Robert Harris - Lustrum

It was an effective point. Crassus grasped the front of his toga between his thumbs and forefingers, and spread his elbows, in the manner of a country gentleman delivering his opinion of sheep at market.

'The gods know, and you all know – and I thank Providence for it – I am not a poor man. I have nothing to gain from the cancellation of all debts; very much the reverse. But I do not think that Catilina can be barred from being a candidate, or these elections delayed an hour longer, purely on the basis of the feeble evidence we've just heard. I therefore propose a motion: That the elections begin immediately, and that this house do adjourn and repair to the Field of Mars.'

'I second the motion!' said Caesar, springing to his feet. 'And I ask that it be put to the vote at once, so that no more of the day may be wasted by these delaying tactics, and the election of the new consuls and praetors may be concluded by sunset, in accordance with our ancient laws.'

Just as a pair of scales that are finely balanced may suddenly be plunged one way or another by the addition of a few grains of wheat, so the whole atmosphere of the senate that morning abruptly tilted. Those who had been howling down Catilina only a short while earlier now began clamouring for the elections to start, and Cicero wisely decided not even to put the matter to a vote. 'The mood of the house is clear,' he said, in a stony voice. 'Polling will begin at once.' And he added, quietly: 'May the gods protect our republic.' I don't think many people heard him, certainly not Catilina and his gang, who didn't even observe the normal courtesy of letting the consul leave the chamber first. Fists in the air, roaring in triumph, they pushed their way down the crowded aisle and out into the forum.

Cicero was now in a fix. He could hardly go home, like a coward. He had to follow Catilina, for nothing could happen until he, as the presiding magistrate, arrived on the Field of Mars to take control of proceedings. Quintus, whose concern for his brother's safety was always paramount, and who had foreseen exactly this outcome, had brought along his old army breastplate, and he insisted that Cicero wear it beneath his toga. I could tell that Cicero was reluctant, but in the drama of the moment he allowed himself to be persuaded, and while a group of senators stood around to shield him, I helped him out of his toga, assisted Quintus in strapping on the bronze armour, and then readjusted the toga. Naturally, the rigid shape of the metal was clearly visible beneath the white wool, but Quintus reassured him that far from being a problem this was all to the good: it would act as a deterrent to any assassin. Thus protected, and with a tight escort of lictors and senators surrounding him, Cicero walked, head erect, from the senate house and into the glare and noise of election day.

The population was streaming westwards towards the Field of Mars, and we were carried with the flow. More and more supporters emerged and adhered around Cicero, until I should say that a protective layer of at least four or five men stood between him and the general throng. A huge crowd can be a terrifying sight – a monster, unconscious of its own strength, with subterranean impulses to stampede this way or that, to panic and to crush. The crowd on the election field that day was immense, and we drove into it like a wedge into a block of wood. I was next to Cicero, and we were jostled and pushed along by our escort until at last we reached the area set aside for the consul. This consisted of a long platform with a ladder up to it, and a tent behind it where he could rest. To one side, behind sheep fencing, was the enclosure for the candidates, of whom there were perhaps twenty (both the consulships and the eight praetorships all had to be decided that day). Catilina was talking to Caesar, and when they saw Cicero arrive, red-faced from the heat and wearing armour, they both laughed heartily and began gesturing to the others to look. 'I should never have worn this damn thing,' Cicero muttered. 'I'm sweating like a pig, and it doesn't even protect my head and neck.'

Nevertheless, as the elections were already running late, he had no time to take it off, but immediately had to go into a conclave with the augurs. They declared that the auspices were good, so Cicero gave the order for proceedings to begin. He mounted the platform, followed by the candidates, and recited all the prayers in a firm voice and without a hitch. The trumpets sounded, the red flag was hoisted up its staff above the Janiculum, and the first century trooped over the bridge to cast its ballots. Thereafter it was a matter of keeping the lines of voters moving, hour after hour, as the sun burned its fiery arc across the sky and Cicero boiled like a lobster in his breastplate.

For what it is worth, I believe that he would have been assassinated that day if he had not taken the course he did. Conspiracies thrive in darkness, and by shining such a strong light on the plotters he had temporarily frightened them off. Too many people were watching: if Cicero had been struck down, it would have been obvious who was responsible. And in any case, because he had raised the alarm, he was now surrounded by such a number of friends and allies, it would have taken scores of determined men to get to him.

So the business of the day went on as usual, with no hand raised against him. He had one small satisfaction at least, which was to declare his brother elected praetor. But Quintus's vote was smaller than expected, whereas Caesar topped the poll by a mile. The results for the consulship were as expected: Junius Silanus came in first and Murena second, with Servius and Catilina tied in last place. Catilina gave a mocking bow to Cicero and left the field with his supporters: he had not expected a different outcome. Servius, on the other hand, took his defeat badly, and came to see Cicero in his tent after the declaration to pour out a tirade against him for permitting the most corrupt campaign in history. 'I shall challenge it in the courts. My case is overwhelming. This battle is not over yet, by any means!' He stamped off, followed by his attendants carrying their document cases full of evidence. Cicero, slumped with exhaustion on his curule chair, swore as he watched him leave. I tried to make some consoling remarks, but he told me roughly to be quiet and to do something useful for a change by helping him take off that damned breastplate. His skin had been chafed raw by the metal edges, and the moment he was free of it he seized it in both hands and hurled it in a fury to the other side of the tent, where it landed with a clatter.

A terrible melancholy now overcame Cicero, of a depth I had never seen before. Terentia went off with the children to spend the rest of the summer in the higher altitudes and cooler glades of Tusculum, but the consul stayed in Rome, working. The heat was more than usually oppressive, the stink of the great drain beneath the forum rose to envelop the hills, and many hundreds of citizens were carried off by the sweating fever, the stench of their corpses adding to the noisome atmosphere. I have often wondered what history would have found to say about Cicero if he had also succumbed to a fatal illness at that time – and the answer is 'very little'. At the age of forty-three he had won no military victories. He had written no great books. True, he had achieved the consulship, but then so had many nonentities, Hybrida being the most obvious example. The only significant law he had carried on to the statute book was Servius's campaign finance reform act, which he heartily disliked. In the meantime Catilina was still at liberty and Cicero had lost a great deal of prestige by what was seen as his panicky behaviour on the eve of the poll. As the summer turned to autumn, his consulship was almost three quarters done and dribbling away to nothing – a fact he realised more keenly than anybody.