Fortune's Favorites (122 page)

“Which means,” said Verres eagerly, “that Lucius Cotta will direct Glabrio to hear whichever of the two cases is ready first, and as you say, it will be Curtius. Then once you're in court you'll drag the proceedings out until the end of the year! Cicero and my trial will have to wait. Brilliant, Quintus Hortensius, absolutely brilliant!”

“Yes, I think it's pretty cunning,” said Hortensius smugly.

“Cicero will be furious,” said Metellus Little Goat.

“I'd adore to see that!” said Hortensius.

But they didn't see Cicero worked into a fury after all. The moment he heard that Hortensius had applied to try an ex-prefect of Achaea in the Extortion Court, he understood exactly what Hortensius was aiming at. Dismay smote him, followed by despair.

His beloved cousin Lucius Cicero was visiting from Arpinum, and saw the instant that Cicero entered his study how disturbed he was. “What's wrong?” asked Lucius Cicero.

“Hortensius! He's going to have another case ready to be heard in the Extortion Court before I can assemble my evidence to try Gaius Verres.” Cicero sat down, the picture of depression. “We'll be held over until next year-and I'd be willing to bet my entire fortune that the Metelli Little Goats have already cooked it up with Hortensius to make sure Marcus Little Goat is the praetor in charge of next year's Extortion Court.”

“And Gaius Verres will be acquitted,” said Lucius Cicero.

“Bound to be! Can't not be!”

“Then you'll have to be ready first,” said Lucius Cicero.

“What, before the end of Quinctilis? That's the date our friend Hortensius has asked the urban praetor to put aside. I can't be ready by then! Sicily is huge, the present governor is Verres's brother-in-law and will impede me wherever I go- I can't, can't, can't do it, I tell you!”

“Of course you can,” said Lucius Cicero, standing up and looking brisk. “Dear Marcus Tullius, when you sink your teeth into a case no one is smoother or better organized. You're so orderly and logical, you have such method! And you know Sicily very well, you have friends there-including many who suffered at the hands of the frightful Gaius Verres. Yes, the governor will try to slow you down, but all those people Verres injured will be trying even harder to speed you up! It is the end of April now. Get your work in Rome finished within two market intervals. While you do that I will arrange for a ship to take us to Sicily, and to Sicily the pair of us will go by the middle of May. Come on, Marcus, you can do it!”

“Would you really come with me, Lucius?” asked Cicero, face lightening. “You're almost as well organized as I am, you'd be the most tremendous help to me.” His natural enthusiasm was returning; suddenly the task didn't seem quite so formidable. “I'll have to see my clients. I don't have enough money to hire fast ships and gallop all over Sicily in two-wheeled gigs harnessed to racing mules.” He slapped one hand on his desk. “By Jupiter, Lucius, I'd love to do it! If only to see the look on Hortensius's face!”

“Then do it we will!” cried Lucius, grinning. “Fifty days from Rome to Rome, that's all the time we'll be able to spare. Ten days to travel, forty days to gather evidence.”

And while Lucius Cicero went off to the Porticus Aemilia in the Port of Rome to talk to shipping agents, Cicero went round to the house on the Quirinal where his clients were staying.

He knew the senior of them well-Hiero of Lilybaeum, who had been ethnarch of that important western Sicilian port city when Cicero had been quaestor there.

“My cousin Lucius and I are going to have to gather all our Sicilian evidence within fifty days,” Cicero explained, “if I am to beat Hortensius's case into court. We can do it-but only if you're willing to bear the expense.” He flushed. “I am not a rich man, Hiero, I can't afford speedy transport. There may be some people I have to pay for information or items I need, and there will certainly be witnesses I'll have to bring to Rome.”

Hiero had always liked and admired Cicero, whose time in Lilybaeum had been a joy for every Sicilian Greek doing business with Rome's quaestor, for Cicero was quick, brilliant, innovative when it came to account books and fiscal problems, and a splendid administrator. He had also been liked and admired because he was such a rarity: an honest man.

“We are happy to advance you whatever you need, Marcus Tullius,” said Hiero, “but I think now is a good time to discuss the matter of your fee. We have little to give except cash moneys, and I understand Roman advocates are averse to accepting cash moneys-too easy for the censors to trace. Art works and the like are the customary donatives, I know. But we have nothing left worthy of you.”

“Oh, don't worry about that!” said Cicero cheerfully. “I know exactly what I want as a fee. I intend to run for plebeian aedile for next year. My games will be adequate, but I cannot compete with the really rich men who are usually aediles. Whereas I can win a great deal of popularity if I distribute cheap grain. Pay me in grain, Hiero-it is the one thing made of gold that springs out of the ground each and every year as a fresh crop. I will buy it from you out of my aedilieian fines, but they won't run to more than two sesterces the modius. If you guarantee to sell me grain for that price to the amount I require, I will ask no other fee of you. Provided, that is, I win your case.”

“Done!” said Hiero instantly, and turned his attention to making out a draft on his bank for ten talents in Cicero's name.

Marcus and Lucius Cicero were away exactly fifty days, during which time they worked indefatigably gathering their evidence and witnesses. And though the governor, various pirates, the magistrates of Syracuse and Messana (and a few Roman tax-farmers) tried to slow their progress down, there were far more people-some of great influence-interested in speeding them up. While the quaestorian records in Syracuse were either missing or inadequate, the quaestorian records in Lilybaeum yielded mines of evidence. Witnesses came forward, so did accountants and merchants, not to mention grain farmers. Fortune favored Cicero too; when it came time to go home and only four days of the fifty were left, the weather held so perfectly that he, Lucius and all the witnesses and records were able to make the voyage to Ostia in a sleek, light, open boat. They arrived in Rome on the last day of June, with a month left in which to get the case organized.

In the course of that month Cicero stood as a candidate for plebeian aedile as well as working on the lawsuit. How he fitted everything in was afterward a mystery to him; but the truth was that Cicero never functioned better than when his desk was so loaded with work that he could hardly see over the top of it. Decisions flickered like shafts of lightning, everything fell into place, the silver tongue and the golden voice produced wit and wisdom spontaneously, the fine-looking head, so massive and bulbous, struck everyone who saw it as noble, and the striking person who sometimes cowered inside Cicero's darkest corner was on full display. During the course of that month he even devised a completely new technique for conducting a trial, a technique which would do what so far Roman legal procedures had never managed to do-get an overwhelming mass of hard and damning evidence in front of a jury so quickly and effectively that it left the defense with no defense.

His reappearance from Sicily after what seemed an absence of scant days had Hortensius gasping, especially as gathering a case against the hapless Quintus Curtius had not proven as easy as Hortensius had surmised-even with the willing assistance of Varro Lucullus, Atticus and the city of Athens. However, a moment's cool reflection served to convince Hortensius that Cicero was bluffing. He couldn't possibly be ready to go before September at the earliest!

Nor had Cicero found everything in Rome to his satisfaction upon his return. Metellus Little Goat and his youngest brother had put in some excellent work on Cicero's Sicilian clients, who were now certain that Cicero had lost interest in the case-he had accepted an enormous bribe from Gaius Verres, whispered the Metelli Little Goats through carefully chosen agents. It took Cicero several interviews with Hiero and his colleagues to learn why they were all atwitter. Once he did find out, to allay their fears was not difficult.

Quinctilis brought the three sets of elections, with the curule Centuriate Assembly ones held first. As far as Cicero's case was concerned, the results were dismal; Hortensius and Metellus Little Goat were next year's consuls and Marcus Little Goat was successfully returned as one of the praetors. Then came the elections in the Assembly of the People; the fact that Caesar was elected a quaestor at the top of the poll hardly impinged upon Cicero's consciousness. After which the twenty-seventh day of Quinctilis rolled round, and Cicero found himself elected plebeian aedile together with a Marcus Caesonius (no relation to the Julii with the cognomen of Caesar); they thought they would deal well together, and Cicero was profoundly glad that his colleague was a very wealthy man.

Thanks to the present consuls, Pompey and Crassus, so many things were going on in Rome that summer that elections were of no moment; instead of deliberately puffing them up into the position of prime importance, the electoral officers and the Senate wanted everything to do with elections over and done with. Therefore on the day following the Plebeian Assembly elections-the last of the three-the lots were cast to see what everyone was going to do next year. No surprise whatsoever then that the lots magically bestowed the Extortion Court on Marcus Little Goat! Everything was now set up to exonerate Gaius Verres early in the New Year.

On the last day of Quinctilis, Cicero struck. As no comitia meetings had been scheduled, the urban praetor's tribunal was open and Lucius Aurelius Cotta in personal attendance. Forth marched Cicero with his clients in tow, announced that he had completely prepared his case against Gaius Verres, and demanded that Lucius Cotta and the president of the Extortion Court, Manius Acilius Glabrio, should schedule a day to begin the trial as soon as they saw fit. Preferably very quickly.

The entire Senate had watched the duel between Cicero and Hortensius with bated breath. The Caecilius Metellus faction was in a minority, and neither Lucius Cotta nor Glabrio belonged to it; in fact, most of the Conscript Fathers were dying to see Cicero beat the system set up by Hortensius and the Metelli Little Goats to get Verres off. Lucius Cotta and Glabrio were therefore delighted to oblige Cicero with the earliest possible hearing.

The first two days of Sextilis were feriae-which did not preclude the hearing of criminal trials-but the third day was more difficult-on it was held the procession of the Crucified Dogs. When the Gauls had invaded Rome and attempted to establish a bridgehead on the Capitol four hundred years earlier, the watchdogs hadn't barked; what woke the consul Marcus Manlius and enabled him to foil the attempt was the cackling of the sacred geese. Ever since that night, on the anniversary day a solemn cavalcade wound its way around the Circus Maximus. Nine dogs were crucified on nine crosses made of elder wood, and one goose was garlanded and carried on a purple litter to commemorate the treachery of the dogs and the heroism of the geese. Not a good day for a criminal trial, dogs being chthonic animals.

So the case against Gaius Verres was scheduled to begin on the fifth day of Sextilis, in the midst of a Rome stunned by summer and stuffed with visitors agog to see all the special treats Pompey and Crassus had laid on. Stiff competition, but no one made the mistake of thinking that the trial of Gaius Verres would attract no onlookers, even if it continued through Crassus's public feast and Pompey's victory games.

Under Sulla's laws governing his new standing courts the general trial procedure originated by Gaius Servilius Glaucia was preserved, though considerably refined-refined to the detriment of speed. It occurred in two sections, the actio prima and the actio secunda, with a break in between the two actiones of several days, though the court president was at liberty to make the break much longer if he so desired.

The actio prima consisted of a long speech from the chief prosecutor followed by an equally long speech from the chief of the defense, then more long speeches alternating between the prosecution and the defense until all the junior advocates were used up. After that came the prosecution's witnesses, each one being cross-examined by the defense and perhaps re-examined by the prosecution. If one side or the other filibustered, the hearing of witnesses could become very protracted. Then came the witnesses for the defense, with the prosecution cross-examining each one, and perhaps the defense re-examining. After that came a long debate between the chief prosecutor and the chief defender; these long debates could also occur between each witness if either side desired. The actio prima finally ended with the last speech delivered by the chief defense counsel.

The actio secunda was more or less a repetition of the actio prima, though witnesses were not always called. Here there occurred the greatest and most impassioned orations, for after the concluding speeches of prosecution and defense the jury was required to give its verdict. No time for discussion of this verdict was allowed to the jury, which meant that the verdict was handed down while the jurors still had the words of the chief defense counsel ringing in their ears. This was the principal reason why Cicero loved to defend, hated to prosecute.

But Cicero knew how to win the case against Gaius Verres: all he needed was a court president willing to accommodate him.

“Praetor Manius Acilius Glabrio, president of this court, I wish to conduct my case along different lines than are the custom. What I propose is not illegal. It is novel, that is all. My reasons lie in the extraordinary number of witnesses I will call, and in the equally extraordinary number of different offenses with which I am going to charge the defendant Gaius Verres,” said Cicero. “Is the president of the court willing to listen to an outline of what I propose?”

Hortensius rushed forward. “What's this, what's this?” he demanded. “I ask again, what is this? The case against Gaius Verres must be conducted on the usual lines! I insist!”