Robert Silverberg: The Reign of Terror

“Wrong. Those people have plenty to eat as it is. For all of Demetrius’s excesses, this is still a prosperous land. And, whatever you think, revolutions don’t spring up because of poverty. It’s the passion for novelty, the pursuit of excitement, that does it. Revolution is the fruit of idleness and leisure, not of poverty.”

“The idleness and leisure of the slum-dwellers of the Subura,” Apollinaris said, gazing thoughtfully at the other man. It was an interesting concept, marvelous in its complete absurdity.

But it appeared that Torquatus found a certain logic in it. “Yes. Amid the general breakdown of law and order, this thing that some people call the Decadence, they’ve come to see that nobody’s really in charge of anything any more. And so they want to get themselves a bigger share of the loot. Overthrow the monarchy, butcher all the patricians, divide up the wealth among themselves. I’ve been in their taverns, Apollinaris. I’ve listened to their harangues. You come with me tomorrow and sit down next to them and you’ll hear the same things yourself.”

“Two Consuls, going freely and unguarded into slum taverns?”

“They’ll have no idea who we are. I’ll show you how to dress.”

“It would be interesting, I suppose. But, thank you, no. I’ll take your word for it: there’s restlessness in the Subura. But we still have an army, Torquatus. I’ve just spent five years pacifying the provinces. I can pacify the Subura too, if I have to.”

“Turn the Roman army against the citizens of the capital? Think about it, my friend. The agitators in the Subura must be dealt with before the real trouble breaks out.—I agree, a great deal for you to consider on your first day back. But there’s no time to waste. We face a very big job.” Torquatus signaled to a slave who was waiting nearby to refill their glasses. “Enough of this talk for the moment, all right? What do you think of this wine? Forty-year-old Falernian, it is. From the Emperor’s own cellars, I should tell you. I had some brought here especially for this occasion.”

“Quite splendid,” said Apollinaris. “But age has made it a trifle bitter. Would you pass me the honey, Torquatus?”

Charax said, “This is the list so far, sir.”

Apollinaris took the sheet of paper from his aide-de-camp and ran quickly down the names. “Statius—Claudius Nero—Judas Antonius Soranus—who are these people, Charax?”

“Lucius Status is the Emperor’s private secretary. Soranus is a Hebrew who is said to import unusual animals from Africa for his collection. I have no information about Claudius Nero, sir, but he is probably a craftsman to the court.”

“Ah.” Apollinaris turned his attention back to the list. “Hilarion and Polybius, yes. The personal attendants. I remember those two. Oily little bastards, both of them. Glitius Agricola. Gaius Callistus. Marco Cornuto—what kind of name is that, ‘Marco Cornuto?’”

“A Roman name, sir. I mean, it’s Roman in language, not Latin.”

That puzzled him. “Latin—Roman—what’s the difference?”

“The lower classes speak some rough new kind of language now that they call ‘Roman,’ a dialect—the dialect of the people, it’s called. Derived from Latin, the way the languages of the provinces are. It’s like an easier, sloppier form of Latin. They’ve begun translating their own names into it, I hear. This Marco Cornuto is probably one of the Emperor’s coachmen, or a stable groom, something along those lines.”

Apollinaris made a face. He very much disliked the custom, of late so prevalent out in the provinces, of speaking local dialects that were coarse, vulgar versions of Latin mixed with primitive regional words: one way of speaking in Gallia, another in Hispania, another in Britannia, and still another, very different from the others, in the Teutonic provinces. He had suppressed the use of those languages, those dialects, wherever he had encountered it. So now it was happening here, too? “What sense does that make, a new dialect of Latin used right here in Roma? In the provinces, those dialects are a way of signifying independence from the Empire. But Roma can’t secede from itself, can it?”

Charax merely smiled and shrugged.

Apollinaris remembered now what Torquatus had told him about the restlessness in the slums, the likelihood of some kind of uprising among the plebeians. Was a new bastard form of Latin beginning to establish itself among the poor, a private language of their own, setting them apart from the hated aristocrats? It was worth investigating. He knew from his experiences in the provinces what power language could have in fomenting political unrest.

He looked once more at the list of those whom Torquatus had arrested.

“Matius—Licentius—Licinius—Caesius Bassius—” He looked up. “What do these little red marks next to some of the names mean?”

“Those are the ones who have already been executed,” Charax said.

“Did you say ‘executed’?” Apollinaris asked, startled.

“Put to death, yes,” said Charax. “You seem surprised. I thought you knew, sir.”

“No,” Apollinaris said. “I haven’t heard anything about executions.”

“At the far end of the Forum, in the little plaza in front of the Arch of Marcus Anastasius: he’s had a platform set up there, and every afternoon there have been executions all week, four or five a day.”

“‘He’?”

“Larcius Torquatus, sir,” Charax said, in the tone of one who was explaining something to a child.

Apollinaris nodded. This was the tenth day since his return to Roma, and they had been busy days. Torquatus had never given him a chance, at their first meeting in Torquatus’s home, to explain that it was his intention to give up his Consulship and retire to private life. And once he had heard what Torquatus had been up to—putting the Emperor under house arrest, throwing His Majesty’s playmates into prison, issuing a raft of stringent new decrees designed to cleanse the government of corruption—Apollinaris had realized that his notion of retiring was an impossible one. Torquatus’s program, commendable though it was, was so radical that he could not be left to carry it out alone. That would make him, in effect, dictator of Roma, and Apollinaris knew from his readings in history that the only kind of dictators Roma would tolerate were those who, like Augustus Caesar, were able to conceal their dictatorial ways behind a façade of constitutional legitimacy. A mere appointive Consul, ruling on his own after overthrowing the Emperor, would not be able to sustain himself in power unless he assumed the Imperial powers himself. Apollinaris did not want to see Torquatus do that. Maintaining the Consular system was essential now. And Torquatus must have a legitimate Consular colleague if he wanted his reforms to have any success.

So Apollinaris had put all thought of retirement aside and had spent his first days back reestablishing his presence at the capital, setting up his office in the Consular building, renewing his connections with the important men of the Senate, and otherwise resuming his life at the center of power. He had met daily with his colleague Torquatus, who assured him that the work of purging the commonwealth of idlers and parasites was moving along smoothly, but up until now Apollinaris had not pressed him for details. That had been a mistake, he realized now. Torquatus’s policy of ending the drain on the public treasury that the Emperor’s huge mob of hangers-on had created was one that he had applauded, of course. But it had never occurred to Apollinaris that his co-Consul was having them killed. And his travels around the city since his return had not taken him anywhere near that little plaza of Marcus Anastasius, the place of execution where heads rolled in the dust by order of M. Larcius Torquatus.