SPQR IX: The Princess and the Pirates

by John Maddox Roberts

  “I am told so by many of my fellow countrymen but never as a compliment.”

  “I think your country values the wrong sort of man. Please come with me.”

  Mystified, I followed her outside. Before her, the visitors parted hastily, some of them bowing almost as deeply as Orientals. Flavia and Alpheus fell in behind us, and we picked up a following of the younger priestesses, some of them visibly pregnant. Unlike Vesta, Aphrodite is not served by virgins. lone led us to a rather small but gnarled tree of a sort I had never seen before.

  “This is the oldest tree in the garden,” lone said. “It was ancient when the kings first erected the terrace and planted the other trees. It is said to have sprouted from the stone when Aphrodite came here to found her temple. It is a myrrh tree, and there is no other like it on Cyprus, nor on the surrounding islands, nor on the nearby mainland. Kore, come here.” A beautiful girl of perhaps seventeen attended and drew from her girdle a small pruning knife, its blade shaped like the crescent moon, lone took the knife and with it cleanly severed a twig from a lower branch. This she presented to me solemnly. Somehow I knew that this was an act of deep significance.

  “Please accept this and with it the favor and protection of the goddess.”

  I took it. “I accept this honor, reverend lady, but I do not understand why you do this.”

  “A man like you needs the protection of the gods far more than most.” With that she turned and walked away, trailed by her beautiful, fruitful priestesses. The visitors who had been watching this strange ceremony regarded me with wonder and envy. Flavia’s expression was more one of fear.

  As Alpheus and I walked back to the harbor, he rattled on about what an extraordinary honor had been bestowed upon me. I still have that twig. It rests in my family shrine with the household gods; and in the many years since I received it from Ione’s hands its leaves have dried and shrunk, but none have fallen off. Has it protected me? No one I knew in those days is still alive, so perhaps Paphian Aphrodite has watched over me. But, if so, it has been as much a curse as a blessing.

  When we reached the harbor, word had just arrived of a pirate attack on a town on the other side of the island, so I took my leave of the poet and sailed off. Of course, we found no pirates, only a town where they had recently been. This time the looting had been of the conventional sort, with only salable goods and persons seized.

  When we got back to Paphos, I learned that Governor Silvanus had been murdered.

  7

  THE MESSENGER THRUST THE BRONZE tube into my hands the moment my feet touched dry land. “Extremely urgent business at the gevernor’s mansion,” he said, before I had a chance to open it. “You are to come with me immediately, Senator.”

  “It can’t be all that urgent,” I told him. “I have things to attend to, not least of which is reading this.” I opened it and read. It was a marvel of baldness:

  Senator Metellus:

  There has been murder here. Come at once.

  A. Gabinius

  “Truly Caesarian brevity,” I remarked to no one in particular. Since the note was signed by Gabinius rather than Silvanus, I already had an idea of just who had been murdered.

  “Ion!” I shouted. The man came running up.

  “Sir?”

  “Don’t let anyone turn in until the ships are readied for instant launch. The practice cruises are over. Next time we’ll be serious. We won’t come back to port until we’ve bagged some pirates. Hermes, Ariston, come with me.”

  Already Cleopatra was rushing from her ship to join me. From the look of it, another messenger had delivered the same summons to her.

  “This sounds serious,” she said, when she arrived, slightly out of breath. She had not waited for her slaves to assemble her litter. “Come on. I may be a princess, but I haven’t forgotten how to walk. I’m not going to wait to travel in state.”

  “No sense arriving tired,” I advised, setting a leisurely pace. “Believe me, whoever’s dead will still be dead whan we get there.”

  Doson, the majordomo, received us at the door. He was pale but composed. “Please come inside, Princess, Senator.” He waited until we were all inside and the door shut behind us before going on. “Forgive this irregularity, but General Gabinius has given instruction that this matter not be made public immediately.”

  “Since General Gabinius is giving the orders, I take it that Governor Silvanus is deceased?” I said.

  “Sadly true. It is terribly tragic and very, very strange. I—ah, here is the general now.”

  Gabinius entered the atrium, his craggy face more than ever like that of a battered eagle’s. “My friend Silvanus is dead,” he said. “I have not allowed word to spread yet. We must discuss this matter. Come with me.”

  We walked through the house, in our progress passing several tough-looking armed men of military bearing. One of them was the grizzled old centurion I had seen on the night we were attacked outside. From someplace came the muffled sound of many voices wailing.

  “Those are the household slaves,” Gabinius explained. “Of course it’s their duty to mourn the master, but I’ve made them do it where they won’t be heard outside.” We entered the room where I’d conferred with the two senior Romans after the street fight.

  “Who are those thugs?” I asked him, as we took chairs. “Old soldiers of mine who’ve thrown in their lot with me. If you are ever exiled, you’ll be well-advised to keep a picked band of such men close to you. In exile you’ll have few friends and a great many enemies. Just now they’re keeping the other guests quiet.”

  “You behave high-handedly, General,” Cleopatra observed. “Had the governor no deputy?”

  “No. One was to be sent out from Rome, but whoever the Senate has picked hasn’t shown up yet.”

  “Then it seems to me,” she said, “that Senator Metellus is the ranking Roman official here.” I wished she had kept her mouth shut. My situation was precarious enough, and the last thing I needed was to get into a dogfight with Gabinius.

  “The senator,” he said, “has a commission from the State to deal with the pirates in the adjacent waters. That is going to keep him fully occupied for a long time. He has never held an office higher than aedile. I have served as praetor and consul together with the attendant promagistracies, as you well know, Princess.”

  “But you are an exile!” she said heatedly.

  “That means only that I may not set foot in Italy until my exile is rescinded. Exile does not diminish my status.”

  I held up a hand. “This does not help things. I am quite willing to attend to my naval duties and leave administration here to an experienced magistrate until a replacement arrives from Rome. Cyprus does not yet have provincial status, and its government is still provisional. This is as good an arrangement as any, for now. There are more immediate matters to attend to.”

  “Exactly,” Gabinius said. “I am glad that you are being so sensible, Decius Caecilius. We should work well together. To begin with, I was a close friend of Silvanus, so I shall undertake all the funeral arrangements and have his ashes sent to his family. They have a vault on the Via Appia, I believe.”

  “Will you deliver the eulogy?” I asked.

  “I have been composing it all morning. It is a shame there are so few Romans of rank here to attend, but I will send the text to Rome to be recited at the tomb site. I will also write his family concerning his slaves and other property here. I presume his will is filed in Rome. It may contain manumissions for the senior slaves, and there will have to be some sort of disposition for the rest. I will see to all this.”

  “Agreed,” I said. “Now I would like to know the circumstances surrounding the governor’s death. You used the word ‘murder’ in your note, so I presume he died violently and that you’ve ruled out accident.”

  “Decidedly. I’ve seen men killed in a great many fashions, but this one is unique in my experience. I think you should view the body.”

  “An excellent idea,” I s
aid, standing. Cleopatra got up as well.

  “No need for you to see this, Princess,” Gabinius said.

  “But I wish to. I have seen people die in great variety, too, General, some of them close relatives.”

  He shrugged. “Suit yourself.” He led us from the room. “The body was discovered early this morning by the chamber slave who was supposed to wake Silvanus at sunrise. He had an early meeting scheduled with those wretched businessmen from Alexandria.”

  We found the late Governor Silvanus reclining upon his bed, his face blackened, eyes wide and protruding, mouth agape as if gasping for breath. Any such breath was precluded by the amorphous, yellowish mass that filled his mouth, spilling onto the pillow. It didn’t look like something regurgitated in his death throes. Rather, it had the distinct aspect of something forcefully crammed into his mouth, causing the cheeks to bulge like a trumpeter’s.

  I picked up a particle from the pillow and examined it closely. It was a golden crystal, semitransparent. It looked almost like stone, but when I squeezed it between my nails it shattered. “What is this stuff?” I mused.

  “You know what it is,” Gabinius growled. “You’ve seen it all your life.”

  Cleopatra picked up a few grains and rubbed them between her fingers, then sniffed at the resulting powder. “Frankincense,” she pronounced. “He choked on frankincense. What an amazing way to die.”

  “I don’t suppose,” I hazarded, “that our host was in the habit of experimenting with exotic foods? I have known others to sample inappropriate foodstuffs to their detriment.”

  “Not likely,” Gabinius said. “Look at him. I’d say this was done by at least two strong men, more likely three. Someone held him down while someone else jammed his gullet full of frankincense. Then he had to be held there for a while. A man doesn’t choke to death quickly, you know that.”

  “All too true. Have the slaves been examined?”

  “Doson got them together and made a count. They’re all here. There are a couple of porters strong enough to have accomplished it, but surely they would’ve fled after murdering their master. I don’t think the household staff were involved.”

  “That’s a relief,” I said.

  “It would make things simpler,” Cleopatra said.

  “Too simple,” I told her. “Under Roman law, when a slave murders a master, all the slaves are crucified.”

  “What was it you said about my family’s homicidal habits?”

  “There are far easier ways to kill a man,” I noted. “Stifling him with frankincense must have some sort of significance. Is there a large amount of it in the house?”

  “The steward tells me there is some kept in the family shrine for the household gods,” Gabinius answered. “There is never more than about half a pound of it on hand. I looked and there is about that much still there. Silvanus has at least a pound jammed down his throat. The killers brought it with them.”

  “Who was the last to see him alive?” I asked.

  “After dinner he dismissed his slaves and went to bed it seems.”

  “And who were his guests?” A wealthy and important Roman almost never dines alone. Failure to entertain nightly means a reputation for miserliness, which is death to a political career.

  “Most were those Roman businessmen from Alexandria,” he said with distaste. “A despicable lot of moneygrubbers if you ask me.” He had the true aristocrat’s distaste for people who earned their own money instead of stealing or inheriting it. Gabinius had stolen and inherited quite a bit of it in his time. All quite respectably, of course. There is no shame attached to plundering the conquered and squeezing treasure out of desperate allies. His conviction for extortion and subsequent exile was just political bad luck not lasting dishonor.

  “Were you here last night?”

  “Eh?” he asked angrily, “what’s that?”

  “I merely want to establish who was present,” I said.

  “As a matter of fact I was at my house outside the town. When the murder was discovered, Doson locked the doors and sent a messenger to fetch me.”

  I ran a hand over my face, deep in thought. This was a complication I surely did not need. Pirates were a nuisance; this could be a disaster. “We need to assess the state of anti-Roman sentiment on the island. If this was done by a disgruntled pro-Ptolemy faction, we could be looking at the start of a war.”

  “I hope you do not imply that I was involved in this sordid business!” Cleopatra said hotly.

  “Just now I can dismiss no one from suspicion. This is a matter of utmost seriousness.”

  “I will conduct the relevant investigation,” Gabinius said. “There is no need for this to distract you from your duties.”

  “But there is,” I said. “I was his guest.”

  There was little he could say by way of objection. Hospitality is more than mutual entertainment; it involves sacred obligations. I was eating his food and sleeping beneath his roof. And ancient, ritual law decrees that if a host is slain, it is the duty of his guest to avenge him. Silvanus was a man I had not known well and did not particularly like, but that is of no significance to religious law. Failure to seek out his killers and bring them to justice could draw the wrath of the gods, and I was not about to risk that.

  For a while I examined the bedchamber but found nothing of significance. There was little evidence of struggle other than a slight disarray of the bedclothes. I assumed that Silvanus must have been asleep when the killers struck, allowing them to pinion him securely before he had a chance to resist.

  “When will you make the announcement of his death?” Cleopatra asked.

  “I see little point in concealing it any longer now that we have been informed,” I said. “Aulus Gabinius, why don’t you go ahead and inform the city council and post notice of Silvanus’s demise? For now there’s no need to say that he was murdered. This isn’t Rome, and we don’t owe these people a rigorous legal accounting. They may as well have the impression that he died of natural causes or misadventure. If anyone challenges that, it will be evidence of a conspiracy.”

  He nodded. “It makes sense. With all that stuff cleared out of his mouth, he’ll look presentable enough for his funeral, except for the color of his face. How shall we say he met his end?”

  I shrugged. “People drop dead all the time, and nobody can say why. But you might as well simply say he choked to death. It’s not an uncommon cause of death. I’ve known men of great distinction and accomplishment who have choked on peach pits or chicken bones. It will account for his blackened face.”

  “I shall do it then,” he agreed.

  “How many of the household know for certain that he was murdered?” Cleopatra asked.

  Gabinius thought for a moment. “Doson, Androcles the steward, and the slave who discovered him; and she’s spoken to no one but Doson, he’s assured me. My own men, and I’ve instructed them to keep silent about it. For the rest, they just know the master’s dead.”

  “Let’s see how long we can keep it that way,” I advised. When will you notify Rome?”

  “It’s too late for a ship to sail today. I’ll compose a letter to the Senate this evening and dispatch it to Rome at first light. I can’t detach any of your ships, and Caesar’s stripped the naval base as you learned. I’ll hire a ship to row hard to Tarsus. There is a naval base there, and the commander is a friend of mine, Lentulus Scaevola. He’ll detach a fast cutter to take the letter to Brundisium or Tarentum. A rider can carry the letter to the house of Cicero in Rome, and Cicero can present it to the Senate.”

  I thought about it for a moment. “I probably can’t get word there any faster. Are you and Cicero on good terms these days?”

  “Excellent. He’ll call a special meeting of the Senate for this.” He was all but grinning, and I could see the wheels turning in his head. Cleopatra looked from one of us to the other, clearly mystified.

  “Let’s do it that way then.” Finished with my examination of the area around the bed
, I straightened. “And now, if you don’t mind, the princess and I are overdue for dinner and some rest.”

  “Go ahead. I’ll see to things here. Doson!” He bellowed the name, but the majordomo had been waiting just outside the bedchamber door. He hurried in. “General Gabinius?”

  “You may release the household staff, but none of them are to leave the house or talk to anyone outside until I say so. They are to attend to their late master’s guests as always. Begin preparations for a funeral and tell everyone to mourn quietly. They can wail as loud as they like at the funeral.”

  The majordomo bowed. “It shall be as you say, General.” We left and repaired to the garden. Slaves appeared and efficiently set about making us comfortable and getting us fed. Despite swollen eyes and tear tracks, they didn’t appear especially grief stricken, merely anxious in the usual fashion of slaves when the master is dead and their future uncertain.

  “Is this the way you Romans always do things?” Cleopatra asked. “I find it difficult to believe that a serving Roman official is deferring to a mere exile! Why did you not take charge and arrange affairs to your own liking?”

  I took a sip of the excellent wine and selected a seedcake. “Rome is a republic, not a monarchy,” I reminded her. “I am not a viceroy, and Gabinius is not a powerless nobody, like someone your father would exile, stripping him of lands, wealth, and influence. Rome is governed by great families whose leading members hold the consulships and praetorships. Their supporters comprise Romans of all levels. There are the bulk of the senators, who are men who have held the lesser offices; the class of equites, who have money and property but who don’t go into politics, like our friend Sergius Nobilior the banker; and the great bulk of the citizenry, who vote in the Plebeian Assembly. There is also the Centuriate Assembly and the Tribunician Committee, but these days real power lies in the Senate and the Plebeian Assembly.”