Dictator

‘No, I wasn’t. How could I have been? I was fighting in the war you encouraged me to join, and then I was trying to save my life, along with those of your son and your nephew!’

Too late Cicero saw how casually he had spoken. ‘My dear brother, I assure you, your welfare – the welfare of all of you – has ever been uppermost in my mind.’

‘Spare me your casuistry, Marcus. Nothing is ever uppermost in your mind except yourself. Your honour, your career, your interests – so that while other men go off to die, you sit behind with the elderly and the womenfolk, polishing your speeches and your pointless witticisms!’

‘Please, Quintus – you are in danger of saying things you will regret.’

‘My only regret is that I didn’t say them years ago. So let me say them now, and you will do me the courtesy of sitting there and listening to me for once! My whole life has been lived as nothing more than an appendix to yours – I am no more important to you than poor Tiro here, whose health has been broken in your service; less important, actually, as I don’t have his skills as a note-taker. When I went out to Asia as governor, you tricked me into staying for two years rather than one, so that you could have access to my funds to pay off your debts. During your exile I almost died fighting Clodius in the streets of Rome, and my reward when you came home was to be packed off again, to Sardinia, to appease Pompey. And now here I am, thanks largely to you, on the losing side in a civil war, when it would have been perfectly honourable for me to have stood side by side with Caesar, who gave me command of a legion in Gaul …’

There was more in this vein. Cicero endured it without comment or movement, apart from the occasional clenching and unclenching of his hands on the armrests of his chair. Marcus looked on, white with shock. Young Quintus smirked and nodded. As for me, I yearned to leave but couldn’t: some force seemed to have pinned my feet to the spot.

Quintus worked himself up into such a pitch of fury that by the end he was breathless, his chest heaving as if he had shifted some heavy physical load. ‘Your action in abandoning the Senate’s cause without consulting me or considering my interests is the final selfish blow. Remember, my position wasn’t exquisitely ambiguous like yours: I fought at Pharsalus – I am a marked man. So I have no choice: I shall have to try to find Caesar, wherever he is, and plead for his pardon, and believe me, when I see him, I shall have something to tell him about you.’

With that he stalked out of the room, followed by his son; and then, after a short hesitation, Marcus left too. In the shocking silence that ensued, Cicero continued to sit immobile. Eventually I asked if there was anything I could fetch him, and when still he made no response, I wondered if he might have suffered a seizure. Then I heard footsteps. It was Marcus returning. He knelt beside the chair.

‘I have said goodbye to them, Father. I will stay with you.’

Wordless for once, Cicero grasped his hand, and I withdrew to let them talk.

Cicero took to his bed and remained in his room for the next few days. He refused to see a doctor – ‘My heart is broken and no Greek quack can fix that’ – and kept his door locked. I hoped that Quintus would return and the quarrel might be repaired, but he had meant what he said and had left the city. When Curius got back from his business trip, I explained what had happened as discreetly as I could, and he agreed with me and Marcus that the best course was for us to charter a ship and sail back to Italy while the weather was still fair. Such, then, was the grotesque paradox we had reached: that Cicero was likely to be safer in a country under Caesar’s control than he would be in Greece, where armed bands belonging to the republican cause were only too eager to strike down men perceived as traitors.

As soon as his depression had lifted sufficiently for him to contemplate the future, Cicero approved this plan – ‘I’d rather die in Italy than here’ – and when there was a decent south-easterly wind we embarked. The voyage was good, and after four days at sea we saw on the horizon the great lighthouse at Brundisium. It was a blessed sight. Cicero had been away from the mother country for a year and a half, I for more than three years.