The recent troubles were the product of a rising mood of nationalism, aggravated by a series of Roman officials whose attitude had been unhelpful. Cestius Gallus, then Governor of Syria, had taken in troops to put down the unrest and been dramatically routed at considerable expense of equipment, the capture of an eagle, and unacceptable loss of life. War was now inevitable. Nero feared that war in Judaea boded ill for the rest of the Empire; that was why he had humbled his musical pride. Having already executed the greatest soldier of their age, Domitius Corbulo, for being too successful, Nero realized that Vespasian was the only man he had left who would be capable of taking on the troubles in Judaea.
* * *
After a time they both slowly drank their wine. Caenis went to bed. He did not come to her. He recognized that she would welcome time alone to adjust to her need to be brave. And already he had too much to think about. He could not spare himself to help her.
She saw little of Vespasian or Titus in the following days. They were working incessantly, commissioning their officers, studying maps, scouring the briefs and dispatches that poured in the moment their appointment was officially announced. Titus was to sail to Egypt to collect the Fifteenth Legion from Alexandria. Vespasian would travel overland after crossing the Hellespont, to make his first contact with the Governor of Syria.
Caenis was interested in the problem, and they made no attempt to shut her out. Yet Vespasian and Titus were forming a close association for an enterprise she would only be able to watch from the sidelines. Once they left Greece, theirs would be a life of action, immediacy, and change. Caenis faced three years of suspense, hearing news selectively and long after the event. Once they did leave her she had decided to travel in Greece alone before returning to Italy; she had never been afraid of being by herself. That did not mean she was not lonely now. Even Vespasian's birthday passed with less than usual ceremony.
On the last night she sat with Vespasian and Titus until it grew dark, while they still worked. Then, despairing of acknowledgment, she went quietly to bed. She heard Titus go to his room, striding perhaps more noisily than usual. He called good night in a low voice as he passed her door.
The house that she hated grew silent.
Caenis was in bed. She had been trying to read, for she was unable to sleep, but the scroll now lay still half unrolled on a side table; Narcissus would have had something to say about that. The knock on her door was so gentle, she was still wondering whether she had heard it when Vespasian came in.
"May I? Saw your light. I'm glad you're still awake."
He came and sat on her bed. Shadows from the disturbed lamp raced for a time up the wall. He was weary, subdued, but obviously wanting to talk to her. "All the work is done. I was determined to finish it so my mind was clear—did you think I had forgotten you?"
"No," Caenis lied. Catching the dregs of her resentment, his eyes flickered momentarily. Her self-pity melted away at once.
Smiling, Vespasian told her, "I've just had a novel experience—I've been given some fatherly advice by my son!"
Caenis was as fond of Titus as he of her; sensing they had quarreled, she frowned. "What was that?"
"He said I should put aside the planning and send for you to my room." She stared down at her folded hands. "Boy's a fool,"Vespasian commented. Besides an attractive temperament, Titus had an inquiring mind, a phenomenal memory, less wit but probably more culture than his critical papa. He was loyal, generous, tactful, and spirited—a delightful young man. And no fool.
Nor was his father.
"Antonia Caenis, I don't send for you; I never did and never will—you come of your own accord. You're not some girl to be called for in the afternoon, then used—and paid—and sent away again until the next gracious summons from the old man. Besides"—his voice dropped—"he either has no imagination, or lacks the experience to know." She looked up, her heart pattering. Vespasian seduced her with his eyes. "It's so much more fun trying to persuade you to invite me to stay here with you!"
With a cry of relief, Caenis had already opened her arms.
* * *
They were both older, and so much slower, but some things were the better for that.
Afterward they both lay awake the greater part of the night. The lights were out. They lay close, and still, neither wishing to disturb the other yet each aware from the steadiness of the other's embrace and occasional quiet movements that they were both awake. After many hours, when Caenis was easing the pressure on her arm, Vespasian finally spoke.
"Well, my lady!"
"Well, my general!"
His lips brushed her forehead as she gave him his new title. "I'm coming back. Same as ever. Promise."
She buried her face in the angle of his neck, her hand moving lightly over the familiar lines of his chest, his shoulder, his strong upper arm. It was then he said, "I never thanked you for the sausage; the one at the British parade."
Caenis had forgotten all about that. "Oh, Titus! I was so glad I saw you that day."
He remained silent for so long, her heart raced with anxiety. "That day was very odd, lass. I didn't seem to be myself." He wrapped both arms around her, gripping her tight, then abruptly confessed, "I wanted rather badly to come to you that night."
Caenis felt she had intruded unintentionally on some private anguish.
He was determined to tell her: "I actually walked out from the banquet on the Capitol and stood for a long time in a colonnade, willing myself to go back in. It would have been right," he declared. "Being with you; after the Triumph."
Caenis made a low distressed sound, horrified to remember how at the time she had misinterpreted what he felt—and grateful that she had. To know this then would have been unbearable; it was difficult to tolerate even now. He released her a little, because he knew her so well that he realized even before she started to move that she wanted to kiss him.
So she did, trying to forget that he had made her want to weep.
When she was kissing him, she heard that soft groan of pleasure, no different now than when they were young. She supposed it might be flattery, but even if it were, the fact that he thought her worth flattering warmed her heart.
There was something about kissing Vespasian in the dark, when all the rest of the household thought them sensibly asleep. One thing led rather conveniently to another, one caress demanded more until, both laughing, they acknowledged what they both had been hoping from the start, as with every tenderness but yet the distinctly urgent passion of two people who were parting for a desperately long time, they moved closer than ever together and once again made love.
* * *
"This is perhaps not the moment to ask—"
"Lass, I am always free . . ." said Vespasian politely—though she was quite right; it was not an easy moment—"for a chat with you . . ."
"Whatever did you do with the sausage?"
"Ate it," he responded, after a short pause. "What did you expect?"
"In the street, lord?" Caenis demanded, as she had done once before.
And Vespasian answered, as he had done the first time, "In the street!"
A four-baton general with full triumphal honors and the dignity of nearly sixty years; it seemed impossible that he would ever change.
PART SIX
THE YEAR OF THE FOUR EMPERORS
When the Caesars were Nero, Galba, Otho, Vitellius, And their successor
THIRTY-SIX
Having wintered in Greece, Caenis spent the following spring by herself, traveling north through Dalmatia to Istria. When there seemed nothing to stay for, she returned to Rome.
During this time Vespasian reached Antioch, the chief city of the eastern Empire, where he made his first rendezvous with the new Governor of Syria, Licinius Mucianus (whom he described to Caenis as a bed-hopping wart posted here as an exile rather than a reward) and their ally, King Agrippa of Judaea (whom Vespasian crudely called a shifty bunch of ringlets on the make). He then marched his Fifth and Tenth Legions south to Ptolomais, which lay a short way north of Mount Carmel on the coast. There Titus joined him from Egypt with the Fifteenth. Campaigning began in Galilee, which had been heavily fortified by the rebels; after an easy assault on Gabara, Vespasian tackled Jotapata, a natural stronghold on a precipice where heavy numbers of enemy troops were dug in. He captured Jotapata in July.