The Blood of Caesar, page 9
part #2 of Pliny the Younger Series
I drew a deep breath, unwilling to accept my own conclusion, in spite of all the evidence carrying me to it, just as surely as the Tiber carries a boat to the sea. The man had been working in an underground passageway, out of sight of other workmen. From my examination of his body, I concluded that he’d been hit on the head by a brick, and hit hard. If it hadn’t fallen from a great height, as Domitian claimed, then someone struck him with considerable force.
And if that was true, I saw some frightening questions confronting me: Had Domitian killed the man, perhaps with his own hands? Why? Could I trust anything Domitian said? About the memoirs? About not killing his brother?
A slave from the archives met me at the foot of the Palatine and escorted me past the Praetorians there. Even though I had made the journey up these steps once before and returned safely, I felt my breathing growing more labored as I ascended, and not just from the steepness of the hill.
Josephus was waiting for me under the stoa next to the temple of Apollo. He did not invite me into the archives, but took me to a bench near a fountain.
“We can talk more freely out here,” he said, “where there are no bookcases or convenient little nooks to conceal eavesdroppers.”
Our backs were against a solid wall, painted with a scene from one of Caesar’s battles in Gaul, and the bubbling of the fountain would make our conversation impossible to hear unless someone was sitting next to us. A servant left a jar of wine, a jar of water, and two cups on a three-legged table in front of the bench.
I waited until the servant withdrew. Pulling out the pouch, which I had tied to a leather strap around my neck, I showed Josephus the letter. “This is what I need to ask you about.”
“How did you get that?” His voice was steady, but he couldn’t keep his face from betraying his surprise.
“Domitian brought it to me this morning. He said you found it in the archives.”
“Yes, I did. Three days ago.” He poured wine and water in the two cups and moved one toward me.
“Where exactly did you find it?” As illogical as it seemed, I hoped Agrippina’s original diary might be close to where this letter had been kept. Josephus quickly disabused me of that notion.
“Oddly enough, it was in some boxes of Titus’ papers. Domitian sent them over. He said I might find something useful in there pertaining to the war or the fall of Jerusalem.”
I returned the letter to its pouch and slipped it back under my tunic. “But what would a letter from Agrippina to Nero be doing among Titus’ effects?”
“I wondered that myself,” Josephus said, speaking softly and darting his eyes around, even though there was no one near us. “Given the subject matter, I suspect someone found it when Vespasian took power. Nero’s fall was so sudden he had no time to clean out his records. And the three short-lived rulers who came after him weren’t in power long enough even to learn where the archives are.”
I sipped the wine. It was Chian, very rich. “Do you think Vespasian and Titus kept this letter because it worried them?”
Josephus nodded and stroked his beard. “The existence of a rival is the constant worry of any ... tyrant. And if that rival has a stronger claim to power, the worry becomes a nightmare.”
“Were Vespasian and Titus hunting for blood relatives of Nero?”
“I never heard them express such a concern, but I imagine they were ... always vigilant.”
“So it’s likely this letter is genuine.” I touched it like some sort of amulet.
“Funny you should raise that question. It occurred to me immediately when I found it among Titus’ effects. If it had been anywhere else, I don’t think a doubt would have crossed my mind, but Titus had a remarkable skill with a pen. He could copy exactly the way another person shaped his letters. Once, while we were at dinner outside the walls of Jerusalem, he told me to write something in Hebrew. Then, writing in a language he didn’t even know, he copied it so precisely that, had I not seen him do it, I could not have told which was my copy and which was his. He laughed and said, ‘If I don’t follow Vespasian to power, I’ll become the most celebrated forger of all time’.”
“Are you suggesting that Titus might have forged this letter?”
Josephus raised his hands and shrugged. “I’m merely saying he had the skill to do it.”
“But why forge a letter that could undermine his family’s claim to power?”
“He wouldn’t do it for that reason, of course. But he might do it and leave it where Domitian would find it, just to annoy his brother. There was no love lost between them, you know.”
I nodded. Everyone in Rome knew how much Domitian resented his older brother because of the preferential treatment Vespasian bestowed on him. During Titus’ brief reign Domitian conspired against him and talked openly about encouraging the army to revolt. Titus had displayed remarkable restraint toward his troublesome brother. Perhaps too much, if there was any truth to the rumors about Domitian’s role in his death.
“But the seal on the letter is authentic,” I said.
“How do you know that?”
“My chief scribe knows Agrippina’s seal. He has verified this one.”
“Does that necessarily mean she sealed the letter herself?”
The question caught me off-guard, like a throw from an unexpected angle in a game of trigon. “Who else could have?”
“Anyone who had her seal.” Josephus sipped his wine. “Agrippina was murdered at night by a squad of Nero’s guards. In the accounts of her death that I’ve read, I’ve never seen any mention of her seal being destroyed. Someone could have kept it in order to forge documents that would incriminate her friends. That has been known to happen.”
“You make me wonder if we can trust the genuineness of any document.”
“A little skepticism about written documents is always healthy, Gaius Pliny. Some knowledge of history is also useful, as your uncle knew and as your friend Tacitus seems to appreciate. Do you read much history?”
I shook my head. “It doesn’t interest me.”
“Would it interest you to know about the relationship between Titus and Nero’s family.”
“What relationship?”
“Because Vespasian was such a successful general, Titus was raised in Claudius’ house. It was supposed to be an honor for Vespasian’s family, but it also gave Claudius a hostage to insure Vespasian would not turn his army on Rome. Titus was educated alongside Nero and Britannicus, who became his close friend. When Nero poisoned Britannicus, Titus picked up the fatal cup as it fell from Britannicus’ hand and swallowed the last few drops. He hoped by dying with Britannicus he would free his father to overthrow Nero. All he got for his noble sacrifice was two days of indigestion.”
“By the gods! I had never heard that story.”
“I heard it from Titus himself, and I read it in your uncle’s history, the one that continues Aufidius Bassus’ work. There’s a copy in this library, but I’m sure you have one of your own.”
I had the information I’d come for, and I was in no mood for a snide lecture on the deficiencies of my education, so I stood to leave. “You’ve given me a great deal to think about, Flavius Josephus. Thank you for taking the time to see me.”
Josephus remained seated and refilled his cup, with much more wine than water. “I enjoy talking with you, Gaius Pliny. By the way, what do you make of the scribbling on the back of that letter?”
“It looks to me like someone was practicing writing Greek.”
“But not doing it very well, was he?”
“No.” I touched the pouch hanging around my neck again. It felt heavier than when I had climbed to the top of this hill. “Could you make any sense of it?”
“I could not. I suspect it’s not actually Greek. Perhaps some kind of code using Greek letters.”
“But why would Agrippina have written such a thing on the back of a letter she was sending to her son?”
Josephus stroked his beard. “Do we know she wrote it? It could have been written before or after she wrote the letter. Nero had her confined to a house near Naples at that time. Writing material might have been scarce. Perhaps she picked up a scrap.”
“So it could mean nothing.”
Josephus raised his cup in a toast. “Or everything.”
* * * *
As I reached the bottom of the steps a light rain started to fall, making me glad I had come in a litter. I closed the curtains on the side the rain was coming from. My bearers made good time until we reached the Flavian Amphitheater. The rain had brought the shows there to an early end, and the crowd was streaming out like ants from a hill into which a boy has thrust a stick. I felt like a scrap of food being carried along in that swarm as the litter was turned toward the nearby baths of Titus.
“We can’t get through, my lord,” Aeolus, the chief of my bearers, said. “What do you want us to do?”
“Let’s just follow the crowd until we get to that fork ahead. It isn’t the best route, but it will take us home.”
I was about to draw the other curtains when I recognized a man walking past my litter.
“Greetings, Valerius Martial!” I called.
Martial is a young poet whose reputation has risen dramatically in the last few years. I count him among my friends rather than my clients, though not among my closest friends. The linch-pin of our relationship is a woman, but we have mutually pledged to say nothing about her in public. She now lives on a small farm near Nomentum, a few miles northeast of Rome, a farm which I gave Martial two years ago, out of my affection for the woman, not for Martial.
Martial turned toward me in surprise. “Good day, Gaius Pliny, if there can be anything good about such a sodden day.”
“Are you going far? Would you like to ride with me?”
“That’s a welcome offer, if you’re going home. I have business atop the Esquiline myself.” He climbed into the litter and we arranged ourselves at opposite ends and closed the curtains.
“How is everyone at Nomentum?” I asked.
“They are well. I’ve just returned from spending several days out there. It’s wonderful to be able to escape the heat of the city at this time of year. Your generosity is still appreciated.”
“You don’t need to make any further mention of it. Where may I take you?”
“To the house of Marcus Aquilius Regulus, if you’ll pardon me for speaking that name. I’ve been invited to—”
I shook my head. “No explanation is necessary. You’re under no obligation to me.”
The surging crowd brought the litter to a halt. “Brace yourself,” Martial said.
“For what?”
“With this rig you might as well hang out a sign, ‘RICHEST MAN IN THE CROWD.’ Just wait.”
I heard the arguing voices of a man and a woman drawing closer to my litter.
“Off with you!” the man cried. “One like this has no need of a bag of bones like you. He’s got much better at home.”
“Bugger yourself!” a raspy woman’s voice replied. “He wouldn’t feed his dogs with them clumps of scraps you call sausages.”
Martial and I jerked back as the woman shoved her head and shoulders through the curtains. She wore a blonde wig and enough make-up for all the women, slave and free, in my house. The rain was threatening to turn it into a paste. As she bent over to talk to us, her loose gown revealed—deliberately, I was sure—a pair of wrinkled, aging breasts.
“Good afternoon, my lord. What can I do for ... Oh, two of you! Not that I mind, but that’ll be a bit extra.”
As the blood drained from my face, Martial put his hand on the woman’s head to push her away. “Perhaps another time, Grandmother. I’d rather talk to the sausage man.”
The woman stiffened her neck and wouldn’t let Martial dismiss her. “Please, my lord. I’ll do anything you like. With this weather the gents ain’t been hangin’ around long enough to have a little fun. I’ve lost my spot under the arches, and I’ve not ate in near two days.”
“That’s one of the perils of your occupation,” Martial said. “Now step aside and let me talk to this other flesh peddler.”
The drops that started from the woman’s eyes weren’t rain. I reached into my money pouch and pulled out a denarius. “Here,” I said, “get yourself something to eat.”
She snatched the coin so rapaciously I feared she might take one of my fingers with it. “Oh, thank you, my lord! Thank you! I’d be happy to earn it. You just tell me what you’d like.”
“We’d like for you to go away.” Martial gave her another push, this time with his foot.
As the litter began to move again the sausage man stuck his head in and Martial completed his transaction. We resumed our trip, with the litter filled by the aroma of greasy, grilled animal scraps and some spicy sauce. My own diet tends toward vegetables and fish, lighter fare. The combination of the smell and the swaying of the litter as we started uphill soon affected me as though I were on a boat.
“You look a bit green,” Martial said around a mouthful of sausage.
I opened one of the curtains and stuck my head out. “I just need some air.”
“You’d have been a lot sicker if that old whore had climbed all over you.”
When we neared my house I directed my bearers to go on to Regulus’ house, which is nearer the top of the Esquiline than mine. He has bought properties on either side of his and expanded his house so his wife, Sempronia, can have her own wing, giving her the privacy to indulge some of her rather peculiar interests. Everyone in Rome knows their marriage is an arrangement of financial convenience between two greedy, power-mad individuals. Every day prayers and sacrifices are offered that they will not have a son. The city survived Caligula and Nero; no one believes we could survive the monster that would be the son of Regulus and Sempronia.
“You can stop here,” Martial said. “I know you don’t want to risk an encounter with Regulus.”
We were still a block away from Regulus’ front door but in sight of one of his servants’ entrances. As Martial said his farewell, a man stepped out of Regulus’ door and threw the hood of his cloak over his head against the rain. I caught only a quick glimpse of him before he walked away in the opposite direction. Something about him seemed familiar, but I dismissed the notion. Men in hooded cloaks in the rain all tend to look alike.
“Isn’t that your man Glaucon?” Martial asked.
* * * *
When my litter-bearers deposited me back at home I retreated to the garden, the place where I go when I need to collect myself. Much of my early childhood was spent on my uncle’s country estates, where I could walk in the fields and woods. In my teens, when my mother and I began to spend more time in Rome, I found this garden a refuge from the responsibilities for which my uncle was training me. Since his death I had had several more trees planted here, to create as much of the feel of the woods as I could.
The garden had suffered from neglect while I was in Syria. Even the best gardener needs close supervision, and the two slaves Demetrius assigned to the task proved to be unequal to it. I had brought the best topiarius from my Laurentian villa to oversee the recovery of this garden. Thanks to his skill and the ample rain this summer, it was convalescing nicely. Compared to those in my villas at Laurentium or Tuscany, it was small—only twenty paces by thirty—but childhood memories made this a special place.
Paths paved with tufa stone wound their way diagonally across the peristyle, skirting the piscina where Hashep and Dakla liked to play. I followed the one that led to my bedroom at the opposite corner. Apple and pear trees stood in the center of the four sections created by the paths. Boxwoods, carefully pruned into the shapes of mythical creatures, outlined the four sides of the garden. The rose bushes on my right were heavy with blossoms. On my left beds of violets and poppies glistened with rain.
Several of my female slaves were crossing the garden, carrying baskets. They nodded their heads and wished me a good afternoon. I wondered if they were actually working or merely trying to give the appearance. My uncle would occasionally stop one of his slaves and ask just what he or she was doing. He sometimes discovered they were merely walking from one place where they had been unoccupied to another place where they planned to continue in idleness.
After making a circuit of the garden I sat on a marble bench under a trellis with grape vines running over it. Above the bench, in a niche in the rear wall of the house, stood a marble bust of my uncle. A similar memorial of my father sits on a pedestal at the other end of the garden, outside my mother’s bedroom. The right cheek of that bust shows a dark, smooth spot where my mother caresses it each time she walks by. I have no recollection of my father at all. Four years after my uncle’s death, I can still visualize him, although the memory is dimming, the way images in even the most vivid dream fade after we wake.
I studied my uncle’s bust, wishing he could advise me. He had to live for fourteen years under that madman Nero and virtually withdrew from public life during that time, but then he got to enjoy the last years of his life under Vespasian and Titus, two very reasonable men. What made the third member of this family so different? Domitian was worried about Nero returning when he himself acted like a reincarnation of the very man he feared.
There were so many questions I needed answered. In addition to all the questions Domitian had forced on me, I now had to wonder why a slave of mine was leaving Regulus’ house when I had not sent him there. Was my scribe, a man who saw all of my correspondence and private papers, one of Regulus’ spies?
Images—of Domitian in my tablinum, of Domitian and Regulus standing over Maxentius’ body, and of Glaucon leaving Regulus’ house—raced through my mind until they blurred together like the spokes of a fast-moving chariot wheel. Closing my eyes, I tried to hear my uncle’s voice, deep and a little raspy because of his persistent breathing problems. But all I heard was the rustle of the leaves on the trellis above my head. Perhaps I should take that as the voice of a god. Shrines have been built around just such ethereal phenomena.
