“I’m glad to see you’re not using the public baths.”
At the sound of my master’s voice, I leapt up and whipped round to face him, as much to save him from the embarrassment of seeing his stripy handiwork as to relieve me of the discomfiture of exhibiting it. Hanno grabbed towels, pinched together by the two remaining fingers of each hand. The weight of the larger one caused it to slip from his grasp. Reddening and repeating apologies, he handed me the smaller and dropped awkwardly to his knees. Using the fallen bath sheet, he scrubbed at the water my turning had splashed upon Crassus’ senatorial shoes, the black ones with a “C” stitched in silver thread on the top of each boot. This was the traditional emblem for the original number of conscript fathers in that august deliberative body-one hundred. Six times that number were now accommodated in Sulla’s Curia Cornelia, resplendent in their white togas. Only a few were curule magistrates, allowed to wear the toga praetexta of their ancient office, embellished by a broad purple border. Crassus was one of the oldest, most venerated among them.
“I have instructed everyone to remain in the compound, if possible,” I said, “and if they must go down into town, not to do so without an escort.”
“Good,” Crassus said, wincing as the seat Hanno was guiding to him scraped along the floor. “It’s not safe in the city. Stop fussing, boy!” Hanno abandoned his attempt to wrestle the back of the chair into a parallel position behind dominus’ legs and stood with his hands at his sides, his chin trembling.
“It’s all right,” I said. “Fetch me one as well.” That brought the smile out again. He dragged another chair to me, but I stood there dripping, my towel being of a size that made it perfect for blowing one’s nose, but little else. I held it bunched in my hand, deciding not to risk a flood of tears by asking for another.
Crassus said, “Sit.” I sat. “Hannibal,” he added, “would you mind fetching us a bowl of olives?” Hanno was off like a lurching charioteer, leaving his grin hanging in the humid air.
“Shall we move to a more comfortable setting?” I asked, hoping to change into some dry clothes and get off this chair.
“I don’t know which prospect is worse-suffering that unfortunate’s drawbacks or attempting to talk my wife out of keeping him. Best leave it be. And no, we’ll stay here where it’s warm. It’s freezing outside.”
He did that on purpose. Splendid. I’ll be wearing the pattern of this woven cane seat on my bottom for hours. As I spoke, I thought how best to employ my towel. “Why all the precautions, dominus?” If I put it on the chair, I’ll have to rise to do so, and I had just been commanded to be seated. “Clodius’ faction wouldn’t harm us.” If I stuff it under my buttocks to give my cheeks some relief, Crassus will think me insane, or incontinent. If I drape it across my lap, I’ll appear a prude. “He’s praised you on the rostra and vilified Pompeius.” In the end, I mopped my brow with it and dropped it casually on the floor.
“Anything to foment confusion and disruption,” Crassus said. “Anything to stir up a hornet’s nest of dissatisfaction. He has no real love for me or the constitution, and I have never, nor would I ever stoop to solicit or accept his praise. Mind you, even if it was a hollow gesture to gain support for his political aims, his passage of a grain dole for the poor was admirable. How we’ll be able to import enough to perpetually feed 300,000 mouths and pay for it all is quite another matter.
“He is a dangerous fool, Alexander. He’s destroyed hapless Cicero; if that man wasn’t such a pugnacious prig, Pompeius and I might have forestalled his exile. I would have done, too, if I had known Clodius would incinerate and confiscate the poor blowhard’s property. Now Clodius’ gang of armed rabble terrorize citizens and senators alike. He claims he acts in the name of the people, but in truth, anarchy is his newfound god. If my purpose was not ineluctably fixed elsewhere, I should like very much to bring him to heel.”
Crassus shook his head. “This is a dangerous time for the Republic-Caesar’s ambition seems boundless; I must devote all my energies to exacting our revenge, but to do so I must mimic his audacity. It is a hard thing, Alexander-I am become part of the corruption and misgovernment I abhor.”
“Are you certain there is no other course you may follow?” Hanno returned with a bowl of glistening olives. Both Crassus and I held our breath until he had placed them on a small pedestal table between the two chairs and moved to stand with his back against the far wall. He took Tulio’s gift from his belt and I knew without looking that his eyes soon would be glazing over with each soothing stroke of the brush.
Crassus rolled an oily green olive between his thumb and index finger. He looked as though he might crush it rather than eat it. “I am certain of nothing but that I love Tertulla and revile the man who attacked her. I will have him ruined and exiled, or perish in the effort.”
I glanced at Hanno and gauged he was too distant to hear, and if he heard, to understand, and if he understood, to care. “My insides twist at the thought of your tribulation.”
“Who else knows?”
“In this house, only the three of us, but there is talk. For domina, it is easier to bury the fact than the memory.”
“We must protect her as best we can. I am sorry to disrupt the familia, but from this point on, my determination must brook no distraction. There is much to do, and the first step is to win the consulship.”
“In other words, your revenge hinges on doing Caesar’s bidding.”
“You might have phrased it less painfully, but yes.”
“The senate must grant him five more years in Gaul, and you must take Syria for your proconsulship.”
“And from there I will march on Parthia, the largest jewel not already set in the Roman crown.”
“Dominus, we have treaties with Parthia. The senate will never sanction such an adventure.”
“Do not belittle such an achievement with the wrong noun, Alexander. This is conquest. The senate will sanction a triumph quick enough when I bring their king home in chains, I promise you. Though I suppose you’re right-it will be an adventure. Wouldn’t you like to see the legacy of the Great Alexander: Antioch, Hierapolis, Seleucia?”
“A tempting offer, my lord, but traveling in the company of so many legionaries is bound to bring up too many disturbing memories. If you could manage to leave them behind?”
Crassus answered by reaching for another olive.
“One thing puzzles me, dominus,” I said. “If you must win this coming election and thus be granted Syria to govern after your year’s term, why have both you and Pompeius refused to announce your candidacies?”
“Lentulus, who now serves, is a good and honest consul, and a hardened conservative. He will not be bullied by any extra-legal decisions made by us at Luca. He has refused to take our names-the deadline for declaring is long past. His co-consul, Philippus, favors Caesar and the populares, and therefore badgers us to run. But he is not a man who can see beyond a single move on the board. I will not risk declaring myself a candidate while the mood in the city is fractious and uncertain. The senate will follow us, but between the grain shortage and the few but vocal optimates crying out against us, the outcome of a vote now would be uncertain.”