The Ides of March (2 page)

‘Then surround yourself with men you trust. Arrange things so that, if it should happen, someone is there to cover you with a toga and there is a closed litter ready to take you where no one can see you. I will be waiting there for you. When the crisis has passed you will be able to return to what you were doing as if nothing had happened. That’s all I can say.’

Caesar nodded. ‘It’s good advice. You can go now, Antistius. I feel better.’

‘I’d rather stay.’

‘No. You must have other business to attend to. Send in Silius with my breakfast. I’ll have something to eat.’

Antistius nodded. ‘As you wish. Along with your breakfast, Silius will bring you a potion I’ll mix for you now. It will help to thin the humours of your spleen. That should provide some relief. Now, lie back and give those stiff limbs a little rest. When you feel stronger, a hot bath and a massage would be in order.’

There was no answer from Caesar and Antistius walked out with a sigh.

H
E FOUND
Calpurnia in the atrium, sitting in an armchair. She was still wearing her nightgown and she had not bathed or eaten. The signs of strain were evident on her face and in her posture. When she saw Antistius heading for the kitchen, she followed him.

‘Well?’ she asked. ‘What do you think?’

‘There’s nothing new, but unfortunately I have the impression that the disease has taken hold. For the moment all we can do is seek to limit its effects. However, we can always hope that it will go away as suddenly as it started. Remember that Caesar is a man of great resources.’

‘No man can weather so many storms of the body and spirit without suffering lasting damage. The past ten years have been as intense as ten lives and they’ve taken their toll. Caesar is fiftysix years old, Antistius, and yet he intends to embark on another expedition in the East. Against the Parthians.’

As the doctor was crushing seeds in a mortar and then setting them to boil on the stove, Calpurnia sat down. A maidservant began preparing her usual breakfast, an egg cooked under the embers and some toasted bread.

‘And that woman is only making the situation worse.’

Antistius didn’t need to ask to whom she was referring. Cleopatra VII, the Queen of Egypt, was living in Caesar’s villa on the far side of the Tiber. He fell silent, knowing what would happen if he expressed any opinion at all on the subject. Cleopatra had even brought her child to the villa with her, a boy she’d dared to call Ptolemy Caesar.

‘That whore,’ Calpurnia continued, realizing that Antistius was not going to pick up on her invitation to join the conversation. ‘I hope she drops dead. I’ve even had the evil eye put on her, but who knows what antidotes she’s found to protect herself, and what philtres she’s given my husband to drink to keep him bound to her.’

Antistius couldn’t help but speak. ‘My lady, any middle-aged man would be flattered to conceive a child with a beautiful woman in the bloom of youth. It makes him feel young, vigorous . . .’

Here his voice dropped off and he bit his tongue: not exactly the most diplomatic of things to tell a woman who had never been able to have children herself.

‘Forgive me,’ he added hastily. ‘This is really no affair of mine. What’s more, Caesar doesn’t need to feel vigorous. He is vigorous. I’ve been a doctor my whole life and I’ve yet to see another man of such a hardy constitution.’

‘Never mind. I’m used to hearing such things,’ replied Calpurnia. ‘What worries me is the enormous burden he is carrying. He can’t keep this up much longer and I’m sure there are many men out there who would like nothing better than to see him on his knees. Many of those who feign friendship today would turn into bloodthirsty beasts tomorrow. I trust no one, you understand? Nobody.’

‘Yes, my lady, I do,’ replied the doctor.

He took his potion off the flame, filtered it and poured it into a cup that he set on the tray where the cook was arranging Caesar’s breakfast: fava beans, cheese and flatbread with olive oil.

Silius entered and took only the potion.

‘Does he not want breakfast now?’ asked Calpurnia.

‘No. I’ve just spoken to him and he’s changed his mind. He no longer wants to eat. He’s gone out on to the terrace.’

‘Y
OUR POTION
, Caesar.’

Caesar had his back to Silius, his hands on the balustrade. He was facing the Aventine Hill, from where a flock of starlings had risen like a dark cloud flying towards the Tiber.

He turned slowly, as if he’d only just realized that Silius was present. He took the steaming potion and set it on the parapet. After a few moments he lifted it to his lips and took a sip.

‘Where is Publius Sextius?’ he asked after he’d swallowed.

‘Centurion Publius Sextius is in Modena, on your orders, Caesar.’

‘Yes, yes, I know that, but according to my calculations he should be heading back by now. Has he sent a message?’

‘No, not that I know of.’

‘If a letter arrives from him, inform me immediately, at any time of day or night and no matter what I am doing.’

‘You’re expected shortly at the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus at the Capitol to offer a sacrifice. If you’re feeling strong enough, of course.’

Caesar took another sip of the potion and looked Silius in the eye.

‘Of course. At times I forget I’m the High Priest of Rome and yet it should be my foremost concern . . . No bath and no massage, then.’

‘That depends on you, Caesar,’ replied Silius.

‘Remember: wake me, even if I’m sleeping.’

‘Sorry?’

‘If a message from Sextius arrives.’

‘Of course. Don’t worry.’

‘It should be the first of my concerns . . .’ he repeated, as if talking to himself.

Silius looked at him with a puzzled expression, trying to follow Caesar’s meandering thoughts.

‘. . . my priesthood, that is. And yet I’ve never believed that the gods care a whit about us. Why should they?’

‘It’s the first time I’ve heard you say such a thing. What are you thinking of, commander?’

‘Don’t you know why we burn victims on the altar day after day? It’s so that the gods will see the smoke rising from our cities and remember not to trample them when they walk invisibly on the earth. Otherwise they would crush us as easily as we crush an ant.’

‘What an interesting analogy, sir,’ replied Silius. ‘Antistius said to drink it all,’ he added, pointing.

Caesar picked up the cup again and downed the potion.

‘In fact, there is no smoke so black or so dense as that of scorched flesh. Believe me, I know.’

Silius knew as well. And he knew what his commander was thinking of. Silius had been at his side at Pharsalus and at Alexandria, in Africa and in Spain. Ever since Caesar had crossed the Rubicon, the bodies he’d seen burning had been those not of uncivilized enemies but of citizens like himself. The bodies of Roman citizens. Burned into Silius’s memory were images of the battlefield of Pharsalus covered with the corpses of fifteen thousand fellow citizens, including knights, senators, former magistrates. From his horse, Caesar had scanned the field of slaughter with the eyes of a hawk. He had said, ‘It’s what they asked for,’ but in a low voice, as if talking to himself, as if to clear his conscience.

It was Caesar who shook Silius from his thoughts this time, saying, ‘Come now. They’re waiting for us and I still have to get ready.’

They went down together and Silius helped Caesar to wash and dress.

‘Shall I call for the litter?’ Silius asked.

‘No. We’ll go on foot. The stroll will do me good.’

‘Then I’ll call your guard.’

‘No, don’t bother. Actually, I’m thinking I should get rid of them.’

‘Of your personal guard? Why would you do that?’

‘I don’t like the idea of going around my own city with bodyguards. That’s what tyrants do.’

Silius regarded him with amazement but said nothing. He blamed Caesar’s strange attitude and behaviour on his illness. Could the disease be influencing the way he thought?

‘After all,’ Caesar continued, ‘the senators have approved a
senatus consultum
in which they swear to shield me with their own bodies if my person should be threatened. What better defence could I ask for?’

Silius was dumbfounded. He couldn’t believe what he was hearing and was already thinking of how to prevent Caesar from taking such a foolhardy decision. He asked to be excused, went down to the ground floor and instructed several of the servants to follow them at a distance with a litter.

T
HEY WALKED
down the Sacred Way, passing in front of the Temple of Vesta and the basilica that Caesar was building with the spoils of his campaign against the Gauls. Although he had dedicated it two years before, driven by a sense of urgency even then, the work had not yet been completed.

It was a magnificent structure nonetheless, clad in precious marble, with a wide central nave and two aisles. The basilica was one of the gifts that Caesar had offered the city, but certainly not the last. Since his return from Alexandria, Rome no longer satisfied him. The city had grown in a disorderly, unharmonious way, building upon building, creating an impression of unseemly clutter. The imposing roads, majestic palaces and extraordinary monuments of Alexandria, which excited the admiration of visitors from every part of the world, were utterly lacking in Rome.

The Forum to their right was beginning to fill up with people, but no one noticed Caesar because he’d pulled his toga over his head and his face wasn’t visible. They passed in front of the Temple of Saturn, the god who had ruled during the Age of Gold, back when men were happy with what the soil and their flocks offered them. Back when men lived in simple wooden huts, sleeping soundly after a modest meal shared around the with their wives and children, before waking to birdsong.

Silius found himself thinking that the age destiny had reserved for him was quite different: an age of ferocity and greed, of incessant conflict, civil strife, the slaughter of Romans by other Romans, citizens banished, exiled, sentenced to death. A violent age, an age of war and betrayal. And hatred between brothers was the fiercest and most implacable hatred of all, Silius mused, as he glanced over at Caesar’s face, which was carved by the shadows of the toga that fell at the sides of his head. He wondered whether this man might truly be the founder of a new age. An age in which these seemingly endless hostilities would run their course and open on to an era of peace so lasting that it would make men forget how much blood had been spilled and how tenaciously their rancour had gripped them. He raised his eyes to the grand temple which dominated the city from the top of the Capitol.

The sky was dark.

2

Romae, in via Sacra, a.d. VIII Id. Mart., hora secunda

Rome, the Sacred Way, 8 March, seven a.m.

A
MASSIVE BATTLE STEED
came forth from the main gate of Alesia, its proud rider dressed in gleaming armour and wearing the
phalera
he had been awarded for bravery and valour.

Caesar waited, cloaked in red, seated on the magistrate’s chair outside the camp fortifications, surrounded by his officers and legionaries.

The city bastions were packed with a mute, unbelieving crowd, who watched as their supreme leader went forth to give himself up.

The great warrior rode his horse once around the man who had defeated him, then dismounted and cast off his weapons. He threw them at Caesar’s feet and sat down on the bare ground. By handing himself over to the Romans, he hoped to spare the city and the people he had ruled.

A
GAIN
: one of those flashes of memory that struck him with such force and frightening realism that he could not distinguish it from the physical world around him. He started when he heard Silius’s voice.

‘Are you not feeling well, commander?’

Caesar turned towards the Tullian prison. ‘Why did I have Vercingetorix killed?’ he murmured.

‘What are you saying, commander? It’s the law, everyone knows that. A defeated enemy is paraded behind the triumphal chariot and then strangled. That’s the way it’s always been.’

‘But it’s barbaric. Traditions . . . should preserve values worth preserving, not be a throwback to archaic, primitive times and ferocious customs.’

‘I wouldn’t say our times were any better.’

‘No, they’re not.’

‘Commander, only one rule holds: “
Vae victis!
” Woe to the vanquished. One must seek victory, always, as long as it is possible.’

‘I just saw his ghost. Emaciated, with sunken eyes and a long beard. Madness in his eyes.’

‘A man in your position should never be touched by remorse. Other men are held accountable for their actions, but you answer to no one, Caesar. You did what you felt was necessary. That’s all. That’s all there is to it. Remember when the battle seemed lost in Spain, at Munda? We were ready to die. Vercingetorix could have done the same and spared himself such an ignominious end. But deliberately taking your own life requires much more courage than slaying your enemies in the heat of battle.’

Without replying, Caesar continued on.

Silius hung back for a moment, watching as Caesar mounted the last ramp leading to the Capitol. His stride was energetic, resolute – a soldier’s stride. He had weathered another attack and, if anything, seemed more vigorous for it. Perhaps even now he was convincing himself that he could overcome this illness, just as he had overcome everyone and everything that had ever blocked his path.

The temple was open and the statue of Jupiter was visible inside. In reality only the head could be seen at first, but as one walked up the ramp, the perspective changed and, little by little, the god revealed his chest, his arms, his groin, his knees. It was an ancient statue, its features harsh and angular, its beard stiff. An effigy designed to be frightening, or at least to inspire awe. Jupiter was flanked, in the chambers on either side, by statues of Minerva and Juno.

The two men approached the altar, where a small crowd was waiting. Some of them were senators, including several of Caesar’s friends. Others, like Antony, were missing. His duties as consul must have been occupying him elsewhere.