than the usual distaste. They muttered something in their language, an insult surely. The Tarentine boy wrinkled his brow and pretended not to notice him.
Something in the boy's dismissive look broke his resolve. Damn reason. Damn sanity! Both were overrated and daily trumped by the world. If he was insane, perhaps he could be happily so. When would he again have the chance to follow a figment of his imagination in pursuit of the great love of his life? Such moments come rarely and are best seized at once. So Imco told himself as he gathered up a minimum of supplies and walked casually away, nodding to the men in his charge as if he were just going off on some mundane errand. But once he was well away, he picked up his pace and turned to follow the ass's arse.
It would have been inappropriate to offer such a young leader as Publius Scipio an official triumph. After all, he had never held the office of consul. The blood of his battles was barely dry. The news of Ilipa preceded him by only a few weeks and had yet to be considered in detail. Despite his string of victories the great peninsula of Iberia was far from pacified. Some thought him foolish to leave his post before his assignment was completed. Considering all this, the Senate decided that on his return to Rome Publius Scipio should pause outside the city, at the Temple of Bellona on the far bank of the Tiber. There, beneath a chill drizzle from a slate-gray winter sky, he made sacrifices in praise of the gods. He humbled himself before the divine forces and gave a full account of his campaign to the gathered senators, many of whom sat with their arms crossed, searching the proconsul's face for the first signs of hubris.
Publius did not try to justify himself too boldly, but he did suggest that his return was only a product of his continuing duty to Rome. He believed he had accomplished most of what he could in Iberia. As the first Roman general to defeat Carthaginian forces so far, he thought he should bring news of his tactics home and aid in planning future moves. They needed a new thrust to end the war for good, a strike like his move on New Carthage, an attack that bypassed Hannibal's armor and struck at his weakness instead of at his strengths.
Having said only this much, he entered the city to a roar of welcome from the people made more impressive by the lack of an official celebration. Men shouted their support on the street, from windows and rooftops and bridges. Women tossed trinkets of affection at him, reached to touch him, called him their savior, their hero. Girls pouted with painted lips and smiled and swooned as he passed. Children greeted him wearing headdresses meant to suggest a Numidian's curly locks. Some wore shifts like the red-rimmed Iberian tunics or sported tufts of donkey hair stuck to their chins to look like Hannibal's guards. They ran from the proconsul in mock panic, looking over their shoulders, never truly disappearing but instead looping back toward him again and again so that they could renew their cries.
The people believed his Iberian victories to be a sign of things to come. Some said that Publius conversed in person with Apollo and had thus devised his ingenious tactics for success. Others, thinking of champions from the past, pored over their records, concluding that Publius had accomplished more than they had at his age. Priests— never far from the current of public opinion—found in their augury sign after sign that favored Publius. Mass opinion was so clearly in his favor that he was voted into the coming consulship, making him the youngest person ever to hold such an honor.
But if rumor and enthusiastic chatter helped buoy him into office, so, too, did they stir the ire of his peers. Someone had heard him declare that his consulship bestowed upon him a mandate to prosecute the war to completion, as he saw fit, calling on no counsel save that of his own inclination. Others said that he had already begun preparations for a mission so secret even the Senate had no say in it. Or that he had dismissed his fellow consul, Licinius Crassus, as irrelevant. And a few swore that he had offered to meet Hannibal himself in individual combat and so decide the issue with his own blood.
Publius heard these tales with a smile. He had said none of those things. He did have a plan, but he kept it sealed within the close circle of those he trusted most. Once, Laelius' body had pointed out New Carthage as a target; this idea, too, came to Publius through his companion. Shortly before they left for Rome, as they shared wine and hashed over recently arrived details of Hannibal's campaigns in Italy, Laelius said that they should offer thanks to the elders of Carthage.
When asked to explain himself, Laelius said, “They alone may save us from Hannibal. If they'd once given Hannibal the support he needed, we'd be finished. He's won and won again for them, but they send supplies and men everywhere but to him. Hannibal fights like a lion, never realizing that behind him a pack of hyenas salivates to bite him in the ass. He sheds his blood for them, but what do they—”
Laelius froze mid-sentence. “What?” he asked. “What's wrong with you? You've gone white as a barbarian.”
And so he had. Publius had just heard in his companion's words the key to the war. In fact, he must have known the answer for some time. It was not even a completely new idea, but now Laelius had banged him on the forehead with it. Hannibal's weakness, his Achilles' heel, the force that drained him month after month but never offered him a thing . . . It had been right there before them all the time. Carthage itself. Carthage. Carthage. Publius had said the word a thousand times that first day and was still uttering it inside his head, a prayer composed of a single word.
Though he tried to keep the idea quiet until the right moment, rumors of it spread, as if bits of his own thoughts were slipping out of his skull and whispered in the ears of his enemies. Success and ambition—he was fast learning—change everything. No thought is truly secret, no conversation truly safe from someone's keen ears. And rivals spring up in the most unlikely of places. Fabius Maximus—the same man to whom Publius had loaned his eyes only a few years ago—brought the issue up in the Senate before Publius had yet done so himself. The venerable senator rose with care and indicated that he would speak on a grave matter. He could not see the other side of the chamber, but he spoke with his gaze moving from place to place, as if he were making eye contact with the entire room. He was stooped with age and seemed to have deteriorated disproportionately fast since his dictatorship, yet this frail look and his graying hair gave him an air of wise authority that had come to serve as a weapon in a world populated by younger men.
“Considering the points I am about to make,” Fabius began, “I might need to preface my remarks by making it clear that I hold no ill will toward young Scipio. Some will say I am jealous of his accomplishments, but this is nonsense. What rivalry can there be between one of my age and history, and another younger even than my sons? Perhaps I would have some of his youthful vigor to please my wife, but such things fade in accordance with the will of the gods. Consider, if you will, that I was called upon to serve as dictator in Rome's hour of greatest need . . .”
Publius exhaled loudly and impatiently, enough so that all near him heard the slight. Fabius may have heard it himself, but it was hard to be certain as the old man's hearing was fading just as his vision already had. Laelius guffawed. A few others chuckled behind their hands. Some turned stern gazes on the young men. But all present knew, as Laelius and Publius did, that they were in for a long ramble. Fabius had often recounted his past deeds on even slimmer pretexts. This time he spoke at length, trying to erase any notion that his record could possibly be matched by anyone, assuring all that any criticisms he had to make of Publius' plans were offered only for the good of Rome and in a spirit of sober, mature thought. Publius thought that with each extra phrase and qualification the aged senator undermined himself, but he was content to let the speech run its course.
“Let me point out,” Fabius said, after having spun out the full measure of his own accomplishments, “that neither the Senate nor the people have yet decreed that Africa be the young Scipio's province, much less a target of campaign. If the consul is to be understood to have usurped the Senate's authority, then I, for one, take offense at this. Do not my fellow senators agree?”
Some obviously did, judging by the murmurs of affirmation. Fabius, heartened, went on to ask why the consul did not apply himself to a straightforward conduct of war. Why not attack Hannibal where he lay, on Italian soil? Why go to a distant nation of which he knew little, to fight on land with which he was not familiar, with no harbors open to him, no foothold prepared for him, opposed by a numberless army? Would all this truly force Hannibal to return? Not likely, Fabius suggested. If anything, the enemy might march on Rome itself. That was the true threat. And if Hannibal were somehow convinced to leave his entrenched second home, how could the young consul possibly hope to defeat him on his own soil when none of his predecessors had yet done so in Italy?
“Consider how fickle the inclinations of our children are,” Fabius said. “Cornelius Scipio, that venerated personage, turned back from his quest to Iberia in order to save his homeland. Now we've before us his son, who wants to leave his homeland in order to win glory for himself. Countrymen, regard this plan for what it is—the scheme of a youth misled by early success, a boy on the verge of a great mistake. Be wiser than this, friends, and do not make the child's error the death knell of the nation.”
