Robert Harris - Lustrum

'Crassus I can beat,' replied Cicero. 'Pompey I can outwit. Even Caesar I have managed to hold in check in the past. But all three combined, and with Clodius as their weapon?' He shook his head wearily. 'How am I to live?'

That evening Cicero went to see Pompey, taking me with him, partly to show that this was a business call and not in any way social, and also I suspect to bolster his nerve. We found the great man drinking in his bachelor den with his old army comrade and fellow Picenian Aulus Gabinius. They were examining the model of Pompey's theatre complex when we were shown in, and Gabinius was gushing with enthusiasm. He was the man who, as an ambitious tribune, had proposed the laws that secured Pompey his unprecedented military powers, and he had duly been rewarded with a legateship under Pompey in the East. He had been away for several years, during which time – unknown to him – Caesar had been conducting an affair with his wife, the blowsy Lollia (at the same time as he had been sleeping with Pompey's wife, come to think of it). But now Gabinius was back in Rome – just as ambitious, a hundred times as rich, and determined to become consul.

'Cicero, my dear fellow,' said Pompey, rising to embrace him, 'will you join us for some wine?'

'I shall not,' said Cicero stiffly.

'Oh dear,' said Pompey to Gabinius, 'do you hear his tone? He's come to upbraid me for that business this afternoon I was telling you about,' and turning back to Cicero he said, 'Do I really need to explain to you that it was all Caesar's idea? I tried to talk him out of it.'

'Really? Then why didn't you?'

'He was of the view – and I must say I have to agree with him – that the tone of your remarks in court today was grossly offensive to us, and merited a public rebuke of some kind.'

'So you open the way for Clodius to become a tribune – knowing that his stated intention once he gains that office is to bring a prosecution against me?'

'I would not have gone that far, but Caesar was set on it. Are you sure I cannot tempt you to some wine?'

'For many years,' said Cicero, with a terrible calmness, 'I have supported you in everything you wanted. I have asked for nothing in return except your friendship, which has been more precious to me than anything in my public life. And now at last you have shown your true regard for me to all the world – by helping to give my deadliest enemy the weapon he needs to destroy me!'

Pompey's lip quivered and his oyster eyes filled with tears. 'Cicero, I am appalled. How can you say such things? I would never stand aside and see you destroyed. My position is not an easy one, you know – trying to exert a calming influence on Caesar is a sacrifice I make on behalf of the republic every day of my life.'

'But not today, apparently.'

'He felt that his dignity and authority were threatened by what you said.'

'Not half as threatened as they will be if I reveal all I know about this Beast with Three Heads and its dealings with Catilina!'

Gabinius broke in. 'I don't think you should speak to Pompey the Great in that tone.'

'No, no, Aulus,' said Pompey sadly, 'what Cicero says is right. Caesar has gone too far. The gods know I have tried to do as much as I can to moderate his actions behind the scenes. When Cato was flung in prison, I had him released at once. And poor Bibulus would have suffered a much worse fate than having a barrel of shit poured over him if it hadn't been for me. But on this occasion I failed. I was bound to one day. I'm afraid Caesar is just so… relentless.' He sighed and picked up one of the toy temples from his model theatre and contemplated it thoughtfully. 'Perhaps the time is coming,' he said, 'when I shall have to break with him.' He gave Cicero a crafty look – his eyes had quickly dried, I noticed. 'What do you think of that?'

'I think it cannot come soon enough.'

'You may be right.' Pompey took the temple between his fat thumb and forefinger and replaced it with surprising delicacy in its former position. 'Do you know what his new scheme is?'

'No.'

'He wishes to be awarded a military command.'

'I'm sure he does. But the senate has already decreed that there will be no provinces for the consuls this year.'

'The senate has, yes. But Caesar doesn't care about the senate. He is going to get Vatinius to propose a law in the popular assembly.'

'What?'

'A law granting him not just one province, but two – Nearer Gaul and Bithynia – with the authority to raise an army of two legions. And it won't just be a one-year appointment, either – he wants five years.'

'But the award of provinces has always been decided by the senate, not the people,' protested Cicero. 'And five years! This will smash our constitution to pieces.'

'Caesar says not. Caesar says to me, “What is wrong with trusting the people?”'

'It isn't the people! It's a mob, controlled by Vatinius.'

'Well,' said Pompey, 'now perhaps you can understand why I agreed to watch the skies for him this afternoon. Of course I should have refused. But I have to keep a larger picture in view. Someone must control him.'

Cicero put his head in his hands in despair. Eventually he said, 'May I tell some of my friends your reasons for going along with him today? Otherwise they will think I no longer have your support.'

'If you must – in the strictest confidence. And you may tell them – with Aulus here as a witness – that no harm will befall Marcus Tullius Cicero as long as Pompey the Great still breathes in Rome.'

Cicero was very silent and thoughtful as we walked home. Instead of going straight to his library, he took several turns around his garden in the darkness, while I sat at a table nearby with a lamp and quickly wrote down as much of Pompey's conversation as I could remember. When I had finished, Cicero told me to come with him, and we went next door to see Metellus Celer.

I was worried that Clodia might be present, but there was no sign of her. Instead Celer was sitting in his dining room alone, lit by a solitary candelabrum, chewing morosely on a cold chicken leg, with a jug of wine beside him. Cicero refused a drink for the second time that evening and asked me to read out what Pompey had just said. Celer was predictably outraged.

'So I shall have Further Gaul – which is where the fighting will have to be done – and he Nearer, yet each of us is to have two legions?'

'Yes, except that he will hold his province for an entire lustrum, while you will have to give up yours by the end of the year. You may be sure that if there's any glory to be had, Caesar will have it all.'

Celer let out a bellow of rage and shook his fists. 'He must be stopped! I don't care if there are three of them running this republic. There are hundreds of us!'

Cicero sat down on the couch beside him. 'We don't need to beat all three,' he said quietly. 'Just one will do. You heard what Pompey said. If we can somehow take care of Caesar, I don't think he'll do much about it. All Pompey cares about is his own dignity.'

'And what about Crassus?'

'Once Caesar is off the scene, he and Pompey won't be allies for another hour – they can't abide one another. No: Caesar is the stone that holds this arch together. Remove him and the structure falls.'

'So what do you propose we should do?'

'Arrest him.'

Celer gave Cicero a sharp look. 'But Caesar's person is inviolable, not once, but twice – first as chief priest, and then as consul.'

'You really think he'd worry about the law if he were in our place? When his every act as consul has been illegal? We either stop him now, while there's time, or we leave it until he's picked us all off one by one and there's nobody left to oppose him.'

I was amazed by what I was hearing. Until that afternoon I am sure that Cicero would never have entertained for a moment the thought of such a desperate action. It was a measure of the chasm he now saw opening up before him that he should actually have given voice to it.