by Peter Tonkin
And becoming a close friend of Antony’s into the bargain. Antony who, typically – and almost uniquely in the snobbish, patrician Senate – saw the soldier not the slave; the man and not the mule-seller. Artemidorus, also the result of a chequered career, also saw the man. Bassus, in return, saw how vital the secret agent’s work could be – and how much more useful a properly organised military intelligence unit might become in the future. Not to mention a full-blown secret service. Consequently, the pair of them had always got along very well.
Bassus welcomed them to his camp in Arretium, one hundred and fifty miles south of Mutina through the trackless Apennine mountains, therefore, when they arrived three hard-riding days after the battle. Just as Antony was entering the mouth of that valley three hundred and fifty miles north. And taking the first steps of his epic journey across the Alps.
The Greek centurion and secret agent knew the route that Antony proposed to adopt. The Gaulish cavalry commander knew the best way to follow their general across the mountains to Governor Lepidus’ province of Gallia Narbonensis. The widely experienced general of three legions knew how vital it would be to bring more than just his men with him. And to that end he had begun to assemble supplies of everything an army on the move though harsh and hostile country might require. But carts and cattle, sheep and supply wagons, goats and grain transports all travel slowly. And Antony, as ever, was in a hurry. So there was a delicate balance to be struck. Which the contubernium, the Gaulish legate, General Bassus and his senior officers debated far into the night. Before setting out at dawn next day.
*
One of the many benefits of taking the coast roads from Arretium rather than going back north through the Apennines, Artemidorus thought on the afternoon of the second day, was the fact that it was the quickest route from the north-west section of Cisalpine Gaul to Rome. It was, therefore, the route by which the governor of that province, finally marching his legions in pursuit of Antony, chose to communicate with the Senate.
Decimus Albinus’ messenger sat, his face flushed with outrage, on the ground beside his horse. Tied hand and foot. With Gretorex’ spada sword uncomfortably close to his throat. Artemidorus broke the seal of the message tube, unrolled the papyrus scroll it contained and glanced at the contents. Which weren’t even in code.
‘Decimus Albinus sends greetings to his friend Marcus Tullius Cicero and the Senate,’ he paraphrased. Glancing up at his audience – which consisted of his contubernium as well as General Bassus and his senior officers. ‘The governor expresses great concern at the situation in which he finds himself and lists a series of complaints as the cause. First, that Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, Governor of Gallia Narbonensis, is apparently hesitant about stopping Antony should Antony succeed in crossing the Alps. A disappointment paralleled, secondly and thirdly, by Albinus’ mistrust of both Governors Plancus in Transalpine Gaul and Pollio in Further Spain. Compounded, fourthly and perhaps most importantly, by Caesar Octavius’ continued refusal to lend him any of the legions he now commands as a result of the deaths of both Consuls Hirtius and latterly Pansa.’
Artemidorus paused, glanced round, added – speaking slowly. Giving what he was saying added weight. ‘A note here adds the observation that Pansa’s quaestor second in command suspects that Pansa may not have died as a result of his wound but because he has been poisoned. The physician Glycon is suspected. And, it is observed, Caesar Octavian visited the ailing Pansa on the night he was found dead.
‘As a result, Governor Albinus, with the legions from Mutina, still weak and half starved though they are, will pursue Antony alone and unsupported…
‘Ah! Now this is very interesting too. Apparently Albinus has also received word that Antony’s friend General Publius Ventidius Bassus is on the move. He has asked Caesar Octavius whether, as he refuses to pursue Antony, he would consider cutting off General Bassus’ legions if they come north. He assesses that Caesar is unlikely to do this either. Therefore he will take his own legions through Castra Torinorum and perhaps as far south as Genua in the hope of coming across Bassus himself. Even so, he concludes hopefully, his legions should easily outmatch the ones Antony currently commands. If and when he catches up with him…’
Bassus gave a great bellow of laughter, reminding the spy irresistibly of Antony himself. ‘Well, now we know where Albinus will be, we’ll make sure we’re somewhere else. That way when it comes right down to it we’re still going to come as an unpleasant surprise to the snivelling little back-stabber!’
iii
‘Here?’ said Ventidius Bassus incredulously three days later. ‘He went in here?’
‘That was the plan, General,’ Artemidorus assured him. ‘If anyone’s to blame its Polybius the Historian. Antony’s taken his description of Hannibal crossing the Alps as a personal challenge.’
‘But it’s a desertum wilderness. No tracks to follow. Nothing to scavenge! And you said he had no supplies with him. Hardly anything at all to eat or drink. And, what, three thousand men? Maybe more?’ General Bassus shook his head in wonder and disbelief. ‘How long did he calculate it would take to get across?’
‘Apparently Hannibal took sixteen days to come the opposite way,’ said the spy. ‘And he had thirty elephants. The general believes he can do it in two of Divus Julius’ new weeks. Maybe less.’
‘Well, we’d better get after him then. Gretorex. Is there a way round? Or do we just have to follow in his footsteps and hope we can catch up?’ Bassus had already discussed the danger of coming up against the rear of Antony’s army on a path too narrow to allow overtaking.
‘General Antony is following the most direct route,’ answered the Gaulish legate. ‘But if we strike south, there, I can take you to a lower pass. The route is longer but we may be able to move more swiftly. And your men are fresher, fitter and better supplied. Then, after the lower pass we can swing north again and meet Antony as he descends into Gallia Narbonensis. Just in case Governor Lepidus decides he wants to side with Cicero after all.’
‘Very well. The legions are all briefed and prepared. We will follow your longer but swifter route. Lead on.’
Artemidorus and the contubernium, now more or less part of Gretorex’ alae, went with the Gaulish leader as he rode into the valley. The spy had no difficulty in seeing the tracks left by Antony’s legions as they followed the right-hand bank. But as the mountain slopes closed around them and the light dimmed in the valley foot, Gretorex led them across a section of the river where it ran wide and shallow to the left bank. After a mile or so, a smaller, tributary valley led off southward, and soon the route taken by Antony and his legions was left far behind.
They camped the first night in a pine forest. The trees broke the power of the wind while the pines scented the restless air. The wild scent of the great black forests of northern Gaul and Germania. Not the civilised aroma of Roman pines. But the ground was made soft by layers of pine needles and the pinecones made good kindling for the legionaries’ cooking-fires. Bassus was a strong disciplinarian and he liked to do things according to military tradition, but, accepting Gretorex’ assurances of absolute safety from local tribes, he did not insist that the legions build a palisaded perimeter. Though he set extra guards. Protection against wolves, bears, lynx and other predators.
The next day took them slowly higher and the third higher still. Until the forests at last gave way to great grey-green meadows. The route was not hard to follow, though as they climbed higher, some of the men began to find it more difficult to breathe. Two further days took them out of the meadows and into the snow fields. Where the challenge of breathing went hand in hand with that of keeping warm – particularly at night. For the nights were crystal clear and icily cold, the chill of the altitude outweighing the gathering warmth of spring. The stars so huge and low that it was only the difference in colour that distinguished them from the legions’ campfires.
iv
Enobarbus crouched at the top of the cliff, gasping for breath. He w
as so high that he really felt that if he stood erect and stretched his hands up he would be able to touch the sky. Or the clouds at least. Behind him was the slope he had just scaled, coming at it crabwise from a good way back along the path that Antony and the rest of his command were following. The tribune had read his Polybius and knew that this was one of the points at which the local tribes nearly brought the Carthaginian invasion to an abrupt end by raining rocks down upon Hannibal’s army. If this was indeed the path that Hannibal took – something that was still open to debate. Everywhere but in Antony’s mind apparently. And there were rocks piled nearby. Large, rounded boulders which could never have arrived here naturally. Indeed, the whole slope was dotted with great grey rocks of various sizes. Apparently left ready to resupply anyone rolling those nearest over the edge.
Enobarbus glanced over his shoulder. He had a disturbing feeling that he was being watched and wished for a moment that he had brought a bodyguard of Gaulish warriors with him. But the locals were apparently friendly. To Antony at least. Because Antony was at war with Decimus Albinus whose legions had run riot in the high country before Antony trapped them all in Mutina. With whom, therefore, the local chieftains had several scores to settle. Still, it was an uncomfortable feeling.
Enobarbus dragged his mind back and looked in front of himself. The view was at once spectacular and disturbing. The clear, thin air stretched away to another peak in the distance. A peak that seemed to be burning as the wind lifted clouds of snow like smoke off its flanks. Between them was a valley of immense depth whose sides were so steep that it seemed miraculous that they could ever meet at the bottom. The tribune was used to measuring distances – had done some work with ballistae catapults in the past. But he couldn’t even begin to guess how deep this valley was. Perhaps the sheer sides never met at all, he thought fancifully. Perhaps the valley simply opened through the roof of Hades’ dark kingdom itself. Went on down until it met the surface of the River Styx. Or even the fires of Tartarus far below even the river of the dead.
And part way down this sheer side, perhaps two hundred pedes feet directly beneath him, was a ledge. And on the ledge, a track perhaps a third as wide as the Via Aemilia. And on that track was Antony, leading his horse, at the head of his army. Like a line of ants walking along the thinnest twig at the top of the tallest pine tree in Rome.
Enobarbus would never know what made him glance back over his shoulder then. As a lone wolf the size of a British war dog came charging up the slope towards him. It came silently and incredibly swiftly. The tribune had no time to reach for his gladius or his pugio. He threw himself downslope away from the precipice, turning as he did so to try and meet the monster head-on. As he straightened, the thing took one long last bound and leaped for his throat.
Enobarbus had served with Caesar in Britannia. Had faced the native war dogs which were often as big as their ponies. So he was by no means frightened. Even though he knew his situation was desperate. If his attacker was alone he might stand a chance. If it was the leader of a pack, then he was dead. He had a flashing image of a lean grey muzzle, burning golden eyes and long yellow teeth. A blood-red tongue, dripping drool. The stench of its breath in his face. Grabbing it by the throat he fell backwards, praying that he had come in from the edge just far enough to stop himself going over. But not far enough to stop the wolf going over. As he fell, he heaved with all his might, kicking up with his right leg even as the back of his helmet and the shoulders of his backplate hit the icy ground. And the wolf was gone. Cartwheeled away by the momentum of its own attack. Thrown over his head entirely. Pitched over the edge of the cliff immediately beyond. Its howl of rage seeming to echo endlessly towards silence as it fell.
*
‘Typical!’ bellowed Antony later, as Enobarbus and he waited for his army to edge gingerly off the precipitous path. ‘The one thing with a bit of meat on it that we’ve come across in this forsaken place and you chuck it off a cliff!’
‘I wasn’t thinking of it as food at the time,’ answered Enobarbus.
‘That’s just about all I do think about at the moment.’ Antony admitted. ‘I’ve even stopped thinking about women!’ He stooped and cupped a scoop of puddle water in his hands, drank and spat. ‘Horse piss,’ he said. And Enobarbus knew he meant it. Literally. ‘Well, almost,’ he continued. ‘Cleopatra somehow sneaks into my thoughts every now and then. But largely because she serves such amazing feasts! What I wouldn’t give for a wild boar or two at the moment. Stuffed with Nile perch and flamingo. Roasted over sandalwood…’ he wiped the back of his hand over his mouth and down the front of his thickening beard which was now wet with saliva as well as horse piss.
‘The best you’re likely to get in the immediate future is the nuts out of the pine cones when we get back down to the tree line,’ said Lucius, joining the tribune and his elder brother. ‘Or, if we’re lucky there might be some grass. But, if we get really desperate, there’s always the horses…’
‘That’s what Decimus Albinus did, Lucius. Stupid little pederast! Not for me, brother. I’ll need my cavalry able to ride at the enemy. Not run!’ His lip curled with disdain. ‘To tell you the truth, I’d rather the men ate each other than the horses.’
‘Don’t let anyone hear you suggesting that, General,’ said Enobarbus. ‘Because I’d say you’re still the plumpest of all of us.’
‘He’s right, Antony!’ laughed Lucius as he climbed into the saddle. ‘There’d be a lot of good eating on that great big carcase of yours!’
v
Artemidorus and Gretorex came across them first, for they were scouting ahead of Bassus’ column as they came down from the lower pass and out onto the flat plains near the river Rodonos. Turning north as planned, in search of Antony’s legions as they too came out of the mountains. Artemidorus could hardly believe the change in them. Even Antony, famously as robust as Hercules, was lean. The face beneath the wild hair and lengthening beard all sunken eyes, lines and angles. Cheekbone and hollow cheek. Enobarbus and the other legates and tribunes of his senior staff were gaunt to put it mildly. And the legions following on behind were almost ghostly. Two weeks without real food or potable water had taken a terrible toll.
And yet their spirits seemed high.
‘SEPTEM!’ bellowed Antony as he recognised the riders galloping towards him. ‘Well met! Have you anything to eat? I’ve eaten nothing but bits of trees for a week and if I see another pine cone on the menu it’s the vomitorium for me!’
‘General Bassus will bring up supplies as soon as he knows we’ve made contact, General. But we should be able to scavenge something more immediate. At the very least there will be early grapes down here in the valley. It’s Maius after all.’
‘An excellent notion, Septem. But I would rather we started making use of the big fat birds that feed on the grapes. And the equally plump animals that feed on the birds. Did I mention that my tribune here threw a perfectly edible wolf off a precipice? I mean it went right over my head and away before I could catch it. Let alone kill it and cook it. That was more than a week ago and there’s been nothing to eat since! I think I’m going to have to get a smaller breastplate.’
Artemidorus, his contubernium and a squad of Gretorex’ men oversaw the supply column as General Bassus sent it forward past his own hungry legions. And necessarily so. The route through the lower valley had been no easier than Antony’s route over the high col. The only difference was the fact of that supply column. And that Bassus’ men had been less hungry at the outset. Even so, they needed to exercise all their self-discipline as they watched the food they craved go forward. Though they knew it was going to feed legionaries in far worse straits than they were in themselves.
But the contubernium of secret agents proved to be a greater asset than either Antony or Bassus calculated. For as the six legions, cavalry alae and ancillaries settled into encampments along the bank of the river whose valley they were occupying, so Artemidorus and the others led the legionary scavengers
to pools and reaches aswim with fine fat fish. To stands of reeds packed with ducks, geese, herons, coots and grebes. And that was before the quaestors and quartermasters made contact with local farmers and bought up all the grain, olives, oil, bread, goats, sheep, cows and oxen that could be spared.
This was only the beginning, however. For, as Antony’s and Bassus’ legions settled in on the eastern bank of the river, so the legions commanded by Marcus Aemilius Lepidus marched onto the west bank opposite. Settled and set up their camps. Antony, Bassus and their legions were, after all, in the province of Gallia Narbonensis now. And the governor was under direct orders from the Senate to arrest the hostis outlaw Antony and bring either his body in chains or his head to impale on a spike to the Forum in Rome.
*
At this point the river was wide but shallow. Artemidorus reckoned that if he was careful he would be able to wade across most of it and only be forced to swim in one or two of the deeper sections. But the stream was swollen by snowmelt which added to the power of the current as well as to the simple volume of water rushing between the widespread banks. And, of course, to the lowering of the temperature. Even on an early summer’s night like this, the water seemed to give off a sinister chill that could be felt far away from the banksides.
‘Are you sure this is a good idea?’ demanded Ferrata on behalf of all the others.
‘We need to know what they’re thinking and planning over there,’ said Artemidorus. ‘We should have gone over earlier. I’m surprised Lepidus hasn’t sent spies across to sound out our men.’
‘No you’re not,’ observed Quintus. ‘Lepidus is just playing a waiting game and you know it. He doesn’t want to precipitate anything. Certainly he doesn’t want to do anything that might irritate Antony and bring things to a head here. And spies running around in each other’s camps are the sort of thing that will do that.’
