Suddenly his brother looked back at him. Kaeso’s reaction at seeing him exactly matched that of Titus on seeing Kaeso. He blanched, looked shocked and appalled, then disgusted and angry. The twins stared at each other for a long moment, as if looking into a distorting mirror. Then, as neither could bear to look at the other a moment longer, at the same instant they turned their gazes elsewhere.
Soon the tramp of marching feet echoed through the Forum. Having failed to quell the mob with his edict, Nero had summoned more Praetorians from their garrison outside the city. As the ranks of grim-faced soldiers converged with swords drawn, many in the crowd panicked and fled at once. Others pulled back reluctantly, throwing rocks as they withdrew. A few dared to stand up to the Praetorians, wielding their bludgeons and torches.
Titus looked for Kaeso, but he had disappeared in the surging crowd.
To reinforce the Praetorians, Nero also called up the vigiles, the troop of trained firefighters first organized by Augustus. The vigiles also acted as night watchmen and sometimes apprehended runaway slaves. They wore leather helmets instead of armour and carried firefighter’s pickaxes, not swords, but their discipline made them more than a match for the shopkeepers and labourers in the crowd.
A few heads were broken and some blood was spilled, but soon the mob dispersed. While the vigiles extinguished the abandoned torches scattered around the Forum, the Praetorians regrouped and headed for the house of Pedanius, where the slaves were being kept under guard.
Within the hour, the slaves were driven to the place of execution outside the city, with Praetorians lining the entire route to forestall any interference. Normally the crucifixions would have been a public event – the larger the crowd, the better, for the purpose of moral instruction – but once the slaves were outside the walls, the Praetorians closed the Appian Gate and diverted all traffic from the Appian Way.
The crucifixions were carried out with no spectators. The work went on through the day and into the night.
The next morning, with Praetorians still patrolling the area, the Appian Gate and the Appian Way were reopened for traffic. For travellers arriving from the south, their first view of the city’s outskirts was the grisly display of Roman justice that lined the road. From within the city a steady stream of citizens came to witness the fate of the 400 slaves of Pedanius. Some gawked, speechless. Some muttered angry words. Some wept.
The crucified bodies remained on display for many days. Most of the senators found time to go and take a look at their handiwork, including Gaius Cassius Longinus, who cursed the failing eyesight that prevented him from beholding the full splendour of Roman justice.
Titus Pinarius did not go to see the crucifixions. He tried to forget everything that had happened that terrible day in the Senate House.
AD 64
Before dawn on a warm morning in the month of the Divine Julius, in his house on the Aventine Hill, Titus Pinarius awoke with the smell of smoke in his nostrils.
“Hilarion!” he called.
Chrysanthe stirred beside him. “What’s happening?”
“I’m sure it’s nothing, my dear. Go back to sleep.”
Young Hilarion appeared at the door. The former doorkeeper had become one of Titus’s favourite slaves; that was why Titus called for Hilarion by name, rather than simply clapping his hands to summon whichever slave was nearest.
Over the last three years or so – since the Pedanius affair – Titus had made a point of actually looking at his slaves, learning to tell them apart, paying attention to their idiosyncrasies, and even learning all their names. Every slave owner in Roma had taken a closer look at his human possessions in the aftermath of Pedanius’s murder, and Titus had made a conscious decision to treat his slaves with more care. He told himself this was not a sign that he was growing soft with age (he was only forty-six, after all); he was simply being prudent. Did not a well-treated horse or dog return the investment of its master’s kindness with better and longer service? Why should it not be so with the people one owned?
Among his slaves, Titus had taken special notice of Hilarion. The young man was not only presentable, being easy to look at and always well groomed, but was quick-witted and uncannily deft at anticipating his master’s needs. Titus had taken to calling on Hilarion for almost everything, and so, waking with the smell of smoke in his nostrils, it was Hilarion’s name that sprang to his lips.
“Yes, Master?” Hilarion spoke softly, in deference to his dozing mistress.
“Do you smell it, too?” Titus whispered
“Yes, Master. Smoke. It’s not coming from inside the house. I woke some of the other slaves and we checked everywhere. It’s not from close-by, either. I sent two of the messenger boys to circle the neighbourhood, and they saw no signs of fire.”
“That’s a relief. Good for you, Hilarion. That was very responsible of you.
“Thank you, Master.”
“Still, there’s definitely smoke in the air. I think the smell is getting stronger.”
“I think you’re right, Master.”
“Did you go on the roof?”
“Not yet, Master.” Hilarion averted his eyes. The young man seemed to have a fear of heights. Ah well, no slave was perfect.
“Bring the ladder to the garden.” Titus rose from his bed, groaning as he stretched his limbs. “I shall climb up myself.”
Chrysanthe, keeping her eyes shut, murmured, “Make one of the slave boys do it.”
“I think not, my dear. If there’s something to be seen, I want to see it with my own eyes. But I’m sure I’ll see nothing. Go back to sleep.”
The climb up the ladder, even by the dim light of dawn, did not frighten Titus, but the possibility of slipping on a loose or broken tile did. He trod very cautiously across the roof, feeling the dry wind on his face. The wind came from the east and carried the smell of smoke. The sunlight just breaking over the distant hills to the east illuminated a small cloud of smoke that appeared to be rising from the far end of the Circus Maximus, down in the valley between the Palatine and the Aventine. As the cloud rose, it was tattered and dispersed by the wind, but lower down it was dense and black, and within it Titus fancied he could see the glow of flames and bits of whirling cinder.
What was burning? There was a shopping arcade at that end of the circus, with a large fabric storehouse Chrysanthe sometimes visited. Burning wool and linen would account for such a dense volume of smoke rising from such a small area. Ascertaining the source of the flames reassured him. The fire was a long way off, and undoubtedly the vigiles were already moving to contain it.
What wisdom and foresight the Divine Augustus had displayed when he established the vigiles! Before that, there had been only privately operated fire brigades in the city, composed of slaves hired out by their masters to fight fires. That system had never worked very well; the slaves had little incentive to risk their lives, and not everyone could afford to pay the exorbitant fees demanded by the brigade owners. Augustus levied a tax on the sale of slaves to establish the state-run vigiles, put military men in charge of their training, and induced slaves to take on the hazardous duty by offering them freedom and citizenship after a six-year term of service.