'Caesarius — read that again!' he spluttered. 'A ton of silver to those filthy barbarians, for allowing us passage on a river that is ours by right?'
I returned to the offending passage and reread it aloud.
'"…in exchange for a one-time payment of two thousand pounds of silver…" Indeed, that is what it says, Julian.'
'This is how he informs me of Florentius' dealings, by ordering me to pay two thousand pounds of silver in a treaty with which I was in no way involved?'
Julian was outraged. He clambered out of the pool and paced dripping wet along the side, naked in the frigid air, his furious expression ill-disguised by the dim light of the torches. He was still slight of build, but the stoop with which he had trudged as a scholar had been replaced by a springy, almost nervous bounce and the ramrod straightness of a soldier. So too, his physique had developed a hard, well-defined musculature and a series of scars resulting from his daily physical training and strenuous living on campaign. The boy Caesar now had a coarse coating of hair on his chest and shoulders, and a hard, determined look in his eyes, and his demeanor was far more impatient and demanding than when I had first come to know him. In fact, I reflected, there was very little left of the Julian I had first encountered years ago in Athens. I reexamined the letter.
'Here,' I said, 'the Emperor perhaps anticipated your resentment at being informed in this way of Florentius' agreement — in the next sentence, he softens his command by adding the phrase, "unless it seems absolutely disgraceful for you to do so…"'
'Disgraceful? It's an outrage! I refuse to submit to Florentius' bullying, and his preying on Constantius' ignorance of conditions here. Is he so uninformed of my goals? Does he believe this is how we restore Gaul to prosperity? This is how we recapture Rome's lost glory in the eyes of the barbarians? It is scandalous, an outrage!..' And for long moments afterwards he muttered in fury, until he finally realized the discomfort of pacing in that temperature outside the confines of the hot water, and slipped back in.
I did not even inquire at the time what he found so disgraceful about the payment: whether it was the high price or the manner in which it was presented to him. I suspect, however, that even if the outlay had been nothing more than a pound of dried cod and an old shoe, he still would have been infuriated with Florentius' back-dealing.
'And what do you imagine the Emperor's reaction will be at your refusal to pay the negotiated settlement?' I inquired evenly after he had calmed somewhat.
Julian glanced at me slyly and then slid under the steaming water till his head was completely submerged, where he remained motionless a long while, only a trail of bubbles rising to indicate he was still alive. After a moment, he slowly rose up again, now with a faint smile on his face as he wiped the water from his eyes with the back of his hand.
'He will have the same reaction as he did when I sent General Marcellus packing, when I reconquered Cologne, when I defeated the Alemanni without assistance from Barbatio, when I exceeded my mandate — nothing.'
I was not impressed. 'Julian,' I said, 'for four years you have been walking a very fine line as far as Constantius is concerned. You are perceived in the court as a threat to his sole rule. He has killed many rivals for much less worthy reasons.'
Julian snorted and, climbing out, began toweling himself off. 'Of all the things I should fear, that is the last,' he said.
'Oh?'
'Think, Caesarius. His eunuchs may perceive me as a threat — but clever Constantius knows better. For the first time in decades the province's treasury is full and tribute is pouring into the Emperor's coffers. The Alemanni are on the run, freeing up his legions for the Persians. And his troublesome young cousin is apparently quietly satisfied in his provincial little cities in Gaul, safely out of the Emperor's hair in Rome. Constantius could do much, much worse than to keep me alive and content in my position, don't you think?'
Thus in answer to the Emperor's missive, Julian's first order was to the city's bakers: since the season was still long before the snows would melt in the passes and his spring campaigning rations arrive from Aquitania, he ordered all the army's reserve stocks of grain to be mobilized from the surrounding depots, and the ovens to be operated day and night until a sufficient quantity of buccellatum, hardtack, had been baked to be distributed to each soldier to last twenty days. Their rucksacks filled with these crusts, he marched the army out of winter quarters two months before the traditional spring campaigning season was to begin. As planned, he encountered the barbarians still lolling in their beds. Within a matter of weeks, he had carried out such a number of lightning raids as to leave every barbarian king who had not submitted after Strasbourg, including King Hortarius, King Suomarius the Beardless, the brother kings Macrianus and Hariobaudes, the legendary King Vadomarius, King Urius the Harelip, and even the far-off kings Ursicinus and Vestralpus, begging him on their knees to accept hostages and allow their people to retreat back to the far side of the Rhine.
Even this Julian did not accept, however, for to him it was not sufficient that the Rhine serve as a mere boundary between Rome's empire and the barbarian lands: the river must henceforth be subject to free passage for all of Rome's ships and supplies, and so he demanded not only that the barbarians transfer across the river, but that they move far beyond, leaving a wide buffer zone between their own lands and the thither bank. When Urius the Harelip complained at what he viewed as excessively harsh treatment in forbidding his people from their ancestral lands, and refused to vacate his villages and farms, Julian deigned not even to respond to his envoys, but merely sent his legions across one of the new pontoon bridges he had built and put Urius' homes and harvests to flame, with all plunder and prisoners packed up and sent immediately to Rome. After that, there were no further challenges to Roman authority from the Alemanni.
During his years of campaigning against the Germans, Julian crossed the Rhine with his armies three times while under attack; he rescued and restored to their lands twenty thousand Roman citizens and their dependents being held captive on the far side of the river; and in two battles and one siege he captured ten thousand Alemanni prisoners, not merely ones of unserviceable age, but men in the prime of military life — the numbers of old men, women, and children he captured numbered probably thrice again as many. To Constantius he sent four large levies of excellent Gallic and Germanic infantry, an additional three more that were not so excellent, and two complete and remarkably fit squadrons of cavalry, a very attractive rate of return on the Emperor's original investment in Julian, which, as you will recall, Brother, consisted merely of a handful of singing ascetics; and most important, he recovered all the towns and cities the Alemanni were holding in Gaul upon his arrival four years earlier, strengthened their fortifications against any future attacks, and repopulated their deserted streets and farms.
Julian was right: Gaul was now at peace, and the Emperor could do much worse than to keep him alive and content.