Ben Kane: Eagles at War

If the damn bridge over the Rhenus had been built in a direct line east of the camp rather than just outside the settlement, thought Tullus, such a thing could never happen. Yet the camp’s position on high ground, back from the vicus, made tactical sense. As a result, soldiers had no option but to pass through it each time they had to venture over the river. And that, despite an officer’s best intentions, meant an inevitable slowing in their pace. The instant that legionaries were spotted, every shop and restaurant owner, every trickster and wild-eyed soothsayer, every whore and vendor of trinkets, thronged to the side of the road, where they harangued the passing business. He could see them gathering already, could hear a red-cheeked woman bellowing about her delicious, fresh-cooked sausages.

Senior centurion and cohort commander Tullus might be, but he didn’t have any legal jurisdiction over civilians. Nevertheless, he readied his vitis. In practice, he could do as he wished. If someone got too enthusiastic, he wouldn’t hesitate to administer a sharp clout.

In they tramped, hobnails clashing on the paving stones, past the miserable shacks in which the poorest of the poor lived. Snot-nosed children in rags watched the armoured legionaries with wide eyes. ‘Spare an as ?’ shouted the most confident one to no one in particular. The call was like the first drop from a raincloud. The urchins darted forward, yelling, running alongside the soldiers with outstretched hands. ‘Got any bread, sir?’ ‘A coin, sir, a coin!’ ‘Want to screw my sister, sir? She’s beautiful!’

Few men were interested in this first wave. Used to Tullus’ close monitoring, they kept moving, giving as good as they got. ‘I haven’t got two asses to rub together,’ Tullus heard Piso say. ‘I wouldn’t waste my money on little tykes like you,’ declared another soldier. ‘Your sister?’ retorted a third. ‘If she’s got your looks, she’s got webbing between her fingers and toes!’

Hurling insults, but quietly – they knew well the pain a kick from a studded sandal could deliver – the urchins withdrew.

As the next flood of hopefuls descended, Tullus sighed, and readied his vitis once more.

‘Fresh bread, hot from the oven! Who’d like some?’ ‘A cup of wine for any of you brave men? I sell only the best vintages!’ ‘Look at you strong, handsome boys! One of you must have time for a little knee-trembler! Three sestertii , and I’ll even let you kiss me!’ The whore who’d made that offer wasn’t as raddled as most in the settlement, and Tullus sensed the step of the legionaries nearest her waver. Wheeling out of rank, he was on her in half a dozen strides.

‘They have other business right now. Clear off.’

She leered and pulled down the neck of her grimy robe, exposing her still pert breasts. ‘A fine centurion like you must have the money to buy a feel of these – and more!’

‘Go on, piss off!’ Tullus’ eyes appraised her chest even as he raised his vitis.

With a knowing pout, she retreated to the door of her hut, where she continued to entreat his men to come inside.

Tullus let her be. Fenestela, who was in the tenth rank, and the tesserarius, at the back, would ensure that no one dared to break formation. If it hadn’t been for his other officers, however, he wouldn’t have put it past one of his men to try and have a ‘quickie’. It had been done by soldiers in other units before, without the centurion noticing, or so the gossip around the fires went in the evenings.

In the event, he didn’t have to use his stick. The swarm of locals eased as they entered the vicus proper, where homes and businesses of a better class were situated. This was where many of the camp’s legionaries, and not a few of the officers, had common-law wives. Invitations to come and eat, to drink wine, to buy weapons or trinkets for their girls, continued to rain down, but their path wasn’t impeded. Laughter broke out among his soldiers when a pair of hefty tribeswomen with braided hair, sisters perhaps, spotted their common-law husbands in the century’s midst and rained a barrage of abuse on both, complaining that neither man had given them as much as a denarius for the previous month. The miserable bastards needn’t come back over the Rhenus, the women squawked, or set foot in their houses, until they gave them some money. The soldiers’ muttered excuses that they hadn’t yet been paid brought down further abuse. Hoots and jeers from their comrades added to the clamour.

‘Keep moving!’ roared Tullus, quelling his men’s noise, if not that of their wives. He marched on, grateful to be free of such nagging. At times, he missed having a woman, but running his own soldiers as well as a cohort of six centuries more than filled his time. When the need came upon him, which was less often than it used to, he visited the best whorehouse in the settlement. Upon his retirement, there would be time to find a young bride, to raise a family. Until then, he was wedded to the army.

The buildings close to the vicus’ forum were proud affairs, the homes of merchants who’d grown rich on the trade that flowed to and fro across the Rhenus. Studying a grandiose house, Tullus considered whether he’d have been happier selling wine, pottery and silver platters over the river in return for cattle, slaves and women’s hair – the goods that Rome desired from Germania. He’d have made a fortune – could have owned a large property with central heating, private toilet facilities and a courtyard. Then, from the pavement, a veteran in a faded military tunic gave him a proud salute – with the stump of his right arm. Tullus returned the gesture, ashamed that he might consider anything other than being a soldier. The comradeship granted by a life in the legion was beyond price. Money came second to that – and it always would. Besides, his centurion’s pension would be plenty to live on, and a sight more than the poor bastard with one hand received. He fumbled with the purse at his belt and tossed the man a denarius. Loud blessings followed him down the street.

Jupiter, Greatest and Best, grant that I see my final days out whole in mind and body, Tullus prayed. If that is not to happen, I wish for a swift death. In reflex, he rubbed the phallus amulet that hung from his neck. Why this dark mood? he asked himself as they took the street that ran towards the river. There’s no call for it on this fine day.

‘Off on patrol, sir?’ called the lead sentry, one of eight legionaries outside a small building by the side of the crossing. The position was manned day and night.

‘Yes. Lucius Cominius Tullus, senior centurion, Second Cohort of the Eighteenth.’

‘Today’s password, sir, if you please.’

‘Roma Victrix.’

With a salute, the soldier stood aside.

Tullus led the way on to the stone arched bridge, which was wide enough for two carts or eight legionaries to pass abreast, and which spanned a section of the river that was a hundred and fifty paces wide. Beyond it, in midstream, was a narrow island, dotted with thickets of crab-apple trees. A party of off-duty soldiers joked with one another as they fished from the bank nearest the vicus. Further off, a crane perched by the water’s edge. A paved road led straight across the islet to another island, via another, bigger bridge. Beyond that, a third bridge took the road to the eastern bank. The last one had been a bitch to construct, Tullus remembered. The river there was deep and fast-flowing. A number of men had drowned before the massive wooden piles that formed the foundations had been manoeuvred into place. Halfway across, a plaque commemorated the unit that had built it, and venerated Augustus with the words Pontem perpetui mansurum in saecula – ‘I have built a bridge that will last forever’. You didn’t build it, thought Tullus with a trace of anger. We did, with our sweat and blood. The names of the dead legionaries ought to have been inscribed on the stonework, but that was not Rome’s way, or the army’s, worse luck.