and by the look in Cicero’s as well, heavy-lidded and drooping from something other than the heat. Tiro was unused to being given such menial tasks. And Cicero? One sees it all the time, a master taking out petty frustrations on the slaves around him. The habit becomes so commonplace that they do it without thinking; slaves come to accept it without humiliation or repining, as if it were a godsent inconvenience, like rainfall on a market day.
Cicero and Tiro were not nearly so advanced along that path. Before Tiro had disappeared pouting from the room, Cicero relented, as much as he could without losing face. ‘Tiro!’ he called. He waited for the slave to turn. He looked him in the eye. ‘Be sure to bring a portion for yourself as well.’
A crueller man would have smiled as he spoke. A lesser man would have cast his eyes to the floor. Cicero did neither, and in that moment I discovered my first glimmering of respect for him.
Tiro departed. For a moment Cicero toyed with a ring on his finger, then turned his attention back to me.
‘You were about to tell me something of how one goes about arranging a murder in the streets of Rome. Forgive me if the question is presumptuous. I don’t mean to imply that you yourself have ever offended the gods by taking part in such crimes. But they say – Hortensius says – that you happen to know more than a little about these matters. Who, how, and how much . . .’
I shrugged. ‘If a man wants another man murdered, there’s nothing so difficult about that. As I said, a word to the right man, a bit of gold passed from hand to hand, and the job is done.’
‘But where does one find the right man?’
I had been forgetting how young and inexperienced he was, despite his education and wit. ‘It’s easier than you might think. For years the gangs have been controlling the streets of Rome after dark, and sometimes even in broad daylight.’
‘But the gangs fight each other.’
‘The gangs fight anyone who gets in their way.’
‘Their crimes are political. They ally themselves with a particular party—’
‘They have no politics, except the politics of whatever man hires them. And no loyalty, except the loyalty that money buys. Think, Cicero. Where do the gangs come from? Some of them are spawned right here in Rome, like maggots under a rock – the poor, the children of the poor, their grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Whole dynasties of crime, generations of villains breeding pedigrees of vice. They negotiate with one another like little nations. They intermarry like noble families. And they hire themselves out like mercenaries to whatever politician or general offers the grandest promises.’
Cicero glanced away, peering into the translucent folds of the yellow curtain, as if he could see beyond it all the human refuse of Rome. ‘Where do they all come from?’ he muttered.
‘They grow up through the pavement,’ I said, ‘like weeds. Or they drift in from the countryside, refugees from war after war. Think about it: Sulla wins his war against the rebellious Italian allies and pays his soldiers in land. But to acquire that land, the defeated allies must first be uprooted. Where do they end up, except as beggars and slaves in Rome? And all for what? The countryside is devastated by war. The soldiers know nothing of farming; in a month or a year they sell their holdings to the highest bidder and head back to the city. The countryside falls into the grip of vast landholders. Small farmers struggle to compete, are defeated and dispossessed – they find their way to Rome. More and more I’ve seen it in my own lifetime, the gulf between the rich and poor, the smallness of the one, the vastness of the other. Rome is like a woman of fabulous wealth and beauty, draped in gold and festooned with jewels, her belly big with a foetus named Empire – and infested from head to foot by a million scampering lice.’
Cicero frowned. ‘Hortensius warned me that you
Cicero and Tiro were not nearly so advanced along that path. Before Tiro had disappeared pouting from the room, Cicero relented, as much as he could without losing face. ‘Tiro!’ he called. He waited for the slave to turn. He looked him in the eye. ‘Be sure to bring a portion for yourself as well.’
A crueller man would have smiled as he spoke. A lesser man would have cast his eyes to the floor. Cicero did neither, and in that moment I discovered my first glimmering of respect for him.
Tiro departed. For a moment Cicero toyed with a ring on his finger, then turned his attention back to me.
‘You were about to tell me something of how one goes about arranging a murder in the streets of Rome. Forgive me if the question is presumptuous. I don’t mean to imply that you yourself have ever offended the gods by taking part in such crimes. But they say – Hortensius says – that you happen to know more than a little about these matters. Who, how, and how much . . .’
I shrugged. ‘If a man wants another man murdered, there’s nothing so difficult about that. As I said, a word to the right man, a bit of gold passed from hand to hand, and the job is done.’
‘But where does one find the right man?’
I had been forgetting how young and inexperienced he was, despite his education and wit. ‘It’s easier than you might think. For years the gangs have been controlling the streets of Rome after dark, and sometimes even in broad daylight.’
‘But the gangs fight each other.’
‘The gangs fight anyone who gets in their way.’
‘Their crimes are political. They ally themselves with a particular party—’
‘They have no politics, except the politics of whatever man hires them. And no loyalty, except the loyalty that money buys. Think, Cicero. Where do the gangs come from? Some of them are spawned right here in Rome, like maggots under a rock – the poor, the children of the poor, their grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Whole dynasties of crime, generations of villains breeding pedigrees of vice. They negotiate with one another like little nations. They intermarry like noble families. And they hire themselves out like mercenaries to whatever politician or general offers the grandest promises.’
Cicero glanced away, peering into the translucent folds of the yellow curtain, as if he could see beyond it all the human refuse of Rome. ‘Where do they all come from?’ he muttered.
‘They grow up through the pavement,’ I said, ‘like weeds. Or they drift in from the countryside, refugees from war after war. Think about it: Sulla wins his war against the rebellious Italian allies and pays his soldiers in land. But to acquire that land, the defeated allies must first be uprooted. Where do they end up, except as beggars and slaves in Rome? And all for what? The countryside is devastated by war. The soldiers know nothing of farming; in a month or a year they sell their holdings to the highest bidder and head back to the city. The countryside falls into the grip of vast landholders. Small farmers struggle to compete, are defeated and dispossessed – they find their way to Rome. More and more I’ve seen it in my own lifetime, the gulf between the rich and poor, the smallness of the one, the vastness of the other. Rome is like a woman of fabulous wealth and beauty, draped in gold and festooned with jewels, her belly big with a foetus named Empire – and infested from head to foot by a million scampering lice.’
Cicero frowned. ‘Hortensius warned me that you
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