Caesar's Women

  Bibulus paused to gaze about. The senators were very quiet, and no one on the back tier was napping. Catullus was right—tell them a story and they'd all stay awake to listen like children to a nursery maid. Caesar sat as always very straight on his seat, face wearing a look of studious interest, a trick he did better than anyone else, telling those who saw him that secretly he was absolutely bored, but too well mannered to let it show.

  "Very good, we have Publius Servilius the respected knight in possession of one small yet extremely valuable vineyard. Yesterday able to qualify for the four-hundred-thousand-sesterces census of a full knight. Today a poor man. But how can that possibly be? How can a man so suddenly lose his income? Was Publius Servilius in debt? No, not at all. Did he die? No, not at all. Was there a war in Campania nobody told us about? No, not at all, A fire, then? No, not at all. A slave uprising? No, not at all. Perhaps a neglectful vigneron? No, not at all."

  He had them now, except for Caesar. Bibulus lifted himself upon his toes and raised his voice.

  “I can tell you how my friend Publius Servilius lost his sole income, my fellow senators! The answer lies in a large herd of cattle which were being driven from Lucania to—oh, what is that noisome place on the Adriatic coast at the top of the Via Flaminia? Licenum? Ficenum? Pic ... Pic ... It's coming, it's coming! Picenum! Yes, that's it, Picenum! The cattle were being driven from the vast estates Gnaeus Pompeius mistakenly called Magnus inherited from the Lucilii to the even vaster estates he inherited from his father, the Butcher, in Picenum. Now cattle are useless creatures, really, unless one is in the armaments business or makes shoes and book buckets for a living. No one eats them! No one drinks their milk or makes cheese from it, though I do believe the northern barbarians of Gaul and Germania make something called butter from it, which they smear with equal liberality upon their coarse dark bread and their squeaky wagon axles. Well, they don't know any better, and they live in lands too chill and inclement to nurture our beautiful olive. But we in this warm and fertile peninsula grow the olive as well as the vine, the two best gifts the Gods gave to men. Why should anyone need to keep cattle in Italy, let alone to drive them hundreds of miles from one pasture to another? Only an armaments king or a cobbler! Which one do you suppose Gnaeus Pompeius mistakenly called Magnus is? Does he make war or shoes? Then again, perhaps he makes war and military boots! He could be both armaments king and cobbler!"

  How fascinating, thought Caesar, maintaining that look of studious interest. Is it me he's after, or is it Magnus? Or is he killing two birds with the same stone? How utterly miserable the Great Man appears! If he could do it without being noticed, he'd get up right now and leave. But somehow this doesn't sound like our Bibulus. I wonder who's writing his speeches these days?

  "The enormous herd of cattle blundered on into Campania, tended by a few scallywag shepherds, if those who escort cattle can be termed shepherds," said Bibulus in a storytelling manner. "As you all know, Conscript Fathers, every municipium in Italy has its special routes and trails reserved for the movement of livestock from one place to another. Even the forests have trails demarcated for livestock—for moving pigs to the acorns in oak woods during winter—for moving the sheep from high to low grazing as the seasons change—and most of all for driving beasts to the greatest market in Italy, the yards of the Vallis Camenarum outside the Servian Walls of Rome. These routes and trails and tracks are public land, and livestock using them are not allowed to stray onto privately owned lands to destroy privately owned grass, or crops, or... vines.''

  The pause was very long. "Unfortunately," said Bibulus with a doleful sigh, "the scallywag shepherds who tended the herd of cattle didn't quite know whereabouts the proper trail was—though, I add, it is always a good mile wide! The cattle found succulent vines to eat. Yes, my dear friends, those vile and useless beasts belonging to Gnaeus Pompeius mistakenly called Magnus invaded the precious vineyard belonging to Publius Servilius. What they did not eat, they trampled into the ground. And, in case you are not aware of the habits and characteristics of cattle, I will now tell you one more fact about them: their saliva kills foliage, or else, if the plants are young, prevents regrowth for as long as two years. But the vines of Publius Servilius were very, very old. So they died. And my friend the knight Publius Servilius is a broken man. I even find it in me to weep for King Phraates of the Parthians, who will never again drink that noble wine."

  Oh, Bibulus, can you possibly be going where I think you are going? asked Caesar silently, his face and posture unchanged.

  "Naturally Publius Servilius complained to the men who manage the vast holdings and possessions of Gnaeus Pompeius mistakenly called Magnus," Bibulus went on with a sob, “only to be told that there was no possibility of compensation being paid for the loss of the world's finest vineyard. Because—because, Conscript Fathers, the route along which those cattle were being driven had last been surveyed so long before that the boundary markers had vanished! The scallywag shepherds hadn't erred, because they had no idea where they were supposed to be! Surely not in a vineyard, I hear you say. Quite so. But how easily can any of this be proven in a court of law or before the urban praetor's tribunal? Does anyone in each municipium even know where the maps are showing the routes and tracks and trails reserved for traveling livestock? And what of the fact that about thirty years ago Rome absorbed the whole of peninsular Italy into her own domains, giving in exchange the full citizenship? Does that make it Rome's duty to delineate the stock routes and trails and tracks from one end of Italy to the other? I think it does!"

  Cato was leaning forward like a hound on a leash, Gaius Piso had succumbed to silent laughter, Ahenobarbus was snarling; the boni were obviously preparing for a victory.

  "Senior consul, members of this House, I am a peaceful man who has acquitted himself faithfully of his military duty. I have no desire in my prime to march off to a province and make war on hapless barbarians to enrich my own coffers far more than Rome's. But I am a patriot. If the Senate and People of Rome say I must take up provincial duty after my consulship is over—for I will be consul!—then I will obey. But let it be a truly useful duty! Let it be a quiet and self-effacing duty! Let it be memorable not for the number of floats which roll along in a triumphal parade, but for a desperately needed job finally well done! I ask that this House apportion to next year's consuls exactly one year of proconsular duty afterward, surveying and properly demarcating the public routes, trails and paths for Italy's traveling livestock. I cannot restore Publius Servilius's murdered vines to him, nor hope to heal his rage. But if I can persuade all of you to see that there can be more to proconsular duty than making war in foreign parts, then in some small way I will have made a kind of reparation to my friend the knight Publius Servilius."

  Bibulus stopped, but did not sit down, apparently thinking of something to add. "I have never asked this body for much during my years as a senator. Grant me this one boon and I will never ask for anything more. You have the word of a Calpurnius Bibulus."

  The applause was enthusiastic and widespread; Caesar too applauded heartily, but not for Bibulus's proposal. It had been beautifully done. Far more effective than declining a province in advance. Take on a dolorous, thankless task voluntarily and make anyone who objects look small.

  Pompey continued to sit unhappily while many men gazed on him and wondered that so wealthy and powerful a man could have treated poor Publius Servilius the knight so atrociously; it was Lucius Lucceius who answered Bibulus very strongly and loudly, protesting at anything so ridiculous as a task better suited to professional surveyors contracted out by the censors. Others spoke, but always in praise of Bibulus's proposal.

  "Gaius Julius Caesar, you're a highly favored candidate for these elections," said Celer sweetly. "Do you have anything to add before I call for a division?''

  "Not a thing, Quintus Caecilius," said Caesar, smiling.

  Which rather took the wind out of the boni sails. But the motion to assign Italy's woodland a
nd pasture trails and paths to next year's consuls passed overwhelmingly. Even Caesar voted for it, apparently perfectly content. What was he up to? Why hadn't he come roaring out of his cage?

  "Magnus, don't look so down in the mouth," said Caesar to Pompey, who had remained in the House after the mass exodus.

  "No one ever told me about this Publius Servilius!" he cried. "Just wait until I get my hands on my stewards!"

  "Magnus, Magnus, don't be ridiculous! There is no Publius Servilius! Bibulus made him up."

  Pompey stopped short, eyes as round as his face. "Made him up?" he squeaked. "Oh, that settles it! I'll kill the cunnus!"

  "You'll do no such thing," said Caesar. "Stroll home with me and drink a cup of better wine than Publius Servilius ever made. Remind me to send a pamphlet to King Phraates of the Parthians, would you? I think he'll love the wine I make. It might be a less wearing way to make money than governing Rome's provinces—or surveying her traveling stock routes."

  This lighthearted attitude did much to mend Pompey's spirits; he laughed, cuffed Caesar on the arm and strolled as bidden.

  "Time we had a talk," said Caesar, dispensing refreshments.

  "I confess I've wondered when we were going to get together."

  “The Domus Publica is a sumptuous residence, Magnus, but it does have some disadvantages. Everyone sees it—and who goes in and out. The same thing happens at your place, you're so famous there are always tourists and spies lurking." A sly smile lit Caesar's eyes. "So famous are you, in fact, that when I was going to see Marcus Crassus the other day, I noticed whole stalls in the markets selling little busts of you. Are you getting a good royalty? These miniature Pompeiuses were being snapped up faster than the vendors could put them out."

  "Really?" asked Pompey, eyes sparkling. "Well, well! I'll have to look. Fancy that! Little busts of me?”

  "Little busts of you."

  "Who was buying them?"

  "Young girls, mostly," Caesar said gravely. "Oh, there were quite a few older customers of both sexes, but in the main they were young girls."

  "An old fellow like me?"

  "Magnus, you're a hero. The mere mention of your name makes every feminine heart beat faster. Besides," he added, grinning, "they're not great works of art. Someone's made a mold and pops out plaster Pompeii as rapidly as a bitch pops pups. He's got a team of painters who slap some color on your skin and drench your hair with gaudy yellow, then put in two big blue eyes—you are not quite as you actually look."

  Give Pompey his due, he could also laugh at himself once he understood that he was being teased without malice. So he leaned back in his chair and laughed until he cried because he knew he could afford to. Caesar didn't lie. Therefore those busts were selling. He was a hero, and half of Rome's adolescent female population was in love with him.

  “You see what you miss by not visiting Marcus Crassus?"

  That sobered Pompey. He eased upright, looked grim. "I can't stand the man!"

  “Who says you have to like each other?''

  "Who says I have to ally myself with him?"

  "I do, Magnus."

  "Ah!" Down went the beautiful goblet Caesar had given him, up came two very shrewd blue eyes to stare into Caesar's paler and less comforting orbs. "Can't you and I do it alone?"

  “Possibly, but not probably. This city, country, place, idea—call it what you will—is foundering because it's run by a timocracy dedicated to depressing the aims and ambitions of any man who wants to stand higher than the rest. In some ways that's admirable, but in other ways it's fatal. As it will be to Rome unless something is done. There ought to be room for outstanding men to do what they do best, as well as for many other men who are less gifted but nonetheless have something to offer in terms of public duty. Mediocrities can't govern, that's the problem. If they could govern, they'd see that putting all their strength into the kind of ludicrous exercise Celer and Bibulus ran in the Senate today accomplishes nothing. Here am I, Magnus, a very gifted and capable man, deprived of the chance to make Rome more than she already is. I am to become a surveyor tramping up and down the peninsula watching teams of men use their gromae to mark out the routes where traveling stock can legally eat with one end and shit with the other. And why am I to become a minor official doing a much-needed job which could be done, as Lucceius said, more efficiently by men contracted at the censors' booth? Because, Magnus, like you I dream of greater things and know I have the ability to carry them through."

  "Jealousy. Envy."

  "Is it? Perhaps some is jealousy, but it's more complicated than that. People don't like being outclassed, and that includes people whose birth and status should render them immune. Who and what are Bibulus and Cato? The one is an aristocrat whom Fortune made too small in every way, and the other is a rigid, intolerant hypocrite who prosecutes men for electoral bribery but approves of electoral bribery when it meets his own needs. Ahenobarbus is a wild boar, and Gaius Piso a totally corrupt bumbler. Celer is infinitely more gifted, yet falls down in that same area—he would rather channel his energies into trying to bring you crashing than forget personal differences and think of Rome."

  "Are you trying to say that they genuinely can't see their inadequacies? That they really believe themselves as capable as us? That conceited they couldn't be!"

  "Why not? Magnus, a man has only one instrument whereby to measure intelligence—his own mind. So he measures everyone by the greatest intellect he knows of. His own. When you sweep Our Sea clear of pirates in the space of one short summer, all you're actually doing is showing him that it can be done. Ergo, he too could have done it. But you didn't let him. You denied him the opportunity. You forced him to stand by and watch you do it by enacting a special law. The fact that all he's been doing for years is talk is beside the point. You showed him it can be done. If he admits he couldn't do it the way you did, then he's telling himself he's worthless, and that he won't do. It isn't pure conceit. It's a built-in blindness coupled to misgivings he dare not acknowledge. I call him the revenge of the Gods on men who are genuinely superior."

  But Pompey was growing restless. Though he was quite capable of assimilating abstract concepts, he just didn't find the exercise a useful one.

  "All well and good, Caesar, but it doesn't get us anywhere to speculate. Why do we have to bring Crassus in?"

  A logical and practical question. A pity then that in asking it Pompey rejected an offer of what might have become a deep and enduring friendship. What Caesar had been doing was reaching out to him, one superior sort of man to another. A pity then that Pompey was not the right superior man. His talents and interests lay elsewhere. Caesar's impulse died.

  "We have to bring Crassus in because neither you nor I has anything like his clout among the Eighteen," Caesar said patiently, "nor do we know one-thousandth the number of lesser knights Crassus does. Yes, both of us know many knights, senior and junior, so don't bother to say it. But we're not in Crassus's league! He's a force to be reckoned with, Magnus. I know you're probably far richer than he is, but you didn't make your money the way he does to this day. He's an entirely commercial creature, he can't help it. Everyone owes Crassus a favor. That is why we need him! At heart all Romans are businessmen. If they're not, why did Rome rise to dominate the world?"

  "Because of her soldiers and her generals," Pompey said instantly—and defensively.

  "Yes, that too. Which is where you and I come in. However, war is a temporary condition. Wars can also be more pointless and more costly to a country than any number of bad business ventures. Think of how much richer Rome would be today if she hadn't had to fight a series of civil wars for the last thirty years. It took your conquest of the East to put Rome back on her financial feet. But the conquering is done. From now on it's business as usual. Your contribution to Rome in relation to the East is finished. Whereas Crassus's is only just beginning. That's where his power comes from. What conquests win, commerce keeps. You win empires for Crassus to preserve and Romanize.
"

  "All right, you've convinced me," said Pompey, picking up his goblet. "Let's say the three of us unite, form a triumvirate. What exactly will that do?''

  "It endows us with the clout to defeat the boni because it gives us the numbers we need to enact laws in the Assemblies. We won't get approval from the Senate, basically a body designed to be dominated by ultraconservatives. The Assemblies are the tools of change. What you have to understand is that the boni have learned since Gabinius and Manilius legislated your special commands, Magnus. Look at Manilius. We'll never get him home, so he stands as an example to would-be tribunes of the plebs of what can happen when a tribune of the plebs defies the boni too much. Celer broke Lucius Flavius, which is why your land bill went down—not to defeat in a vote, it never even got that far. It died because Celer broke you and Flavius. You tried the old way. But these days the boni can't be bluffed. From now on, Magnus, brute strength is all-important. Three of us have to be better than two of us, simply because three are stronger than two. We can all do things for each other if we're united, and with me as senior consul we have the most powerful legislator the Republic owns. Don't underestimate consular power just because consuls don't usually legislate. I intend to be a legislating consul, and I have a very good man for my tribune of the plebs—Publius Vatinius."

  Eyes fixed on Pompey's face, Caesar paused to assess the effect of his argument. Yes, it was sinking in. Pompey was no fool, for all his need to be loved.

  "Consider how long you and Crassus have been struggling to no avail. Has Crassus managed after almost a year of trying to get the Asian tax-farming contracts amended? No. Have you after a year and a half got your settlement of the East ratified or land for your veterans? No. Each of you has tried with all your individual power and strength to move the boni mountain, and each of you has failed. United, you might have succeeded. But Pompeius Magnus, Marcus Crassus and Gaius Caesar united can move the world."