Roma - Saylor Steven - Страница 123
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Phagites turned to one of his underlings, who produced a scrap of parchment, and together they pored over it for a moment, whispering and sniping at one another. At last Phagites swaggered back. He smirked and looked down his nose at Lucius. “Just how much are you willing to pay me to make sure I don’t make any…mistakes?”
Lucius bit his lip. He thought for a long moment, then whispered a sum.
Phagites laughed. “I don’t blame you for whispering! You ought to be ashamed, offering so little to make sure that nothing bad happens to your wife’s darling brother. Make it four times that amount, and I’ll consider your offer.”
Lucius swallowed a lump in his throat. “Very well.”
Phagites nodded. “That’s more like it. Now, all you have to do is beg me to take the money, and I’ll be on my way.”
“What!”
“Beg me. I have to have some sport tonight, don’t I? Go down on your knees, citizen, and beg me to accept your offering.”
Lucius glanced at Julia, who averted her face. Gaius seemed to have been drained of his last ounce of strength by the sudden panic, and was hardly able to stand. Lucius dropped to his knees. “I implore you, Cornelius Phagites, take the money I offer, and leave us in peace!”
Phagites laughed. He mussed Lucius’s hair. “Much better, little man! Very well, go fetch my money. But you’re striking a fool’s bargain. Your brother-in-law will be dead before the next Ides. Oh, I’ll take your money now, and let young Caesar keep his head; and later, when I do take his head, I’ll get a second payment from Sulla. I shall be paid twice for the same head—on his shoulders, and off!”
Lucius brought the money. Phagites and his men left without another word. Julia was too distraught to speak. Gaius staggered to his dining couch and collapsed on it.
Lucius felt Gaius’s forehead. The young man was again burning with fever.
Despite Gaius’s illness, later that night Lucius and Julia summoned a litter and took him to another hiding place. If Phagites had found Gaius, so might someone else. The fact that his name was not yet among the proscribed clearly was no guarantee of safety.
In the days and nights that followed, despite his lingering ague, Gaius moved from one refuge to another. Meanwhile, the elders of the Julii entered into frantic negotiations with members of Sulla’s inner circle, trying to remove Gaius from danger. Lucius met with the Julii daily, hoping for good news.
The proscriptions continued. New names were added daily. Lucius began to fear that he himself might be added to the lists. He made sure that the door broken down by Phagites and his men was repaired and made stronger than before. He kept a dagger on his person at all times. He purchased a quick-acting poison from a dubious character on the waterfront, and gave it to Julia for safekeeping. Death by beheading would be grisly but swift, he told himself, but he shuddered to think of what might be done to Julia once he was gone. He wanted her to have a means of quick escape. What times they lived in, that a man should have to plan for such contingencies!
One day a visitor came to the house, attended by many bodyguards. He was a beautiful young man with a mane of golden hair. Lucius recognized him: Chrysogonus, an actor who had become one of Sulla’s favorites. Ever since he was young, Sulla had had a weakness for actors, and especially for blonds. Chrysogonus was dressed in a tunic made of a sumptuous green fabric embroidered with silver stitching. The garment must have cost a fortune, Lucius thought. He wondered who had died so that Sulla’s catamite could wear it.
“I won’t stay long,” said Chrysogonus, gazing about the vestibule with a practiced eye, as if scrutinizing a property that might someday be his. “My friend Felix sends you a message.”
Lucius could barely stifle his disgust at hearing a former slave and actor speak so familiarly of the most powerful man in Roma. Chrysogonus, sensing his disdain, fixed him with a cold stare. Lucius’s mouth turned dry. “What does Sulla say?”
“Your wife’s brother will be spared—”
“You’re certain?” Julia, who had remained out of sight, rushed to Lucius’s side.
“If you will allow me to finish?” Chrysogonus raised an eyebrow. “Gaius Julius Caesar will be spared—but only on the condition that my friend Felix is able to meet with him face to face.”
“So that he can see the boy beheaded with his own eyes?” snapped Lucius.
Chrysogonus gave him a baleful look. “The dictator will call on you tonight. If he sincerely wishes to receive the dictator’s pardon, the young Caesar will be here.” With a theatrical flair, Chrysogonus spun about on his heel and departed, surrounded by his bodyguards.
A festive retinue appeared in the street outside Lucius’s house that night. Chrysogonus was among them, along with several other actors and mimes, male and female; they laughed and joked among themselves, as if out for a carefree stroll by torchlight. The bodyguards looked more like trouble-loving street toughs than staid, sober lictors. Sobriety was in short supply. Several members of the party were obviously drunk.
Perusing the group through the peephole of his front door, Lucius shook his head.
Sulla himself arrived in a curtained red litter carried by a phalanx of burly slaves. One of them dropped to his hands and knees so that the dictator could use his back as a step to descend to the street. Seeing him, Lucius sucked in a breath, appalled that the fate of the Republic and its citizens should rest in the hands of such a decayed specimen. Once strappingly muscular, the very image of a dashing Roman general, Sulla had grown jowly and fat. His complexion had always been splotchy—“mulberries covered with oatmeal,” as some described it—but now a skein of spidery red veins had been added to his blemishes.
The dictator banged his fist against the door. Lucius stepped back and nodded to a slave to open it, then stood straight to greet his visitor. Sulla stepped past him and entered the vestibule without a word, alone, bringing not a single bodyguard with him. Did he think himself invulnerable? He had named himself Felix, after all.
Gaius awaited him in the atrium. Physically, the young man could not have presented a greater contrast to the dictator. Naturally slender, with a long face, Gaius had been rendered even leaner by his illness, and his bright eyes glittered with fever. Despite his weakness, his bearing was fearless. He stood with his shoulders back and his chin held high. For the occasion he wore a toga borrowed from Lucius. Even with Julia’s nips and tucks, it hung on him loosely.
While Lucius stood to one side, Sulla gave Gaius a long, appraising look. He stepped closer.
“So this is young Caesar,” he finally said. “I stare, and you stare back at me. I frown, but you do not blanch. Who do you think you are, young man?”
“I am Gaius Julius Caesar. I am the son of my father, who was praetor. I am the scion of the Julii, an ancient patrician house. We trace our lineage back to Venus herself.”
“Maybe so. But when I look at you, young man, I see another Marius.”
Lucius held his breath. His heart pounded in his chest. Did Sulla intend to kill Gaius with his bare hands?
The dictator laughed. “Nonetheless, I have decided to spare you, and so I shall—as long as my conditions are met.”
Lucius stepped forward. “Dictator, you requested that young Caesar should meet you face and face, and here he is. What more…?”
“First and foremost,” said Sulla, speaking to Gaius, “you must divorce your wife, Cornelia. And then—”
“Never.” Gaius stood still. His face showed no emotion, but his voice was adamant.
Sulla raised an eyebrow. His fleshy forehead was creased with furrows. “I repeat: You must divorce Cornelia. In your marriage, the houses of my enemies Marius and Cinna are combined. I cannot have such a union—”
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