The Seven Hills (4 page)

"Scipio was never given permission to open relations with Egypt, much less to frolic with the Egyptian queen
and take charge of her army!" yelled a senator whose blond
hair proclaimed his northern ancestry. "He wants to be a king in his own right!"

The uproar threatened to break into open violence until the presiding consul ordered the lictors to separate all the belligerents and restore order. When matters had settled a bit, he stood. The consul was a soldierly, fierce-faced man named Quintus Cornelius Scipio and the person being charged with treason was his son.

"Conscript fathers," he began, "this bickering is unseemly and advances our cause not at all. I remind you that my son was given a far-ranging commission with wide powers of discretion. If his methods have been unorthodox, does any man here deny that the reports he has sent to us have been invaluable? Has he not given us the city of Carthage as if we had built it ourselves?" He gestured toward the detailed model of the city that occupied a corner of the curia, constructed according to the reports and drawings of the expedition young Scipio had led. "Furthermore," here he glared around him at the assembled senators, "does any man here dare say that a Scipio has ever betrayed Rome? if so, I stand ready to lay down my imperium and meet that man, or those men, on the Field of Mars, on horseback or afoot, with sword, spear and dagger."

Amid the uneasy silence an older man stood. He was Publius Gabinius, the princeps senatus, empowered to
speak first on all matters. "Gentlemen," he said calmly, "are
we primitive tribesmen, to resort to arms over matters of personal honor? The gods forbid it! We are the Senate of
Rome and we have raised ourselves to mastery over other
nations because we prize reasoned debate, intelligent planning, compromise and discipline above brute ferocity. Rome is now embarked upon a campaign of unprecedented magnitude. Now is not the time for such unseemliness. Moderate your tone or I may be forced to expel some of you." He gazed around him, waiting for the proper moment. "And let me remind you that the Princess Selene is not queen of Egypt but merely the sister of the boy-king Ptolemy. Egypt is a nation with which Rome has no cause for hostility. In fact, as the implacable enemy of Carthage, we should seek alliance with that country."

Another senator stood. "Nonetheless, Honored Princeps,
the fact remains that four of our legions are now lost somewhere in Egypt, and we can ill afford such a loss at this time."

"They are not lost, just missing," Gabinius said, hiding his own misgivings. "That force is led by the son of our other consul. Let us hear his thoughts on this matter."

"I yield the floor to my colleague," the Consul Scipio said, resuming his seat on his curule chair.

The Consul Titus Norbanus, elder of that name, stood. "That my son is in command of the missing expedition is of no consequence. A Roman soldier serves his country, without regard to parentage or family affiliation, and the highest officer is no more sacred than the commonest legionary."

There were many shouts of approval for this patriotic sentiment, and the Princeps Gabinius smiled and nodded
cynically, thinking:
He neatly sidesteps the fact that his boy got
the command without ever having held a higher office, as the consti
tution requires.

"And while I cannot approve of young Scipio's actions in
Alexandria," Norbanus went on, "the fact remains that those legions were stranded in Egypt when we, the Senate, meeting in this very chamber, voted to invade Sicily, thus declaring war upon Carthage."

As if in answer to a plea for an omen, the sound of clattering hoofbeats from without silenced even the low murmur in the room. A horse galloping across the Forum could mean only one thing: an army messenger with important dispatches.

"Clear the doorway, there!" called the princeps. Immedi
ately, lictors made a pathway from the door to the consuls' podium. The hoofbeats ceased, and moments later a man in military belt, tunic and boots, travel-stained and exhausted,
strode in. Looking neither right nor left, he went to the con
suls' podium and held out a bronze tube.

"Dispatches for the honored Senate from the Proconsul Norbanus."

The presiding consul waved it away. "My colleague should read this first."

Norbanus took the message tube, forcing his hands to be steady. He examined the seal, then broke it and twisted the cap off the tube. He withdrew some sheets of Egyptian papyrus, unrolled them and began to read.

"From the Proconsul Titus Norbanus to the Senate of Rome, greeting." There were grumbles from those who thought it unfit for young Norbanus to style himself thus without having held the office of consul or even praetor first, but the father silenced them with a glare. He resumed reading.

"Our legions were in the process of subduing the cities along the Nile when word arrived from Alexandria that Hamilcar had withdrawn from Egypt and that the glorious reconquest of Italy and Sicily had begun. At a council of commanders our options were examined and discussed. We are eager to join the offensive, but a return through Carthaginian territory is unfeasible. The attitude of Egypt is uncertain, since we took part in Hamilcar's invasion. The Egyptian army is laughable and no threat to four Roman legions, but the Senate has not indicated a desire for war with
Egypt, so we shall be careful not to provoke one.

"Marcus Scipio has tried to order us to Alexandria, but his commission from the Senate was merely to carry out a
reconnaissance of Italy and Carthage, so none of us feel con
strained to obey him, lacking orders from the Senate. There are those among us who doubt his loyalty.

"South of us lies a primitive wilderness, desert on both sides. Our only course is to march north to the Delta, then eastward, into territory unseen by Romans for more than a century. By the time the Senate receives this missive, we
should be in a place called Sinai, said to be desert, but passable since the days of the pharaohs. The land beyond seems
to be under some dispute. There is a sometimes-independent state ruled by a king of the Jews, and north of that lies Seleucid Syria, although both of these states are said to be under great pressure from the expanding Parthian Empire.
Whatever our fate, we shall continue our reconnaissance and
report faithfully to the Senate, in order that Rome's knowledge of the East may be expanded.

"Our plan is to march up the coast until we come to a port where sufficient ships are available to embark for Italy, Sicily or wherever the noble Senate shall order us. Should no such fleet present itself, then we shall march through Cilicia, Pamphilia, Lycia, Asia, Greece, Macedonia and Dalmatia until we reach Italy. We shall show the world that nothing is beyond the capabilities of the legions of Rome.

"I shall send further dispatches at every opportunity.
Long live the noble Senate. Long live Rome." Norbanus the
elder rolled the papyri and replaced them in the tube, his face glowing with triumph.

A senator leapt to his feat. "He proposes a feat worthy of
Xenophon!" Shouts and cheers erupted.

Gabinius stood and gestured for quiet. "Let's cheer the feat when it is accomplished, shall we? Commander Norbanus proposes an extreme course, but anyone can see that his situation calls for such measures. I wish him well, as do
we all. Now, we have been concentrating on Sicily, Carthage
and the South to the neglect of the great world of the East. I propose we appoint a committee to study the situation
there. We have assumed that the Seleucids are still supreme
there, as they were when we went into exile. What sort of people are these Parthians who seem to be causing such trouble there? Will we be facing them once we have settled with Carthage?.We must know."

With some routine government work under proposal, the excitement subsided and the Senate got serious. While names for the study board were submitted, everyone talked
of the latest news. First war in Sicily, now this! After gener
ations of grinding warfare against the savages of the North, Rome was engaged with the old world once more.

Satisfied that the danger of open violence was past, the princeps joined the two consuls for some serious talk.

"Your son seems to be acquitting himself well," Gabinius
said to Norbanus.

"I notice that you gave him the title 'commander,' not 'proconsul,'" Norbanus said.

"I believe it will set a bad example if we let men who
have never served in the offices that rightfully confer im
perium to hold so lofty a title officially. This situation is
unprecedented in our experience and of course certain expedients were called for. Let's not make a practice of it."

"Your boy is not being cheated of anything," the Consul
Scipio said. "What any of us would have given for such an opportunity at so young an age, eh? The gods love young
Norbanus; that much is clear. If he pulls this off, he'll return to Rome covered with so much glory that the highest offices
will fall into his hands like ripe olives. But the princeps is
right. Let's not let our young officers think they can bypass
the
cursus honorum
through military glory. Men with success
ful wars behind them are nothing but a danger to the Republic if they don't know how to govern."

Norbanus waved a hand impatiently. "Let it pass for the moment. What concerns us now is: What's to be done? We can't leave a Roman army out wandering about with no guidance from the Senate, no matter who is in charge."

"Exactly," said his colleague. "We need a means of com
munication, as we have with our army in Sicily. Granted,
the distances between your son's force and us are far greater
than with the Sicilian expedition, but it should not be insurmountable. We need fast ships and men to sail them and
a knowledge of the ports along the coast between Egypt and
Greece."

"We have maps," Gabinius said, "but they are old ones. The ports will be there, but who knows who owns them now? I will take personal charge of the study board. In the
meantime, we must all be thinking about how to use our reserve force. Six new legions are due from Noricum any day.
Will we send them west, south or east?"

"Too soon to speculate," Norbanus said. "First they must
get used to the climate. They can move into the camps down south that the Sicilian expedition left behind. From there they can move in any direction the Senate orders with minimum waste of time."

"Excellent," said the princeps. "An Italian summer is very different from one in Noricum, and it will prepare them for Africa."

The others nodded. An African campaign would be the next step, once Sicily was secured. Carthage had to be destroyed. The gods had ordained that grim task.

With the major questions settled, the Senate meeting broke up and they left the curia, in strict order of precedence: first, the consuls preceded by their lictors, then the princeps senatus, then the senior magistrates, the lower of
fice holders, finally the mass of senators holding no particu
lar office that year.

Gabinius stepped onto the porch of the Curia, feeling once again the exhilaration of serving Rome in the very building erected by the King Tullus Hostilius, from which
every great consul and all the senators of old had made laws and sent forth the legions. Brutus and Camillus, and Appius
Claudius, the builder of roads and aqueducts, had presided in-this sacred building. Now he, Publius Gabinius, carried on their tradition. As he looked over the city with great satisfaction, he noticed two unusual men standing at the bottom of the steps, gazing up at him. They had the unmistakable aspect of Greeks. One of them was a handsome man of excellent bearing and immaculate dress, the other a scruffy, unkempt fellow dressed no better than a slave but with an arrogant stance and eyes that blazed with intelligence. As Gabinius descended the steps, these two climbed toward him, as if they wished to speak.

Zeno and Izates listened to the noise from within the curia rise and fall. They heard individual speakers shout or project their voices in the manner approved by the teachers of rhetoric, and spoken thus they could understand that the Latin tongue had great force and dignity. Then they jumped aside as a messenger thundered up on horseback, leapt from his mount and ran into the building.
Then there were a few minutes of silence followed by cheer
ing.

"Good news, apparently," Izates said.

"Are Senate meetings usually this uproarious?" Zeno asked Gorgas.

"I've heard that they can get noisy. The Senate's divided into a lot of cliques, and they're all at each other's throat
over high office and military command. They're only united
against the rest of the world."

They waited a while longer, then Izates said: "I think there is nothing more to be learned here. Let's go get something to eat."

They were about to do just that when men began to emerge from the curia. First came a line of men who each carried a bundle of rods tied around an axe. These Gorgas identified as lictors: attendants to the higher magistrates. A man who wore a toga bordered with a broad purple stripe followed the lictors. Then came another line of lictors and another such magistrate. A third man emerged, unaccompanied by lictors, then more lictors preceding purple-
striped magistrates and finally a crowd of senators, some of
them wearing purple-bordered togas, most dressed in plain garments.