Sejanus

9

Vibius Serenus. Erstwhile Spanish governor, prosecuted after the revolt for fomenting public violence in his province, exiled, then again a few months later for direct involvement with Sacrovir. Yeah. I'd been wondering when we'd get round to him. And uncovering another Julian plot was all very well, but my brief was to nail Aelius Sejanus, not Agrippina. Sure, as the Wart's deputy where the cloak-and-dagger stuff was concerned he must've been involved, but it would be with official blessing. That was no use to me. If I wanted his hide pegged out I needed something more.

'You're saying Serenus was Sejanus's man?' I said.

'Don't rush me.' Lippillus shook his head. 'Maybe. But it's not that simple, at least I don't think it is. He was a real Julian, he had to be. All the same, there's something about him that doesn't square. If you're looking for a starting point then my gut feeling is that Serenus is your best bet.'

'How do you mean, "doesn't square"?'

'Corvinus, I'm not sure I know what I mean myself. Certainly not sure enough to put it into words.'

'You care to try?' I trusted Lippillus's gut feelings more than I would another man's certainties. And it wasn't just because I liked the guy. Plug-ugly dwarfs with no-class names don't make regional Watch commander every day, and if they do it's no accident.

Lippillus's brow creased. 'Think of roles. The Gauls — Florus, Sacrovir, Montanus — were the fall guys, the suckers on the fringes who got chopped. Maybe they were being loyal clients, maybe they were political ingénus who thought they had a genuine chance, I don't know, and it doesn't matter because they died anyway. Silius the German governor was nearer the centre. Sure, if I'm right he helped get things going, but his involvement was never overt and once the rebellion was under way he switched sides. If I'm right and the purpose was to embarrass the Wart politically then that makes sense, because his part was finished and there was no reason for him to stick his neck out further.'

'But Serenus's role was the same, surely?' I objected.

Lippillus hesitated. 'Yes and no.'

'What the hell's that supposed to mean? We've just been saying that — '

'Corvinus, bear with me, will you? I don't have all the answers, and I can't even ask most of the questions. All I'm telling you is that Serenus doesn't fit the pattern. Whether that's significant or not, and if so how, I don't know.'

'Okay.' I took a swallow of wine. 'I'm sorry. Go ahead.'

'When Aelius Sejanus began targeting the main Julian supporters for the Wart he encouraged a lot of the smaller fry to shift their allegiance to him. Right?'

'Right.' That made sense. Politics is a pragmatic business, and based on alliances. The Julians had built up quite a network over the years, and when they were smashed the lesser families who'd been dependent on their patronage were quick to look for a replacement. On Sejanus's side, he might have power through the Wart but he didn't have a party — we'd been through that before — and a leader without a party is nothing. He'd've welcomed the Julian deserters with open arms, because he needed them as much as they needed him.

'Okay,' Lippillus said. 'Now we go back a few years. You remember the Libo trial?'

'Sure.' My interest sharpened. Libo had been a rich young smartass framed for treason a couple of years after the Wart came to power. One of the guys behind the framing — and this I did know — had been Sejanus.

'Who were the prosecutors?'

I knew the answer to that one, too, or at least I knew one of them: his involvement in the Libo prosecution had been what put me on to his link with Sejanus in the first place, and incidentally provided the reason why he now hated my guts. 'Fulcinius Trio. Our latest consul.'

'One of the others was Serenus.'

'Is that so?' I sat back. I could see what Lippillus was getting at now, about Serenus being different, and he was right: guys who started out mates of Sejanus's and then switched to the Julian side would be as hard to find as Jews in a pork-butcher's. Serenus didn't fit the pattern because he went against the flow. Julian to Sejanan, sure, no problem, that took in half of Rome. But Sejanan to Julian? No way. He was right. Something smelled.

'Axing Libo for Sejanus was what got Serenus his city judgeship. And, following on that, his Spanish posting. He was a Sejanan from the first, and doing well out of it.' Lippillus was looking at me over his wine cup. 'So why did he switch?'

'The obvious answer is that he didn't. He was a double.'

'Maybe. But if so he went down with the rest. He's in exile now, on Amorgos, and likely to stay there. And if the senate had had its way he'd be dead.'

Yeah. That, at least, had been in the records. The senate had voted for death after the second conviction, but Tiberius had vetoed the proposal. If Serenus was a Julian that made sense, like with the Asian governor Silanus: the Wart hadn't wanted to push the Julians too hard. He couldn't afford to. On the other hand, if Serenus had been Sejanus's buddy all along and working for him on the inside then a commuted sentence would still have made sense…

Ah, hell. My brain hurt. I was out of my depth here, and I knew it.

'Maybe,' I said slowly, 'a word with the prosecutor in the Serenus trial might clear up a few things.'

Lippillus nodded. 'Exactly. That's what I was thinking, Corvinus. It's not often that a guy's prosecuted for treason by his own son. And if Serenus is on his island, Vibius Celsus is still in Rome. If I were you I'd pay him a visit.'

On the way back home I went over what I remembered from my notes on the Serenus trials, just to make sure I had them straight in my head. They were pretty complicated. The guy had faced prosecution twice in twelve months. The first time the charge was fomenting or failing to discourage public violence in his province, and he'd been convicted and exiled to Amorgos. The second was the occasion we'd been talking about. Serenus had been hauled back from Greece to stand trial before the senate on the charge — brought by his own son Vibius Celsus — of sending agents to Sacrovir in Gaul. Celsus had cited a collaborator in Rome, one Caecilius Cornutus. Before the case began, Cornutus had committed suicide.

Okay. So far — reading between the lines — so good. Serenus had acted like a pukkah Julian. He'd turned a blind eye to seditious demonstrations, maybe even encouraged them, and established links with the Gallic rebels. Cornutus had been his contact with the Julians themselves back in Rome. He hadn't expected to be implicated, and when it was clear he was under suspicion he'd panicked and taken the quick way out. Or maybe had it taken for him. It wouldn't be the first time that a weak link had been eliminated.

With Cornutus gone Serenus had brazened it out. He'd challenged his son to prove his case by naming other associates. Celsus promptly accused Cornelius Lentulus and Seius Tubero; Lentulus being an old friend of the Wart's and Tubero being Sejanus's elder stepbrother. Naturally the case collapsed. Lentulus and Tubero were discharged by an embarrassed senate without a hearing, and Celsus quickly left Rome for Ravenna.

Interesting enough, but that wasn't the end of it, because the Wart then proceeded to shove his personal oar in. Despite the fact that Serenus's slaves had given evidence under torture that suggested their master's innocence, Tiberius hauled Celsus back and forced him to carry on with the prosecution. In the teeth of the slaves' evidence Serenus was tried, convicted and sentenced to death. At which point the Wart intervened again, this time on grounds of mercy, and sent the guy back to his original island, where he still was.

Weird, right? And a complete mess, into the bargain. However, certain things stuck out like sore thumbs. First, like Lippillus had said, for a son to prosecute his father on a capital charge is practically unheard of even in these degenerate days. Second, why should Celsus have picked on Lentulus and Tubero? Lentulus was a harmless old duffer, practically senile and devoted to the Wart's interests; Tubero was just as unlikely a crypto-Julian, being one of Sejanus's closest relatives. More, I knew for a fact that ten years ago on Sejanus's instructions he'd used his position as city judge to block a crucial murder investigation. Neither of them, obviously, could be considered a likely supporter of Agrippina's, even given the senate's overheated imagination. Third, what the hell was the Wart playing at? And fourth, if Celsus had had the nerve to accuse Sejanus's stepbrother of treason in open court then why was he still breathing?

Like I said the whole thing was weird; and as far as plausibility was concerned you could stick it in a pig's ear and drop it down the nearest manhole. Even so, these were the facts. Explaining them was my problem.

By this time I was past Racetrack Corner and on my way to the Publician Incline. It was a beautiful spring day, perfect for walking. Even the tenements looked good in the sunshine, splashed with colour where housewives had planted bulbs outside the doors in tubs. Sure, the streets stank; but the stink was friendly, and the noise was friendly, too.

Hell, what I really needed was a holiday. This was Rome after all, and I hadn't been back for years; not properly back, anyway. I carefully put politics out of my head as I walked through the huge open market of the Velabrum and Cattlemarket Square, that spills southwards past the Temple of Hercules and covers the triangle between Racetrack, Aventine and river: past the stalls with vegetables and herbs, butchers' tables, racks of cheap ready-made tunics and headscarves, cheesemongers, knife-sellers, all one glorious muddle as if the bits and pieces left over from the city's separate trading areas had been bundled together and dropped down at random. Like always, it was crowded and I had to shove in places; ordinary Romans pay no attention to a purple stripe unless it has a few slaves with heavy sticks in front of it. The sun had brought out the hucksters with their trays of roasted pumpkin seeds, hot sausages and doughnuts in honey. Whores, too. A couple of them in red mantles glittering with tin-and-glass jewellery waved to me and I flung them a silver piece each for the hell of it, just because they looked like they were enjoying life.

Maybe Livia had been right about me and Rome after all. Certainly I was enjoying myself, really enjoying myself, for the first time in ten years, and Rome was the reason. Not the Rome that belonged to the hypocrites in the senate who'd sell their grandmothers for a four-month consulship, but the filthy, sprawling, gutsy city itself, that never left you feeling empty, like Athens did or any other of the dozen cities Perilla and I had stayed in since we'd moved abroad. And if that was what the old sinner had meant by altruism then I agreed with her, one hundred percent.

Maybe Serenus was just a guy on the make, Celsus no better, and neither of them had had any more dealings with Sejanus than an oyster knows Greek. Maybe the whole thing was one great mare's nest. At that moment I didn't particularly care. It was too good a day to waste thinking, and in a hundred years' time we'd all be dead together, Sejanus, the Wart and Agrippina included. The hell with it.

Well, if that was my holiday I'd had it. I bought a nut-stuffed pastry for Perilla, watched a group of jugglers and a guy sucking flames from a lighted torch, then headed back towards the Palatine and home.