“The guards! The praetorians!” Pilate shouted. “Somebody get the guards!”
But the praetorians, who were ringing the villa to ensure Tiberius’s privacy, had already started down the long stairways with the first sounds and tremors, and now they came rushing over to what was left of the grotto. With remarkable efficiency, they burrowed into the rubble and extracted the living, the wounded, and the dead. Pilate tried to assist them until a burly young praetorian pointed to the wound on his arm. Looking down, Pilate saw a great stain of spreading crimson and meekly surrendered to medical assistance. Casualties were soon set at five dead—two of the guests, Greek scholars, and three servants had been killed—with a score injured or bruised.
But where was Tiberius? In near hysteria, the praetorians resumed their grisly excavations. Since neither the emperor nor Sejanus had been found under the rubble around the entrance to the grotto, they were obviously trapped deeper in the interior, behind a wall of clay and rock—or under it. Tunneling deep inside, the guards kept shouting “Princeps!” “Princeps!” having little hope for the survival of either their emperor or commander. Clawing their way through moist earth and putting their shoulders to huge stones that blocked their path, the rescuers found that part of the ceiling had held, allowing passage into the grotto. With renewed hope, they inched their way into the darkness.
Finally they heard an anguished call for help from the very bowels of the cavern. Pulling away still more debris, they found Tiberius cringing near the floor, while Sejanus hovered over him, shielding him from falling rock with the trunk of his body. Sejanus himself had sustained several wounds and had to be helped out of the grotto, but a lusty cheer went up from the troops as they found their emperor distraught and dirty, but very much alive and physically unscathed.
The villa was transformed into an emergency hospital, as attending physicians did what they could for the injured. They promised Pilate and Sejanus that they would recover with no permanent disfigurement—barring complications. Pilate was given the cheering information that had he been in only a slightly different spot in the grotto, the falling slab of stone would have crushed his head instead of only gashing his arm.
Later that evening, while his circle sat in the villa recovering from the afternoon’s disaster, Tiberius was in a reflective mood. “It puzzles me,” he said, “why so many at Rome presume to give the princeps advice…such wrong advice. How many senators during the past months have warned me of a danger to the state. There is an overambitious man, they say, who will stop at nothing to gain personal power for himself. Who? Sejanus. The man who saved my life. Sejanus is splitting the state, they whine. He is plotting against the princeps. His loyalties are only to himself. Who? The man who risked his life to save mine.”
Frowning, Tiberius got up and stalked about the room. Then he stopped and spoke with marked emotion. “Know this, my friends, and see that Rome learns it too: today we have had the proof of blood. While all of you were scampering out of the grotto like so many mice from a foundering trireme, one man thought to serve his emperor. Let there be no further questioning of Lucius Aelius Sejanus. In loyalty and service, this man is the greatest in the Empire.”
Chapter 4
Departing in August, Pilate had a choice between land or sea travel to Judea. Since the overland journey across Greece and Asia Minor was notoriously long and tedious, and since the Mediterranean was a predictable sea, offering safe, calm waters from May to September, Pilate chose the direct sea voyage.
With Rome dependent on Egypt for her wheat supply, Tiberius regarded the shuttle of grain ships from Alexandria to Puteoli as the lifeline of the Empire. These great, wide-beamed merchantmen, the largest ships afloat on the Mediterranean, unloaded their cargoes at Puteoli on the Bay of Naples, Italy’s major port, and returned with plenty of space for passengers. Pilate booked passage for Palestine via Alexandria with a grain fleet that would sail the third week of August.
When he, Procula, and their personal staff left for Puteoli, a near-caravan of carriages trailed after them, loaded with gear and effects that could probably have been bought in Egypt or even Judea; but Procula, with her patrician tastes, did not want to take her chances in provincial marketplaces. Because it might be several years before they would return, they stopped over for a few days in Caudium so that Procula would have the chance to meet those of her husband’s relatives who had not been able to attend their wedding.
Tiberius intentionally had not specified the length of Pilate’s tenure, since he would want a free hand to remove him after a short time in case he did not fulfill Sejanus’s promises. On the other hand, if he governed well, his term of office might extend as long as a decade.
From Caudium it was only a short trip down to Puteoli. The port was nestled in a northern corner of the Bay of Naples, with the domineering Mount Vesuvius hovering over the eastern shore. Pilate pointed out for Procula two bustling towns near its base, Herculaneum and Pompeii, and, just off the southern end of the bay, the fluted, gray-white palisades of the isle of Capri.
The imperial harbor master had arranged for Pilate’s passage on the Trident of Neptune, a reliably large Alexandrian merchantman, about 180 feet long with 45-foot beam. Its tall, central mainmast towered over a smaller foremast, which slanted rakishly toward the bow. Hanging from the single fat yard was a multicolored squarish mainsail, rippling in the breezes as if impatient at being docked.
Surprisingly spacious passenger cabins were provided aft below deck, and the best had been reserved for Pilate, Procula, and the modest company of three military aides and four household servants who accompanied them. The captain made a special point of giving Pilate a gracious welcome on board, for although he was in charge of the maritime responsibilities of the voyage, the moment a Roman magistrate stepped on board a vessel chartered for imperial service, he, not the captain, was in supreme command of the ship.
A fleet of eight merchantmen would make the voyage together—there was safety in numbers—and an extra day was needed to load and synchronize the convoy. Just before sailing, an honor guard of praetorians marched onto the wharf to bid Pilate farewell and present personal gifts from the imperial party at Capri. Sejanus sent him a specially tailored governor’s military standard with the image of Tiberius in gold and the name “Pontius Pilatus” beautifully woven into the purple fabric. An even more significant gift came from Tiberius himself, a gold ring engraved with his image, signifying that Pilate was now welcomed into the inner circle of amici Caesaris or Caesar’s friends, an elite fraternity open only to senators and equestrians high in imperial service. It all portended well indeed for the new prefect of Judea.
Since Pilate was the highest-ranking officer in the flotilla, the Trident of Neptune now set sail as the lead ship. While rounding the promontory of Misenum, they passed several ships of the Roman navy. They were long, slender warships driven by oar, not sail, for maneuverability, each painted with a glaring eye near its bow and projecting ugly iron-clad beaks at water level for ramming enemy ships. Out across the bay, past Capri on their portside, and into the blue Tyrrhenian Sea glided their ships, aiming south-southeast for the Straits of Messina, the narrow channel between Italy and Sicily.