The Sacrilege(82)

At intervals along the roof, between the fire buckets full of water, stood bins of fist-sized rocks. The city had no laws against possession of rocks, but few things are more effective when launched from a roof. The guards boasted that they had left some sore heads among the besiegers.

Milo came onto the roof, active and alert as always. He never seemed to sleep.

“What’s the plan?” he asked. “The triumphal procession will be forming up soon.”

“As a Senator,” I said, “I will have to take part, so first we must go to the Circus Flaminius. Just get me there safely and I will do the rest.”

He was incredulous. “You really propose to march in Pompey’s triumph?”

“As a Senator, I consider it my duty,” I assured him.

He leaned back and roared with laughter. “You may be a fool, Decius, but you have real style. To the Circus, then.”

Hermes had delivered my formal toga to Milo’s house so that I would be properly dressed. Awkward though the garment was, it was so voluminous that it gave adequate concealment for my weapons.

“I wonder if Pompey will be bold enough to have you attacked during the procession,” Milo mused as we walked toward the Campus Martius.

“With luck, he won’t know I’m there for a while,” I said. “The Senate and magistrates march in front, with the gods. Pompey can’t even come into the city until his soldiers have marched through the whole route and had the gates shut behind them afterward. As for Clodius”—I patted the handle of my sword to reassure myself—“we shall just have to see how rash he is.”

All Rome was flocking to get a good position to see the triumph. The greater part would be in the two great Circuses, but a window or rooftop along the route would afford a better and closer view. Along the Via Sacra, some people had camped out for the past two or three nights on especially favorable rooftops, and landlords had rented out the best windows for tidy sums. The Roman need to gape at glory was insatiable.

At the Circus I had to leave the comforting proximity of Milo and his thugs. Circus officials, accustomed to sorting out huge crowds, were ordering matters. Near the gate where the chariots enter for the races, I was hustled toward the rear of the senatorial procession.

“By Jupiter!” said a junior Senator. “It’s Decius! I can’t believe you’d show your face in public.”

“Duty calls,” I said. “How could I forgo my very first opportunity to participate in a triumph?”

“Don’t get us laughing in front of the citizens, Metellus,” said another.

Atop the spina, a sheep was sacrificed and its entrails examined. To nobody’s surprise, the priests announced that the gods were favorable to the celebration of a triumph on that day. I have never known them to be unfavorable at such a time. I squinted at the priests, but they were just ordinary Etruscan haruspices, not the strange hammer specialists Pompey had brought to the city.

With a blast of trumpets, we stepped out and entered the Circus, walking up one side, rounding the spina and then back down the other side. The populace applauded respectfully, although the Senate certainly wasn’t what they had come to see. And so it went, all the long triumphal route, finally down the Via Sacra to the Forum, then up the Capitol. It was exhilarating, although my mind was elsewhere much of the time.

After a formal salute to the image of Jupiter Capitolinus, we Senators scattered to get good vantage points for the main part of the show. I began to walk down the hill toward the Forum and the Rostra, which was a fine vantage point from which to view a spectacle. And from which to be seen.

A hand gripped my arm and I reached for my sword. I hadn’t expected to be attacked on the Capitol. Men have died for less foolish assumptions.

“Draw that and I’ll have you sentenced to the Sicilian sulfur mines.”

“Why, Caius Julius Caesar, you do me great honor.” He smiled widely, nodding and acknowledging greetings and well-wishers. I smiled back as gaily. We were two distinguished Romans, walking down the hill on this great day of Rome’s triumph.

“Pompey wants you dead, and by all the gods, I never saw a man cooperate so wholeheartedly in his own assassination! How did a family of plodding drudges like the Metellans ever produce a specimen like you?”

“Oh, come now, Caius Julius, we may be a bit conservative, but we are scarcely—”

“Shut up and listen!” he hissed. “You might, just might, live to draw breath tomorrow if you will heed me. Pompey will be far too busy to concern himself with you for the next few days, what with his triumph and his games. Clodius thirsts for your blood, but while the celebrations are going on, he won’t be able to get his men to do anything.”