Roma - Saylor Steven - Страница 95

• Предыдущая
• 95/145
• Следующая

“You’re certain?”

“Of course.”

Kaeso began to cry, weeping unabashedly with joy as he had been unable to weep with sorrow for Hilarion. Indeed, in his relief for Scipio, he all but forgot his grief over Hilarion. Quintus, who had seen terrible things at Cannae and had despaired of ever returning to Roma, had tears streaming down his cheeks as well.

Together they went to find Maximus.

On the eve of the Roman Games, the city was gripped by yet another crisis.

An emissary from Hannibal, a Carthaginian noble named Carthalo, arrived at the city gates. In exchange for a steep ransom, he offered to return a large number of Roman prisoners. A few representatives of the prisoners came with him to plead their cause, for the Romans had a long history of turning their backs on men who had surrendered to the enemy. In spite of the ban, a vast crowd of women gathered in the Forum to plead for the ransom of their husbands, fathers, and sons.

Behind closed doors, the Senate debated the matter.

The representatives of the prisoners defended their actions. They had remained on the battlefield at Cannae until the bodies lay thick around them, then had managed to break through the enemy circle and flee to the Roman camp. In the morning, rather than die on the ramparts, they had given themselves up. It was true that they had neither died bravely nor been clever enough to escape. Yet, they argued, was it not better to pay for the return of genuine Roman soldiers than to enlist yet more slaves to defend the city?

Those who opposed the ransom argued that the captives had surrendered rather than die fighting, and had therefore proven themselves cowards who deserved to be sold into slavery by their captors. Besides, any ransom paid from the public treasury would enrich Hannibal and enable him to hire more mercenaries.

In the end it was decided that the ransom would not be paid. The prisoners were abandoned to their fate. Most would be sent back to Carthage as slaves. Their relatives would never see them again.

There was bitter lamentation throughout the city. Maximus dispatched his lictors to maintain order.

In such an atmosphere, the date arrived for the Roman Games. The invocation to Jupiter on the Capitoline had an edge of desperation. The procession from the Temple of Jupiter to the Circus Maximus was a sad affair; many of the senators and magistrates who normally would have strutted before the people were conspicuously missing. The Feast of Jupiter consisted of little more than the scant daily rations allowed by the dictator for the duration of the crisis.

The company of Plautus performed The Casket. Their rehearsal for the new play had been rushed and chaotic, and the terrible fate of Hilarion had shattered their morale. The production was a disaster. Plautus’s only consolation was that the comedy’s spectators were even more depressed than its performers. The audience scarcely noticed the tardy entrances, missed cues, and flubbed lines. No one hissed or booed; nor did anyone laugh.

The athletic competitions were equally lackluster. Many of Roma’s best young runners and boxers had died at Cannae, and the highly trained slaves who ranked fastest among the chariot racers had been called away to military service.

The citizens who took part in the Roman Games merely went through the motions, performing their patriotic duty to attend an annual celebration that dated back to the days of the kings. They had been rendered insensible by the massacre at Cannae, the scandal of the Vestal virgins, and the wrenching rejection of the captives’ plea for ransom.

Roma was numb with grief and worry. The future of the city was very much in doubt.

212 B.C.

Four years later, the war with Carthage continued to rage, with no end in sight.

Hannibal never marched on Roma. This curious fact was to become part of the city’s legend, another element of her mystique: At the city’s most vulnerable moment, she was spared an assault that would surely have ended in her destruction. How and why had Roma survived? Fabius Maximus was given credit for seizing the reins when chaos threatened, and Scipio was widely praised for his inspiring example to the younger generation; but most Romans, agreeing with their priests, believed that Jupiter himself had deflected the wrath of Hannibal, allowing the Romans a chance to rally.

Hannibal and his marauding army remained in Italy. His apparent strategy—to isolate Roma and to undermine her dominance of the peninsula by winning over her allies, either by force or by persuasion—met with only limited success. The Romans steadfastly avoided another direct confrontation with Hannibal, but ruthlessly struck back at the allies who betrayed them. In regrouping their forces, marshaling their resources, and regaining their morale, the Romans proved to be remarkably resilient.

Meanwhile, the theater of war, already waged in Spain and Sicily and on the sea, expanded to the east. Philip of Macedonia, the heir to Alexander’s homeland, allied himself with Carthage. To counter the threat from Philip, Roma dispatched ambassadors to seek new alliances in Greece and Asia.

As the struggle between the two cities spread across the whole of the Mediterranean world, from the Pillars of Hercules to the straits of the Hellespont, the Romans adopted an increasingly outward-looking foreign policy. The more visionary men of the Senate dared to indulge in heady dreams of empire far beyond the confines of Italy. Roma was like the legendary phoenix consumed by fire only to rise from its own ashes.

The turn of events also brought unexpected good fortune to Kaeso. Because of his lameness and his nonexistent political prospects, his parents had despaired of finding him a suitable wife. After the massacre at Cannae, and the resulting shortage of young bachelors, Kaeso’s mother was able to find a perfectly acceptable patrician girl for him to marry.

Sestia was not beautiful. People said she had a mannish face, but Kaeso found her pleasant enough to look at. Like Kaeso, she had not expected to marry, and was pleased that Fortuna had allowed her to achieve the status of matron. She seemed content to confine her interests to running the household, and demanded no more of Kaeso’s attention than he demanded of hers. She never questioned him about his expenses or business affairs, his abrupt comings and goings, the odd hours he kept, or the exotic perfumes that frequently scented his clothes. Her simple needs and incurious nature suited Kaeso.

Both accepted, from the outset, that the principal purpose of their marriage was to create a child. They made love on a regular basis, though without much enthusiasm on either’s part. Their workmanlike efforts were rewarded. Within a year after they were married, Sestia gave birth to a daughter.

When he saw that little Fabia had been born without physical defects, Kaeso was enormously relieved. He had feared that the baby might be a monster, like the children who had preceded him from his own mother’s womb, or at best flawed and ungainly, like himself. But Fabia was perfect in every regard. There and then, after giving thanks to the gods, Kaeso swore never to have another child.

To settle for a daughter was not the Roman way. Kaeso’s relatives and in-laws suggested that he and Sestia should try again, to see if she could give him a son. But Kaeso, fearing to tempt the Fates, and little drawn to having sex with his wife, remained adamant that he would produce no more children after Fabia. She was now almost three years old.

Sestia had brought with her a small but useful dowry. With it, Kaeso had been able to buy out the other investors in the theater company of Plautus. Being the sole owner of a comedy troupe would never make him wealthy, and certainly would never earn him the respect of his patrician relatives, but Kaeso delighted in the role of impresario and took an active part in running the company. He consulted with Plautus about the Greek source material for his plays, he haggled with magistrates about budgets and allowances for festivals, and he particularly enjoyed auditioning the young slaves whom Plautus put forth as possible additions to the company.

• Предыдущая
• 95/145
• Следующая