5. Caesar

by Colleen McCullough

  Publius Servilius Vatia Isauricus was a quiet man. Loyalty ran in the family; his father, a great plebeian aristocrat, had cleaved to Sulla and remained one of Sulla's greatest supporters until that difficult, contrary man died. But because the father too had been a quiet man, he adjusted to life in a post-Sullan Rome with grace and some style, did not lose the massive clout which an old name and a huge fortune brought with it. Probably seeing something of Sulla in Caesar, the father before his death had liked him; the son simply carried on the family tradition. He had been a praetor in the year Appius Claudius Censor and Ahenobarbus were consuls, and had soothed boni fears by prosecuting one of Caesar's legates. Not an aberration but a deliberate ploy; Gaius Messius was not important to Caesar. In the years since he was always to be found on Caesar's side of any senatorial division, nor could he be intimidated. No surprise then that when Pompey and the bulk of the Senate fled, Vatia Isauricus remained in Rome. Caesar, it was clear, mattered more to him than the alliances his marriage to Servilia's eldest daughter, Junia, might have predicated. Though when Cicero blabbed all over Rome that Junia's portrait was one of those in the baggage of a lowbred scoundrel, Vatia Isauricus did not divorce her. A loyal man remains loyal in all respects. The day after Caesar arrived in Rome, Mark Antony sent word that he was waiting on the Campus Martius in Pompey's villa, and Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, who had secured the dictatorship for Caesar, waited in the Domus Publica for an interview. But it was Vatia Isauricus whom Caesar saw first. "I can't stay long, alas," said Caesar. "That I expected. You'll have to get your army to the other side of the Adriatic before the equinoctial gales." "And lead it myself. What do you think of Quintus Fufius Calenus?" "You had him as a legate. Don't you know?" "In that respect, a good man. But this campaign against Pompeius necessitates that I restructure my high command I won't have Trebonius, Fabius, Decimus Brutus or Marcus Crassus, yet I do have more legions than ever. What I need from you is an assessment of Calenus's ability to handle high command rather than a legion." "Aside from his role in the regrettable affair of Milo and Clodius, I think him ideal for your purpose. Besides, in all fairness to poor Calenus, he accepted a ride in Milo's carriage without any knowledge of what Milo was planning. If anything, Milo's selecting him is a very good reference. Calenus is probably unimpeachable." "Ah!" Caesar settled back in his chair and gazed at Vatia Isauricus intently. "Do you want the job of running Rome in my absence?" he asked. Vatia Isauricus blinked. "You want me to act as your Master of the Horse?" "No, no! I don't intend to remain Dictator, Vatia." "You don't? Then why did Lepidus organize it?" "To give me dictatorial clout for long enough to start things moving again. Really, just until I can have myself and one other man of my choice elected consul for the coming year. I'd like you as my consular colleague." That was very evidently good news; Vatia Isauricus beamed. "Caesar, a great honor!" He frowned, not in anxiety but in thought. "Will you do as Sulla did and nominate two candidates only for the consular elections?" he asked. "Oh, no! I don't mind how many men want to run against us." "Well, you'll get no opposition from the Senate, but the men of the Eighteen are terrified of what you might do to the economy. The election results might not be what you want." Which statement provoked a laugh. "I assure you, Vatia, that the knights of the Eighteen will scramble to vote for us. Before I hold elections, I intend to bring a lex data before the Popular Assembly to regulate the economy. It will quieten all those fears that I intend a general cancellation of debts, not to mention other, equally irresponsible acts. What Rome needs is proper legislation to restore faith in business circles and enable people on both sides of the debt fence to cope. My lex data will do that in the most sensible and moderate way. But the man I leave behind to govern Rome has to be a sensible and moderate man. That's why I want you as my colleague. With you, I know Rome will be safe." "I won't destroy your faith in me, Caesar." Next came Lepidus, a very different sort of man. "In two years, Lepidus, I expect you'll be consul," said Caesar pleasantly, eyes never leaving that handsome and vaguely disquieting face; a man of great hauteur, riddled with weaknesses. Lepidus's face changed, twisted in disappointment. "Not any sooner than two years, Caesar?" he asked. "Under the lex Annalis, it can't possibly be sooner. I do not intend that Rome's mos maiorum be disturbed any more than is necessary. Though I follow in Sulla's footsteps, I am no Sulla." "So you keep saying," said Lepidus bitterly. "You have a very old patrician name and high ambitions to enhance it," said Caesar coolly. "You've chosen the winning side, and you'll prosper, that I promise you. But patience, my dear Lepidus, is a virtue. Practise it." "I can practise it as well as the next man, Caesar. It's my purse is impatient." "A revealing statement which doesn't augur well for Rome under your authority. However, I'll make a bargain with you." "What?" asked Lepidus warily. "Keep me informed of everything, and I'll have Balbus pop a little something in your hungry purse regularly." "How much?" "That depends on the accuracy of the information, Lepidus. Be warned! I don't want the facts warped to suit your own ends. I want exact transcriptions of the truth. Yours won't be my only sources of information, and I am no fool." Mollified yet disappointed, Lepidus departed. Which left Mark Antony. "Am I to be your Master of the Horse?" was Antony's first question, asked eagerly. "I won't be Dictator long enough to need one, Antonius." "Oh, what a pity! I'd make a terrific Master of the Horse." "I'm sure you would, if your conduct in Italia these past months is anything to go by. Though I must protest strongly against lions, litters, mistresses and mummers. Luckily next year you won't have any chance to behave like the New Dionysus." The heavy, pouting face lowered. "Why?" "Because, Antonius, you're going with me. Italia will be stable without you because Italia will have a praetor peregrinus, Marcus Caelius. I need you as a member of my high command." The red-brown eyes lit up. "Now that's more like it!" And that, Caesar reflected, was one man he had managed to please. A pity the Lepiduses of this world were choosier.

  Caesar's lex data found immediate favor with the knights of the eighteen senior Centuries and with many, many thousands more of lower status in Rome's commercial sphere. Its scope was wider than merely the city; it provided for Italia as well. Property, loans and debts were regulated through a series of provisos which favored neither creditors nor debtors. Those creditors who classified their debts as hopeless were directed to take land as settlement, but the value of the land was to be assessed by impartial arbitrators supervised by the urban praetor. If the interest payments on loans were up to date, the debtors received a deduction from the capital sum owed of two years' interest at twelve percent. No one was allowed to have more than sixty thousand sesterces in cash. The ceiling on all new loans was to be ten percent simple interest. And, most enormous relief of all, Caesar's lex data contained a clause which severely punished any slave who sought to inform on his master. As Sulla had encouraged slave informers and paid them well with money and freedom, this clause told Rome's businessmen that Caesar was no Sulla. There would be no proscriptions. Overnight the world of commerce began to right itself, for debtors used Caesar's law as much as creditors, and both kinds of man vowed the law was an excellent one. Sensible and moderate. Atticus, who had been saying ever since the Rubicon that Caesar was no radical, preened himself, said "I told you so!" to everyone, and blandly accepted congratulations on his perspicacity. Little wonder then that when the elections were held for all ranks of magistrates the curule men in the Centuries, the quaestors and tribunes of the soldiers in the People's tribes, and the tribunes of the plebs and plebeian aediles in the tribal Plebs Caesar's candidates, discreetly indicated, were all returned. The consular elections saw several candidates other than merely Caesar and Vatia Isauricus, but Caesar was returned as senior consul and Vatia as his junior. The Eighteen's way of saying thank you, thank you, thank you! Vacancies in the priestly colleges were filled and a belated Latin Festival held on the Alban Mount. Things happened. But then, men were remembering, didn't things always happen when Caesar was in government? And this time he had no Bibulus to retard his progress. Because he w
ould not assume the consulship until the first day of the New Year, Caesar retained his dictatorship until then. Under its auspices he legislated the full citizenship for every man of Italian Gaul; the old, bitterly resented wrong was gone. He restored the right to stand for public office to the sons and grandsons of Sulla's proscribed, then brought home those exiles whom he chose to repatriate as improperly banished. With the result that Aulus Gabinius was once more a Roman citizen in good standing, whereas Titus Annius Milo and Gaius Verres, among others, were not. By way of thanks to the People, he gave an extra free grain dole to every Roman citizen man, paying for it out of a special treasure stored in the temple of Ops. The Treasury was still very full, but he would have to borrow another large sum from it to fund his campaign in Macedonia against Pompey.

  On the tenth day of this sojourn in Rome, he finally had the leisure to summon a full meeting of the Senate, which he had convened on two earlier days in such a hurry that he left the senators quite winded; many of them had forgotten what Caesar in a hurry was like. "I leave tomorrow," he said from the curule dais in Pompey's curia, a deliberate choice of venue; it amused him to stand below that hubristic statue of the man who was no longer the First Man in Rome. There were those who had pressed him to remove it; he had firmly declined, saying that Pompeius Magnus should witness the doings of Caesar Dictator. "You will note that I have instituted no laws to remove their citizen status from that group of men who wait for me across the Adriatic. I do not regard them as traitors because they have chosen to oppose my occupation of the consuls' chair, nor because they sought to destroy my dignitas. What I have to do is show them that they are wrong, misguided, blind to Rome's welfare. Without, I sincerely hope, much if any bloodshed. There is no merit in shedding the blood of fellow citizens, as my conduct so far in this difference of opinion has conclusively shown. What I find hardest to forgive in them is that they abandoned their country to chaos, that they left it in no condition to continue. That it is now in good condition is due to me. Therefore the reckoning must be paid. Not to me, but to Rome. "I have given Enemy of the People status to only one man, King Juba of Numidia, for the foul murder of Gaius Scribonius Curio. And I have given Friend and Ally status to Kings Bocchus and Bogud of Mauretania. "How long I will be away I do not know, but I go secure in the knowledge that Rome and Italia, and their provinces in the West, will prosper under proper and sensible government. I also go with the intention of returning to Rome and Italia their provinces in the East. Our Sea must be united." Even the fence-sitters were there that day: Caesar's uncle Lucius Aurelius Cotta, his father-in-law Lucius Calpurnius Piso, and his nephew-in-law Lucius Marcius Philippus. Looking very stern and above such things as internecine strife. Excusable in Cotta, still rather crippled by two strokes, and excusable perhaps in Philippus, constitutionally incapable of taking sides in anything. But Lucius Piso, so tall, so dark and so ferocious looking that Cicero had once had a fine old time describing him as a barbarian, was irritating. A complete self-server whose daughter was far too nice to deserve him as a father. Lucius Piso cleared his throat. "You wish to speak?" asked Caesar. "I do." "Then speak." Piso rose to his feet. "Before committing us to a war, Gaius Caesar, might it not be politic to approach Gnaeus Pompeius and ask for peace negotiations?" Vatia Isauricus answered, and tartly. "Oh, Lucius Piso!" he said, making a rude noise with his lips. "Don't you think it's a little late for that? Pompeius has been living high in the palace at Thessalonica for months, with plenty of time to sue for peace. He doesn't want peace. Even if he did, Cato and Bibulus wouldn't permit it. Sit down and shut up!" "I loved it!" chuckled Philippus over dinner that afternoon. " 'Sit down and shut up!' So delicately put!" "Well," said Caesar, grinning, "I suppose he thought it was time he said something. Whereas you, you reprobate, sail on as serenely as Ptolemy Philopator's barge." "I like the metaphor. I'd also love to see that barge." "The biggest ship ever built." "Sixty men to an oar, they say." "Rubbish!" said Caesar, snorting. "With that many men on an oar, it would act like a ballista." Young Gaius Octavius, grey eyes wide, sat listening raptly. "And what do you say, young Octavius?" asked Caesar. "That a country which can build a ship that big and cover it in gold must be very, very rich." "Of that there is no doubt," said Caesar, assessing the boy coolly. Fourteen now. There had been some changes associated with puberty, though the beauty had not diminished. He was beginning to have an Alexandrine look to him, and wore his luxuriantly waving golden hair long enough to cover the tips of those jutting ears. More worrying to Caesar, sensitive on that subject, was a certain not precisely effeminacy, more a lack of the adolescent version of masculinity. To his surprise, he found that he cared about the future of this lad, didn't want to see him set off in a direction which would make his public career painfully difficult. No time now to speak privately with young Gaius Octavius, but somewhere in his crowded schedule he would have to make that time a fact.