A Murder on the Appian Way Read online

  Antony’s grandfather, his father, his stepfather—they had all risen to glory and had all ended in ruin. The world is like a spinning disk, driving men and women to the edge and then hurling them this way and that into the void beyond its whirling rim. Most are never seen again, but some manage to grab hold of the edge and claw their way back to the center, not once but again and again. Cicero was one of those. So was Caelius.

  “You’ve explained his lineage,” I said. “What about Antony himself?”

  “He fell in with a bad crowd—Clodius and his gang of aristocratic young incorrigibles,” said Cicero. “The usual formula for dissipation: high living, radical politics, mad schemes for the future. And no money to finance any of it. Antony’s father left an estate so encumbered with debts that Antony refused his inheritance. Technically he started his career as a bankrupt. It was young Gaius Curio who covered his debts. He and Antony were like peas in a pod. Companions in debauchery. Inseparable. So close that their relationship gave rise to all sorts of … nasty rumors. Well, when Curio’s father got the bill for Antony’s debts, he went through the roof. Came seeking my advice. I told him to grit his teeth, hand over the silver, and forbid his son ever to see Antony again. The next time Antony came calling on Curio the watchmen turned him away. So what did Antony do? Scaled a wall and let himself down through a hole in the roof, directly into Curio’s bedroom, like a determined suitor!”

  Cicero and Caelius shared a laugh, interrupted by another wince from Cicero as he gingerly clutched his belly. “Anyway, Antony solved his money problems when he married a woman named Fadia, the daughter of a rich freedman. A freedman! The scandal of marrying that far below one’s station would have ruined an aristocrat when I was young, but I suppose the incorrigibles in Antony’s circle applauded him for flouting convention and landing a big dowry. At least the marriage seems to have gotten Antony’s mind off Curio; I’m told that Antony fathered several children before Fadia died. Meanwhile, he spent some time in Greece studying oratory, put in some military service in Judaea and Syria, helped put down a revolt against King Ptolemy in Egypt, and eventually hitched himself to Caesar and headed for Gaul. Oh, and a couple of years ago he found time to get married again—this time to his cousin Antonia.

  “And now Marc Antony has become one of Julius Caesar’s most trusted lieutenants. I suppose he’s good at his job if Caesar deems him worthy of grooming for office and sends him back to Rome to stand for quaestor.”

  While the slaves brought water and wine to refill the cups and cleared away the dishes, I mulled over all that Cicero had told me. Sempronia said that Antony had chased after Clodius with a sword on the Field of Mars, trying to kill him. But according to Cicero, Antony had been a member of Clodius’s intimate circle.

  “So Antony and Clodius were good friends,” I ventured.

  “They were,” said Caelius, whose age and quicksilver alliances made him more privy to the intimate affairs of the radical generation than Cicero, “until their little misunderstanding over Fulvia.”

  “Misunderstanding?”

  “Apparently Antony misunderstood that Fulvia was Clodius’s wife and thought she was free for the taking.” Caelius flicked his tongue to catch a drop of wine at the corner of his mouth.

  “You mean—”

  “Oh, the affair probably meant nothing to Antony. Between his boyhood lover Curio, his two wives, and all the whores of his youth, what was a little fling with Fulvia? But Clodius was furious when he found out. He and Fulvia were still newlyweds, more or less. And Clodius always tended to fly off the handle at the least provocation, didn’t he? This was, oh, about six years ago. After that, there was a chill between Antony and Clodius. And then a whole sea between them, when Antony went off to Greece and Judaea. And then several mountain ranges, when Antony headed up to Gaul. He and Clodius never saw eye to eye again. They were never close enough.”

  “Except on the Field of Mars?” I suggested.

  Caelius threw back his head and laughed. “Oh, that! How could I forget? Cicero, you must remember my telling you about it. Last year, during one of the canceled elections, Antony and Clodius ran into each other, quite by accident, I imagine. They had words. Antony pulls out his sword—brave slayer of a thousand Gauls—and Clodius lets out a shriek and takes off like a scared rabbit. I suppose that made Antony the dog; what could he do but give chase? Of course, if he’d caught Clodius it might have been more the case of the dog and the ferret, with the mutt getting his nose bitten and howling all the way back to Gaul.”

  “What started the fight? The old business about Fulvia? But you say that was six years ago …”

  Caelius shrugged. “Who knows? Clodius and Antony are both famous for long memories and short tempers.”

  “How did we ever get started on the subject of Marc Antony, anyway?” said Cicero.

  “Fulvia must have been feeling nostalgic when Gordianus visited her this morning,” said Caelius. “Did she discuss all her former lovers with you?”

  “No,” I said. “And neither did Clodia.” The grin froze on Caelius’s face. Cicero gave him an unsympathetic glance. I pulled myself upright on the couch. “An excellent meal, Marcus Cicero. Perfect for the middle of the day—not too light, not too heavy. I might say the same for the conversation. Now I think that my son and I must be on our way.”

  “Why did you bring up Marc Antony?” asked Eco on the short walk back to my house.

  “Antony was the reason Fulvia wanted to see me. He’s offered to help prosecute Milo. She’s not sure whether to trust him. She has a suspicion that he was involved somehow in Clodius’s death. Or it may be her mother who suspects Antony, and Fulvia wants to prove him innocent.”

  “Did she tell you that she and Antony used to be lovers?”

  “No. And just because Cicero and Caelius say so, that doesn’t mean it’s true.”

  “But she did tell you about the chase across the Field of Mars last year?”

  “Yes.”

  Eco nodded. After a moment he laughed. “That was amazing, the way you handled them.”

  “Who?”

  “Cicero and Caelius.”

  “Was it? I’m sure they thought it was they who were handling me. I probably told them more than I should have. And now, for a few scraps of information about Antony, they’ll act as if I owe them the world.”

  “But the way you talk to them sometimes—practically insulting them to their faces!”

  “Yes, well, it’s a strange thing, but people like Cicero and Caelius like to be insulted.”

  “Do they?”

  “That’s been my experience. I needle them, they needle me back. They know they have nothing to fear from me; nothing I might say can really hurt them. They enjoy my needling, the way one sometimes enjoys having a mosquito bite—the itch gives them something to scratch. Not like a bee sting; not like the bloody sores I’ve seen Cicero inflict on his enemies with a barbed word or two.”

  Davus let us in. From the look on his face I knew that something was up. Before Davus could speak, a voice rumbled behind him.

  “The master of the house, home at last!”

  He was a big man, probably a gladiator or a soldier, despite the richly embroidered fabric of his gray tunic and dark green cape. His nose had been broken, maybe more than once, and each of his hands was the size of a baby’s head. His own head was as bald as a baby’s, and almost as ugly. He had the look of a man who could walk through a dangerous place without being bothered.

  “A visitor,” said Davus, unnecessarily.

  “So I see. And who sent you … citizen?” I said, noting the iron ring on his finger. He was probably someone’s freedman.

  “The Great One,” he said bluntly. His voice was like gravel in a sluice.

  “You mean—”

  “That’s all I ever call him. It’s how he likes to be addressed.”

  “I’m sure. And what does the Great One—”

  “The honor of your presence, at your earli
est convenience.”

  “Now?”

  “Unless you can make it earlier.”

  “Davus—”

  “Yes, Master?”

  “Tell your mistress that I have yet another errand. This one will take me outside the city walls, I imagine.”

  “Do you want me to go with you?”

  I looked to the man I’d decided to call Baby Face, who smiled and said, “I brought a whole troop of bodyguards with me.”

  “Where are they?”

  “I told them to wait across the street, down the Ramp a ways. I figured there was no need to bother your neighbors with a lot of traffic.”

  “You’re more discreet than some of my callers today.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Eco, will you come with me?”

  “Of course, Papa.” Eco had never met the Great One either. I noticed that my stomach was suddenly churning. I couldn’t blame Cicero’s cook.

  So I set out for the third time that day, thinking again of the old Etruscan proverb. But this was not a downpour. This was a deluge.

  12

  The law forbids any man with an army under his command to enter the city walls. Technically, Pompey was such a commander, though his army was off in Spain; he had seen fit to delegate its operation to lieutenants while he stayed close to Rome to keep watch on the electoral crisis. He resided at his villa on the Pincian Hill not far outside the walls. As Pompey was unable to come to Rome, Rome went to Pompey, as the mob had done when they ran to his villa to offer him the consular axes, or as Milo had done when unsuccessfully seeking an audience, or as Eco and I found ourselves doing that afternoon.

  Baby Face and his troop of gladiators closed ranks around us like an armored tortoise for the walk down the Ramp, across the Forum and through the Fontinalis Gate. We crossed the traditional boundary of the city as we stepped through the gate, but the Flaminian Way was just as crowded with buildings outside the wall as within. Gradually the buildings became smaller and fewer until we came to an open area. The disused public voting stalls were off to our left. Up ahead to the right was a high, guarded gate that opened at our approach.

  The paved path led up through terraced gardens, sometimes sloping, sometimes in steps, switching right and left as it ascended. The grounds on either side were mantled with winter grays and browns, the dreariness of the naked trees and bushes relieved here and there by statues in marble or bronze. A regal swan that might have been Jupiter courting Leda graced a small circular pool. We passed a low wall where a slave boy sat pulling a thorn from his foot, painted in such lifelike colors I might have mistaken him for flesh and blood except that he was naked under the cold sun. I saw no gods or goddesses in the garden, until we came upon the requisite Priapus, guardian and motivator of growing things, occupying a stone alcove set into a high hedge, grinning lasciviously and displaying an erection almost as large as the rest of him. The crown of his marble phallus had been rubbed shiny-smooth by passing hands.

  We came at last to the villa, where more gladiators stood guard before a pair of tall wooden doors with bronze fittings. Baby Face told us to wait while he went inside.

  Eco tugged at my sleeve. When I turned there was no need to ask what he wanted to show me. The view was spectacular. Tangled branches and treetops hid the path we had just ascended, as well as the Flaminian Way and the voting stalls immediately below us, but above and beyond the treetops the whole Field of Mars lay open before us. The ancient marching grounds and equestrian training courses had all but vanished in the course of my lifetime, filled up by cheap tenements and jumbled warehouses. Dominating everything else was the great complex built by Pompey in his consulship two years back, a sprawling mass of meeting halls, galleries, fountains, gardens and the city’s first permanent theater. Farther on, like a great arm curving around the Field of Mars, was the Tiber, its course marked by a low, thick blanket of river mist that allowed only glimpses of the gardens and villas on its other bank. Clodia’s garden villa, where the stylish young men of Rome used to swim nude for her amusement, was somewhere on that distant bank. The whole scene was like a painting done in muted winter hues of rustred and gray-green, bone white and iron blue.

  Eco tugged at my elbow again and nodded toward the south. The mass of the villa blocked the view of most of the city proper except for a narrow glimpse of the temples on the Capitoline Hill and a jumbled cityscape beyond. Far away, perhaps on the Aventine Hill, a plume of smoke rose like a vast marble pillar into the still air. Whatever chaos reigned at the base of that pillar, it was too far away for us to see or hear. Did a man begin to feel remote and uncaring, looking down on Rome from such a high place? Or did he become even more acutely aware of buildings burning out of control and chaos in the streets, surveying Rome from such a godlike vantage point?

  The doors behind us opened with a clank. Baby Face emerged, smiling grimly. “The Great One will see you now.”

  I must have been rather nervous as Baby Face ushered us through the vestibule, into the atrium and up a curving flight of stairs, because afterward, when Bethesda asked me, I couldn’t remember a thing about the furnishings and fixtures, though I could vividly recall that my mouth was as dry as vellum and my heart seemed to have swollen to twice its normal size.

  We were led to a room of many windows at the southwest corner of the house. Curtains and shutters had been pulled back to allow an expansive view of the city. The column of smoke off to the south which we had glimpsed from the doorstep was at the center of this view, and was joined by two more pillars of smoke, closer and off to the left, probably made by fires on the Esquiline Hill or down in the Subura. Pompey stood at the windows, his back to us. He was only a silhouette at first, a crown of unkempt curls above powerful shoulders and a robust, well-padded torso. As my eyes adapted to the light I saw that he wore a long, voluminous woolen robe of emerald green. His hands were joined together behind his back, his fingers tapping nervously against each other. He heard us enter and slowly turned around. Baby Face moved inconspicuously into a corner. I glimpsed the shadow of another guard on the balcony outside the windows.

  Pompey was the same age as Cicero, which meant that he was a few years younger than me. I could have wished for as few wrinkles, though not for as many chins. It occurred to me that Pompey might be the sort of man who turns to food in a crisis. Commanding armies on the march kept him busy and fit. Holed up in his Pincian villa, he had taken on the weight of the world.

  But there were no puns in my mind at that moment. This was not Fulvia or Clodia, mysterious and grimly determined but made vulnerable by their sex. Nor was it Cicero or Caelius, a known quantity with whom I could exchange careless banter. This was Pompey.

  When he was young, poets had swooned for his beauty. With his luxuriant, wind-tossed locks of hair, his smooth brow and chiseled nose, people had called the boy general another Alexander even before his military prowess proved them right. Young Pompey’s typical expression had been a placid, dreamy half smile, as if the contemplation of his own future greatness kept him perpetually cheerful but also a bit aloof. If his face had a flaw, it was a tendency to roundness and a fullness in his lips and cheeks that appeared either ripely sensual or pleasantly plump, depending on the angle and the light.

  As he grew older his face seemed to flatten a bit and to grow even rounder. The chiseled nose became fleshy. The wild locks were shorn in deference to maturity. The smile became less sensual, more complacent. As his prestige and power grew, it was as if Pompey had less need of physical beauty, and so put aside the comely garment of his youth.

  All this I had seen from a distance as Pompey built his career, orating in the courts of law, campaigning for office on the Field of Mars, cutting a great swath through the Forum attended by his vast retinue of military and political lieutenants, each of those lieutenants in turn attended by his own coterie of followers seeking favors at second hand from the Great One. But what cannot be seen from a distance are a man’s eyes, as I now saw Pompey�
�s eyes staring into mine with a disconcerting intensity. For some reason I recalled a famous quote from his youth. When he was sent to drive the dictator Sulla’s enemies out of Sicily, the people of the liberated city of Messana had complained that Pompey had no jurisdiction over them because of ancient agreements between themselves and Rome. Pompey had replied, “Stop quoting laws to us. We carry swords.”

  “Gordianus the Finder,” he said, “and your adopted son Eco.” He smiled to himself and nodded, as if pleased that he could remember such insignificant details without a slave to remind him. “We haven’t met before, have we?”

  “No, Great One.”

  “I didn’t think so.”

  The silence that followed was uncomfortable for me, but apparently not for Pompey, who paced slowly before us, his hands still clasped behind his back. “You’ve had a busy day,” he finally said.

  “Pardon, Great One?”

  “Clodia comes by to carry you off in her litter. You pay a call on Fulvia. I suppose Sempronia was there, as well. No sooner are you home than Cicero’s freedman comes calling, and you and your son are off to confer with Cicero and Caelius. Milo wasn’t there today, was he?”

  I started to answer, then realized that Pompey was looking not at me but at Baby Face, who shook his head and answered, “No, Great One. Milo hasn’t left his house all day.”

  Pompey nodded and returned his gaze to me. “But you’ve met with Milo before, under Cicero’s roof.”

  It was not a question, but it seemed to require a response—an admission, rather than an answer. “Yes.”

  “It’s been quite a while since I saw Titus Annius Milo. How is he looking these days?”

  “Looking, Great One?”

  “He’s always been so proud of his powerful physique, naming himself after Milo, the legendary wrestler of Croton, and all that. Is he holding up?”

  “He appears fit enough.”

  “And his state of mind?”

  “I’m not privy to that, Great One.”

  “No? But you’re a reader of signs, are you not? Surely you read something from his face, his voice.”