Caesar by Colleen McCullough Read Free Book Online Page A

Quintus Cicero and Atrius. “We'll put all the cavalry, all the baggage animals save for the century mules, and two of the legions on board that half, and send it to Portus Itius first. Then the ships can come back empty and pick up me and the last three legions.” With him he kept Trebonius and Atrius; the other legates were ordered to sail with the first fleet.
    “I'm pleased and flattered to be asked to stay,” Trebonius said, watching those three hundred and fifty ships pushed down into the water. These were the vessels Caesar had ordered specially built along the Liger River and then sent out into the open ocean to do battle with the two hundred and twenty solid-oak sailing ships of the Veneti, who thought the Roman vessels ludicrous with their oars and their flimsy pine hulls, their low prows and poops. Toy boats for sailing on a bathtub sea, easy meat. But it hadn't worked out that way at all.
    While Caesar and his land army picnicked atop the towering cliffs to the north of the mouth of the Liger and watched the action like spectators in the Circus Maximus, Caesar's ships produced the fangs Decimus Brutus and his engineers had grown during that frantic winter building the fleet. The leather sails of the Veneti vessels were so heavy and stout that the main shrouds were chain rather than rope; knowing this, Decimus Brutus had equipped each of his more than three hundred ships with a long pole to which were fixed a barbed hook and a set of grapples. A Roman ship would row in close to a Veneti ship and maneuver alongside, whereupon its crew would tilt their pole, tangle it among the Veneti shrouds, then sprint away under oar power. Down came the Veneti sails and masts, leaving the vessel helpless in the water. Three Roman ships would then surround it like terriers a deer, board it, kill the crew and set fire to it. When the wind fell, Decimus Brutus's victory became complete. Only twenty Veneti ships had escaped.
    Now the specially low sides with which these ships had been built came in very handy. It wasn't possible to load animals as skittish as horses aboard before the ships were pushed into the water, but once they were afloat and held still in the water, long broad gangplanks connected each ship's side with the beach, and the horses were run up so quickly they had no time to take fright.
    “Not bad without a dock,” said Caesar, satisfied. “They'll be back tomorrow, then the rest of us can leave.”
    But tomorrow dawned in the teeth of a northwesterly gale which didn't disturb the waters off the beach very much, but did prevent the return of those three hundred and fifty sound ships.
    “Oh, Trebonius, this land holds no luck for me!” cried the General on the fifth day of the gale, scratching the stubble on his face fiercely.
    “We're the Greeks on the beach at Ilium,” said Trebonius.
    Which remark seemed to make up the General's mind; he turned cold pale eyes upon his legate.
    “I am no Agamemnon,” he said through his teeth, “nor will I stay here for ten years!”
    He turned and shouted. “Atrius!”
    Up ran his camp prefect, startled. “Yes, Caesar?”
    “Will the nails hold in what we have left here?”
    “Probably, in all except about forty.”
    “Then we'll use this northwest wind. Sound the bugles, Atrius. I want everyone and everything on board all but the about forty.”
    “They won't fit!” squeaked Atrius, aghast. “We'll pack 'em in like salt fish in a barrel. If they puke all over each other, too bad. They can all go for a swim in full armor once we reach Portus Itius. We'll sail the moment the last man and the last ballista are aboard.”
    Atrius swallowed. “We may have to leave some of the heavy equipment behind,” he said in a small voice.
    Caesar raised his brows. “I am not leaving my artillery or my rams behind, nor am I leaving my tools behind, nor am I leaving one soldier behind, nor am I leaving one noncombatant behind, nor am I leaving one slave behind. If you can't