The Iron Hand of Mars Read online

  “That forced Civilis to come out in his true colours,” Justinus explained. “He summoned all the chiefs of the Gallic and German tribes to a meeting in a sacred grove in the forest, let the wine flow freely, then fired them with powerful speeches about shaking off the Roman yoke and establishing a free Gallic empire.”

  “Stirring stuff!”

  “Oh, highly dramatic! Civilis himself even dyed his hair and beard bright red, then swore never to cut them until he had driven out every Roman.”

  This colourful detail gave my own mission a picturesque quality I hated. “Just the sort of ethnic madman I love trying to outwit! Did he ever shave?”

  “After Vetera.”

  We were silent for a moment, thinking of the siege.

  “A fort like that should have held out.”

  Justinus shook his head. “I haven’t been there, Falco, but by all accounts Vetera was neglected and understaffed.”

  We buried ourselves in the tribune’s gruesome wine, while I reflected sourly on what I had heard about Vetera.

  It had been a double fort, though nowhere up to strength after Vitellius had drawn off large vexillations for his march on Rome. The remnant of the garrison put up the best show they could. Plenty of initiative. But Civilis was Roman-trained in siege warfare. He made his prisoners build battering-rams and catapults. Not that the defending legions lacked invention: they had devised an articulated grab that could scoop up attackers and toss them into the fort. But by the time they surrendered, they really had eaten all the mules and rats and were down to chewing roots and grass torn from the rampart walls. Besides, with the civil war raging in Italy, they must have felt completely cut off. Vetera was one of the most northerly forts in Europe, and Rome had other preoccupations.

  A relief force was sent, under Dillius Vocula, but he bungled it. Civilis stopped him fairly decisively, then paraded the Roman standards he had captured around the fort at Vetera, just to add to the occupants’ despair. Later Vocula did break through and raise the siege, but he found the garrison sullen. His own men mutinied, and he himself was murdered at Vetera by the troops.

  The fort surrendered. The soldiers, having despatched their commander, swore allegiance to the Gallic Empire. They were disarmed by the rebels, ordered to march out of camp—and were then ambushed and cut down.

  “Justinus, did Civilis have a reputation that should have led our men to expect to be betrayed?”

  “I think not,” replied Justinus slowly, not wanting to prejudge the Batavian. “I believe they assumed that an ex-Roman auxiliary commander would honour their parole. It’s said that Civilis did protest to his allies about it.”

  We were silent again for a moment.

  “What kind of man is he?” I asked.

  “Highly intelligent. Massive charisma. Intensely dangerous! At one time most of Gaul plus several tribes from Germania Libera were supporting him, and he achieved a completely free run of Lower Germany. He regards himself as a second Hannibal—or Hasdrubal, in fact, since he too has only one eye.”

  I groaned. “So I’m searching for a tall, one-eyed prince with flowing bright red hair, who hates Rome bitterly. At least he ought to stand out in the marketplace … Did he also,” I wondered, “make an objection when Munius Lupercus was captured in the ambush and bundled off as Veleda’s gift?”

  “I doubt that. Civilis encouraged her prophetic authority. They were regarded as partners. When Civilis seized the flagship of Petilius Cerialis, he sent that to her, too.”

  “I’m too far gone to ask you how that disaster came about!” I had heard that our general Cerialis had his faults. He was impetuous and kept poor discipline, which led to losses he could have avoided. “So Veleda received her personal state barge—in addition to a high-ranking Roman trussed up and delivered to her tower to use as a sex slave, or whatever! What do you think she did with Lupercus?”

  Camillus Justinus shuddered, and would not try to guess.

  * * *

  My head was spinning. This seemed a good point to yawn a lot like a tired traveller and depart for bed.

  The notes of the twisted trumpet sounding out the night watch upset me, and I dreamed I was a young recruit again.

  XXI

  Next day I pondered fitfully on the brainteasers Vespasian had commissioned me to pursue. It was hard to raise any enthusiasm for this crazy selection, so I looked instead into the one problem where no one had asked me to interfere: I went to see the missing legate’s wife. As I crossed to the XIV’s side of the fort, I must say I felt fairly confident that the eminent Florius Gracilis would turn out not to be missing at all.

  The legate’s house was everything you would expect. Given that Julius Caesar, even when campaigning in hostile territory with all his resources stretched to the limit, carted panels of floor mosaic to lay in his tent in order to demonstrate Roman splendour to the tribes, there was no chance that a full-scale diplomatic residence inside a permanent fort would lack any convenience. It was as large as possible, and decorated in spectacular materials. Why not? Each succeeding occupant, his noble wife full of design ideas, would call for improvements. Every three years the house would be stripped out and refurbished to a different taste. And every extravagance they ordered came at State expense.

  The residence was based around a series of courtyard gardens with long pools and exquisite fountains that filled the air with a fine, luxurious mist. In summer there must have been strident flowers; in October the impeccable topiary assumed a lonelier grandeur. But there were peacocks. There were turtles. In the morning, when I turned up with my hopeful grin, leaf-sweepers and twig-pruners were crawling over the scenery like aphids. Real aphids stood no chance. Neither did I, probably.

  Indoors was a parade of frescoed reception rooms. The brilliant-white stuccoed ceilings were astounding. The floors comprised geometric mosaics with fascinating three-dimensional effects. The lamps were gilded (and screwed to the walls). The urns were immense (too heavy to run off with). Discreet wardens patrolled the colonnades, or were stationed unobtrusively among the Hellenic statuary. The salon furniture would have made my auctioneer father gnaw his nails and ask for a quiet word behind a pillar with the household steward.

  The steward knew his stuff. Florius Gracilis had long ago made a smooth transition from the casual bachelor disorder in which Camillus Justinus lived to a world of constant public entertainment on the grandest scale. His residence was organised by troops of purposeful flunkeys, many of whom would have been with him for nearly two decades of hectic senatorial social life. Since high officials travel out to their provinces all expenses paid, the legate had not only brought his tortoiseshell bedheads and gold Cupid lampstands, but while he was packing he also made space for the wife. But I knew even before I met her that adding a young bride to this slick regime had almost certainly been superfluous.

  My research in Rome had told me Gracilis was the normal age for a legionary commander. He was in his late thirties—still free of arthritis, but mature enough to strut impressively in the circular purple cloak. His wife was twenty years younger. In patrician circles they tend to marry schoolgirls. When alliances are being made for blunt political reasons there is a premium on the untouched and biddable. Not for men of this status the haphazard attractions that mess up life for the rest of us. Florius Gracilis had first married in his twenties, when he was aiming for the Senate. He had shed the woman as soon as it seemed convenient, then equipped himself adroitly with a new wife—this time from an even older, even richer family—about eighteen months ago. That must have been when he started looking for his legionary command and wanted to appear a man of public probity.

  Maenia Priscilla interviewed me in a gold and black salon, the kind of highly lacquered room that always makes me notice where a flea bit me the previous day. Half a dozen maids escorted her, broad-browed, slightly hirsute wenches who looked as though they had been bought at the slave market as a matched set. They seemed remote from their mistress, sitting quie
tly in two groups and getting on with rather dull embroidery.

  Priscilla ignored them. She was small. A sweeter nature might have given her a dainty air. Time and money had been spent on her, though without disguising her inbuilt surliness. She favoured a languid, catlike expression, which grew harder when she forgot to cultivate it. She was probably the daughter of some offhand praetor who only perked up when his female offspring were old enough for flashy dynastic marriages. Now she was married to Gracilis. Not much fun either, probably.

  She took several minutes settling herself in a shimmer of violet flounces. She wore pearl ear-drops, amethyst-studded bracelets and at least three plaited gold necklaces, though more may have lurked in the lustrous folds that swathed her. This was her Thursday-morning set, completed by the usual battery of finger-rings. Somewhere among the tinsel was a half-inch wedding band; it failed to make its presence felt.

  “Didius Falco, madam.”

  “Oh really?” Sustaining a conversation was just too wearisome. My mother would have put this limp little creature on a red meat diet and had her digging turnips for a week.

  “I am an imperial representative.” Interviewing an imperial envoy ought to have brightened her morning. Indeed, life in the most dangerous part of the Empire would have fascinated some girls, but I could tell Maenia Priscilla’s interests rarely stretched to current affairs. A bird who had managed to avoid learning. She despised the arts. I could not envisage her busy with charitable works. Altogether, as the partner of one of the Empire’s most prominently placed diplomats, she failed to impress.

  “How nice for you!” No wonder the Empire had been creaking at its seams lately. I refused to react, but it was ill-judged and inexcusable. The girl possessed a mixture of schoolgirl arrogance and ignorance that was likely to cause trouble. If Gracilis didn’t watch her, I gave him six months before there was a scandal with a centurion or an incident in a barrack block that had people being sent home hurriedly.

  “Excuse me for invading your privacy. I need to see your husband, but he was not at the Principia—”

  “He’s not here either!” This time she spoke out quickly, with the triumphant edge some people use instead of wit. Her brown eyes gave me the once-over, which was fair enough since I had done the same to her. Yet she was seeing nothing, trying only to insult me.

  I twitched up an eyebrow. “You must be very concerned. Does Gracilis make a habit of vanishing?”

  “The legate’s habits are his own affair.”

  “Not quite, madam.”

  Annoyance yanked her mouth into an uglier twist. Men in shapeless sorrel-coloured tunics with woolly linings in their battered boots did not usually answer her back. (I would have liked to be kitted out more excitingly, but my banker had counselled against overstretching my budget that year. Bankers are so predictable. My budget, too.)

  “Your ladyship, there seems to be a problem here! A man of your husband’s standing ought not to become invisible. It worries the lower orders. In fact, the Emperor might consider it politically inept … If Gracilis is dodging his creditors—” I had been joking, but she let out a bitter laugh. A wild guess had struck lucky. “Oh, is that it?”

  “Possibly.”

  “Can you give me a list of his debts?”

  She shrugged. Gracilis had probably brought her to Germany to avoid the risk that back in Rome she might suborn his numerous stewards into letting her spend cash. Men like that keep their wives securely cut off from the household abacus. I prodded, but she seemed genuinely uninformed. I was not surprised.

  “So you cannot tell me where to start looking? You have no idea where your husband may be?”

  “Oh I know that!” she exclaimed archly. I bit back my irritation.

  “Madam, this is important. I have a message from Vespasian for Florius Gracilis. When the Emperor sends despatches, he expects me to deliver them. Will you say where your husband is?”

  “With his mistress, presumably.” She was so vapid, she did not even watch me to see the effect it had.

  “Look,” I said, still trying to keep my temper, “your domestic life is private, but however modern your views on marriage, I assume you and Gracilis follow some rules. The conventions are clear enough.” I stated them anyway: “He fritters away your dowry; you eat into his inheritance. He can beat you; you can slander him. He supplies you with moral guidance and an extravagant dress allowance; you, madam, at all times protect his reputation in public life. Now try to grasp this: if I don’t find him quickly, there is going to be a scandal. Whatever else, he will want you to avoid that!”

  She jumped up in a jangle of atonal jewellery. “How dare you!”

  “How dares a public man have the front to disappear right under the nose of the provincial governor?”

  “I couldn’t care less!” cried Maenia Priscilla with her first real sign of liveliness. “Get out of here, and don’t come back again!”

  She swept from the room. A gust of unlikeable balsamic perfume swirled round after her. She bounced off so angrily that an ivory hairpin shot itself from the torsion of a castellated braid in her elaborate hair, and landed at my feet.

  I picked it up, then silently handed the missile to one of the waiting-women. The maids looked resigned, then gathered their trappings and followed her out.

  I was not alarmed. Somewhere in the residence there would be a wizened accountant who would take a more realistic attitude to my enquiry than the petulant wife had. He was bound to know exactly which creditors he was fobbing off on a daily basis, and if I took an interest in his work, he would probably tell me.

  As for the name of the legate’s mistress, that would be common coin anywhere in the barracks.

  XXII

  During my search for information, I at one point bumbled into the legate’s private gymnasium. I saw what Justinus meant about Gracilis being a sporty type: his den was packed with weights, dumbbells, beanbags for throwing-games, and all the other paraphernalia that normally suggest a man who is afraid of seeming puny—probably because it’s true. At one end of the room his spears and hunting trophies were hung on hooks. A sad Egyptian who would have been better employed mummifying kings for their meeting with Osiris sat cross-legged, engaged in taxidermy on a rather small deer. I never waste time talking to Egyptians. He could stuff a roebuck, but hearing his views on life as a timeless river of sorrows would not help me find his master. I nodded and passed on.

  I finally tracked down the accountant, who supplied me with a lengthy list of disappointed wine merchants, furriers, bookmakers, stationers, and importers of fine-scented oils.

  “Jupiter, this man certainly does not believe in paying bills!”

  “He’s a little unbusinesslike,” the scribe agreed mildly. The fellow had swollen eyes and a restrained manner. He looked tired.

  “Is there no income from His Honour’s estates in Italy?”

  “They’re flourishing, but mostly mortgaged up.”

  “So he’s in trouble?”

  “Oh, I doubt that!”

  He was right. Gracilis was a senator. In the first place, teetering on the brink of financial disaster was probably second nature, so unlikely to worry him. Marrying Maenia Priscilla must have given his collateral a fillip. In any case, he came equipped with massive clout. To the small tradesmen of a remote provincial town, his lordship must be untouchable. A few adroit business fiddles would soon get him out of any temporary squeeze.

  “Can I take it you have no idea then why your master might have disappeared?”

  “I was unaware of any mystery.”

  “He left you no instructions?”

  “He’s not renowned for forethought. I thought he was off on business for a few days. His bedchamber slave is absent too.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Heard the man’s girlfriend bemoaning the fact.”

  “She works in the house?”

  “She’s a barmaid at the Medusa, near the Principia Dexter Gate.”

/>   I took away the names of both the creditors and the slave’s girlfriend scratched on my pocket memo tablet. Its wax had hardened up through lack of use, a sure hint that it was time to do some work.

  “Tell me something else: is your master a ladies’ man?”

  “I couldn’t possibly comment.”

  “Oh, stretch a point!”

  “My sphere is purely financial.”

  “That needn’t be unrelated to what I asked! His funds could be tight as a result of expensive mistresses…”

  I let him stare me out. We both knew I would find other sources eager to supply me with the sordid facts.

  I left the residence with a light step. Having clues always gives my optimistic side a boost.

  I then made the mistake of pushing my luck again with the high-handed XIV Gemina.

  * * *

  Prefect of the camp was never a post in the traditional republican legion. As with so much else, I reckon the old republicans got it right. Nowadays these prefects wield an undue influence. Each legion appoints one, and they have a wide range of responsibilities for organisation, training, and kit. In the absence of the legate and senior tribune they take command, which is when things become dangerous. They are drawn from the pool of first spears who are resisting retirement, which makes them too old, too pedantic, and too slow. I don’t like them on principle. The principle being that it was a camp prefect whose obtuse behaviour destroyed the II Augusta’s reputation in the British Revolt.

  At Moguntiacum there was just one, responsible for the whole fort. Since the XIV were the only experienced legion stationed there, he had been supplied by them.

  The camp prefect occupied an office whose oversized proportions must have appealed to his underdeveloped personality. I found him in it. He was reading scrolls and writing busily. He had made his nook deliberately spare. He used a folding stool with a rusted iron frame and a campaign table that looked as if it had served at Actium. It was supposed to give the impression that he would have preferred to be on active duty in the field. In my view, if Rome was to sustain any military reputation, men like this had to be kept in camp—gagged, bound and bolted to the floor.