Saturnalia s-5

by John Maddox Roberts

  “Now, Senator,” Narcissus said, “how may I be of service?”

  “Your former patron, Ariston of Lycia, attended my kinsman, the consul Quintus Caecilius Metellus Celer, in his final illness. Did you accompany him on that occasion?”

  He nodded gravely. “I did. He was a most distinguished man. His passing was a great misfortune to Rome.”

  “Indeed. Did Ariston remark at the time upon, oh … any irregularities in the manner of Celer’s passing?”

  “No, in fact he stated rather emphatically that the symptoms were those common to death from natural, internal disorders such as attend a great many common deaths. This time, he declared, the only unusual circumstance was the seemingly robust health enjoyed by the deceased.”

  “You said ‘seemingly robust health,’ “I pointed out. “May I know why you qualify it thus?”

  “Well, first of all, he was dead. This alone means that he was not as healthy as he had seemed.”

  “Clearly, unless said good health was terminated by an outside agent. Poisoning has been freely conjectured.”

  Narcissus nodded, a puzzled expression on his fine, serious features. “I know. It made me wonder why Ariston never told the widow or the close relatives about Celer’s previous visits.”

  My scalp prickled. “Previous visits?”

  “Yes. I said nothing at the time because that would have been in violation of the confidentiality that must always exist between physician and patient. But since both Celer and Ariston have passed on, I see no reason why I should withhold evidence that should lay to rest these rumors of poison.”

  “None indeed,” I said encouragingly. “Please, do go on.”

  “Well, you see, the distinguished consul came here about a month before the termination of his period in office, needing urgently to confer with my patron.”

  “Wait,” I said, “he came here?”

  “Oh, yes. Ordinarily, of course, a physician is summoned to attend upon so prominent a client. But in this instance, the consul called after dark, dressed as an ordinary citizen. Truly, this is not a terribly uncommon occurrence. You must understand,” he glanced back and forth between Asklepiodes and myself, “that the confidentiality I mentioned sometimes calls for clandestine meetings between physician and patient.”

  “To be sure,” I affirmed. More than once I had called upon Asklepiodes to patch me up after some extra-legal encounters.

  “So it was in this instance. The consul had been suffering severe pains in the chest and abdomen. He was a strong and soldierly man and was able to conceal this infirmity from even his closest companions. Apparently even his wife was unaware of it.”

  “Not a difficult bit of deception considering how much they saw of each other,” I commented.

  “And you must understand why he did not want his condition to become known?”

  I nodded, much becoming clear. “Exactly. He had been given the proconsular command everyone has been drooling over for the last year or two: Gaul. He couldn’t afford to appear unfit for the command.”

  “It was not the first time a man of great public importance came to Ariston for confidential treatment of a condition potentially injurious to a career, rather as women often resort to the clandestine treatment of a saga for the well-known condition so injurious to marriage.”

  “And did Ariston provide a satisfactory treatment for the consul’s condition?” Asklepiodes asked.

  “As you know, Master Asklepiodes, the symptoms evinced in this case are the classic signs preceding death from apoplexy, although men may suffer them for many years before the inevitable happens. However, Ariston provided a medication sufficient to suppress the painful symptoms.”

  “I see,” Asklepiodes said, apparently full of professional interest. “Do you know what the contents of this prescription might have been?”

  Narcissus frowned slightly. “No, Ariston insisted that I was not yet advanced enough in my studies to entrust with that particular formula.” That flicker of disloyalty told me why Narcissus was willing to discuss Ariston’s questionable behavior. “I do know that each time Celer was given a supply sufficient to last for a matter of weeks.”

  “He had some on hand at the time of the first visit?” I asked.

  “Yes. I heard him instruct the consul to take it each morning. Celer said that he would mix it with his morning pulsum.”

  “I see. This way the vinegar would disguise the taste of the medicine?”

  He looked puzzled. “No. He told Celer that the medicine was nearly tasteless. But the consul was a man of regular habits, and the pulsum would ensure that he took it regularly every morning.”

  I glanced at Asklepiodes and he raised his eyebrows quizzically.

  “How many times did Celer call here?” I asked.

  “Three times that I am aware of. The last time was about half a month before his death.”

  I stood. “You have been most helpful, Narcissus. I am grateful.”

  He stood as well. “It is nothing. Consider it a part of my service to the illustrious Metelli.” Reminding me that he, and he alone, would follow in the footsteps of Ariston of Lycia as physician to the Metelli. Asklepiodes and I made our way down the stairs.

  “What do you think?” I asked when we were out on the street. Before us lay the cattle market, where even the livestock looked hung over.

  “Much is now made plain, but much is obscure. In the first place, Celer may not have had a fatal condition at all. Narcissus is correct in naming the symptoms as those of a preapoplectic condition, but they could as easily reveal ulceration of the stomach or esophagus, not uncommon conditions among men who spend their careers arguing with people.”

  “The condition is hardly material. What is important is that it provided an excuse to introduce poison into the daily ingestion of a man who rarely needed medication. I think there is no doubt that we have our poisoner here.”

  “The question is one of motive,” Asklepiodes said. “Why would a man like Ariston want to poison Celer? He was unscrupulous, I admit, but this is rather extreme.”

  We were walking along the street, our heads down and our hands behind our backs, like two academic philosophers conferring on abstruse points of logic. Or was it the peripatetics who walked around like that?

  “Cicero has expounded to me upon a very basic principle of criminal law, a question the investigator must ask himself and a prosecutor expound to the jury in every case of anomalous wrongdoing: Cui bono? Who stands to benefit from this?”

  “As you have said, Celer was not a man without enemies.”

  “Envious enemies. Noisiest and most colorful among them being the tribune Flavius.”

  “Their public rows were the talk of Rome last year,” Asklepiodes said. “But Roman politics are usually boisterous. And yet it seems to me that Flavius accomplished his ends without resorting to poison.”

  “Not for certain. The very day he dropped, Celer was going to court to sue for the return of his Gallic command. Flavius still stood to lose.”

  “But by that time Flavius was out of office,” Asklepiodes pointed out.

  “Out of the office of tribune. But he was standing for the office of praetor for next year, and it wouldn’t have looked good if his coup against Celer failed. Besides, their conflict went far beyond ordinary partisan politics and into the realm of personal insult and violence. Plain revenge could play a part here.”

  “That much makes sense,” Asklepiodes admitted. “But how would he have known that Celer would need to be treated by Ariston?” Learned as Asklepiodes was, he did not extrapolate very well, probably the result of receiving wisdom from long-dead Greeks.

  “Ariston told him. You heard Narcissus say that the medication was supposed to be tasteless?”

  “And was puzzled by the statement. It scarcely agrees with what the woman Ascylta said.”

  “That is because the first time Celer visited he was given a legitimate medication, at least one that was not harmful. Once A
riston realized the possibilities, he went shopping for someone needing his services. In the case of Celer, there was probably no shortage of buyers.”

  “That was extraordinarily cold-blooded.”

  “I suspect that it was not the first time. He knew exactly where to go to find the poison he needed. He may have been a regular patron of Harmodia’s little stall. A list of Ariston’s late patients might make for some interesting reading. Who is in a better position than a physician to surreptitiously hasten one’s transport to the realm of shades?”

  “Assuredly,” he murmured, “this is a most exceptional case.”

  “I don’t doubt it a bit. Still, from now on I shall be very careful in my choice of physicians. I am, of course, more than fortunate in having a friend such as you to patch me up while I am in Rome.”

  “Will your stay be a lengthy one this time?” he asked.

  “No, everyone wants me away while Clodius is tribune. My father wants to pack me off to Gaul with Caesar.” An involuntary shudder ran down my spine. “I must find some way out of it.”

  “If I may make so bold, certain men have come to me desirous of avoiding hazardous service. The usual expedient is to amputate the thumb of the right hand and pretend that it occurred in an accident. I am quite skilled at the operation, should you …”

  “Asklepiodes!” I said. “How utterly unethical!”

  “This presents a problem?”

  “No, I’d just rather not lose my thumb.” I held up that unique digit and exercised it. “It comes in handy. Nothing like it for jabbing a man’s eye in a street fight. No, I’d feel incomplete without it. Besides, nobody would believe it was accidental. I’d be accused of cowardice and barred from public office.”

  “Even heroes resort to stratagems to avoid particularly onerous or foolhardy military adventures. Odysseus feigned madness, and Achilles dressed as a woman.”

  “People already think I’m insane. Anyway, if I dressed like a woman, everyone would think I was just one of Clodia’s odd friends.”

  “Then I fear I run short of suggestions. Why not go? You might find it amusing, and a countryside filled with howling savages is no more dangerous than Rome in unsettled times.”

  “Yes, why not? Shall I suggest to Caesar that you accompany the expedition as army surgeon?”

  “And here I must leave you,” he said, turning abruptly. “I must go prepare to operate on the unfortunate Marcus Celsius.” He walked off in the direction of the Sublician Bridge.

  I proceeded to the Forum, where Rome was beginning to come shakily to life. Most of the drunks had risen like animated corpses to totter off and seek dark corners to continue their recovery. The business of the City was resuming, after a somewhat late start. Everywhere, state slaves were listlessly but steadily plying their brooms and mops, repairing the wreckage of Saturnalia.

  I went to the basilicas and asked questions and eventually ended up in the Basilica Opimia, where several of the praetors-elect were conferring, making their final arrangements for the ordering of their courts. Some of them had already assumed the purple-bordered toga of curule office; others were waiting until the beginning of the new year.

  A slave pointed out the man I was seeking. He was one of the stripe wearers, tall and craggy-featured, with unruly, graying hair that stuck out from his scalp in stiff waves. His beak of a nose was flanked by the sort of cold, blue eyes you don’t want to see looking at you over the top of a shield. I walked up and presented myself for his attention.

  “Lucius Flavius?” I asked, not bothering with his title since he had yet to assume office.

  “That is correct,” he said. “I don’t believe we’ve met.”

  “I am Decius Caecilius Metellus the Younger.”

  “Then you are a man of distinguished lineage.” Clearly, his warmth toward the Metelli was limited.

  “I am looking into the circumstances surrounding the death of Metellus Celer. I understand you had some rather notable run-ins with him.”

  “That was last year. I am busy preparing for next. By whom have you been commissioned to investigate?”

  “By the tribune Metellus Pius Scipio Nasica and …”

  “A tribune is not a curule officer,” he snapped. “He cannot appoint an iudex.”

  “This is an informal investigation requested by my family,” I told him. “Including Metellus Nepos, who would appreciate your cooperation.”

  That gave him pause. “I know Nepos. He’s a good man.” As long as both supported Pompey, they would be colleagues. Flavius put a hand on my shoulder and guided me to a relatively uncrowded alcove of the vast, echoing building. “Is it true that Nepos will stand for next year’s consular election?”

  “It is.”

  He rubbed his stubbly chin. He hadn’t dared to trust a barber that morning either. “It will be an important year to have such a man in office, if he wins.”

  “He will win,” I said. “When a Metellus stands for consul, he usually gets the office. It’s been that way for more than two centuries.”

  “All too true,” he mused. “Very well, what do you want to know?”

  “I understand that your disputes with Celer were occasions of public violence.”

  “Not all of them, but a few times. What’s unusual about that? If our debates didn’t involve a little blood on the pavement from time to time, we’d all turn into a pack of effeminate, philosophy-spouting Greeks.”

  “We certainly wouldn’t want that. Do I understand correctly that the gist of your dispute was the land settlement for Pompey’s veterans?”

  “You do. And a more just and politically wise policy could hardly be imagined. Celer was the leader of the loony end of the aristocratic party. They’d rather face civil war than give public land to hungry veterans who’ve earned it. And for all their protestations, it’s because they’ve been using that land themselves at a nominal rent or wanted to buy it up cheap. They …”

  I held up a hand. “I know the argument, and I am fully in sympathy with the land settlements.”

  He settled his ruffled feathers. “Well, even Cicero supported the settlement, once he’d added some amendments concerning compensation for former owners, and Cicero is a notorious supporter of the aristocrats.” He shook his head and snorted through his formidable nose. “Those last weeks in office Celer seemed scarcely in control of himself once he got angry.”

  His last month in office Celer had been taking Ariston’s medication. I wondered whether this might have affected his judgment and self-control.

  “He was especially indignant over your depriving him of the proconsulship of Gaul?”

  “Who wouldn’t be? But I considered his behavior in office disgraceful and urged the Popular Assemblies to overrule the Senate and that was that.”

  “Except that he was suing to get the command returned to him,” I commented.

  “Yes. But he died before he could win his case. What difference does it make? If he hadn’t died in Rome he’d have died in Gaul, and it would be some legate tidying up the paperwork to hand it over to Caesar right now.” The way he pronounced Caesar’s name told me what he thought of him.

  “I think Celer would not have died if he had gone to Gaul.”

  “Why should that be?”

  “I now know for a fact that Celer was poisoned.”

  “That’s unfortunate, but he never should have married that slut.”

  “No, I am nearly certain that Clodia is entirely innocent, for once.”

  “Then what is this all about?” he asked suspiciously.

  “When you urged the assemblies to strip Celer of his imperium in Gaul, did you also try to get it transferred to Pompey?”

  “Of course I did! Pompey is the most capable general of our age. He would settle that Gallic business quickly, efficiently, and at the minimum cost to Rome.”

  I knew better than to argue Pompey’s merits, or rather lack of them, with one of his rabid supporters.

  “So Pompey was the m
an with the most to lose if Celer was given back Gaul,” I said.

  “What are you implying?” His face went dark. “Pomptinus was continued in command in Gaul until the matter could be settled, so he gains. Caesar is to have the whole place for five years, so he gains. Pompey is serving here in Italy on special civilian commissions and has made no move at all to take Gaul from Caesar. If you are looking for a poisoner, Senator Metellus, you are looking in the wrong place! Go look into Caesar’s doings! Good day to you, sir, and if you come to me again with unfounded allegations I shall have my lictors drag you into court!” He whirled and stalked off.

  I sighed. One more powerful man in Rome disliked me. I would just have to live with it. I had borne up beneath such burdens before. I walked out into the sunlight and went to provoke somebody else. Back across the Forum and past the Circus Maximus and up the slope of the Aventine to the Temple of Ceres. The elderly freedman and the slave boy I had encountered two days before were still there, but there were no aediles present. I asked after Murena, fearing that he would still be home in bed, nursing an aching head like much of the City.

  “The aedile Caius Licinius Murena,” the freedman said importantly, “is in the jeweler’s market this morning.”

  So I went to find him. Outside, on the temple steps, I paused in case the slave boy should run out with more information to sell. After a reasonable interval I set off for another trudge: back past the circus, back past the cattle market, and through the Forum. No matter how I tried to plan, I always seemed to be retracing my steps.

  The jeweler’s market sold a great deal more than jewelry, but all of the wares displayed there were expensive luxury goods: silks, perfumes, rare vases, furniture of exquisite workmanship, and a great many other things I couldn’t afford. There the merchants did not operate from tiny booths and tents that they set up and took down every day. The jeweler’s market was a spacious, shady portico where the dealers could display their wares to wealthy patrons in gracious ease. No raucous-voiced vendors cried their wares, and even the most elegant ladies could descend from their litters and browse through the great arcade without being jostled or forced into proximity with the unwashed. The splendid portico was owned by the state, and the merchants secured their enviable accommodations through payment of regular fees, some small part of which usually stuck to aedilician fingers.