Imperium

“You would defend Catilina ?” Quintus was well used to his brother, and it took a great deal to shock him, but on that day he was almost speechless.

“I would defend the blackest devil in hell if he was in need of an advocate. That is our system of law.” Cicero frowned and shook his head irritably. “But we went over all this with poor Lucius just before he died. Come on, brother-spare me the reproachful face! You wrote the book: ‘I am a new man. I seek the consulship. This is Rome.’ Those three things-they say it all. I am a new man, therefore there is no one to help me but myself, and you few friends. I seek the consulship, which is immortality-a prize worth fighting for, yes? And this is Rome-Rome -not some abstract place in a work of philosophy, but a city of glory built on a river of filth. So yes, I will defend Catilina, if that is what is necessary, and then I will break with him as soon as I can. And he would do the same to me. That is the world we live in.” Cicero sat back in his chair and raised his hands. “Rome.”

CICERO DID NOT MAKE A MOVE immediately, preferring to wait and see whether the prosecution of Catilina would definitely go ahead. There was a widespread view that Clodius was simply showing off, or perhaps trying to distract attention from the shame of his sister’s divorce. But in the lumbering way of the law, as the summer came on, the process passed through all its various stages-the postulatio, divinatio, and nominas delatio -a jury was selected and a date was fixed for the start of the trial in the last week of July. There was no chance now that Catilina would be free of litigation in time for the consular elections; nominations had already closed.

At this point, Cicero decided to let Catilina know that he might be interested in acting as his advocate. He gave much thought as to how to convey the offer, for he did not wish to lose face by being rebuffed, and also wanted to be able to deny ever making an approach in case he was challenged in the Senate. In the end he hit upon a characteristically subtle scheme. He called Caelius to his study, swore him to secrecy, and a

I guess it must have taken all of a day and a half for a messenger to turn up on Cicero’s doorstep, bearing a letter from Catilina, asking him if he would care to visit, and proposing-in the interests of confidentiality-that the rendezvous be conducted after dusk. “And so the fish bites,” said Cicero, showing me the letter, and he sent back with the slave a verbal reply that he would attend on Catilina in his house that same night.

Terentia was now very close to parturition and was finding the heat of Rome in July insufferable. She lay, restless and groaning, on a couch in the stifling dining room, Tullia on one side reading to her in a piping voice, a maid with a fan on the other. Her temper, warm in the best of circumstances, was in these days permanently inflamed. As darkness fell and the candelabra were lit, she saw that Cicero was preparing to leave, and immediately demanded to know where he was going. When he gave a vague reply, she tearfully insisted that he must have taken a concubine and was visiting her, for why else would a respectable man go out of doors at this hour? And so, reluctantly, he told her the truth, that he was calling on Catilina. Of course this did not mollify her in the slightest, but only enraged her further. She demanded to know how he could bear to spend a moment in the company of the monster who had debauched her own sister, a vestal virgin, to which Cicero responded with some quip about Fabia having always been “more vestal than virgin.” Terentia struggled to rise but failed, and her furious invective pursued us all the way out of the house, much to Cicero’s amusement.

It was a night very like the one on the eve of the elections for aedile when he had gone to see Pompey. There was the same oppressive heat and feverish moonlight; the same slight breeze stirred the smell of putrefaction from the burial fields beyond the Esquiline Gate and spread it over the city like an invisible moist dust. We went down into the Forum, where the slaves were lighting the streetlamps, past the silent, darkened temples, and up onto the Palatine, where Catilina had his house. I was carrying a document case, as usual, and Cicero had his hands clasped behind his back and was walking with his head bowed in thought. Back then the Palatine was less built up than it is today, and the buildings were spaced farther apart. I could hear the sound of a stream nearby and there was a scent of honeysuckle and dog rose. “This is the place to live, Tiro,” said Cicero, halting on the steps. “This is where we shall come when there are no more elections to be fought, and I need take less account of what the people think. A place with a garden to read in-imagine that-and where the children can play.” He glanced back in the direction of the Esquiline. “It will be a relief to all concerned when this baby arrives. It is like waiting for a storm to break.”

Catilina’s house was easy to find, for it was close by the Temple of Luna, which was painted white and lit up at night by torches, in honor of the moon goddess. A slave was waiting in the street to guide us, and he took us straight into the vestibule of the mansion of the Sergii, where a most beautiful woman greeted Cicero. This was Aurelia Orestilla, the wife of Catilina, whose daughter he was supposed to have seduced initially, before moving on to the mother, and for whose sake, it was rumored, he had murdered his own son by his first marriage (the lad having threatened to kill Aurelia rather than accept such a notorious courtesan into the family). Cicero knew all about her and cut off her effusive greeting with a curt nod. “Madame,” he said, “it is your husband I have come to see, not you,” at which she bit her lip and fell silent. It was one of the most ancient houses in Rome, and its timbers creaked as we followed the slave into the interior, which smelled of dusty old drapes and incense. One curious feature I remember was that it had been stripped almost bare, and obviously recently, for one could see the blurred rectangular outlines of where pictures had once hung, and circles of dust on the floor marked the absence of statues. All that remained in the atrium were the dingy wax effigies of Catilina’s ancestors, jaundiced by generations of smoke. This was where Catilina himself was standing, and the first surprise was how tall he was when one got close up-at least a head higher than Cicero-and the second was the presence behind him of Clodius. This must have been a terrific shock to Cicero, but he was far too cool a lawyer to show it. He shook hands quickly with Catilina, then with Clodius, and politely refused an offer of wine; the three men then turned straight to business.

Looking back, I am struck by how alike Catilina and Clodius were. This was the only time I ever saw them in a room together, and they might have been father and son, with their drawling voices, and the way they stood together so languidly, as if the world were theirs to own. I suppose this is what is called “breeding.” It had taken four hundred years of intermarriage between the finest families in Rome to produce those two villains-as thoroughbred as Arab bloodstock, and just as quick and headstrong and dangerous.

“This is the deal as we see it,” said Catilina. “Young Clodius here will make a brilliant speech for the prosecution and everyone will say he is the new Cicero and I am bound to be convicted. But then you, Cicero, will make an even more brilliant argument for the defense in reply, and therefore no one will be surprised when I am acquitted. At the end of it, we shall have put on a good show and we shall all emerge with our positions enhanced. I am declared i

“And what if the jury decides differently?”

“You need not be concerned about them.” Catilina patted his pocket. “I have taken care of the jury.”

“The law is so expensive,” said Clodius, with a smile. “Poor Catilina has had to sell his heirlooms to be sure of justice. It really is a scandal. How do people manage?”

“I shall need to see the trial documents,” said Cicero. “How soon before the hearing opens?”

“Three days,” said Catilina, and he gestured to a slave who was standing at the door. “Does that give you long enough to prepare?”

“If the jury has already been convinced, I can make the speech in six words: ‘Here is Catilina. Let him go.’”

“Oh, but I want the full Ciceronian production!” protested Catilina. “I want: ‘This

“You will get,” said Cicero, coldly cutting him off, “a professional job.” The slave had returned with the papers for the trial and I began rapidly piling them into my document case, for I could sense the atmosphere begi

“By all means. I have nothing better to do. I had been expecting to stand for the consulship this summer, as you well know, until this young mischief-maker put a stop to it.”

It was the agility that was so shocking in a man of such height. He suddenly lunged forward and wrapped his powerful right arm around Clodius’s neck and dragged the younger man’s head down, so that Clodius was bent double. Poor Clodius-who was no weakling, incidentally-let out a muffled cry, and his fingers clawed feebly at Catilina’s arm. But the strength of Catilina was appalling, and I wondered whether he might not have broken his visitor’s neck with a quick upward flick of his forearm, if Cicero had not said calmly, “I must advise you, Catilina, as your defense attorney, that it would be a grievous mistake to murder your prosecutor.”