Gore Vidal’s Caligula (7 page)

“I have no idea, but . . .” Chaerea began.

At that moment, a workman clad in the leather apron of a stonemason approached them, wiping the back of his hand across his face to clean the dust off.

“We did, Lord,” he told Caligula.

Anger made the young man’s nostrils flare. “By whose orders?”

The mason shook his head. “No one’s, Lord. We were just making some repairs, that’s all.”

Relief flooded Caligula, and his blue eyes lit up in a smile. It was not an omen after all. No significance, not a particle. He could see now. There
was
a chip here, a slight erosion there. It was being fixed. Of course. The statue would be better than ever. He was safe. So far.

“Ahhhhh,” he sighed happily, staring down at his carved marble image. Then he looked impishly at the stern-faced Roman officer. “Which is more beautiful, Chaerea?” He touched his own face lightly with his fingers. “This?” Then, prodding the statue with his foot, “Or this?”

A look of astonishment came over the colonel’s features.

“Beautiful? I don’t know, Lord. I mean . . . well, it’s a good likeness . . . but . . .” It was evident that he was totally unprepared to deal with the mischievous vanity of this princeling. Could this be the commander Germanicus’ son? The same child who, dressed in a private soldier’s armor, had held onto the pommel of Chaerea’s saddle like a grown-up legionary of Rome?

But Caligula had turned away, bored. “Is my beloved grandfather in good health?” he asked in a tone of feigned interest.

Here Chaerea was on safe territory. “Excellent, praise heaven,” he boomed.

“Praise heaven,” echoed Caligula, according to rote.

“He looks forward to going to Rome again. To see the Senate. To see his people . . .”

“It’s been a long time, hasn’t it?” Caligula smiled faintly and pointed to the crowd of supplicants who, seeing that they’d caught his attention, tried to surge past the guards, still waving their scrolls and petitions. “Just look at them. They’ve not seen their Emperor for more than ten years. How sad for them!”

“Are you ready, Prince?” asked the colonel.

“Ready?”

“For the trip up the mountain, Lord. The Emperor is waiting. The mules are saddled and at your disposal.”

Caligula took a deep breath and nodded. He was as ready as he’d ever be, he supposed.

The trip up the cliffs to the Villa Io was slow, for there was but one road, and that one almost impassable in several places. But Tiberius had chosen Capri years ago for that very reason—its inaccessibility. Even before he’d selected Capri, the Emperor had taken refuge from the crowds he so despised. He had left Rome for Campania, where he posted guards to keep the people away from him, and issued edicts forbidding the disturbance of his privacy. But he came to hate Campania too, because it was part of the mainland and had easy access to Rome and the Romans.

Capri was ideal for him. It was isolated; three miles of water separated it from the tip of the Surrentum promontory. Apart from the small stretch of beach where Caligula had landed, it was harborless, and only a few sentries were needed to guard its approaches. In the winter the climate was mild, and in summer it was glorious. So it was on Capri that Tiberius had built the Villa Io. Actually, the estate comprised twelve separate villas, each exquisite and contributing to the whole, each separately named. The Romans, who had heard of the incredible debaucheries practiced by Tiberius in his private brothel, called the place not Villa Io, but “The Villa of the Monsters”. The name had stuck, and in fact Tiberius was amused by it. He determined to give the Roman gossips their money’s worth. In time, the entire island of Capri became known in Rome as “Caprineum”, a Latin pun on the word for “goatish”, because of Tiberius’ randy habits.

It was as though a magical change had come over the Emperor after he’d taken refuge in Capri. He had always been tyrannical and autocratic, and always fierce-tempered and cruel. But for more than sixty years he had acted like a Roman soldier, with the rough but honest morals of a soldier. After he’d been named Emperor, he’d gone through a positively prudish phase, making new, harsher laws against adultery, driving the
spintriae,
those painted, prancing boy-whores in female clothing, out of Rome. But with the building of his villa, and his separation from the prying eyes and wagging tongues of the Romans, he began to indulge in perversions and depravities at a rate that more than made up for a lifetime of clean living. Now the very
spintriae
he’d exiled were among his favorite companions.

Riding through the rocky mountain pass that led up to the villa, Caligula was blind to the breathtaking views that opened at every turn of the road. He had no eye for beauty today, no heart to contemplate sky and sea, and the rays of sunlight glittering on deep water. All his thoughts were directed ahead of him, toward his grandfather. Why had he been summoned? Why brought here to Capri? How long was he expected to stay this time? Not years, please, Isis, protect me! Don’t let him keep me here again for years!

But how many years did Tiberius himself have left? About a thousand, Caligula answered himself gloomily. After all, why should he die? The Emperor had the best of all possible worlds, sitting up here safe and warm in his private kingdom, guarded by fully half a legion of the strongest soldiers, entertained in ways so lavish and so depraved that, if Rome but knew the full story, Rome’s collective jaw would drop in disbelief. Never had there been so vile or so beautiful a place as this Villa of the Monsters, Caligula told himself, and then the last bend in the road brought him his first glimpse of the place.

The main villa, which could be seen from the top of the road, was faced with white marble from Luna, so that it would glisten in the sun and dazzle the eyes of the visitor. Caligula raised his arm to shield his eyes from the sunstruck marble, then smiled. The old fox. He would catch you any way he could, impress you and make you uncomfortable at the same time.

They were inside the main gate now, past the first platoon of soldiers. The guards had saluted respectfully, but Caligula had the feeling that their duties were paid more to Colonel Chaerea than to himself. Then he saw that Nerva was approaching down the stone path to greet him, and he straightened his robe and made an ineffectual pass at his hair to smooth it. Marcus Cocceius Nerva, Senator of Rome, had that effect on people.

In Rome, they said that when Tiberius had abandoned the city he had carried part of it to Capri with him in the person of Nerva. And, truly, they were a strange pair, the degenerate Emperor and his counsellor the old-style patrician, upright, moral, stern. After Tiberius had finally disposed of his old partner in crime, the evil Sejanus, he had drawn even closer to Nerva, whose nobility was displayed in sharp contrast to the degeneracy of the Emperor. Why did Tiberius never turn his savagery on Nerva? There seemed to be a deepseated psychological need for Tiberius to keep in touch with the finer qualities of himself, perhaps not lost entirely and personified in Nerva. As for Nerva, he appeared to serve the
imperium,
the power, rather than the Emperor’s person; he acted as guide and conscience to Tiberius in those rare moments when Tiberius would listen to a voice of sanity and reason.

Nerva was the ideal image of Senatorial Rome. His wrinkled face was set into lines of moral sternness; his head was held high on a long, scrawny neck. A fine, high-arched nose jutted from his face like the prow of a ship, and he held his aged body firmly erect. Even his balding head seemed made to bear the laurels of honor and victory. His toga was impeccable, snowy white of the finest lambswool. It was the fashion of the Senators these days to border their togas with much more purple than they were entitled to by the laws, either broader stripes or more of them. But the purple stripe bordering Nerva’s toga was of the exact width set down in the ancient laws, not an eighth of an inch more or less. And, Caligula noted, the stripe was none of your cheap Roman
purpurea,
more garnet than purple, but the true Tyrian purple, for which many thousands of tiny shellfish had given their lives. A stripe like that could cost as much as an emerald.

As usual, Nerva’s dignified presence made Caligula feel like an overdressed, rather trashy boy. He hated Nerva.

As they walked together toward the villa, Caligula noticed more armed men standing stiffly at attention in the loggia. Tiberius had a small army here; it must cost Rome a fortune to keep them fed.

Nerva lost no time in beginning his old refrain: Tiberius belonged in Rome, not Capri. The power should be returned to the base of power.

“Ten years is a long time for an Emperor to be hidden away,” Nerva said gravely.

“But if he’s happy here?” replied Caligula with well-masked apprehension.

“I
shall be happier when he is back at Rome,” said Nerva.

They were walking through the villa now, a series of buildings and gardens linked by columned porches and courtyards, everywhere guarded by tall men in full armor, although the day was very warm for early March.

“How is he?” asked Caligula, his voice a blend of concern and eagerness.

“Old. Like me.” Nerva gave a slight sigh.

Caligula bit his lips. “I mean . . . uhhh . . . how is . . .”

“His mood?”

“Yes.”

“Like the weather,” smiled Nerva.

Caligula looked at the sky. Not a cloud in view. “The weather’s good . . . today,” he said.

“But the season is still winter,” observed Nerva, knowing the remark would unsettle Caligula.

He looked hard at the slight young man beside him. Clad in expensive finery unbecoming a Roman, the boy looked like a Persian male whore. Nerva’s lips turned downward in contempt. Gold borders to his garments, threads of gold bullion woven through his tunic. Even the fibulae clasping his cloak were of gold, embossed with the heads of lions. Under the old sumptuary laws of Rome, this boy could be punished by death for parading around in this wretchedly excessive clothing. So this was what Rome was coming to! This dressed-up puppet, this cloth-of-gold doll, would most likely be the next Emperor.

But Caligula had just come from Rome, and he was close to necessary information. Nerva put one hand on the boy’s arm.

“I have heard that in the last month seven of my colleagues in the Senate have been put to death for treason?” he said in heavy tones, waiting for confirmation.

“Nine, actually,” Caligula replied casually. “And five of them cheated; they killed themselves. Most inconsiderate. Don’t you agree, Nerva?” A nasty smiled played around his lips as he looked at the older man.

“They were good men,” mused Nerva sadly.

Caligula’s blue eyes glittered with malice. “If they were good men,” he said slowly, enunciating each syllable carefully, “Why were they found guilty of treason against my beloved grandfather?”

Nerva pulled his thoughts back from Rome and regarded the young man standing mockingly before him. “You have a gift for logic, Prince,” he said drily, and then was silent as they walked on.

The approach to Tiberius’ outdoor swimming pool was guarded by a double bank of soldiers, standing against the vined trellises that ensured the Emperor’s privacy. The villa itself contained a complete bath house and two small indoor pools, but Tiberius believed that the waters of his spring-fed outdoor pool contained health-giving mineral properties that would keep him young. And so it had become his favorite spot; he swam there every clement day. Feeling particularly vulnerable when he was naked, the Emperor insisted that no fewer than a dozen of the bravest of his legionaries guard his person at the pool.

They were tall for Romans, these soldiers, whose breastplates bore the insignia of the Emperor’s picked guard, a serpent with its tail in its mouth. Instinctively, Caligula straightened his shoulders and walked taller, his eye upon the troops like a commanding officer’s.

It struck Caligula suddenly that one of the guards was swaying slightly. He took a step closer. Yes, it was unmistakable. That sour smell on the man’s breath was certainly that of the rough wine that soldiers tippled all over the Empire.

“You!” he barked.

“Sir?” asked the sentry, a look of apprehension on his face.

“Step forward.”

The soldier took one unsteady step out of rank.

“Drunk!” shrieked Caligula.

“Oh, no Lord!” gasped the terrified sentry.

An officer was hurrying now toward Caligula, concerned.

“Relieve this man!” ordered Caligula, his face a thundercloud.

“Yes, Prince.”

A garden filled with pomegranate trees and ornamental shrubbery led to Tiberius’ pool, deep in a grotto. High giggling came from behind the shrubs; the Emperor’s playthings were scampering in the garden like mice, waiting for him to finish his swim.

The pool itself had been enlarged from a natural formation. It had deep walls of rough stone, cut sharply by the centuries of rushing water. It was fed by springs of mineral waters that mingled in an eddying flow at the center. On the limestone banks of the pool grew wildflowers and mosses, planted there to enhance the feeling that here was a totally natural place, haunted by fauns, centaurs, nymphs and the Great God Pan himself.

Pan indeed, thought Caligula, as he stared down into the dark waters, watching a figure that rose and dove, and rose to dive again. Suddenly, with a roar, the figure surfaced and stood erect, the sparse tufts of hair around his ears sticking up like a randy goat’s horns. Wearing only a thin tunic, wet and plastered to his ancient but still powerful body, the Emperor Tiberius Caesar, waved an arm cheerily at his grandson.

“Caligula!” he bellowed.

Feeling a mixture of awe, fear, revulsion and respect, Caligula came down to the pool and squatted on the slimy, rocky edge. Eagerly, he grasped the hand that Tiberius held out to him and kissed it.

“Lord . . . beloved grandfather . . . Great Caesar . . .” he murmured. Glancing down into the pool, he saw the dim, shadowy figures of what appeared to be two large fish swimming around Tiberius’ legs. Frolicking like porpoises, the “fish” splashed and played, diving under the old man’s tunic.