Caesar (76 page)

At the end of October, Caesar arrived in Placentia with his army, secure in the knowledge that he was now Dictator. The governor of Italian Gaul, Marcus Crassus Junior, met him there.“ All's well, save for Gaius Antonius's fiasco in Illyricum,” said Crassus, and sighed. “I wish I could say that was a freak mischance, but I can't. Why on earth he chose to base himself on an island, I don't know. And the local people were so supportive! They adore you, therefore any legate of yours has to be worthwhile. Would you believe that a group of them built a raft and tried to help fend Octavius's fleet off? They hadn't anything beyond spears and stones—no ballistae, no catapultae. All day they took what Octavius threw at them. When night came, they committed suicide rather than fall into enemy hands.” Caesar and his legates listened grimly.“ I wish,” said Caesar savagely, “that we Romans didn't hold the family in such reverence! I knew Gaius Antonius would manage to stuff up whatever command I gave him! The pity of it is that wherever I sent him, things would have gone the same way. Well, I can bear losing him. Curio is a tragedy.”

“We've lost Africa, certainly,” said Trebonius.“ And will have to do without Africa until Pompeius is beaten.”

“His navy is going to be a nuisance, I predict,” said Fabius.“ Yes,” said Caesar, tight-lipped. “It's time Rome admitted that the best ships are all built at the eastern end of Our Sea. Where Pompeius is obtaining his fleets, while we're at the mercy of Italians and Spaniards. I took every ship Ahenobarbus left behind at Massilia, but the Massiliotes don't build much better than the shipyards in Narbo, Genua and Pisae. Or Novum Carthago.”

“The Liburnians of Illyricum build a beautiful little galley,” said Crassus. “Very fast.”

“I know. Unfortunately they've done it in the past to equip pirates; it's not a well-organized industry.” Caesar shrugged. “Well, we shall see. At least we're aware of our deficiencies.” He looked at Marcus Crassus enquiringly. “What of preparations to give all Italian Gauls the full citizenship?”

“Just about done, Caesar. I appreciate your sending me Lucius Rubrius. He conducted a brilliant census.”

“Will I be able to legislate it when I'm next in Rome?”

“Give us another month, and yes.”

“That's excellent, Crassus. I've put my Lucius Roscius onto the Roman end, which means I ought to be able to have the whole matter finished by the end of the year. They've waited since the Italian War for their citizenships, and it's twenty years since I first gave them my word that I'd enfranchise them. Yes, high time.”

There were eight legions encamped around Placentia—the new Sixth, the Seventh, Eighth, Ninth, Tenth, Eleventh, Twelfth and Thirteenth. The bulk of Caesar's Gallic army. The men of the Seventh, Eighth, Ninth and Tenth had been under the Eagles now for ten years, and were at the peak of their fighting ability; in age they were between twenty-seven and twenty-eight, and had been enlisted in Italian Gaul. The Eleventh and Twelfth were a little younger, and the Thirteenth, whose men were only twenty-one years old, was a mere baby by comparison. The Sixth, recruited earlier in this year and still unblooded, was a legion of shavelings looking very forward to some real fighting. As Caesar had remarked to Gaius Trebonius, his was an army composed of Italian Gauls, many of whom were from the far side of the Padus. Well, shortly these men could no longer be dismissed as non-citizens by certain senatorial fools. Recruitment was flourishing as Italian Gaul across the Padus realized that its forty-year battle to attain the full citizenship was over, and Caesar was its hero. He wanted twelve legions to take east to fight Pompey; Mamurra, Ventidius and their staff had labored to achieve Caesar's figure, and informed him when he reached Placentia that there would indeed be a Fifteenth, Sixteenth, Seventeenth and Eighteenth by the time he was ready to ship them to Brundisium. Serene in the knowledge that his veteran troops belonged to him completely, Caesar went about the business of a governor. He paid a special visit to his colony at Novum Comum, where Marcus Marcellus had ordered a citizen flogged two years before, and personally paid the man compensation at a public meeting in the town marketplace. From there he visited the people of Marius's old colony at Eporedia, dropped in to see how things were at the big and thriving town of Cremona, and toyed with the idea of going further east along the foothills of the Alps to give out the news of impending citizenship. This was a great coup, for it meant that the large population still disenfranchised in Italian Gaul would, when citizens, come into his clientship. A courier came from Gaius Trebonius in Placentia, demanding that Caesar return there immediately.“ Trouble,” said Trebonius curtly when Caesar arrived.“ What kind of trouble?”

“The Ninth is disaffected.” For the first time in their long association, Trebonius saw the General bereft of words, stunned.“ It can't be,” he said slowly. “Not my boys!”

“I'm afraid it is.”

“Why?”

“I'd rather they told you. There's a deputation coming here this afternoon.” It consisted of the Ninth's senior centurions, and was led by the chief centurion of the Seventh Cohort, one Quintus Carfulenus. A Picentine, not an Italian Gaul. Perhaps, thought Caesar, face flinty, Carfulenus was in the clientele of Pompey. If so, he gave no sign of it. The General received the men, ten in all, clad in full armor and seated in his curule chair; on his head he wore a chaplet of oak leaves to remind them—but how could the Ninth forget?—that he too was no mean soldier in the front line.“ What is this?” he asked.“ We're fed up,” said Carfulenus. Caesar looked not at Carfulenus but at his primipilus centurion, Sextus Cloatius, and his pilus prior centurion, Lucius Aponius. Two good men, yet very ill at ease; Carfulenus, a hard-bitten man of forty, was ten years their senior in age. Not satisfactory, thought Caesar, seeing an unsuspected problem for the first time. He would have to order his legates to examine the pecking order in their legions' centurions. Quintus Carfulenus, a senior man yet eleven grades junior to Cloatius and Aponius, was the dominant influence in this legion, under the command of Sulpicius Rufus. Behind Caesar's set face and cold eyes a turmoil seethed; of grief, awful anger, incredulity. He had never believed this could happen to him— never believed for one moment that any of his beloved boys would cease to love him, plot to bring him down. Not a humbling experience, to find that his confidence had been misplaced; rather a disillusionment of huge proportions, in the wake of which roared an iron determination to reverse the process, to make the Ninth his again, to strike Carfulenus and any who genuinely felt as he did down to the dust. Literally, dust. Dead.“ What are you fed up with, Carfulenus?” he asked.“ This war. Or better say, this non-war. No fighting worth a lead denarius. I mean, that's what soldiering is all about. The fighting. The plunder. But so far all we've done is march until we drop, freeze in wet tents, and go hungry.”

“You've done that for years in Gallia Comata.”

“Why, that's exactly the point, General. We've done it for years in Gallia Comata. And that war's over. Been over for near two years. But where's the triumph, eh? When are we going to march in your triumph? When are we going to be discharged to a nice little plot of good land with our share of the spoils in our own purses and our legion savings accounts cashed in?”

“Do you doubt my word that you'll march in my triumph?” Carfulenus drew a breath; he was truculent and on his guard, but not quite sure of himself. “Yes, General, we do.”

“And what leads you to that conclusion?”

“We think you're deliberately stalling, General. We think you're trying to wriggle out of paying us our due. That you're going to take us to the other end of the world and leave us there. This civil war is a farce. We don't believe it's real.” Caesar stretched his legs out and looked at his feet, no expression on his face. Then the unsettling eyes came up and stared into the eyes of Carfulenus, who moved uncomfortably; they shifted to Cloatius, who looked agonized, then to Aponius, clearly wishing he was somewhere else, and slowly, horribly, at each of the other seven men.“ What are you going to do if I tell you that you're marching for Brundisium within a few days?”

“Simple,” said Carfulenus, gaining assurance. “We won't go to Brundisium. The Ninth won't march a step. We want to be paid out and discharged here in Placentia, and we'd like our land around Verona. Though I want my piece in Picenum.”

“Thank you for your time, Carfulenus, Cloatius, Aponius, Munatius, Considius, Apicius, Scaptius, Vettius, Minicius, Pusio,” said Caesar, demonstrating that he knew the name of every member of the delegation. He didn't rise; he nodded. “You may go.” Trebonius and Sulpicius, who had witnessed this extraordinary interview, stood without a word to say, sensing the gathering of some terrible storm but unable to divine the form it was going to take. Odd, that such control, such lack of emotion, could give off emanations of impending doom. Caesar was angry, yes. But he was also shattered. And that never happened to Caesar. How would he cope with it? What might he do?“ Trebonius, summon the Ninth to an assembly on, the parade ground at dawn tomorrow. Have the First Cohort of every other legion present as well. I want my whole army to participate in this affair, even if only as onlookers,” said Caesar. He looked at Sulpicius. “Rufus, there's something very wrong with a legion whose two most senior centurions are dominated by a man of lower rank. Take the military tribunes who are liked by the rankers and start investigating who in the Ninth among the centurions has the gumption and the natural authority to fulfill the proper roles of primipilus and pilus prior. Cloatius and Aponius are nothings.” It became Trebonius's turn again. “Gaius, the legates in command of my other legions will have to undertake the same sort of investigation. Look for troublemakers. Look for centurions who are dominating more senior men. I want the army swept from top to tail.” At dawn the five thousand-odd men of the Ninth Legion were joined on the parade ground by the six hundred men of the First Cohort of seven other legions, a total of four thousand two hundred extra men. To speak to ten thousand men was feasible, particularly for Caesar, who had worked out his technique while campaigning in Further Spain as propraetor thirteen years ago. Specially chosen clerks with stentorian voices were positioned at intervals through the assembled soldiers. Those close enough to hear Caesar repeated what he said three words behind him; the next wave repeated what they heard, and so on through the crowd. Few speakers could do it, for the shouted repeats formed a colossal echo and made it extremely difficult to keep going against what had already been said. By making his mind tune the echoes out, Caesar could do it. The Ninth was apprehensive yet determined. When Caesar mounted the dais in full armor he scanned the faces, which didn't blur with distance; his eyes, thank the Gods, were still keen both near and far. A thought popped into his head having nothing to do with legionary discontent: what were Pompeius's eyes like these days? Sulla's eyes had gone, and made him mighty touchy. Things happened to eyes in middle age—look at Cicero. Though he had often wept at assemblies, today there were no tears. The General stood with feet apart and hands by his sides, his corona civica on his head, the scarlet cloak of his high estate attached to the shoulders of his beautifully worked silver cuirass. No helmet. His legates stood to either side of him on the dais, his military tribunes in two groups on either side below the dais.“ I am here to rectify a disgrace,” he cried in the high, carrying voice he had found went further than his naturally deep tones. “One of my legions is mutinous. You see it here in its entirety, representatives of my other legions. The Ninth.” No one murmured in surprise; word got round, even when men were quartered in different camps.“ The Ninth! Veterans of the whole war in Gallia Comata, a legion whose standards groan with the weight of awards for valor, whose Eagle has been wreathed with laurel a dozen times, whose men I have always called my boys. But the Ninth has mutinied. Its men are no longer my boys. They are rabble, stirred and turned against me by demagogues in the guise of centurions. Centurions! What would those two magnificent centurions Titus Pullo and Lucius Vorenus call these shabby men who have replaced them at the head of the Ninth?” Caesar's right hand went out, pointed close by. “See them, men of the Ninth? Titus Pullo and Lucius Vorenus! Gone to the honorable duty of training other centurions here in Placentia, but present today to weep at their old legion's dishonor. See their tears? They weep for you! But I cannot. I am too filled with contempt, too consumed by anger. The Ninth has broken my perfect record; I can no longer say no legion of mine has ever mutinied.” He didn't move. The hands remained by his sides.“ Representatives of my other legions, I have called you together to witness what I will do to the men of the Ninth. They have informed me that they will not move from Placentia, that they wish to be discharged here and now, paid out and paid up, including their share of the spoils of a nine-year war. Well, they can have their discharge—but it will not be an honorable one! Their share of the spoils of that nine-year war will be divided up among my faithful legions. They will have no land, and I will strip every last one of them of his citizenship! I am the Dictator of Rome. My imperium outranks the imperium of the consuls, of the governors. But I am no Sulla. I will not abuse the power inherent in the dictatorship. What I do here today is not an abuse of that power. It is the just and rational decision of a commander-in-chief whose soldiers have mutinied.” I tolerate much. I don't care if my legionaries stink of perfume and ram each other up the arse, provided they fight like wildcats and remain utterly loyal to me! But the men of the Ninth are disloyal. The men of the Ninth have accused me of deliberately cheating them of their entitlements. Accused me! Gaius Julius Caesar! Their commander-in-chief for ten long years! My word isn't good enough for the Ninth! The Ninth has mutinied!"

His voice swelled; he roared, something he never did in a soldier assembly. “I WILL NOT TOLERATE MUTINY! Do you hear me? I WILL NOT TOLERATE MUTINY! Mutiny is the worst crime soldiers can commit! Mutiny is high treason! And I will treat the mutiny of the Ninth as high treason! I will strip its men of their rights, their entitlements, and their citizenships! And I will decimate!”