Fortune's Favorites (62 page)

“I don't understand,” said Gaius Matius as he sat in the garden at the bottom of the light well, hands linked about his knees as he stared at Caesar, similarly seated on the ground. “You say your honor has been impeached, and yet you took a bag of gold from the old king. Isn't that wrong?”

From anyone else the question would not have been tolerated, but Gaius Matius was a friend since infancy.

Caesar looked rueful. “Had the accusation come before the gold, yes,” he said. “As it was, when the poor old man gave me the gold it was a simple guest-gift. Exactly what a client king ought to give to an official envoy from his patron, Rome. As he gives tribute, what he bestows upon Rome's envoys is free and clear.” Caesar shrugged. “I took it with gratitude, Pustula. Life in camp is expensive. My own tastes are not very grand, but one is forever obliged to contribute to the common mess, to special dinners and banquets, to luxuries which everyone else asks for. The wines have to be of the best, the foods ridiculous-and it doesn't matter that I eat and drink plain. So the gold made a big difference to me. After Lucullus had said what he did to me, I thought about sending the gold back. And then I realized that if I did, I would hurt the King. I can't possibly tell him what Lucullus and Bibulus said.”

“Yes, I see.” Gaius Matius sighed. “You know, Pavo, I am so glad I don't have to become a senator or a magistrate. It's much nicer being an ordinary knight of the tribuni aerari!”

But that Caesar could not even begin to comprehend, so he made no comment about it. Instead, he returned to Nicomedes. “I am honor bound to go back,” he said, “and that will only add fuel to the rumors. During the days when I was flamen Dialis I used to think that nobody was interested in the doings of people like junior military tribunes. But it isn't so. Everyone gossips! The gods know among how many people Bibulus has been busy, tattling the story of my affair with King Nicomedes. I wouldn't put it past Lucullus either. Or the Lentuli, for that matter. Sulla certainly knew all the juicy details.”

“He has favored you,” said Matius thoughtfully.

“He has. Though I can't quite understand why.”

“If you don't know, I have no chance!” An inveterate gardener, Matius noticed two tiny leaves belonging to a just-germinated weed, and busied himself digging this offender out of the grass. “Anyway, Caesar, it seems to me you'll just have to live the story down. In time it will die. All stories do.”

“Sulla says it won't.”

Matius sniffed. “Because the stories about him haven't died? Come, Caesar! He's a bad man. You're not. You couldn't be.”

“I'm capable of murder, Pustula. All men are.”

“I didn't say you weren't, Pavo. The difference is that Sulla is a bad man and you are not.”

And from that stand Gaius Matius would not be budged.

Sulla's wedding came and went; the newly wed pair left Rome to enjoy a holiday in the villa at Misenum. But the Dictator was back for the next meeting of the Senate, to which Caesar had been commanded. He was now, at twenty years of age, one of Sulla's new senators. A senator for the second time at twenty!

It ought to have been the most wonderful day of his life, to walk into the filled Senate chamber wearing his chaplet of oak leaves and find the House risen to its feet-including consulars as venerable as Flaccus Princeps Senatus and Marcus Perperna-with hands vigorously applauding in this one permissible infraction of Sulla's new rules of conduct for the Senate.

Instead, the young man found his eyes studying face after face for any hint of amusement or contempt, wondering how far the story had spread, and who despised him. His progress was an agony, not helped when he ascended to the back row wherein the pedarii sat-and wherein he fully expected he himself would sit-to find Sulla shouting at him to sit with the men of the middle tier, wherein soldier heroes were located. Of course some men chuckled; it was kindly laughter, and meant to approve of his embarrassment. But of course he took it as derision and wanted to crawl into the furthest, darkest corner.

Through all of it, he had never wept.

When he came home after the meeting-a rather boring one-he found his mother waiting in the reception room. Such was not her habit; busy always, she rarely left her office for very long during the day. Now, stomach roiling, she waited for her son in a stilled patience, having no idea of how she could broach a subject he clearly did not wish to discuss. Had she been a talker it would have been easier for her, of course. But words came hard to Aurelia, who let him divest himself of his toga in silence. Then when he made a movement toward his study she knew she had to find something to say or he would leave her; the vexed subject would remain unbroached.

“Caesar,” she said, and stopped.

Since he had put on his toga of manhood it had been her custom to address him by his cognomen, mostly because to her “Gaius Julius” was her husband, and his death had not changed the file of references in her mind. Besides which, her son was very much a stranger to her, the penalty she paid for all those years of keeping him at a distance because she feared for him and could not allow herself to be warm or kind.

He halted, one brow raised. “Yes, Mater?”

“Sit down. I want to talk to you.”

He sat, expression mildly enquiring, as if she could have nothing of great moment to say.

“Caesar, what happened in the east?” she asked baldly.

The mild enquiry became tinged with a mild amusement. “I did my duty, won a Civic Crown, and pleased Sulla,” he said.

Her beautiful mouth went straight. “Prevarication,” she said, “does not suit you.”

“I wasn't prevaricating.”

“You weren't telling me what I need to know either!”

He was withdrawing, eyes chilling from cool to cold. “I can't tell you what I don't know.”

“You can tell me more than you have.”

“About what?”

“About the trouble.”

“What trouble?”

“The trouble I see in your every movement, your every look, your every evasion.”

“There is no trouble.”

“I do not believe that.”

He rose to go, slapping his thighs. “I can't help what you believe, Mater. There is no trouble.”

“Sit down!”

He sat down, sighing softly.

“Caesar, I will find out. But I would much rather it came from you than from someone else.”

His head went to one side, his long fingers locked around themselves, his eyes closed. Then he sighed again, and shrugged. “I obtained a splendid fleet from King Nicomedes of Bithynia. Apparently this was a deed of absolute uniqueness. It was said of me that I obtained it by having sexual relations with the King. So I have returned to Rome the owner of a reputation not for bravery or efficiency or even cunning, but for having sold my body in order to achieve my ends,” he said, eyes still closed.

She didn't melt into sympathy, exclaim in horror, or wax indignant. Instead, she sat without saying anything until her son was obliged to open his eyes and look at her. It was a level exchange of glances, two formidable people finding pain rather than consolation in each other, but prepared to negotiate.

“A grave trouble,” she said.

“An undeserved slur.”

“That, of course.”

“I cannot contend with it, Mater!”

“You have to, my son.”

“Then tell me how!”

“You know how, Caesar.”

“I honestly don't,” he said soberly, his face uncertain. “I've tried to ignore it, but that's very difficult when I know what everyone is thinking.”

“Who is the source?” she asked.

“Lucullus.”

“Oh, I see.... He would be believed.”

“He is believed.”

For a long moment she said nothing more, eyes thoughtful. Her son, watching her, marveled anew at her self-containment, her ability to hold herself aloof from personal issues. She opened her lips and began to speak very slowly and carefully, weighing each word before she uttered it.

“You must ignore it, that is first and foremost. Once you discuss it with anyone, you place yourself on the defensive. And you reveal how much it matters to you. Think for a little, Caesar. You know how serious an allegation it is in the light of your future political career. But you cannot let anybody else see that you appreciate its seriousness! So you must ignore it for the rest of your days. The best thing is that it has happened now, rather than ten years further on-a man of thirty would find the allegation far harder to contend with than a man of twenty. For that you must be grateful. Those ten years will see many events. But never a repetition of the slur. What you have to do, my son, is to work very hard to dispel the slur.” The ghost of a smile lit her remarkable eyes. “Until now, your philanderings have been restricted to the ordinary women of the Subura. I suggest, Caesar, that you lift your gaze much higher. Why, I have no idea, but you do have an extraordinary effect on women! So from now on, your peers must know of your successes. That means you must concentrate upon women who matter, who are well known. Not the courtesans like Praecia, but noblewomen. Great ladies.”

“Deflower lots of Domitias and Licinias, you mean?'' he asked, smiling broadly.

“No!” she said sharply. “Not unmarried girls! Never, never unmarried girls! I mean the wives of important men.”

“Edepol!” cried her son.

“Fight fire with fire, Caesar. There is no other way. If your love affairs are not public knowledge, everyone will assume you are intriguing with men. So they must be as scandalous and generally known as possible. Establish a reputation as Rome's most notorious womanizer. But choose your quarry very carefully.” She shook her head in puzzlement. “Sulla used to be able to cause women to make absolute fools of themselves over him. On at least one occasion he paid a bitter price-when Dalmatica was the very young bride of Scaurus. He avoided her scrupulously, but Scaurus punished him anyway by preventing his being elected praetor. It took him six years to be elected, thanks to Scaurus.”

“What you're trying to say is that I'll make enemies.”

“Am I?” She considered it. “No, what I think I mean to say is that Sulla's trouble arose out of the fact that he did not cuckold Scaurus. Had he, Scaurus would have found it much harder to be revenged-it's impossible for a man who is a laughingstock to appear admirable. Pitiable, yes. Scaurus won that encounter because Sulla allowed him to appear noble-the forgiving husband, still able to hold his head up. So if you choose a woman, you must always be sure that it's her husband is the goose. Don't choose a woman who might tell you to jump in the Tiber-and never choose one clever enough to lead you on until she is able to tell you to jump in the Tiber absolutely publicly.”

He was staring at her with a kind of profound respect as new on his face as it was inside his mind. “Mater, you are the most extraordinary woman! How do you know all this? You're as upright and virtuous as Cornelia the Mother of the Gracchi, yet here you are giving your own son the most dreadful advice!”

“I have lived a long time in the Subura,” she said, looking pleased. “Besides, that is the point. You are my son, and you have been maligned. What I would do for you I would not do for anyone else, even for my daughters. If I had to, I would kill for you. But that wouldn't solve our problem. So instead I am very happy to kill a few reputations. Like for like.”

Almost he scooped her into his arms, but the old habits were too strong; so he got to his feet and took her hand, kissed it. “I thank you, Mater. I would kill for you with equal ease and pleasure.” A thought struck him, made him shiver with glee. “Oh, I can't wait for Lucullus to marry! And that turd Bibulus!”

The following day brought women into Caesar's life again, though not in a philandering context.

“We are summoned by Julia,” said Aurelia before her son left to see what was going on in the Forum Romanum.

Aware he had not yet found the time to see his beloved aunt, Caesar made no protest.

The day was fine and hot but the hour early enough to make the walk from the Subura to the Quirinal an enjoyable one. Caesar and Aurelia stepped out up the Vicus ad Malum Punicum, the street which led to the temple of Quirinus on the Alta Semita. There in the lovely precinct of Quirinus stood the Punic apple tree itself, planted by Scipio Africanus after his victory over Carthage. Alongside it grew two extremely ancient myrtle trees, one for the patricians and one for the plebeians. But in the chaotic events which had followed the Italian War the patrician myrtle had begun to wither; it was now quite dead, though the plebeian tree flourished still. It was thought that this meant the death of the Patriciate, so sight of its bare dry limbs brought Caesar no pleasure. Why hadn't someone planted a new patrician myrtle?

The hundred talents Sulla had permitted Julia to retain had provided her with quite a comfortable private dwelling in a lane running between the Alta Semita and the Servian Walls. It was fairly large and had the virtue of being newly built; Julia's income was sufficient to provide enough slaves to run it, and more than enough to permit her life's necessities. She could even afford to support and house her daughter-in-law, Mucia Tertia. Scant comfort to Caesar and Aurelia, who mourned her sadly changed circumstances.

She was almost fifty years old, but nothing seemed to change Julia herself. Having moved to the Quirinal, she took not to weaving on her loom or spinning wool, but to doing good works. Though this was not a poor district-nor even closely settled-she still found families in need of help, for reasons which varied from an excessive intake of wine to illness. A more presumptuous, tactless woman might have been rebuffed, but Julia had the knack; the whole of the Quirinal knew where to go if there was trouble.

There were no good deeds today, however. Julia and Mucia Tertia were waiting anxiously.

“I've had a letter from Sulla,” said Mucia Tertia. “He says I must marry again.”

“But that contravenes his own laws governing the widows of the proscribed!” said Aurelia blankly.

“When one makes the laws, Mater, it isn't at all difficult to contravene them,” said Caesar. “A special enactment for some ostensible reason, and the thing is done.”