‘That’s as may be,’ replied Methodius testily. ‘But we cannot start bending the rules just to accommodate every change of circumstance. Permission to speak denied.’
‘Oh, come now — isn’t that a bit unreasonable?’ put in the senator who had spoken earlier. ‘It would appear that General Rodericus is unselfishly putting the public good above his own interests, thus preventing him from attending this unscheduled meeting in his role of senator. Must he be penalized for that, through slavish observance of a procedural nicety?’
A growing groundswell of assent arose: ‘A fair point. . Let the nephew have his say. . What difference can it make?’
Methodius banged his staff for silence. ‘Oh, very well,’ he declared with a hint of exasperation. He called to Petrus, ‘The floor is yours, young man.’
Feeling like a condemned prisoner walking to the place of execution, Petrus advanced to the rostrum. Self-conscious in his drab undress uniform, and aware that he must be the youngest person in the chamber, he faced the rows of white-clad senators, their faces etched with experience, expectant, critical. A sudden wave of panic swept over him; he felt his mouth dry out and his palms begin to sweat. For a terrible moment his mind went blank and he felt unable to speak. Then the words of Celer’s sneering denigration of his uncle — the man whom he loved and respected above all others — seemed to sound in his brain, dissolving his mental paralysis and replacing it with indignation.
‘What the Magister Officiorum has told you concerning Vitalian and Hypatius may well be true,’ Petrus began, speaking slowly in order to gain time to marshall some sort of argument. ‘I myself am not sufficiently informed to judge. But in seeking to cast a slur on the name of my uncle, General Rodericus, he not only dishonours the traditions of his office, which have always stood for probity and fairness, but slanders a good and loyal servant of the Empire.’ Growing anger over the injustice of Celer’s attack on Roderic welled up inside him. His training in rhetoric warned him to be careful; properly harnessed, anger could lend force and conviction to a speech; unrestrained, it was likely to destroy it, by causing incoherence and diffusion of focus.
‘Cast your minds back, if you will,’ Petrus continued, choosing his words with care, ‘to the year of the consul Paulus,* when East Rome faced perhaps the most terrible threat in her history, a danger greater even than that posed by Attila — the conquest of the Diocese of Oriens and that of Egypt, by the Persians: half the Empire’s territory. With the imperial armies tied down in Isauria, all that stood against a vast Persian host was a tiny force of limitanei under my uncle’s command. Faced with such overwhelming odds, most generals would, without dishonour, have opted for a tactical withdrawal. Not Rodericus. Knowing the tremendous issues that were at stake, he took on the Persians, and — through a combination of coolness, courage, and inspired leadership — inflicted on them a crushing defeat.’
Suddenly, out of nowhere it seemed, a daring thought occurred to Petrus. He had done his best to rehabilitate his uncle in the minds of his audience. What if, at the same time, he were able to inflict a telling blow against Celer — one that would damage his credibility? It would mean taking a colossal risk, and, however it turned out, making of Celer an enemy for life — a powerful, dangerous, and unforgiving one. Petrus hesitated, aware that he had arrived at a personal Rubicon. .
One of the strengths of the imperial bureaucracy was its openness and comparative accessibility. Armed with a permit from the appropriate official, Petrus had often had occasion to search state records on behalf of his uncle, in the latter’s capacity of senator. The year of the consul Paulus had been memorable, not only for Roderic’s defeat of Tamshapur, but for an exceptionally poor harvest, leading to bread rationing in the capital. Significantly, it was from this time that Celer’s name had begun to appear in the records of various scrinia or state departments, especially those of the Comites Sacrarum Largitionum and Rei Privatae: the Counts of the Public and Privy Purses, respectively. Over the years, Celer’s promotion in these two departments had been steady if hardly rapid, progressing from palatinus or clerk, to committee secretary, to comes commerciorum or customs officer, to curiosus of the cursus publicus — inspector of the public post. Transfer to the Scrinium Officiorum, had seen his rise from agens in rebus,** via Magister Admissionum or Master of Audiences, to his present position of Magister Officiorum — the most powerful post in the Empire, barring that of the emperor himself.
In the course of his researches, Petrus had taken no particular note of Celer’s name — just one among many others. But his legal training and search work had developed to an extraordinary degree Petrus’ powers of selective recall, so that at any given moment he could summon in his mind sections of documents he had studied in the past, and visualize particular names included therein. Before Paulus’ consular year, the name of Celer had nowhere appeared in the records; after it, hardly a year had gone by but Celer’s name had featured. Something, Petrus reasoned, must have happened in that particular year to cause a dramatic improvement in Celer’s fortunes. To obtain a post in the civil service, money, influence, or exceptional talent were necessary to obtain a foothold on the ladder. Celer’s family was neither wealthy nor distinguished, and Celer himself, while competent enough, was of no more than run-of-the-mill material. Payment of suffragium — a ‘sweetener’ to cover the going rate for purchase of a post — was virtually standard practice; though strictly speaking illegal, it was widely connived at. However, to ensure that the administration maintained its efficiency, a formal examination ensured that only candidates of sound ability were accepted. All of which suggested to Petrus that Celer had suddenly come into funds in that particular year — enough to enable him to secure a post in the administration. With the sort of instinct that had often enabled him to surmise a defendant’s guilt or innocence in advance of the verdict, Petrus knew where those funds must have come from — speculation in grain!
Petrus could imagine a grubby little scene: an ambitious young Celer (penniless but with a network of shady contacts) arranging a deal with the skipper of one of the grain ships from Alexandria — a scheme that would make them both rich. A consignment of ‘spoiled’ grain would be transferred to one of the state warehouses (whose supervisor would naturally receive a generous sportula or tip), then sold on to a starving populace at inflated prices. .
All these reflections raced through Petrus’ mind in seconds. His heart thumping painfully, he wet lips that had suddenly gone dry.
‘Honourable members of this great Assembly,’ he declared, ‘I have but one more point to make. Ask yourselves this: when my uncle was risking his life to save the Empire from the Persian threat, and the poor of Constantinople were clamouring for bread, what was Celer doing that enabled him suddenly to acquire great wealth?’ His tunic drenched with sweat, walking stiffly to conceal the trembling in his legs, Petrus left the rostrum and returned to his position in the aisle.
A thunderous silence filled the Senate House. In an agony of suspense, Petrus waited for the angry denunciations that Celer would be bound to utter, if his, Petrus’, implied indictment should be false.