triumvirate consists of three men, not one.”
Cicero gritted his teeth and bowed. “It would be an honour.”
Crassus bowed in return. “I knew you would do the patriotic thing.”
—
The following day, Spinther read out the pontiffs’ judgement to the Senate: unless Clodius could provide written proof that he had consecrated the shrine on instructions from the Roman people, “the site can be restored to Cicero without sacrilege.”
A normal man now would have given up. But Clodius wasn’t normal. Though he might pretend to be a pleb, he was still a Claudian—a family who took pride in hounding their enemies to the grave. First he lied and told a meeting of the people that the judgement had actually gone in his favour and called on them to defend “their” shrine. Then, when the consul-designate Marcellinus proposed a motion in the Senate to return to Cicero his three properties—in Rome, Tusculum and Formiae, “with compensation to restore them to their former state”—Clodius tried to talk out the session, and would have succeeded had he not, after three hours on his feet, been howled down by an exasperated Senate. Nor were his tactics entirely without effect. Frightened of antagonising the plebs, and to Cicero’s dismay, the Senate agreed to pay compensation of only two million sesterces to rebuild the house on the Palatine, and just half a million and a quarter of a million respectively for the repairs at Tusculum and Formiae—far below the actual costs.
For the past two years most of Rome’s builders and craftsmen had been employed on Pompey’s immense development of public buildings on the Field of Mars. Grudgingly—because anyone who has ever employed builders learns quickly never to let them out of one’s sight—Pompey agreed to transfer a hundred of his men to Cicero. Work on restoring the Palatine house began at once, and on the first morning of construction Cicero had the great pleasure of swinging an axe at the head of Liberty and smashing it clean off, then crating up the remains and having them delivered to Clodius with his compliments.
I knew Clodius would retaliate, and one morning soon afterwards, when Cicero and I were working on some legal papers in Quintus’s tablinum, we heard what sounded like heavy footsteps clumping across the roof. I went out into the street and was lucky not to be struck on the head by bricks dropping from the sky. Panicking workmen came running round the corner and shouted that a gang of Clodius’s toughs had overrun the site and were demolishing the new walls and hurling the debris down on to Quintus’s house. Just then Cicero and Quintus came out to see what the trouble was, and yet again they had to send a messenger to Milo to request the assistance of his gladiators. It was just as well, for no sooner had the runner gone than there was a series of flashes overhead, and burning brands and lumps of flaming pitch started landing all around us. Fires broke out on the roof. The terrified household had to be evacuated, and everyone, including Cicero and even Terentia, was pressed into service to pass buckets of water, drawn from the street fountains, from hand to hand to try to prevent the house from burning down.
Crassus had a monopoly of the city’s fire services, and fortunately for us, he was at his home on the Palatine. He heard the commotion, came out into the street, saw what was going on, and turned up himself in a shabby tunic and slippers, with one of his teams of fire slaves dragging a water tender equipped with pumps and hoses. But for them the building would have been lost; as it was, the damage caused by the water and smoke rendered the place uninhabitable, and we had to move out while it was repaired. We loaded our luggage into carts and, with night coming on, made our way across the valley to the Quirinal hill, to seek temporary refuge in the house of Atticus, who was still away in Epirus. His narrow, ancient house was fine for an
Cicero gritted his teeth and bowed. “It would be an honour.”
Crassus bowed in return. “I knew you would do the patriotic thing.”
—
The following day, Spinther read out the pontiffs’ judgement to the Senate: unless Clodius could provide written proof that he had consecrated the shrine on instructions from the Roman people, “the site can be restored to Cicero without sacrilege.”
A normal man now would have given up. But Clodius wasn’t normal. Though he might pretend to be a pleb, he was still a Claudian—a family who took pride in hounding their enemies to the grave. First he lied and told a meeting of the people that the judgement had actually gone in his favour and called on them to defend “their” shrine. Then, when the consul-designate Marcellinus proposed a motion in the Senate to return to Cicero his three properties—in Rome, Tusculum and Formiae, “with compensation to restore them to their former state”—Clodius tried to talk out the session, and would have succeeded had he not, after three hours on his feet, been howled down by an exasperated Senate. Nor were his tactics entirely without effect. Frightened of antagonising the plebs, and to Cicero’s dismay, the Senate agreed to pay compensation of only two million sesterces to rebuild the house on the Palatine, and just half a million and a quarter of a million respectively for the repairs at Tusculum and Formiae—far below the actual costs.
For the past two years most of Rome’s builders and craftsmen had been employed on Pompey’s immense development of public buildings on the Field of Mars. Grudgingly—because anyone who has ever employed builders learns quickly never to let them out of one’s sight—Pompey agreed to transfer a hundred of his men to Cicero. Work on restoring the Palatine house began at once, and on the first morning of construction Cicero had the great pleasure of swinging an axe at the head of Liberty and smashing it clean off, then crating up the remains and having them delivered to Clodius with his compliments.
I knew Clodius would retaliate, and one morning soon afterwards, when Cicero and I were working on some legal papers in Quintus’s tablinum, we heard what sounded like heavy footsteps clumping across the roof. I went out into the street and was lucky not to be struck on the head by bricks dropping from the sky. Panicking workmen came running round the corner and shouted that a gang of Clodius’s toughs had overrun the site and were demolishing the new walls and hurling the debris down on to Quintus’s house. Just then Cicero and Quintus came out to see what the trouble was, and yet again they had to send a messenger to Milo to request the assistance of his gladiators. It was just as well, for no sooner had the runner gone than there was a series of flashes overhead, and burning brands and lumps of flaming pitch started landing all around us. Fires broke out on the roof. The terrified household had to be evacuated, and everyone, including Cicero and even Terentia, was pressed into service to pass buckets of water, drawn from the street fountains, from hand to hand to try to prevent the house from burning down.
Crassus had a monopoly of the city’s fire services, and fortunately for us, he was at his home on the Palatine. He heard the commotion, came out into the street, saw what was going on, and turned up himself in a shabby tunic and slippers, with one of his teams of fire slaves dragging a water tender equipped with pumps and hoses. But for them the building would have been lost; as it was, the damage caused by the water and smoke rendered the place uninhabitable, and we had to move out while it was repaired. We loaded our luggage into carts and, with night coming on, made our way across the valley to the Quirinal hill, to seek temporary refuge in the house of Atticus, who was still away in Epirus. His narrow, ancient house was fine for an
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