And-you could have bowled all of us over with a feather!-consented to marry him."

  "Lucky Cicero! One of Fortune's favorites. Her money will come in very handy."

  "That's what you think," said Varro grimly. "She's made up the marriage contract herself and retained complete control of her wealth, though she did agree to dower any daughters she might have, and contribute toward funding the careers of any sons. But as for Cicero-he's not the man to get the better of Terentia!"

  "What's he like as a person these days, Varro?"

  “Pleasant enough. Soft inside, I think. But vainglorious. Insufferably conceited about his intellect and convinced it has no peer. An avid social climber ... Hates to be reminded that Gaius Marius is his distant relative! If Terentia had been one of those abysmally undistinguished daughters of our less salubrious plutocrats, I don't think he would have looked at her. But her mother was a patrician and once married to Quintus Fabius Maximus, which means Fabia the Vestal Virgin is her half sister. Therefore Terentia was 'good enough,' if you know what I mean." Varro pulled a face. "Cicero is an Icarus, Lucius Cornelius. He intends to fly right up into the realm of the sun-a dangerous business if you're a New Man without a sestertius."

  "Whatever is in the air of Arpinum, it seems to breed such fellows," said Sulla. "As well for Rome that this New Man from Arpinum has no military skills!"

  "Quite the opposite, I have heard."

  "Oh, I know it! When he was my contubernalis he acted as my secretary. The sight of a sword made him ashen. But I've never had a better secretary! When is the wedding?"

  “Not until after Varro Lucullus and his brother celebrate the ludi Romani in September." Varro laughed. "There's no room in their world at the moment for anything except planning the best games Rome has seen in a century-if at all!"

  "A pity I won't be in Rome to see them," said Sulla, who did not look brokenhearted.

  A small silence fell, which Varro took advantage of before Sulla could think of some other subject. "Lucius Cornelius, I wondered if you knew that Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus is coming to Rome shortly?" he asked diffidently. "He would like to call to see you, but understands how busy you are."

  "Never too busy to see Magnus!" said Sulla cheerfully. He directed a keen look at Varro. "Still running round after him with a pen and paper to record his every fart, Varro?"

  A deep red suffused Varro's skin; when dealing with Sulla one didn't always know how he would see even the most innocent things. Did he, for example, think that Varro's time would be better spent recording the deeds (or farts) of Lucius Cornelius Sulla? So he said, very humbly, "I do from time to time. It started as an accident because we were together when war broke out, and I was not proof against Pompeius's enthusiasm. He said I should write history, not natural history. And that is what I do. I am not Pompeius's biographer!"

  "Very well answered!"

  Thus it was that when Varro left the Dictator's house on the Palatine, he had to pause to wipe the sweat from his face. They talked endlessly about the lion and the fox in Sulla; but personally Varro thought the worst beast he harbored was a common cat.

  He had done well, however. When Pompey arrived in Rome with his wife and took up residence in his family's house on the Carinae, Varro was able to say that Sulla would be glad to see Pompey, and would allocate him sufficient time for a cozy chat. That was Sulla's phrase-but uttered with tongue in cheek, Varro knew. A cozy chat with Sulla could turn out to be a walk along a tightrope above a pit of burning coals.

  Ah, but the self-confidence and conceit of youth! Pompey, still some months short of his twenty-seventh birthday, breezed off to see Sulla with no misgivings whatsoever.

  "And how's married life?" asked the Dictator blandly.

  Pompey beamed. "Wonderful! Glorious! What a wife you found for me, Lucius Cornelius! Beautiful-educated- sweet. She's pregnant. Due to drop my first son later this year."

  "A son, eh? Are you sure it will be a son, Magnus?"

  "Positive."

  Sulla chuckled. "Well, you're one of Fortune's favorites, Magnus, so I suppose it will be a son. Gnaeus Junior ... The Butcher, Kid Butcher, and Baby Butcher."

  "I like that!" exclaimed Pompey, not at all offended.

  "You're establishing a tradition," said Sulla gravely.

  "We certainly are! Three generations!"

  Pompey sat back, pleased. Then, noted the watching Sulla, a different look came into the wide blue eyes; the happiness fled, replaced by a wary and thoughtful calculation as Pompey turned something over in his mind. Sulla waited without speaking until it came out.

  "Lucius Cornelius..."

  "Yes?"

  "That law you promulgated-the one about making the Senate look outside of its own ranks if no military commander could be found among the senators ..."

  "The special commission, you mean?"

  "That's the one."

  "What about it?"

  "Would it apply to me?"

  "It could do."

  "But only if no one within the Senate volunteered."

  "It doesn't quite say that, Magnus. It says if no capable and experienced commander within the Senate volunteers."

  "And who-decides that?"

  "The Senate."

  Another silence fell. Then Pompey said, idly it seemed, "It would be nice to have lots of clients within the Senate."

  "It is always nice to have those, Magnus."

  At which point Pompey transparently decided to change the subject. "Who will be the consuls for next year?" he asked.

  "Catulus, for one. Though I haven't decided yet whether he's to be senior or junior consul. A year ago, it seemed a clear-cut decision. Now I'm not so sure."

  "Catulus is like Metellus Pius-a stickler."

  "Perhaps. Neither as old nor as wise, unfortunately."

  "Do you think Metellus Pius can beat Sertorius?"

  "At first, probably not," said Sulla, smiling. "However, don't hold my Piglet too lightly, Magnus. It takes him a while to get into stride. But once he finds his stride he's very good."

  "Pah! He's an old woman!" said Pompey contemptuously.

  "I've known some doughty old women in my time, Magnus."

  Back to the changed subject: “Who else will be consul?''

  "Lepidus."

  "Lepidus?" Pompey gaped.

  "Don't you approve?"

  "I didn't say I didn't approve, Lucius Cornelius. As a matter of fact, I think I do! I just didn't think your mind was inclined his way. He hasn't been obsequious enough."

  "Is that what you believe? That I give the big jobs only to men willing to wash my arse?"

  Give Pompey his due, he was never afraid. So, much to Sulla's secret amusement, he continued. "Not really. But you certainly haven't given the big jobs to men who have made it as obvious as Lepidus has that he doesn't approve of you."

  "Why should I?" asked Sulla, looking amazed. "I'm not fool enough to give the big jobs to men who might undermine me!"

  "Then why Lepidus?"

  "I'm due to retire before he takes office. And Lepidus," said Sulla deliberately, "is aiming high. It has occurred to me that it might be better to make him consul while I'm still alive."

  "He's a good man."

  "Because he questioned me publicly? Or despite that?"

  But "He's a good man" was as far as Pompey was prepared to go. In truth, though he found the appointment of Lepidus not in character for Sulla, he was only mildly interested. Of far more interest was Sulla's provision for the spe
cial commission. When he had heard of it he had wondered what he himself might have had to do with it, but it had been no part of Pompey's plans at that stage to ask Sulla. Now, almost two years since the law had been passed, he thought it expedient to enquire rather than ask. The Dictator was right, of course. A man found it hard enough to gain his objectives as a member of the Senate; but seeking his objectives from that body when a man was not a member of it would prove extremely difficult indeed.

  Thus after Pompey took his leave of Sulla and commenced the walk home, he strolled along deep in thought. First of all, he would have to establish a faction within the Senate. And after that he would have to create a smaller group of men willing-for a price, naturally-to intrigue actively and perpetually on his behalf, even engage in underhand activities. Only-where to begin?

  Halfway down the Kingmakers' Stairs, Pompey halted, turned, took them lithely two at a time back up onto the Clivus Victoriae, no mean feat in a toga. Philippus! He would begin with Philippus.

  Lucius Marcius Philippus had come a long way since the day he had paid a visit to the seaside villa of Gaius Marius and told that formidable man that he, Philippus, had just been elected a tribune of the plebs, and what might he do for Gaius Marius?-for a price, naturally. How many times inside his mind Philippus had turned his toga inside out and then back again, only Philippus knew for certain. What other men knew for certain was that he had always managed to survive, and even to enhance his reputation. At the time Pompey went to see him, he was both consular and ex-censor, and one of the Senate's elders. Many men loathed him, few genuinely liked him, but he was a power nonetheless; somehow he had succeeded in persuading most of his world that he was a man of note as well as clout.

  He found his interview with Pompey both amusing and thought-provoking, never until now having had much to do with Sulla's pet, but well aware that in Pompey, Rome had spawned a young man who deserved watching. Philippus was, besides, financially strapped again. Oh, not the way he used to be! Sulla's proscriptions had proven an extremely fruitful source of property, and he had picked up several millions' worth of estates for several thousands. But, like a lot of men of his kind, Philippus was not a handy manager; money seemed to slip away faster than he could gather it in, and he lacked the ability to supervise his rural money-making enterprises-as well as the ability to choose reliable staff.

  "In short, Gnaeus Pompeius, I am the opposite of men like Marcus Licinius Crassus, who still has his first sestertius and now adds them up in millions upon millions. His people tremble in their shoes whenever they set eyes on him. Mine smile slyly."

  "You need a Chrysogonus," said the young man with the wide blue gaze and the frank, open, attractive face.

  Always inclined to run to fat, Philippus had grown even softer and more corpulent with the years, and his brown eyes were almost buried between swollen upper lids and pouched lower ones. These eyes now rested upon his youthful adviser with startled and wary surprise: Philippus was not used to being patronized.

  "Chrysogonus ended up impaled on the needles below the Tarpeian Rock!"

  "Chrysogonus had been extremely valuable to Sulla in spite of his fate," said Pompey. "He died because he had enriched himself from the proscriptions-not because he enriched himself by stealing directly from his patron. Over the many years he worked for Sulla, he worked indefatigably. Believe me, Lucius Marcius, you do need a Chrysogonus."

  "Well, if I do, I have no idea how to find one."

  "I'll undertake to find one for you if you like."

  The buried eyes now popped out of their surrounding flesh. “Oh? And why would you be willing to do that, Gnaeus Pompeius?"

  "Call me Magnus," said Pompey impatiently.

  "Magnus."

  "Because I need your services, Lucius Marcius."

  "Call me Philippus."

  "Philippus."

  "How can I possibly serve you, Magnus? You're rich beyond most rich men's dreams-even Crassus's, I'd venture! You're-what?-in your middle twenties somewhere?-and already famous as a military commander, not to mention standing high in Sulla's favor-and that is hard to achieve. I've tried, but I never have."

  "Sulla is going," said Pompey deliberately, "and when he goes I'll sink back into obscurity. Especially if men like Catulus and the Dolabellae have anything to do with it. I'm not a member of the Senate. Nor do I intend to be."

  "Curious, that," said Philippus thoughtfully. "You had the opportunity. Sulla put your name at the top of his first list. But you spurned it."

  "I have my reasons."

  "I imagine you do!"

  Pompey got up from his chair and strolled across to the open window at the back of Philippus's study, which, because of the peculiar layout of Philippus's house (perched as it was near the bend in the Clivus Victoriae) looked not onto a peristyle garden but out across the lower Forum Romanum to the cliff of the Capitol. And there above the pillared arcade in which dwelt the magnificent effigies of the Twelve Gods, Pompey could see the beginnings of a huge building project; Sulla's Tabularium, a gigantic records house in which would repose all of Rome's accounts and law tablets. Other men, thought Pompey contemptuously, might build a basilica or a temple or a porticus, but Sulla builds a monument to Rome's bureaucracy! He has no wings on his imagination. That is his weakness, his patrician practicality.

  "I would be grateful if you could find a Chrysogonus for me, Magnus," said Philippus to break the long silence. "The only trouble is that I am not a Sulla! Therefore I very much doubt that I would succeed in controlling such a man."

  "You're not soft in anything except appearance, Philip-pus," said the Master of Tact. "If I find you just the right man, you will control him. You just can't pick staff, that's all."

  "And why should you do this for me, Magnus?"

  "Oh, that's not all I intend to do for you!" said Pompey, turning from the window with a smile all over his face.

  "Really?"

  "I take it that your chief problem is maintaining a decent cash flow. You have a great deal of property, as well as several schools for gladiators. But nothing is managed efficiently, and therefore you do not enjoy the income you ought. A Chrysogonus will go far toward fixing that! However, it's very likely that-as you're a man of famously expensive habits-even an expanded income from all your estates and schools will not always prove adequate for your needs."

  "Admirably stated!" said Philippus, who was enjoying this interview, he now discovered, enormously.

  "I'd be willing to augment your income with the gift of a million sesterces a year," said Pompey coolly.

  Philippus couldn't help it. He gasped. "A million?"

  "Provided you earn it, yes."

  “And what would I have to do to earn it?''

  "Establish a Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus faction within the Senate of sufficient power to get me whatever I want whenever I want it." Pompey, who never suffered from bashfulness or guilt or any kind of self-deprecation, had no difficulty in meeting Philippus's gaze when he said this.

  "Why not join the Senate and do it for yourself? Cheaper!"

  "I refuse to belong to the Senate, so that's not possible. Besides which, I'd still have to do it. Much better then to do it behind the scenes. I won't be sitting there to remind the senators that I might have any interest in what's going on beyond the interest of a genuine Roman patriot-knight."

  "Oh, you're deep!" Philippus exclaimed appreciatively. "I wonder does Sulla know all the sides to you?"

  "Well, I'm why, I believe, he incorporated the special commission into his laws about commands and governorships."

  "You believe he invented the special commission because you refused to belong to the Senate?"

  "I do."

  "And that is why you want to pay me fatly to establish a faction for you within the Senate. Which is all very well. But to build a faction will cost you far more money than what you pay me, Magnus. For I do not intend to disburse sums to other men out of my own money-and what you pay me is my own money."
r />   "Fair enough," said Pompey equably.

  “There are plenty of needy senators among the pedarii. They won't cost you much, since all you need them for is a vote. But it will be necessary to buy some of the silver-tongues on the front benches too, not to mention a few more in the middle." Philippus looked thoughtful. "Gaius Scribonius Curio is relatively poor. So is the adopted Cornelius Lentulus- Gnaeus Cornelius Lentulus Clodianus. They both itch for the consulship, but neither has the income to attain it. There are a number of Lentuli, but Lentulus Clodianus is the senior of the branch. He controls the votes of those backbenchers in the Lentulus clientele. Curio is a power within himself-an interesting man. But to buy them will take a considerable amount of money. Probably a million each. If Curio will sell himself. I believe he will for enough, but not blindly, and not completely. Lucius Gellius Poplicola would sell his wife, his parents and his children for a million, however."

  "I'd rather," said Pompey, "pay them an annual income, as I will you. A million now might buy them, yes, but I think they would be happier if they knew that there was a regular quarter million coming in every year. In four years, that's the million. But I am going to need them for longer than four years."

  "You're generous, Magnus. Some might say foolishly so."

  "I am never foolish!" snapped Pompey. "I will expect to see a return for my money in keeping with the amount of it!"

  For some time they discussed the logistics of payments and the amounts necessary to people the back benches with willing-nay, eager!-Pompeian voters. But then Philippus sat back with a frown, and fell silent.

  "What is it?" asked Pompey a little anxiously.

  "There's one man you can't do without. The trouble is he's already got more money than he knows what to do with. So he can't be bought and he makes great capital out of that fact."

  "You mean Cethegus."

  "I do indeed."

  "How can I get him?"

  "I haven't the faintest idea."

  Pompey rose, looking brisk. "Then I'd better see him."

  "No!" cried Philippus, alarmed. "Cethegus is a patrician Cornelian, and such a smooth and syrupy sort of man that you'd make an enemy out of him-he can't deal with the direct approach. Leave him to me. I'll sound him out, find what he wants."