Free Augustus by Allan Massie Page A

our self-confidence and relaxation.' 'Nevertheless', he said, and proceeded straightaway to do what Agrippa had thought unnecessary. That 'nevertheless' was why Maco was such a fine sergeant-major - he never took things at face value; and why he stayed a sergeant-major - there are times when face value is true value.
    'Well?' I said.
    'Well. Have you eaten?'
    'No, I don't think so.'
    'Well, you bloody should. I've told you that often. You'll wear yourself out, shrimp, if you don't eat. You'll get ulcers. Told you that too bloody often, you don't bloody listen, do you? You feed your horse, don't you? Wouldn't let him go without food, eh? Well, then, don't be such a bloody fool. This is good cheese. Here, you!' he called, 'Bring the general bread and cheese and wine. Look sharp about it.'
    'All right, all right,' I said, 'you don't need to go on. I've nothing against food, you know.'
    'I should hope not. It's only the bloody rich can afford to despise food.'
    'Well, I'm rich,' I said. 'Bloody rich, if you like. So what's the news?' Agrippa began to laugh.
    'All right,' I said, 'I concede. You've forced me to ask this time.'
    I picked up a piece of bread. 'Look,' I said, 'I'm eating. So what's the news?'
    'They'll all desert, bar a few of the stuffier officers. But on one condition. You yourself must advance to them, ahead of your army, with no bigger escort than you have here. They want to make it seem spontaneous, not as if they've been coerced.'
    He paused, gave me a crooked smile. 'Do you buy that?' he said.
    'Why not? It's not that proposal I'm buying, it's your judgement. And I bought that a long time ago, and see no reason to go back on the deal. You obviously think it's fine, or you wouldn't be eating this bread - which is on the stale side by the way, and the wine's sour - sitting here on your backside. You would have been posting back to camp, fairly sharply I should say.'
    'Too bloody right I would,' he said. 'It's OK, they're yours. There are no hostile troops between here and Rome.'
    * * *
    It was very hot the next few days. Agrippa drank great draughts of beer and sweated it out almost as fast as he engulfed them. As for me I contented myself with sucking at lemons and pomegranates and sipping white wine in which a block of snow brought down by mule train from the high Apennines had been allowed to dissolve. We were lucky, they said, to get snow to cool our wine so late in the year.
    There was a constant coming and going of secretaries. Letters were flooding in from the municipalities, from the priestly colleges, from individual senators, from the trade guilds and the equestrian corporations. 'If we'd realized you were this loved, my dear, we wouldn't have delayed all these dreary months,' Maecenas said. 'I can't wait to be in the city. To visit the baths and the theatre. I've heard there's a sensational new dancer from Spain, a real yum-yum, only sixteen and not an ounce of puppy fat, hard as a camp-bed (to coin a phrase). Give me another glass of that muck, ducky, I can hardly wait. . .'
    'What the hell are we waiting for anyway?' Agrippa said.
    'Things must be done properly,' Marcellus said. 'We are not entering the city as conquerors. We must arrange the right sort of reception. It takes time.'
    I experienced a curious peace as I listened to them, a peace such as I had indeed not known before. It was as if we had rolled the whole last year of struggle into one ball, which was now hanging on the lip of the hole as in a game of marbles. For the moment there was no need of decision, no further struggle. I have known the same feeling since; it comes when the flood of events has taken direction of one's life out of one's hands. No doubt despair can affect one similarly. I have never known despair.
    Now all I said was: 'Besides I must first go to see that all is well with my mother and sister.'
    * * *
    Octavia was confused.
    'You look the same,' she said, 'when I look at you properly, but I would hardly have