John Roberts - The Year of Confusion

This was new. “I think I know what you mean,” I told him. “The first time I met Sosigenes at the Museum several years ago he almost managed to convey some of the excitement of his work, and I am usually immune to the charms of philosophy. I think it was the enthusiasm he brought to the subject.”

“Yes, that is it exactly. I truly enjoyed talking with him.”

“I marvel to hear you say so,” I said. “Others I have spoken to considered him a dull sort, a drudge.”

“Then you have been speaking with the astrologers and their followers. I prefer philosophy unpolluted with superstition, so I esteemed the company of Sosigenes and Demades and the true astronomers.”

“Now, Brutus,” his mother said through tight lips. To my amazement, Brutus was entirely uncowed.

“Mother, you and your crowd pursue those fraudulent mountebanks like children chasing after the crossroads magicians who make doves appear from empty purses and extract denarii from their ears.”

“That will be quite enough,” she all but hissed, but somehow her son had grown a spine.

“I’ve studied too much philosophy and come to appreciate the truth in it, Mother. I’ve put aside all that childish nonsense about the gods taking a personal hand in the affairs of men and placing the stars in the heavens to tell us whether it’s a good day to arrange an advantageous marriage for a daughter or begin building a house. The gods are far too majestic for such sordid matters.”

She unwound to her feet like a cobra rising and spreading its hood. “That’s not how you talked when your horoscope predicted the highest of destinies for you! And you have forgotten how to treat your mother with respect before strangers.”

“Oh, Decius Caecilius is hardly a stranger, Mother. We’ve known him for rather a long time, haven’t we?”

She turned to me and I confess I flinched back. “Senator, I fear I must be rude and take my leave. I hope my son will be able to help your investigation.” With this she whirled and stalked off, radiating anger in an almost visible miasma.

“She isn’t going to forgive me for witnessing this little scene,” I sighed.

Brutus put a friendly hand on my shoulder, another unexpected gesture. “Pay no heed. Servilia’s day is done. She is an old woman trying to be a young one.”

“She seems to have regained Caesar’s favor,” I said. “I saw him squiring her about just a few days ago.”

“Caesar is the greatest man in the world at this moment,” Brutus said ponderously. “He can have any woman he wants. He already has Cleopatra and even an incredibly rich queen of Egypt is not enough for him. No, he retains a fond memory of his former connection with my mother, that is all.”

“Well, it’s none of my business anyway,” I said. “What is my business is these murders and I would greatly appreciate any help you could give me. I had not known you were acquainted with Demades, much less fond of him.”

He frowned at the pitcher of water and turned to a slave. “Bring the senator something more suitable to drink. The Campanian, from the estate at Baiae.” For once I found myself actually liking Brutus.

“How did you come to meet Demades?” I asked him.

“It was at one of Callista’s salons, shortly after the astronomers arrived from Alexandria. Callista made sure that they were introduced to Rome’s scholarly community. I met Sosigenes and the others at the same time. After that, I saw him from time to time at various gatherings of the philosophical set.”

“You found that they appealed to you?”

“The true astronomers, not the fortune-tellers. As you may have gathered I learned to regard the latter with some distaste. I have studied philosophy for much of my life, but the astronomers struck me as the men of purest thought, matched only by the mathematicians.”

“You mean like the Pythagoreans?” I asked. “I’ve known a few of those.” The slave returned with the wine and it was excellent.

Brutus snorted. “Pythagoreans are to real mathematicians what astrologers are to true astronomers. They are just mystics who cloak their mummery in some of the trappings of philosophy. They propound absurd doctrines of transmigration of souls and commerce with spirits and ridiculous dietary practices and try to justify it all with some basic geometry and progressions of musical notes.”

“I always thought it was rather silly,” I said.

“Men like Demades and Sosigenes are the farthest thing from all that trash. They draw their theories and conclusions only from observable phenomena, eschewing all mysticism and supernatural explanations. If their observable data cannot explain a thing, they look for more data instead of resorting to the supernatural.”

“Admirable,” I murmured.

“Exactly.”

“But where does that put our auguries?” I asked him. “Where does it put most of our religious practice, for that matter?”

“I would never suggest that the gods do not exist,” he said, “but as I told my mother, they are not petty creatures that take an interest in the affairs of individual mortals. They are not Homer’s Olympians. It may be that they take an interest in the fates of entire nations, though I rather doubt the efficacy of discerning their will in the flights of birds, or in thunder and flashes of lightning. These are the beliefs of our primitive ancestors.” He’d been hanging around those Greeks on the island, all right. “At least,” he went on, “the augurs are more dignified than the haruspices, with their examinations of the entrails of sacrificial animals.”

“I’ve never liked that business either,” I agreed.

“The people must have religion and they must see that their leaders are suitably pious. This is essential to social order. One of the wisest provisions of our constitution was to make the priesthoods a part of official office. Thus we have always avoided the dangers of religious fanaticism, and of hereditary priesthoods contending for power with legitimate government. You have been in places where these things prevail, have you not?”

“I have. Things can get quite awful. Egypt, Gaul, Judea, the list goes on.”

“Yes, religion has a place, but it must be a clearly restricted, controlled place. And I feel that the childishness of fortune-telling, divining, astrology, and so forth have no place at all. If I were censor I would drive them all from Rome, and from Roman territory.”

“They’d just come back,” I told him. “They always do. I’ve seen the mountebanks and the mystery cults expelled from Rome three or four times in my lifetime. I would say that right now they are more numerous than ever.”

“You are correct, of course. Something stronger than expulsion is called for. Caesar was rather thorough in cleansing Gaul of Druids.”

Caesar had considered the Druids’ habit of mass human sacrifices distasteful, but it was their political influence he could not countenance. Kings followed their counsel and they were a uniting force among the very disunited Gallic tribes. Caesar had solved the problem by slaughtering them all. I wondered whether that was the fate Brutus had planned for the fortune-tellers. I didn’t like them myself, but it seemed a bit drastic. I decided it was time for a change of subject.

“Did Demades have other admirers? Conversely, did he have enemies? I already know that he disputed with Polasser, but they are both dead, which pretty much clears Polasser of the charge.”

“Why so? Demades was killed first, wasn’t he? Perhaps Polasser killed him, then someone else killed Polasser.”

“That would be a consideration, were it not for the fact that they were killed identically and in a fashion so strange that even Asklepiodes, who knows all about killing people, is having a hard time figuring out how it was done.”