The River God's Vengeance(17)

“If this is doing well enough, you can have it,” he said, turning back to the stacks of documents.

Foreigners often act as if law and order were the highest of civic virtues, especially those from the civilized and monarch-ridden eastern part of the world. Romans were disorderly in those days, but at least they didn’t spend their lives kissing the backside of a king. Unlike now.

Hermes and I enjoyed the show in the Forum for a while longer. Two well-known swordsmen of the day, Thracian dagger fighters, climbed on the monument and dueled to great applause and encouragement. Hermes won his denarius back on that one. On the whole, although it lacked pomp and solemnity, gilded armor and colorful plumes, it was almost as good as the munera.

“Aedile?” said the freedman. “As much as I hate to interrupt your—”

“Think nothing of it,” I said, waving aside his apology. “It’s all but over. Nothing much left to do except mop up the blood. What progress have we made?”

“We,“ he said, emphasizing the word, “have separated all the documents relating to the public contracts let by authority of that censorship. I have marked two that featured the name you mentioned.” The stack he indicated was much reduced but still substantial.

“Excellent. Have these delivered to my house in the Subura. I shall need to peruse them at leisure.”

He looked at me as if a malicious god had just transformed me into a sheep. “You want me to allow state documents to leave the Tabularium?” Judging by his tone of voice, I might have asked him to break into the House of the Vestals and bugger all the virgins.

“Exactly. The Tabularium is not a temple or any other sacred place. It is state property dedicated to the storage of state documents. As an official of the State in pursuit of his duties, I require that these documents be taken to my home.”

He folded his arms and stared at me down his long, Graeco-Syrian nose, no small feat since I was far taller than he. “Not without the express order of a censor or one of the consuls.” There is nothing to match the hauteur of a state fiunky.

“The censors stepped down from office last year,” I said, “and the consuls have not yet taken office due to irregularities in the election of last year.”

“Well, then, you must simply do your perusing here.”

Behind him the state slaves grinned. One of them winked at me and made the universal hand sign for a transfer of funds.

I draped an arm over the freedman’s shoulder. “My friend, let us take a little walk and speak together.” We promenaded along the beautiful colonnade, where scholars and officials studied a multitude of state documents at the long tables, the southern exposure affording them the best possible reading light. As we walked, heads close together, we negotiated.

Luckily for me, the man did not want his bribe in the form of cash, of which I had little to spare; but he knew that I would be a praetor within a very few years, and there was a promotion he very much desired, which, in that office, I would be in a position to grant him. He likewise wanted to name the state slave to be manumitted and placed in his own present post. I knew that it was from that man he would receive his cash bribe, making his transaction with me more like a respectable exchange of favors. By the time we returned to the table, we had come to an agreement, and he directed some of the slaves under his charge to box up the documents and deliver them to my house.

This was a fairly straightforward transaction as such things were practiced at the time. A straight transfer of money was crass and vulgar, but a mutual exchange of favors was much esteemed. It was an unfair, inefficient, and corrupt system; but at least it worked, after a fashion. The First Citizen has spoiled it all by creating a bureaucracy made up of his own freedmen, handpicked by him and educated to their tasks, subject to periodic review and promoted or demoted accordingly. It is awesomely efficient and service is much improved, but the freedmen owe their loyalty only to him.

I prefer the old way.





4


WE WERE WALKING BACK across the Forum when Festus caught up with me.

Now that the fighting was over, a couple of praetors had come out with their lictors to make arrests. A number of men lay about groaning, trying to crawl away, or just lying inert. I couldn’t tell if any particular gang had emerged victorious, but that really wasn’t the point. It is seldom possible to determine the winner in a brawl. The idea is to disrupt civic life and cow and terrorize the citizenry so that nobody dared stand for office against the gang leaders or the politicians they supported. The elections themselves were usually decided by bribery. I never said the Republic was perfect.