That afternoon the Senate met in an emergency session and passed the Final Act. They called on the only officeholders then in place, a Regent (interrex, an official appointed every five days in the absence of elected Consuls), on the Tribunes and on Pompey, with his Proconsular authority, to take steps to restore order. They authorized Pompey to raise troops.
Pompey was in no hurry to accept the Senate’s commission. He wanted full powers without conditions and was eager to consult Caesar in Gaul, anxious to avoid any step that might unbalance the equal partnership agreed on at Luca. The delaying tactic worked, for the Senate, having lost whatever last vestige of control it could lay claim to, in desperation offered him what he wanted, full and complete authority. Even Cato approved, saying that any government was better than no government at all. The optimates cleverly arranged for Pompey to be appointed sole Consul rather than Dictator, the post he would have preferred. This was to close off any risk that he might repeat the precedent set by Sulla, who had extended his Dictatorship beyond the legal six-month limit. To make sure of Caesar’s consent to the deal a sweetener was offered; all ten Tribunes put forward a bill allowing him to stand for a second-term Consulship in absentia. Once he was in charge, Pompey moved firmly. Troops were levied and the city was brought under control.
With characteristic managerial firmness, the sole Consul acted to restore law and order through the courts. A series of trials was undertaken of Clodius’s men and Milo, for his part, was brought to justice for Clodius’s murder. Cicero, the obvious choice, was asked to undertake the defense. When the case came up, troops lined the Forum. Milo knew of Cicero’s tendency to be nervous at the beginning of a speech and was afraid that the presence of soldiers might alarm him. He persuaded him to come down from his home on the Palatine to the Forum in a closed litter and to wait quietly inside the litter until the jury had assembled and the court was ready. It was a good idea, but it didn’t work. AS soon as Cicero emerged from the litter he saw Pompey standing on high ground as if commanding a military operation and weapons flashing in the sunlight from all sides. His body shook, his voice faltered and he could hardly start his speech. This was a potential catastrophe, for, unusually, he was Milo’s only advocate.
The line of defense Cicero chose was controversial. Some advised that the best thing would be to admit to the killing but to claim bluntly that it had been in the public interest. Cicero chose instead to trump the prosecution, which claimed that Milo had ambushed Clodius, with the counterargument that it was Clodius who had ambushed Milo. Of course, both accounts were wrong, for the encounter had come about by chance.
When Cicero began to speak, followers of Clodius in the square, undaunted by the presence of troops, created an uproar. He did not completely break down, but his performance fell a long way short of his usual standards. He spoke briefly and soon withdrew. It was the most embarrassing moment in his professional life.
Milo was convicted and exiled from Rome. He retired to Massilia. Cicero sent him a copy of the fully worked-up address, which he had prepared for publication. It was an accomplished piece of work. Milo sent a letter back saying that it was lucky for him that this had not been what had been said in court, for he would not now be eating such wonderful Massilian mullets.
During these years when his own career had stalled, Cicero developed an interest in nurturing the prospects of promising young men. There was Caius Trebatius Testa, a lawyer in his late twenties or early thirties, for whom he arranged a job with Caesar in Gaul. And in 53 the reprobate Curio made a reappearance, now an ardent conservative and ready for public life. Cicero recalled the good advice he had given him “in the days of your boyhood.”
But perhaps the most important of Cicero’s youthful correspondents in those years was his personal slave and secretary, Tiro. It is not certain when Tiro was born, but he was probably a young man at this time. His name is a Latin word (meaning “newcomer,” “recruit” or “beginner”) and this suggests that he may have been born in the Cicero household rather than bought at a sale. Cicero was deeply attached to him and the references in his letters present him almost as a member of the family (“a friend to us rather than a slave,” Cicero wrote to Quintus). Tiro was given his freedom in 53 but, like most former slaves in Roman society, continued to work for his onetime owner.
Tiro was the man who looked after confidential financial matters. Every month he chased up debtors and pacified creditors. He checked the management accounts of the steward Eros, which were sometimes incorrect. He negotiated with moneylenders on the not infrequent occasions when Cicero found himself embarrassed for ready cash. Once he was even commissioned with the sensitive task of pursuing an aristocratic debtor for a repayment. He was also involved in superintending building works, watching over the upkeep of gardens and generally harassing workmen. He looked after Cicero’s social life and organized the guest lists for dinner parties, often a delicate matter. “See about the dining room,” Cicero once instructed him. “Tertia will be there—provided that Publilius is not invited.”
But Tiro’s main duties were secretarial and even editorial. He devised a shorthand which allowed him to write as fast as Cicero dictated. It is reported that he even helped Cicero with his writing and this is confirmed by a letter his master sent him in 53 when he was unwell. “My (or our) literary brainchildren have been drooping their heads missing you.… Pompey is staying with me as I write, enjoying himself in cheerful mood. He wants to hear my compositions, but I told him that in your absence my tongue of authorship is tied completely.”
Tiro’s health was poor and Cicero often had reason to be seriously worried. “Aegypta arrived today,” Cicero once wrote to him solicitously. “He told me you were quite free of fever and in pretty good shape but said that you had not been able to write to me.… You cannot imagine how anxious I feel about your health.” Cicero told Atticus that Tiro “is extraordinarily useful to me when well in all sorts of ways, both in business and in my literary work, but I hope for his recovery more because he is such a nice, modest fellow than for my own convenience.” Although he was always complaining about Quintus’s overdependence on his freedman, Statius, his relationship with Tiro was just as close and trusting.
Tiro seems to have been popular with other members of the family too. In the following decade, when he had saved up enough money to buy a small farm, young Marcus congratulated him in a letter that is full of affection and good humor. “Well, you are a man of landed property! You must shed your town-bred ways—you are now a Roman squire! How amusing to picture the delightful sight of you now. I imagine you buying farm tackle, talking to the bailiff, hoarding pips at dessert in your jacket pockets!”
The past few years had been deeply unsatisfactory for Cicero, who felt he had been unfairly sidelined by the rise of the First Triumvirate. He did not anticipate the future with any greater confidence. Diehards in the Senate were determined to take revenge on Caesar for the illegalities of his Consulship. Political stability hung on the permanence of his partnership with Pompey and there were signs that this was coming under strain. In one sense, a breakdown in relations between the two men would be welcome to Cicero, for it would lift what he saw as a serious threat to the rule of law; but, from another perspective, it might transform civil discord into civil war.