Gates of Rome

CHAPTER 53

AD 54, 18 miles north of Rome

‘ What? ’ General Lepidus sputtered wine across his desk.

‘It’s what I’ve heard, sir. This very afternoon.’

Lepidus stood up and the chair legs barked across the wooden floor. ‘Arrests?’

The young tribune shuffled uncomfortably, his helmet respectfully under one arm. He was still puffing from his exhausting five-hour ride from the city.

‘Come on, Atellus! What are you prattling on about?’ Lepidus’s voice sounded shrill and sharp, almost effeminate; he hated it when nerves, anxiety, made him sound that way.

‘Arrests… Crassus was one of them.’

Lepidus’s wide face instantly paled. ‘Crassus!’

Atellus nodded. Lepidus slumped back down in his chair; it creaked under his heavy frame. He looked shaken. ‘Crassus! Gods help me, he’ll talk at the first sign of pain!’ He looked at his subordinate. ‘And names will be mentioned, Atellus. You and I…’

The tribune nodded.

Lepidus wiped his mouth, his skin already damp and tacky with anxiety. ‘I curse that withered old prune for roping me into his bloody politics!’

A couple of visits, that’s all. Him and Atellus. That had been enough for him to realize the old man was going to get them all killed if he wasn’t a great deal more careful. Lepidus had backed away quickly from the fool’s small gathering of conspirators. Deliberately ignored his repeated invitations to rejoin them. He should never have gone in the first place… but ambition, vanity, had piqued his curiosity. Crassus had suggested Rome might need a Protector in the aftermath, should something happen to Caligula. Someone with power, popular with his soldiers, near to hand… and no great fan of the emperor.

Someone. Someone like himself.

Lepidus had brought along an officer he trusted, Atellus, expecting a lunch at the old politician’s expense and a carefully worded conversation, a gentle probing of his thoughts on what direction Rome should take… should something, regrettably, happen to their emperor.

What he hadn’t expected was an assembly of strangers… and such open, reckless, dangerous talk. And such a pitiful assembly of conspirators! Three senators, a tribune of the Guard and one or two others.

What he should have done, was leave the meeting immediately and report them all to the emperor just as soon as he could. But he hadn’t. He and Atellus had returned and said nothing about the matter to anyone.

Enough right there to be deemed as guilty as Crassus and his conspirators in Caligula’s eyes. And to make matters worse, Crassus had been badgering him to come back. Sending presents even.

‘Dammit!’ He reached for the cup on the desk in front of him, nearly knocking it over and spilling wine across the nest of scrolls in front of him, the routine and endless paperwork of a legion encamped. He emptied the cup quickly and wiped his mouth. ‘That treacherous old snake has been playing games with me!’

‘Sir?’

Lepidus winced, cursed under his breath. ‘He sent me several gifts over the last year. Those Parthian horses? That attractive slave?’

Atellus nodded. He knew full well about them. Most of the camp did. The slave had been particularly well received by the general. ‘Sir, surely those gifts have nothing to do with this — ’

‘Don’t you see, you idiot? Crassus has been trying to make it look like I’m part of his mischief! He’s trying to…’ Lepidus stopped. His eyes widened. ‘Gods help me!’

‘What is it?’

‘I wrote a letter to him… I… thanked him!’ Before he’d attended that meeting he’d been almost seduced by Crassus’s persuasive flattery. His eyes darted left and right as he tried to remember the precise wording of his correspondence. Crassus had sent his gifts with letters punctuated with carefully phrased criticisms of Caligula; subtly worded inducements for Lepidus to expand on that criticism a little more.

Sounding me out. That’s what he was doing.

Lepidus remembered carefully avoiding any references to Crassus’s less than flattering thoughts about the emperor and his appalling neglect of the affairs of the city in his reply. The general quite clearly remembered writing a polite and very neutral ‘thank you’ to the old man for his lovely gifts. But most importantly… ignoring those dangerously obvious phrases; phrases clumsily probing him for where his allegiance lay.

‘Oh, help me!’ he whispered.

‘Sir?’

What he hadn’t done… was immediately forward that correspondence to his emperor. What he hadn’t done was warn Caligula of Crassus’s treacherous mutterings.

Oh, the gods!

The general’s thinking in recent years had been that sitting tight and keeping his head down — waiting this madness out — was the clever strategic game to play. With his two legions permanently encamped a mere day’s march away from Rome, he was perfectly placed to sweep in and replace that insane fool the moment something happened to him.

And something inevitably would. Caligula was mentally unstable. Increasingly so. Believing himself to be a god, immortal… the crazy fool would end up either killing himself in some reckless chariot race to impress his people, or believing he could actually fly and stepping off a high wall. That or some desperate, starving citizen was going to get lucky with a slingshot or an arrow. Caligula’s insanity seemed to be approaching some sort of a feverish crescendo. As if he expected something truly world-changing to happen to him very soon.

But this news? These rumours…?

Gods help him if that exchange of correspondence between him and Crassus should fall into the emperor’s hands. Not participating in any conspiracy the old senator had been quietly organizing was not going to be enough to save him.

‘Sir?’

Lepidus looked up at his tribune.

‘We have to do something, sir. We could be next…?’

Caligula was going to have new heads on spikes all over the city by the first light of morning. And two of them might just be mine and his.

‘Atellus?’

‘Sir.’

‘I want every officer from both legions assembled in my quarters in half an hour!’

‘Yes, sir. What…?’

‘What do I plan to do?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘I have no choice, do I? Crassus has made sure of that.’

He thought he saw a grim smile play across his tribune’s lips. ‘Yes. Atellus, I want the men ready to decamp.’

‘Sir… you are considering marching on Rome?’ Atellus hesitated. ‘Confronting Caligula?’

‘Of course I am!’

‘The men, sir… they may not take well to the idea.’

Atellus was quite right. The legions, officers and men’s allegiance was broadly with the emperor. His was the hand that fed them and fed them very well. Lepidus couldn’t be sure his men were going to be behind him. And should an order for his arrest arrive as well…

‘Might I make a suggestion, sir?’

‘Go on.’

‘Let them believe the Guard is moving against the emperor.’

Lepidus nodded slowly. Yes, of course.

‘Mobilize the men, sir. Let them believe we’re marching on Rome to protect Caligula from a palace coup. Tell them the emperor will reward them for their loyalty… that the Guard will be disgraced, disbanded as a result of this treachery.’

Yes… there’s no love lost there between the legions and the Guard.

‘Atellus… every officer in here in half an hour. Move!’

‘Yes, sir!’ The tribune saluted, turned on his heel and swept out of Lepidus’s private quarters.

By first light he was going to have both the Tenth and the Eleventh assembled and ready to march. However the next few days panned out… whether he was going to need to confront the Guard or not, whether he was going to attempt to move against Caligula or not, it would be better to be ready for it; to have his men in their armour and on their feet.