I could have become her lover. Sometimes we shared more than a jug of wine, and would sit, hand in hand, or embrace.
One night I did grow amorous but she starkly pointed to a cobweb. ‘Did you know, Parmenon, that the female spider eats her mate?’
She drew away. ‘People like you, Parmenon, should have nothing to do with the likes of me. I have the same blood as Caligula. Everyone we touch dies violently. The Furies nest close to us.’
I heeded the warning. As the months passed, Agrippina was allowed more visitors and messengers from Rome, but they were only spies attempting to provoke some admission or treasonable remarks. They did bring news of her brother and his mad antics, hoping to provoke her.
Caligula had decided to launch an all-out war against the Germans. Eager to emulate his own father’s triumphs, he assembled an enormous force of some quarter of a million troops, with a huge convoy of military equipment and food. The Emperor himself, however, travelled with a retinue of gladiators, actors and women. When he reached the Rhine he downgraded certain commanders and executed others on the grounds that they had conspired with his sister against him. Caligula then decided that he was the embodiment of Mars, but could find no one to fight him so he arranged for his German bodyguards to sneak across the Rhine and hide in the forest. One day, as the Emperor was finishing lunch, his scouts told him that the enemy were gathering. His bodyguard, pretending to be the enemy, launched a fictitious ambush. Caligula had them captured and brought back in chains. In honour of his triumph, Caligula had all the surrounding trees shorn of their branches and decorated the stumps with trophies. When the news reached Rome, the Senate pretended that Caesar had won a great triumph, and poor Uncle Claudius was sent north to congratulate the victorious Emperor. Caligula was furious that such a clumsy messenger had been sent and had his uncle pitched into the Rhine for his pains.
Eager for a fresh triumph, Caligula marched the army into Gaul, having decided to invade Britain. He assembled his forces along the sea coast in full battle order. Catapults and other engines of war were all primed. Caligula took to sea in a trireme, travelled a short distance and then returned to shore. He ordered the trumpeters to sound the charge. Caligula rode along the beach, instructing his soldiers to attack the sea and use their helmets and shields to pick up shells as plunder and spoils of their great victory against the God Neptune.
After this nonsense, he marched back to Rome. On the way he stopped at Lyons where he auctioned off all of Agrippina’s property and possessions. He also organised a contest in Greek and Latin oratory in which the losers were forced to present the prizes to the winners as well as erase their own contributions, some with a sponge and the worst with their tongues. If they didn’t like this they were given a choice of being beaten with rods or thrown into the nearby river.
Caligula continued his march on Rome, his carts full of seashells. He added a few captives and deserters from Gaul, making them grow their hair long and dyed. These unfortunates were taught a little German and were given barbarian names. Caligula was eager for his Triumph: the Senate and people of Rome had no choice but to accept this farcical turn of events.
Agrippina bore the loss of her property and possessions with equanimity. She listened to such news, nodded and then returned to her flower collection.
One visitor, however, brought secret messages. Cassius Chaerea, a tribune from the Praetorian Guard, had been sent by Caligula to search the island and ensure that Agrippina was observing the terms of her exile. I’ve never met a soldier who looked more like a woman. Agrippina conceded he was better looking than her: tall and graceful with a long, slim, olive face and dark expressive eyes. My mistress said he had lips and eyelashes which any girl would envy. Nevertheless, Cassius was a seasoned soldier and, from the beginning, it was obvious that his heart was not in his task. Agrippina studied him for a few days then summoned me to our usual meeting place on the cliff top.
‘Cassius has brought me news from Rome. The Emperor’s madness is now the talk on everyone’s lips.’
‘And your son?’ I asked, trying to hide my jealousy. ‘You persuaded Chaerea to talk about your son?’
Agrippina smiled and whistled under her breath. ‘Are you jealous, Parmenon?’
‘You dress your hair,’ I replied. ‘You put paint on your face and bathe your body in perfume. You wear the most elegant robes and always arrange for Cassius to sit near you when we eat. You are not trying to seduce him, are you?’
‘Oh, I’ve already done that,’ Agrippina murmured. ‘Last night.’
I recalled Agrippina leaving the evening meal early, complaining she felt unwell, the usual sign that she wished to be left alone. Chaerea had retired an hour later.
‘I didn’t think you’d be so stupid!’ I retorted.
‘What’s Cassius going to say?’ Agrippina snapped. ‘That he dared seduce the Emperor’s disgraced sister? I know every mark on that beautiful body. More importantly, I have found a man who hates Caligula even more than I do. Do you think the army liked that stupid spectacle on the coast, escorting carts back into Rome full of seashells?’
‘That doesn’t make Chaerea a traitor,’ I replied.
‘Oh, Parmenon, think back to last night and the other times we’ve talked with Cassius. Every time I mention Caligula he blushes slightly. I discovered why: Caligula calls Cassius a girl. One of Chaerea’s tasks is to ask the Emperor every day for the personal password.’ Agrippina bit back her laughter. ‘Caligula teases him with replies such as “Vagina”, “Penis” or “Kiss Me Quick”. Can you imagine the roars of laughter which greet this? Cassius also tells me that others hate Caligula just as much as he.’ She tapped me on the hand. ‘Now, for practical news. My husband Domitius has done us all a favour by dying of dropsy. I won’t be a hypocrite – I didn’t give his life a passing thought, so why should I mourn his death?’
‘And your son?’ I demanded.
‘A bouncing boy with red curls. He’s already ordering about the other children in the nursery.’
‘And?’ I demanded. ‘There is something else?’
‘Cassius has brought a pass. You can return to Rome for the winter. I think Caligula wants to find out how his sister is faring. When Cassius leaves, you are to go with him.’
‘To plot, be caught and executed!’ I exclaimed.
‘No, listen.’
Agrippina gripped my wrist, a sign that she was going to impart something important. It always made me shiver, reminding me how Charicles used to take Tiberius’s pulse.
‘Caligula will die,’ Agrippina insisted. ‘And who is there left? Those doddering fools in the Senate may try and restore the Republic but the army won’t allow that.’
‘Your Uncle Claudius?’ I replied.
‘Precisely.’ Agrippina squeezed my wrist even tighter. ‘If Caligula dies suddenly, there’ll be confusion. You and Cassius must ensure that Claudius is hailed as Emperor. He’ll bring me back to Rome.’
Agrippina dropped my wrist. ‘Whatever happens, Parmenon, you must ensure that, somehow, Claudius is brought forward. Naturally, in the chaos following Caligula’s death, my son must be closely protected.’ She got to her feet and pulled me up. ‘By the way, I know you’ve got too tender a heart so Cassius will do this for me – ensure that Caligula’s wife Caesonia and her little brat don’t survive any longer than he does. Now, come! I am sure Cassius is already pining for me and we’ve got preparations to make.’
Chapter 10
‘Chaos: an ill-formed and unordered Mass.’
Ovid, Metamorphoses: 1, 7
It was good to be back in Rome. Despite the winter, the taverns were crowded as usual. After the silence of Pontia, I enjoyed walking through the different quarters watching the barbers shave their customers in the middle of the street, the loud-mouthed hawkers selling their small boxes of sulphur matches and trinkets, the raucous cries of the sausage-sellers with their makeshift mobile ovens. Schoolmasters, ringed by their pupils in a small, dirty squar
e, shouted themselves hoarse. Nearby, a money-changer sifted his coins in a metal grille whilst his assistant pounded with a shiny mallet on clipped and chipped coins. Conjurors and tricksters swarmed everywhere, competing with the beggars. The sheer frenetic bustle of their lives was a sharp contrast to the horrors of Caligula’s court or Agrippina’s seething anger as she plotted her return.
I lodged with Cassius Chaerea in the Praetorian barracks near the Viminial Gate. Of course, I had to be presented to the Emperor, and was obliged to attend one of his famous supper parties in Livia’s old palace. Caligula was, as usual, lounging on a couch. He seemed taller and thinner, his face had assumed a skull-like look, hollow-eyed and sunken-cheeked. He was nearly bald except for an incongruous tuft of hair which rested on the nape of his neck. He looked me up and down. I was obliged to kneel and kiss his slippered foot.
‘How is my darling sister?’ he lisped. ‘I often think of her.’ He repeated his ominous threat, ‘And, when you return, Parmenon, remind her I have daggers as well as islands!’
Chaerea had informed me that Caligula had banished many of his enemies and, on a mere whim, sent executioners to hunt them down and forced them to take their own lives. If they refused, they were cruelly butchered.
‘Well, get up! Get up!’ Caligula waved his hand airily. ‘I have to retire.’
I took my place on the couches which were arranged in a horseshoe around the Emperor’s which stood on a raised dais. The mood was one of sheer terror. No one dared eat without the Emperor’s permission and everyone was petrified of catching his eye. The Emperor withdrew, and when he returned, he was dressed as a woman in a beautiful silk gown, with a veil over his balding head. He wore artificial green finger- and toenails. He didn’t take a seat but clapped his hands and the musicians struck up the tune of a well-known Syracusan dance. The Gods be my witness, we had to sit and watch as the Emperor of Rome danced and cavorted as if he were a tumbler from Antioch. Of course, at the end, the applause was deafening. Caligula, still in his female clothes, returned to his couch, sharing it with an actor who was under strict instructions to treat the Emperor as if he was a woman.
I was forced to remain in court for the next few days. The Emperor lived in a world of his own. He often made public appearances in a woman’s cloak covered with embroidery and precious stones. Or, in sharp contrast, he’d wear the famous military boots which gave him his nick-name. He had an artificial golden beard which he would fasten to his face and carry a thunder-bolt trident or serpentine staff as he pretended to be Jupiter or Apollo. On occasions he’d disport himself as Venus, which was truly dangerous: with his bony shoulders and spindly legs, it was difficult not to laugh out loud.
Caligula’s only link with sanity seemed to be his love of chariot racing but even here his madness had eventually manifested itself. He fell in love with his own horse Incitatus and built him a marble stable with an ivory stall, purple blankets and jewelled harness. Before a race the entire neighbourhood around the imperial stable was put under armed guard, and sentence of death was passed on anyone who disturbed his horse. The charioteers were divided into different factions, with an intense rivalry between the ‘Blues’ and ‘Greens’. Caligula supported the ‘Greens’. Woe betide any charioteer from an opposing faction who threatened the Emperor’s favourites – they could expect either themselves, or their horses, to be poisoned. No wonder Rome seethed with unrest.
At first I was left alone by the conspirators. Caligula had me watched but, as the New Year came and went, dismissed me as a nonentity; he was more interested in the games and festivities planned for the end of the month. I was left to my own devices. I went out to the Via Sacre and visited the baby Nero. He was, as Agrippina had described him, a bouncing, unruly, little boy with bulbous blue eyes and a shock of red-coppery hair. Even then he was a born actor. I had to sit with his guardians while the little fellow sang and danced. I don’t believe in premonitions, yet, as I watched the child, I kept thinking of the monster on the Palatine. For the first time in my life, I quietly prayed that Agrippina had chosen the right course for her son. The aged aunt who looked after the boy was a cold, austere, old woman with a face like vinegar.
Never once, she proudly informed me, had she reminded the boy of his mother.
I smiled thinly and assured her that Agrippina would never forget such a remark. I also called on Uncle Claudius in the library of the Senate house. His twisted face was unshaven, his tunic and toga soiled with dust and ink. He walked me up and down the rows of shelves, dragging his foot behind him, whilst delivering a lecture on the possible ancestors of the Divine Augustus. Round and round we went until I became dizzy. In a shadowy, dusty corner, he abruptly paused and sat down on a stool, mopping his face with the rag he kept up his sleeve.
‘Are you part of it?’ he asked. His eyes had lost that empty, vacuous look. His mouth was no longer slack, the jaw line seemed firmer, his voice free of any impediment. He spoke clearly and distinctly whilst those shrewd grey-green eyes studied me.
‘So, you are Agrippina’s man?’ he asked.
‘I am.’
He puckered his lower lip. ‘And are you one of them?’ he repeated.
‘One of what, sir?’ I asked.
‘You know full well,’ he teased. ‘Caligula is going to die, isn’t he? He’s obscene. He’s mad and his wickedness grows every day. At the moment, he’s absorbed in his games but soon he’ll lash out once more and his kin will feel his wrath. The signs are all there. The portents . . .’
‘What portents, sir?’
Claudius sighed. ‘The Capitol has been struck by lightning,’ he explained. ‘As has the Palatine here in Rome. Sulla the soothsayer sent a message to the Emperor to be careful.’ Claudius’s eyes narrowed. ‘Caligula has been told to beware of a man called Cassius. But we don’t need the Gods, do we, Parmenon, to tell us there’s going to be a change?’ He made a rude sound with his lips. ‘Oh, don’t worry, we can relax here. Spies find it very difficult to listen to conversations in a library, they can’t openly eavesdrop; it’s the best place to plot a coup. Come on, man, are you part of it or not?’
‘Yes, sir, I am.’
Claudius rearranged his cloak round his shoulders.
‘Now listen carefully, young man. Agrippina is directing matters.’ He laughed at my surprise. ‘Oh, didn’t you know she’s been writing to me? Don’t be offended,’ he soothed. ‘Agrippina wouldn’t tell you lest you were captured and tortured. She wouldn’t use you as a messenger for the same reason. Caligula is to be killed and the best chance is as he leaves the games or the theatre. If we can separate him from his guards, the others will fulfil their task.’ He tapped his sandalled foot on the floor like a schoolmaster giving instruction. ‘Cassius Chaerea is a leading conspirator. Caligula still heaps insults on him: last night he made him kiss his little finger then waggled it in a most obscene manner. My only fear is that Chaerea may not be able to contain himself and strike before we are ready.’
‘Will you be involved?’ I taunted.
In answer Claudius got up and stood with his fingers to his lips as he examined scrolls on a shelf. He murmured to himself and plucked one down, greasy and stained with age.
‘Do you know what this is, Parmenon? It’s an account of Julius Caesar’s assassination. All those involved in his murder died violently themselves. I will not suffer a similar fate. I will act the frightened rabbit, and I suggest you do likewise. If, and when, the blow is struck, distance yourself. Ensure that the young Nero is safe and sound, and that I -’ he smiled ‘- am discovered cowering in some apartment in the palace. If that’s done, all will be well. The rest,’ he spread his hands, ‘is in the lap of the Gods. Now, I’ve got manuscripts to file and you’ve murder to plot.’
He rose and shuffled away. I suppose with someone like Agrippina you learn something new every day. I had always regarded Claudius as a fool, but Agrippina thought otherwise. She had learnt her lesson and, like Uncle Claudius, would not show her hand
. Cassius Chaerea was different: his hatred for the Emperor was now a consuming passion. After nightfall, when free of the Emperor’s spies, we met the other conspirators out in the gardens or shady groves where Cassius’s men could defend us. Other tribunes of the Praetorian Guard were drawn in: Papinius, Asiaticus, Clovinus Rufus an ex-consul, as well as senators such as Balbus. The password was ‘liberty’ and the day of the murder was chosen: 24 January, the last day of the Palatine Games.
The conspirators chose their place well. A makeshift amphitheatre had been erected in the Emperor’s palace, served by narrow galleries and passageways. The conspirators took oaths to either kill Caligula there or, if they failed, kill themselves. I became their shadow. The only person Agrippina had told me to take care of was Progeones, I had only glimpsed that awful little creature from afar. Progeones was now hated by everyone. He was regarded as Caligula’s dagger man and constantly carried a list of those the Emperor wished to condemn.
On the morning of the twenty-fourth, Cassius arranged that I join the Emperor in the imperial box at the games. Caligula was in good form, shouting, gesticulating, throwing coins at the mob. He espied me, called me over and clapped me on the shoulder.
‘I’ve had enough of your miserable face, Parmenon. It’s back to Pontia for you. Tell my bitch of a sister that I have been thinking about her more often than I should.’
I kissed the Emperor’s hand and withdrew. I glanced quickly at Progeones. He seemed nervous and ill at ease, and I wondered if he had a spy amongst the conspirators. Caligula then went to a makeshift altar and sacrificed a flamingo for good luck. When some of the blood splashed on his toga, he wiped it off and licked his fingers. He resumed his seat, now and again calling over a senator to kiss his slippered foot.
I glanced around. Chaerea, in full dress armour, tense as a bow string, stood next to the door clutching his sword. The strike had been planned for the end of the day, but the tension was already palpable. I left my seat and crossed to Chaerea.
Domina (Paul Doherty Historical Mysteries) Page 15
