A Pillar of Iron: A Novel of Ancient Rome

by Taylor Caldwell

  Marcus had paled. He could not look away from Sulla.

  “No.” he said. “It is true. No.”

  Sulla’s mouth opened for a new breath.

  “Let us consider the Censors, the tribunes of the people, the politicians! Is there any man as vain, brutal, or criminal as a man who has a purse filled with a little authority and who can strut haughtily before those who elected him? Is there anyone who can boast of being a more desperate thief than these representatives of the people, one who will not sell his votes for the honor of sitting with patricians at their table, or of kissing the hand of a strumpet of a powerful lord? Who is more of a betrayer of the people than a man who swears that he serves them?

  “Look upon them! Will they turn from the busyness of filling their coffers if you cry to them to save Rome? Will they yield their petty staffs in the name of the people, and serve the citizens who elected them without fear or favor? Will they denounce the Senate, and demand of them that they respect the Constitution and pass no self-serving law? Will they cry ‘freedom!’ rather than privilege? Will they exhort the electorate to practice virtue and thrift and husbandry again, and ask nothing of tribunes but what is only just? Will they face the mobs of Rome and say, ‘Be men and not idle cattle’? Will you find one of these among the representatives of the people?”

  Marcus put down the shining utensils in his hands, though he had barely touched the rich pork and fish. And he gazed at his plate with desolation. “No, lord,” he said.

  Sulla lifted a goblet to his lips and drank deeply. No one, not even the light women, moved a hand.

  Sulla spoke. “You, Cicero, consider the middle-class, of whom you are a representative. The lawyers, the physicians, the bankers, the merchants, the owners of merchant fleets, the investors, the stock-sellers, the businessmen, the shopkeepers, the manufacturers of goods, the importers, the purveyors. Will they, of their own will, serve Rome but a month each year, yielding their profits above taxes, so that we may be solvent again? Will they besiege Senator, patrician, tribune, or Consul with demands that Rome be restored to her ancient grandeur and nobility, and above all, her peace? Will they relinquish the profits of war and not take such a profit? Will one of your lawyers challenge the lawmakers and cry to them, “This is un-Constitutional, an affront to a free people; and it must not pass?’ Will one of these, your own, lift his eyes from his ledgers long enough to scan the Twelve Tables of Roman law, and then expose those who violate them and help to remove them from power, even if it costs their lives? These fat men! Will six of them in this city, disregarding personal safety, rise up from their offices and stand in the Forum, and tell the people the inevitable fate of Rome unless they return to virtue and thrift and drive from the Senate the evil men who have corrupted them for the power they have to bestow?”

  “Before God, lord, no,” said Marcus.

  Sulla closed eyes that appeared suddenly exhausted. “Cicero, let us consider the sweltering polyglot mobs of Rome, the men who have smothered her face with their own dung. The mobs of Rome, the cat-mouthed, jackal-voiced mobs! The wall-scrawling villains of the sewers and the alleys! The bold and insolent people, the enthusiastic and uncontrolled and uncontrollable swill of our towns and many nations! If one honest man implored them to work industriously, and practice austerity, and return to the simple faiths—would they let him live? If a man cried to them that no longer must they depend upon government for their food, their shelter, the tunics that cover them, their amusements—would they harken to him? If a hero admonished them for their idleness and their greed, what would they do?”

  Marcus clasped his hands on the table and looked down at them. “Lord, they would murder him, or scream him to silence with their howlings.”

  “True,” said Sulla, with sombreness. “Now let us consider the old Romans, men like yourself, who still live in this city and on the countryside. They are the true inheritors of that for which our fathers died. They boast of the soldiers in their families, of dead warriors borne on their own shields after a battle. The speak proudly of Horatius, of all the heroes of Rome, and consider themselves one with them. Their homes are marked with ancient arms. Their children bear the names of mighty men now sleeping in the dust. They are everywhere these men, in all conditions of life.

  “Can you gather together one dozen of these old Romans and ask them to stand on the bridge of Horatius with you, and will they say to the mobs, ‘Silence!’ To the Senators, ‘Honor and law and justice!’ To the voracious in the counting house, ‘For a certain time give up your profits for the sake of Rome’? Will they say to the tribunes, ‘Represent us or yield your staff of office’? Will they say to me and my generals, ‘Depart from us, so that we may regain our liberty and our law’? Are there such a dozen of the old Romans who will cry these things, and pledge their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor to recreate Rome in her old image?”*

  Marcus’ very lips were white. He shook his head. “Before God, lord, they would not do that. They are pusillanimous, these descendants of heroes. They are afraid to lift their voices.”

  Sulla pressed his lean dark hands over his face for a moment. All the others sat transfixed, barely touching the food on their plates. Even the musicians had fallen silent.

  Then Sulla said behind his hands in a muffled voice, “Let us consider the farmers beyond our gates, cultivating the land. For many years they have sold their grain to the government granaries and have received large sums for it, and it has been fed to the slothful at their demand. The farmers are happy. It is nothing to them that our treasury is bankrupt.

  “If I should say to them, ‘Roman farmers, the nation is bankrupt and in danger, and, therefore, I pray to you to decline the bounties heretofore poured in your hands, of your own will, for the sake of Rome,’ would they lift their arms in an affirmative vow, for the love of Rome?*

  Marcus’ face became full of pain. “No, lord, they would not say that.”

  Sulla dropped his hands and turned his countenance upon Marcus and it was black with passion.

  “Look upon me, Cicero, a soldier, the dictator of Rome! Remember that I am here, in this house, in Rome, with this power, not because I willed it for myself in some dream of fantasy in a lonely night.

  “If one hundred men whom I could honor had met me at the gates and had said to me, ‘Lay down your arms, Sulla, and enter the city only on foot and only as a Roman citizen,’ I should have obeyed in thankfulness. Above all, I am an old soldier, and an old soldier respects the power of established law and courage. Yet, there were not a hundred men to challenge me at the gates, or to offer their lives to our swords in the name of their country! There were not even fifty, nor twenty, nor ten, nor five. There was not even one!”

  Marcus gazed at him and saw his powerful grief and despair.

  “I would, even now,” said Sulla, “at the cost of my life, try to restore Rome as she was once, and Roman law, and Roman virtues, and Roman faith, honesty, justice, charity, manliness, labor, and simplicity, if it would avail. But you know I should die in vain! A nation which has reached the abyss which now confronts Rome, by her own willing, her own fatness and ambition and greed, never retreats from that abyss. The leper cannot remove the marks of his disease; the blind man cannot restore his sight; the dead man cannot rise again.

  “You have thought me evil, the image of dictatorship. But I am what the people deserve. Tomorrow, I shall die as all men die. But I tell you that worse men than myself will follow me! There is a more inexorable law than any law ever made by man. It is the law of death for corrupt nations, and the minions of that law are already stirring in the wombs of history. There are many who are alive today, young and lustful and without faith. They will not fail. So passes Rome.”

  He lifted his goblet and drank it to the last drop in a sad and reckless gesture.

  “I drink to the corpse of Rome.”

  He stared at the faces about him, the faces of the vital young men in their narrow silence, the empty faces
of their women. “Look upon these, Cicero,” he said. “They are Rome’s tomorrow. They are her executioners. Well, lads, will you not drink a toast to your gilded, terrible tomorrow?”

  Julius met his exhausted eyes boldly with his own. “Lord,” he said, “you do us an injustice. We love Rome as you love her.”

  Sulla threw back his soldier’s head and laughed long and loud, and it was a frightful sound in that room. The others stared in each other’s eyes with strange smiles, their lips pursed, and their shoulders shrugged slightly.

  Marcus stood up, and leaned his hands on the table and waited until Sulla’s laughter had died. And then when he had the general’s sudden attention, he said in a quiet voice:

  “Lord, I stand indicted before you. I was not at the gates to challenge your entry. I was a prudent and careful man, a lawyer. I was the writer of briefs; I was the saver of money; I was the cherisher of my family. In short, I was a coward.

  “Lord, I must remove my guilt. If only for that reason I must defend Servius. In his person I defend the Rome I betrayed.”

  He bowed. Then in the silence he walked from the room and closed the door behind him.

  A slave refilled Sulla’s glass. He was now sick with wine and his furious sorrow. He said to the young men, “There departs a Roman, marked for death, if not tomorrow, then in the future. It is his fate.”

  “A traitor,” said Curius, with hatred and contempt.

  “A fool,” said Piso. “A base-born fool.”

  “A man of emotion, and hasty judgments,” said Julius.

  “A man of irrelevant passions,” said Crassus.

  Sulla’s mouth opened in a smile.

  “A man,” he said.

  *Patrick Henry quoted these actual words of Sulla, whom he admired.

  *Roman farmers were receiving government subsidies.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Marcus dined with Roscius in the actor’s gem of a house, and Noë was also present. “Politicians,” said Roscius, “must be mountebanks, or they are not politicians.”

  “I am not yet a politician,” said Marcus.

  “My dear friend,” said Roscius, “all lawyers are incipient politicians. And both are actors. It is not what they say before magistrates or the people. It is how they say it, the postures they assume, the manipulations of their voices. One of my early mentors, a very old actor, had the ability to count to ten and so moving was his voice, so tragic his aspect, that spectators burst into tears.”

  “Marcus has a most eloquent voice,” said Noë, “and most moving, and I have taught him to stand gracefully and use certain gestures.”

  “I have observed him before magistrates,” said Roscius, refilling his goblet, and then turning to study Marcus critically. “I have also observed that he wins often after appeals, when the records are read meticulously. Why does he not always win originally, in spite of those fine gestures you have mentioned, Noë? Eheu! He is not much of an actor.”

  “Thank you,” said Marcus. “I know I am jejune, but I was under the impression that lawyers win on points of law and the justice of their causes.”

  “What nonsense,” said Roscius.

  “So Scaevola told him, and I,” said Noë. “What was our reward? He asked us sarcastically why we had summoned a ‘Greek chorus.’ Scaevola threw up his hands in despair.”

  Roscius sighed in sympathy. “Stand up,” he directed Marcus. “Consider me a Senator. Walk toward me, as if about to present the case of Captain Cato Servius.”

  Marcus obeyed, trying to conceal his annoyance. He fixed Roscius with his eyes; he stood tall in his long plain robe with its wide leather belt. Roscius pursed his lips. “I like that fire in the eye,” he said. “Can you summon it at will?”

  “I did not know it was there,” said Marcus. “I was only considering knocking out a few of your teeth, those splendid teeth of yours.”

  “Excellent,” said Roscius, slapping his knee. “Consider the teeth of the venal Senators. Do they not devour the substance of the people? Are they not the curse of widows and orphans. Retreat, and approach me again, so I may observe you more closely.”

  Marcus did so. He stopped before Roscius who stood to examine him. Then the actor nodded and sat down again. “You have a proud air,” he said. “It will not be well on this occasion. You must appear broken. And you must wear the clothing of mourning, and carry a staff on which you will lean as if you need its support. There must be ashes on your brow, and a kerchief in your hand with which you will wipe tears away at intervals, tears which I trust you can produce easily.”

  He lifted his hand as Marcus began to protest in a loud voice. “Listen to me, my dear friend, and listen intently.”

  He spoke for some time. Marcus’ expression lost its indignation. He began to smile. His eyes sparkled with marveling amusement. When Roscius had done, he laughed with delight, shaking his head. “I shall feel a fool,” he remarked.

  Marcus gave exclusive thought to the case of Cato Servius in the next few days, and wrote on his address day and night to the point of exhaustion. Nothing pleased him. Then he remembered his first appearance before the Senate, and went to his father and explained all to him.

  The pale and emaciated and sickly Tullius listened with new passion.

  “So, it has come to this in Rome,” he said, as he had said so many times before in a grieved and broken voice. “You say it is possible, my son, to save Servius’ honor. You think that enough? You must save his life also, for which you despair. His grandsons are very young. Who will be their guardians after the death of Servius? Servius must live, that he instruct his grandsons in fearless pride and Roman faith.”

  Marcus was silent. Then his face glowed. He put his hands on his father’s shoulders and bent and kissed his cheek. “You are right, my father,” he said. “But you must pray for my success, for which I fear.” And he marveled again in himself that one so secluded and so timid and unworldly could strike so directly at the heart of a matter.

  “Men of honor in these days,” he said to his father, “are like the bird who feigns to have a broken wing to lead astray the destroyer who would despoil her nest and murder her children. We have but broken wings. The destroyer will prevail.”

  “Yes,” said Tullius, his mild eyes shimmering. “Nevertheless, some fledglings survive. What you save of Rome today will be remembered by a few, who will hand the lamp of truth down through the ages to other men, to light the darkness.”

  Lucius Sergius Catilina said to Julius Caesar, “I do not know your reason, but you should have permitted Cicero to be murdered. Are you still sentimental?”

  “No,” said Julius. “But he has a reputation, and there are multitudes who love him.”

  “Bah,” said Catilina. “The people forget their heroes; they obey only their masters.”

  Julius smiled. Catilina laughed heartily. “You!” he exclaimed. “No, it is something else. You will not tell me, of course.”

  “No,” said Julius. He paused. “But Cicero is still under my protection.”

  “Though he will oppose you and Pompey in the Senate.”

  “Though he will oppose me.”

  “You think you will succeed?”

  “Without doubt. Do you not know that he has written to Sulla to say that he will denounce his noble client, Captain Cato Servius, before the Senate?”

  “No! It is not possible!”

  Julius smiled complacently. “It is true. Sulla showed me Cicero’s letter.”

  Catilina was stunned. “You are speaking truly? Cicero wrote that he would denounce that old fool before the Senate?”

  “Yes. I saw the letter with my own eyes.”

  “Then he is not as formidable as I thought him,” said Catilina, still incredulous. He considered, then said angrily, “He is a trickster! I do not believe he is retreating now.”

  “He was never that,” said Julius. He smoothed his thin black hair. “He has respectfully prayed that Sulla be present.”

  Catil
ina stared at him, then frowned. “He would never dare, that Chick-pea, to humiliate the great Sulla before the Senate,” he said.

  Julius considered. He said, “I doubt that Cicero would not dare to do anything. You have thought him mild and ineffective, and his triumph over you due only to an accident, the slip of your foot. But I have known him well. He is afraid of nothing. Did he not defeat those who would have murdered him?”

  “But he would not dare humiliate Sulla! It would cost him his life.”

  Julius, who had hardly listened, said, “I may have underestimated him, for I recall him as a gentle and humorous youth, full of honor and uprightness. But what would he gain if he gamble everything in a game he cannot win?”

  Marcus sat with his old friend and tutor, Archias, in the house of the Greek, before a round bronze stove containing hot and comfortable coals.

  “Your strategy, my dear Marcus, is very dangerous,” said the Greek.

  “I have always been extremely cautious, to my present regret.”

  “I have counseled caution, if you may remember, but now I deplore it. Cautious nations become slaves. Let me read, again, your address to the Senate.”

  Archias shook his head. “My years are heavy on me, otherwise I should be enchanted at all this. Why do I cling to what little time remains for me? It is simple. The known is less frightful to contemplate than the unknown. I pray again, but to whom I do not know.” He paused. “You understand, of a certainty, that this cause of yours can result either in triumph or in death—for you?”

  “Yes.”

  Captain Cato Servius turned his face with umbrage upon Marcus, as they sat knee to knee in the prison.

  “I cannot do this,” said Servius, shaking his head.

  Marcus said wearily, as he had said a dozen times, “I am asking you to do nothing dishonorable, for I should not do it myself. The dust of the earth is filled with the remains of reckless heroes. If a man climb to a high pillar and then hurl himself stupidly upon the winds, exclaiming that the gods will uphold him with their arms and their wings, will they do so? No. It is expected of men that they use the intelligence and prudence with which they have been endowed, and not tempt the gods. What availed the recklessness of Icarus? Apollo melted the wax on his presumptuous wings and let him die in the sea.”