John Roberts - The Year of Confusion

The beak-nosed one glared at me for a moment. “Oh, it’s you. You’re just another of Caesar’s lackeys. Stay out of this.”

I stuck my right hand into a fold of my tunic and slipped the bronze cestus over my knuckles, just in case. “No need to call names, ah, Flavus, is it?” At last I recognized him as Caius Caesetius Flavus, a tribune decidedly in the anti-Caesarian camp, meaning he was a man with few allies. One of these, another tribune named Marullus, now spoke up.

“You should have died with the rest of your family, Metellus. They were better men.”

I decided the bridge of his nose would do nicely for a target. One smack for him, then a half-turn and lay another one on Flavus’s jaw. I bet myself that I could put them both on the pavement in the same moment, but this time Hermes played peacekeeper.

“What’s that thing you’re waving around?” he asked.

Flavus held it up. “Last night someone put a crown on the head of Caesar’s statue!”

“What of it?” I asked. “The Senate has granted Caesar the right to adorn his statues with the Civic Crown and the Siege Crown.” I gestured around the Forum, where a minor crowd of Caesar’s statues stood in prominent places. He really was overdoing it in those days.

“This is not one of the crowns of honor,” Marullus hissed. “It is a diadem, a royal crown!”

“Put it back,” yelled yet another tribune. I did not recognize this one. You hardly saw them in the Senate since they lost their veto.

“Shut your mouth, Cinna!” Flavus bellowed. Cinna charged and for a while a good-sized brawl erupted at the base of the statue, with numerous bystanders taking part. Hermes and I kept out of it. A tattered golden object came flying from the pile of struggling men and Hermes caught it adroitly. I examined it and found it to be made of gilded parchment, not metal.

Eventually the disputants were separated. Flavus and Marullus were taken off to their houses, much the worse for wear. Cinna sat on the steps blotting at the blood running freely from his nose. I handed him a kerchief and he pressed it to his nose, tilting his head back for a while. When the bleeding stopped he stood.

“Many thanks, Senator Metellus.”

“Think nothing of it. You’re not Cornelius Cinna, I know him. Are you Cinna the poet?”

“Helvius Cinna, and yes, I flatter myself that I write verses of some merit. Come, I need a drink, and I’ll stand you to some wine as well.”

“Bacchus lays his curse on a man who turns down a free drink,” I said. “Lead on.”

We went down an alleyway that led to a small square with a fountain in its center. The tavern had outdoor tables covered by arbors that provided shade in summer. Just then the sun overhead and the buildings on all four sides kept the temperature tolerable for dining or drinking in the open.

He ordered a pitcher with some snacks to go with it, and we filled our cups, poured a libation on the ground, and pledged one another’s health. It was the raw red stuff of the country, a welcome change from the rather effete vintages I had been imbibing of late. At least so I told myself. The fact was, I would drink just about anything. Still do, for that matter. The girl came back with a large bowl of crisp-fried nuts and dried peas, liberally salted.

“I know you of course, Senator Metellus,” Cinna said, his voice slightly distorted by his swollen nasal passages. His nose, doubtless handsome in its usual state, was rapidly assuming the shape and color of a ripe plum. “I know that you are married to Caesar’s niece, and that you’ve been his friend since you were both boys.”

I took a long drink, pondering how to play this. It was a distinct exaggeration to style us boyhood friends. I barely knew him until I was in my twenties. He was about ten years older. We had worked closely together many times in the years since, though. To a recently arrived man like this obscure Cinna, it might well seem that Caesar and I were old cronies.

“Caesar trusts no other man the way he trusts my patron,” Hermes said with smarmy sincerity. He had already decided the best approach and I thought it best to play along.

“That’s good to know,” he said. “Caesar has a great many toadies, but only a few true supporters.”

“Hence your lack of objection to the crown on the statue,” I observed.

He chuckled. “I put it there.”

This was interesting. “And you would have no objection to a real crown on the dictator’s head?”

“Why not? The Republic of the old days is dead, anyone can see that. Since Marius it’s been one strongman after another taking dictatorial power, whether or not he held the title. When there’s none in power, the rest are all fighting to gain that power. It’s messy and it’s stupid and destructive. Caesar is the first man of true talent and genius to pick up the iron rod and wield it over lesser men. Why not let him have the throne and crown to go with it? We had kings in the past, and they were good ones. It wasn’t until we had Etruscans for kings that we rejected monarchy.”

“Feeling runs deep against unlimited one-man power, especially if it can be inherited.” I munched on some nuts.

“But that’s foolish,” he objected. “A republic worked well enough when Rome was a little city-state like dozens of others in Italy. A panel of wealthy farmers could rule well enough in those days, when all their retainers lived within a day’s march of the City. But now Rome rules a world-spanning empire and our provinces are so far away that a man sent out to govern travels so long to get to his province he practically has to turn around on arrival to be back in Rome for election time. It’s foolish!”

“Very true,” Hermes said, nodding. “He should have all the trappings of a king, so he can deal with foreign kings on an equal footing.”

“Right,” Cinna said. He smiled slyly. “In fact, this is supposed to be secret, but the whole city will know about it soon enough. I have the bill all drawn up in legal fashion, I’m just waiting for Caesar to give me the word to introduce it-”

“Tell us!” I pleaded. He looked satisfied as only a man who holds a secret can. I slugged down some wine and tossed a handful of the snacks into my mouth.

“Well, this is for your ears only, right?” We nodded with wide eyes like a pair of idiots. “All right. This bill, which I will bring before the Plebeian Assembly, empowers Caesar to marry any woman he wishes, and as many of them as it pleases him to marry, simultaneously, not sequentially.”

There is a great art to not choking on a mouthful of dried peas and nuts when news like this gets dropped on one. Fortunately, I am a master of this art. It has saved my dignity at many a political banquet. I continued chewing and turned that into a nod.

“Makes sense,” Hermes said.

I swallowed. “Absolutely. Kings do that sort of thing all the time.”

“It’s traditional for sealing alliances in the east,” Cinna pointed out, “and Caesar plans further conquests in that direction. Alexander had no problem with marrying some kinglet’s daughter when he needed an alliance.”

“And we all know Caesar has taken Alexander as his model,” Hermes said with an air of great wisdom. He was laying it on a bit thick, but Helvius Cinna seemed like the sort of man who wouldn’t notice such a thing. Typical poet.

“Has he given you any idea when he wants you to bring this before the consilium ? I asked him.

“No, but I think it can’t be much longer. He will be leaving for his Asian campaign soon.”

We finished our wine and traded a few more pleasantries and parted with hearty handclasps and tokens of good friendship. Without exchanging a word Hermes and I walked down to the embankment by the side of the Tiber, a handsome park above the retaining wall that had been built by the aediles after the last big flood. There we found a fine marble bench between shade-trees and sat, watching the river flow by.