"Then suppose you get whatever supplies you need. Fight the naval battle."
Gaius had to struggle to keep himself from smiling. This was a test of command in an asymmetric struggle, and he was ready for it. "I must start by agreeing with Cleopatra how we shall fight," Gaius said. "I agree my fight is with Octavian, and I tell my troops, and anyone else who will listen, including their troops, that once Octavian himself is defeated, there will be no more of Roman killing Roman."
"You are still on land and Octavian is at sea," the general smiled, but he had nodded in appreciation of Gaius' sentiments.
"I know you are going to accuse me of hindsight," Gaius said, "but Cleopatra has to go to the north of me, or stay on land. I drill her troops well before the fight, and make sure the commanders know what the plan is, and what to do under the various options that might develop. They have to believe me, so they stay with the fight."
"That's sound," the General nodded. "What you must realize is that particularly with ships, once the battle starts it is very difficult to issue more than the very basic commands. So, why are they not going to flee?"
"Basically, I hope to have a surprise for Octavian."
"And that is?"
"The fundamental problem at Actium was that neither ship could do much to the other, so they all stood off and fired arrows and spears a each other, without doing an awful lot of damage. Antony should have known that, because he knew the characteristics of the ships."
"That's not a surprise," the General pointed out.
"I'm getting to it. What I do is plate some of the upper decks, and have good fires going. If I can find some naphtha, I fill flasks with it, and if not, I'll have a good store of burnable wood impregnated with sulphur. Well before the battle, I shall have tried to modify ballistae or catapults to propel this stuff, but if not, we have to throw it. The quinqueremes were much higher, so we can propel that down onto the enemy ships. And before you bite my head off, in the time leading up to the battle, I would have developed what is needed to carry this off, and had my men drilled so it would work. The drills would, of course be out of sight of Octavian," Gaius added.
"So, on September 2, what exactly are you going to do?"
"I ensure the ships are ready, the crews are well-fed thanks to my raids into Greece, the catapults are working, and the fires lit. I then sail out to meet Octavian. I then try to work out where Octavian is likely to be, and attack towards the south of him, leaving the centre open. We start off fighting with spears and arrows."
"Why?"
"If Octavian wants to get in behind me, so much the better," Gaius said simply. "He can't flee from there."
"So?"
"Once the fighting gets underway, and our quinqueremes are properly surrounded, I order the fire attack," Gaius said. "I hope to burn their ships. Once a fire is going, fleeing is pointless. I offer them the surrender or incineration. Surrender requires the striking of any sail, the laying down of weapons, and rowing towards my land forces."
"I see," the General nodded.
"So?"
"Again, who knows? However, I will say this for you. If you ever launch a surprise in battle and it does realistic damage, you usually prevail. In battle, the enemy simply has no time to coordinate a response. Even if some captain thinks out a response to your tactic, it will only save him. With no communication, each ship has to come up with its own solution, and that is simply asking too much. If you offer them the option of surrender, most will probably accept. Why?"
"Because to die with no possibility of escape, purpose, or victory is not courage," Gaius remarked. "It is just plain stupid."
"What about Thermopylae?"
"There was purpose," Gaius noted, "namely to buy time, but in my view on the last day the survivors should have fled to fight another day."
"Ah, but think, no legend!"
"I want to be a winner, not a legend," Gaius countered.
"I can understand that," the General smiled. "Gaius, this is your last lesson from me, but don't stop learning. I'll recommend you to Tiberius, and when you get your command, remember you're still learning. The one thing you cannot be taught is how to sense what's going on. My one piece of advice is, when you see the enemy make a move, ask yourself, why? Try pretending you are him. If you can answer why he is doing whatever he is doing, you might guess what's coming next in time to do something about it. Don't despise the enemy, but don't grant him superhuman skill. Most of the time he's about average. Finally, look after your men. If you do, they'll look after you, and to start with, you'll need looking after. Good luck to you."
When Gaius left the room, one phrase kept ringing in his ears: when you get your command. He had satisfied the old man. He would get the hand up he needed.
Chapter 19
"It is now time to have our debate. You have elected to follow the theory of Aristarchus. Do you wish to concede?" Timothy's face was strangely tense.
"Before I've started?" Gaius asked in disbelief.
"Just checking," Timothy shrugged. "You wish to bet?"
"No." Timothy's expression was familiar, but where had he seen it?
"And why not? Are you afraid?" Timothy taunted.
"Afraid of what?" a perplexed Gaius asked. "You think you could put up more money than I could cover?"
Now Timothy's expressions became apprehensive. He had planned his approach over and over again, and he had convinced himself that the best way to secure his freedom was to play on the natural Claudian arrogance. But, despite all the mental rehearsals, this had not gone the way it was supposed to go. Suddenly he was on the defensive, and not in the position he had hoped for. "I might want my freedom," he said at last.
"Oh!" Gaius laughed. "So that's it!" He now understood the tense expression: it meant 'this has got to work'. But where had he seen it, and why was it bothering him?
"And you object?" a now deflated Timothy almost rasped out.
"Of course not!" Gaius replied. "I'm not betting because, quite simply, there's no way of verifying what the truth is, however I've promised you your freedom, so why bet for what you've got? All you can do is lose?"
"I haven't actually got my freedom," Timothy said softly. "I know you said, but. ."
"But some Romans don't honour their word?" Gaius asked in a challenging tone, then, on seeing Timothy's fearful expression, he added, "Don't say any more. A lot of Romans don't honour their word, but I'm not one of them. Here, win or lose, is the piece of paper freeing you, and here is payment for services to date. " He paused, and handed over a sheet of vellum and a small bag of coins.
"Thank you," Timothy felt even more deflated when he saw the small bag of coins. Typical Roman, stingy to the end. Then he looked inside the bag, and gasped. Where he expected sesterces and had hoped for denarii, there were aureii. He looked at Gaius, firstly with a new respect, then with an expression of greedy curiosity, then, pulling himself together, he said, "Then we'd better finish off the lessons with our debate. You must state your interpretation of the theory of Aristarchus. You may vary it if you wish."
"Then as I understand it," Gaius started slowly but clearly, and while he appeared to be looking into empty space, his eyes were fixed on Timothy as he watched for reflexes, to let him know where Timothy thought his strength was. "The Earth is a very large sphere and along with the planets, which are of comparable size, it travels around the sun. Jupiter and Saturn, being so bright and so distant will be much bigger. The Moon travels around the Earth, and it is a sphere of about a third the size of the Earth. That would give it a diameter of about 4,500 kilometers, and from geometry it is somewhere between a hundred and thirty thousand to half a million kilometres away. From Aristarchus' calculation the sun is approximately twenty times bigger and twenty times further away. I believe these distances are only approximate and. ."