The Dictator

by Robert Harris

  Antony had dismissed the Senate until the first day of June, and gradually the great villas around the Bay of Naples began to fill with the leading men of Rome. Most of the new arrivals, like Hirtius and Pansa, were still in a state of shock at Caesar’s death. The pair were supposed to take over as consuls at the end of the year, and as part of their preparation they asked Cicero if he would give them further lessons in oratory. He didn’t much want to—it was a distraction from his writing, and he found their doleful talk about Caesar irritating—but in the end he was too easy-going to refuse. He took them on to the beach to learn elocution as Demosthenes had done, by speaking clearly through a mouth full of pebbles, and to learn voice projection by delivering their speeches into the crashing waves. Over the dinner table they were full of stories of Antony’s high-handedness: of how he had tricked Calpurnia on the night of the assassination into giving him custody of her late husband’s private papers as well as his fortune; of how he now pretended these documents contained various edicts that had the force of law, whereas in fact he had forged them in return for enormous bribes.

  Cicero said, “So he has his hands on all the money? But I thought three quarters of Caesar’s fortune was supposed to go to this boy Octavian?”

  Hirtius rolled his eyes. “He’ll be lucky!”

  Pansa added, “He’ll have to come and get it first, and I wouldn’t give much for his chances.”

  Two days after this exchange, I was sheltering from the rain in the portico, reading the elder Cato’s treatise on agriculture, when the steward came up to me to announce that L. Cornelius Balbus had arrived to see Cicero.

  “Then tell the master he’s here.”

  “But I’m not sure that I should—he gave me strict instructions that he was not to be disturbed, no matter who came to call.”

  I sighed and laid aside my book: Balbus was one man who would have to be seen. He was the Spaniard who had handled Caesar’s business affairs in Rome. He was well known to Cicero, who had once defended him in the courts against an attempt to strip him of his citizenship. He was now in his middle fifties and owned a huge villa nearby. I found him waiting in the tablinum with a toga-clad youth I took at first to be his son or grandson, except when I looked more closely I saw that he couldn’t be, for Balbus was swarthy whereas this boy had damp blond hair badly cut in a basin style; he was also rather short and slender, pretty-faced but with a pasty complexion pitted by acne.

  “Ah, Tiro,” cried Balbus, “will you kindly drag Cicero away from his books? Just tell him I have brought Caesar’s adopted son to see him—Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus—that ought to do it.”

  And the young man smiled shyly at me, showing gapped uneven teeth.

  Naturally Cicero came at once, overwhelmed by curiosity to meet this exotic creature, seemingly dropped into the tumult of Roman politics from the sky. Balbus introduced the young man, who bowed and said, “It is one of the greatest honours of my life to meet you. I have read all your speeches and works of philosophy. I have dreamed of this moment for years.” His voice was pleasant: soft and well educated.

  Cicero fairly preened at the compliment. “You are very kind to say it. Now please tell me, before we go further: what am I to call you?”

  “In public I insist on Caesar. To my friends and family I am Octavian.”

  “Well, since at my age I would find another Caesar hard to get used to, perhaps it could be Octavian for me as well, if I may?”

  The young man bowed again. “I would be honoured.”

  And so began two days of unexpectedly friendly exchanges. It turned out that Octavian was staying next door with his mother Atia and his stepfather Philippus, and he wandered back and forth quite freely between the two houses. Often he appeared on his own, even though he had brought an entourage of friends and soldiers over with him from Illyricum, and more had joined him at Naples. He and Cicero would talk in the villa or walk along the seashore together in the intervals between showers. Watching them, I was reminded of a line in Cicero’s treatise on old age: just as I approve of the young man in whom there is a touch of age, so I approve of the old man in whom there is some flavour of youth…Oddly enough, it was Octavian who sometimes seemed the older of the two: serious, polite, deferential, shrewd; it was Cicero who made the jokes and skimmed the stones across the sea. He told me that Octavian had no small talk. All he wanted was political advice. The fact that Cicero was publicly aligned with his adopted father’s killers appeared to be neither here nor there as far as he was concerned. How soon should he go to Rome? How should he handle Antony? What should he say to Caesar’s veterans, many of whom were hanging around the house? How was civil war to be avoided?

  Cicero was impressed: “I can understand entirely what Caesar saw in him—he has a certain coolness rare in one of his years. He might make a great statesman one day, if only he can survive long enough.” The men around him were a different matter. These included a couple of Caesar’s old army commanders, with the hard, dead eyes of professional killers; and some arrogant young companions, two in particular: Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa, not yet twenty but already bloodied by war, taciturn and faintly menacing even in repose; and Gaius Cilnius Maecenas, a little older, effeminate, giggling, cynical. “Those,” said Cicero, “I do not care for at all.”

  On only one occasion did I have an opportunity to observe Octavian closely for any length of time. That was on the final day of his stay, when he came to dinner with his mother and stepfather, along with Agrippa and Maecenas; Cicero also invited Hirtius and Pansa; I made up the nine. I noticed how the young man never touched his wine, how quiet he was, how his pale grey eyes flicked from one speaker to another and how intently he listened, as if he was trying to commit everything they said to memory. Atia, who looked as if she might have been the model for a statue commemorating the ideal Roman matron, was far too proper to voice a political opinion in public. Philippus, however, who certainly did drink, became increasingly voluble, and towards the end of the evening announced, “Well, if anyone wants to know my opinion, I think Octavian should renounce this inheritance.”

  Maecenas whispered to me, “Does anyone want to know his opinion?” and he bit on his napkin to stifle his laughter.

  Octavian said mildly, “And what leads you to that opinion, Father?”

  “Well, if I may speak frankly, my boy, you can call yourself Caesar all you like but that doesn’t make you Caesar, and the closer you get to Rome the greater the danger will be. Do you really think Antony is just going to hand over all these millions? And why would Caesar’s veterans follow you rather than Antony, who commanded a wing at Pharsalus? Caesar’s name is just a target on your back. You’ll be killed before you’ve gone fifty miles.”

  Hirtius and Pansa nodded in agreement.

  Agrippa said quietly, “No, we can get him to Rome safely enough.”

  Octavian turned to Cicero. “And what do you think?”

  Cicero dabbed carefully at his mouth with his napkin before replying. “Just four months ago your adopted father was dining precisely where you are now and assuring me he had no fear of death. The truth is, all our lives hang by a thread. There is no safety anywhere, and no one can predict what will happen. When I was your age, I dreamed only of glory. What I wouldn’t have given to be in your place now!”

  “So you would go to Rome?”

  “I would.”

  “And do what?”

  “Stand for election.”

  Philippus said, “But he’s only eighteen. He’s not even old enough to vote.”

  Cicero continued: “As it happens, there’s a vacancy for a tribune: Cinna was killed by the mob at Caesar’s funeral—they got the wrong man, poor devil. You should propose yourself to fill his place.”

  Octavian said, “But surely Antony would never allow it?”

  Cicero replied, “That doesn’t matter. Such a move would show your determination to continue Caesar’s policy of championing the people: the plebs will love it. And when Ant
ony opposes you—as he must—he’ll be seen as opposing them.”

  Octavian nodded slowly. “That’s not a bad idea. Perhaps you should come with me?”

  Cicero laughed. “No, I’m retiring to Greece to study philosophy.”

  “That’s a pity.”

  After the dinner, when the guests were preparing to leave, I overheard Octavian say to Cicero, “I meant what I said. I would value your wisdom.”

  Cicero shook his head. “I fear my loyalties lie in the other direction, with those who struck down your adopted father. But if ever there was a possibility of your reconciling with them—well then, in such circumstances, in the interests of the state, I would do all I could to help you.”

  “I’m not opposed to reconciliation. It’s my legacy I want, not vengeance.”

  “Can I tell them that?”

  “Of course. That’s why I said it. Goodbye. I shall write to you.”

  They shook hands. Octavian stepped out into the road. It was a spring evening, not yet entirely dark, no longer raining either but with moisture still in the air. To my surprise, standing silently in the blue gloom across the street were more than a hundred soldiers. When they saw Octavian they set up the same din I had heard at Caesar’s funeral, banging their swords against their shields in acclamation: it turned out these were some of the Dictator’s veterans from the Gallic wars, settled nearby on Campanian land. Octavian went over with Agrippa to talk to them. Cicero watched for a moment, then ducked back inside to avoid being seen.

  When the door was shut I asked, “Why did you urge him to go to Rome? Surely the last thing you want is to encourage another Caesar?”

  “If he goes to Rome he’ll cause problems for Antony. He’ll split their faction.”

  “And if his adventure succeeds?”

  “It won’t. Philippus is right. He’s a nice boy, and I hope he survives, but he’s no Caesar—you only have to look at him.”

  Nevertheless, he was sufficiently intrigued by Octavian’s prospects to postpone his departure for Athens. Instead he conceived a vague idea of attending the Senate meeting Antony had summoned for the first of June. But when we arrived in Tusculum towards the end of May, everyone advised him not to go. Varro sent a letter warning that there would be murder. Hirtius agreed. He said, “Even I’m not going, and no one’s ever accused me of disloyalty to Caesar. But there are too many old soldiers in the streets too quick to draw their swords—look what happened to Cinna.”

  Octavian, meanwhile, had arrived in the city unscathed and sent Cicero a letter:

  From G. Julius Caesar Octavianus to M. Tullius Cicero, greetings.

  I wanted you to know that yesterday Antony finally agreed to see me at his house: the one that used to be Pompey’s. He kept me waiting for more than an hour—a silly tactic that I believe shows his weakness rather than mine. I began by thanking him for looking after my adopted father’s property on my behalf, invited him to take from it whatever trinkets he desired as keepsakes, but asked him to hand over the rest to me at once. I told him I needed the money to make an immediate cash disbursement to three hundred thousand citizens in accordance with my father’s will. The rest of my expenses I asked to be met by a loan from the public treasury. I also told him of my intention to stand for the vacant tribunate and asked him for evidence of the various edicts he claims to have discovered in my father’s papers.

  He replied with great indignation that Caesar had not been king and had not bequeathed me control of the state; that accordingly he did not have to give an account of his public acts to me; that as far as the money went, my father’s effects were not as great as all that, and that he had left the public treasury bankrupt so there was nothing to be got from there either; as for the tribunate, my candidacy would be illegal and was out of the question.

  He thinks because I am young he can intimidate me. He is wrong. We parted on bad terms. Among the people, however, and among my father’s soldiers my reception has been as warm as Antony’s was cold.

  Cicero was delighted at the enmity between Antony and Octavian and showed the letter to several people: “You see how the cub tweaks the old lion’s tail?” He asked me to go to Rome on his behalf on the first of June and report back what happened in the Senate meeting.

  I found Rome, as everyone had warned us, teeming with soldiers, mostly Caesar’s veterans whom Antony had summoned to the city to serve as his private army. They stood around on the street corners in sullen, hungry groups, intimidating anyone who looked as though they might be wealthy. As a result, the Senate was very thinly attended, and there was no one brave enough to oppose Antony’s most audacious proposal: that Decimus should be removed from the governorship of Nearer Gaul and that he, Antony, should be awarded both of the Gallic provinces, together with command of their legions, for the next five years—exactly the same concentration of power that had set Caesar on the road to the dictatorship. As if this were not enough, he also announced that he had summoned home the three legions based in Macedonia that Caesar had planned to use in the Parthian campaign and placed these under his own command as well. Dolabella did not object, as might have been expected, because he was to receive Syria, also for five years; Lepidus was bought off with Caesar’s old position of pontifex maximus. Finally, as this arrangement left Brutus and Cassius without their anticipated provinces, he arranged for them to be offered instead a couple of Pompey’s old corn commissionerships—one in Asia, the other in Sicily; they would have no power at all; it was a humiliation; so much for reconciliation.

  The bills were approved by the half-empty Senate and Antony took them to the Forum the next day to be voted on by the people. The inclement weather continued. There was even a thunderstorm halfway through the proceedings—such a terrible omen that the assembly should have been dismissed at once. But Antony was an augur: he claimed to have seen no lightning and ruled that the vote could go ahead, and by dusk he had what he wanted. There was no sign of Octavian. As I turned to leave the assembly I saw Fulvia watching from a litter. She was soaked from the rain but did not seem to notice, so engrossed was she in her husband’s apotheosis. I made a mental note to myself to warn Cicero that a woman who hitherto had been nothing more than a nuisance to him had just become a far more dangerous enemy.

  The following morning I went to see Dolabella. He took me to the nursery and showed me Cicero’s grandson, the infant Lentulus, who had just learnt to take a few wobbling steps. It was now more than fifteen months since Tullia’s death, yet still Dolabella had not repaid her dowry. At Cicero’s request I began to broach the subject (“Do it politely, mind you: I can’t afford to antagonise him”), but Dolabella cut me off at once.

  “It’s out of the question, I’m afraid. You can give him this instead in full and final settlement. It’s worth far more than money.” And he threw across the table an imposing legal document with black ribbons and a red seal. “I’ve made him my legate in Syria. Don’t worry, tell him—he doesn’t have to do anything. But it means he can leave the country honourably and gives him immunity for the next five years. My advice, tell him, is that he should get out as soon as he can. Things are worsening by the day and we can’t be held responsible for his safety.”

  I took the message back to Tusculum and relayed it verbatim to Cicero, who was sitting in the garden beside Tullia’s grave. He studied the warrant for his legateship. “So this little piece of paper has cost me a million sesterces? Does he really imagine that waving this in the face of some illiterate half-drunk legionary would deter him from sticking his sword in my throat?” He had already heard what had happened at the Senate and in the public assembly, but wanted me to recite my precis of the speeches. At the end he said, “So there was no opposition?”

  “None.”

  “Did you see Octavian at all?”

  “No.”

  “No—of course not—why would you? Antony has the money, the legions and the consulship. Octavian has nothing but a borrowed name. As for us, we daren’t even show ou
r faces in Rome.” He slumped against the wall in despair. “I tell you something, Tiro, between you and me—I’m starting to wish the Ides of March had never happened.”

  There was to be a family conference with Brutus and Cassius on the seventh day of June in Antium to decide their next steps: he had been invited and he asked me to accompany him.

  We set off early, descending the hills just as the sun came up, and crossed the marshy land in the direction of the coast. The mist was rising. I remember the croaking of the bullfrogs, the cries of the gulls; Cicero barely spoke. Just before midday we reached Brutus’s villa. It was a fine old place built right on the shoreline with steps cut into the rocks leading down to the sea. The gate was blocked by a strong guard of gladiators; others patrolled the grounds; more were visible walking on the beach—I guess there must have been a hundred armed men in all. Brutus was waiting with the others in a loggia filled with Greek statuary. He looked strained—the familiar nervous tapping of his foot was more pronounced than ever. He told us he had not left the house for two months—amazing considering he was urban praetor and not supposed to be out of Rome for more than ten days a year. At the head of the table sat his mother, Servilia; also present were his wife, Porcia, and his sister Tertia, who was married to Cassius. Finally there was M. Favonius, the former praetor known as Cato’s Ape on account of his closeness to Brutus’s uncle. Tertia announced that Cassius was on his way.

  Cicero suggested I might fill in the time while we waited by giving a detailed account of the recent debates in the Senate and the public assembly, whereupon Servilia, who had ignored me up to that point, turned her fierce eye upon me and said, “Oh, so this is your famous spy?”

  She was a female Caesar—that is the best way I can describe her: quick-brained, handsome, haughty, bone-hard. The Dictator had presented her with lavish gifts, including estates confiscated from his enemies and huge jewels picked up on his conquests, yet when her son arranged his murder and she was given the news, her eyes stayed as dry as the gemstones he had given her. In this too she was like Caesar. Cicero was slightly awed by her.