“And now,” I said, “Caesar is so buried beneath his debts that he needs a province and its legions to dig him out.”
“And soon he will have just such excavationary resources,” Lisas said.
“Then why,” I asked, “is he still in Rome?”
Lisas performed an expressive shrug. “More rumors. His creditors will not allow him to leave until he posts some surety for his debts.”
“A surety only Crassus can provide,” I said.
“I know of no one else.”
I thanked him for his hospitality and his enlightening gossip and took my leave. A slave fetched Hermes and brought him to the atrium. He looked a bit distressed.
“They took me to see the crocodiles,” he said. His breath smelled of Egyptian date wine. “There’s one in there that must be twenty feet long. Biggest lizard I ever saw.”
“Did you see them eat?”
“No, but I saw bones in the bottom of the pool. They looked like human bones.”
“It makes you think, doesn’t it?” I said. The tour of the crocodile pool was a service the embassy provided for the slaves of their guests. The “bones” were made of marble. It seems that crocodiles crunch bones to tiny fragments.
We almost made it to the door before a house slave scurried up to me with a wrapped parcel.
“The master said that you forgot this. It is for your slaves at home.” At a dinner, of course, I would have wrapped some goodies in my napkin to take home to my slaves. It had not occurred to me to do so at this informal lunch. As I have said, Lisas was uncommonly thoughtful. I handed the parcel to Hermes.
“I want you to take this home to Cato and Cassandra. Don’t unwrap it and eat along the way. Cato is to divide it among you after you get there.”
He shrugged. “They fed me here. Better than you do.”
“Lisas can afford it. Do you know where Milo lives?”
“Everyone in Rome knows that.”
“Then you are to rejoin me there when you have delivered this. Wait for me in Milo’s atrium and don’t fraternize with his household staff. They are very bad people.”
He grinned with gleeful anticipation. “Yes, sir!” That I was a Senator and a Caecilius Metellus meant little to him. That I was the friend of Titus Milo impressed him no end.
I was glad of the opportunity to walk alone and think things over. I often had my best thoughts in this fashion, ambling along in a semi-unconscious state, letting my feet take me where they would. Sometimes, my feet would lead me to a place crucial to the solution of my problem. I have often wondered why this should be, and I think it may be that the small gods of the crossroads, whose shrines I passed at every intersection, were aiding me. They are the most Roman of deities, and it was only natural that they should take an interest in my ponderings, which usually involved protecting our ancient city in some fashion.
I thought about Caesar, and Crassus, and Pompey and all the others who plagued us with their power games. And I thought of Julia. Something she had said had raised a question in my mind, but I had been so distracted by her presence that I had not been able to concentrate, and now I had forgotten what it was. I dismissed that as a lost cause and went back to Crassus and Caesar.
Crassus was unthinkably rich, but he was woefully lacking in the sort of military leadership we considered crucial to a successful political career. To wit: one that involved plenty of loot and glory. He had all the requisite experience under senior commanders. He had commanded legions in one campaign, the Servile War against Spartacus and his slave army.
Spartacus might have been the wiliest, ablest, most dangerous enemy Rome had ever faced, but he was a slave and his followers were slaves, and Romans refused to acknowledge a slave army as a worthy enemy. Worse, Crassus had conducted a prudent, plodding war of maneuver, making best use of the legions’ skills of discipline and engineering. He turned in a victory that was shatteringly complete and low in Roman casualties, but lacking in the sort of dash admired by the public. As usual, Pompey had arrived from Spain after all the real fighting was over, mopped up a few bands of fleeing slaves and claimed credit for the victory. Crassus had never forgotten. He was itching for a good war, but perhaps, given his mentality, a coup was not out of the question.
As for Caesar, then as now he was an enigma. He was a man of immense capability who had done nothing. He was an aristocrat of one of the oldest patrician families who posed as a man of the people. He was an old Marian in a Rome that had belonged to the supporters of Sulla for twenty years. We Metellans had been his supporters, as had the Claudians, the Cornelians naturally enough, and most of the other great families, such as the Crassi. Even some Julians had backed him, but Caius Julius had always stressed his marriage connection to Gaius Marius, even during the years when his fortunes were the lowest. Could there be more to Caesar than I had thought? He even backed the Greens in the Circus.