Chapter XVIII #4
He was angry now, a muscle twitching in his cheek – always a warning sign – but I was angry myself, and in no mood to retreat. He turned his back and took a few paces away from me, then halted. When he swung round, he had mastered his temper, although his face was clenched with suppressed rage.
– Very well. If you insist, I shall take my will to the Senate and read it out. Does that satisfy you?
I replied that it did.
I started to leave, but he called me back.
– Aren’t you forgetting something?
He held out his hand.
– My ring. You no longer have any need of it.
I took it from my finger and placed it on his open palm, then left without another word.
Augustus duly kept his promise.
Or rather, he half kept it.
In June, he processed down the Palatine Hill to the Senate House and entered to an ovation. He was carrying a document that he told me was his will. I walked behind him and took my place on the front benches.
Piso formally proposed him for his new office, granting him tribunician powers for life.
The result of the vote had been settled beforehand.
The motion passed without a dissenting voice.
A noisy demonstration of approval followed.
On and on it went. Each time Augustus, smiling and gesturing downwards with both hands, managed to suppress the acclamation, it started up again, like the roar of successive waves pounding on a beach.
He shrugged – helplessly, modestly – until at last he became quite stern and shouted at them, Enough!
I can no longer remember exactly what he said in his speech. He thanked them for their prayers during his illness. He spoke proudly of his years as consul. He accepted his new position with all humility. He pledged to maintain the Republic.
Finally, he said that he knew there had been speculation at the height of his sickness as to who would replace him if he died.
That was not a matter for him, but for the Senate and people of Rome.
Naturally, he had his own ideas, although he had never discussed them in public. He felt it would not be wise.
– The Divine Julius named me his heir, but in his wisdom, he did not inform me beforehand, and I am very glad he didn’t.
Can you imagine the burden that would have fallen on me, a lad of seventeen, if I had been conscious of my destiny?
Can you imagine the plots that would have swirled around me?
Do you think his murderers would have killed him and let me live?
Nevertheless, he said, his policy was to be honest at all times. For that reason, he had brought his will with him today, and if the Conscript Fathers really believed it was in the best interests of the nation, he was prepared to read it aloud.
I still have no idea whether the response that followed was prearranged or spontaneous. All I know is that someone sitting behind me shouted out that he was not to read it, prompting several isolated cries of No! that spread around the chamber and swelled into a thunderous chant.
– No! No! No!
After a while, during which again it was impossible for him to speak, Augustus shrugged, and tucked the document into the sleeve of his toga.
On his way out of the chamber, he gave me a sidelong look, with a rueful half-smile, as if to say, I tried, but what can I do?
That was enough for me.
The following day, I asked to see Augustus, and told him I had decided to leave Rome immediately and travel abroad.
For once, I took him completely by surprise. At first he refused to believe me. He tried to laugh it off. Then, when he saw that I was serious, he berated me for my ingratitude and disloyalty.
– What if I refuse you permission to leave Italy? I have the power, you know.
– Then I shall go anyway, and you can arrest me.
That produced another outburst. He shouted that I was abusing his friendship. He had raised me up from nothing. Without him, where would I be? Just a soldier in the ranks!
He was too irritably defensive to apologise for his duplicity over the non-reading of his will, and too proud to beg me to stay. Not that it would have made any difference if he had. My mind was made up.
I pointed out that there was nothing left to keep me in the city. I held no magistracy. My programme of building was practically finished. There were no wars that had to be fought. And I was heartily sick of the marriage to Claudia that he had insisted upon.
– Your position is unassailable. For the first time since we were boys, you have no need of me.
He began to calm down. His tone became more reasonable.
– People will say we have quarrelled.
– Haven’t we?
– Yes, which is a grief to me. But I would prefer it if no one else knew. You might become a focus for discontent.
– I would never allow it.
– Even so, you are the most famous general in the Republic. We can’t be seen to have fallen out. At least accept a legateship, so that I can say you are travelling as my representative. Where is it you wish to go?
– I haven’t decided. The east somewhere.
– That can be arranged. I’ll ask Maecenas to put his mind to it. He’ll be in touch.
And so we parted, civilly enough at the end, after more than a quarter of a century of intimate friendship, torn apart by the ineluctable dictates of power.