Gods and Legions (18 page)

THE CROSSING

The death of earth is to become water, and the death of water is to become air, and the death of air is to become fire.

– HERACLITUS THE OBSCURE

I

We arrived several days later, shortly after the noon hour, after talking our way past Barbatio's guard outposts and across the river on a rickety supply ferry. Even this far toward the Rhine's source, and in the low waters of summer, the river was wide and sluggish. Trotting north along the well-traveled road, signs of Barbatio's camp became evident miles before we actually arrived. For yards on either side of the road the land had been laid bare – clear-cut of its enormous, centuries-old fir and pine trees, the terrain shorn and denuded of all but the slenderest of saplings. Limbs and brush had been dragged into mounds and burned to charred heaps. Skid roads and wagon ruts crossed the land at all angles where the huge logs were still being bucked and dragged away by Gallic drovers using enormous teams of oxen – twenty-four, sometimes thirty-six or more, enough muscle power and raw materials to build an entire city.

Upon rounding the final bend before Barbatio's camp, I drew up my horse in astonishment. There before me lay not the small, temporary trading post and river docks I had been led to believe would be the site of the Roman encampment, but a veritable fortress city, constructed entirely of wood. For months Barbatio's army had been here, and the general had spared no effort or expense in securing the comfort and safety of his troops. Wharves extended far out into the river, braced sturdily on pillars of the same straight, heavy trunks I had seen dragged on sledges from the forests upstream; broad storehouses and depots were built directly on the piers, with others lining the riverbank for a hundred yards, all sided with sawed planks nailed on sturdy posts and beams; and the troops' barracks, hundreds of identical, flat-topped log huts neatly arrayed on carefully measured quadrants, each capable of sleeping eight or ten soldiers. The blocks of houses extended up the slope for a quarter mile, with the officers' quarters nearest the river somewhat larger and more luxuriously appointed. Surrounding the whole was a high palisade, the tips of the logs hewn to rough points, the walls fronted by a deep and broad ditch.

There was clearly no fear of attack at the moment, however, and the guard posts were minimal. The few men in the city itself were calmly going about their daily tasks, the sick and injured were recuperating on their litters by the street in the warm sun. The entire population, it seemed, both legionaries and hired hands, was swarming over the quays and docks, for it was here that the most amazing structure of all was to be found.

At this point the river was some five hundred yards across, at first glance a placid stream. But beneath its smooth surface, it bore a rapid current capable of carrying even the heaviest boats downstream at a man's jogging pace – in fact, the heavier the vessel, the faster. A deeper keel reached currents that would whisk the ship along at a speed that far surpassed that of lighter rafts and dinghies bobbing at the calm surface. Here Barbatio was constructing his bridge, one capable of sustaining the march of five Roman legions with their wagons and supplies, and their subsequent return loaded with barbarian plunder.

Pairs of huge pilings had been laboriously driven into the river a hundred feet apart across the entire expanse of the water, while across each such span heavy hempen ropes were stretched securely, forming the solid bracing for what was to follow. Stretched in a gently curving train from the right bank was an enormous line of barges and rafts – not of uniform length or width, but a motley assortment of craft, including grain and supply barges seized from the Alemanni and rude pontoons assembled locally by the soldiers. These were lined up end to end, the bow of each vessel securely lashed to the stern of the next, with the entire column passing between each pair of pillars. The sturdy ropes stretched between these pilings prevented the lateral movement that would have caused the entire line to shift downstream from the pull of the current.

The bridge was complete but for a short space in the middle, with room for perhaps two or three vessels, which were being poled along the existing portions of the bridge, readied for insertion into their places. Along the entire length hundreds of soldier-carpenters labored like ants, carrying flat-planed boards laboriously cut by teams of naked troops along the bank, working in pairs at crosscut saws. The planks too were laid end to end and nailed securely along the line of craft, lending rigidity to the entire structure at the joints between vessels, and forming two parallel tracks precisely the width of wagon wheels. This would provide a uniform surface on which the troops could march during the crossing the next day and, more important, stability for the hundreds of supply wagons to follow, drawn by skittish horses and oxen that would rebel at any more than a gentle swaying of the craft beneath their feet.

I stood on the low ridge above the encampment for an hour watching the unhurried but relentless labor below, one of the greatest examples of Roman military engineering I had seen. Finally, feeling the fatigue of my journey, I urged my horse into a slow trot and made my way along the hardpacked street to the general staff building, a two-story, framesided structure with legion pennants fluttering at the door.

This I was not even permitted to enter, for when the sentry was informed that I came from Julian, he curtly called into the doorway, summoning his cohort commander.

'General Barbatio is occupied with final preparations for tomorrow's crossing,' the man stated in a matter-of-fact tone. 'He cannot see you now.'

'May I at least make an appointment to see him later?' I inquired wearily.

The officer looked at me more closely. 'Are you an army officer?' he asked suspiciously.

'No, sir – the Caesar's personal physician and his envoy. I have an important request for your commander. I need a few moments of his time.'

The man paused and stroked his chin thoughtfully. 'Come by this evening,' he said. 'I'll see what I can do. In the meantime, take your rest in the officers' barracks behind us. There are several empty cots. You can eat with us in the staff commissary while you're here.'

I nodded gratefully, and leaving my horse I walked slowly to the barracks, the weariness now weighing on me like a leaden blanket. Seeing that the first cot at the door had no baggage and appeared not to have been slept in, I dropped my bag at the foot, collapsed onto it, and immediately fell asleep.

I awoke with a start. The hut in which I lay was still empty, but from the darkness I judged I had slept for hours, and the night was now well advanced. Standing hurriedly, I strode to the doorway and stepped into the street, dismayed to see by the height of the moon that the time must have been near midnight. Still, the sawing and hammering continued at the same steady pace I had heard at midday. Dodging shifts of soldiers carrying long planks through the street, this time by the light of torches and camp lanterns, I walked over to the staff headquarters. There I found the cohort commander standing outside, chatting with the sentry.

He looked at me with a wry smile. 'And so the dead have risen.'

I returned his gaze with a surly expression. 'You could have awakened me so I wouldn't miss my interview with the general.'

'Wouldn't have done any good. The general hasn't been in his quarters all evening. Even now he's inspecting the bridge and conferring with his engineers. You did well by sleeping.'

I shrugged. 'I'll wander over to the bridge myself. Maybe I can corner him there.'

Stepping back into the street I followed the sounds of the heaviest activity and made my way to the foot of the bridge, which consisted of a massive wheat barge, fifty feet wide and two hundred feet long. A soldier told me the Alemanni had scuttled it in a swamp nearby, but Barbatio had ordered it raised and patched. Lashed securely fore and aft to two pairs of gigantic pilings, it formed the rocklike base for the entire right-bank side of the bridge, with room to spare for warehouse structures and toolsheds along its sides, sheltering the narrow plank road that had been constructed in the middle. A similar massive craft had been installed on the left bank.

The bridge, I saw in the moonlight, had been completed while I slept. The train of craft swept in an unbroken line the entire width of the river, the linked vessels swaying downstream slightly in gentle arcs between each set of pilings, like festive ribbons draped over an archway. In the middle, carpenters were completing construction of the plank road and further securing the crucial joints between the last craft that had been inserted.

The full moon shone bright and peaceful, rising high south of the bridge and casting beautiful shadows and glimmers the length of the river, a pale, liquid light that reflected almost effervescent on the water, illuminating its course for miles in either direction.

It was while peering at the moon's reflected gleam, its long white tail rippling playfully in the gently swaying surface, that I saw them.

Far upstream, they appeared almost as waves or shadows, perhaps merely the strange diversions of currents caused by the underwater shifting of sandbars or the remains of a bevy of stumps. I stared at them absentmindedly for a time, until I noticed that they were not stationary, but rather drifting steadily closer. A flotilla of boats perhaps? No, not boats, for they rode too low in the water. I strode out onto the bridge and trotted along the grain barge to the next vessel, which was not encumbered by the large warehouses obstructing my view upstream. Arriving at the end of the structures, I looked again.

They were closer now, not more than a half mile distant. Something more than ripples but less than ships, bearing down on the bridge with the relentless speed of the river's current. I looked around somewhat nervously, and seized the arm of a nearby centurion. He looked at me with irritation, but I merely pointed to the middle of the river upstream of the bridge. He followed the direction of my finger, and his expression changed from annoyance, to questioning, and finally to complete understanding – and fear. Suddenly he whirled, stepping onto the plank road and racing along the boards to the middle of the bridge.

'Logs!' he cried. This produced no response from anyone, as the city and bridge were surrounded by logs. 'Bearing down from upstream!' he shouted. 'Clear the bridge! Clear the bridge!'

I looked back upstream. Logs, enormous specimens, seven, eight, and nine feet across, were riding low and menacingly in the water like huge marauding sea creatures, bearing down upon the very center of the bridge with all the speed the irrepressible river could offer. Thirty of them, no, fifty, a hundred in all, on a front a hundred yards wide, in perfect true to the current, pointed like arrows at the heart of Barbatio's structure. Now the din rose as men saw them coming, and as they realized the consequences of being on the bridge when the massive missiles struck. Soldiers and carpenters dropped their tools where they stood, tossing planks to the side or into the water, rushing forward or back, some on the far end losing their heads and running back to the near side so as not to be stranded away from the Roman encampment. Men pushed and jostled, tripping over one another and bottlenecking at unfinished sections of the planking, all eyes fixed upstream at the silent black shadows bearing down on them.

The initial impact caused a sickening crunch, and a shudder snaked through the structure from center to ends, like a rope that has been sharply snapped. Timbers groaned and creaked as the huge logs smashed ponderously into the vertical pilings, loosening them like tent stakes kicked from the ground. As the logs hit, the force of the current rotated them sideways, and their rear ends swung around, slamming their full length and weight against the slender ties of the bridge.

But that was all. After the shudder and groan – silence. The bridge had held, barely, although it was bowing out dangerously where several of the support pilings had been uprooted. Yet still the bridge held! The men on both ends broke into a spontaneous cheer of relief, echoing across the silent river – yet their jubilation was short-lived.

At first I thought it could only be shadows, the trick plays of moonlight on overwrought eyes. But pushing my way through the crowds of men to the front closest to the center, I soon realized I was mistaken.

'Barbarians!' someone shouted. 'It's the Alemanni!'

It was pandemonium. I stood rooted to the spot as the unarmed men behind me rushed again to the ends of the bridge for safety. First dozens, then hundreds of dark, shadowy figures, their naked bodies painted black with grease, clambered over the logs under which they had been hiding, some still clutching the hollow reeds through which they had been breathing as they had floated beneath and beside the missiles they had aimed at the bridge. Working rapidly and nimbly, they drew long knives and swords from their belts, and with trained strokes began hacking at the support ropes strung between the pilings, sawing at the lashings linking together the rafts and barges, using sticks and levers to pry up the planks that had been so painstakingly smoothed, fitted, and installed.

Within moments the middle of the bridge had been broken, and the first loosened vessel began floating away down the stream. With the structural tension released, the two ragged ends in the middle also began bowing out, and as the surface current began rushing through the breach, the jam of logs too began exerting inexorable pressure on the weak spot that had been opened.

Another cry rose up from Barbatio's men, this one of outrage at seeing their work destroyed by a handful of greased apes. With a roar that was echoed by their counterparts on the left bank, men seized tools lying about – axes and adzes, pry bars, boards, even the occasional sword or bow, and rushed in an angry mob toward the middle of the bridge, which was now swaying ominously, the ragged ends drifting steadily away from the linear into a curve down the stream.

'Don't let them get away!' I heard someone cry, and looking up I saw an officer in full dress armor bearing a crimson cloak – General Barbatio. 'Seize those criminals!'

But the Alemanni had seen us coming. With white smiles glowing eerily in the moonlight from their blackened faces, they pried and slashed at the ropes until just before the lead Roman carpenters, wielding woodcutting tools, had reached their position. Then, each one pausing only long enough to seize a loosened plank, they leaped back into the water – this time
downstream
of the bridge – lay with their bellies flat on the broad boards beneath them, and serenely paddled off with the current, the moonlight reflecting for a long while on their glistening backs, as the Romans raged impotently on their now broken and wandering bridge.