Render Unto Caesar (45 page)

Hermogenes stared at him in disbelief. “Lord Prefect, Pollio termed me a thief in every barbershop in the city. My friend has had his house watched by Rufus and searched by Pollio—things which, you may be sure, have been noticed and discussed by all
his
friends with all of
their
friends. How can you possibly expect that the whole affair can now be covered over in silence? If I tell people that I am forbidden to discuss it, all that will happen is that they will draw their own conclusions.”

“Very well: discuss it
in confidence,
and only with those who can't manage without an explanation!” snapped Taurus. “I do not want this to be the gossip of barbershops.”

“Unlike my career as a thief?”

Taurus raised a hand forbiddingly. “An unsubstantiated accusation from a man such as Vedius Pollio will not harm your reputation. I will have it posted in the prefectures that he never brought the charge before the law and submitted no evidence that any crime had taken place. If anyone does go to him with news of your whereabouts, his likely reception will both convince him of your innocence and discourage any of his friends from trying the same.”

Hermogenes glared at him.

“I am certain that you are well able to find some form of the truth that will keep your associates quiet,” Taurus said, meeting the glare with a flat, implacable gaze. “You must do so.”

Hermogenes sighed, then bowed his head in acquiescence. “May I ask
how
you have settled the matter, Lord Prefect?”

“Very polite all of a sudden, aren't you?” said the Roman, with distaste. “Pollio has agreed to write off Lucius's debt to him, in exchange for my taking no further action on the matter.” His lip curled in distaste. “He is ill. I hoped this morning might prove the end of him, but unfortunately he recovered and went home. Still, I think he is unlikely to last too much longer: he is much decayed since the last time I saw him. The emperor would undoubtedly prefer to allow him to die quietly of natural causes, without further scandal.”

“And so you asked him to cancel Rufus's debt?” Hermogenes asked angrily. “All
four million
of it? It sounds to me, Lord Prefect, as though you are still trying to save Tarius Rufus.”

Taurus shrugged defensively. “Lucius has served the state well, and led our troops to victory many times. He holds the consulship by the emperor's appointment. He was my friend for many years.” There was real pain in his voice as he said the last phrase. After a moment of silence he went on, “He has been … unlike himself … ever since that business with his son.”

“What business?” asked Hermogenes warily.

Taurus gave him a look of affront, then said harshly, “His son and heir plotted his murder, some years back—or so Lucius believes. He heard the evidence privately at a family council, and then sent the young man away, exiled until his father's death. Obviously something like that preys upon a man, undermines his confidence in his friends … and then there was that freedman of his, Macedo, giving him bad advice. I never liked the creature: he always believed his patron had the right to do anything he pleased, and told him so. I'm glad I broke the ugly parasite's neck!” His voice had become a snarl.

Hermogenes kept his face carefully blank.

Taurus settled in his chair again, like a ruffled eagle. “You disagree, do you?”

“I think Macedo told Rufus what Rufus wanted to hear,” Hermogenes replied. “And when the man attacked me this morning, he must have known that he'd die for it. He must have believed that if I were silenced, Rufus would be safe. He sacrificed his life for his patron. One has to admire his loyalty.” He shrugged. “But I have to admit that I am grateful to you for stopping him.”

Taurus snorted in amusement. “Sometimes, Greek, I almost think I could like you.” They looked at one another for a moment, and then the general went on angrily, “Then I remember that you cursed Rome.”

“Sometimes I almost think I could like you, too, Roman, if you weren't so bloodthirsty,” replied Hermogenes. “I never meant that curse. I have Roman friends, whom I have no desire at all to see destroyed by the gods. I think even you will admit that I had every reason to feel very angry.”

Taurus gave another snort. “Then you should work to control your tongue. Well, I accept that you are honest. I have let both Pollio and Lucius know that they are not to interfere with you in any way, and I've told Lucius to give you your money. Now, name what reward you want from me.”

“I told you before, I want nothing from you.”

“You're a very proud man, aren't you?”

“Yes,” agreed Hermogenes evenly. “I came to Rome to claim what the laws of Rome grant me as my
right
. If you ‘reward' me, then what I have obtained isn't a right at all but a favor dished out by a master of the state to a slave who has done him a service. It diminishes it and me.”

Taurus smiled sourly. “A very proud man,” he repeated, but this time it was with approval. “I will tell you one more thing. When that woman Cantabra was a slave in my school, I asked her to sleep with me. She has a certain kind of magnificence, don't you find? And great courage, which I admire. I'd watched her win a fight despite having spent the previous three days in a punishment cell—win it through sheer refusal to be beaten—and I wanted her.”

Hermogenes sat very still, remembering the way Maerica had left out that detail when she told the story, and remembering also how she had insisted that Taurus was honest and honorable. “I am grateful,” he said slowly, “as I know she was, that you respected her refusal and accepted it.”

Taurus snorted appreciation. “You do know her, don't you? Yes, of course she refused me: she hates Romans even more than you do. What was the name you used for her?”

“Maerica. It is her real name. I do not hate Romans, Lord Prefect. I've just told you that. As for the empire, it rules the world, and there's no future in opposing it. I simply want it to be an empire where all citizens have rights, and not just those who are Italian-born and powerful.”

“You want a Roman empire run by Greeks for their own benefit, you mean,” said Taurus softly. “That was what Marcus Antonius would have made of our republic, him and your Queen Cleopatra. That was what we fought against at Actium, and we shouted with joy when we got the victory.”

There was real feeling in the words—and a real threat implicit. “I was never a supporter of Cleopatra,” Hermogenes said carefully. “As your own researches proved.”

“When we occupied Egypt, our informants readily assumed that anyone who'd opposed the monarchy was the emperor's friend,” Taurus replied. “But at Alexandria, as I recall, those who opposed the monarchy mostly did so because they believed it to be subservient to Rome. They supported anyone who promised to throw
all
the Romans out.”

“No one promises that anymore,” Hermogenes told him flatly. “The battles have all been fought, and Rome won. Lord Prefect, I am not a political man. This past month has been the only occasion when I involved myself in affairs of state, and, I assure you, I will be
extremely
glad to get back to shipping syndicates.”

At that, Taurus laughed. “And introduce your gladiator to them. It still seems an odd pairing—a wild Cantabrian warrior woman and an Alexandrian businessman—but I wish you good fortune in it.” He got to his feet. “I trust you will see to that letter tomorrow morning. I will tell the hospital to provide a litter to take you and your concubine to your friend's house now. Good health!”

*   *   *

When the general had gone, Hermogenes sat down by Maerica again and took her hand.

“Well?” she demanded.

He kissed a scar on her thumb. “He says he's told Rufus and Pollio both to leave me alone, and that Rufus will send me the money at Titus Crispus's house within the next few days.”

A slow grin spread across her face. She caught his chin with her free hand and pulled his head over to kiss him. “Victory,” she whispered.

He grimaced. “He's also told Pollio that he'll take no action against him if he writes off the whole of the debt Rufus owes to
him
, and Pollio's agreed.
Four million sestertii!
Let off that, it's no wonder Rufus can suddenly afford to pay
me
. And Taurus wants to keep the whole business quiet, to protect Rufus. He's prepared to blame most of Rufus's troubles on the freedman.”

“Oh.” She was quiet a moment. “Rufus was his friend,” she said at last. “They may have had debts of their own. The main thing is, you won. You have what you wanted. A Roman consul has been forced to humble himself and obey the laws. And that evil man Pollio is punished, too. His plan has failed, he remains out of favor, and he has lost money as well.”

He grimaced again. “Perhaps. But it doesn't feel like victory. It feels more like—what do they call it in the arenas, when a fight has no clear winner?”

“We say the fighters are ‘dismissed standing,'” said Maerica. “Dear heart, believe me, this is not a dismissal, it is a win. Just because the losers are spared instead of killed doesn't mean you are any less a victor.”

He began to believe it. He grunted, though, still not entirely satisfied, still without any feeling of triumph. “Taurus said one other thing,” he told her. “He said that when you were his slave he asked you to sleep with him.” He linked her fingers with his own and looked up into her face. “Why didn't you tell me that?”

Her eyes had gone hard. “He told you he'd had me?”

He shook his head. “I think he wanted to see if I would conclude that, but he was not surprised when I didn't. He never pretended you did anything but refuse. I don't know, though, why you didn't tell me that he was willing to
honor
your refusal. After all, you were his slave. Most men would be indignant at being refused by their own slave. Many would have made you suffer for it. It would've reassured me to know that he was willing to respect it.”

“I was afraid you'd believe that I'd agreed,” she said in a small voice. “That I was his castoff.”

He shook his head and kissed her thumb again, smiling. “Even if you had agreed … you were a slave. He could have destroyed you—and he could have brought you out safely from the arena, given you your freedom. Who wouldn't choose life and freedom over slavery and death?”

“I could never sleep with him,” she declared fiercely. “He commanded the Roman forces at the beginning of the war that destroyed us. I told him I would fight for him, but I could never love him. He understood.”

“I see.”

“And … why I didn't tell you … I was afraid that if you knew, and if you believed me, you might think I wanted to protect him,” she went on, quietly, but also more confidently now. “If you thought I was protecting him, you wouldn't pay attention to what I said. You would have gone to Maecenas. It was what you wanted to do, and I was afraid that if you did it, Pollio would get you. It was the move he anticipated.”

“And
did
you want to protect him?”

She shrugged. “Mostly I wanted to protect
you.
But yes. I did.”

He thought of the enmity to Rome she had shown so clearly right from the start:
I knew you were not Roman, and I knew your enemies were.
He thought of his dream in the Mamertine Prison. “Why?” he asked quietly.

She was silent, then said slowly, “When Statilius Taurus commanded the enemy, he was fierce and brutal, but so were many of our own people. He was also brave and honorable, and we respected him. He was replaced, though. First we fought against the emperor and Marcus Agrippa, and then, when they had defeated us, the peace was given to the charge of a man called Publius Carisius. A butcher, a man who loved only gold. It was only then that we understood that the Romans were not like us at all, that to many of them honor matters not at all.

“There are worse men than Statilius Taurus. He believes in the right of Romans to rule the world, but he also believes in duty and discipline and fairness. If he had been left in command, and Carisius had stayed in Rome…” She trailed off, then resumed. “For such a long time, I hated all Romans. But that was in my own country, when I met only enemies. Once I was here in Rome, even in the arenas, I met some who were kind to me, some whom I respected, some whom I liked. And Rome rules the world. What will become of the world, if we allow those Romans who are honorable to be murdered by those who are like Rufus and Pollio?”

“The empire isn't going to fall,” he suggested, “so our only option is to support those parts of it that make it something we can endure?”

“Yes,” she agreed, relaxing. “That is how it is.”

He thought of all that she had suffered, and was moved by a respect bordering on awe that she could say that—that she could move beyond the suffering and hatred and plan for a better future. He kissed her. “We are agreed, then.”

The doctor bustled up, looking indignant. “They tell me that the general has given orders that you're both to have a litter over to some place on the Via Tusculana this evening,” he said accusingly.

“Yes,” agreed Hermogenes. “Is that a problem?”

“Yes!” declared the young man, drawing himself up. “Your, um, concubine took a serious wound, and has lost a great deal of blood. I have stitched the cut, but it has barely begun to knit. I would strongly advise against moving her for another two days at the very least.”

“Thank you,” Hermogenes replied at once. “We will take no risks with my concubine's life, and she will not leave here until you say it is safe for her to travel.”

“Huh!” said Maerica in contempt, while the doctor blinked in surprise at the ease of his victory.