Roma.The novel of ancient Rome - Saylor Steven - Страница 95

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“Comedy is darker than tragedy,” said Plautus. “No laugh was ever born except out of someone’s suffering, usually mine. And now-poor Hilarion!”

The two of them stood motionless for a long time, enduring the din of the hammers. Suddenly Kaeso blinked and furrowed is brow. “Is that…my cousin Quintus?”

A young officer wearing the insignia of a military tribune was striding purposely across the open expanse of the Circus. Kaeso ran toward him.

Quintus looked pale and haggard. There was a fresh scar across his forehead, but otherwise he appeared to be intact.

“You’re alive!” said Kaeso.

“By the will of the gods.”

“We’ve had no word. Your father has been ill with worry.”

“Even so, it looks like he’s managed to keep the city running. I understand he’s been appointed dictator.”

“Have you not seen him?”

“I only just arrived.”

“What news?”

“News?”

Kaeso dreaded to ask. “What of Scipio?”

Quintus smiled. “Wouldn’t you know? He proved his bravery once again, just as he did at the Ticinus. If there was one Roman hero to emerge from the catastrophe at Cannae, it was Scipio.”

“Tell me!”

“The mongrels encircled us. The slaughter was terrible. Only a handful of us managed to fight our way through it and escape with our lives. We became separated. We were wounded, dazed, fearful of capture at any moment. It took days for us to find one another, one by one, all the time hiding from Hannibal’s mercenaries. When we finally regrouped, and put enough distance between ourselves and the enemy to catch our breaths, a debate broke out. Where should we go, and who should lead us there? I confess, I was among those who gave in to despair and argued that we should leave Italy altogether. We assumed that Hannibal would march on Roma at once, burn the city, and enslave the citizens. There’s a Roman army in Spain, and a Roman navy fighting the war on the sea. Join them, I argued, and see where the future leads us, because Roma is finished forever and there’s no going home.

“But Scipio wouldn’t hear of it. Even though his father and uncle are off fighting in Spain, he said he had no intention of joining them, not as long as Roma needed us to defend her. He mocked our despair. He shamed us. He made us take an oath to Jupiter never to abandon the city, to die fighting for her rather than to surrender to Hannibal. Once we took that oath, it was as if a great weight was lifted from us. We knew we could endure anything, because Scipio had given us back our honor.

“Then we watched and waited. Days passed, but Hannibal made no move to march toward the city. We were puzzled, then elated. We began the journey back to Roma, taking back roads so that no Carthaginian out-riders would find us. The way was slow. Some of the men were badly wounded, and Scipio refused to leave them behind. Finally we reached the Appian Way, and I rode ahead. I’m the first to arrive.”

“And Scipio?”

“He should be here tomorrow, or the day after.”

“He’s alive, then?”

“Yes.”

“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.

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