Colleen McCullough - 1. First Man in Rome

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It was well into April of the calendar year before Marius and Sulla had word that the Germans were packing up and beginning to move out of the lands of the Atuatuci, and another month before Sertorius came in person to report that Boiorix had kept the Germans together as a people sufficiently to ensure his plan was going to be put into effect. The Cimbri and the mixed group led by the Tigurini started off to follow the Rhenus, while the Teutones wandered southeast down the Mosa. "We have to assume that in the autumn the Germans will indeed arrive in three separate divisions on the borders of Italian Gaul," said Marius, breathing heavily. "I'd like to be there in person to greet Boiorix himself when he comes down the Athesis, but it isn't sensible. First, I have to take on the Teutones and render them impotent. Hopefully the Teutones will travel the fastest of the three groups, at least as far as the Druentia, because they don't have any alpine territory to cross until later. If we can beat the Teutones here and do it properly then we ought to have time to cross the Mons Genava Pass and intercept Boiorix and the Cimbri before they actually enter Italian Gaul.'' "You don't think Catulus Caesar can deal with Boior on his own?" asked Manius Aquillius. "No," said Marius flatly. Later, alone with Sulla, he enlarged upon his feelings about his junior colleague's chances against Boiorix; for Quintus Lutatius Catulus was leading his army north to the Athesis as soon as it was trained and equipped. "He'll have about six legions, and he has all spring and summer to get them into condition. But a real general he's not," said Marius. "We must hope Teutobod comes earliest, that we beat Teutobod, cross the Alps in a tearing hurry, and join up with Catulus Caesar before Boiorix reaches Lake Benacus." Sulla raised an eyebrow. "It won't happen that way," he said, voice certain. Marius sighed. "I knew you were going to say that!" "I knew you knew I was going to say that," said Sulla, grinning. "It isn't likely that either of the two divisions traveling without Boiorix himself will make better time than the Cimbri. The trouble is, there's not going to be enough time for you to be in each place at the right moment." "Then I stay here and wait for Teutobod," said Marius, making up his mind. "This army knows every blade of grass and twig of tree between Massilia and Arausio, and the men need a victory badly after two years of inaction. Their chances of victory are very good here. So here I must stay." "I note the 'I,' Gaius Marius," said Sulla gently. "Do you have something else for me to do?" "I do. I'm sorry, Lucius Cornelius, to cheat you of a well-deserved chance to swipe a few Teutones, but I think I must send you to serve Catulus Caesar as his senior legate. He'll stomach you in that role; you're a patrician," said Marius. Bitterly disappointed, Sulla looked down at his hands. ' 'What help can I possibly be when I'm serving in the wrong army?" "I wouldn't worry so much if I didn't see all the symptoms of Silanus, Cassius, Caepio, and Mallius Maximus in my junior consul. But I do, Lucius Cornelius, I do! Catulus Caesar has no grasp either of strategy or of tactics he thinks the gods popped them into his brain when they ordained his high birth, and that when the time comes, they'll be there. But it isn't like that, as you well know!" "Yes, I do," said Sulla. "If Boiorix and Catulus Caesar meet before I can get across Italian Gaul, Catulus Caesar is going to commit some ghastly military blunder, and lose his army. And if he's allowed to do that, I don't see how we can win. The Cimbri are the best led of the three branches, and the most numerous. Added to which, I don't know the lie of the land anywhere in Italian Gaul on the far side of the Padus. If I can beat the Teutones with less than forty thousand men, it's because I know the country." Sulla tried to stare his superior out of countenance, but those eyebrows defeated him. "But what do you expect me to do?" he asked. "Catulus Caesar is wearing the general's cape, not Cornelius Sulla! What do you expect me to do?" Marius's hand went out and closed fast about Sulla's arm above the wrist. "If I knew that, I'd be able to control Catulus Caesar from here," he said. "The fact remains, Lucius Cornelius, that you survived over a year of living among a barbarian enemy as one of them. Your wits are as sharp as your sword, and you use both superbly well. I have no doubt that whatever you might have to do to save Catulus Caesar from himself, you will do." Sulla sucked in a breath. "So my orders are to save his army at all costs?" "At all costs." "Even the cost of Catulus Caesar?" "Even the cost of Catulus Caesar."

Spring wore itself out in a smother of flowers and summer came in as triumphantly as a general on his victory parade, then stretched itself out, hot and dry. Teutobod and his Teutones came steadily down through the lands of the Aedui and into the lands of the Allobroges, who occupied all the area between the upper Rhodanus and the Isara River, many miles to the south. They were warlike, the Allobroges, and had an abiding hatred for Rome and Romans; but the German host had journeyed through their lands three years earlier, and they did not want the Germans as their overlords. So there was hard fighting, and the Teutonic advance slowed down. Marius began to pace the floor of his command house, and wonder how things were with Sulla, now a part of Catulus Caesar's army in Italian Gaul, camped along the Padus. Catulus Caesar had marched up the Via Flaminia at the head of six understrength new legions late in June; the manpower shortage was so acute he could recruit no more. When he got to Bononia on the Via Aemilia, he took the Via Annia to the big manufacturing town of Patavium; this was well to the east of Lake Benacus, but a better route for an army on the march than the side roads and lanes and tracks with which Italian Gaul was mostly provided. From Patavium he marched on one of these poorly kept-up side roads to Verona, and there established his base camp. Thus far Catulus Caesar had done nothing Sulla could fault, yet he understood better now why Marius had transferred him to Italian Gaul and what he had thought at the time was the lesser task. Militarily it might well be yet Marius, Sulla thought, had not mistaken the cut of Catulus Caesar. Superbly aristocratic, arrogant, overconfident, he reminded Sulla vividly of Metellus Numidicus. The trouble was, the theater of war and the enemy Catulus Caesar faced were very much more dangerous than those Metellus Numidicus had faced; and Metellus Numidicus had owned Gaius Marius and Publius Rutilius Rufus as legates, besides harboring the memory of a salutary experience in a pigsty at Numantia. Whereas Catulus Caesar had never encountered a Gaius Marius on his way up the chain of military command; he had served his requisite terms as a cadet and then as a tribune of the soldiers with lesser men engaged in lesser wars Macedonia, Spain. War on a grand scale had always eluded him. His reception of Sulla had not been promising, as he had sorted out his legates before leaving Rome, and when he reached Bononia found Sulla waiting for him with a directive from the commander-in-chief, Gaius Marius, to the effect that Lucius Cornelius Sulla was appointed senior legate and second-in-command. The action was arbitrary and highhanded, but of course Marius had had no choice; Catulus Caesar's manner toward Sulla was freezing, and his conduct obstructive. Only Sulla's birth stood him in good stead, but even that was weakened by his past history of low living. There was also a tiny streak of envy in Catulus Caesar, for in Sulla he saw a man who had not only seen major actions in major theaters, but had also pulled off a brilliant coup in spying on the Germans. Had he only known of Sulla's real role in that spying, he would have been even more mistrustful and suspicious of Sulla than he already was. In fact, Marius had displayed his usual genius in sending Sulla rather than Manius Aquillius, who might also have proven his worth as a watchdog-cum-guardian; for Sulla grated on Catulus Caesar's nerves, rather as if out of the corner of Catulus Caesar's eye he was always conscious that a white pard stalked him yet when he turned to confront the thing, it wasn't there. No senior legate was ever more helpful; no senior legate was ever more willing to take the burdens of day-to-day administration and supervision of the army from a busy general's shoulders. And yet and yet Catulus Caesar knew something was wrong. Why should Gaius Marius have sent this fellow at all, unless he was up to something devious? It was no part of Sulla's plan to settle Catulus Caesar down, allay his fears and suspicions; on the contrary, what Sulla aimed to do was keep Catulus Caesar fearful and suspicious, and thus gain a mental ascendancy over him which when necessary if necessary he could bring to bear. And in the meantime he made it his business to get to know every military tribune and centurion in the army, and a great many of the ranker soldiers as well. Left to his own devices by Catulus Caesar in the matter of routine training and drilling once camp was established near Verona, Sulla became the senior legate everyone below the rank of legate knew, respected, trusted. It was very necessary that this happen, in case he was obliged to eliminate Catulus Caesar. Not that he had any intention of killing or maiming Catulus Caesar; he was enough of a patrician to want to protect his fellow noblemen, even from themselves. Affection for Catulus Caesar he could not feel; affection for that man's class he did.