2
‘Scipio! It’s ready!’ The voice came from the corner of the room opposite Hippolyta, from a wide recess containing a fireplace. Fabius could just make out a figure in the gloom squatting over the brazier, a lighted tallow candle in one hand. He saw Scipio glance anxiously at the door where the centurion would arrive, and then look at the others. ‘All right. Ennius has something to show us. But at the first sound of the centurion coming down the corridor, everyone rushes back to their places around the table. You know what old Petraeus thinks of Ennius’ inventions. We’ll all be for it.’
They crowded around the recess, Hippolyta included. Polybius stood alongside Scipio, his hands behind his back, peering with interest over the others, looking much more a scholar than a soldier. Ennius’ experiments of the last few months owed much to Polybius, who had introduced him to the wonders of Greek science and fuelled his fascination with military engineering. Scipio nudged Polybius. ‘So what ancient magic have you revealed to him this time, my friend?’
Polybius shrugged. ‘We talked yesterday about Thucydides’ account of the siege of Delium.’
Gulussa was standing beside them, and looked keenly at Polybius. ‘In the year of the three hundred and fiftieth Olympiad, that is, a hundred and fifty-six years ago,’ he said, his Latin accented with the soft guttural sound of Numidian. ‘The action where the philosopher Socrates fought as a hoplite, when the Athenians were routed by the Boeotians. The first major battle in history to involve full-scale tactical planning, including the detailed coordination of cavalry and infantry.’
Polybius cocked an eye at him. ‘You listen to my lectures well, Gulussa. Full marks.’
Scipio peered into the recess. ‘So what is it? Some kind of engine of war?’
‘All I know is that after I told him about the siege he disappeared off to Ostia, where he has a friend in a back alley behind the harbour who supplies him with all manner of exotic substances, brought from all corners of the earth,’ Polybius replied.
‘That would be Polyarchos the Alexandrian,’ Scipio said resignedly. ‘Usually that means pyrotechnics, and usually you can’t get the smell out of your clothes for days.’
Ennius had his back towards them and was shaping something with his hands on the brazier, moulding it. ‘Just give me a moment,’ he said, his voice muffled in the recess. Fabius listened out for the centurion’s distinctive step, but only heard the swish of blades and the sound of scuffled feet in the arena below, and the occasional grunt. Brutus had left them during the study period, and was practising his swordplay again. Fabius turned back to the squatting figure in the gloom. Since Fabius had first met him as a boy, playing on the Palatine Hill with Scipio, Ennius had been intrigued by all manner of contraptions: bridges, boats, cranes for bringing stone columns and blocks into the city, the principles of architecture. The old centurion approved of that: when a legionary was not fighting, his proper job was to dig fortifications and build forts, presided over by centurions who prided themselves on their building skills almost as much as their fighting prowess.
But Ennius’ latest craze was a different matter altogether. With Polybius’ introduction to Greek science had come a fascination with fire. Ennius had even accompanied Ptolemy when he had sailed back to Egypt three months ago, after Ptolemy had been recalled from the academy to assume the throne of Egypt. Ostensibly Ennius had accompanied him for Ptolemy’s marriage ritual and to go crocodile-hunting, but mainly he had wanted to visit the university at Alexandria to see the work of Greek scientists at first hand, and he had returned only the week before, overflowing with enthusiasm. He had even suggested to Petraeus that the Roman army needed a specialised cohort of fabri, engineers, with himself as tribune, tasked to supervise and improve fortifications and also to develop new weapons of war. Scipio had never seen such a black cloud descend over the old centurion’s face. To suggest that specialists should do the traditional work of legionaries was an affront to their honour. To suggest that new weapons of war were needed was not only an affront to the legionaries, but also an insult to the centurion himself; Ennius was questioning his ability to kill with the time-honoured weapons of thrusting sword and javelin and bare hands. But even the week of punishment Ennius had endured mucking out the dung of the elephant stable had failed to diminish his ardour, and here he was again risking the wrath of the centurion to show them yet another miracle of science.
‘All right.’ Ennius shuffled back from the fireplace and swivelled round to face them, the object he had been shaping lying in his hands. It looked like a sphere of wet clay, only it glistened black. In front of the fireplace were pots filled with powders — one bright yellow, others red and brown. Ennius coughed, then stared at them, his expression brimming with excitement.
‘Well?’ Scipio said. ‘We haven’t got all day.’
Ennius picked up a waxed writing tablet and a metal stylus. ‘First, you need to understand the science.’
‘No.’ Scipio held up his hand. ‘No, we don’t. Just show us.’
Ennius looked briefly disappointed. He put down the tablet, and picked up the lit candle again. ‘What do you know about Greek fire?’
Scipio thought for a moment. ‘The Assyrians used it. They made it from black tar that boils up in the desert.’
‘I myself have seen the tar, when I visited the land of the Israelites, beside the briny inland sea,’ Metellus added. ‘The Greeks call it naphtha.’
‘They also call it water fire,’ Polybius murmured. ‘It’s not extinguished by water, and will even continue to burn if you throw it on the surface of the sea.’
‘Right,’ Ennius said, twitching with excitement. ‘Now watch this.’ He put the ball into a bed of kindling below the brazier and thrust the candle into it. The chips of wood ignited and flames enveloped the ball, the flames rising towards the chimney. Suddenly the ball crackled and erupted in a violent flame that roared up the chimney and disappeared, followed by a suck of wind and leaving nothing but embers in the brazier and an acrid smell in the air. Ennius tossed a pot of water on the flames, watched the smoke disappear up the chimney and turned to them again, a broad smile on his face. ‘Well?’ he said. ‘Impressed?’
Metellus was closest to the fire, and held his nose. ‘What did you put in that, Ennius? Elephant dung?’
‘Not far off.’ Ennius wiped his forehead, leaving a black smudge. ‘Nitre, made from ground-up bird droppings. An Egyptian priest showed me how to do it. But the smell is sulphur.’
‘What’s your point, Ennius?’ Scipio said, his ear cocked for any sound from the corridor.
‘Did you see how the rising heat from the fire drew the flames from the naphtha up the chimney? By the time it reached the roof, it would have erupted out in a jet of flame far higher even than the Capitoline Temple.’
‘Jupiter above, I hope the old centurion didn’t see that,’ Scipio muttered.
‘So you think this might be a weapon?’ Metellus said doubtfully.
Ennius looked up. ‘Polybius, tell them.’
Polybius cleared his throat. ‘At the siege of the Boeotian fortress of Delium, the Athenians set up metal tubes to throw fire at the enemy. Thucydides called them flamethrowers.’
‘You see?’ Ennius said. ‘Somebody had the idea almost three hundred years ago, but then it’s forgotten. It’s typical of our attitude to technology. Why? Look at our beloved centurion. Total inflexibility.’ He shook his head in frustration but then became animated again, gesticulating as he spoke. ‘You would need a tube of bronze about six feet high and a hand’s breadth in width, set at an angle facing the enemy. At the base would be a brazier with a fire to create the necessary draught up the tube. You drop a ball of naphtha down the tube, and then you have an arc of flame a hundred or more feet high.’