Catilina's riddle rsr-3

by Steven Saylor

  Hungry for all that life has to offer, as you must have been once.'

  ‘Please, Catilina, don't tell me that you've seduced him, too.' He paused for a long moment then smiled wistfully. 'All right, I won't.'

  I walked blindly to the cot where Meto had been sitting. I picked up the breastplate he had been polishing. For a moment I studied my reflection, distorted amid the hammered flourishes of lions' heads and griffins, then threw the breastplate across the room. 'And now you have him polishing your armour, like a slave!'

  'No, Gordianus, that's not my armour. It's his. He wants it to be very bright, for the battle.'

  I stared at the various pieces on the cot — the greaves to protect his shins, the plumed helmet with its visor, the short sword tucked into its scabbard. The pieces were a hodgepodge that normally would have belonged to men of different ranks; even I could see how makeshift it all was. I tried to imagine Meto wearing it, and could not

  'Speaking of fashion,' said Catilina, 'I understand that in my honour the whole Senate staged some sort of ceremony to put off their normal togas and put on special clothing for the duration of the crisis, and have admonished the populace to do likewise. Is that true?'

  'Eco mentioned something about it in a letter,' I said dully, staring at the bits of armour. I suddenly felt lightheaded.

  'Imagine that! Well, they're always corning up with these ancient ceremonies and customs that no one alive can remember. Some are rather ridiculous, but I rather like this one. I've always been called an arbiter of fashion, and this proves it; I've even got stodgy Cato to change his outfit!'

  I lifted my eyes and stared at him. He shook his head.

  'No, Gordianus, I'm not mad. But an epigram always relaxes me before a battle.'

  'A battle?’

  'Within the hour, I imagine. Manlius and Tongilius are gathering the troops to hear me speak. You arrived just in time. Imagine, if you had missed my speech — you'd never be able to forgive yourself! Even so, if you wish to take your leave beforehand, so as to have a head start on eluding the carnage, I won't hold it against you.'

  'But here, now—'

  'Yes! The moment has arrived. I had hoped to postpone it once again, to buy a little more time. It was my intention to cross these mountains and somehow get to Gaul, taking back roads to evade battle, fighting our way through the passes if we had to, surviving the snowstorms if we could. But when we reached the pass up above, what do you think we saw waiting for us on the other side? Another Roman army. I decided to come back down and face this one. It's commanded by the consul Antonius, you see. He was once sympathetic to my cause. I hear that Cicero bought him off by giving up the governorship he was due at the end of his consulship and letting Antonius have it instead. Still, you never know; Antonius might decide to join me at the last moment. Yes, Gordianus, I know that's impossible, but don't say so aloud! No more ill omens within the tent, if you please. But look here, just as I said: your son returns.'

  Meto stood at the entrance. 'I've come to put on my armour,' he said.

  'Here, help me with mine first. It will take only a moment.' Catilina stood and raised his arms while Meto fitted a breastplate around him and tightened it, then attached a long crimson cape. He picked up a gilded helmet with a splendid red plume and placed it on Catilina's head.

  'There!' said Catilina, observing his reflection in a burnished plate. 'Don't tell Tongilius I let you dress me; he'll be jealous of the honour.' He took his eyes from the mirror and looked at each of us in turn, a long, steady gaze such as one gives to friends before leaving on a long journey. 'I'll leave you alone now. Don't be long.'

  Meto watched him depart, then walked to the cot where his armour lay.

  'Meto—'

  'Here, Papa, help me. Would you bring my breastplate? Somehow it ended up across the room'

  I picked it up and went to him. He lifted his arms. 'Meto—'

  'It's simpler than it looks. Line up the leather laces with the buckles and fasten the top pair on either side to begin with.' I did as he said, as if I moved in a dream.

  'Forgive me for deceiving you, Papa. I couldn't think of any other way.'

  'Meto, we must leave this place at once.' 'But this is where I belong.' 'I'm asking you to come home with me.' 'I decline.'

  . 'And if I command you as your father?'

  His breastplate fully fastened, Meto drew back and looked at me with an expression at once sad and rebellious. 'But you are not my father’ 'Oh, Meto,' I groaned.

  'My father was a slave I never knew, as I was a slave’ 'Until I freed you and adopted you!'

  One at a time he put his feet on the cot to fasten his greaves into place. 'Yes, the law calls you my father, and by law you have the right to command me, or even to kill me for disobeying you. But we both know that in the eyes of the gods you're not really my father. I have none of your blood in my veins. I'm not even Roman, but Greek, or some mongrel mixture—'

  ‘You're my son!'

  Then I'm a man as well, a free citizen, and I've made my own choice’

  'Meto, think of those who love you. Bethesda, Eco, Diana—' From without we heard a trumpet blast.

  "That's the signal for Catilina's speech. I have to be there. You should probably leave now, while you still have time, Papa—' He bit his tongue, as if to take back what he had called me, then quickly finished outfitting himself. When he was done, he looked at himself in the burnished plate and seemed gravely pleased. He turned to face me. 'Well, what do you think?' he said, with a trace of shyness.

  You see, you are my son. I thought; why else do you seek my praise? But out loud I snapped at him, 'What does it matter?' He lowered his eyes and his cheeks turned red, and now it was my turn to bite my tongue; it would have been worse if I had told him what I truly thought, for as I looked at him dressed in his gleaming, mismatched armour, what I saw was a little boy outfitted in a make-believe costume, pretending to go to war. The idea that others could look at him and see a real soldier, fit to be killed if they could manage it, sent a chill through my heart.

  'I can't miss the speech,' he said, walking quickly past me. I followed him out of the tent and across the camp, to a place where a depression in the rocky hillside formed a natural amphitheatre. We worked our way through the dense crowd until we were close enough to see. There was a blare of trumpets to quiet the crowd, and then Catilina stepped forward, resplendent in his armour and wearing a sombre smile on his face.

  'No speech from a commander, no matter how rousing or eloquent, ever made a coward brave, or turned a sluggish army into a keen one, or gave men who had no cause to fight a reason to do so. Yet it is the custom for a commander to give his troops a speech before a battle, and so I will.

  'One reason for a speech, I suppose, is that in many armies, most of the soldiers have seldom laid eyes on the man who supposedly leads them, much less have spoken to him or been spoken to by him, and so a speech is thought to establish a certain bond. That justification for a speech does not apply here today, for I doubt there is a single man among you whom I haven't personally greeted and welcomed to the ranks of this army, or with whom I haven't shared some moment of hardship or triumph in this struggle. Yet it is the custom for a commander to give his troops a speech before a battle, and so I will.

  'I said before that mere words cannot put courage into a man. Every man has a certain degree of boldness, I believe, either inborn or cultivated by training; so much, and no more, does he generally exhibit in battle. If a man is not already stirred by the prospect of glory or by immediate danger, then it is merely a waste of breath to exhort him with rhetoric; fear in the heart makes deaf the ears. Yet it is the custom for a commander to give his troops a speech before a battle, and so I will.'

  How peculiar, I thought, for a Roman orator to begin a speech by deriding its importance, to satirize an oration even while orating it, to be unabashedly honest before a crowd of listeners!

  Catilina's expression became sombre. 'I will set befor
e you as plainly as I can the prospect we face together, and the stakes for which we fight.

  'You know how our allies in Rome have failed us, what a lack of judgment and enterprise was shown by Lentulus and his friends, and how disastrous it has been for themselves and for us. Our present predicament is as obvious to all of you as it is to me. Two enemy armies now bar our way, one between us and Gaul, the other between us and Rome. To remain where we are is impossible, for we have run short of grain and other supplies. Whichever path we decide to take, we must use our swords to cut our way through.

  'Therefore I counsel you to be resolute and to summon up whatever measure of courage you have. When you go into battle, remember that riches, honour, glory, and, what is more, your liberty and the future of your country are held in the hand that wields your weapon. If we win, we shall obtain all we need to continue; towns will open their gates to us with thanksgiving and we shall be showered with supplies. New recruits will join us, and we shall grow again in strength and numbers. The tide that flows against us will be turned and will carry us to glory. But if tear causes us to flinch, the whole world will turn against us: no one will shield a man whose own arms have failed to protect him.

  'Keep in mind that our adversaries are not impelled by the same necessity as we are, nor by as just a cause. For you and me, country, justice, and liberty are at stake. They, on the other hand, have been ordered into battle to protect a ruling elite for which they can have little love. We have chosen our glorious course; we have endured exile and hardship; we have proclaimed to the world that we will not return to Rome with our heads bowed in shame, willing to live out our lives as the cringing subjects of unworthy rulers. The men we are to face, on the other hand, have already submitted to the yoke of their masters and closed their eyes to any other course. Which of these armies will show the more spirit, I ask you — those whose eyes are meekly cast down or those whose eyes are on the heavens?'

  To this question Catilina received a great cheer, and among the other voices Meto's rang in my ears, crying out the name of his commander. The din went on and on. Swords were beaten against shields to produce a deafening clang. The noise died down, only to spring up again in a great roar that covered my arms with gooseflesh. At last Tongilius stepped forward and raised his arms for silence so that Catilina could go on.

  He had begun his speech in a dry, sardonic tone, asifby his own brash example he could lend spirit to his men. But I think he was moved by their accolades, for he ended with a quaver in his voice. 'When I think of you, soldiers, and consider what you've already achieved, I have high hopes for victory. Your boldness and valour give me confidence. We will fight upon a plain. To our left are mountains, and to our right is rough, rocky ground. In this confined space, the enemy's superior numbers cannot encircle us. We shall face them man to man, with courage and just cause as our strongest weapons. But if, in spite of this, Fortune robs your valour of its just reward, do not sell your lives cheaply. Do not be taken and slaughtered like catde! Fight like men: let bloodshed and lamentation be the price that the enemy must pay for his bitter victory!'

  Another cheer went up, echoing between the hills on either side. It was ended by blaring trumpets, calling for the troops to take up their battle formations. All around us men began to move with quick determination. Meto seized my arm with a bruising grip.

  'Go now! If you take your horse, you may be able to escape the way you came, or else head up towards the pass and find some trail to lead you back down again when the battle's over.'

  'Come with me, Meto. Show me the way.'

  'No, Papa! My place is here.'

  'Meto, the cause is hopeless! Never mind Catilina's speech. If you could have heard the way he spoke to me in the tent—'

  'Papa, there's nothing you know that I do not. My eyes are open.'

  And fixed on the heavens, I thought. 'Very well, then. Can you equip me with some sort of armour?' 'What?’

  'If I'm to stay here and fight beside you, I'd like to have something more suitable than the dagger in my belt, though many of these wretches don't appear to have anything better.'

  'No, Papa, you can't stay!'

  'How dare you say that to me! Would you stand your ground and deny me the same honour?'

  'But you've given it no thought—'

  'No, Meto, on the journey here I had many hours to think. I imagined this moment long before it came. In my imagination it sometimes turned out considerably more to my liking, but sometimes it turned out much worse -1 thought I might find you dead without ever seeing you again, or find only a pit filled with dead bodies, with nothing to show me which was yours. This is better than that, and not as bad as I had feared. For one thing, I'm not as frightened as I thought I would be, at least not yet. No, Meto, this is my deliberate and premeditated choice, to fight beside my son.'

  'No, Papa, it must be for Catilina, for what he represents, if it's to mean anything!'

  'That is your cause, Meto; but very well, I'll fight for Catilina. Why not? The truth, Meto: if I had the power of Jupiter I'd wave a thunderbolt and give Catilina everything he wants. Why not? I'd resurrect Spartacus from the dust and let him have his way as well. I'd roll back time and see that Sulla was never born, or Cicero for that matter. I'd change the world in the blink of an eye, for better or worse, merely to see it changed into something different. But I cannot do those things, and neither can anyone else. So why not take up a rusty sword and run screaming into battle beside my son, for the glory of what he loves with all his foolish young heart?'

  Meto looked at me for a long time with an unreadable expression in his eyes. He must believe I'm mad, or lying, or both, I thought. But when he finally spoke, he said: 'You are my father.'

  'Yes, Meto. And you're my son.'

  Men ran madly around us. Horses neighed, metal clanged on metal, officers shouted, trumpets blared. At last Meto took my arm. 'Come, hurry, I think there's enough spare armour in Catilina's tent to put something together for you!'

  And so at the age of forty-seven I became a soldier for the first time in my life, outfitted in scraps of cast-off armour, wearing a coat of mail with half the scales missing and a much-dented helmet shaped like a hewn-off pumpkin, wielding a blunted sword for a hopeless cause under a doomed commander. I felt I must be approaching the very heart of the Labyrinth; I could almost smell the Minotaur's hot breath upon my face.

  There is not much I can do to describe the battle, as I never knew quite where I was or quite what was happening. It seems that Catilina arrayed his forces in three parts, with Manlius on one side, another commander on the other, and himself in the centre surrounded by his ardent young followers and a picked body of well-armed fighting men, along with Meto and myself. We marched forward with Tongilius carrying the eagle standard until Catilina chose the spot where he would make his stand, and there Tongilius planted the standard in the ground. There was no cavalry, only infantry, for before the battle Catilina saw that all the horses were driven back towards the mountains. By doing this he showed his men that their commanders could not flee, and that their danger was shared by all alike.

  The danger approached like a great crimson and silver tide, drawing towards us with a roar unlike anything I had ever heard. I know now how it must be for the enemies of Rome when they see their doom approaching. I was awed and horrified, and yet not frightened. Fear seemed pointless in the face of such catastrophe. Why should a simple man cringe with fear for his simple life, when the whole world was about to end in screaming madness?

  I felt no regret, but I did feel something of a fool, for I could not help thinking to myself: stupid man, Bethesda will never forgive you for this. And it was that I feared, more than the jagged wall of steel bearing down on us.

  I stayed close beside Meto, who stayed close beside Catilina. There was a great deal of running, sometimes from one side to the other, sometimes forward, but never back. I remember an arrow that whirred by my ear and struck a man behind me with a sickening thud. I rem
ember soldiers, men I had never seen before, rushing towards me with swords in their hands and murder in their eyes; it all seemed so unlikely that I only wanted the nightmare to end. But the sword in my hand seemed to know what to do, so I followed it blindly.

  I remember foaming blood sprayed upon my face like the pounding surf of the ocean. I remember seeing Catilina, his face contorted into a terrible grimace, his sword arm slashing, with an arrow projecting from his left shoulder and blood spilling down his glistening breastplate. I remember seeing Meto rush to Catilina's side with grim determination on his face, hewing a path with his sword as if he had been doing such things all his life. I hurried after him but tripped over something solid and fleshy. As I spun around, I glimpsed Tongilius in the throng behind me, bringing up the eagle standard, for with Catilina leading we had cut our way deep into the enemy's line. I gained my footing again and looked frantically for Meto, who had disappeared in the chaos.

  Then, from the comer of my eye, I saw the spear approaching. I remember watching, transfixed, as it came hurtling straight towards my forehead. It seemed to move very slowly, and everything in the world, including myself, came to a sudden stop awaiting its arrival; so slowly did it approach that I felt like a man on a pier waiting for a boat to arrive. It drew closer and closer, and when it was very, very close the world abruptly jerked back into frantic motion. The absurd thought struck me that I really should be doing more than I was to get out of the thing's way — then the spear struck its target with a peculiar sound of crumpled metal and all at once I was flying backwards through the air. Behind or above me — direction lost all meaning — I caught a glimpse of the eagle banner as it wavered and tottered and went crashing to the ground like myself, and then the blood-red world turned darkest black.

  XXXIX

  I sat on a hard rock surrounded by rough-hewn walls of black stone, with black stone underfoot and above my head. I thought at first that the place was a cave, but the walls were too angular to be natural, and the air was warm, not cold and clammy. Perhaps it was the old silver mine up on Mount Argentum, I thought, but that was all wrong. I was in the famous Labyrinth of Crete, of course, for peering at me from around a corner, its horns making a vast shadow on the wall beyond, was the Minotaur itself.