"And still a virgin, so far as I know. Would you like to marry her? You can if you like. I took a fancy to her for a moment, but it's a funny thing, I don't really like immature women.... Or any mature woman, for that matter, except Caesonia.
Did you recognise the girl?"
"No, Lord, I was only watching you, to tell the truth."
"She's your cousin Messalina, Barbatus' daughter. The old pander didn't utter a word of protest when I asked for her to be sent along to me. What cowards they are, after all, Claudius!"
"Yes,
Lord
God."
"All right, then, I'll marry you two to-morrow. I'm going to bed now, I think."
"A thousand thanks and homages. Lord." He gave me his other foot to kiss.
Next day he kept his promise and married us. He accepted a tenth of Messalina's dowry as a fee but otherwise behaved courteously enough. Calpurnia had been delighted to see me alive again and had pretended not to mind about my marriage.
She said in a business-like way: "Very well, my dear, I'll go back to the farm and look after things for you there again.
You won't miss me, with that pretty wife of yours. And now you have money you'll have to live at the Palace again."
I told her that the marriage was forced on me and that I would miss her very much indeed. But she pooh-poohed that: Messalina had twice her looks, three times her brains, and birth and money into the bargain. I was in love with her already, Calpurnia said.
I felt uncomfortable. Calpumia had been my only true friend in all those four years of misery. What had she not done for me? And yet she was right: I was in love with Messalina, and Messalina was to be my wife now. There would be no place for Calpurnia with Messalina about.
She was in tears as she went away. So was I. I was not in love with her, but she was my truest friend and I knew that if ever I needed her she would be there to help me. I need not say that when I received the dowry money I did not forget her.
XXXIII
MESSALINA WAS AN EXTREMELY BEAUTIFUL GIRL, SLIM and quick-moving with eyes as black as jet and masses of curly black hair. She hardly spoke a word and had a mysterious smile which drove me nearly crazy with love for her.
She was so glad to have escaped from Caligula and so quick to realise the advantages that marriage with me gave her, that she behaved in a way which made me quite sure that she loved me as much as I loved her. This was practically the first time I had been in love with anyone since my boyhood; and when a not very clever, not very attractive man of fifty falls in love with a very attractive and very clever girl of fifteen it is usually a poor look-out for him.
We were married in October. By December she was pregnant by me. She appeared very fond of my little Antonia, who was aged about ten, and it was a relief to me that the child now had someone whom she could call mother, someone who was near enough to her in age to be a friend and could explain the ways of society to her and take her about, as Calpurnia had not been able to do.
Messalina and I were invited to live at the Palace again.
We arrived at an unfortunate time. A merchant called Bassus had been asking questions of a captain of the Palace Guards about Caligula's daily habits--was it true that he walked about the cloisters at night because he could not sleep?
At what time did he do this? Which cloisters did he usually choose? What guard did he have with him? The captain reported the incident to Cassius and Cassius reported it to Caligula. Bassus was arrested and cross-examined. He was forced to admit that he had intended to kill Caligula but denied even under torture that he had any associates. Caligula then sent a message to Bassus' old father, ordering him to attend his son's execution. The old man, who had no notion that Bassus had been planning to assassinate Caligula or even that he had been arrested, was greatly shocked to find his son groaning on the Palace floor, his body broken by torture. But he controlled himself and thanked Caligula for his graciousness in summoning him to close his son's eyes. Caligula laughed. "Close his eyes indeed!
He's going to have no eyes to close, the assassin! I'm going to poke them out in a moment. And yours too."
Bassus' father said: "Spare our lives. We are only tools in the hands of powerful men. I'll give you all the names."
This impressed Caligula, and when the old man mentioned the Guards'
Commander, the Commander of the Germans, Callistus the Treasurer, Caesonia, Mnester, and three or four others, he grew pale with alarm. "And whom would they make Emperor in my place?" he asked. "Your uncle Claudius."
"Is he in the plot too?"
"No, they were merely going to use him as a figurehead." Caligula hurried away and summoned the Guards' Commander, the Commander of the Germans, the Treasurer and myself to a private room. He asked the others, pointing to me;
"Is that creature fit to be Emperor?"
They answered in surprised tones, "Not unless you say so, Jove."
Then he gave them a pathetic smile and exclaimed, "I am one and you are three. Two of you are armed and I am defenceless. If you hate me and want to kill me, do so at once and put that poor idiot into my place as Emperor."
We all fell on our faces and the two soldiers handed him their swords from the floor, saying, "We are innocent of any such treacherous thought. Lord. If you disbelieve us, kill us!"
Do you know, he was actually about to kill us! But while he hesitated I said; "Almighty God, the colonel who summoned me here told me of the charge brought against these loyal men by Bassus' father. Its falsity is evident. If Bassus had really been employed by them, would it have been necessary for him to question the captain about your movements? Would he not have been able to get all the necessary information from these generals themselves? No, Bassus' father has tried to save his own life and Bassus' by a clumsy lie."
Caligula appeared to be convinced by my argument. He gave me his hand to kiss, made us all rise, and handed the swords back. Bassus and his father were thereupon hewn to pieces by the Germans. But Caligula could not rid his mind of the dread of assassination, which was presently increased by a number of unlucky omens. First the porter's lodge at the Palace was struck by lightning. Then Incitatus, when he was brought in to dinner one evening, reared up and cast a shoe which broke an alabaster cup that had belonged to Julius Caesar, spilling the wine on the floor. The worst omen of all was what happened at Olympus, when, in accordance with Caligula's orders, the temple workmen began to take the statue of Jove to pieces for conveyance to Rome. The head was to come off first, to be used as a measure for the new head of Caligula that would be substituted when the statue was reassembled. They had got the pulley fixed to the temple roof and a rope knotted around the neck and were just about to haul, when suddenly a thunderous peal of laughter roared out through the whole building. The workmen rushed away in panic. Nobody could be found bold enough to take their places.
Caesonia now advised him, since by his immovable rigour he had made everyone tremble at the very sound of his name, to rule mildly and earn the people's love instead of their fear. For Caesonia realised how dangerously he was placed and that if anything happened to him she would [4^9] certainly lose her life too, unless she was known to have done her best to dissuade him from his cruelties. He was behaving in a most imprudent way now. He went in turn to the Guards' Commander, the Treasurer and the Commander of the Germans and pretended to take each of them into his confidence saying, "I trust you, but the others are plotting against me and I want you to regard them as my deadliest enemies." They compared notes; and that is why when a real plot was formed they shut their eyes to it. Caligula said that he approved Caesonia's advice and thanked her for it; he would certainly follow it when he had made his peace with his enemies. He called the Senate together and addressed us in this strain: "Soon I shall grant you all an amnesty, my enemies, and reign with love and peace a thousand years. That is the prophecy.