Roma.The novel of ancient Rome - Saylor Steven - Страница 99

“Your uncle is also dead, Aedile. Because of storms, I had to wait many days to catch a ship from Spain. Even as I was boarding the ship, another messenger arrived. He brought news of the battle in which Gnaeus Cornelius Scipio perished. The enemy laid siege to his camp and overran the ramparts. He took refuge in a lookout tower. The tower was set aflame. The commander and his men emerged and died fighting. I know no other details, but I’m sure he died as heroically as his brother before him.”

Scipio stared at the dancing flame of the lamp that lit the room. His voice was strangely distant. “My father…my uncle…both dead?”

“Yes, Aedile.”

“Impossible!”

“I assure you, Aedile-”

“But who is commanding the legions in Spain?”

“I…I’m not sure, Aedile.”

For a long time Scipio stared at the flame. The centurion, used to awaiting orders, stood silent and still. Kaeso hardly dared to look at his friend’s face, fearful of seeing his anguish. But Scipio, with his long hair and handsome features, might have been a statue of Alexander. Without moving, without expression, he stared at the flame.

At last Scipio stirred. He stood and looked down at each of his limbs in turn with a bemused expression, as if he had forgotten who he was and needed to take account of himself. Then he strode purposefully out of the room.

Kaeso followed him. “Scipio, where are you going?”

“Where the god calls me,” said Scipio, with no further explanation. In the vestibule he paused to look at the wax effigies of his ancestors. Then, dressed as he was, in a light tunic and thin slippers, he opened the door and left the house.

He walked steadily through the dark, deserted streets, descended to the Forum, then headed for the path that would take him to the top of the Capitoline. Kaeso followed at a distance. In poems and plays, he had read of men possessed by the gods, but he had never seen such a thing. Had Scipio been possessed by a god? His reaction to the dreadful news seemed so strange, and his movements so controlled and deliberate, that Kaeso could hardly believe Scipio was acting of his own volition.

Atop the Capitoline, Scipio entered the Temple of Jupiter. Kaeso stopped at the foot of the steps. It seemed somehow improper to follow Scipio inside.

Kaeso waited. The landscape of the night seemed unfamiliar to him, and slightly eerie. The sacred precinct of temples and towering statues was utterly quiet, as if the gods themselves were sleeping.

But not for long. A flicker of torches caught Kaeso’s eye. A group of magistrates and priests approached, headed by the Pontifex Maximus.

The priest gave him a nod of recognition. “You’re Maximus’s young cousin.”

“Yes. Kaeso Fabius Dorso.”

“Have you heard? A catastrophe! The worst defeat since Cannae!”

“I heard the news at the side of the curule aedile himself,” said Kaeso quietly. “I followed him here.”

“Young Scipio is in the temple?”

“Jupiter summoned him.”

“Summoned him?”

“That’s what Scipio said.”

The Pontifex Maximus gazed up uncertainly at the open doors of the temple. Like Kaeso, he and the others chose to wait at the foot of the steps. Soon others joined them, for news of the disaster was spreading quickly through the city, as was word of Scipio’s lone vigil inside the temple. Little by little, a great throng gathered. The space was filled with low murmurs of lamentation and cries of grief. The light of many torches turned night into day. If the gods had been sleeping before, thought Kaeso, they were awake now.

At last, Scipio emerged from the temple. People shouted his name, along with the names of his father and his uncle, and cried aloud to Jupiter for protection and salvation. Many in the anxious, grieving crowd believed that Scipio had been communing with the god and awaited his message.

Scipio stood for so long on the porch of the temple, unmoving and hardly seeming to notice the crowd, that Kaeso began to fear that his friend had lost his senses.

Suddenly Scipio stepped forward, raised his arms, and gave a shout. “Citizens! Be quiet! Can you not hear the voice of Jupiter speaking? Be quiet!”

The crowd fell silent. All eyes were on Scipio. He cocked his head and returned the crowd’s gaze with a look of bewilderment. At last, as if solving a puzzle, he raised his eyebrows and nodded. “No, none of you can hear what I hear-but you can hear my voice, so listen to what I have to say. Citizens! I saved the life of my father in battle once, long ago at the river Ticinus. But when the combined fury of our enemies encircled him in Spain, I was not there, and I could not save him. When they turned their wrath against his brother Gnaeus, my father was not there to come to his rescue, and neither was I.

“My father is dead. My uncle is dead. The legions in Spain are broken and leaderless. Roma stands defenseless against our enemies to the west. If Hasdrubal should come to join his brother Hannibal in Italy…if he should bring the Numidian whelp Masinissa with him…what shall become of Roma?”

There were cries of alarm from the crowd.

“That must never happen!” cried Scipio. “The bleeding wound of Spain must be stitched up. Hasdrubal and Masinissa must be driven out. The Suessitani must be punished. Tonight, here before you, upon the steps of the god’s dwelling place, I make the vow that Jupiter demands of me. I pledge to take my father’s place-if the people of Roma see fit to give me the command. I pledge to avenge his death. I pledge to drive his killers from Spain, and after that task is accomplished, I pledge to drive the one-eyed fiend himself from Italy, along with every mongrel mercenary under his command. To the east, Philip of Macedonia will be punished for allying himself with our enemy. We shall take the war to Carthage. We shall make them regret that they ever dared to challenge the will of Roma.

“It may take many years-it may take all the days that remain of my lifetime-but when I am done, I will make sure that Carthage can never endanger us again. I make this pledge to you, and I make this pledge to Jupiter, greatest of all the gods. Of Jupiter, I beg for strength. Of you, I ask for my father’s command.”

The crowd reacted. Moaning and weeping turned to shouts of exultation. The people began to chant: “Send the son to Spain! Send the son to Spain! Send the son to Spain!”

Kaeso looked at the faces of the magistrates and priests at the front of the crowd. They did not join in the chanting, but they did not dare to stop it. Wise men would argue that Scipio was far too young and inexperienced to receive such a command, just as he had been too young to serve as curule aedile. But he had asked the people directly for the command of Spain, and who could doubt that he would receive it?

Kaeso bowed his head, and wondered at his own audacity. How could he ever have thought, however fleetingly, that he might lay claim to the affections of a man so beloved by so many? Whether destined for triumph or defeat, Scipio had embarked on a path upon which Kaeso could not hope to follow.

“I think I must have felt as men felt in the presence of Alexander the Great,” said Kaeso.

Plautus gave him a sardonic look. “Madly in love with the fellow, you mean?”

Kaeso smiled crookedly. “What an absurd idea!” Even in the uninhibited atmosphere of the playwright’s house, he felt uncomfortable talking about his feelings for Scipio.

“Is it so absurd?” said Plautus. “Alexander’s men were all in love with him, and why not? They say there was never a man more beautiful or more full of fire-a divine fire, a spark from the gods. And Alexander loved at least one of them in return, his lifelong companion Hephaestion. They say he went mad with heartbreak after Hephaestion died and rushed to join his beloved in Hades. Who’s to say you couldn’t be Hephaestion to Scipio’s Alexander?”