Colleen McCullough - 6. The October Horse - A Novel of Caesar and Cleopatra

VII

The Cracks Appear

From INTERCALARIS of 46 B.C. until SEPTEMBER of 45 B.C.

Caesar's nephew Quintus Pedius and Quintus Fabius Maximus had marched four "new" legions from Placentia in western Italian Gaul during November, and arrived in Further Spain a month later. By the seasons it was late summer, very hot; to their delight, they found the province not entirely at the beck and call of the three Republican generals, so were able to make a good camp on the upper Baetis River and buy the harvest of the region. Caesar's orders were to wait for him and use the time laying in supplies, even though he didn't expect a long campaign. Better to be safe than sorry was always Caesar's motto when it came to logistics. Then at the beginning of the sixty-seven days of Intercalaris which followed the end of December, this comfortable situation changed; Labienus appeared with two legions of well-trained Roman men and four legions of raw local troops, and proceeded to besiege the camp. In a pitched battle Caesar's legates Pedius and Fabius Maximus would have fared well, but in a siege situation Labienus could use his superior strength to best advantage, and did. Safe was definitely preferable to sorry; besieged or no, Caesar's troops could still eat. Unsure of the water from the stream that ran through the camp, the four penned-up legions dug wells for groundwater and settled down to wait for Caesar and rescue. With the Tenth, the Fifth Alauda and two fresh legions largely made up of bored veterans, Caesar set out from Placentia at the same moment as his two legates in Further Spain came under siege. The distance to Corduba on the Via Domitia was one thousand miles, and it was a typically Caesarean march: it took twenty-seven days at an average of thirty-seven miles a day, assisted by the fact that it was no longer necessary to build a camp each night. Gaul of the Via Domitia was so pacified that even Caesar could see no need for a camp with walls, ditches and palisades. That changed when they came down through the pass from Laminium in Nearer Spain to Oretum in Further Spain, but by then there were only a hundred and fifty miles to go. The moment Caesar appeared, Labienus vanished.

Sextus Pompey was holding the heavily fortified capital of Corduba while older brother Gnaeus took the bulk of the army and went to besiege the town of Ulia, defiantly anti-Republican. But the moment Labienus sent word that Caesar was already marching to take Corduba before Sextus could bring up reinforcements, Gnaeus Pompey packed up his siege to return to Corduba. Just in time! "We have thirteen legions, Caesar eight," said Gnaeus Pompey to Labienus, Attius Varus and Sextus Pompey. "I say we face him now and beat him for once and for all!" "Yes!" cried Sextus. "Yes," said Attius Varus, though less eagerly. "Absolutely not," said Labienus. "Why?" asked Gnaeus Pompey. "Let's finish it, please!" "At the moment Caesar can eat, but winter's on the way, and according to the locals, it's going to be a hard one," Labienus said, tones reasonable. "Leave Caesar to face that winter. Harry him, prevent his foraging, make him use up his supplies." "We outnumber him by five legions," Gnaeus said, unconvinced. "Four of our thirteen are veteran Roman troops, another five are almost as good, which leaves four only of recruits, and they're not all that bad I've heard you say so yourself, Labienus." "What you don't know and I do, Gnaeus Pompeius, is that Caesar also has eight thousand Gallic cavalry. They were some days behind him through the pass, but they're here now. The year's been dry, the grazing isn't wonderful, and if the upper Baetis gets snow this winter, Caesar will lose them. You know Gallic cavalry " He stopped, grunted, looked wry. "No, of course you don't. Well, I do. I worked with them for eight years. Why do you think that Caesar came to prefer Germans? When their precious horses start to suffer, Gallic cavalry ride home. Therefore we leave Caesar alone until spring. Once the horses begin starving, it's goodbye to Caesar's cavalry." The news broke on the two Pompeys as a bitter disappointment, but they were their father's sons; Pompey the Great had never fought unless his forces heavily outnumbered the enemy's. Eight thousand horse meant Caesar outnumbered them. Gnaeus Pompey sighed, banged a frustrated fist on the table. "All right, Labienus, I see your point. We spend the winter denying Caesar any chance to work down out of the Baetis foothills to find snowless grazing."

"Labienus is learning," Caesar remarked to his legates, now augmented by Dolabella, Calvinus, Messala Rufus, Pollio, and his admiral, Gaius Didius. Inevitably, he also had Tiberius Claudius Nero, whose only value was his name; Caesar needed all the old patricians he could find to dignify his cause. "It's going to be hard finding sufficient fodder for the horses. They're such a wretched nuisance on any campaign, but with Labienus in the field, we're going to need them. His Spanish cavalry are excellent, and he has several thousand at least. He can also get more." "What do you intend to do, Caesar?" Quintus Pedius asked. "Sit tight here in the upper Baetis for the moment. Once winter really cracks down, I have a few ideas. First, we have to convince Labienus that his tactics are working." Caesar looked at Quintus Fabius Maximus. "Quintus, I want your junior legates to fill in their idle moments by finding trustworthy men among my centurions, and use them to monitor feelings in my legions. I've sensed no mutinous rumbles, but the days when I believed in my troops are over. Most of the men Ventidius enlisted in Placentia are veterans, and he sifted them thoroughly for malcontents, I know. Be that as it may, everyone keep his ear to the ground." An uncomfortable silence fell. How terrible to realize that Caesar, the soldier's general, thought that way these days! Yet he was right to think that way. Mutiny was insidious. Once the men who manipulated the ranks learned that it was possible, it became a way to control the general. Things military had been in a state of flux since Gaius Marius admitted the propertyless Head Count to the legions, and mutiny was just a new symptom of that state of flux. Caesar would find a solution.

At the beginning of January, calendar and seasons now in perfect step, Caesar implemented one of his ideas when he moved to besiege the town of Ategua, a day's march south of Corduba on the river Salsum. Right into the lion's jaws. Ategua contained a huge amount of food, but more important, it held Labienus's winter fodder for his horses. The weather was bitter, Caesar's march as secret as unexpected; by the time that Gnaeus Pompey found out and moved his troops from Corduba to prevent Ategua's capture, Caesar had circumvallated the town in the style of Alesia: a double ring of fortifications, the inner one surrounding the town, the outer one keeping Gnaeus Pompey's relief force at bay. Caesar's eight legions sat within the ring, while his eight thousand Gallic cavalry harassed Gnaeus Pompey continuously. Titus Labienus, who had been absent on a mission, arrived and looked dourly at Caesar's circumvallation. "You can't assist Ategua or break into the ring, Gnaeus," Labienus said. "All you're doing is losing men to Caesar's cavalry. Withdraw to Corduba. Ategua's a lost cause." When the town fell despite heroic resistance, it was a blow to the Republicans in more ways than one. Not only did Caesar feed his horses, but Labienus now had to move closer to the coast to graze his, and the Spanish locals began to lose faith. Desertions in the Spanish levies increased dramatically.

For Caesar, what ought to have been a great satisfaction was blighted by a letter and a book bucket from Servilia.

I thought you'd get as big a kick out of the enclosed, Caesar, as I did. After all, you're the only other person I know whose loathing of Cato rears as high as Mount Ararat. This gem has been authored by that utter peasant, Cicero, and published, naturally, by Atticus. When I chanced to meet the hypocritical plutocrat who manages to stay on good terms with you and your enemies, I served him a tongue-lashing he won't forget in a hurry. "You're a parasite as well as a hypocrite, Atticus!" I said. "The quintessential middleman who makes all the profits without owning any personal talents. Well, I'm delighted that Caesar's put one of his biggest colonies for the Roman Head Count on your latifundium in Epirus that will teach you to start a business on public land! I hope you rot while you're still alive, and I hope Caesar's poor wreck your latifundium!" I couldn't have found a better way to alarm him than that. Apparently he and Cicero thought they'd deflected your colony to somewhere farther from Atticus's cattle and tanneries than Buthrotum. Now they find out that it's still Buthrotum. Caesar, don't you dare let Atticus talk you out of that site for your colony! Atticus doesn't own the land, he doesn't pay rent on the land, and he deserves everything he gets from you and the Head Count! Publishing this revolting paean of praise for the worst man who ever sat in the Senate! I am livid! When you read Cicero's "Cato," you'll be livid too. Of course my idiot son thinks it's just wonderful it seems he'd written a little pamphlet extolling Uncle Cato, but tore it up after he read Cicero's panegyric. Brutus says he's coming back to Rome as soon as Vibius Pansa arrives to govern Italian Gaul in his place. Honestly, Caesar, where do you find these nobodies? Still, Pansa's rich enough to have married Fufiius Calenus's daughter, so I daresay Pansa will go far. There are a number of your old legates from Gaul in Rome at the moment, from praetor Decimus Brutus to ex-governor Gaius Trebonius. I know that Cleopatra writes to you about four times a day, but I thought you might like a more dispassionate tone from someone else. She's managing to survive, but she's so utterly miserable without you. How dared you tell her it would be a short campaign? Rome won't see you for a year, is my estimate. And why on earth did you put her in that marble mausoleum? The poor creature is permanently frozen! This winter is cold and early ice on the Tiber, snow in Rome already. I gather that the Alexandrian winter is about like late spring in Rome. The little boy fares better, thinks that playing in the snow is the best fun ever invented. Now to gossip. Fulvia is with child by Antonius, looks her usual glowing self. Imagine it! Issue, probably male, for the third of her bully-boy rowdies! Clodius, Curio, and now Antonius. Cicero oh, I cannot get away from that man! married his seventeen-year-old ward, Publilia, the other day. What do you think about that? Disgusting. Read the "Cato." Cicero badly wanted to dedicate it to Brutus, by the by, but Brutus declined this signal honor. Why? Because he knew that if he accepted, I'd murder him.