Ovid

She drew herself up a finger's-breadth straighter. She was so tall that her pale eyes were almost on a level with mine.

'And do you think,' she said slowly, 'that I don't know that?'

There was no more to be said. I thanked them and left.

32

I'll say one thing for litters. They give you a chance to think things through in comfort, which is just what I did on the way home. Quinctilia had rattled me more than I liked to admit even to myself. Yeah, sure, the facts pointed clearly to Varus being guilty — after all, a traitor is a traitor is a traitor — but the old girl had been convincing as hell. Maybe I was wrong about Varus after all, or at least half wrong, despite the letter. Maybe he had been set up. The question was how?

Okay, I thought. Let's say he isn't our fourth man. Call the guy X. X's job is to get Varus into bed with Arminius. Obviously he has to be someone Varus trusts and will listen to. And he needs to be on the spot, because the scam's tricky and he has to keep a close personal eye on how things are going.

In other words X is a high-up member of Varus's staff who's also a personal friend.

Fine. So X moves on to the first part of the plan. He arranges for the two to come together. That's easy. Varus already knows Arminius from Rome, they've even met socially. Out there in the sticks with his polished Roman manners Arminius stands out like a rose in a desert. Compared to the other locals he's okay, he's civilised, he's one of the club. So when Arminius tells Varus that he's got a proposition to make, one that's in Rome's interests and incidentally will make Varus a penny or two for himself, the old guy's half won over already.

So Arminius and Varus set up a private bargain. North of the river, where Roman writ stops, Germany's a loose collection of hostile tribes, one of which is Arminius's. Up to now they've been nothing but a pain in the arse, which is why we've had to keep the Rhine garrisons up to strength. Arminius proposes, with Varus's help, to weld them into a federation with himself at the head. With Arminius in charge that would leave us with a friendly client kingdom on the far bank which would take the pressure off our northern frontier. Sure, he tells Varus, it'll be dangerous in the short term. I'll have to pretend that I'm acting against Rome. Only you'll know the truth. You'll know I'm on your side. So all it needs is for Varus to turn a blind eye, maybe kick in now and again by using Roman troops against tribes that wouldn't play ball. And then there would be the money; lots and lots of money, because Roman military governors don't come cheap…

Yeah. The greedy old sod would've jumped at it.

So who was X, the lad who starts the ball rolling? Like I said, he had to be someone close to Varus and one of the imperial admin team. Someone high up.

Varus's deputy? Numonius Vela?

It fitted. Vela was a family friend, Quinctilia had told me that. He was also the second most important man in the province after the governor. And when it came time to shift the blame — the time of the final march — he would've made sure he had the hard evidence to clear himself if necessary and incriminate his boss: Quinctilia's letter. Short of a signed confession witnessed by all six Vestals and half the College of Augurs no one could ask for better. With the finger pointing at his own choice for governor Augustus himself was down the tube without a lifebelt. I'd've betted he'd oppose the detour to the Teutoburg, too, knowing that Varus would overrule him.

The last stage of the plan fitted as well. Varus would've thought the German trap was only another part of the scam: one last bit of propaganda to really get things cooking: a victory over a Roman army in the field. Only Vela knew better. He'd made his own deal with Arminius. Sure, the engagement would be limited, but not all the blood would be fake. The Germans would let Varus into the Teutoburg, but they wouldn't attack at once like he expected them to. They'd wait until he was too far in to get himself out and then they'd hit him hard and keep hitting him until he didn't know which end was up any more…

At which point they'd stop. That was the crucial difference between how X had arranged things with Arminius and how they'd actually happened. There would be no massacre. Varus would surrender, or be allowed to come out of the forest with his army in shreds. The result would be the same either way. Varus's reputation would be down the tube and Augustus's with it.

Only, of course, it didn't happen that way either. Arminius had been playing a game of his own. He'd doublecrossed both Varus and Livia's agent and gone straight for the jugular. No wonder Vela was twitchy. He must've realised that he'd been had long before the last day when he'd cut his losses and tried to make it on his own back to the Rhine. Maybe he thought Arminius would let him through; or maybe he just panicked. In any case it hadn't done him any good. Exit Varus. And exit our fourth conspirator.

Leaving, of course, the prime movers behind the scam, Livia and Tiberius, in the shit up to their imperial eyeballs.

I leaned back against the litter cushions feeling pretty smug. Yeah. It worked, it hung together. I had to find out more about Vela, though. At the moment the guy was no more than a name. Maybe Perilla could help.

But when I stopped off to talk to her the door slave said she was out, visiting her mother.

33

Which reminded me of my own filial duties. I hadn't been round to my mother's in over two months, not even during the Floralia. Now might be as good a time as any. At least I looked sober and presentable: I'd put on my sharpest mantle for the visit to Quinctilia's and I still had my best litter out. It was hard luck on the litter-team that Mother happened to live out on the Caelian where we'd just been, but with my eccentric preference for walking the guys could afford to lose a few pounds anyway.

After the divorce Mother had married a widower, Helvius Priscus. Apart from the wedding ceremony itself, when I'd given the bride away, I'd only seen the old guy twice, and I doubted if my mother had seen him much oftener, because his hobby took him away from home a lot. Priscus's bag was tombs and tomb inscriptions. Etruscan and early Republican tombs especially. Try to get him to talk about normal things, like how the Blues are doing these days race-wise or who said what to who at last night's party and all you get is grunts. Ask him about the development of orthography from its primitive beginnings to the modern day tied in with the epigraphic evidence for a vowel shift in the vernacular and you can't shut the guy up. Ah, well. It takes all types.

Mother was looking welclass="underline" she'd lost a lot of weight after the still-birth and never put it back on. When I came in she was discussing floral arrangements with one of the house slaves.

'Marcus! Lovely to see you!' She came over and kissed me on the cheek, and I smelt the scent she has specially mixed for her by the best perfume maker in Alexandria. 'Where have you been these last few months?'

'Only two, Mother.'

'Then it seems longer.' She stepped back. I saw her eyes go to the bruise beside my ear, where I'd landed when Silanus's porter threw me out. 'You've hurt yourself.'

'Nothing serious. I fell down some steps, that's all.'

'You drink too much, dear.

'It had nothing to do with anything I drank.'

'Nonsense.' The smile in her eyes took the sting from her words. 'Come and sit down.'

I stretched myself out on the guest couch as she gave the house slave his final instructions. Then, sitting down herself, she turned back to me.

'So, Marcus,' she said. 'And what's been happening with you?'

'Nothing particular.' I wasn't going to tell her about the Ovid affair; and with Priscus being strictly the butt end of high society I doubted if she'd have heard from anyone else.