"Yes," my father said, "but you are not dead. I could not endure knowing that I had allowed you to die before your time. You will not be tried for treason. I have composed a letter which I shall read to the Senate. You will be charged under my law of the crime of adultery, and you will be exiled from the city and provinces of Rome. It is the only way. It is the only way to save you and Rome." He smiled a little, though I could see that his eyes were moist. "Do you remember, I used to call you my Little Rome?"
"Yes," I said.
"And now it seems that I was right. The fate of one may be the fate of the other."
"Julius Antonius," I said. "What will become of Julius Antonius?"
He touched my hand again. "My child," he said, "Julius Antonius is dead. He took his life this morning, when he learned beyond doubt that the plot was discovered."
I could not speak. At last I said, "I had hoped… I had hoped…"
"I shall not see you again," my father said. "I shall not see you again."
"It does not matter," I said.
He looked at me once more. Tears came into his eyes, and he turned away. In a few moments the guards entered the room and took me away.
I have not seen my father since. I understand that he will not speak my name.
In the news that I received from Rome this morning was the information that after all these years Tiberius has returned from Rhodes and is now in Rome. He has been adopted by my father. If he does not die, he will succeed my father, and become the Emperor.
Tiberius has won.
I shall write no more.
BOOK III
Letter: Octavius Caesar to Nicolaus of Damascus (A.D. 14)
August 9
My dear Nicolaus, I send you affectionate greetings and my thanks for the recent shipment of those dates of which I am so fond, and which you have been kind enough to furnish me over the years. They have become one of the most important of the Palestinian imports, and they are known throughout Rome and the Italian provinces by your name, which I have given them. The nicolai, I call them; and the designation has persisted among those who can afford their cost. I hope it amuses you to learn that your name is known better to the world through this affectionate eponym than through your many books. We both must have reached the age when we can take some ironic pleasure in the knowledge of the triviality into which our lives have finally descended.
I write you from aboard my yacht, the one upon which so many years ago you and I used to float leisurely among the little islands that dot our western coastline. I sit where we used to sit-slightly forward of midship upon that canopied platform which is raised so that the constant and slow movement of the sea might be observed without hindrance. We set sail from Ostia this morning, in an unseasonably chill hour before dawn; and now we are drifting southward toward the Campanian coast. I have determined that this shall be a leisurely journey. We shall depend upon the wind to carry us; and if the wind refuses, we shall wait upon it, suspended by the vast buoyancy of the sea.
Our destination is Capri. Some months ago one of my Greek neighbors there asked me to be guest of honor at the yearly gymnastic competitions of the island youths; I demurred at the time, pleading the burden of my duties. But a short while ago, it became necessary for me to travel southward upon another mission, and I determined to give myself the pleasure of this holiday.
Last week my wife approached me with that rather stiff formality she has never lost, and requested that I accompany her and her son on a journey to Benevento, where Tiberius had to go on some business connected with his new authority. Livia explained to me what I already knew-that the people are not persuaded that I am fond of my adopted son, and that any display of affection or concern I might show will make more secure Tiberius's eventual succession to my power.
Livia did not put the matter so directly as she might have; despite her strength of character, she has always been a diplomatic woman. Like one of those Asian diplomats with whom I have dealt for much of my life, she wished to suggest to me without brutally stating the case that the days of my life are limited in number, and that I must prepare the world for that moment of chaos which will inevitably follow my death.
Of course Livia was in this matter, as she has been in most, quite reasonable and correct. I am in my seventy-sixth year; I have lived longer than I have wished to do, and such mortal boredom does not augment longevity. My teeth are nearly gone; my hand shakes with an occasional palsy that always surprises me; and the lassitude of age pulls at my limbs. When I walk I sometimes have the odd sensation that the earth is shifting under my feet, that the stone or brick or patch of earth upon which I step may suddenly move beneath me, and that I shall fall free of the earth to wherever one goes when time has done with one.
And so I acceded to her request, upon the condition that my accompaniment be a ceremonial one. I suggested that since sea travel makes Tiberius ill, he and his mother take the land route to Benevento, while I traveled in the same direction by sea; and that if either of them wished to make public the news that the husband or adoptive father traveled with them, I would not dispute it. It is a satisfactory arrangement, and I imagine that we all are more pleased by this subterfuge than we would have been by public honesty.
Yes, my wife is a remarkable woman; I suppose I have been more fortunate than most husbands. She was quite beautiful when she was a young woman, and she has remained handsome in her age. We loved each other for only a few years after our marriage, but we remained civil; and I believe that at last we have become something like friends. We understand each other. I know that deep within her Republican heart she has always felt that she married beneath her station, that she traded the dignity of an ancient title for the brute power of one whose authority was undeserved by his more humble name. I have come to believe that she did so for the sake of her first-born son, Tiberius, of whom she has always been inexplicably fond and for whom she has had the most tenacious ambition. It was this ambition that caused the first estrangement between us, an estrangement that grew so deep that at one period of our lives I spoke to my wife only of topics upon which I had made careful notes, so that we might not have to undergo the additional burden of misunderstanding, real or imagined.
And yet in the long run, despite the difficulties it caused between Livia and me, that ambition has worked for the benefit of my authority and Rome. Livia was always intelligent enough to know that her son's succession depended upon my undisputed retention of power, and that he would be crushed if he were not bequeathed a stable Empire. And if Livia is capable of contemplating my death with equanimity, I am sure that she will contemplate her own in a like manner; her real concern is for that order of which we both are mere instruments.
So in deference to that concern for order which I share, and in preparation for this voyage, three days ago I deposited at the Temple of the Vestal Virgins four documents, which are to be opened and read to the Senate only upon the occasion of my death.
The first of these was my will, which bequeaths to Tiberius two-thirds of my personal property and wealth. Though Tiberius does not need it, such a bequest is a necessary gesture to an adequate succession. The remaining portion-except for minor provisions for the citizens and various relatives and friends-goes to Livia, who will also by this document be adopted into the Julian family and be allowed to assume my tides. The name will not please her, but the tides will; for she will understand that her son will gain stature by her possession of the titles, and that her ambition will be that much more easily fulfilled.
The second was a set of directions for my funeral. Those who must put themselves in charge of that matter will no doubt exceed my instructions, which are lavish and vulgar enough to begin with; but such excesses invariably please the people, and thus are necessary. I comfort myself with the knowledge that I shall not have to be witness to this last display.