Lustrum

After a moment, Celer reluctantly lowered his hand. 'So your father is younger than you are? What a farce this is!'

Clodius smirked. 'He was the best that could be found at short notice.'

Precisely what the tribal elders – none of whom was under fifty – must have made of this spectacle, I cannot imagine. Many were old friends of Cicero. We learned later that they had been turfed from their homes and places of business by Caesar's henchmen, frogmarched to the senate house and more or less ordered to approve Clodius's adoption.

'Have we finished here yet?' asked Pompey. He not only looked ridiculous in his augural outfit but plainly was embarrassed.

'Yes, we have finished,' said Caesar. He held out a hand as if bestowing a blessing at a wedding. 'Publius Clodius Pulcher, by the powers of my office as pontifex maximus, I declare that you are now the adopted son of Publius Fonteius, and will be entered into the state's records as a plebeian. Your change of status having immediate effect, you may therefore contest the elections for tribune if you wish. Thank you, gentlemen.' Caesar nodded their dismissal, the curia rose to their feet, and the first consul and chief priest of Rome lifted his robes a fraction and stepped down from the dais, his afternoon's work done. He moved past Clodius with his head averted in distaste, as one might pass a carcass in the street. 'You should have heeded my warning,' he hissed at Cicero as he went by. 'Now look what you've forced me to do.' He processed with his lictors towards the door, followed by Pompey, who still could not bring himself to meet Cicero's eyes; only Crassus permitted himself a slight smile.

'Come along, Father,' said Clodius, putting his arm around Fonteius's shoulders, 'let me help you home.' He gave another of his unnerving, girlish laughs, and after a bow to his brother-in-law and to Cicero, they joined the end of the cortege.

' You may have finished, Caesar,' Celer called after them, 'but I have not! I am the governor of Further Gaul, remember, and I command legions, whereas you have none! I have not even started yet!'

His voice was loud. It must have carried halfway across the forum. Caesar, however, passed from the chamber and into the daylight without giving any sign that he had heard. Once he and the rest had gone and we were alone, Cicero slumped heavily on to the nearest bench and put his head in his hands. Up in the rafters the pigeons flapped and cooed – to this day I cannot hear those filthy birds without thinking of the old senate house – while the sounds of the street outside seemed strangely disconnected from me: unearthly, as if I were already in prison.

'No despairing, Cicero,' said Celer briskly after some time had passed. 'He's not even a tribune yet – and won't be, if I can help it.'

'Crassus I can beat,' replied Cicero. 'Pompey I can outwit. Even Caesar I have managed to hold in check in the past. But all three combined, and with Clodius as their weapon?' He shook his head wearily. 'How am I to live?'

That evening Cicero went to see Pompey, taking me with him, partly to show that this was a business call and not in any way social, and also I suspect to bolster his nerve. We found the great man drinking in his bachelor den with his old army comrade and fellow Picenian Aulus Gabinius. They were examining the model of Pompey's theatre complex when we were shown in, and Gabinius was gushing with enthusiasm. He was the man who, as an ambitious tribune, had proposed the laws that secured Pompey his unprecedented military powers, and he had duly been rewarded with a legateship under Pompey in the East. He had been away for several years, during which time – unknown to him – Caesar had been conducting an affair with his wife, the blowsy Lollia (at the same time as he had been sleeping with Pompey's wife, come to think of it). But now Gabinius was back in Rome – just as ambitious, a hundred times as rich, and determined to become consul.

'Cicero, my dear fellow,' said Pompey, rising to embrace him, 'will you join us for some wine?'

'I shall not,' said Cicero stiffly.

'Oh dear,' said Pompey to Gabinius, 'do you hear his tone? He's come to upbraid me for that business this afternoon I was telling you about,' and turning back to Cicero he said, 'Do I really need to explain to you that it was all Caesar's idea? I tried to talk him out of it.'

'Really? Then why didn't you?'

'He was of the view – and I must say I have to agree with him – that the tone of your remarks in court today was grossly offensive to us, and merited a public rebuke of some kind.'

'So you open the way for Clodius to become a tribune – knowing that his stated intention once he gains that office is to bring a prosecution against me?'

'I would not have gone that far, but Caesar was set on it. Are you sure I cannot tempt you to some wine?'

'For many years,' said Cicero, with a terrible calmness, 'I have supported you in everything you wanted. I have asked for nothing in return except your friendship, which has been more precious to me than anything in my public life. And now at last you have shown your true regard for me to all the world – by helping to give my deadliest enemy the weapon he needs to destroy me!'

Pompey's lip quivered and his oyster eyes filled with tears. 'Cicero, I am appalled. How can you say such things? I would never stand aside and see you destroyed. My position is not an easy one, you know – trying to exert a calming influence on Caesar is a sacrifice I make on behalf of the republic every day of my life.'

'But not today, apparently.'

'He felt that his dignity and authority were threatened by what you said.'

'Not half as threatened as they will be if I reveal all I know about this Beast with Three Heads and its dealings with Catilina!'

Gabinius broke in. 'I don't think you should speak to Pompey the Great in that tone.'

'No, no, Aulus,' said Pompey sadly, 'what Cicero says is right. Caesar has gone too far. The gods know I have tried to do as much as I can to moderate his actions behind the scenes. When Cato was flung in prison, I had him released at once. And poor Bibulus would have suffered a much worse fate than having a barrel of shit poured over him if it hadn't been for me. But on this occasion I failed. I was bound to one day. I'm afraid Caesar is just so… relentless.' He sighed and picked up one of the toy temples from his model theatre and contemplated it thoughtfully. 'Perhaps the time is coming,' he said, 'when I shall have to break with him.' He gave Cicero a crafty look – his eyes had quickly dried, I noticed. 'What do you think of that?'

'I think it cannot come soon enough.'

'You may be right.' Pompey took the temple between his fat thumb and forefinger and replaced it with surprising delicacy in its former position. 'Do you know what his new scheme is?'

'No.'

'He wishes to be awarded a military command.'

'I'm sure he does. But the senate has already decreed that there will be no provinces for the consuls this year.'

'The senate has, yes. But Caesar doesn't care about the senate. He is going to get Vatinius to propose a law in the popular assembly.'

'What?'

'A law granting him not just one province, but two – Nearer Gaul and Bithynia – with the authority to raise an army of two legions. And it won't just be a one-year appointment, either – he wants five years.'

'But the award of provinces has always been decided by the senate, not the people,' protested Cicero. 'And five years! This will smash our constitution to pieces.'

'Caesar says not. Caesar says to me, “What is wrong with trusting the people?”'

'It isn't the people! It's a mob, controlled by Vatinius.'

'Well,' said Pompey, 'now perhaps you can understand why I agreed to watch the skies for him this afternoon. Of course I should have refused. But I have to keep a larger picture in view. Someone must control him.'

Cicero put his head in his hands in despair. Eventually he said, 'May I tell some of my friends your reasons for going along with him today? Otherwise they will think I no longer have your support.'

'If you must – in the strictest confidence. And you may tell them – with Aulus here as a witness – that no harm will befall Marcus Tullius Cicero as long as Pompey the Great still breathes in Rome.'

Cicero was very silent and thoughtful as we walked home. Instead of going straight to his library, he took several turns around his garden in the darkness, while I sat at a table nearby with a lamp and quickly wrote down