commanding generals coming out from Rome. Do I make myself clear?’
Marcellus was pleased to see Titus finally put the upstart in his place. The general’s brother had promised him the words he had just said were true, but Titus knew he would be a fool to place unlimited trust in Quintus. Just as telling was that Aquila had spoken the truth: something had to be done to contain the Lusitani, to at least keep them occupied till he had reached and invested Numantia. They, in the field and allied to the Duncani, might prove too much for the forces he could dispose. Many times in his life, a thought on some related subject had crystallised in his mind while he was talking, and that had happened now.
‘As it happens, gentlemen, I have a plan to keep the Lusitani occupied. I leave for the province of Outer Spain in the morning. Aquila Terentius, you will assume command in my absence.’ Marcellus opened his mouth to protest, so upset that he, even with his upbringing, was prepared to openly question his commander’s orders. Titus’s next words cut him off.
‘And you, Marcellus Falerius, will accompany me!’
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
To anyone who knew him, the face of Sextius Paullus, as he was helped down the ramp at Messana, would have reduced them to helpless mirth. He looked like a man being lowered into a legionary latrine, just at the point where the contents had reached his lower lip. To say that the senator was not a happy man was a definite understatement. He could not comprehend what had come over Claudia; from being the perfect wife, kind, attentive and fully aware of his innate superiority, she had turned into a screeching shrew. The word ‘divorce’ horrified him, and at least she had undertaken never to mention that again. So here he was in Sicily, having been positively bundled out of Neapolis before he had had a chance to look up old acquaintances, only to be stuck, because of bad weather, in Rhegnum, a beastly port full of ruffians. Claudia had behaved as though that were his fault too. The crossing had been undertaken before the storm had properly moderated, which had made him sick, then the master of the vessel, well within sight of the harbour mouth, had demanded an increased fee to land them, saying that the swell made such a prospect dangerous.
His steward had at least secured the services of a gig and they set off for the governor’s palace in silence. Claudia, beside him, craned out of the window in a most unseemly fashion, as though she were a fishwife calling out to passing friends. But he forbore to tell her to desist, aware that nothing he said, these days, produced anything other than abuse.
Titus Cornelius, having been given proconsular powers over the whole of the Iberian Peninsula, also displaced the governor of the southern province, Hispania Ulterior. That fellow, no less venal than Mancinus, took being superseded with more grace, but then he was going back to Rome, not being delivered into the hands of his enemies, with the prospect of suffering torture and abuse, before finally being burnt alive in a wicker cage. The troops in this province, although a lot less numerous, were in the same condition as those who had served under Mancinus, and the enemy, to the north and west, was even stronger, less exposed to Rome and its civilising influence.
Marcellus, given the rank of legatus by Titus, set to work straight away, instituting a tough new regime in the legion, with dire, sometimes fatal results for transgressors, and he questioned the available officers, trying to get a proper appraisal of the current situation. Here the problem was different, since they were exposed to the activities of seaborne raiders as well as the incursions of the Lusitani from the north. Lacking real experience to handle the solution himself, luck intervened, for in Regimus, an old and experienced sailor, he found just the man he was looking for.
They spent a long time together, both in the headquarters and on the seashore until finally Marcellus hired a ship, disappearing with his new-found companion for a week. That suited Titus; away from his main camp in the north and the day-to-day problems of training an army, he could give some thought to how he was going to beat Brennos. He knew that if he failed to find the right method, his army would suffer a worse fate than had been afforded them when they surrendered before Pallentia: Brennos would seek no truce, only the total destruction of his enemies. Of all people, Titus Cornelius knew that the defeat of his legions was, for Brennos, but one step in a greater and more dangerous plan.
Slowly, as he examined the problem, the germ of a solution presented itself, but it only had validity if he could control, in the initial attacks, the numbers he faced. Try as he might, he could think of no way to stop the Lusitani from reinforcing his main enemy.
It was plain, as soon as he returned, that whatever plan Marcellus had hatched to deal with this had got him excited. Calling for a series of maps, he rushed through the basic details without pausing for breath, failing to notice his general did not wholly share his enthusiasm.
‘It depends on how quickly they hear that we are besieging Numantia,’ Titus said.
‘Are you going to besiege it?’
‘If I can, I have to get to the place first.’
‘Communications are good and they share a tribal border. There is nothing to stop the Lusitani coming to the aid of Numantia before you’ve had a chance to launch your first attack. That is, unless someone distracts their attention.’
Titus looked at the map of the western seaboard that Marcellus then placed in front of him, smiling slightly. ‘Perhaps you are going to tell me Marcellus Falerius can do this?’
The younger man ran his finger along the indentations on the coastline, trying to contain his delight. He had never supposed that Titus, land-minded like most Roman generals, would see the logic of his ideas, but at least he was open-minded enough to listen.
‘We can’t besiege Numantia and fight the Lusitani in a land campaign, so we must find a way to occupy them with the forces we already have. One thing that will keep them busy is concern for their own possessions. These are the main river outlets to the sea, and if we can establish a presence on any one of them, we can raid into the interior. They’ll be so busy trying to dislodge us they won’t have time to support Brennos.’
‘What about their ship-borne raiders?’
‘We will attack them first, if they show themselves. Their craft are small and unarmed, no match for a quinquereme.’
‘Which we don’t have,’ said Titus, ‘and I’m not sure that the Senate will agree to send any, quite apart from the time it would take.’
‘Then we’ll build them. We have the wood in abundance, and I undertake to train the rowers. I even have an old decurion who was at sea for years, a fellow called Regimus. He says we can make up the ships’ crews.’
‘From the legions?’
Marcellus nodded. Titus however, shook his head. ‘It’s no good, you’ll need proper sailors. Remember that fight we had with the Sicilian slaves off Agrigentum? We could cast our spears all right, but it took proper seafarers to get us to a point where we could fight.’
‘One sailor per oar, perhaps, that and a crew to steer and set the sails.’
‘That’s still a lot of men we do not have.’
‘The harbour of Portus Albus is full of trading ships, we’ll take what we need.’
Titus favoured the younger man with a wry smile. ‘I can almost hear the words of my indictment. Who do you think owns those trading ships? A good number, if not most of them, are the property of my fellow senators.’
‘Write to Quintus. He’ll keep them off your back.’
The smile remained. ‘You have lofty ideas of my brother’s power, let alone his willingness to sacrifice himself for me. Terentius had a point about my being recalled, even though I glossed it over. Understand, Marcellus, Quintus will only continue to support this operation and me as long as it suits his purpose. If he once feels his position to be threatened he will drop me like a new moulded brick, and you with me.’
Marcellus, if asked, would have denied he was desperate, but that was the naked truth; all these years of being sent to safe places had made him so. They were just enough to justify his candidacy for the cursus honorum and Quintus never tired of telling him, before despatching him to some backwater, that he would inherit his father’s power, but he never quite said how long the son would have to wait. Marcellus suspected that he would have trouble extracting anything from Quintus on his deathbed and, for that reason alone, he had kept his father’s private
