Catilina's Riddle (64 page)

How peculiar, I thought, for a Roman orator to begin a speech by deriding its importance, to satirize an oration even while orating it, to be unabashedly honest before a crowd of listeners!

Catilina's expression became somber.
"I
will set before you as plainly as I can the prospect we face together, and the stakes for which we fight.

"You know how our allies in Rome have failed us, what a lack of judgment and enterprise was shown by Lentulus and his friends, and how disastrous it has been for themselves and for us. Our present predicament is as obvious to all of you as it is to me. Two enemy armies now bar our way, one between us and Gaul, the other between us and Rome. To

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remain where we are is impossible, for we have run short of grain and other supplies. Whichever path we decide to take, we must use our swords to cut our way through.

"Therefore I counsel you to be resolute and to summon up whatever measure of courage you have. When you go into battle, remember that riches, honor, glory, and, what is more, your liberty and the future of your country are held in the hand that wields your weapon. If we win, we shall obtain all we need to continue; towns will open their gates to us with thanksgiving and we shall be showered with supplies. New recruits will join us, and we shall grow again in strength and numbers. The tide that flows against us will be turned and will carry us to glory. But if fear causes us to flinch, the whole world will turn against us: no one will shield a man whose own arms have failed to protect him.

"Keep in mind that our adversaries are not impelled by the same necessity as we are, nor by as just a cause. For you and me, country, justice, and liberty are at stake. They, on the other hand, have been ordered into battle to protect a ruling elite for which they can have little love. We have chosen our glorious course; we have endured exile and hardship; we have proclaimed to the world that we will not return to Rome with our heads bowed in shame, willing to live out our lives as the cringing subjects of unworthy rulers. The men we are to face, on the other hand, have already submitted to the yoke of their masters and closed their eyes to any other course. Which of these armies will show the more spirit, I ask you—those whose eyes are meekly cast down or those whose eyes are on the heavens?"

To this question Catilina received a great cheer, and among the other voices Meto's rang in my ears, crying out the name of his commander. The din went on and on. Swords were beaten against shields to produce a deafening clang. The noise died down, only to spring up again in a great roar that covered my arms with gooseflesh. At last Tongilius stepped forward and raised his arms for silence so that Catilina could go on.

He had begun his speech in a dry, sardonic tone, as if by his own brash example he could lend spirit to his men. But I think he was moved by their accolades, for he ended with a quaver in his voice. "When I think of you, soldiers, and consider what you've already achieved, I have high hopes for victory. Your boldness and valor give me confidence. We will fight upon a plain. To our left are mountains, and to our right is rough, rocky ground. In this confined space, the enemy's superior numbers cannot encircle us. We shall face them man to man, with courage and just cause as our strongest weapons. But if, in spite of this, Fortune robs your valor of its just reward, do not sell your lives cheaply. Do not be taken and slaughtered like cattle! Fight like men: let bloodshed and lamentation be the price that the enemy must pay for his bitter victory!"

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Another cheer went up, echoing between the hills on either side.

It was ended by blaring trumpets, calling for the troops to take up their battle formations. All around us men began to move with quick determination. Meto seized my arm with a bruising grip.

"Go now! If you take your horse, you may be able to escape the way you came, or else head up toward the pass and find some trail to lead you back down again when the battle's over."

"Come with me, Meto. Show me the way."

"No, Papa! My place is here."

"Meto, the cause is hopeless! Never mind Catilina's speech. If you could have heard the way he spoke to me in the tent—"

"Papa, there's nothing you know that I do not. My eyes are open."

And fixed on the heavens, I thought. "Very well, then. Can you equip me with some sort of armor?"

"What?"

"If I'm to stay here and fight beside you, I'd like to have something more suitable than the dagger in my belt, though many of these wretches don't appear to have anything better."

"No, Papa, you can't stay!"

"How dare you say that to me! Would you stand your ground and deny me the same honor?"

"But you've given it no thought—"

"No, Meto, on the journey here I had many hours to think. I imagined this moment long before it came. In my imagination it sometimes turned out considerably more to my liking, but sometimes it turned out much worse—I thought I might find you dead without ever seeing you again, or find only a pit filled with dead bodies, with nothing to show me which was yours. This is better than that, and not as bad as I had feared. For one thing, I'm not as frightened as I thought I would be, at least not yet. No, Meto, this is my deliberate and premeditated choice, to fight beside my son."

"No, Papa, it must be for Catilina, for what he represents, if it's to mean anything!"

"That is
your
cause, Meto; but very well, I'll fight for Catilina. Why not? The truth, Meto: if I had the power of Jupiter I'd wave a thunderbolt and give Catilina everything he wants. Why not? I'd resurrect Spartacus from the dust and let him have his way as well. I'd roll back time and see that Sulla was never born, or Cicero for that matter. I'd change the world in the blink of an eye, for better or worse, merely to see it changed into something different. But I cannot do those things, and neither can anyone else. So why not take up a rusty sword and run screaming into battle beside my son, for the glory of what he loves with all his foolish young heart?"

Meto looked at me for a long time with an unreadable expression

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in his eyes. He must believe I'm mad, or lying, or both, I thought. But when he finally spoke, he said: "You
are
my father."

"Yes, Meto. And you're my son."

Men ran madly around us. Horses neighed, metal clanged on metal, officers shouted, trumpets blared. At last Meto took my arm. "Come, hurry, I think there's enough spare armor in Catilina's tent to put something together for you!"

And so at the age of forty-seven I became a soldier for the first time in my life, outfitted in scraps of cast-off armor, wearing a coat of mail with half the scales missing and a much-dented helmet shaped like a hewn-off pumpkin, wielding a blunted sword for a hopeless cause under a doomed commander. I felt I must be approaching the very heart of the Labyrinth; I could almost smell the Minotaur's hot breath upon my face.

There is not much I can do to describe the battle, as I never knew quite where I was or quite what was happening. It seems that Catilina arrayed his forces in three parts, with Manlius on one side, another commander on the other, and himself in the center surrounded by his ardent young followers and a picked body of well-armed fighting men, along with Meto and myself. We marched forward with Tongilius carrying the eagle standard until Catilina chose the spot where he would make his stand, and there Tongilius planted the standard in the ground. There was no cavalry, only infantry, for before the battle Catilina saw that all the horses were driven back toward the mountains. By doing this he showed his men that their commanders could not flee, and that their danger was shared by all alike.

The danger approached like a great crimson and silver tide, drawing toward us with a roar unlike anything I had ever heard. I know now how it must be for the enemies of Rome when they see their doom approaching. I was awed and horrified, and yet not frightened. Fear seemed point-less in the face of such catastrophe. Why should a simple man cringe with fear for his simple life, when the whole world was about to end in screaming madness?

I felt no regret, but I did feel something of a fool, for I could not help thinking to myself: stupid man, Bethesda will never forgive you for this. And it was that I feared, more than the jagged wall of steel bearing down on us.

I stayed close beside Meto, who stayed close beside Catilina. There was a great deal of running, sometimes from one side to the other, sometimes forward, but never back. I remember an arrow that whirred by my ear and struck a man behind me with a sickening thud. I remember soldiers, men I had never seen before, rushing toward me with swords

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in their hands and murder in their eyes; it all seemed so unlikely that I only wanted the nightmare to end. But the sword in my hand seemed to know what to do, so I followed it blindly.

I remember foaming blood sprayed upon my face like the pounding surf of the ocean. I remember seeing Catilina, his face contorted into a terrible grimace, his sword arm slashing, with an arrow projecting from his left shoulder and blood spilling down his glistening breastplate. I remember seeing Meto rush to Catilina's side with grim determination on his face, hewing a path with his sword as if he had been doing such things all his life. I hurried after him but tripped over something solid and fleshy. As I spun around, I glimpsed Tongilius in the throng behind me, bringing up the eagle standard, for with Catilina leading we had cut our way deep into the enemy's line. I gained my footing again and looked frantically for Meto, who had disappeared in the chaos.

Then, from the corner of my eye, I saw the spear approaching. I remember watching, transfixed, as it came hurtling straight toward my forehead. It seemed to move very slowly, and everything in the world, including myself, came to a sudden stop awaiting its arrival; so slowly did it approach that I felt like a man on a pier waiting for a boat to arrive. It drew closer and closer, and when it was very, very close the world abruptly jerked back into frantic motion. The absurd thought struck me that I really should be doing more than I was to get out of the thing's way—then the spear struck its target with a peculiar sound of crumpled metal and all at once I was flying backward through the air. Behind or above me—direction lost all meaning—I caught a glimpse of the eagle banner as it wavered and tottered and went crashing to the ground like myself, and then the blood-red world turned darkest black.

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C H A P T E R T H I R T Y - N I N E

sat on a hard rock surrounded by rough-hewn walls of black stone, with black stone underfoot and above my head. I thought at first that the place was a cave, but the walls were too angular to be natural, and the air was warm, not cold I and clammy. Perhaps it was the old silver mine up on Mount Argentum, I thought, but that was all wrong. I was in the famous Labyrinth of Crete, of course, for peering at me from around a corner, its horns making a vast shadow on the wall beyond, was the Minotaur itself.

The thing was quite close to me, so close that I could see the glistening flesh of its great black nostrils and the glint in its great black eyes. I should have been mad with fear, but strangely I was not. All I could think was that the beast's nostrils, moist and porous and sprouting a few coarse hairs, looked very delicate and sensitive, and that its eyes were rather beautiful in a bovine way. It was a living creature, and amid so much hard, bloodless stone anything made of living flesh seemed precious and rare, something to be cherished, not feared. Even so, as the beast stepped from around the corner and drew closer, its two hooves clicking on the stone, I was a bit unnerved at the sight of a bull who walked upright and had a human torso. I noticed also that its tall, curv-ing horns had very sharp points and were marked by a stain the color of rust.

The Minotaur snorted, spraying steam from its dripping black nostrils. It stopped a few steps away and cocked its head. When it spoke, it was in a voice that seemed somehow disguised, for it sounded hoarse and unnatural. "Who are you?" it said.

"My name is Gordianus."

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"You don't belong here."

"I came here to find something."

"That was foolish. This is a maze, and the purpose of a maze is to mislead."

"But I've found my way to you."

"Or did I find my way to you?"

I felt a quiver not of fear but of uncertainty, so profound that it made my head ache. I closed my eyes for a moment. When I opened them again, I felt that something had changed, and realized that the stone walls around me had faded away. Even so, it was still quite dark.

I was atop a high hill beneath starlight, looking down on a country scene—a stream with a water mill, a stone wall in the distance, a road, a farmhouse. It was my farm, I realized, though I was seeing it from an unfamiliar angle. I seemed to be on a ridge, though not the ridge I was used to. The view was oddly tilted and askew.

We were no longer alone. I turned and saw three naked, headless bodies seated on tree stumps in a row with their hands in their laps, like spectators at a play, or judges at a trial.

"Who are they? What are they doing here?" I asked the Minotaur in a hushed, confidential tone, though the others were clearly deaf, blind, and dumb. "You know, don't you?"

The Minotaur nodded.

"Then tell me."

The Minotaur shook its head.

"Speak!"

The beast snorted through its great, black, steaming nostrils and said nothing. It raised a human arm and pointed at something on the ground beside me. I looked down and saw a sword. I picked it up and weighed it in my grip, pleased by the way it gleamed beneath the starlight.

"Speak, or I shall make you join them," I said, pointing with the sword to the three headless witnesses.

The Minotaur remained mute. I stood and brandished the blade.

"Speak!" I said, and when the beast refused, I swung the sword with all my strength and cut clear through its great bullish neck. As its head tumbled away, I saw that the Minotaur was hollow inside; its body was only a costume, and its head a mask. The true head began to emerge from within. I stepped back, my temples aching from the suspense.