John Roberts - The Year of Confusion

Asklepiodes finished with his examination. “You will have to give this limb a rest for at least a month. You have strained the tendons of your knee and they need time to heal. I know it is difficult for a man as active as you to rest and relax, but I must insist upon it: no running, wrestling, or fighting for at least a month. You may ride, but be very careful in dismounting and remember to favor this leg.”

“That sounds like a bore,” Balbus said.

“Nonetheless, it is what you must do,” Asklepiodes insisted. “If you injure it further it may give you trouble for the rest of your life.”

Balbus eyed his thick knee dubiously. “It looks all right.”

Asklepiodes sighed like any other expert having to put up with the objections of an ignoramus. “The damage is internal and therefore not visible, but you can feel it, can you not? It needs time to heal just like a cut or a broken bone. Therefore I adjure you to do as I say.”

“I’ll do it,” he grumped.

“Some people must be convinced to stay alive and well,” the physician observed.

“Any progress on the neck-breakings?” I asked.

“I’ve heard some talk about this,” Balbus said. “What is the problem?”

So yet again we had to explain about the broken necks and the strange marks and the physician’s puzzlement over the leverage applied. Like Brutus, Balbus pantomimed the act with his enormous hands, with which he could probably have twisted a man’s head clean off had he so wished. “I see what you mean,” he said. “I’ve never seen anything quite like it. Somehow you have to bring the two first knuckles of each hand to bear against the spine just below the skull, one hand to each side of the spinal column, and exert enough force to separate the vertebrae.”

“You have a fine grasp of anatomy,” Asklepiodes commended.

“My old wrestling instructor probably knew as much about the subject as you, doctor.”

“A Greek, I presume?” Asklepiodes said.

“No, a Phoenician from Cartago Nova.”

“I see. They are also quite expert in the anatomical arts, for barbarians.”

“I can almost picture in my mind how it could be done,” Balbus said, frowning, “but somehow it will not become clear. Tonight I’ll sacrifice to my family gods and maybe they’ll send me a dream that will reveal the technique to me.”

“I hope your gods are more cooperative than mine,” said Asklepiodes. “I’ve been sacrificing regularly with no results so far.”

The slaves brought in our dinner and we applied ourselves to it, speaking of gossip and inconsequentialities for a while. My mind wandered to my recent conversation with Archelaus.

“What do you think of that extraordinary scene in the Senate, Balbus?”

He set his cup down. “You mean Caesar’s dressing down of the Parthian ambassador? It was rough, but I’ve known Spanish kings to skin an offending ambassador alive and send his tanned hide to his sovereign as an answer.”

“We are a bit more sophisticated here in Rome,” I said, “and Caesar is sophisticated even for a Roman.”

“Caesar isn’t a young man anymore,” Balbus observed. “Old men sometimes get cranky.”

“That’s just what Rome needs,” I said. “A cranky dictator. Peevishness isn’t something you want in a man who holds absolute power.” It made me think of all those oriental tyrants to whom the anti-Caesarians were always comparing him.

“Do you think Caesar may be ill?” Asklepiodes said.

“Eh?” said Balbus.

“I have known him only slightly,” said the Greek, “but he has always seemed the soul of congeniality, and of course he is famed the world over for his clemency. But any man’s good nature can be warped by debilitating disease, especially so if it is one of the terribly painful ones.”

“Now I think of it,” Balbus said, “that day he came in by way of the door to the rear of the consular podium, and left the same way, instead of coming up the front steps.”

“You’re right,” I said. “In all the excitement I forgot that. Maybe he didn’t want to be seen looking infirm.”

This gave me much to think about and that evening I spoke with Julia concerning this alarming possibility.

“Why would he conceal an illness?” she asked, frowning.

“Because a man who holds absolute power dares not show the slightest hint of weakness. It could be eating away at him, too. He still feels he has great things to accomplish, but the years and infirmity have crept up on him. It’s the sort of thing that can make even Caesar ill-tempered. He hasn’t yet outshone Alexander so he has to win this Parthian war and after that, I suspect, India.”

“Nonsense! He only wishes to set the republic back in order. Then he will retire.”

“Retire? Caius Julius Caesar? He’ll retire when Jupiter retires from Olympus. I want to know about this. Pay a call upon your uncle. Pump Servilia for information. She’s been with him more than anyone else lately.”

“I’ll do it, but I think you are wrong. This Archelaus must have done something to provoke him. You’ve said yourself that my uncle was rather sharp with Gallic and German envoys when their rulers had behaved haughtily.”

“So Archelaus did, but a Roman citizen is not the same thing as a barbarian, and the king of Parthia is a monarch worthy of respect, even if he is an enemy. It is unlike Caesar to treat one he considers a peer disrespectfully.”

“It does seem odd,” she said, not protesting that Caesar would never consider a king his peer.

Now I had another complication in an investigation that was sufficiently complex as it was. Might Caesar be seriously ill, and, if so, what might this portend? I mulled this over as I crossed the Forum, closely attended by Hermes.

“I don’t see how Caesar’s being sick-” Hermes began.

“ if he’s sick,” I said.

“- If he’s sick-should have anything to do with some murdered astronomers.”

“It shouldn’t. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t a connection.”

“That sounds very profound. What do you mean?” We found a vacant bench just outside the enclosure of the Lacus Curtius and sat. Since I wasn’t very popular lately we weren’t disturbed by too many well-wishers.

“I’ve been concentrating on this almost to the exclusion of all else since my conversation with Asklepiodes and Balbus yesterday. Certain facts seem to come together and are probably related. Caesar is determined to outshine Alexander the Great, but Caesar is getting old. He may well be sick, perhaps deathly sick. He has always been the soul of rationality, so much so that even his seeming follies always prove to be shrewdly calculated. Yet now he has begun to behave irrationally. His brutal treatment of Archelaus in the Senate was perhaps the most public example.”

“Clear so far,” Hermes said, “though I fail to see where this is going.”

“Be patient. Asklepiodes noted that severe illness affects a man’s nature. A great and thwarted ambition can do the same. Suppose both factors were present here.”

“All right, I’m supposing it. I’m still not coming up with anything.”

“You aren’t thinking very clearly today. I think you need something to eat, maybe some wine to go with it.”

“It would be ill-mannered to indulge myself alone, in front of my patron. You must join me.”

“I accept your invitation.” So we went to a nearby tavern and loaded up on sausages and onions grilled over charcoal and chunks of ripe cheese, along with plenty of rough, peasant wine. This is the sort of fare that promotes clarity of thought. At length Hermes sat back and belched with satisfaction.

“Has anything come to you?” I asked, downing the last sausage.