Patrick: Son of Ireland

  The clerics—no fewer than five in our party—occupied themselves morning to night with discussions of theology which wearied me to the bone. I often overheard their disputatious questions: Which were more pernicious—the professions of Manichaeanism, or those of the Gnostics? Was Pelagianism a new form of Gnosticism, or was it merely Arianism in disguise? Was the Son of the same substance as the Father, or was there a material difference between them? Were individual souls created by God as need required, or were they made up from raw material supplied by the parents at the time of conception? Was the Logos preexistent with the Father, or did it come into being as a result of Divine Will and was therefore contingent upon it to be the agent of creation?

  Of course I had even less interest in these questions than in the material difference between the farts of a bishop and those of a pope. The long and painstakingly detailed discussions seemed to me nothing more than the incessant nattering of toads in a water-filled ditch—and of no greater consequence.

  I found the company of the soldiers more convivial, and I spent most of my time walking with them. They were rough men, illiterate, crude in thought and deed, and scornful of anyone or anything they judged weaker than themselves. They cared for nothing except fighting and drinking; the former they considered a chore to be dispensed with as simply and efficiently as possible so that more time could be lavished on the latter.

  They prided themselves on two things: their skill at arms, which did not amount to much so far as I could tell, and their undying loyalty—not to the state, the landowners, or traveling dignitaries like us: these were merely their employers. No, their loyalty was to one another. Brothers in arms, they called themselves, and their disdain for any who stood outside the tight circle of their comradeship knew no bounds.

  Yet I found their earthy practicality refreshing. They demanded nothing of the world but that it provide them with the means to earn their daily pay. With the legions in disarray, the opportunities for plying their needful trade abounded in luxurious profusion.

  The leader of the five with us was a veteran named Quintus—a blunt, square-headed man with short curly hair, clear gray eyes, and a nose that crumpled at the bridge where the bone had been smashed by a Dacian club. “A grievous blow, that,” he told me as we stumped along one day. “The battle was near over for us—just a few sulky brutes unwilling to lie down and die were left. Most of the boys were already stripping armor, and the general ordered a cohort to go and finish off the dregs, you know.

  “Well, a bunch of us hopped up and hurried over there. The Daci are a fearsome tribe, true enough—screech like demons and fight like the furies. But, as with most barbarians I’ve ever seen, you get their chieftain down and they lose heart. Once your brute’s lost heart, he grows meek as a lamb, and you can put him down without much fuss.”

  “Is that so?” I wondered. “I never knew that.”

  “It is a fact, son,” answered Quintus. “Ask anyone who’s been on the field and they’ll tell you the same. Anyway, I put my sword into the first one I come to. He falls, and I look down and see this great gold ring on his arm, you know. I’ll have this, I think, and I bend down to pull it off him.

  “So there I am, tugging away on this gold ring, and the next thing I know I’m sitting on my butt end with my nose in my hands and blood gushing down my tunic. Up jumps the brute, swinging his club and yelling to crack the sky. He takes a swipe at my head, and I dip down, you know, but it’s close—so close I can feel the splinters graze my bristles, and my hair was shorter then.

  “He gives me another swipe or two before I can get my sword up and put it in his neck. He falls, and I give him a chop on the head just to make sure this time. My friend Flavius sees me bloody and comes over to see. ‘Here now,’ he says, ‘you’re wounded. Lie down.’ And I look at him and say, ‘If you think I’m going to lie down and let you steal this ring, then you’re a bigger fool than I am, Flavius.’” The veteran chuckled to himself at the memory.

  “Did you get the ring?” I asked.

  “I did,” replied Quintus. “We hacked off the brute’s arm to get it, you know, and I sold it in the market at first chance. Got a fair price, too. That ring kept me in beef and beer the better part of a year entire. And that’s the very truth.”

  I told him that all in all a smashed nose did not seem like such a bad trade for a year’s worth of meat and drink. He laughed and said, “No, I suppose not. But it never would have happened in the old days. Then we did not get to keep the booty we took. It belonged to Mother Rome, you know.”

  “But now?”

  “Now Mother can’t pay her soldiers, so nine times out of ten the booty you take on the field is the only pay you’ll see. Get no plunder, you get no pay.” He paused, sucking his teeth philosophically. “Still, on a good day you can take more in a bauble or two than you could get in whole campaign in the old days. Save it up, make it last, boy, and you don’t have to sweat too much, you know.”

  The more I talked to Quintus, the more I saw a way opening before me. On the day we came in sight of the walls of Turonum, I asked him, “What will you do now?”

  “Well,” he said, “after we wet our wicks in the town, we’ll head north. The garrisons up on the border always need soldiers. The booty is good, too. We’ll stay the summer up there and go down south for the winter. You don’t want to be up on the northern border when the snow flies, and Massilia is as good a place as any to lay by and soak up the wine.”

  “Would they take me, too, do you think?”

  He cast a seasoned eye over me. “You’re tall enough and strong enough; you’re certainly young enough. Can you fight?”

  “I can fight,” I told him. At least, I reflected, I knew one end of a sword from the other and was not afraid to swing it.

  “Then they’ll take you—so long as they don’t have to pay you nothing.”

  We agreed then and there that if I found no better prospect by the time they were ready to leave the town, I would join them.

  At Turonum the clerics took lodging at a monastery, where they joined other priests from Gaul. More arrived the next day and some the day after. Clearly this council was to be a sizable gathering, but since it concerned me not at all, I made myself familiar with the town instead.

  A venerable Roman market town, Turonum housed a garrison which was manned—albeit to only a third of its capacity. I remembered what Julian had said about Rufus’ serving as a soldier in Gaul, and I saw no harm in trying to establish his whereabouts. On my first circuit of the market square, I found myself standing at the garrison gate asking to speak to the commander. Thinking he might be addressing a new recruit, the commander agreed to see me straightaway.

  “I am General Honorius Grabus,” he said. “You wished to see me.”

  The man before me was a bluff, unsmiling soldier with quick, attentive eyes. I greeted him politely, thanked him for meeting me, and said, “I am searching for a friend of mine. He is a soldier in Gaul.”

  “There are many soldiers in Gaul,” the commander informed me, his disappointment palpable. “It is doubtful I know your friend.” He moved as if to dismiss me.

  “I was hoping to enlist,” I added quickly—just to keep the conversation alive. “I am told he is a centurion, and if I knew where he was stationed, I could perhaps join—”

  “Your friend has a name?”

  “Rufus,” I said. “Licinius Severus Rufus—have you heard of him?”

  General Grabus nodded. “Your gods are with you, friend. I do know this man. He served under my command at Trajectum and Agrippina.”

  “Excellent!” I replied. “Do you happen to know where I can find him?”

  “He is serving at Augusta Treverorum. I know because I promoted him through the ranks. A good soldier, your friend.”

  “I am glad to hear it. Do you think I might obtain a posting under him?”

  “It could be done,” allowed the general. “I will write to the commander and request a sympathetic
hearing.”

  “Thank you, General Grabus. I am in your debt.”

  His keen eyes searched me head to toe. “Are you a patrician?”

  “My father was a nobleman.”

  “Do you have a horse?”

  “I was riding before I could walk,” I answered; this, at least, was little short of the truth. “Why do you ask?”

  “The ala is our most useful weapon on the northern border. If you had a horse, your posting would be assured.” He shrugged. “They will take you anyway, no doubt. We turn away no one these days. Wait here while I write that letter.”

  He strode from the room, and shortly a servant appeared with a scrap of rolled parchment in his hand. “I am to give you this,” he said, handing over the scroll, “with the general’s compliments.”

  “My thanks to the general. Tell him I hope we meet again.”

  Clutching my parchment, I returned to the monastery. Julian and the others were occupied with the arrangements for the council, so next day I made an inspection of the quarter behind the garrison where Turonum’s less reputable inns shared a narrow street. I found Quintus and his comrades in a low tavern called The Cock. The only patrons, they were well in their cups and inordinately happy to see me.

  “Hail and welcome!” cried Quintus when he saw me. “Here is Succat, swift to pry us from the clutches of Bacchus. Come, friend,” he said, sweeping empty bowls and platters onto the floor to make room for me, “drink with us!”

  “I will drink with you,” I said, joining them at the wine-sodden table, “if you will allow me to accompany you on your journey north.”

  “Said and done!” replied Quintus, pouring a cup for me. He hurled away the jar and called for more wine, which appeared with ingratiating haste. “Let us drink to Mother Rome,” he said, raising his cup.

  “And the emperor’s fat ass!” added one of his companions, who quickly dissolved in a fit of laughter.

  We drank to seal our bargain and arranged to meet again in two days’ time. Pleading an uneasy stomach, I made my excuses and left them to their sour wine. I found a moneychanger in the marketplace and exchanged two of my gold sticks for coins. Next I visited the town barber and had my hair cut as short as a fresh recruit’s. He was an agreeable fellow, so I had him shave me, too, and I learned a great deal to my benefit of how matters stood in the northern territories of Gaul.

  Upon returning to the monastery later that day, I heard that the council had begun and was already well on its way to drawing up articles of condemnation against Pelagius, his followers, and his teachings, which would then be sent to the pope in Rome. When they broke from this heady work to observe vespers and eat their supper, I sought out Julian to bid him farewell.

  “What happened to your hair?” he wondered as I slid onto the bench across from him.

  “I have found Rufus,” I replied.

  “Here? In Turonum?”

  “No, he is at Augusta Treverorum, a garrison in the north. I am going to see him.”

  “Are you indeed? And how do you propose to do that?”

  “The soldiers who accompanied us here, remember?”

  “Certainly I remember.”

  “They are traveling north, and I am going with them.”

  “I see.” He appeared to weigh the implications in his mind. “Well, if you are determined, then all that remains is for me to wish you a safe and uneventful journey. Give Rufus my warmest greetings when you see him.”

  I caught an undercurrent of relief in his tone and wondered why this should be. “We leave tomorrow,” I said.

  “How long do you plan to be gone?”

  “I cannot say. All summer at least. Perhaps longer.”

  “Then do not fail to bid Bishop Cornelius farewell. We are returning to Britain before autumn. We may not see you again before we leave.”

  And that was that.

  I do not know what I expected, but I left feeling vaguely disappointed that he had not made more of an effort to talk me out of my decision. He would not have succeeded, mind, but I would like to have seen him try all the same—if only to reveal some hint of the real reason for having talked me into coming to Gaul in the first place. He had said it was for my own good, and perhaps it was. Still, I could not help thinking that some deeper purpose lay behind his insistence. But nothing more was said, and we concluded our farewells shortly after that. Although I spoke briefly to Bishop Cornelius, I did not see Julian again, and the next morning I joined the soldiers to begin the long walk north.

  THIRTY-NINE

  ON A GOLDEN, sun-washed morning, eight mercenaries left Turonum—the original five, myself, and two others returning to the borders after wintering in the south. At Senonum five more joined us. By the time we reached Augusta Treverorum, our ranks had swelled to over thirty—nearly all veterans and survivors of numerous conflicts, most of whom had served in one Gaulish garrison or another, some in Britain as well. Several were fresh recruits, young men like myself, burning to fight barbarians and eager to begin amassing wealth through spoils on the battlefield.

  I did not care about the wealth. Well, not so much. My own reasons for going were less straightforward—or perhaps merely more desperate. If anyone had asked me why I wanted to become a soldier, I would have answered with a simple question: What else?

  I had no skills, no trade, nothing with which to make my way in the world. I still had a little gold in my bag, but, frugal as I was, it would not last beyond the summer. My prospects were decidedly bleak. In truth all I was fit for was to hire myself out as a day laborer—or worse still a shepherd!—and that, I knew only too well, would be to exchange one form of slavery for another.

  Thus I had no other choice but to seek refuge in the only place likely to welcome me at all: the Roman army. I fixed my hope on the Legio XX Valeria Victrix—my last best hope for a future.

  After a lengthy march through pine-covered hills, we descended to a broad valley divided by a wide, slow river. There, on a high mound above the riverbank stood a garrison unlike any I had ever seen. By that I mean it was fully manned and bristling with military might.

  A plain carved out from the surrounding forest formed a boundary many hectares wide around the perimeter of thick outer walls. Although the expanse had been cleared of every last tree and plowed for cornfields, gardens, and pastureland, there were no estates, no villas, no farming settlements. Nor was there a town, save for a mean assortment of dwellings, granaries, and cattle enclosures huddled in the shadow of the walls.

  The walls themselves were timber raised up on a foundation of uncut stone ten courses high, and they enclosed a space large enough to contain a parade field. The compound consisted of twenty castra, or barracks, for two hundred cohorts; an armory, forge, and tannery; six or eight granaries and a dozen kitchens, each with ten or more ovens; a balneum, or bathhouse; four bakeries and a mill; stables for three hundred horses; nine barns, a pottery, a lime kiln, and a score of workshops and storehouses. There was a grand domus for the legionary legate and a slightly smaller one for the garrison commander.

  We approached on the southern road, marching in a long, straggling, knotted line through freshly tilled fields. “Most of the dwellings you see belong to soldiers and their families,” Quintus told me as we neared the large double gate. To call them dwellings was, it seemed to me, extremely generous on his part; they had more in common with cow byres than with houses. “There is also a tavern.”

  “The Gladius,” offered Pallio, a tall, fair-haired soldier who had joined us a few days earlier. “Watery beer, bad wine, and food you wouldn’t give a pig.” He grinned cheerfully. “I have heard there is also a brothel.”

  “You have heard this?” His companion, a swarthy Roman named Varro, laughed. I had yet to see either one outside the other’s company. “Pallio, my friend, without your custom the owner would have starved and his rumored brothel become a kennel long ago.”

  The garrison was, as I say, manned to full fighting strength. Soldiers drawn
from all over Gaul and Britain had been posted to the hostile borderland in anticipation of the summer raiding campaigns of the barbarians. Swelling the ranks of legionaries were many hundreds of mercenaries, mostly veterans, willing to sell their services for a chance at battlefield wealth. Nor was our group of veterans the only mercenary band to choose Treverorum; there were already a number of such groups encamped on the flats of the riverbank below the garrison.

  Quintus took us directly to the commander’s office to enlist us in one of the many auxiliary numera, or small divisions of irregular soldiers. We passed through the wide double gate beneath the watchful eyes of the guards in the towers and crossed the parade yard that was teeming full of soldiers, like ourselves, waiting to enlist. We joined the end of a long line stretching around the block-square building and passed the time talking to the others.

  There is good pay for anyone joining the ala this year, they said. Fifty denarii a day in camp, eighty in the field…. Two raids already across the river this spring…. We are certain to see action before the month is out…. A shipment of new weapons arrived three days ago—good steel from Hispania…. If you get twenty men, they’ll let you have a numerus of your own…. General Septimus is hard but fair…. General Septimus needs a great victory to grease his way into the senate…. General Septimus cares only for his ambitions and nothing for his men…. And so on and on. Rumor, speculation, and gossip were the staff of legionary life, I quickly learned.

  I listened to all that was said and tried to sift the few good grains from the mountains of chaff. The day moved on, and then it was our turn to stand in the commander’s office and swear the oath of allegiance to the emperor, administered by a harried camp prefect to a roomful of men at a time. We dutifully repeated the set phrases, promising to defend the honor, dignity, and person of the emperor and the citizens of the empire wheresoever the need arose, to the last breath of our bodies. We were then summoned one by one to sign the notitia, the legion roster. When my turn came, I took the reed pen, dipped it in the inkpot, and added my name to a list that already stretched to more than four hundred soldiers. I was then given a small wooden tile to take to the armory and exchange for my weapons.