Dictator

We set off early, descending the hills just as the sun came up, and crossed the marshy land in the direction of the coast. The mist was rising. I remember the croaking of the bullfrogs, the cries of the gulls; Cicero barely spoke. Just before midday we reached Brutus’s villa. It was a fine old place built right on the shoreline with steps cut into the rocks leading down to the sea. The gate was blocked by a strong guard of gladiators; others patrolled the grounds; more were visible walking on the beach – I guess there must have been a hundred armed men in all. Brutus was waiting with the others in a loggia filled with Greek statuary. He looked strained – the familiar nervous tapping of his foot was more pronounced than ever. He told us he had not left the house for two months – amazing considering he was urban praetor and not supposed to be out of Rome for more than ten days a year. At the head of the table sat his mother, Servilia; also present were his wife Porcia and his sister Tertia, who was married to Cassius. Finally there was M. Favonius, the former praetor known as Cato’s Ape on account of his closeness to Brutus’s uncle. Tertia announced that Cassius was on his way.

Cicero suggested I might fill in the time while we waited by giving a detailed account of the recent debates in the Senate and the public assembly, whereupon Servilia, who had ignored me up to that point, turned her fierce eye upon me and said, ‘Oh, so this is your famous spy?’

She was a female Caesar – that is the best way I can describe her: quick-brained, handsome, haughty, bone-hard. The Dictator had presented her with lavish gifts, including estates confiscated from his enemies and huge jewels picked up on his conquests, yet when her son arranged his murder and she was given the news, her eyes stayed as dry as the gemstones he had given her. In this too she was like Caesar. Cicero was slightly awed by her.

I stammered my way through the transcript of my notes, all the while conscious of Servilia’s stare, and at the end she said with great contempt, ‘A grain commissionership in Asia! It was for this that Caesar was assassinated – so that my son could become a corn merchant?’

‘Even so,’ said Cicero, ‘I think he should take it. It’s better than nothing – certainly better than staying here.’

Brutus said, ‘I agree with you on your last point at least. I can’t stay hidden from view any longer. I’m losing respect with every day that passes. But Asia? No, what I really need to do is go to Rome and do what the urban praetor always does at this time of year – stage the Games of Apollo and show myself to the Roman people.’ His sensitive face was full of anguish.

‘You can’t go to Rome,’ replied Cicero. ‘It’s far too dangerous. Listen, the rest of us are more or less expendable, but not you, Brutus – your name and your honour make you the great rallying point of freedom. My advice is to take this commission, do some honourable public work far away from Italy in safety, and await more favourable events. Things will change: in politics they always do.’

At that moment Cassius arrived and Servilia asked Cicero to repeat what he’d just said. But whereas adversity had reduced Brutus to a state of noble suffering, it had put Cassius in a rage, and he started pounding on the table: ‘I did not survive the massacre at Carrhae and save Syria from the Parthians in order to be made a grain collector in Sicily! It’s an insult.’

Cicero said, ‘Well then, what will you do?’

‘Leave Italy. Go abroad. Go to Greece.’

‘Greece,’ observed Cicero, ‘will soon be rather crowded, whereas first of all Sicily is safe, second you’ll be doing your duty like a good constitutionalist, and third and above all you’ll be closer to Italy to exploit opportunities when they arise. You must be our great military commander.’

‘What sort of opportunities?’

‘Well, for example, Octavian could yet cause all sorts of trouble for Antony.’

‘Octavian? That’s one of your jokes! He’s far more likely to come after us than he is to pursue a quarrel with Antony.’

‘Not at all – I saw the boy when he was on the Bay of Naples, and he’s not as ill-disposed towards us as you might think. “It’s my legacy I want, not vengeance” – those were his very words. His real enemy is Antony.’

‘Then Antony will crush him.’

‘But Antony has to crush Decimus first, and that’s when the war will start – when Antony tries to take Nearer Gaul away from him.’

‘Decimus,’ said Cassius bitterly, ‘is the man who has let us down more than any other. Just think what we could have done with those two legions of his if he’d brought them south in March! But it’s too late now: Antony’s Macedonian legions will outnumber him two to one.’

The mention of Decimus was like the breaking of a dam. Denunciations flowed from everyone round the table, Favonius especially, who maintained he should have warned them he was mentioned in Caesar’s will: ‘That did more to turn the people against us than anything else.’