Roma.The novel of ancient Rome

SCIPIO’S SHADOW

216 B.C.

“We brought these accursed Carthaginians to their knees once. We shall do it again!” So declared Quintus Fabius Maximus, wearing an expression stern enough to have pleased his great-grandfather, who had been the first to take the name Maximus almost ninety years earlier. With one hand he held a cup of wine. With the other he tapped his upper lip, a nervous habit that called attention to a very prominent wart. For this distinguishing feature on an otherwise homely face, his friends had playfully given him an additional name, Verrucosus.

From across the dining room, young Kaeso stole glances at his host-a man he found quite intimidating-and wished that his own physical imperfections were limited to an ugly wart or two.

One of Kaeso’s legs was shorter than the other. One of his forearms had a strange bend in it and its muscles were not always entirely under his control. He walked with a slight limp and had never been able to ride a horse. He was also subject to the falling disease. The fluttering in his head occurred at the most inopportune times. At its worst it caused him to lose consciousness completely.

Despite these imperfections, Kaeso’s mother had always assured him that he was nonetheless beautiful. At twenty, Kaeso was old enough to look at himself critically in a mirror and see that this was not a mother’s flattery or wishful thinking, but the truth. His eyes were a rare shade of blue. His lustrous hair was the color of sunlight in honey. His face might serve as a model for a Greek sculptor. But what use was a handsome face if a man’s body was unsuited to riding, or marching, or fighting, as the times demanded? Far better to have a strong body and a wart on his lip the size of a chickpea, like his great and powerful cousin Maximus-who had just caught Kaeso staring and stared back at him, scowling.

Kaeso lowered his eyes and nervously tapped at the gold fascinum at this neck, a precious heirloom that he had put on especially for this very important occasion.

The other two guests at the dinner were the same age as Kaeso. His cousin Quintus was the son of Maximus; Publius Cornelius Scipio was their mutual friend. The occasion was a somber one. Come morning, Quintus and Scipio would be going off to war. How Kaeso wished he was going with them!

Seventy years had passed since Appius Claudius the Blind had delivered his stirring speech in the Senate against the Greek invader Pyrrhus. The final retreat of Pyrrhus from Italy was now a distant memory, but there were still old fighters alive who could remember the even greater war that followed, with Carthage. As Appius Claudius had predicted, after their mutual enemy Pyrrhus was defeated, Roma’s maritime rival had become her military foe. For over twenty years, in Sicily and Africa, on land and sea, the Romans and Carthaginians waged a bloody war. The peace that followed, on terms to Roma’s advantage, had lasted for a generation, but now the two cities were at war again, and Carthage, led by a general named Hannibal, had brought the war to Italy.

“As you ride off into battle,” said Maximus, addressing his son and Scipio but pointedly ignoring Kaeso, “never forget: It wasn’t Roma that broke the peace. It was that mad schemer Hannibal, when he dared to attack our allies in Spain. The man has no shame, no scruples, and no honor. A curse on his mongrel army of Libyans, Numidians, Spaniards, and Gauls! May their elephants go mad and stamp them into the dirt!”

“Here, here!” said Quintus, raising his cup. Like his father, he was homely, and he displayed the same earnest scowl, which looked more like a pout on his youthful face.

Scipio raised his cup and joined the toast. Like Kaeso, Scipio had been blessed by the gods with striking looks, though his hair was darker and his features of a more rugged cast. He wore his hair long and swept back from his face-like Alexander, people said-and he was powerfully built. As a student, he had quickly matched and then exceeded the erudition of his tutors. As an athlete, he had excelled above all others. As a soldier, he had already made a name for himself. He was known for his sure, quick stride and his strong grip. Scipio made a powerful impression on everyone he met.

Kaeso belatedly raised his cup as well. Only Scipio seemed to take notice of him, tipping his cup in Kaeso’s direction and shooting him a quick smile.

“As you say, Maximus, the Carthaginians are most certainly in the wrong,” said Scipio. His deep voice was strong but mellow. People often remarked that he would make a fine orator when he was old enough to run for office. “But surely you misspeak when you say that Hannibal is mad. Obsessed, perhaps; we all know the tale of how his father, bitter at his own humiliation and the concessions made by Carthage after the last war, made the boy Hannibal swear undying hatred of Roma and all things Roman. Clearly, Hannibal took the oath to heart. No one can accuse him of shirking his filial duty! He deliberately broke the truce when he attacked our allies in Spain. Then, they say, he had a dream of the future: A god placed him on the back of a gigantic snake, and he rode the snake across the earth, uprooting trees and boulders and causing utter destruction. Hannibal took this dream to mean that he was destined to lay waste to all of Italy.”

“So he told his soldiers.” Quintus smirked. “He probably made up that dream to spur them on.”

“True or not, he set out from Spain and crossed the southern coast of Gaul. Everyone said the Alps would keep him out of Italy; no one thought he could cross the mountains with his army and his elephants intact. But he found a pass, and swept down upon us like a firestorm! One drubbing after another he’s given us. I was there with my father at the river Ticinus, in the first engagement of the war, when the day went so badly for us-”

“Don’t be modest, Scipio,” said Quintus. “You saved your father’s life when he was wounded on the battlefield, and everyone knows it.”

“I did what any son would do.” If Scipio downplayed his own bravery, he also glossed over the magnitude of the repeated defeats the Romans had received at Hannibal’s hand.

In his devastating forays across the Italian peninsula, Hannibal had acquired a reputation for almost superhuman ingenuity and resilience. He had shown himself to be a master of disguise, escaping plots to assassinate him by donning wigs and costumes. He had recovered from terrible wounds, including the loss of an eye. He had conceived and executed outrageous stratagems. One dark night he threw a Roman army into utter confusion by tying flaming torches to the horns of a herd of cattle, which in their panic created the illusion of a vast army rushing in all directions across an otherwise deserted mountainside.

Even as his implacable hatred and seeming invincibility inspired their fear and loathing, Hannibal had won the grudging admiration of many Romans, and Scipio spoke of him with a certain respect.

“Now the one-eyed Cacus and his mongrel mercenaries have penetrated to the very heart of Italy,” said Quintus. “They roam and ravage at will, and pick off our allies one by one. But not for much longer, eh, Scipio?”

“Right you are, Quintus. Tomorrow we set out to hunt down Hannibal and put an end to him, once and for all!”

Maximus grunted. “You know my opinion on this matter,” he said grimly. The previous year Maximus had been appointed dictator with emergency powers. While his colleagues in the Senate clamored for yet another confrontation with the invaders, Fabius had practiced a shadow war, hounding and harrying Hannibal’s army but avoiding a direct engagement. His advice had been, and was still, for caution and patience. While the Romans continued to fight the Carthaginians in other arenas-on the sea, in Spain, and in Sicily-in Italy, he believed, they should avoid any more pitched battles with Hannibal, whose rampaging elephants and Numidian cavalry had so far proven invincible. Instead, the Romans should sit back and let the logistical problems of feeding and finding winter shelter for fifty thousand mercenaries and ten thousand horses take their toll. But Maximus’s tactics had been ridiculed and scorned. His enemies named him Cunctator-“the Delayer”-and he had become the most unpopular man in Roma.

Now, the moment belonged to the newly elected consul Gaius Terentius Varro, a populist firebrand determined to take the battle to Hannibal. He and his fellow consul, Lucius Aemilius Paullus, would be setting out the next morning at the head of the largest Roman army ever assembled, more than eighty thousand men. The plan was to overwhelm Hannibal with sheer numbers. In spite of his father’s objections to the campaign, Quintus would be serving in the post of military tribune, as would Scipio.

Kaeso looked at the two other young men and felt acutely aware of his physical limitations. Luckily for him, his imperfections had not been immediately apparent at birth, or otherwise he might have been exposed to the elements shortly after emerging from the womb; his mother had borne two previous sons with such gross physical defects that they had been carried off to die at the behest of Kaeso’s father. After Kaeso, his dispirited mother had given birth to no more children. When his father died at the battle of the Ticinus, Kaeso became paterfamilias of his small branch of the Fabii. But his freedom and status would do him little good; unable to complete the prerequisite ten years of military service, Kaeso would never be eligible to run for public office, and thus could never compete in the Course of Honor, the sequence of posts that led to the Senate and the higher magistracies.

Kaeso gazed across the room at his friend Scipio and was torn by mixed emotions. How he admired Scipio! How he envied him! Scipio’s steadfast friendship made him feel quite special, and yet, whenever he compared himself to Scipio, he felt only disdain for himself. Scipio was everything Kaeso was not.

“Must we add deafness to the list of your defects, young man?” snapped Maximus. Kaeso, rudely jolted from his reverie, stared blankly at his older cousin. “It’s a tedious guest who makes a host repeat himself. I asked you to make a toast. They say you’re good with words, Kaeso, if with nothing else. Surely these two young warriors deserve some words of encouragement from those of us who will be sitting out this battle.”

“Kaeso has been quiet all night long,” said Scipio. His warm smile and gentle tone were in marked contrast to Maximus’s brusqueness. “That’s not like our Kaeso. He’s usually so funny! I suspect my dear friend must be thinking some very deep thoughts tonight.”

“I was thinking…” Kaeso cleared his throat. “I was thinking that my wise cousin Maximus is most certainly right. No matter what others say, the proper strategy to deal with the devious Carthaginian is to play a game of evasion and wait him out. Let him spend himself against our allies. The more territory he takes, the more he must defend. Let him tie himself down with commitments all over Italy, and spread himself thin. Let the harvests fail, then watch his troops go hungry. Let the winter storms come and spread illness among his men. As I’ve heard you declare on more than one occasion, cousin Maximus, our new consul Varro is a hotheaded fool. You never mince words, do you, cousin? Not even with a poor cripple like me! But…”

Kaeso drew a deep breath. “But, if there must be a battle, and if it must be sooner rather than later, Roma could not ask for better men to fight for her than these two.” He raised his cup. “If every man in the army of Varro and Paullus was the match of you, Scipio-and of you, cousin Quintus-then Hannibal’s elephants would do well to pack their trunks and leave Italy tomorrow!”

The two warriors laughed and raised their cup.

“That’s my Kaeso!” said Scipio. “The one who makes me laugh!”

Kaeso basked in his friend’s affectionate gaze, and forgot his feelings of envy and unworthiness.

The final course of stewed onions in a beef broth was served. Quintus suggested a final toast, but Maximus instead called for a slave to collect their cups. “You’ll thank me in the morning, when you ride out of Roma with a clear head on your shoulders!”

The dinner guests made their way to the vestibule to take their leave. Kaeso trailed behind Maximus, who put his arm around Quintus’s shoulder and spoke into his ear. Kaeso could not help overhearing.

“I’m glad we had this time together, son-though if you ask me, this should have been a party for fighting men only. I’d never have invited cousin Kaeso, except that your friend Scipio insisted. What he sees in that boy, I don’t understand!”

Quintus shrugged. “Scipio says there’s more to life than war and politics. He and Kaeso have interests in common. They both love books, and poetry.”

“Even so…”

Kaeso’s attention was suddenly claimed by a hand on his shoulder.

“I think you must have drunk too much wine tonight,” said Scipio. “You look flushed.”

Kaeso abruptly reached into his tunic and produced a tightly rolled scrap of parchment. He pressed it into Scipio’s hand.

“What’s this?”

“A parting gift,” said Kaeso. “No, don’t unroll it now. Read it later.”

“What is it?”

“I commissioned a poem from Ennius. I know he’s your favorite.”

“Specially written for the occasion? But why didn’t you read it aloud at dinner? You could have added some polish to the evening.”

Kaeso turned even redder. The poem had not been something he was willing to share, with Maximus glowering at him. “Ennius is a fighting man, like you. The poem is a call to arms. Quite stirring, I assure you. No one does that sort of thing better than Ennius.”

“He’ll be as famous as Homer one of these day, mark my words,” said Scipio.

Kaeso shrugged. “A bit grandiose for my taste, but I know how much you like his poetry. Read it before the battle, to screw up your courage. Or after the battle, to celebrate.”

“Presuming I survive the battle,” said Scipio.

Kaeso felt a chill. “Don’t say such a thing, Scipio.”

“In the days to come, however the fighting turns out, a great many men will die. One of them might be me.”

“No! The gods will protect you.”

Scipio smiled. “Thank you for the blessing, Kaeso. And thank you for the poem.”

After leaving the house of Maximus, Scipio and Quintus went in one direction, while Kaeso headed off in another.

The summer night was warm. The moon was full. Kaeso glumly watched his shadow-a limping figure traversing the dark, quiet streets of the Palatine. Maximus’s animosity and Scipio’s talk of death had left him feeling moody and anxious, but he knew a place where he could breathe freely and relax, even at this late hour.

Kaeso reached the foot of the Palatine and headed across the Forum. Passing beyond the district of temples and public spaces, he entered a much humbler part of town. The narrow, winding streets of the Subura offered distractions of every sort, especially after dark. On this final night before their departure for war, soldiers crowded the taverns, gambling dens, and brothels. The sounds of a scuffle echoed from nearby. From elsewhere came drunken voices singing an old marching song. The whole area stank of spilled wine, urine, and vomit. The shutters of an upper-story window flew open. Bright moonlight revealed a grinning prostitute wearing a scanty tunica. She stared down at Kaeso and brazenly beckoned to him. Kaeso stared straight ahead and hurried on.

He found the alley he was looking for. The dank passage was so narrow he could touch both walls at once. No torches were set in the walls, and no moonlight penetrated the gloom; the way was very dark. Kaeso arrived at his destination. He knocked on the crudely made door.

A peephole opened. An eye peered at him. Kaeso spoke his name. The slave opened the door at once.

Kaeso stepped into a crowded room where the atmosphere was very different from the staid, patrician decorum that reigned at the house of Maximus. In one corner, a musician was playing a lively tune on a flute, but he could barely be heard over the din of conversation. A mixed assortment of guests of all ages-some richly attired, some in shabby tunics-sat close together on couches or on rugs on the floor; there were even a few women present.

Every hand held a cup. The host-a portly, bearded man in his thirties-was going about pouring wine from a clay pitcher with a cracked handle. Titus Maccius Plautus looked up from his duties, saw Kaeso, smiled broadly, and stepped toward him, sloshing wine onto one of his guests, a frail-looking youth who shrieked with laughter.

Plautus found an abandoned cup, pressed it into Kaeso’s hand, and poured him some wine. “There you go, boss! Medicine for your melancholy.”

“What makes you think I’m melancholy?”

“That frown on your face. But we shall get rid of that soon enough, boss.” Plautus patted Kaeso on the back with avuncular familiarity.

“Don’t call me that, you silly sybarite.”

“But you are my boss! I am a playwright, and you own a substantial share of the theatrical troupe. That makes you my boss, does it not? And the boss of every fellow here. Well, the actors, anyway. Not their admirers.”

Kaeso looked around the room. Although the presentation of plays was sponsored by the state, as part of various religious festivals, acting was not a profession for reputable citizens. Most of Plautus’s performers were slaves or ex-slaves of various national origins. The ones who played heroic roles or girls tended to be quite young, and some were very handsome. All were extroverts; there was little evidence of shyness in the room.

One of the actors, a swarthy Spaniard, abruptly jumped up from the floor and began to juggle a cup, a copper brooch, and a small clay lamp. The spectators put down their cups and began to clap in time with the flute music. The juggler was barely sober enough to keep the objects in the air. He made a great show of staggering about and putting those nearby in peril. His companions roared with laughter every time he came near to missing one of the flying objects.

Watching this raucous buffoonery, Kaeso heaved a deep sigh and felt himself slowly relax. How much more at home he felt here than in the house of Maximus! Kaeso’s eye fell on one of the younger actors, a newcomer with chiseled features and long blond hair. The youth reminded him a little of Scipio.

“I can’t blame you for staring at the Greek boy,” said Plautus in his ear, “but the fellow we need to impress this evening is the one sitting over there, wearing the very expensive-looking toga.”

“Who is he?”

“None other than Tiberius Gracchus, scion of a very wealthy plebeian family. He’s been elected curule aedile, so he’ll been putting on the annual Roman Games coming up in September. Along with the religious procession and the Feast of Jupiter, and the chariot races and boxing matches, there will of course be a day of comedies to entertain the masses. As Gracchus is footing the bill, and because he’s an aficionado of the theater, he’s taken a personal interest in picking the program.”

“I presume you’ve submitted a script for his approval?”

“Yes, indeed-a thigh-slapper I call The Swaggering Soldier. Adapted from a Greek original, as is the fashion, but I think I’ve managed to give the material a decidedly Roman twist. Gracchus came here tonight to return the script and give me his comments.”

“And?”

“He loves it! Said he fell off his couch laughing. He sees the buffoonish woman-chaser of the title as a lampoon on our bellicose consul Varro; says the play is both timely and hilarious. A good thing, since I’m asking a bigger fee for this production than I’ve ever dared ask before.”

“Your work is worth it, Plautus. You have the best actors of any troupe in the city, and you write the wittiest dialogue of any playwright alive. What Ennius is to poetry, you are to comedy.”

Plautus rolled his eyes heavenward. “And to think, I was raised a poor country boy in Umbria. Had to make my living as a baker when I first came to Roma; thought I’d never get the flour out of my hair. For years, I was just another starry-eyed, would-be actor with a funny stage name-yes, they called me Plautus on account of my flat feet, but I figured it was a name no one would forget. But Fortuna’s wheel turns round and round, and Plautus the clown is the best playwright in town. Boss, you make me blush.”

“Don’t call me that!”

They were both distracted by a sudden crash. The juggler had dropped everything at once. The lamp shattered against a wall. The cup skittered across the floor. The copper brooch struck one of the actors in the forehead. The fellow jumped to his feet and lunged at the juggler, fists flailing. The flute player trilled a shrill, discordant tune, as if to encourage them. Plautus hurried to break up the fight.

Kaeso heard a chuckle behind him. “I saw that coming! Got out of the way just in time. You’re Kaeso Fabius Dorso, I believe.”

Kaeso turned. “Yes. And you’re Tiberius Gracchus.”

“I am.” It was hard to judge the man’s age. His hair was turning silver at the temples, but his sunburned skin had few wrinkles. He had a powerful jaw and strong cheekbones, but the ruggedness of his features was softened by a mischievous glint of amusement in his gray eyes. If he was drunk, he didn’t show it. He carried himself with a graceful dignity that seemed entirely natural.

Kaeso and Gracchus conversed. Gracchus did much of the talking, mostly about the challenges of mounting the Roman Games and the fine work Plautus had done on The Swaggering Soldier. Gracchus had a remarkable memory. He recounted long stretches of dialogue verbatim, and his deadpan delivery make Kaeso laugh out loud. There was no talk of Hannibal or duty or death. Such weighty topics would have seemed out of place in the house of Plautus.

After a while, Kaeso’s eyes fell upon the young newcomer he had noticed before. The Greek youth smiled back at him.

“I believe his name is Hilarion,” said Gracchus, following Kaeso’s gaze.

“Is it?”

“Yes. Hilarion means ‘cheerful’ in Greek. The name fits him. Why don’t you try your chances with the boy tonight, before everyone else has him?”

“I’m not sure what you mean,” said Kaeso.

Gracchus smiled knowingly. “Sporting with catamites was not the sort of thing our staid ancestors approved of, although I suspect they did their share of such things, whether it was spoken of, or not. Nor, I daresay, would your staid cousin Maximus approve even nowadays. But we live in a new age, Kaeso. We inhabit a much bigger world than did our ancestors-a bigger world than men like Maximus have eyes to see. The Spartans, who are renowned as great warriors, consider nothing more manly than the love of two soldiers; on her wedding night, a Spartan woman must cut her hair and put on a boy’s tunic, to coax the groom into desiring her. The Athenians put the love of an older man and a younger man at the very center of their philosophy. Carthaginian generals make love to their young officers before allowing them to marry their daughters. Jupiter had his Ganymede, Hercules his Hylas, Achilles his Patroclus, Alexander his Hephaestion-or perhaps it was the other way around, as Alexander was the younger partner. Nature gives us appetites; appetites must be fed. If your eye should fall on a handsome and available Greek slave, why not do something about it? So long as you maintain the dominant role, of course. The Roman male must always dominate.”

Kaeso nodded. The wine was hot in his veins. He gazed at the long-haired Greek youth and allowed himself to feel desire, but in his heart he longed for Scipio.

The midsummer month of Sextilis brought sweltering weather to Roma. Everyone complained of the heat; people grew listless and short-tempered. A stifling haze settled over the city, and with it an atmosphere of tension and foreboding.

Each day, the Forum was filled with people seeking news of the war, and the news was always the same: the Roman consuls and Hannibal were shadowing one another across Italy as each side maneuvered to engage in battle at the most opportune place. It was only a matter of time; the longed-for confrontation would take place any day now.

Kaeso was limping across the Forum, happily whistling a tune after an evening of pleasure at Plautus’s house, on the day the terrible news arrived.

Near the Temple of Vesta, a weeping woman ran across his path. Then he came upon two elderly senators in togas. At first he thought they were arguing, for one of them was shouting at the other.

“All of them?” The man said. “How is that possible? I don’t believe you!”

“Then don’t,” said the other. “The news is not official. There is no official news, since no officers survived to send word back to Roma!”

“It can’t be true, it simply can’t!”

Kaeso felt a prickling across the back of his neck. “What news?”

The senators looked at him with ashen faces. “Utter disaster!” said the quieter one. “Varro and Paullus met Hannibal at a place called Cannae, near the Adriatic coast. Somehow the Romans became encircled. The entire army was annihilated. Varro’s fate is unknown, but Paullus is dead, along with most of the Senate.”

“How do you know this?”

“A few survivors came straggling into the Forum this morning. Each tells the same story. A complete massacre! The largest army ever assembled-obliterated! The worst day in the history of Roma-even the capture of the city by the Gauls was not as bad as this. And there’s nothing to stop Hannibal from doing just as the Gauls did, marching on the city and burning it to the ground. There’s no one to stand in his way. There’s no Roman army left!”

“It can’t be as bad as that,” said Kaeso, shaking his head.

But it was.

Hannibal’s victory at Cannae was overwhelming. On the second day of the month of Sextilis, more than seventy thousand Romans perished, and ten thousand were taken prisoner. A mere thirty-five hundred escaped, and many of those were wounded. The magnitude of the loss was far beyond anything the Romans had ever experienced.

Amid the panic that threatened to overwhelm the city, it was Maximus who took charge. The wisdom of his scorned policy was now clear to all, and the steady hand with which he took control of the city impressed everyone. The remaining members of the Senate, a gray and toothless assembly, granted him emergency powers. No one opposed the appointment, if only because there was no one left to do so. Virtually every able-bodied member of the Senate had either died at Cannae or was fighting the Carthaginians abroad. No man of Maximus’s experience and stature was left in the city.

For much the same reason-because he was one of the few remaining magistrates-the curule aedile Tiberius Gracchus was appointed to serve as Master of the Horse, who was the right-hand man to the dictator.

First, Maximus dispatched riders to seek out the scattered survivors, hoping that more might have escaped than was previously thought. When the riders returned, bringing home a handful of men, they only confirmed the grim truth.

To raise a fresh army, Maximus decreed that underage boys would be recruited. When their numbers proved insufficient, he declared that slaves would be eligible for military service. Eight thousand were enlisted and armed. Such a thing had never been done before, but no one could suggest a better solution.

Kaeso eagerly responded to the call to arms, but in front of the recruiting officer, in public view on the Field of Mars, he suffered a bout of the falling sickness. He was carried home unconscious, and was forbidden to report again by Maximus himself, who wished to suffer no further embarrassment from a member of his family.

Amid the general hysteria two Vestals, Opimia and Floronia, were accused of breaking their vows. The news caused riots. A mob outside the House of the Vestals accused the transgressors of bringing ruin on the city. Both Vestals were quickly tried and found guilty. Opimia committed suicide. Floronia was entombed alive near the Colline Gate while the clamorous mob looked on. The men found guilty of defiling them were publicly bludgeoned to death by the Pontifex Maximus.

Each day, by the thousands, more men were confirmed dead. Great crowds of women, gathered in the Forum to receive the news, reacted with uncontrollable grief. They ripped their garments, tore out their hair, and fell to the ground wailing. Their frenzy spread across the city. In every street the sound of sobbing was heard all night long. Roma was a city on the verge of madness.

Maximus finally declared that such extreme displays of emotion offended religious decency; the cacophony of so much weeping would drive the gods out of the city. He ordered all women to be shut indoors and imposed a rule of silence. It was decreed that the period of mourning for the dead of Cannae would be limited to thirty days. After that, the city would resume business as usual.

“The show must go on!” declared Plautus, amid the din of hammering.

“So you say,” muttered Kaeso.

“So says your cousin, the dictator Maximus. So says our friend Tiberius Gracchus, who assures me that the Roman Games will proceed exactly as planned. Like everyone else, in light of the crisis, I had assumed that the plays would be cancelled. Is anyone really in the mood for a day of comedy? But the dictator believes that sticking to the regular calendar will reassure the public. Here’s hoping that Hannibal doesn’t show up just as we begin the opening scene of The Swaggering Soldier.”

From above, a carpenter dropped a hammer. It whistled past Plautus’s head, barely missing him.

“Idiot!” shouted Plautus. “That’s what I get for hiring free labor instead of renting slaves. Ah, well, perhaps standing under this scaffolding is not a good idea.”

They were in the Circus Maximus, where, in the great curve at one end of the long racetrack, a temporary stage was being constructed for the Roman Games. The curved bleachers would serve as seats for the audience, with the humblest among them crowding into the semicircle of open ground before the stage. The stage itself-an elevated wooden platform with a decorated wall to serve as a backdrop-would be thrown up quickly and even more quickly pulled down; after a single day of performances it would be dismantled overnight to clear the racetrack for the next day’s athletic competitions. Accordingly, the standards of craftsmanship were no higher than they needed to be. The ornate columns and relief sculptures of the backdrop were illusions made of wood, plaster, cloth, and paint, tawdry when seen close up, but convincing enough at a distance.

“Don’t the Greeks have permanent theaters, built of stone?” asked Kaeso.

“Yes, sometimes built into the sides of hills, with such remarkable acoustics that the actors hardly need to raise their voices to be heard in the back row. But the Greeks are a decadent, pleasure-loving people, sensual to a fault; Romans are not. So, while we love a good comedy, a play may be enjoyed only in the context of a religious festival, and the stage and all its trappings must vanish before the festival is over. It’s a stupid policy, but it keeps these mediocre carpenters employed. You seem preoccupied, boss.”

“I’m worried about my friends. There’s no word yet about cousin Quintus…or about Scipio…” Kaeso wrinkled his brow.

“No news is good news.”

“I suppose.”

“And the best news is that there’s no news of Hannibal marching on Roma. What’s keeping him, I wonder?”

“Maximus made a speech the other day. He said, ‘The hand of Jupiter himself has stayed the Carthaginian monster.’”

Plautus wrinkled his nose. “Is Ennius writing his speeches these day? The masses love that sort of religious hokum. It reassures them, like putting on a festival when the end of the world may be near.” He shook his head. “I have to wonder whether Hannibal isn’t a bit like one of his elephants-huge and destructive, but ultimately rather stupid.”

“Tiberius Gracchus speculates that Hannibal, instead of heading straight to Roma, may want to win over our enemies and lay siege to our allies, so as to secure the whole of Italy while we’re helpless to stop him.”

“But why should he bother to conquer the limbs, one by one, when he could cut off the head? Yet the days pass, and Hannibal does not arrive.”

“Nor does news of Scipio,” whispered Kaeso.

“Look, here comes Tiberius Gracchus-and he does not look happy.”

In fact, Gracchus looked very grim. Without the mischievous glint in his eyes, his face assumed a severe aspect suitable to the Master of the Horse at Roma’s darkest hour.

“Bad news?” said Plautus.

“Bad news and worse news,” said Gracchus.

Plautus sighed. “I’ll have the bad news first, then.”

“After a very long, very unpleasant discussion, the dictator and I have decided that The Swaggering Soldier is not suitable to be presented at the Roman Games.”

“What? No!” Plautus was outraged. “The comedies are cancelled then?”

“No, the plays will go on, but The Swaggering Soldier will not be among them.”

“You’re throwing it out? We have a contract, Gracchus. You signed it as curule aedile.”

“Think, Plautus! The comedy pokes fun at a pompous, philandering military man. Who’s going to laugh at that, after what happened at Cannae?”

“You thought it was funny. You thought it was about Varro!”

“Who barely escaped with his life! People are stunned by Varro’s defeat, they’re appalled by his miscalculations, they’re numb with fury-but no wants to see him made fun of, not after seventy thousand men have died.”

Plautus pinched the bridge of his nose. “All this incessant hammering is giving me a headache. Yes, I see your point. What shall we do, then?”

“You’ll substitute another play.”

“At the last moment? Impossible!”

“You must have something. Think!”

“Well…there is a script I’ve been working on. It’s not nearly as funny as The Swaggering Soldier. It’s called The Casket-a sweet little farce about a girl exposed at birth who’s eventually reunited with her parents. Under the circumstances, I suppose it would at least have the virtue of being inoffensive. But it needs work. Several scenes need to be completely rewritten.”

“You’ll simply have to pull it together,” said Gracchus. “You can do it, Plautus. You’re funny when you write under pressure.”

“No, I get indigestion when I write under pressure. But, if I must…Yes, I suppose it could be done…if Hilarion can play the girl…”

Gracchus’s expression became even grimmer.

Plautus stiffened. “Bad news, you said-and worse news. What is it, Gracchus?”

Gracchus lowered his eyes. What sort of news could cause the Master of the Horse to avert his gaze? Kaeso held his breath.

“Do you remember when the Vestals were accused of breaking their vows?”

“How could I forget?” said Plautus. “For a few days, the whole city was obsessed with the scandal. It took people’s minds off Hannibal even while it gave them someone to blame for what happened at Cannae. As if a couple of Vestals, by losing their virginity, were responsible for so many deaths! If, indeed, the Vestals were guilty. If people wanted vengeance, it’s Varro they should have buried alive instead of that poor girl.”

Gracchus drew a sharp breath. “You forget my position, Plautus. As Master of the Horse I represent the state religion no less than does the Pontifex Maximus. To question the verdict or punishment of the Vestals is tantamount to blasphemy.”

“If you say so. Being a country boy from Umbria, I still find Roman religion a bit puzzling-”

“I’m serious, Plautus. People are in no mood for unpatriotic or irreligious talk. You must watch what you say.”

The playwright clucked his tongue. “Duly noted! But, you were saying?”

“The Vestal Floronia was properly punished, but Opimia escaped her punishment by committing suicide. Auguries were taken. An unfavorable sighting of birds confirmed that the gods had not been fully propitiated. Something must be done to make up for the failure to bury one of the Vestals alive. The Sibylline Books were consulted. A verse was found.”

Gracchus quoted the chosen passage:

A lamb fated for sacrifice dies too soon. Kill two pair of beasts before the next moon, From fields to the north and east of noon.

Plautus wrinkled his nose. “If only my sponsors were as indulgent of my cracked phrasing as was Tarquinius of the Sybil’s! And what was the interpretation of these lovely lines?”

“The priests conferred among themselves. It was decided that, to cleanse the city of the Vestals’ sins, a pair of Gauls and a pair of Greeks must be buried alive.”

Plautus shook his head. “Human sacrifice is a Carthaginian vice! It’s one of the reasons we look down on them as savages.”

“It’s neither your place nor mine to question the dictates of the Sibylline Books.” Gracchus sighed. “The priests came to me for a list of names.”

“To you?”

“A registry is kept by the curule aediles of all foreigners residing in Roma. So is a registry of all slaves, listing their nationality. The priests asked for the lists. I supplied them. How the priests determined which two Gauls and which two Greeks, I don’t know, but they informed me of their decision this morning.”

Plautus snorted. “I own a Gaul or two, myself, and more than a couple of Greeks!” His face fell. “By Hercules! That’s why you’re here, isn’t it? The cancellation of The Swaggering Soldier was only the bad news. Worse news, you said…”

“One of the Greeks they chose was Hilarion.”

Kaeso, who had listened in silence, let out a gasp.

“You’ll be properly compensated, of course,” said Gracchus hastily, averting his eyes.

“Compensated?”

“For the sacrifice of your property.”

“But…why Hilarion?”

“I don’t know. The priests chose the names. The Pontifex Maximus confirmed their decision.”

“I suppose I have no choice in this matter?”

“None whatsoever. Lictors were dispatched to your house before I came here. I imagine they’ve already taken Hilarion into custody. Workmen began digging the pit in the Forum Boarium last night. The entombment will take place this afternoon.”

“What’s the Old Etruscan adage? ‘Quickly done is best done,’” said Plautus bitterly. He gripped his head. “Oh, that infernal hammering!”

Tiberius Gracchus took his leave and strode away.

Kaeso felt unsteady on his feet. There was a fluttering in his head, such as sometimes preceded his seizures. His vision became blurry. Tears welled in his eyes. He shuddered but he did not weep.

“Madness!” whispered Plautus. “When a horror like Cannae occurs, do men react with compassion, reason, kindness? No! They blame the outsider; they punish the guiltless. And if you point out their madness, they call you a traitor and a blasphemer! Thank the gods I have a vessel into which I can pour my darkest feelings-my comedies! Otherwise, I should go as mad as the rest.”

“Your plays aren’t dark,” said Kaeso dully. “They make people laugh.”

“Comedy is darker than tragedy,” said Plautus. “No laugh was ever born except out of someone’s suffering, usually mine. And now-poor Hilarion!”

The two of them stood motionless for a long time, enduring the din of the hammers. Suddenly Kaeso blinked and furrowed is brow. “Is that…my cousin Quintus?”

A young officer wearing the insignia of a military tribune was striding purposely across the open expanse of the Circus. Kaeso ran toward him.

Quintus looked pale and haggard. There was a fresh scar across his forehead, but otherwise he appeared to be intact.

“You’re alive!” said Kaeso.

“By the will of the gods.”

“We’ve had no word. Your father has been ill with worry.”

“Even so, it looks like he’s managed to keep the city running. I understand he’s been appointed dictator.”

“Have you not seen him?”

“I only just arrived.”

“What news?”

“News?”

Kaeso dreaded to ask. “What of Scipio?”

Quintus smiled. “Wouldn’t you know? He proved his bravery once again, just as he did at the Ticinus. If there was one Roman hero to emerge from the catastrophe at Cannae, it was Scipio.”

“Tell me!”

“The mongrels encircled us. The slaughter was terrible. Only a handful of us managed to fight our way through it and escape with our lives. We became separated. We were wounded, dazed, fearful of capture at any moment. It took days for us to find one another, one by one, all the time hiding from Hannibal’s mercenaries. When we finally regrouped, and put enough distance between ourselves and the enemy to catch our breaths, a debate broke out. Where should we go, and who should lead us there? I confess, I was among those who gave in to despair and argued that we should leave Italy altogether. We assumed that Hannibal would march on Roma at once, burn the city, and enslave the citizens. There’s a Roman army in Spain, and a Roman navy fighting the war on the sea. Join them, I argued, and see where the future leads us, because Roma is finished forever and there’s no going home.

“But Scipio wouldn’t hear of it. Even though his father and uncle are off fighting in Spain, he said he had no intention of joining them, not as long as Roma needed us to defend her. He mocked our despair. He shamed us. He made us take an oath to Jupiter never to abandon the city, to die fighting for her rather than to surrender to Hannibal. Once we took that oath, it was as if a great weight was lifted from us. We knew we could endure anything, because Scipio had given us back our honor.

“Then we watched and waited. Days passed, but Hannibal made no move to march toward the city. We were puzzled, then elated. We began the journey back to Roma, taking back roads so that no Carthaginian out-riders would find us. The way was slow. Some of the men were badly wounded, and Scipio refused to leave them behind. Finally we reached the Appian Way, and I rode ahead. I’m the first to arrive.”

“And Scipio?”

“He should be here tomorrow, or the day after.”

“He’s alive, then?”

“Yes.”

“You’re certain?”

“Of course.”

Kaeso began to cry, weeping unabashedly with joy as he had been unable to weep with sorrow for Hilarion. Indeed, in his relief for Scipio, he all but forgot his grief over Hilarion. Quintus, who had seen terrible things at Cannae and had despaired of ever returning to Roma, had tears streaming down his cheeks as well.

Together they went to find Maximus.

On the eve of the Roman Games, the city was gripped by yet another crisis.

An emissary from Hannibal, a Carthaginian noble named Carthalo, arrived at the city gates. In exchange for a steep ransom, he offered to return a large number of Roman prisoners. A few representatives of the prisoners came with him to plead their cause, for the Romans had a long history of turning their backs on men who had surrendered to the enemy. In spite of the ban, a vast crowd of women gathered in the Forum to plead for the ransom of their husbands, fathers, and sons.

Behind closed doors, the Senate debated the matter.

The representatives of the prisoners defended their actions. They had remained on the battlefield at Cannae until the bodies lay thick around them, then had managed to break through the enemy circle and flee to the Roman camp. In the morning, rather than die on the ramparts, they had given themselves up. It was true that they had neither died bravely nor been clever enough to escape. Yet, they argued, was it not better to pay for the return of genuine Roman soldiers than to enlist yet more slaves to defend the city?

Those who opposed the ransom argued that the captives had surrendered rather than die fighting, and had therefore proven themselves cowards who deserved to be sold into slavery by their captors. Besides, any ransom paid from the public treasury would enrich Hannibal and enable him to hire more mercenaries.

In the end it was decided that the ransom would not be paid. The prisoners were abandoned to their fate. Most would be sent back to Carthage as slaves. Their relatives would never see them again.

There was bitter lamentation throughout the city. Maximus dispatched his lictors to maintain order.

In such an atmosphere, the date arrived for the Roman Games. The invocation to Jupiter on the Capitoline had an edge of desperation. The procession from the Temple of Jupiter to the Circus Maximus was a sad affair; many of the senators and magistrates who normally would have strutted before the people were conspicuously missing. The Feast of Jupiter consisted of little more than the scant daily rations allowed by the dictator for the duration of the crisis.

The company of Plautus performed The Casket. Their rehearsal for the new play had been rushed and chaotic, and the terrible fate of Hilarion had shattered their morale. The production was a disaster. Plautus’s only consolation was that the comedy’s spectators were even more depressed than its performers. The audience scarcely noticed the tardy entrances, missed cues, and flubbed lines. No one hissed or booed; nor did anyone laugh.

The athletic competitions were equally lackluster. Many of Roma’s best young runners and boxers had died at Cannae, and the highly trained slaves who ranked fastest among the chariot racers had been called away to military service.

The citizens who took part in the Roman Games merely went through the motions, performing their patriotic duty to attend an annual celebration that dated back to the days of the kings. They had been rendered insensible by the massacre at Cannae, the scandal of the Vestal virgins, and the wrenching rejection of the captives’ plea for ransom.

Roma was numb with grief and worry. The future of the city was very much in doubt.

212 B.C.

Four years later, the war with Carthage continued to rage, with no end in sight.

Hannibal never marched on Roma. This curious fact was to become part of the city’s legend, another element of her mystique: At the city’s most vulnerable moment, she was spared an assault that would surely have ended in her destruction. How and why had Roma survived? Fabius Maximus was given credit for seizing the reins when chaos threatened, and Scipio was widely praised for his inspiring example to the younger generation; but most Romans, agreeing with their priests, believed that Jupiter himself had deflected the wrath of Hannibal, allowing the Romans a chance to rally.

Hannibal and his marauding army remained in Italy. His apparent strategy-to isolate Roma and to undermine her dominance of the peninsula by winning over her allies, either by force or by persuasion-met with only limited success. The Romans steadfastly avoided another direct confrontation with Hannibal, but ruthlessly struck back at the allies who betrayed them. In regrouping their forces, marshaling their resources, and regaining their morale, the Romans proved to be remarkably resilient.

Meanwhile, the theater of war, already waged in Spain and Sicily and on the sea, expanded to the east. Philip of Macedonia, the heir to Alexander’s homeland, allied himself with Carthage. To counter the threat from Philip, Roma dispatched ambassadors to seek new alliances in Greece and Asia.

As the struggle between the two cities spread across the whole of the Mediterranean world, from the Pillars of Hercules to the straits of the Hellespont, the Romans adopted an increasingly outward-looking foreign policy. The more visionary men of the Senate dared to indulge in heady dreams of empire far beyond the confines of Italy. Roma was like the legendary phoenix consumed by fire only to rise from its own ashes.

The turn of events also brought unexpected good fortune to Kaeso. Because of his lameness and his nonexistent political prospects, his parents had despaired of finding him a suitable wife. After the massacre at Cannae, and the resulting shortage of young bachelors, Kaeso’s mother was able to find a perfectly acceptable patrician girl for him to marry.

Sestia was not beautiful. People said she had a mannish face, but Kaeso found her pleasant enough to look at. Like Kaeso, she had not expected to marry, and was pleased that Fortuna had allowed her to achieve the status of matron. She seemed content to confine her interests to running the household, and demanded no more of Kaeso’s attention than he demanded of hers. She never questioned him about his expenses or business affairs, his abrupt comings and goings, the odd hours he kept, or the exotic perfumes that frequently scented his clothes. Her simple needs and incurious nature suited Kaeso.

Both accepted, from the outset, that the principal purpose of their marriage was to create a child. They made love on a regular basis, though without much enthusiasm on either’s part. Their workmanlike efforts were rewarded. Within a year after they were married, Sestia gave birth to a daughter.

When he saw that little Fabia had been born without physical defects, Kaeso was enormously relieved. He had feared that the baby might be a monster, like the children who had preceded him from his own mother’s womb, or at best flawed and ungainly, like himself. But Fabia was perfect in every regard. There and then, after giving thanks to the gods, Kaeso swore never to have another child.

To settle for a daughter was not the Roman way. Kaeso’s relatives and in-laws suggested that he and Sestia should try again, to see if she could give him a son. But Kaeso, fearing to tempt the Fates, and little drawn to having sex with his wife, remained adamant that he would produce no more children after Fabia. She was now almost three years old.

Sestia had brought with her a small but useful dowry. With it, Kaeso had been able to buy out the other investors in the theater company of Plautus. Being the sole owner of a comedy troupe would never make him wealthy, and certainly would never earn him the respect of his patrician relatives, but Kaeso delighted in the role of impresario and took an active part in running the company. He consulted with Plautus about the Greek source material for his plays, he haggled with magistrates about budgets and allowances for festivals, and he particularly enjoyed auditioning the young slaves whom Plautus put forth as possible additions to the company.

The fourth anniversary of Cannae came and went, stirring bitter memories of the massacre and its terrible aftermath, but also a sense of rejuvenation and hope; the unspeakable despair of those days now seemed distant and unreal, like a bad dream. As Sextilis gave way to September, Kaeso looked forward to the annual Roman Games with special anticipation, for his dear friend Scipio had been elected curule aedile and was in charge of putting on the festivities.

By law, Scipio had been too young to stand for the magistracy. But on voting day an adoring crowd raised Scipio on their shoulders and carried him through the city, demanding his election with chants, songs, and deafening cheers. The throng grew so large and unruly that the polling officials were completely overwhelmed. After a hasty conference, they allowed the unprecedented election of a twenty-four-year-old to the office of curule aedile.

Afterward, with a wink and a laugh, Scipio denied any responsibility for engineering the “spontaneous” near-riot that resulted in his election. “If all Roma wants to make me aedile,” he said, “well, then-I must be old enough!” Surprised or not by his election, he seemed quite ready to take office. On the very day he assumed the aedileship, he announced a detailed plan for putting on the most lavish Roman Games ever produced. “The city needs a celebration,” he declared, “an escape from months and years of constant worry. This year, let the games be not a patriotic duty, but a pure delight!”

A few grumblers complained that election laws that had served Roma for centuries had been broken to reward an upstart youth, and that Scipio’s bland disavowals of self-promotion proved him to be devious and disingenuous. Well, thought Kaeso, what politician was not? And if anyone deserved to have the rules bent on his behalf, was it not the young hero of the Ticinus and Cannae? Kaeso was in awe of his friend’s relentless drive and ambition, and hardly surprised by his extraordinary popularity. It seemed to Kaeso that no man was more deserving of every man’s love.

For the theatrical program, naturally enough, Scipio solicited a comedy from Kaeso’s company. After consulting with Plautus, Kaeso suggested The Swaggering Soldier.

It was a daring gamble. In the aftermath of Cannae, Gracchus had canceled the play, fearing that its portrayal of a vain, lecherous military man would be taken as a distasteful lampoon of Roma’s defeated generals. But now, with the insertion of a few new puns and some hints from the costuming-would a patch over one eye be too obvious? — the character of the Swaggering Soldier might be seen as a parody of the most arrogant military man of all-Hannibal. Until now, the Romans’ dread of the Carthaginian had been too great to indulge in satire, but in the years since Cannae he had shown himself to be indecisive and increasingly fallible. The Romans still loathed and despised Hannibal; were they ready to laugh at him?

When Scipio came to Kaeso’s house for a copy of the play, Kaeso expected him to take it and read it at his leisure. Instead, Scipio began to read it at once. Kaeso left him alone in his study, and for a while paced nervously in his garden. Then he heard Scipio laugh. For the next hour, the laughter continued with hardly a break. Finally, Scipio stepped into the garden, clutching the scroll in one hand and wiping away a tear of laughter with the other. He flashed a mischievous grin, looking as carefree as a boy who had yet to don his first toga.

“Hilarious! Charming! An utter delight! The lovers get each other, and the Swaggering Soldier gets his comeuppance-a sound flogging, right there on the stage! ‘Serve all lechers so, and lechery would cease to grow’-indeed! It’s the ideal play for the occasion. By Hercules, I needed to laugh like that-and so do the people of Roma! They’re going to love it, and they’re going to love me for treating them to it!” He tapped Kaeso’s chest with the scroll. “You’re a clever fellow, Kaeso Fabius Dorso.”

Kaeso lowered his eyes. “Plautus is the clever one.”

“Of course he is. But without you to finance the company, the playwright would have no stage, and without a stage, all his clever lines would be no more than whispers in the wind. Don’t sell yourself short, Kaeso. You have an eye for talent, just as a good general has an eye for bravery. You’re a valuable fellow to know.” The play had put Scipio in such a facetious mood that he tousled Kaeso’s hair, then gave his backside a playful swat with the scroll.

Kaeso blushed so furiously that Scipio drew back and blinked at him in wonder, then swatted his backside again and laughed uproariously. Kaeso drew a sharp breath, then he began to laugh, too. He laughed at himself, at the absurdity of the world, at the ridiculous vanity of the Swaggering Soldier. He laughed until his sides ached and tears flowed from his eyes. He had not laughed like that in a very long time.

The splendor of the Roman Games that year was on a scale such as Roma had never witnessed before. The sacred rites atop the Capitoline exuded an air of buoyancy and optimism; men smiled as they intoned the ancient formulas to dedicate the festivities of the coming days to Jupiter, greatest of gods. The procession to the Circus Maximus became a joyous celebration, led by brightly clad charioteers on horseback, strutting boxers in scanty loincloths, and dancers twirling javelins to the music of flutes, lyres, and tambourines. Mimes in the guise of satyrs scurried in and out of the crowd, pinching bottoms and eliciting screams of laughter from the women and girls. Griffin-headed censers hung from poles were swung about, scenting the air with clouds of incense.

In the vicinity of the Circus Maximus, the perfume of the censers gave way to the aroma of meat roasting in the open air, the scent of freshly baked bread, the tangy smell of pickled fish, and the delicate odor of salted olives served in oil. No curule aedile had ever fed the citizens of Roma so well, or so copiously. There was so much food on offer, in so many places, that hardly anyone had to stand in line, and everyone could go back as many times as he wished. The Feast of Jupiter would last all day, and continue the next day as well. It was as if every man, for a couple of days, was a rich man, with a belly as full as he could want and his hours filled with leisure, secure in the blessings of Jupiter.

In the midst of the feasting, a fresh-faced youth with a powerful voice-one of Plautus’s actors-in-training-stood on a box and addressed the crowd. “Citizens! Stop stuffing your faces for an hour and come see The Swaggering Soldier! It’s a new comedy by Plautus-that’s right, the flatfooted playwright from Umbria, the one who makes you laugh until you piss! Come, see the Swaggering Soldier himself, Pyrgopolynices, as he puts the make on his concubine, the ravishing Philocomasium!”

People in the crowd began to laugh, if only at hearing the boy wrap his tongue around the absurdly convoluted Greek names.

“Come, citizens, and behold the heartsick Pleusicles, a young man desperately in love, as he does his best to rescue the soldier’s concubine! Come, see the angry old man Periplectomenus…” The boy raised his eyebrows and pressed a forefinger to lips. “And whatever you do, don’t tell Periplectomenus about the secret passageway between his house and the soldier’s, or you’ll spoil the plot! Come, see the wily slaves Palaestrio, Sceledrus, and Lurcio-they always know more than they let on!”

The boy jumped from the box, produced a pipe, and played a merry tune to lead the spectators into the Circus Maximus.

Underneath the stage, Kaeso stood not far from the trapdoor-Plautus had thought of a number of ingenious ways to use it during the play-and peered through a peephole to watch the bleachers fill up. Scipio, he noticed, was among the first to arrive, taking his place in the dignitary’s section along with a retinue of friends and colleagues. The day was mild and the sky was clear, with no sign of rain. The feast had put the audience in a happy mood, ready to be entertained. With full bellies and a warm sun, the danger was that they might fall asleep.

As it turned out, there was no chance of that. Any spectator who nodded off for even an instant would have been awakened by the roars of laughter around him. The players did an outstanding job. During rehearsals, Kaeso had never seen them attack Plautus’s lines with such vigor; the laughter of the audience inspired them to outdo themselves. On that day, as never before, Kaeso saw the living proof of a belief that Plautus, after several cups of wine, had once confided to him: “When does comedy become sublime? When there is a collaboration in equal measures between playwright, players, and spectators, all working together in harmony to delight the gods with the music of human laughter. When men laugh, the gods laugh, and for a brief time this miserable world becomes not merely bearable, but beautiful.”

The applause at the end of the play was thunderous. The audience hailed the players, especially the actor who portrayed the blustering Pyrgopolynices. Plautus ran onto the stage to take several bows. Then Scipio, laughing and genuinely taken by surprise, was swept off his feet and lifted onto the shoulders of his companions to receive the gratitude of the adoring crowd.

Kaeso remained under the stage, observing the audience through his peephole. At that moment, he wanted very much to be close to Scipio, but in such a throng even approaching him would be impossible. As he watched, Scipio dispatched a young slave, who dexterously threaded a path through the crush and made his way under the stage.

The slave found Kaeso and drew a quick breath. “My master, Publius Cornelius Scipio, says to tell you that he wishes he could congratulate you in person, but, with all the day’s events, he must hurry off. However, in three day’s time, when the Games are over and well behind him, he says he would be honored if you would join him for dinner.”

“Of course,” said Kaeso. “Of course we’ll come. Plautus will be delighted.”

The slave smiled and shook his head. “My master asks that you come alone. He says he’ll feast the playwright on another night, but once the Games are done, he looks forward to a quiet repast in the company of an old friend.”

No power on earth could have kept Kaeso from joining Scipio on the appointed night.

“What a whirlwind! I only wish my father could have been here to see it.” Scipio gazed into his cup and swirled the wine. It seemed to Kaeso that his friend had drunk very little that night. Perhaps Scipio found the success of the Games intoxicating enough.

“Your father is where Roma most needs him to be, with your uncle, commanding the legions in Spain,” said Kaeso. “Have you heard from them lately?”

Scipio frowned. “I received my father’s last letter almost two months ago. A letter from Uncle Gnaeus arrived a few days after that. Not a word since then. No news from Spain at all. Just a long silence.”

Kaeso shrugged. “Messages go astray. Your father and uncle are such busy men, I’m surprised they have time to write at all. They call Spain the viper’s nest, don’t they, because it was Hannibal’s original base of operations? Everyone agrees there’s no battleground in the war that’s more important.”

“Or more fiercely fought. They’ve been at it for years now, trying to drive out the Carthaginians. According to my father, if any man hates us more than Hannibal, it’s his brother, Hasdrubal, who commands the Carthaginians in Spain.”

Kaeso nodded, not sure what else to say. He would have liked more wine, but it was uncouth to drink more than one’s host. Scipio’s full cup seemed merely a dark mirror upon which to focus his gaze.

“In my father’s last letter,” said Scipio, “he complained of the cowardice of the locals. His Celtiberian allies deserted the Roman camp overnight. They claimed there was a tribal conclave that required their attendance at the far side of the peninsula, but it was obvious they were fleeing because word had arrived that an army of Suessitani was coming down from Gaul to reinforce the enemy.” Scipio sighed. “Father was already feeling outnumbered by the Carthaginians and the Numidians. What a cavalry those African bastards can mount-as we learned to our regret at Cannae! Numidians are born on horseback. Father says they have a very strong leader in Spain, an audacious young prince named Masinissa, hardly more than a boy, but utterly sure of himself. It’s Masinissa who worries him now, even more than Hasdrubal.” Scipio sighed again.

“Perhaps this Masinissa was the true model for the Swaggering Soldier,” said Kaeso. To his relief, Scipio laughed.

“What a delight that play was! Really, your troupe outdid themselves, Kaeso. They made me very proud. I sat through all the other comedies, but not one of them made me laugh half as much as yours.”

“It’s Plautus who should get the credit. But, on his behalf, I gratefully accept your words of praise. To Plautus!” Kaeso raised his cup. Scipio did likewise, and Kaeso was happy to see him drain his cup.

The wine seemed to affect Scipio almost at once. Perhaps, being normally so abstemious, he was more vulnerable to intoxication than a heavier drinker like Kaeso.

“A splendid play,” he said dreamily. “And the athletic competitions were just as splendid. Wonderful chariot races! Excellent boxing, foot races, and javelin tosses. I especially enjoyed that exhibition of Greek-style wrestling, though the athletes were not entirely naked, as the Greeks prefer.” He grinned. “Perhaps you would have preferred that, as well, Kaeso?”

Kaeso stammered for a moment, but Scipio didn’t seem to expect an answer. Talking about the Games had excited him. “What did you think of the Feast of Jupiter?”

“It was the best public feast I can remember. Handing out vessels of olive oil to everyone who attended was a very nice touch. And the menu for the second day was even better than the first.”

“It was, wasn’t it? Roast pork and fowl, savory onions on skewers, and chickpeas with garum. Don’t you love garum, Kaeso? I mean a really good garum, not too sweet, not too salty-not that cheap pickled fish sauce they sell in the Subura, but the kind that’s been properly fermented, so pungent it pops the top of your head off. I’ll wager that most people at this year’s Feast of Jupiter had never before tasted a garum as good as the one I gave them. When they think of the best garum they ever ate, they shall always think of me.”

“And vote for you?”

“Exactly!” Scipio giggled like boy and raised a brawny arm to push back his mane of chestnut hair.

Kaeso blinked and tried to think of something to say. “The Games must have cost you a fortune.”

“Indeed they did! Father supplied most of the money, but it wasn’t nearly enough. You can’t imagine all the expenses! It was like running a military campaign-logistics, supply lines, transport. I’m afraid I had to borrow quite a bit.”

“Scipio! I’ll feel guilty now, asking for the fee we agreed on.”

“Nonsense. Every politician goes into debt to finance public entertainments for the voters. That’s what moneylenders are for. Do you know, I think I shall have some more of this very fine wine. I paid for it out of the budget for the Games, after all!”

Scipio poured them both another cup. “A toast to our friendship!”

“To our friendship,” whispered Kaeso, and they both drank deeply.

Scipio’s eyes glittered in the lamplight. “I treasure our friendship, Kaeso. You’re so very different from most of the men I associate with nowadays. They’re all so relentlessly ambitious, always pushing to get ahead, concerned about nothing but fighting and politics. Their lives have no other dimension-there is the Course of Honor, and nothing else. Their marriages are only a means to an end, as are their friendships. The same applies to their education-they duly memorize a few passages so they can drop a learned quotation into a speech from time to time, but they have no appreciation of beautiful writing and lofty ideas; they don’t know their Ennius from their Iliad. Even the worship of the gods means little to them, apart from the role it plays in advancing their careers.”

He sighed. “It’s the way of the world, I suppose, but you and I, Kaeso, we know there’s more to life than chasing after wealth and honor. There’s a spark of life inside us, unique and separate from everything else, a kind of secret flame that must be cherished and tended, as the Vestals tend the sacred hearth. Sometimes I find it hard to remember that. Sometimes I envy you, Kaeso, standing as you do outside the Course of Honor.”

Kaeso managed a halting laugh. “Surely you joke, Scipio.” He gazed at his friend, admiring his beauty, acutely aware of his accomplishments and the adoration he received from others, and found it very hard to imagine that Scipio was envious of any man.

Scipio’s face became grave. He placed his hand on Kaeso’s and gazed into his eyes. “No, Kaeso, I’m not joking. Your friendship is different from any other. It means a great deal to me. You mean a great deal to me.”

Kaeso looked at the hand that remained atop his own. If he dared to move his forefinger, it would brush against Scipio’s forefinger, in an unmistakable gesture of intimacy. “I think this must be the wine talking,” he whispered.

“Perhaps. But in wine is truth, as the saying goes. Do you not feel the same about me?”

Kaeso’s pulse began to race. He felt lightheaded. His mouth was suddenly dry. Wine, give me strength to speak the truth! he thought. But did he dare to say aloud what he felt for Scipio? He had no fear that his friend would scoff or laugh, or do anything to belittle or berate him, but even the least expression of pity or disdain on Scipio’s face would be devastating to him.

Kaeso opened his mouth to speak. He looked up, intending to gaze steadily into Scipio’s eyes, but his friend was looking past him, at a slave who had entered the room.

“What is it, Daphnis?”

“A messenger, master. He says it’s very urgent.”

Scipio snorted. “Probably a contractor for the Games, wanting a payment.”

“No, master. It’s a centurion. He has a message from your uncle in Spain.”

Scipio withdrew his hand from Kaeso’s. He sat upright. He drew a deep breath. All traces of inebriation vanished. “Show the man in.”

The centurion wore a grim expression. He extended a small wax tablet to Scipio, of the type used for writing and rewriting short missives. Scipio stared at it for a moment, then shook his head. “No, read it aloud to me.”

The centurion balked. “Are you sure, Aedile?”

“Read it!”

The centurion untied the lacings and opened the hinged cover. He stared for a long moment at the tiny, crabbed letters scraped in the wax, then cleared his throat. “‘To my nephew Publius, I send tragic news. Your father, my beloved brother…’” The soldier hesitated for a long moment, then thrust out his jaw and continued. “‘Your father, my beloved brother, is dead. Riding forth to engage the Suessitani before they could reach and reinforce the Carthaginians and Numidians, he unexpectedly encountered all three enemies, one after another. He was outflanked. In the thick of battle-fighting, rallying his men, exposing himself wherever they were hardest pressed-he was pierced through the right side by a lance-’”

Scipio gave a cry and pressed a fist to his mouth. After a moment, he waved to the centurion to continue.

“‘He fell from his horse. The Romans lost heart and took flight, but escape through the line of Numidian cavalry was impossible. The only survivors were those who managed to stay alive until nightfall, when darkness put an end to the battle and allowed them to elude the enemy.

“‘Nephew, I mourn with you, but at this moment, I can write no more. Your father’s heroic death has made Hasdrubal and Masinissa bolder than ever. They press upon us. Our Spanish auxiliaries have melted away. The situation is desperate. Jupiter, be my shield! Mars, be my sword! Farewell, nephew. Your uncle, Gnaeus.’”

Having finished, the centurion again offered the tablet to Scipio, who took it but seemed unable to focus his eyes upon the wax. He put the tablet aside. His voice was hollow. “Is this all my uncle sent? Did he send no memento of my father? A scrap of his armor? Some keepsake?”

“Your uncle…”

“Yes? Speak!”

“Your uncle is also dead, Aedile. Because of storms, I had to wait many days to catch a ship from Spain. Even as I was boarding the ship, another messenger arrived. He brought news of the battle in which Gnaeus Cornelius Scipio perished. The enemy laid siege to his camp and overran the ramparts. He took refuge in a lookout tower. The tower was set aflame. The commander and his men emerged and died fighting. I know no other details, but I’m sure he died as heroically as his brother before him.”

Scipio stared at the dancing flame of the lamp that lit the room. His voice was strangely distant. “My father…my uncle…both dead?”

“Yes, Aedile.”

“Impossible!”

“I assure you, Aedile-”

“But who is commanding the legions in Spain?”

“I…I’m not sure, Aedile.”

For a long time Scipio stared at the flame. The centurion, used to awaiting orders, stood silent and still. Kaeso hardly dared to look at his friend’s face, fearful of seeing his anguish. But Scipio, with his long hair and handsome features, might have been a statue of Alexander. Without moving, without expression, he stared at the flame.

At last Scipio stirred. He stood and looked down at each of his limbs in turn with a bemused expression, as if he had forgotten who he was and needed to take account of himself. Then he strode purposefully out of the room.

Kaeso followed him. “Scipio, where are you going?”

“Where the god calls me,” said Scipio, with no further explanation. In the vestibule he paused to look at the wax effigies of his ancestors. Then, dressed as he was, in a light tunic and thin slippers, he opened the door and left the house.

He walked steadily through the dark, deserted streets, descended to the Forum, then headed for the path that would take him to the top of the Capitoline. Kaeso followed at a distance. In poems and plays, he had read of men possessed by the gods, but he had never seen such a thing. Had Scipio been possessed by a god? His reaction to the dreadful news seemed so strange, and his movements so controlled and deliberate, that Kaeso could hardly believe Scipio was acting of his own volition.

Atop the Capitoline, Scipio entered the Temple of Jupiter. Kaeso stopped at the foot of the steps. It seemed somehow improper to follow Scipio inside.

Kaeso waited. The landscape of the night seemed unfamiliar to him, and slightly eerie. The sacred precinct of temples and towering statues was utterly quiet, as if the gods themselves were sleeping.

But not for long. A flicker of torches caught Kaeso’s eye. A group of magistrates and priests approached, headed by the Pontifex Maximus.

The priest gave him a nod of recognition. “You’re Maximus’s young cousin.”

“Yes. Kaeso Fabius Dorso.”

“Have you heard? A catastrophe! The worst defeat since Cannae!”

“I heard the news at the side of the curule aedile himself,” said Kaeso quietly. “I followed him here.”

“Young Scipio is in the temple?”

“Jupiter summoned him.”

“Summoned him?”

“That’s what Scipio said.”

The Pontifex Maximus gazed up uncertainly at the open doors of the temple. Like Kaeso, he and the others chose to wait at the foot of the steps. Soon others joined them, for news of the disaster was spreading quickly through the city, as was word of Scipio’s lone vigil inside the temple. Little by little, a great throng gathered. The space was filled with low murmurs of lamentation and cries of grief. The light of many torches turned night into day. If the gods had been sleeping before, thought Kaeso, they were awake now.

At last, Scipio emerged from the temple. People shouted his name, along with the names of his father and his uncle, and cried aloud to Jupiter for protection and salvation. Many in the anxious, grieving crowd believed that Scipio had been communing with the god and awaited his message.

Scipio stood for so long on the porch of the temple, unmoving and hardly seeming to notice the crowd, that Kaeso began to fear that his friend had lost his senses.

Suddenly Scipio stepped forward, raised his arms, and gave a shout. “Citizens! Be quiet! Can you not hear the voice of Jupiter speaking? Be quiet!”

The crowd fell silent. All eyes were on Scipio. He cocked his head and returned the crowd’s gaze with a look of bewilderment. At last, as if solving a puzzle, he raised his eyebrows and nodded. “No, none of you can hear what I hear-but you can hear my voice, so listen to what I have to say. Citizens! I saved the life of my father in battle once, long ago at the river Ticinus. But when the combined fury of our enemies encircled him in Spain, I was not there, and I could not save him. When they turned their wrath against his brother Gnaeus, my father was not there to come to his rescue, and neither was I.

“My father is dead. My uncle is dead. The legions in Spain are broken and leaderless. Roma stands defenseless against our enemies to the west. If Hasdrubal should come to join his brother Hannibal in Italy…if he should bring the Numidian whelp Masinissa with him…what shall become of Roma?”

There were cries of alarm from the crowd.

“That must never happen!” cried Scipio. “The bleeding wound of Spain must be stitched up. Hasdrubal and Masinissa must be driven out. The Suessitani must be punished. Tonight, here before you, upon the steps of the god’s dwelling place, I make the vow that Jupiter demands of me. I pledge to take my father’s place-if the people of Roma see fit to give me the command. I pledge to avenge his death. I pledge to drive his killers from Spain, and after that task is accomplished, I pledge to drive the one-eyed fiend himself from Italy, along with every mongrel mercenary under his command. To the east, Philip of Macedonia will be punished for allying himself with our enemy. We shall take the war to Carthage. We shall make them regret that they ever dared to challenge the will of Roma.

“It may take many years-it may take all the days that remain of my lifetime-but when I am done, I will make sure that Carthage can never endanger us again. I make this pledge to you, and I make this pledge to Jupiter, greatest of all the gods. Of Jupiter, I beg for strength. Of you, I ask for my father’s command.”

The crowd reacted. Moaning and weeping turned to shouts of exultation. The people began to chant: “Send the son to Spain! Send the son to Spain! Send the son to Spain!”

Kaeso looked at the faces of the magistrates and priests at the front of the crowd. They did not join in the chanting, but they did not dare to stop it. Wise men would argue that Scipio was far too young and inexperienced to receive such a command, just as he had been too young to serve as curule aedile. But he had asked the people directly for the command of Spain, and who could doubt that he would receive it?

Kaeso bowed his head, and wondered at his own audacity. How could he ever have thought, however fleetingly, that he might lay claim to the affections of a man so beloved by so many? Whether destined for triumph or defeat, Scipio had embarked on a path upon which Kaeso could not hope to follow.

“I think I must have felt as men felt in the presence of Alexander the Great,” said Kaeso.

Plautus gave him a sardonic look. “Madly in love with the fellow, you mean?”

Kaeso smiled crookedly. “What an absurd idea!” Even in the uninhibited atmosphere of the playwright’s house, he felt uncomfortable talking about his feelings for Scipio.

“Is it so absurd?” said Plautus. “Alexander’s men were all in love with him, and why not? They say there was never a man more beautiful or more full of fire-a divine fire, a spark from the gods. And Alexander loved at least one of them in return, his lifelong companion Hephaestion. They say he went mad with heartbreak after Hephaestion died and rushed to join his beloved in Hades. Who’s to say you couldn’t be Hephaestion to Scipio’s Alexander?”

“Don’t be ridiculous! Hephaestion was Alexander’s equal as an athlete and a warrior, for one thing. Besides, Greeks are Greeks and Romans are Romans.”

Plautus shook his head. “Men are the same everywhere. That’s why comedy is universal. Thank the gods for that! A laugh is a laugh, whether you’re in Corinth or Corsica-or Carthage, I daresay. Every man likes to laugh, eat, spill his seed, and get a good night’s sleep-usually in that order.”

Kaeso shrugged and sipped his wine.

The playwright smirked. “Divine spark or not, your friend Scipio has fallen behind in his social engagements. Didn’t you say he intended to have me over, to celebrate our mutual success? It’s almost a month since the Roman Games, and I’m still waiting for my dinner invitation.”

“You can’t be serious, Plautus. Can you imagine how busy Scipio must be, preparing to take the command in Spain? He doesn’t have time to entertain! I was probably the last person with whom he actually sat down and enjoyed a meal.”

“You should feel lucky, then, and honored.”

“I do. It will be a very long time, I imagine, before Scipio smiles again as he smiled that night-relaxed and contented and with hardly a worry. Now the weight of destiny is on his shoulders.”

Plautus nodded. “He’s set himself an arduous task. It will make him or break him.”

“Only time will tell,” whispered Kaeso. He mouthed a silent prayer to Jupiter to watch over his friend.

201 B.C.

Eleven years later, Scipio had fulfilled the vows he made to Jupiter, to the shades of his father and uncle, and to the people of Roma.

After decisive victories in Spain, Scipio took the war to Africa and proceeded to menace Carthage. This was done over the strenuous objections of Fabius Maximus, who told the Senate that Hannibal should be decisively defeated in Italy rather than lured away, and who warned against the uncertainties and entanglements of an African campaign. But Scipio’s strategy succeeded brilliantly. Panicked, the Carthaginians recalled Hannibal from Italy to defend their city. Just as many of Roma’s jealous allies and subjects had eagerly betrayed her, so did many of Carthage’s neighbors. Scipio pressed his advantage. At the battle of Zama, some one hundred miles inland from Carthage, the long war reached its climax.

Before the battle, in a final attempt at negotiations, Hannibal asked to talk with Scipio, and the two met face to face in Scipio’s tent. For a long moment, both men were struck dumb with mutual loathing and admiration. Hannibal spoke first, asking for peace despite the bitter taste of the word in his mouth. He offered terms advantageous to Roma-but not advantageous enough. Scipio craved a victory, not a settlement. Nothing less would satisfy his vow to Jupiter.

Hannibal made a final plea. “You were a boy when I began my war on Roma. You’ve grown up. I’ve grown old. Your sun is rising. I see twilight ahead. With age comes weariness, but also wisdom. Hear me, Scipio: The greater a man’s success, the less it may be trusted to endure. Fortuna can turn on a man, in the blink of an eye. You believe that you have the upper hand going into this battle, but when the bloodshed and the madness begin, all the odds count for nothing. Will you stake the sacrifice of so much blood and so many years of struggle on the outcome of a single hour?”

Scipio was unimpressed. He pointed out that Roma had proposed terms of peace on numerous occasions, to which Carthage had always turned a deaf ear. Negotiation was no longer an option. As for Fortuna, Scipio was well aware of her vagaries. She had taken those dearest to him, but she had also given him a chance to exact his revenge.

Hannibal was allowed to return to the Carthaginian camp unharmed.

The next day, the two most famous generals commanding the two mightiest armies in the world advanced to battle. The closely fought contest was a test of sheer endurance for both sides. Scipio had prayed for a rout; he achieved a bare victory, but a victory nonetheless. Defeated, exhausted, abandoned by Fortuna, Hannibal fled back to Carthage.

The Romans’ terms were harsh. Stripped of her warships and military stores and made to pay massive reparations, Carthage was reduced to little more than a client state of Roma. A war that had wreaked havoc on the whole of the Mediterranean for seventeen years had at last come to an end, and Roma emerged stronger than ever, a power poised to rival the fabled Egyptians or the Persians at the peak of their empires. The survivors who had fought and won the war could rightly consider themselves the greatest generation in Roman history, and the greatest among them, without question, was Publius Cornelius Scipio, forever after to be called Africanus-conqueror of Africa.

“He’s cut his hair short! When did that happen? I’ve never seen him without his long mane of chestnut hair.”

Kaeso spoke wistfully. Through the peephole beneath the stage, he gazed at the crowded bleachers of the Circus Maximus, where Scipio had finally arrived to take his seat of honor. The crowd stood and cheered him for a long time, crying “Africanus! Africanus!” Eventually the spectators began to take their seats, and Kaeso was finally able to get a clear view of the recipient of their acclaim.

“Are you disappointed, boss?” said Plautus, who was performing a last-minute inspection of the trapdoor. The simple task made him huff and puff; over the years, he had grown fat with success. “Does short hair not suit him?”

“Quite the contrary! It suits him very well indeed.” Kaeso squinted slightly; his eyesight was not as good as it used to be. “He no longer looks like a boy-”

“I should think not! He must be at least thirty-five.”

“But he’s more handsome than ever. Not so much like Alexander anymore; more like Hercules, perhaps. He used to be almost too pretty, you know? Now he looks so rugged, so-”

“By Venus and Mars, stop swooning!” Plautus laughed. “He’s just a man.”

“Really? Did you see the triumphal procession?”

“Some of it. It went on too long for me to watch the whole thing.”

“All those captives, all that booty! The splendor of his chariot, the magnificence of his armor! All those people shouting his name…”

“I’m only glad he decided to include an afternoon of comedy among the festivities-though I must admit I was a bit surprised when he requested that we revive The Swaggering Soldier for the occasion.”

“Why not The Swaggering Soldier? It hearkens back to his very first elected office; people still talk about the Roman Games of that year. And it’s a clever way for him to show people that he doesn’t take himself too seriously. The audience can see the play as an affectionate parody of Roma’s most beloved soldier, a man who’s earned the right to swagger, the invincible Scipio Africanus. Giving them a laugh at his own expense will only make them love him more.”

“While you, dear boss, could hardly love Scipio more than you already do.”

Kaeso made no reply. He was deep in thought, musing on Scipio’s spectacular success. His own life seemed hopelessly humdrum and shabby by comparison-a comfortable but loveless marriage, a daughter to whom he had never felt particularly close, an endless series of dalliances with actors and slave boys, and a merely adequate livelihood earned from his theater company and from his staff of scribes, who specialized in copying Greek books for sale to the literate upper classes.

Plautus slapped his shoulder. “Snap out of it, boss! You’ve been a shadow to Scipio all your life. You’ve admired him, desired him, idolized him, envied him-done everything, I suppose, except hate him.”

“That I could never do!”

“Ah, but there you differ from your fellow citizens. They adore him now-they worship him like a god-but they’ll turn on Scipio some day.”

“Impossible!”

“Inevitable. The audience is fickle, Kaeso. You alone are faithful, like the keeper of a shrine. Scipio should appreciate you more than he does! Has he invited you to dinner even once since we met to talk about putting on the play?”

“He’s been very busy.” Kaeso frowned. Then a flash of movement caught his eye; one of the actors had forgotten from which side he needed to make his entrance and was using the passage under the stage to get across. The actor was new to the company, and quite young; they seemed to grow younger every year. He was also uncommonly good-looking, with long hair and broad shoulders. He flashed a grin at Kaeso as he hurried past.

Plautus glanced over his shoulder, then looked back at Kaeso and smiled. “Ah, yes, the new boy, from Massilia. Scipio’s haircut notwithstanding, I see you haven’t entirely lost your appreciation for long-haired beauties.”

“I suppose I haven’t,” admitted Kaeso with a crooked grin.

Above their heads, the play began. The tromping of the actors across the boards was loud in their ears, but not as loud as the first roar of laughter from the audience. Amid the din, Kaeso was sure that he could distinctly hear Scipio, laughing louder and harder than anyone else.

191 B.C.

“It seems we hardly ever run into each other anymore, except at the theater,” said Scipio. “When did I see you last, Kaeso? It’s must have been a couple of years, at least.”

The festive occasion was the opening of a temple on the Palatine, dedicated to a goddess new to Roma: Cybele, the Great Mother of the Gods, whom the Romans called Magna Mater. Her cult was said to date back to prehistoric times, but was not native to Roma or even to Italy. It had been imported from one of Roma’s new allies in the East, the kingdom of Phrygia. Since the defeat of Carthage, Roma’s expanding sphere of influence had resulted in an influx of new people, new languages, new ideas-and new deities. Cybele was quite unlike any goddess previously seen in Roma. The statue in the new temple depicted her wearing exotic garments and adorned from head to foot with bull’s testicles. Along with her statue, the priests of Cybele had also been imported from Phrygia. They were called galli, and were also something new to Roma: eunuchs.

Games had been organized to celebrate the occasion, and a temporary theater had been erected in front of the new temple. The company of Plautus was about to put on a new comedy. For this performance, Kaeso had chosen to sit in the audience rather than remain backstage, and had invited Scipio to sit beside him. Before he could answer his friend’s question, a small commotion in the audience distracted them both. The galli had arrived in a group and were filing into their seats of honor, not far from Kaeso and Scipio. The priests were gaudily attired in red turbans and yellow gowns. They wore bangles on their wrists and paint on their cheeks.

“Can you imagine our grandfathers putting foreign-born eunuchs on the sacred payroll?” asked Scipio. “Our ancestors thought of eunuchs, if they thought of them at all, strictly as the sycophants of kings, half-men who could never breed, and so would never try to put their own progeny ahead of the king’s heirs. A republic has no king; ergo, no need for eunuchs. Yet now we have eunuchs in Roma, thanks to Cybele! Fascinating, aren’t they? I hear they cut off their testicles themselves. They work themselves into a such a frenzy that they don’t even feel it. Amazing, the acts to which religious devotion will drive a man!”

Kaeso winced at the idea of a man castrating himself, but found himself staring at one of the galli, a dark-eyed, exceptionally good-looking youth with full lips and skin like marble. He had heard that a man who was castrated in adulthood did not lose his erotic appetites. What sort of proclivities might such a young man possess, who had been willing to do such a thing for his goddess? Kaeso could not help being curious.

Aloud, he remarked, “If anyone should know about the Great Mother and her galli, it’s you, Scipio. After all, it was you who officially welcomed them to the city and accepted the gift of the black stone.”

The black stone, even more than the statue of the goddess, was the centerpiece of the new temple. It was said to have fallen from the sky, and its shape roughly depicted an even more primitive image of the goddess, an amorphous mass suggesting a massively pregnant female with no distinguishing features. The black stone, too, was unlike anything previously worshiped in Roma, but when the galli in the Phrygian city of Pessinus offered it as a gift, along with a request to establish Cybele’s worship in Roma, a verse had been found in the Sibylline Books that called on the Roman people to accept the gift and welcome the new goddess.

Whatever its religious function, the importation of Cybele possessed a political dimension as well. Men of vision, like Scipio, believed that Roma’s future now lay to the East. After Hannibal had been dealt with, the Romans turned their energies to defeating Philip of Macedonia, and had done so with help from Phrygia. Roma’s embrace of the Great Mother would strengthen her bonds with her new ally. When the stone arrived by ship at Ostia, the verse in the Sibylline Books required that only the greatest of the Romans could accept it. Naturally, Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus was chosen for the honor.

Perhaps because he was thinking of the galli and their sacrifice, Kaeso touched the golden fascinum that hung from the necklace he wore. He had put away the heirloom many years before, and had virtually forgotten about it, until he happened to come across it while going through a box of old things. The glitter of the gold caught his eye, and on a whim he decided to begin wearing it again on special occasions, as had been the practice, so he had once been told, of his ancestors.

Touching the fascinum led to another train of thought. He cleared his throat and said to Scipio, in an offhand way, “All these new religions flooding into Roma-some official, some…not so official. What do you think of the so-called Cult of Bacchus? They say it offers initiation into secret rites that promise an ecstatic release from the material world.”

Scipio looked at him sidelong and raised an eyebrow. “The Cult of Bacchus is controversial, to say the least. Like everyone else, I’ve heard about it. It seems to be an offshoot of a Greek cult that worships a god of wine and madness. How much of what I’ve heard can be believed, or how widespread the cult’s become, I don’t know. I do know it has no recognition from the state.”

“So it’s not illegal?”

“Not technically, I suppose. But, from what I’ve heard, the cult’s ‘ecstatic’ rituals are nothing more than drunken orgies where every possible sexual act is encouraged. Also…” Scipio lowered his voice. “The initiation of men into the cult requires that they submit to anal penetration-as if they were slave boys! I’ve also heard that the cult is nothing more than a front for a group of ruthless criminals. The so-called priests and priestesses are forgers, blackmailers, even murderers.” Scipio took a deep breath. “I would advise you, Kaeso, to steer clear of any cult that has no official status, especially the Cult of Bacchus!”

“Yes, of course,” muttered Kaeso. He hurriedly changed the subject. “I’m a grandfather now!”

Scipio smiled. “So I’ve heard. Congratulations.”

“My daughter struck a lucky match when she married young Menenius. No man could have given her a more beautiful baby. I only wish my wife had lived to see little Menenia.”

“Yes, I was saddened to hear of Sestia’s death.”

Kaeso shrugged. “To be honest, I was never much of a husband to her. Nor was I much of a father to Fabia. But the role of grandfather seems to suit me. I dote shamelessly on Menenia, as I never doted on her mother or grandmother. And what about you, Scipio? You’ve just had a daughter.”

“Indeed I have! If you think you dote on Menenia, you should see me with Cornelia.”

Kaeso nodded. “Curious, that your daughter and my granddaughter should be almost exactly the same age.”

“Perhaps they can grow up to be friends, as you and I have been friends, Kaeso.”

“I should like that,” Kaeso said. “I should like that very much.” He gazed steadily at Scipio. His chestnut hair, kept short, was now mixed with silver. In his rugged features, all trace of the boy was gone, except in his eyes, which sometimes glowed with youthful exuberance when he laughed. This was one of the reasons Kaeso had invited Scipio to sit beside him in the theater that day, because it would give him such pleasure to see Scipio laugh.

They were distracted by the sound of applause and a flurry of movement. Many in the audience spontaneously rose from their seats. Plautus had just entered the theater and was making his way to the empty seat next to Kaeso. At the age of sixty-three, the Umbrian playwright was the grand old man of the Roman stage. The audience knew him by sight and gave him a standing ovation.

The galli alone failed to recognize him. They looked at one another in puzzlement, then stood and joined uncertainly in the applause.

Plautus embraced Kaeso, then exchanged greetings with Scipio. The three of them sat, and the applause gradually dwindled.

“So, my flatfooted friend, what’s the play today?” said Scipio.

Plautus shrugged. “Oh, a trifle I’ve titled after the main character, a wisecracking slave. It’s called Pseudolus.”

“A trifle? Your masterpiece!” declared Kaeso.

“Spoken with all the conviction one would expect from the owner of the company!” Plautus laughed. “Oh, the dialogue sparkles in places, I must admit; but not nearly so brightly as words may sparkle in real life. I refer, Scipio, to the dialogue you exchanged with your old enemy Hannibal when the two of you met face to face on your recent mission to the East-if one can believe the gossips. Can one believe the gossips?”

Scipio had already told the anecdote to Kaeso, when they met outside the theater, but he obligingly related it again. “It’s true. While I was in Ephesus, I learned that Hannibal happened to be there as well, and I arranged to meet him. Our spies say he’s been wandering the East for years, offering his services to any king willing to challenge Roma. It’s because of that accursed vow he made to his father; he can never stop plotting our downfall as long as there’s a breath in his body. So far, he’s had no takers. He’s become a bit of a joke, actually.”

“What did you two talk about?” said Plautus.

“This and that. At one point, I asked him which general, in his opinion, was the greatest of all time.”

“A leading question!” said Plautus. “What was his reply?”

“‘Alexander,’ Hannibal answered. And what commander would he place second? ‘Pyrrhus,’ he said. And third? ‘Myself!’ declared Hannibal. Well, I had to burst out laughing. I said, ‘And where would you rank if you had defeated me?’ Hannibal looked me in the eye and replied, ‘In that case, I would put myself before Pyrrhus and even before Alexander-in fact, before all other generals who ever lived!’”

Plautus slapped his knee. “Outrageous! Really, I could never invent a line like that, or a character like Hannibal.”

“It’s Carthaginian flattery, don’t you see?” said Scipio. “Devious and indirect. But…I was flattered nonetheless.” He sighed. “Someday, I have no doubt, Hannibal will be assassinated, or else driven to suicide. Not by me, of course, but by those who come after me.”

Kaeso shook his head. “There’ll never be another man big enough to take your place.”

Scipio laughed, a little sadly and a little bitterly. “Sweet words, my friend, but alas, I grow smaller every day, and the space I occupy becomes easier to fill. I feel my influence waning. The world has grown tired of me, just as the world has grown tired of Hannibal. When people hear his name, they no longer tremble. They smirk. They hear my name, and they shrug. My political enemies circle me like wolves, waiting for the chance to bring me down on some trumped-up charge. The same small-minded men who will murder Hannibal will sooner or later drive me into exile, if they can.”

Kaeso was distressed. “No! I don’t believe you. Surely you’re at the peak of your power. You were chosen to accept the black stone of Cybele. A magnificent arch is being built in your honor, to serve as the gateway to the Capitoline Hill. The Arch of Scipio Africanus will stand forever as a monument to your glory.”

“Perhaps. Monuments last. Men don’t. As for glory…” Scipio shook his head. “When we met for the first time, before the battle of Zama, Hannibal said something I’ve never forgotten: ‘The greater a man’s success, the less it may be trusted to endure.’ We shall both be swept aside, Hannibal and I, swallowed by the rush of time. Do you want to see the future? Look there.”

He pointed to a senator in the audience, a man in his forties, perhaps a little younger than Scipio. His slender face, seen in profile, was dominated by a beaklike nose. He was leaning forward with a tense posture and scanning the crowd with a predatory, birdlike gaze.

“My nemesis: Marcus Porcius Cato,” said Scipio. “A so-called New Man, first of his family to hold elected office,” he added, with some disdain. “But his neophyte status doesn’t stop him from slandering me at every opportunity, and muttering behind my back about ‘finishing’ the war with Carthage-as if we had any reason to attack a crippled seaport that’s been stripped of her champion, her navy, and her colonies. He says my handling of the settlement after Zama was ‘lackluster, bordering on incompetent’; says I accomplished nothing in the long run because I failed to have Hannibal beheaded and burn Carthage to the ground. He slanders me on personal grounds as well; says I’ve ‘gone Greek’ because I happen to like the baths and the theater. Given Cato’s loathing for all things not Roman, I’m rather surprised to see him in the audience today. What in Hades is he doing here?”

As if on cue, Cato rose from his seat. “Citizens! Citizens! Listen to me!” he cried, in such a powerful, strident voice that in short order he had the attention of everyone in the audience.

“Citizens, you know me well. I am Marcus Porcius Cato. I began my service to Roma when I enlisted at the age of seventeen, back when that scoundrel Hannibal was having his run of luck, setting Italy on fire. Since that time, I have devoted my entire life to the salvation of this city and the preservation of the Roman way of life. Four years ago, you honored me by electing me consul and sending me to Spain; subsequently I received a triumph for pacifying the revolt there. If further unrest broke out again after my departure, I think we can safely say that was the fault of my successor.”

Under his breath, Scipio muttered an obscenity. It was Scipio who had taken control of Spain after Cato.

“In terms of holding high office, some call me a ‘New Man,’” said Cato. “But in terms of the bravery and prowess of my ancestors, I assure you that I am as old as any man here! So, I hope you will lend me your ears for a few moments, and consider what I have to say.

“Citizens! What are you doing here today? What is this decadent spectacle in which you have chosen to take part? Think of it: Here you are, gathered to watch a play based on a Greek original, performed in honor of an Asiatic goddess imported from a land ruled by a king, all to make a group of foreign eunuchs feel welcomed! To all of this, I say: no, no, no!

“How can such an abomination have come about? I’ll tell you how. Wealth and all the vices that spring from wealth-greed, love of luxury, crass opportunism-are leading you astray from the upright virtues of your forefathers. I look about me, and everywhere I see loose morals, loose living, and loose thinking. Now it comes to this: We are deliberately polluting the purity of our religious worship, diluting and demeaning our reverence for the ancient gods who have preserved us for centuries!

“Things go from bad to worse. Importing a priesthood of eunuchs is bad enough, but one hears of even stranger and more insidious foreign cults spreading among the populace. The play to which you shall be subjected today will, I daresay, be bad enough-yet another revolting compendium of Greek obscenities-but recently some senators, who should know better, have spoken of erecting a permanent theater in Roma, built of stone. Are we Romans to become as idle and pleasure-loving as the Greeks?

“You, there, Marcus Junius Brutus!” Cato pointed to the praetor who was sponsoring the games. “What would your heroic ancestor say, he who revenged the rape of Lucretia and brought down the last king, Tarquinius, if he could see this sorry sight? Has our beloved Roma risen to unparalleled heights of glory only to fall into an abyss of shame?

“Citizens, I beseech you! If my words have ignited even the tiniest spark of patriotism in your heart, do as I now do, and leave this place at once!”

Cato ostentatiously gathered the folds of his toga. After a few steps he halted and turned back. “Oh, and one more thing: Carthage must be destroyed!” With that, he stalked out of the theater, followed by a substantial entourage.

A handful of people scattered throughout the audience did likewise, but a greater number began to boo Cato, who disappeared through the exit without looking back. People shifted uneasily in their seats. A murmur spread through the audience.

Scipio rose from his seat. He said nothing to call for the crowd’s attention, but gradually all eyes came to rest on him. The audience fell silent.

“Citizens! If the senator who just imposed on our patience by marring the joyous nature of this occasion had not seen fit to attack me personally-something he appears to do compulsively, like a man with an uncontrollable twitch-I would not presume to try your patience further by addressing you myself. However, I feel obliged, first, to say this: A man who leaves a mess behind him has no business casting aspersions on the man who comes after him. Just as I had to clean up the mess left behind by Hannibal’s elephants,’ so I had to clean up the mess that Cato left behind in Spain.”

The audience burst into laughter. The tension left in Cato’s wake was dispersed in an instant.

“Second: If, after all my years of service to the Roman people, I have any claim to speak on their behalf, allow me to apologize to our guests of honor, the priests of the goddess Cybele, for the aspersions cast upon them by the senator. I assure you, not all Romans are so boorish and inhospitable.”

The galli, who had sat stone-faced through Cato’s harangue, smiled and nodded to acknowledge Scipio’s courtesy.

“Likewise, allow me to apologize for the uncouth words that my colleague addressed to you, Marcus Junius Brutus, generous sponsor of these festivities. Instead of citing your great ancestor to make a dubious rhetorical point, let him use the example of one of his own famous ancestors. Oh, but I’m forgetting-Cato has no famous ancestors.”

Brutus laughed and called out, “Here, here! Well said, Africanus!”

“As for all the other drivel that spilled from the senator’s mouth, I will say only this.” Scipio gestured to Plautus. “In the terrible year of Cannae, all the might of Hannibal could not stop the performance of this playwright’s work. Surely a temper tantrum by Cato will not stop it today. The show must go on!”

Laughing and applauding, the audience leaped to their feet and gave Scipio a joyous ovation.

The crowd’s response reassured Kaeso. Here was proof, he thought, that Scipio’s gloomy fears about the future were unfounded. But what a burden his friend had to bear, enduring the abuse of men like Cato! Whatever Kaeso’s own petty problems, at least he did not have to worry about ruthless rivals plotting his downfall. Perhaps there was something to be said for leading an insignificant life. He thought of Hannibal’s words to Scipio, but reversed their meaning. He muttered aloud, “The smaller a man’s success, the more it may be trusted to endure.”

“What did you say?” asked Plautus, as the ovation began to die down.

“Nothing,” said Kaeso. “Nothing at all.”

The play was a rollicking success.

After it was over, Kaeso declined an invitation to celebrate at Plautus’s house. Limping slightly, he set off alone. The day’s official festivities were over, but there were still a great many people out and about. Kaeso was jostled by the crowd. More than once he had to sidestep a pool of vomit left by someone who had celebrated too much. He only vaguely noticed these irritations; as always after seeing Scipio, he was restless and unsettled, preoccupied by thoughts of how his life might have turned out had he been a different man with a different destiny, a man like Scipio, or else a man who could have been Scipio’s comrade-in-arms, worthy to share his adventures, his glory, his tent…

As he drew nearer to his destination, a house on the Aventine Hill, the crowds thinned. The streets were almost empty. He sighed with relief, glad to be out of the crush and knowing that the place where he was headed would offer relief from all his earthly cares.

On a respectable street in a respectable neighborhood, he came to a house where all the windows were shuttered. He rapped at the door. The peephole slid open. For a moment, he forgot the pass phrase, but then it came back to him: “Upon Mount Falernus in Campania grow the grapes from which Falernian wine is made.” The phrase was changed often, but always had something to do with wine, because wine was Bacchus’s gift to mankind, and essential to his worship.

The door opened, then was quickly shut after Kaeso stepped inside. The garden at the center of the house had been closed off, and all the windows had been shuttered, with heavy hangings pulled across them to keep sounds from reaching the neighbors. As a result, the interior was quite dark except for the soft illumination cast by lamps, and the sounds from within were strangely muffled.

Those sounds included exotic music played upon tambourines and pipes. The tune was by turns languorous and dreamy, then fast and frenzied. Familiar faces, male and female, emerged from the shadows. They smiled and bowed their heads in deference to him. “Welcome, high priest,” they said in unison.

One of them whispered in his ear, “A new acolyte is within, awaiting initiation.”

Kaeso raised his arms from his sides until they were parallel with the floor. The men and women undressed him, then anointed his naked body from head to foot with sweet-smelling oil. A cup filled with wine was pressed to his lips. He threw back his head and swallowed. Wine overflowed his mouth and trickled down onto his chest, where greedy tongues lapped it up. Hands glided over his shoulders and chest and hips and buttocks, caressing him, fondling him, exciting him.

He was taken by both hands and guided into a room that smelled of sweat and incense. Here the music was louder, and he could now discern the murmur of a low, insistent chant in which the name of Bacchus was invoked. The room was hazy with incense, and crowded with warm, naked bodies pressed close together. Presiding above the crowd, upon a high pedestal, was a statue of the god-Bacchus, deity of wine and euphoria, with grape leaves in his air and a smile of bliss upon his bearded face.

Kaeso gazed up at the god with reverence and gratitude. The coming of the cult to Roma had marked the beginning of a new epoch in his life. In the warm, secret embrace of the god, Kaeso had at last found a purpose to his existence.

Kaeso abruptly experienced a fluttering in his head, of the sort that sometimes preceded one of his falling spells, but he felt no anxiety. The priests and priestesses of Bacchus had explained to him that his affliction was not a curse but a mark of special favor from the god. Just as Scipio had always enjoyed a special relationship with Jupiter, so Kaeso had at last discovered his own special link to the god Bacchus.

The fluttering in his head subsided. On this occasion, the god had seen fit merely to pass through him without striking him senseless.

Someone whispered in his ear, “High priest, the initiate is ready for the ritual.”

His rigid sex was firmly grasped, and in his other ear a voice whispered, “And you appear to be ready for the initiate!”

Kaeso touched the fascinum that lay upon his bare breast. He tightly closed his eyes. Step by step, the acolytes guided him forward until his sex was met by a circle of resistance, then swallowed by a convulsive embrace. He heard the muffled cry of the initiate, followed by a whimper and a groan. Kaeso surrendered to a state of bliss.

Who was the initiate before him? Male or female, young or old? He did not know. Behind his closed eyes it was Scipio he envisioned, Scipio when his hair was still long and not a single battle scar had yet marred his perfect beauty. It was Scipio into whom he thrust all the love and longing inside him.

Even in the throes of ecstasy, he knew that his vision of Scipio was only a fantasy. But the bliss he felt was genuine. When all was said and done, only these brief moments of release were real. All else was illusion. Earthly glory was meaningless; Scipio himself had admitted as much. Scipio had reached a pinnacle of so-called greatness unknown to other men, but had Scipio ever attained the unspeakable delights that Kaeso had experienced since he joined the Cult of Bacchus?

183 B.C.

Kaeso ran his fingers through the mop of graying hair on his head and closed his eyes to rest them for a moment. How weak his vision had grown in recent years! When he was younger, even well into his forties, he had been able to read without effort all those poems by Ennius and plays by Plautus, no matter how tiny the letters. Now, squint as he might, it was almost impossible for him to read any of the documents spread before him. Reading was his secretary’s job, of course, but Kaeso wanted to make sure that no mistakes were made.

He had decided to liquidate all his assets. A group of buyers had been found to purchase his theatrical troupe, and his staff of scribes was being sold piecemeal. He was going over his will, as well, though the terms were simple enough; his entire estate would be left in trust to his granddaughter, Menenia.

Kaeso opened his eyes and gazed about his study, at all the pigeonhole bookcases stuffed with scrolls. Over the years he had accumulated a considerable library, anticipating long years of retirement in which he would require many books to keep him company.

Amid the bookcases, there was a small shrine, a little stone altar upon which stood a miniature statue of Bacchus. Kaeso gazed into the god’s smiling eyes for a long moment, then looked away.

“I think our work is done. You may go now,” he said to the secretary. “Send in Cletus.”

The secretary withdrew. A few moments later a handsome young slave with broad shoulders and long hair stepped into the room.

“Cletus, I wish to go for a walk today.”

“Of course, master. The weather is quite fine.” The slave offered a thickly muscled forearm for Kaeso to lean upon. Kaeso did not really need the support, but he enjoyed clinging to Cletus’s arm anyway.

Together, they took a long stroll around the city.

First, Kaeso visited the arch which had been built to commemorate Scipio’s victories, conspicuously located on the the path that led to the top of the Capitoline. The relief carvings depicting the triumphs of Africanus were as magnificent as he remembered. It was a worthy monument to his friend.

Next, he ventured to the necropolis outside the Esquiline Gate, where he placed flowers upon the humble funeral monument of Plautus. This day was the first anniversary of the playwright’s death. How Kaeso missed him-his keen insights, his piercing wit, his unflagging loyalty to his friends. At least the scores of plays that Plautus had written would live on; Kaeso had kept copies of them all.

Leaning upon Cletus’s arm-for he was genuinely growing a little weary-Kaeso headed toward the Aventine Hill for the final destination of his excursion. In the vicinity of the Circus Maximus, he noticed a highly animated group of men. From the way they were all talking at once, they appeared to be discussing some highly significant bit of news. Was the news dreadful or joyous? Kaeso could not tell from their expressions.

Among the men, he recognized an old acquaintance, Lucius Pinarius, and sent Cletus to ask him over.

“What’s going on, Lucius?”

“You haven’t heard?”

“Would I be asking, if I had?”

“Hannibal is dead.”

Kaeso drew a sharp breath. As simple as that: Hannibal is dead. It was like hearing that the sea had dried up, or the moon had fallen from the sky. And yet it must be true. What could be simpler, or more inevitable? Hannibal was dead.

“How?”

“Suicide. Sixty-four years old, and still plotting against us, trying to stir up trouble in Greece and Asia. The Senate finally had enough of his treachery and sent a military force to extradite him. I suppose he couldn’t face the humiliation of being tried and executed. He took poison. But before he died, he dictated his last words to a scribe: ‘Let us now put an end to the great anxiety of the Romans, who have thought it too long and too heavy a task to wait for a hated old man to die.’”

“A bitter end.”

“And long overdue. Scipio Africanus-”

“Yes, I know: Scipio should have killed him when he had the chance, and burned Carthage to the ground. But I’ll not hear a word spoken against the memory of my dear departed friend, certainly not on this day!”

Kaeso turned away from Pinarius. He called for Cletus to lend him his arm so they could proceed.

How prescient Scipio had been! All had come to pass just as he predicted. But what a stroke of fate, that the two great generals who once bestrode the world like Titans both should have died within a year!

With Cletus to help him, Kaeso struggled up the slope of the Aventine, finally arriving at the humble house of Ennius. The poet resided alone, with only a single slave woman to serve him. She opened the door to Kaeso and showed him in to Ennius’s study. Cletus stayed behind in the vestibule.

“I suppose you’ve heard the news,” said Kaeso.

“About Hannibal? Yes.” The poet, who was careless with his dress and perpetually in need of a haircut and a shave, looked even shabbier than usual. “I don’t suppose Hannibal will be needing an epitaph for his gravestone. From what I heard, he uttered his own epitaph with his dying breath.”

Kaeso smiled. “What about Scipio’s epitaph? Have you finished it yet?”

“I have indeed. It’s ready to be chiseled on his grave monument. I was greatly honored that in his will he asked me to compose it.”

“Who else? You were always his favorite poet. Well?”

Ennius handed him a piece of parchment.

Kaeso made a face. “You know I can’t possibly read this. Recite it aloud to me.”

Ennius cleared his throat.

The sun that rises above the eastern-most marshes of Lake Maeotis Illumines no man my equal in deeds. If any mortal may ascend to the heaven of immortals, For me alone the gods’ gate stands open.

Kaeso managed a crooked smile. “A bit grandiose for my taste, but just the sort of thing Scipio would have wanted. Where on earth is Lake Maeotis?”

Ennius raised an eyebrow. “It’s the body of water located beyond the Euxine Sea, at the uttermost edge of the civilized world. I have no memories of it from this life, but I think in my first life I must have gone there; of course, I would never have actually seen the sunrise, since I was blind during that incarnation.”

Kaeso nodded. Since becoming a follower of the teachings of the Greek philosopher Pythagoras, Ennius was convinced of the transmigration of souls. He was quite certain that he had begun existence in the body of Homer, author of The Iliad. His other incarnations included a peacock, several great warriors, and Pythagoras himself.

Ennius was still speaking, but Kaeso, who found such notions tiresome, let his mind wander. His thoughts returned to Scipio. How accurately his friend had foreseen his fate! In the end, his enemies overwhelmed him. He did accomplish one final military victory, a successful campaign against the upstart King Antiochus, who presumed to challenge Roma’s hegemony in Greece. But it was a Pyrrhic victory; when Scipio returned to Roma he was charged with taking bribes from the king and conspiring to join him as a co-ruler. No accusation could be more damning to a Roman politician than the claim that he wished to make himself a king. It was Cato, of course, who masterminded the prosecution. Rather than face trial, Scipio retired to his private estate at Liternum, on the coast south of Roma. Behind massive walls, with a colony of loyal veterans to protect him, he withdrew from warfare, politics, and life. Heartbroken and bitter, he fell ill and died at the age of fifty-two. And now, within a year, Hannibal was also dead.

“Two giants, hounded to death by lesser men,” muttered Kaeso.

“If you ask me, Scipio is well out of it,” said Ennius. “Roma’s become a bitter place. The atmosphere is poison. Small-minded reactionaries like Cato have gained the upper hand.”

Kaeso nodded. “People’s tastes have changed as well. I see it in the theater. No more comedies by Plautus. Now we have tragedies by Ennius. People leave the theater in a somber mood, to fit these somber days.”

Ennius grunted. “I’d be glad to write a comedy, if I saw anything to laugh at. How did we come to this? When we finally brought down Carthage, do you remember the elation people felt, the boundless sense of well-being and camaraderie? Then came our victories in the East-heady days, with endless wealth and exciting new ideas flooding into Roma. But things changed too fast. People grew uneasy. Men like Cato manipulated their fears, and the result was a very ugly backlash.” Ennius sighed. “I suppose the worst manifestation of that backlash was the appalling suppression of the cult of Bacchus.”

Kaeso stiffened. He opened his mouth to change the subject, but Ennius had only begun to rant.

“What horrid days those were! The official inquiry, the flimsy accusations of crimes and conspiracy against the state, the cult and all its members outlawed. Thousands of men and women executed, forced into exile, driven to suicide! The hatred unleashed against those poor people was sickening, and absolutely nothing could be done to stop it; say a word against the inquiry, and you were branded a sympathizer and persecuted along with them! I myself was never part of the cult, but I knew men who were, and even that tenuous association put me under suspicion for a while. I was terrified.

“And yet, a remnant of the cult may yet survive. There’s been a new series of arrests. Only the other day I witnessed one, just down the street. The scene was all too familiar: the accused man, dazed, trembling with fear, being dragged from his home by stone-faced lictors. Meanwhile, the household slave who betrayed the poor wretch stood off to one side, trying not to look guilty. A chilling sight!”

Kaeso could stand no more. He abruptly rose and told Ennius he must take his leave.

“So soon? I had hoped-”

“I’m afraid I have no time. I merely wanted to hear Scipio’s epitaph. Thank you. But now I really must go. I’m expecting callers at my house, later today.”

“Dinner guests?”

“Not exactly.”

Back at home, tired after the long walk, Kaeso sat alone in his study and gazed at the many scrolls that filled his library; they were like old friends, to whom he must bid a sad farewell. He made sure his will was in the proper place. Though he could not read it, he found the passage that he had instructed his secretary to underline that morning. It mentioned the fascinum specifically, and his desire that Menenia should wear it on special occasions, and when she did so, that she should remember her loving grandfather. Kaeso removed the talisman from his neck and laid it atop the will.

He reached for a decanter and poured a cup of wine-a fine Falernian-and into the wine he stirred a powder. Holding the cup, he knelt before the shrine of Bacchus. He kissed the statue of the god, and waited.

It was not long before he heard a loud banging at the front door. A few moments later, Cletus came running into the study.

“Armed men, master. They’re demanding entrance.”

“Yes, I’ve been expecting them.”

“Master?” The color drained from Cletus’s face.

“Isn’t this the hour at which you told them to come? I overheard you talking to that fellow in the Forum yesterday, Cletus. Why did you betray me?”

There was the sound of a commotion from the vestibule. The lictors were no longer waiting at the door. Cletus looked away, unable to hide his guilt.

Quickly, Kaeso drank the poison. He would die with the taste of the god’s favorite vintage on his lips.