A Pillar of Iron

by Taylor Caldwell

  “Sic transit Roma,” he told Marcus in a dream. “Do not be distressed. Rome will perish, but your memory shall endure.”

  I prefer not to be a memory, thought Marcus on awakening. I prefer to be potent. I prefer to be a Roman to the last day of my life, and I hope that life will be long in the service of my country. I have no desire to encounter Cerberus and to cross the Styx. So, I will be prudent. One should, perhaps, hide virtue.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Rome was suddenly in the utmost disorder and terror.

  The sweltering heat in the city and the brazen sun of an unusually hot season appeared to confine and contain the great city within her guarded walls, and to imprison the inhabitants who dared now not to go through the gates on any business at all. For Sulla was approaching the very walls of Rome, if one was to believe rumor and the blood-flecked and panting couriers of Carbo’s defeated armies who came in desperate gallop to Rome.

  There was no reason to doubt the couriers. Rome became an armed camp, swept with violent winds of fear. The mindless mobs, who cared nothing for Carbo or for Sulla, and knew nothing of politics, nevertheless found the vehement climate of terror exciting. They milled through the plazas and fora, streamed up and down the hills, shouting, gesticulating, embracing each other, running everywhere like brainless sheep, laughing, weeping, shrilling, calling sometimes for Carbo—who had suddenly left Rome with a fresh legion to confront Sulla—and sometimes howling for the grim general. Rumor with her thousand tongues flew above their heads in winged madness. They shrieked that when Sulla triumphed in Rome there would be more free grain, bread, beans, and meat distributed to the idle and incompetent, and that even free wine would flow into multitudes of eager goblets. They dreamed of plunder, and slavered. Other mobs hailed Carbo, who had promised as much, or more. Factions sprang up overnight, one shouting that Carbo was the hero, the other insisting that Sulla was the “deliverer.” (From what he would deliver the fat and avaricious mobs was not very clear.) There were tumultuous dancings in the streets, day and night, and public drunkenness and riots in the wine shops, and everywhere the exuberant, insane laughter of an ignorant and envious populace. Worthy citizens locked their gates and their doors and set slaves on everlasting watch, fiercely armed. The Senate gathered and for once the doors of the chamber were shut, and the frightened men discussed flight and disappearance. And the gates of Rome opened constantly to admit crowds of refugees from the provinces and exhausted and wounded soldiers.

  Marcus Tullius Cicero, attempting to go about his affairs and uphold the trembling law, considered the mobs of Rome with grimness. Should Sulla be successful, they would shout and laugh and dance no longer, nor live easily on the industry of their neighbors. They would work or starve, according to the ancient laws of Rome. Marcus, for the first time, found himself hoping that Sulla would indeed conquer. He was surely no monster like old Marius, the dead uncle of Julius Caesar, no irresolute Consul like Cinna, no bewildered and tyrannical fool like Carbo, whose adherents had murdered Scaevola.

  The mighty giantess on the seven hills shook as if with an earthquake during the storm of events, her red, green, yellow, and ochre walls appearing to tremble constantly. The city, the people, sweltered with excitement and the brazen heat. The streets rang with the tread of soldiers preparing to defend the city from Sulla. All waited for news of Carbo. It finally came. He had fought a fierce battle with Sulla near Clusium, but was defeated by Sulla’s general Metellus Pius, near Faventia. Then he had fled from Italy. The mobs paused, blinking, to consider this and to give, for the first time, some thought to their own fate. Those who had shouted for Carbo muttered about the virtues of Sulla. Those who had howled for Sulla were triumphant. They ran in disordered ranks through the alleys and even down in the great Forum before the Senate chamber, carrying ragged banners inscribed with the name of Sulla, and shouting for surrender to him. They roared with wild but empty eyes into the temples, particularly the temple of Jupiter, to shriek their prayers in behalf of the terrible general. Thousands attacked and looted little shops, and struck down the shopkeepers. Armed guards, ready to kill, surrounded larger business establishments, swords unsheathed, and the mobs mocked them and thrust fists into their faces. But the mobs neither understood nor cared for that which they bellowed. They only knew that in their numbers lay terror, and felt invincible, and their excitement grew with their excesses. They scrawled on the walls at night, with red pigments. Sometimes, for no reason at all, they joined hands in the midst of the streets and leaped like dervishes, or the two sexes coupled in alleys in the very daylight in their frenzy of exuberance.

  And the intelligent and industrious citizens went about their business, upholding law, and trying, with dignity, to ignore the mobs who roared ceaselessly day and night. Many of the prosperous and sound spoke with quiet dread of Sulla, for it was notorious that he was a militarist only, and despised all but the military. Senator after Senator slipped away from the city in the dead of night, after bribing the soldiers at the gates.

  Julius Caesar, in hiding with his little wife, in the deserted house of a Senatorial friend, was always in touch not only with rumor but with fact. One day he received a letter which made him smile. He went to his wife and said, “Do not fear any longer. I have had a message from my dear friend, Pompey, who, as you know, is now with Sulla. It was Pompey, himself, who captured Carbo at Cossyra only a week ago, and put him to death. Ah, you weep for your father, beloved. But one must be realistic.” There were no tears in his own eyes. To Julius, all men were expendable except himself.

  He was a member of the populares, or democratic, party, and Sulla despised and hated that party as the ally of the mobs of Rome. But for some reason—which history was never to explain—Julius was not very alarmed. He comforted his young wife. She shed tears for her father, and he wiped them away. When the time came, he assured her, he would offer large sacrifices in Cinna’s name and pay lavishly for prayers for the repose of his soul. Sometimes, closely hooded, he ventured forth from his hiding place to visit the temple of his patron, Jupiter, the father of all the gods, the invincible one. There, among the mobs, he would raise a votive light. He was beginning to have faith in Jupiter and to believe his own stories of his remarkable visions. Quite often in the temple he would exchange hurried whispers with others like himself, and messages passed from hand to hand and were hidden in cloaks, to be sent to another destination even beyond the walls of Rome.

  One day, when Sulla was within a few miles of Rome, Julius stumbled against Marcus when the latter was leaving the Basilica of Justice. Marcus saw only a slight quick figure cloaked and hooded in that dull brassy light; he was not surprised at the garb, for there were thousands of such furtive figures on the streets these days. He merely muttered an apology, and was startled when a thin brown hand darted from the folds of the cloak and seized his wrist. He turned his head and saw nothing but a faintly smiling mouth in the shadow of the hood, but there was something about that smile and the flash of the bright teeth that was familiar to him.

  “Speak not my name, dear friend,” said a voice he instantly recognized. “Come. Let us find a secluded spot in which to exchange news of each other’s health.”

  Marcus thrilled with alarm. He glanced about him at the crowds in the Forum hurriedly pushing their way against streams which poured down from the Palatine. But Julius, still gripping his wrist, moved with a serpentine grace and ease through the throngs, and the two young men walked without obvious hurry to the foot of the Palatine and the great steps that rose upon it. The crowds were even thicker here, but Julius found a place behind the monolithic statue of Mars. Marcus withdrew his wrist, and said in a low voice, “This is imprudent of you. It is most dangerous. There are some who would tear you to pieces in an instant if they recognized you.”

  “True,” said Julius, still keeping his face shadowed. His smile was gay and wide. “What is it that your old friend, Scaevola, always said? ‘Only in republics and despotisms are men utt
erly safe, for in the first they are free and in the second they are slaves. In democracies, they are not free and they are not slaves; therefore they live in danger.’ But, tell me. How goes it with you, dear Marcus?”

  “Well enough,” said Marcus, glancing at the streams climbing up and down the stairs. “And you?”

  “As you have said, well enough. I am sorry that Scaevola was murdered, for he was dear to you and I admired him greatly. But he suffered the fate of all just men who live in democracies, death by the sword or death by slander. Ah, well. We shall have a democracy no longer when Sulla seizes the government.”

  “You are not afraid? For you are the nephew of Marius.”

  Julius chuckled. “I have never been afraid in my life. But you are concerned about my safety, and that touches my heart. Has your concern given you that pallor and those white lips, my friend?”

  Marcus was becoming more frightened for Julius at every moment, for occasionally he caught a curious glance from passing men.

  “Do not be frivolous,” said Marcus, with impatience and growing fear. “I do not wish to witness your death. The mobs are scenting blood in Rome. They need but one bloody spectacle and they will rush roaring like the whirlwind through the streets, killing senselessly and with joy. Do not give them that spectacle in your person. How reckless this is of you! Why have you not fled Rome, as hundreds have done in these days, and hid discreetly until you are no longer threatened?”

  “I am not pusillanimous,” said Julius, “and I love the smell of danger, though I prefer to smell it from afar. Why should I flee? I am safe enough.” His teeth flashed again. “You would not betray me even if a lion were at your throat.”

  “No. I would not betray you,” said Marcus, with increasing anxiety. “Do not be absurd. We cannot stay here. A group has paused at the foot of the steps and are looking up at us with a curiosity I do not like.”

  “They recognize you, dear Marcus. Ah, I hear tremendous things of you, and I am proud to be your friend!”

  Marcus was forced to smile. “What a liar you are. We cannot stand here. Return to your hiding place. Are you often this indiscreet?”

  “I go to honor Jupiter in his temple and plead for his protection. No one would believe that one such as I would dare appear on the streets, even in a hooded cloak, in these days when Sulla is being acclaimed from every portico. These volatile dogs! It was only yesterday that they were acclaiming my uncle, and Cinna, and Carbo. Tomorrow, who knows? They will be acclaiming someone who overthrows Sulla.”

  “True. But I must detain you no longer for your own sake.” A vast uneasiness pervaded Marcus. It was obvious that Julius was not afraid of Sulla. That meant that he was either a traitor to his own party and people, or was vainglorious. It came to Marcus that he was probably both.

  Julius had now satisfied himself that he could depend completely on Marcus’ affection and good will. Such a one was extremely valuable to an ambitious man. He pressed Marcus’ hand. Marcus saw the thin strong fingers and felt their grip. “You are comparatively safe?” he asked, annoyed that his voice expressed his deep anxiety.

  “I am safe,” said Julius. He touched his hand lightly to his hooded forehead in a salute. “I go. But I shall not forget you, Marcus.”

  Marcus caught his arm. “My brother, Quintus. You have heard no rumors of him? I am fearful for him,” Marcus added rapidly, and wondered why he should question Julius who dared not show his face on the streets of Rome.

  Julius paused. “He lives,” he said, kindly, and Marcus believed him. He watched Julius melt like a mist among the throngs on the steps.

  Marcus’ heart lifted with relief and became almost light. It was his intuition which had made him inquire of his brother of Julius. Julius was a liar, and that was certain. Yet, there had been conviction in his voice. He would not lie to me merely to soothe me, thought Marcus, as he descended the steps again. Marcus had another and disturbing thought: he was positive, knowing Julius’ nature, that had he raised a cry of betrayal on these steps Julius would not have hesitated a moment to plunge a dagger into his friend’s heart. He would have killed, and felt no remorse later. He is very ambiguous, thought Marcus, and now his heart was no longer light. He thought of Scaevola’s cryptic warnings against Julius, and his description of the golden-scaled serpent in the young man’s house.

  The ruthless, inflexible general, Lucius Cornelius Sulla, drove the unfortunate Samnites before him to the very walls of Rome, and there they died by the many thousands at the Collina Gate at the hands of the Roman armies, while the armies of the Consuls within the gates prepared to lay down their arms. Sulla’s officers and soldiers, resting after the slaughter of their fellow Italians, could hear the roaring of the mighty contained city beyond, and the thunderous shouts of the populace hailing the general. Sulla smiled darkly. He was the man whom his enemies called “half-lion, half-fox,” and he had a coldly violent nature which could flush his face purple during frequent rages.

  “Had the armies of the Consuls defeated me, and had they seized me, that same mob of jackals would be screaming for my blood and my head,” he said to his officers. “Ah, we shall see!” His hard face, carved in tight flesh, flashed as if the blade of a knife had passed over it. He had been born of a poor but patrician family, which had always been of the Senatorial party, as he was, himself. He believed in power; he had come to hate the weak Senators who took bribes and were for sale to their clients and friends. In many ways he was an “old” Roman, incisive of mind, fierce and dedicated of purpose, implacable in his desires and his ambitions. Now, he was determined on vengeance. He would not accept the title and position of Consul of Rome. He would declare himself dictator. “And I shall retain my horse,” he said to his laughing officers.

  He had been wise enough to promise his fellow Italians that his success over Rome would not mean the abrogation of franchise and liberties all over the peninsula. “I come to restore the Republic,” he said, and there was no smile on his lips as he said this.

  He entered Rome during the most fiery of thunderstorms, which frightened a people who were acquainted with such storms. But never had any, in their memory, been so huge and terrible. At the moment Sulla, wrapped in his cloak and riding his magnificent black horse, and followed by the ranks of his officers and his foot soldiers and charioteers, reached the Sacred Way, the temple of Jupiter was struck by lightning and the pillars and the walls rose in flame and fell to the earth in shattered and crashing fragments. The temple had been the resting place of the famous books of Sybil, and they burned with the building. Sulla, at a little distance, surveyed the wild and roaring fire, which defied even the plangent rain. Those who had gathered to welcome Sulla, howling tens of thousands of them, were stilled into terrified silence. This was a portent, they cried to each other, their eyes wide and aghast, their ears deafened by the constant thunder that seemed to hover in deadly rage above the city, seeking to destroy it.

  Sulla was a Roman, and therefore superstitious for all his intelligence and education. Had the temple of Jupiter been destroyed to reveal to him that he was mightier, in Rome, than even Jupiter, or was it an ominous warning? He, being an egotistic man, decided on the former. When the thunder paused enough to allow him to be heard, he said to his officers near him, who were watching the blazing ruins with awe and with pale faces, “You will observe that Jupiter, himself, has lit a torch to guide me!” They waited for him to follow this remark with his hoarse laugh, but he did not even smile.

  One of his officers, Gnaeus Pompey (Pompeius), did not smile either. He thought of his friend, Julius Caesar, whose patron was Jupiter. Was this a portent? Pompey sat on his horse in the dark, flame-filled rain, and thought. His position in Rome until fairly recently had been equivocal; he had pretended to be one of the Marian party in order to preserve his life, though he was of the Senatorial party. He had served Sulla as a spy and liaison officer during his years in Rome, and had joined Sulla later, during the last stages of the war. For all he w
as a plebeian he had aristocratic pretensions and ambitions. Astute and worldly, cool and immovable, he had always been convinced that Sulla would return from the East and make himself master of Rome. In the meantime, through subtle contrivances, he had been able to leave Rome at will and report to the couriers of Sulla in quiet places, and then return.

  Pompey’s helmet glimmered in mingled lightning and reflections from the fire. He was a young man, but his eyes were not young. His broad face was impassive, his short nose prominent in its fleshy contours, his mouth heavy and straight and firm. His thick and curling dark hair glittered with raindrops and he moved a little on his horse as he wondered about Julius Caesar. He remembered that his friend’s name appeared prominently on Sulla’s list of proscriptions; he knew of the imminent slaughter of those men who had espoused the Marian party. He also remembered his dispassionate assurances to Julius; he remembered many things about his friend, among them the fact that Julius had much information about him, Pompey, also. Pompey looked at the burning temple with a smooth, inscrutable expression.

  The lightning continued to inflame white column and portico and all the buildings in the Forum; it lighted up the massively crowded dwellings on the hills, so that they appeared to catch fire, and then to be curtained by darkness. Among the officers who watched the awesome spectacle of dusk and fire was Lucius Sergius Catilina, home from the wars, and ceaselessly plotting. He thought of his general, Sulla, and he smiled a little, and considered the murders and the tempests which should now afflict Rome. By craning his head he could see Sulla on his black horse, towering over all others, like a silent god indifferent to the fury about him and even unaware of it.

  All that Catilina hated and loathed would be at the mercy of Sulla now, and of his officers. The mobs of Rome! Their master was only resting until he could avenge himself upon them, and upon their craven masters. Catilina felt the serpentine ring on his finger. This, he thought, was only the beginning.