David Wishart - Nero

'My dear boy,' Seneca said calmly. 'It's not a question of sides. Perhaps if you could tell us a little more about your plans we might understand better.'

'But it's so simple!' Lucius was on his feet now, and beaming at us. 'I've been training for this all my life! Think of it as a divine mission!'

Burrus stiffened. He was the oldest of us, and had the clearest memories of the mad godlet Caligula.

'Divine mission?' he said.

Lucius smiled at him.

'To civilise Rome. To bring her a little basic culture.'

There was a silence.

'For example?' Burrus's face was wooden.

'Athletics. Ballet. Theatre. Musical performances. All the usual stuff.' I thought of the plans he'd shown me two years before, for a 'Greek' amphitheatre in Mars Field. They had come to nothing in the end, but the idea, it seemed, had persisted. 'Darlings, it would be brilliant! A total renaissance!'

'And your part in this would be…?' Burrus said.

'Oh, an active one, of course! I mean, I may be emperor, but I've got to have some fun, haven't I? And we'd offer prizes, naturally, to encourage people to get involved.'

'"People"?' I wondered how Nero's Commander of Praetorians could get the word out between his clenched teeth.

'Anyone who likes! Anyone at all! Naturally I'd expect the top families to set an example. They're not all stuffy old faggots like you, my dear. They'd be thrilled to be asked, I'm sure.'

Burrus had gone beetroot red. He half rose from his chair.

'That's…' he began.

'…an interesting idea, my dear fellow,' Seneca finished smoothly, his hand gripping Burrus's wrist. 'But perhaps one that needs some discussion before we put it into practice.'

Lucius ignored him. He was striding the room. 'I thought we could start with the new Vatican Racetrack. I might give a little demonstration of chariot-driving.'

I thought Burrus would have a stroke there and then.

'You mean,' he whispered, 'you would drive a chariot yourself? In public?'

'Of course, darling. Why not?' Lucius turned his smile on Tigellinus.'I'm good enough, aren't I, Tiggy?'

Tigellinus was smiling too. He was the only one of us completely at his ease, and I wondered if Lucius had discussed this with him already.

'You're very good, sir,' he said. 'Better than Hermippus any day.' Hermippus was the leading charioteer of the Greens, Lucius's favourite team.

'There you are.' Lucius's smile broadened. 'And Tiggy knows what he's talking about. He'll be supplying the horses.'

Ah. So he had known. And it also explained why Tigellinus had been invited to this little confab.

'Nero, I'm sorry,' Burrus said, 'but you cannot possibly do this.'

Lucius went very still, as did we all.

'But I'm the emperor, my dear,' he said quietly. 'And I can do anything I fucking well like.'

'Burrus, please!' Seneca's face was impassive, but I could see sweat on his forehead. 'Our young friend is perfectly correct. We can only advise. If he chooses not to take our advice, then there is an end of it.' He turned to Lucius. 'Perhaps at first…a few invited guests…to give people a little time to get used to the idea? You said yourself it would be a mistake to force things along too quickly.'

'Did I?' Lucius frowned. 'Perhaps I did. It doesn't matter much. And if it'll keep old poker-arse here happy then we'll do it that way. But in principle you're not opposed, are you?'

'How could I possibly be? As you say, my dear fellow, you are the emperor.'

'And there's an end of it.' Lucius was beaming at us again. 'Oh, good. I'm glad we're all friends again. Don't worry, you'll see I'm right.'

'Might I ask' — Seneca was delicate — 'what else you have in mind?'

Lucius sat down on the bench. 'I told you. Lots of things. A theatrical festival, for a start. Ballet, tragic recitals. I've got some wonderful songs lined up.' He giggled. 'Poppy's been on at me to shave my beard, she says it tickles. That would be the excuse. I mean, a first shave's awfully important to you old Romans, isn't it, Burrus darling? Terribly traditional! I thought we might call them the Youth Games.'

Burrus's lips set in a line. Lucius, noticing, scowled and turned away from him.

'Oh, please yourself, you old fart!' he snapped. 'That's enough for tonight anyway, you're all giving me a headache. Now go away and sulk.'

We left.

Seneca had a dinner engagement elsewhere on the Palatine. I shared my litter with Burrus, who was still fuming.

'The fool's lost what little sense he had!' he burst out as soon as the curtains closed. 'If he goes through with this idiotic scheme he'll have the whole establishment up in arms!'

'Things could be worse,' I said. 'At least he hasn't gone paranoid like Tiberius, or wants us all to burn incense to him like Caligula.'

But Burrus was not to be pacified.

'Perhaps if he had the decency to go properly mad I'd have more sympathy for him,' he growled. 'At least then we'd know where we stood.'

I liked Burrus, and felt I owed him a little bit of honesty.

'Personally I'm quite looking forward to it,' I said. 'Rome could do with a good sharp breath of fresh air.'

He stared at me as if I'd gone mad myself. 'You're not serious!'

'Of course I'm serious. Compared with Greece Rome's a bore, and only two steps this side of barbarism. I've always thought so.'

He sighed as if giving me up as a bad job. 'Petronius, we've had this conversation before. The Greeks are fine in their way, but they're water to Rome's oil. An emperor who tries to mix the two will have his work cut out, and he'll fail in the end.'

'We'll see. But I think Nero's got a valid point, and I wish him luck.'

'Then you're as big a fool as he is.'

We subsided into silence, until I thought he'd fallen asleep. I pulled the litter's curtain aside and stared out into the darkness. Then he suddenly said: 'By the way, what did you think of Tigellinus?'

I turned back.

'Not a lot, my dear.'

He chuckled. 'Me neither. The man's a complete chancer and rotten as a maggoty apple.'

'Who is he exactly?'

'An ex-slave of Agrippina's. Caligula exiled him for having it off with his mistress and her sister and he went over to Greece. He made a small fortune in the luxury fish business and then oiled his way back to Italy. These days he breeds horses for the racetrack near Tarentum.'

'A colourful character. Nero seems quite fond of him.'

He grunted and nodded. 'Yes, doesn't he? And that's worrying. Like I said, the man's a chancer. We'll have to keep our eyes on darling Tiggy.'

But it was two years before Tigellinus began to make his presence properly felt; and by that time Burrus was dead.

Lucius's demonstration of chariot-driving raised even more metaphorical dust than literal. Dressed in gorgeous robes of Coan silk, made up to the eyebrows and with his hair bound back with a golden charioteer's cord, the ruling Emperor of Rome galloped his four horses round the Vatican Racetrack beneath a blue canopy studded with gold stars. Did it well, too: Tigellinus had exaggerated when he compared him to Hermippus, but not by much.

Rome was delighted. She was horrified. She was scandalised. The drive cocked a glorious snook at convention, and it split the city. The mob was wildly enthusiastic, of course, but then the Roman mob will cheer anything. The upper classes were another matter. Some were laughing in their sleeves. Some, mostly the younger element and those who appreciated what Lucius was trying to do, applauded, while the diehard traditionalists watched with frozen faces and tight lips, and privately consigned him to ten kinds of hell.

I'd arranged to watch the up-and-coming Youth Games with Silia, but in the event we were a group of four.

'I've asked Acte up to stay, Titus,' she said when we were finalising arrangements; Acte had moved out of the palace several months before and was living in the villa Lucius had bought her at Puteoli. 'She's had such a lonely time of it, poor dear. Oh, and Gnaeus as well. I wouldn't usually inflict him on you but he's terribly upset just now over some little Corinthian flute-player and the poor lamb needs comforting. You don't mind too much, do you?'