Colleen McCullough - 3. Fortune's Favorites

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In Miletus he learned how Verres had stolen the finest wools and tapestries and rugs the city owned, and advised the ethnarch to lodge a complaint with the Senate in Rome. "Though," he said, preparing to embark for the voyage to Halicarnassus, "you were lucky he didn't pilfer your art and despoil your temples as well. That was what he did elsewhere." The ship he had hired in Byzantium was a neat enough cargo vessel of some forty oars, high in the poop where the two great rudder oars resided, and having a cabin for his use on the deck amidships. Thirty assorted mules and horses including the Nesaean and his own beloved Toes were accommodated in stalls between his cabin and the poop. As they never sailed more than fifty miles without putting in at another port, readying to sail again was something of a fussy ordeal as horses and mules were brought back on board and settled down. Miletus was no different from Smyrna, Pitane, half a dozen earlier ports of call; everyone in the harborside area knew that this particular ship was on hire to a Roman senator, and everyone was hugely interested. Look, there he was! The lovely young man in the pristine toga who walked as if he owned the world! Well, and didn't he own the world? He was a Roman senator. Of course the lesser lights in his retinue contributed to the talk, so that all the habitual loiterers around the Miletus harborfront knew that he was a high aristocrat, a brilliant man, and single handedly responsible for persuading King Nicomedes of Bithynia to leave his realm to Rome when he died. Little wonder then that Caesar himself was always glad when the gangplanks were away, the anchors up, and the ship cast off to put out to sea again. But it was a beautiful day and the water was calm, a good breeze blew to fill the great linen sail and spare the oarsmen, and Halicarnassus, the captain assured Caesar as they stood together on the poop, would be reached on the following day. Some seven or eight miles down the coast, the tip of a promontory jutted into the sea; Caesar's ship sailed placidly between it and a looming island. "Pharmacussa," said the captain, pointing to the island. They passed it close inshore with Iasus on the mainland much further away, on a course which would skirt the next peninsula on that dissected coast. A very small place, Pharmacussa was shaped like a lopsided pair of woman's breasts, the southernmost mound being the bigger of the two. "Does anyone live there?" asked Caesar idly. "Not even a shepherd and his sheep." The island had almost slid by when a low, sleek war galley emerged from behind the bigger breast, moving very fast, and on a course to intercept Caesar's ship. "Pirates!" squawked the captain, face white. Caesar, who had turned his head to look down their wake, nodded. "Yes, and another galley coming up our rear. How many men aboard the one in front?'' he asked. "Fighting men? At least a hundred, armed to the teeth." "And on the one behind?" The captain craned his neck. "It's a bigger ship. Perhaps one hundred and fifty." "Then you do not recommend that we resist." "Ye gods, Senator, no!" the man gasped. "They would kill us as soon as look at us! We must hope they're looking for a ransom, because they know from our lie in the water that we're not carrying cargo." "Do you mean they're aware there's someone aboard us who will fetch a good ransom?" "They know everything, Senator! They have spies in every port around the Aegean. It's my guess the spies rowed out from Miletus yesterday with a description of my vessel and the news that she carries a Roman senator." "Are the pirates based on Pharmacussa, then?" No, Senator. It would be too easy for Miletus and Priene to scour them out. They've just been hiding there for a few days on the lookout for a likely victim. It's never necessary to wait more than a few days. Something juicy always comes along. We're unlucky. This being winter and usually stormy, I'd hoped to escape pirates. But the weather has been too good, alas!" "What will they do with us?" "Take us back to their base and wait for the ransom." "Whereabouts is their base likely to be?" "Lycia, probably. Somewhere between Patara and Myra." "Quite a long way from here." "Several days' sail." "Why so far away?" "It's absolutely safe there a haven for pirates! Hundreds of hidden coves and valleys there are at least thirty big pirate settlements in the area." Caesar looked unperturbed, though the two galleys were now closing on his ship very quickly; he could see the armed men lining each gunwale, and hear their shouts. "What's to stop me sailing back with a fleet after I've been ransomed and capturing the lot of them?'' "You'd never find the right cove, Senator. There are hundreds, and they all look exactly the same. A bit like the old Knossus labyrinth, only linear rather than square.'' Summoning his body servant, Caesar asked calmly for his toga, and when the terrified man came back bearing an off white armful, Caesar stood while he draped it. Burgundus appeared. "Do we fight, Caesar?" "No, of course not. It's one thing to fight when the odds are even remotely favorable, quite another when the odds indicate that to fight is suicide. We'll go tamely, Burgundus. Hear me?" "I hear." Then make sure you tell everyone I want no foolhardy heroes." Back he turned to the captain. "So I'd never locate the right cove again, eh?" "Never, Senator, believe me. Many have tried." In Rome we were led to believe Publius Servilius Vatia got rid of the pirates when he conquered the Isauri. He was even let call himself Vatia Isauricus, so great was his campaign." "Pirates are like swarming insects, Caesar. Smoke them out all you like, but as soon as the air is clear again, they're back." "I see. Then when Vatia put ooops, Vatia Isauricus! put an end to the reign of King Zenicetes of the pirates, he only scraped the scum off the surface. Is that correct, Captain?" "Yes and no. King Zenicetes was just one pirate chieftain. As for the Isauri" the captain shrugged "none of us who sail these waters could ever understand why a great Roman general went to war against an inland tribe of Pisidian savages thinking he was striking a blow at piracy! Perhaps a few Isauric grandsons have joined the pirates, but the Isauri are too far from the sea to be concerned with piracy and pirates." Both warships were now alongside, and men were pouring on board the merchantman. "Ah! Here comes the leader," said Caesar coolly. A tall, youngish man clad in a Tyrian purple tunic heavily embroidered with gold pushed his way between the milling hordes on the deck and mounted the plank steps to the poop. He was not armed, nor did he look at all martial. "Good day to you," said Caesar. Am I mistaken in thinking that you are the Roman senator Gaius Julius Caesar, winner of the Civic Crown?'' "No, you are not mistaken." The pirate chieftain's light green eyes narrowed; he put a manicured hand up to his carefully curled yellow hair. "You're very collected, Senator," the pirate said, his Greek indicating that perhaps he came from one of the isles of the Sporades. "I see no point in being anything else," said Caesar, lifting his brows. "I presume you will allow me to ransom myself and my people, so I have little to fear." "That's true. But it doesn't stop my captives from shitting themselves in terror." "Not this captive!" "Well, you're a war hero." "What happens now er I didn't quite catch the name?" "Polygonus." The pirate turned to look at his men, who had gathered the merchantman's crew into one group and Caesar's twenty attendants into another. Like their chief, the rest of the pirates were dandies; some sported wigs, some used hot tongs to produce rolling curls in their long locks, some were painted like whores, some preferred exquisitely close shaves and the masculine look, and all were very well dressed. What happens now?'' Caesar repeated. Your crew is put aboard my ship, I put a crew of my own men at the oars of your ship, and we all row south as fast as we can, Senator. By sunset we'll be off Cnidus, but we'll keep on going. Three days from now you'll be safe in my home, where you will live as my guest until your ransom is paid." "Won't it be easier to allow some of my servants to leave the ship here? A lighter could take them back to Miletus that is a rich city, it ought not to have too much difficulty raising my ransom. How much is my ransom, by the way?" The chieftain ignored the second question for the moment; he shook his head emphatically. "No, we've had our last ransom from Miletus for a while. We distribute the burden around because sometimes the ransomed men are slow to pay it back to whichever community scraped it together. It's the turn of Xanthus and Patara Lycia. So we'll let you send your servants off when we get to Patara." Polygonus tossed his head to make his curls float. "As for the sum twenty silver talents." Caesar reared back in horror. "Twenty silver talents?" he cried, outraged. "Is that all I'm worth?" "It's the going rate for senators, all pirates have agreed. You're too young to be a magistrate." "I am Gaius Julius Caesar!" said the captive haughtily. "Clearly, fellow, you fail to understand! I am not only a patrician, I am also a Julian! And what does being a Julian mean, you ask? It means that I am descended from the goddess Aphrodite through her son, Aeneas. I come from consular stock, and I will be consul in my year. I am not a mere senator, fellow! I am the winner of a Civic Crown I speak in the House I sit on the middle tier and when I enter the House every man including consulars and censors! must rise to his feet and applaud me. Twenty silver talents? I am worthy fifty silver talents!" Polygonus had listened fascinated to all this; his captives were never like this one! So sure of himself, so unafraid, so arrogant! Yet there was something in the handsome face Polygonus liked could that be a twinkle in the eyes? Was this Gaius Julius Caesar mocking him? But why should he mock in a way which meant he was going to have to pay back more than double his proper ransom? He was serious he had to be serious! However ... Surely that was a twinkle in his eyes! "All right, Your Majesty, fifty silver talents it is!" said Polygonus, his own eyes twinkling. "That's better," said Caesar. And turned his back.