A Gladiator Dies Only Once

THE CONSUL'S WIFE

"Honestly," muttered Lucius Claudius, his nose buried in a scroll, "if you go by these accounts in the Daily Acts, you'd think Sertorius was a naughty schoolboy, and his rebellion in Spain a harmless prank. When will the consuls realize the gravity of the situation? When will they take action?" I cleared my throat.

Lucius Claudius lowered the little scroll and raised his bushy red eyebrows. "Gordianus! By Hercules, you got here in a hurry! Take a seat."

I looked about for a chair, then remembered where I was. In the garden of Lucius Claudius, visitors did not fetch furniture. Visitors sat, and a chair would be slipped beneath them. I stepped into the spot of sunlight where Lucius sat basking, and folded my knees. Sure enough, a chair caught my weight. I never even saw the attendant slave.

"Something to drink, Gordianus? I myself am enjoying a cup of hot broth. Too early in the day for wine, even watered."

"Noon is hardly early, Lucius. Not for those of us who've been up since dawn."

"Since dawn?" Lucius grimaced at such a distasteful notion. "A cup of wine for you, then? And some nibbles?"

I raised my hand to wave away the offer, and found it filled with a silver cup, into which a pretty slavegirl poured a stream of Falernian wine. A little tripod table appeared at my left hand, bearing a silver platter embossed with images of dancing nymphs and strewn with olives, dates, and almonds.

"Care for a bit of the Daily! I'm finished with the sporting news." Lucius nodded toward a clutter of little scrolls on the table beside him. "They say the Whites have finally got their act together this season. New chariots, new horses. Should give the Reds a run for the prizes in tomorrow's races."

I laughed out loud. "What a life you lead, Lucius Claudius. Up at noon, then lolling about your garden reading your own private copy of the Daily Acts."

Lucius raised an eyebrow. "Merely sensible, if you ask me. Who wants to elbow through a crowd in the Forum, squinting and peering past strangers to read the Daily on the posting boards? Or worse, listen to some clown read the items out loud, inserting his own witty comments."

"But that's the whole point of the Daily," I argued. "It's a social activity. People take a break from the hustle and bustle of the Forum, gather round the posting boards and discuss whatever items interest them most-war news, marriages and births, chariot races, curious omens. It's the highlight of many a man's day, perusing the Daily and arguing politics or horses with fellow citizens. One of the cosmopolitan pleasures of city life."

Lucius shuddered. "No thank you! My way is better. I send a couple of slaves down to the Forum an hour before posting time. As soon as the Daily goes up, one of them reads it aloud from beginning to end and the other takes dictation with a stylus on wax tablets. Then they hurry home, transcribe the words to parchment, and by the time I'm up and about, my private copy of the Daily is here wait-ing for me in the garden, the ink still drying in the sun. A comfy chair, a sunny spot, a hearty cup of broth, and my own copy of the Daily Acts-I tell you, Gordianus, there's no more civilized way to start the day."

I popped an almond into my mouth. "It all seems rather antisocial to me, not to mention extravagant. The cost of parchment alone!"

"Squinting at wax tablets gives me eyestrain." Lucius sipped his broth. "Anyway, I didn't ask you here to critique my personal pleasures, Gordianus. There's something in the Daily that I want you to see."

"What, the news about that rebellious Roman general terrorizing

Spain?"

"Quintus Sertorius!" Lucius shifted his considerable bulk. "He'll soon have the whole Iberian Peninsula under his control. The natives there hate Rome, but they adore Sertorius. What can our two consuls be thinking, failing to bring military assistance to the provincial government? Decimus Brutus, much as I love the old bookworm, is no fighter, I'll grant you; hard to imagine him leading an expedition. But his fellow consul Lepidus is a military veteran; fought for Sulla in the Civil War. How can those two sit idly on their behinds while Sertorius creates a private kingdom for himself in Spain?"

"All that's in the Daily Acts?" I asked.

"Of course not!" Lucius snorted. "Nothing but the official government line: situation under control, no cause for alarm. You'll find more details about the obscene earnings of charioteers than you'll find about Spain. What else can you expect? The Daily is a state organ put out by the government. Deci probably dictates every word of the war news himself." "Deci?"

"Decimus Brutus, of course; the consul." With his ancient patrician connections, Lucius tended to be on a first-name basis, sometimes on a pet-name basis, with just about everybody in power. "But you distract me, Gordianus. I didn't ask you here to talk about Sertorius. Decimus Brutus, yes; Sertorius, no. Here, have a look at this." His bejeweled hand flitted over the pile and plucked a scroll for me to read.

"Society gossip?" I scanned the items. "A's son engaged to B's daughter… C plays host to D at his country villa… E shares her famous family recipe for egg custard dating back to the days when Romulus suckled the she-wolf." I grunted. "All very interesting, but I don't see-"

Lucius leaned forward and tapped at the scroll. "Read that part.

Aloud."

" 'The bookworm pokes his head outside tomorrow.

Easy prey for the sparrow, but partridges go hungry.

Bright-eyed Sappho says: Be suspicious!

A dagger strikes faster than lightning.

Better yet: an arrow.

Let Venus conquer all!'"

Lucius sat back and crossed his fleshy arms. "What do you make of it?"

"I believe it's called a blind item; a bit of gossip conveyed in code. No proper names, only clues that are meaningless to the uninitiated. Given the mention of Venus, I imagine this particular item is about some illicit love affair. I doubt I'd know the names involved even if they were clearly spelled out. You'd be more likely than I to know what all this means, Lucius."

"Indeed. I'm afraid I do know, at least in part. That's why I called you here today, Gordianus. I have a dear friend who needs your help."

I raised an eyebrow. Lucius's rich and powerful connections had yielded me lucrative work before; they had also put me in great dan-ger. "What friend would that be, Lucius?"

He raised a finger. The slaves around us silently withdrew into the house. "Discretion, Gordianus. Discretion! Read the item again."

"The bookworm-'"

"And whom did I call a bookworm only a moment ago?" I blinked. "Decimus Brutus, the consul." Lucius nodded. "Read on."

" 'The bookworm pokes his head outside tomorrow…'" "Deci will venture to the Circus Maximus tomorrow, to watch the races from the consular box." " 'Easy prey for the sparrow…"'

"Draw your own conclusion from that-especially with the men-tion of daggers and arrows later on!"

I raised an eyebrow. "You think there's a plot against the consul's life, based on a blind item in the Daily Acts? It seems far-fetched, Lucius."

"It's not what I think. It's what Deci himself thinks. The poor fel-low's in a state; came to my house and roused me out of bed an hour ago, desperate for advice. He needs someone to get to the bottom of this, quietly and quickly. I told him I knew just the man: Gordianus the Finder;"

"Me?" I scowled at an olive pit between my forefinger and thumb. "Since the Daily is a state organ, surely Decimus Brutus himself, as consul, is in the best position to determine where this item came from and what it really means. To start, who wrote it?"

"That's precisely the problem."

"I don't understand."

"Do you see the part about 'Sappho' and her advice?" "Yes."

"Gordianus, who do you think writes and edits the Daily Acts?" I shrugged. "I never thought about it."

"Then I shall tell you. The consuls themselves dictate the items about politics and foreign policy, giving their own official viewpoint. The drier parts-trade figures, livestock counts and such-are compiled by clerks in the censor's office. Sporting news comes from the magistrates in charge of the Circus Maximus. Augurs edit the stories that come in about weird lightning flashes, comets, curiously shaped vegetables, and other omens. But who do you think oversees the society news-weddings and birth announcements, social engage-ments, 'blind items,' as you call them?"

"A woman named Sappho?"

"A reference to the poet of ancient Lesbos. The consul's wife is something of a poet herself."

"The wife of Decimus Brutus?"

"She wrote that item." Lucius leaned forward and lowered his voice. "Deci thinks she means to kill him, Gordianus."

"My wife…" The consul cleared his throat noisily. He brushed a hand nervously through his silvery hair and paced back and forth across the large study, from one pigeon-hole bookcase to another, his fingers idly brushing the little title tags that hung from the scrolls. Outside the library at Alexandria, I had never seen so many books in one place, not even in Cicero's house.

The consul's house was near the Forum, only a short walk from that of Lucius Claudius. I had been admitted at once; thanks to Lucius, my visit was expected. Decimus Brutus dismissed a cadre of secretaries and ushered me into his private study. He dispensed with formalities. His agitation was obvious.

"My wife…" He cleared his throat again. Decimus Brutus, high-est magistrate in the land, used to giving campaign speeches in the Forum and orations in the courts, seemed unable to begin.

"She's certainly beautiful," I said, gazing at the portrait that graced one of the few spaces on the wall not covered by bookcases. It was a small picture, done in encaustic wax on wood, yet it domi-nated the room. A young woman of remarkable beauty gazed out from the picture. Strings of pearls adorned the masses of auburn hair done up with pearl-capped pins atop her head. More pearls hung from her ears and around her throat. The chaste simplicity of her jewelry contrasted with a glint in her green eyes that was challeng-ing, aloof, almost predatory.

Decimus Brutus stepped closer to the painting. He lifted his chin and squinted, drawing so close that his nose practically brushed the wax.

"Beautiful, yes," he murmured. "The artist didn't capture even a fraction of her beauty. I married her for it; for that, and to have a son. Sempronia gave me both, her beauty and a baby boy. And do you know why she married me?" The consul stepped disconcertingly close and peered at me. With another man, I would have taken such proximate scrutiny as an intimidation, but the myopic consul was merely straining to read my expression.

He sighed. "Sempronia married me for my books. I know, it sounds absurd-a woman who reads! — but there it is: she didn't as-sent to the marriage until she saw this room, and that made up her mind. She's read every volume here-more than I have! She even writes a bit herself-poetry and such. Her verses are too… passionate… for my taste."

He cleared his throat again. "Sempronia, you see, is not like other women. Sometimes I think the gods gave her the soul of a man. She reads like a man. She converses like a man. She has her own motley circle of friends-poets, playwrights, dubious women. When Sempronia has them over, the witticisms roll off her tongue. She even appears to think. She has opinions, anyway. Opinions on everything-art, racing, architecture, even politics! And she has no shame. In the company of her little circle, she plays the lute-better than our best-trained slave, I have to admit. And she dances for them." He grimaced. "I told her such behavior was indecent, com-pletely unsuitable for a consul's wife. She says that when she dances, the gods and goddesses speak through her body, and her friends un-derstand what they see, even if I don't. We've had so many rows, I've almost given up rowing about it."

He sighed. "I'll give her this: she's not a bad mother. Sempronia has done a good job raising little Decimus. And despite her youth, her performance of official duties as consul's wife has been impeccable. Nor has she shamed me publicly. She's kept her… eccentricities… confined to this house. But… "

He seemed to run dry. His chin dropped to his chest.

"One of her duties," I prompted him, "is to oversee society news in the Daily Acts, is it not?"

He nodded. He squinted for a moment at Sempronia's portrait, then turned his back to it. "Lucius explained to you the cause for my concern?"

"Only in the most discreet fashion."

"Then I shall be explicit. Understand, Finder, the subject is… acutely embarrassing. Lucius tells me you can keep your mouth shut. If I'm wrong, if my suspicions are unfounded, I can't have news of my foolishness spread all over the Forum. And if I'm right-if what I suspect is true-I can afford the scandal even less."

"I understand, Consul."

He stepped very close, peered at my face, and seemed satisfied.

"Well, then… where to begin? With that damned charioteer, I suppose."

"A charioteer?"

"Diocles. You've heard of him?" I nodded. "He races for the Reds."

"I wouldn't know. I don't follow the sport. But I'm told that Diocles is quite famous. And rich, richer even than Roscius the actor. Scandalous, that racers and actors should be wealthier than senators nowadays. Our ancestors would be appalled!"

I doubted that my own ancestors would be quite as upset as those of Decimus Brutus, but I nodded and tried to bring him back to the subject. "This Diocles…"

"One of my wife's circle of friends. Only… closer than a friend."

"A suspicion, Consul? Or do you have sure knowledge?"

"I have eyes in my head!" He seemed to realize the irony of claiming his feeble eyesight as reliable witness, and sighed. "I never caught them in the act, if that's what you mean. I have no proof. But every time she had her circle in this house, lolling about on couches and reciting to each other, the two of them seemed always to end up in a corner by themselves. Whispering… laughing…" He ground his jaw. "I won't be made a fool of, allowing my wife to sport with her lover under my own roof! I grew so furious the last time he was here, I… I made a scene. I chased them all out, and I told Sempronia that Diocles was never again to enter this house. When she protested, I commanded her never to speak with him again. I'm her husband. It's my right to say with whom she can and cannot consort! Sempronia knows that. Why could she not simply defer to my will? Instead she had to argue. She badgered me like a harpy-I never heard such language from a woman! All the more evidence, if I needed any, that her relationship with that man was beyond decency. In the end, I banned her entire circle of friends, and I ordered Sempronia not to leave the house, even for official obligations. When her duties call, she simply has to say, 'The consul's wife regrets that illness prevents her.' It's been like that for almost a month now. The tension in this house… "

"But she does has one official duty left."

"Yes, her dictation of society items for the Daily Acts. She needn't leave the house for that. Senators' wives come calling-respectable visitors are still welcome-and they give her all the tidbits she needs. If you ask me, the society section is terribly tedious, even more so than the sporting news. I give it no more than a quick glance to see if family are mentioned, and their names spelled correctly. Sempro-nia knows that. That's why she thought she could send her little message to Diocles through the Daily Acts, undetected."

He glanced at the portrait and worked his jaw back and forth. "It was the word 'bookworm' that caught my eye. When we were first married, that was the pet name she gave me: 'My old bookworm.' I suppose she calls me that behind my back now, laughing and joking with the likes of that charioteer!"

"And 'Sappho'?"

"Her friends call her that sometimes."

"Why do you assume the blind item is addressed to Diocles?"

"Despite my lack of interest in racing, I do know a thing or two about that particular charioteer-more than I care to! The name of his lead horse is Sparrow. How does the message start? 'The bookworm pokes his head outside tomorrow. Easy prey for the sparrow… ' Tomorrow I'll be at the Circus Maximus, to make a public appearance at the races."

"And your wife?"

"Sempronia will remain confined to this house. I have no intention of allowing her to publicly ogle Diocles in his chariot!" "Won't you be surrounded by bodyguards?"

"In the midst of such a throng, who knows what opportunities might arise for some 'accident' to befall me? In the Forum or the Senate House I feel safe, but the Circus Maximus is Diocles's territory. He must know every blind corner, every hiding place. And… there's the matter of my eyesight. I'm more vulnerable than other men, and I know it. So does Sempronia. So must Diocles."

"Let me be sure I understand, Consul: You take this item to be a communication between your wife and Diocles, and the subject is a plot on your life… but you have no other evidence, and you want me to determine the truth of the matter?"

"I'll make it worth your while."

"Why turn to me, Consul? Surely a man like yourself has agents of his own, a finder he trusts to ferret out the truth about his allies and enemies."

Decimus Brutus nodded haltingly.

"Then why not give this mission to your own finder?"

"I had such a fellow, yes. Called Scorpus. Not long after I banned Diocles from the house, I set Scorpus to find the truth about the charioteer and my wife."

"What did he discover?"

"I don't know. Some days ago, Scorpus went missing." "Missing?"

"Until yesterday. His body was fished out of the Tiber, downriver from Rome. Not a mark on him. They say he must have fallen in and drowned. Very strange."

"How so?"

"Scorpus was an excellent swimmer."

I left the consul's house with a list of everyone Decimus Brutus could name from his wife's inner circle, and a pouch full of silver. The pouch contained half my fee, the remainder to be paid upon the consul's satisfaction. If his suspicions were correct, and if I failed him, I would never collect. Dead men pay no debts.

For the rest of the day and long into the night, I learned all I could about the consul's wife and the charioteer. My friend Lucius Claudius might move among the rich and powerful, but I had contacts of my own. The best informants on Sempronia's circle of intimates, I decided, would be found at the Senian Baths. Such a close-knit group would visit the baths socially, in couples or groups, the men going to their facility and the women to theirs. Massage and a hot soak loosen the tongue; the absence of the opposite gender engenders even greater candor. What masseurs, masseuses, water bearers, and towel boys fail to overhear is hardly worth knowing.

Were Diocles and Sempronia lovers? Maybe, maybe not. According to my informants at the baths, reporting secondhand the gossip of Sempronia's circle, Diocles was notorious for his sharp tongue, and Sempronia had an ear for cutting remarks; there might be noth-ing more to their relationship than whispering and laughing in corners. Sempronia chose her friends, male and female alike, because they amused her or pleased her eye or stimulated her intellect. No one considered her a slave to passion; the abandon with which she danced or declaimed her verses was only part of her persona, one small facet of the steel-willed girl who had made herself a consul's wife and had read every volume in the consul's study.

Regarding a plot against the consul, I heard not a whisper. Sempronia's circle resented her confinement and their banishment from the consul's house, but the impression passed on by the bathing at-tendants was more of amusement than of outrage. Sempronia's friends considered Decimus Brutus a doddering, harmless fool. They playfully wagered among themselves how long it would take Sempronia to bend the old bookworm to her will and resume her social life.

One discovery surprised me. If I were to believe the bathing attendants, Sertorius, the renegade general in Spain, was a far hotter topic of conversation among Sempronia's circle than was the consul, his wife, and the charioteer. Like my friend Lucius Claudius, they believed that Sertorius intended to wrest the Spanish provinces from Rome and make himself a king. Unlike Lucius, Sempronia's friends, within the whispered hush of their own circle, applauded Sertorius and his rebellion.

Decimus Brutus had dismissed his wife's friends as frivolous people, careless of appearances, naive about politics. I tried to imagine the appeal a rebel like Sertorius might hold for such dilettantes. Were they merely infatuated by the bittersweet glamour that emanates from a desperate cause?

From the baths, I moved on to the Circus Maximus, or, more pre-cisely, to the several taverns, brothels, and gambling dens in the vicinity of the racetrack. I paid bribes when I had to, but often I had only to drop the name of Diocles to get an earful. The consensus among the circus crowd was that the charioteer's tastes ran to young athletes, and always had. His current fascination was a Nubian acro-bat who performed publicly during the intervals between races, and was thought to perform privately, after the races, in Diocles's bed-chamber. Of course, the Nubian might have been only a cover for another, more illicit affair; or Diocles, when it came to his lovers, might have been something of a juggler himself.

If Sempronia's circle was abuzz about Sertorius, the circus crowd, disdainful of politics, was abuzz about the next day's races. I had a nagging sense that some of my informants were hiding something. Amid the horse talk and the rattle of dice, the raucous laughter and the cries of "Venus!" for luck, I sensed an edge of uneasiness, even foreboding. Perhaps it was only a general outbreak of nerves on the night before a racing day. Or perhaps, by then, I had shared too much wine with too many wagging tongues to see things clearly.

Still, it seemed to me that something untoward was afoot at the Circus Maximus.

Cocks were crowing when I left the neighborhood of the circus, trudged across Rome, and dragged myself up the Esquiline Hill. Bethesda was waiting up for me. Her eyes lit up at the sight of the pouch of silver, somewhat depleted by expenditures, which she eagerly snatched from my hands and deposited in the empty household coffer.

A few hours later, my head aching from too much wine and too little sleep, I found myself back in the consul's study. I had agreed to arrive at his house an hour before the first race to deliver my report, such as it was.

I told him all I had learned. The secondhand gossip of bathing attendants and tavern drunks seemed trivial as I recounted it, but Decimus Brutus listened in silence and nodded gravely when I was done. He squinted at the portrait of his wife.

"Nothing, then! Scorpus is drowned, and the Finder finds nothing. Have you outsmarted me after all, Sempronia?"

The portrait made no reply.

"I'm not done yet, Consul," I told him. "I shall attend the races today. I'll keep my eyes and ears open. I may yet-"

"Yes, yes, as you wish." Decimus Brutus vaguely waved his hand to dismiss me, never taking his furiously squinting eyes from the image of Sempronia.

A slave escorted me from the consul's study. In the atrium, a small retinue crossed our path. We paused as the train of women flitted past, escorting their mistress from one part of the house to an-other. I peered into their midst and glimpsed a wealth of auburn hair set with pearls. Green eyes met mine and stared back. Hands clapped, and the retinue came to a halt.

Sempronia stepped forward. Decimus Brutus had been correct: the picture did not do her beauty justice. She was taller than I expected. Even through the bulky drapery of her stola, her figure sug-gested a lithesome elegance that carried through to the delicacy of her long hands and graceful neck. She flashed the aloof, challenging smile which her portraitist had captured so well.

"You're new. One of my husband's men?" she said.

"I… had business with the consul," I said.

She looked me up and down. "There are circles under your eyes. You look as if you were out all night. Sometimes men get into trouble, staying up late… poking their noses where they shouldn't."

There was a glint in her eye. Was she baiting me? I should have kept my mouth shut, but I didn't. "Like Scorpus? I hear he got into trouble."

She pretended to look puzzled. "Scorpus? Oh, yes, my husband's all-purpose sneak. Scorpus drowned."

"I know."

"Odd. He could swim like a dolphin."

"So I heard."

"It could happen to anyone." She sighed. Her smile faded. I saw a glimmer of sympathy in her eyes, and a look that chilled my blood. Such a pleasant fellow, her look seemed to say. What a pity it would be if one had to kill you!

Sempronia rejoined her retinue, and I was shown to the door.

By the time I reached the Circus Maximus, all Rome seemed to have poured into the long, narrow valley between the Palatine and Aventine Hills. I pushed through the crowds lined up at the food and bev-erage shops tucked under the stands, stepping on toes and dodging elbows until I came to the entrance I was looking for. Inside the stadium, the seats were already thronged with spectators. Many wore red or white, or waved little red or white banners to show their affiliation. I swept my eyes over the elongated inner oval of the stadium, dazzled by the crazy patchwork of red and white, like blood spattered on snow.

Restless and eager for the races to begin, spectators clapped, stamped their feet, and took up chants and ditties. Cries of "Diocles in red! Quicker done than said!" competed with "White! White!

Fast as spite!"

A high-pitched voice pierced the din-"Gordianus! Over here!" — and I located Lucius Claudius. He sat by the aisle, patting an empty cushion beside him. "Here, Gordianus! I received your message this morning, and dutifully saved you a seat. Better than last time, don't you think? Not too high, not too low, with a splendid view of the finish line."

More important, the consular box was nearby, a little below us and to our right. As I took my seat, I saw a silvery head emerge from the box's private entrance. Decimus Brutus and his fellow consul Lepidus were arriving along with their entourages. He had made it safely to the circus, at least. Partisan chants were drowned out by cheers. The two consuls turned and waved to the crowd.

"Poor Deci," said Lucius. "He thinks they're cheering him. The fact is, they're cheering his arrival, because now the races can begin!"

There was a blare of trumpets and then more cheering as the grand procession commenced. Statues of the gods and goddesses were paraded around the racetrack on carts, led by Victory with wings outspread. As Venus passed-favorite of gamblers as well as lovers-coins showered down from the crowd and were scooped up by her priests. The procession of gods ended with an enormous gilded statue of Jupiter on his throne, borne upon a cart so large it took twenty men to pull it.

Next came the charioteers who would be racing that day, slowly circling the track in chariots festooned with the color of their team, red or white. To many in the stands, they were heroes larger than life. There was a chant for every racer, and chants for the lead horses as well. The noise of all the competing chants ringing out at once was deafening.

Never having been a gambler or a racing aficionado, I recognized few of the charioteers, but even I knew Diocles, the most renowned of the Reds. He was easy to spot by the extraordinary width of his shoulders, his bristling beard, and his flowing mane of jet-black hair. As he passed before us, grinning and waving to the crowd, I tried to see the reaction of Decimus Brutus, but I was able to see only the back of the consul's head. Did Diocles's smile turn sarcastic as he passed the consular box, or did I only imagine it?

The procession ended. The track was cleared. The first four char-iots took their places in the starting traps at the north end of the cir-cus. Two White chariots, a principal along with a second-stringer to regulate the pace and run interference, would race against two Red chariots.

"Did you get a racing card?" Lucius held up a wooden tablet. Many in the stands were using them to fan themselves; all around the red-and-white checkered stadium, I saw the flutter of racing cards.

"No?" said Lucius. "Never mind, you can refer to mine. Let's see, first race of the day… " The cards listed each charioteer, his color, and the name of the lead horse in his team of four. "Principal Red: Musclosus, racing Ajax-a hero of a horse, to be sure! Second-string Red: Epaphroditus, racing a five-year-old called Spots-a new horse to me. For the Whites: Thallus, racing Suspicion, and his colleague Teres, racing Snowy. Now there's a silly name for a horse, don't you think, even if it is pure white. More suitable for a puppy, I should think-by Hercules, is that the starting trumpet?"

The four chariots leaped out of their traps and onto the track. Once past the white line, they furiously vied for the inner position alongside the spine that ran down the middle. Clouds of dust billowed behind them. Whips slithered and cracked as they made the first tight turn around the post at the end of the spine and headed back. The Reds were in the lead, with Epaphroditus the second-stringer successfully blocking the principal White to give his col-league a clear field, while the second-string White trailed badly, unable to assist. But in seven laps, a great deal could happen.

Lucius jumped up and down on his pillow. All around us, spectators began to place wagers with one another on the outcome.

"I'm for Snowy!" shouted the man across the aisle from Lucius.

A man several rows down turned and shouted back. "The second-string White? Are you mad? I'll wager you ten to one against Snowy winning. How much?"

Such is the Roman way of gambling at the races: inspired by a flash of intuition and done on the spur of the moment, usually with a stranger sitting nearby. I smiled at Lucius, whose susceptibility to such spontaneous wagering was a running joke between us. "Care to join that wager, Lucius?"

"Uh… no," he answered, peering down at the track. Under his breath, I heard him mutter, "Come on, Ajax! Come on!"

But Ajax did not win. Nor did the long-shot Snowy. By the final lap, it was Suspicion, the principal White, who had pulled into the lead, with no help from the second-string White, who remained far in the rear. It was a stunning upset. Even the Red partisans in the crowd cheered such a marvelous display of Fortune's favor.

"A good thing you didn't bet on Ajax," I said to Lucius. He only grunted in reply and peered at his racing card.

As race followed race, it seemed to me that I had never seen Lucius so horse-mad, jumping up in excitement at each starting trumpet, cheering jubilantly when his favored horse won, but more often sulking when his horse lost, and yet never once placing a bet with anyone around us. He repeatedly turned his racing card over and scribbled figures on the back with a piece of chalk, muttering and shaking his head.

I was distracted by my friend's fidgeting, and even more by the statuelike demeanor of Decimus Brutus, who sat stiffly beside his colleague in the consular box. He was so still that I wondered if he had gone to sleep; with such poor eyesight, it was no wonder he had no interest in watching the races. Surely, I thought, no assassin would be so bold as to make an attempt on the life of a consul in broad day-light, with dozens of bodyguards and thousands of witnesses all around. Still, I was uneasy, and kept scanning the crowd for any signs of something untoward.

With so much on my mind, along with a persistent headache from the previous night's wine, I paid only passing attention to the races. As each winner was announced, the names of the horses barely registered in my ears: Lightning, Straight Arrow, Bright Eyes.

At last, it was time for the final race, in which Diocles would compete. A cheer went up as he drove his chariot toward the start-ing traps.

His horses were arrayed in splendid red trappings. A gold-plumed crest atop her head marked his lead horse, Sparrow, a tawny beauty with magnificent flanks. Diocles himself was outfitted entirely in red, except for a necklace of white. I squinted. "Lucius, why should Diocles be wearing a scrap of anything white?"

"Is he?"

"Look, around his neck. Your eyes are as sharp as mine…" "Pearls," declared Lucius. "Looks like a string of pearls. Rather precious for a charioteer."

I nodded. Diocles had not been wearing them in the opening procession. It was the sort of thing a charioteer might put on for luck just before his race-a token from his lover…

Down in his box, Decimus Brutus sat as stiffly as ever, displaying no reaction. With his eyesight, there was little chance that he had noticed the necklace.

The trumpet blared. The chariots sprang forward. Diocles took the lead at once. The crowd roared. Diocles was their favorite; even the Whites loved him. I could see why. He was magnificent to watch. He never once used his whip, which stayed tucked into his belt the whole time, alongside his emergency dagger. There was magic in Diocles that day. Man and horses seemed to share a single will; his chariot was not a contraption but a creature, a synthesis of human control and equine speed. As he held and lengthened his lead lap after lap, the crowd's excitement grew to an almost intolerable pitch. When he thundered across the finish line there was not a spectator sitting. Women wept. Men screamed without sound, hoarse from so much shouting.

"Extraordinary!" declared Lucius.

"Yes," I said, and felt a sudden flash of intuition, a moment of god-sent insight such as gamblers crave. "Diocles is a magnificent racer. What a pity he should have fallen into such a scheme."

"What? What's that you say?" Lucius cupped his ear against the roar of the crowd.

"Diocles has everything: skill, riches, the love of the crowd. He has no need to cheat." I shook my head. "Only love could have drawn him into such a plot."

"A plot? What are you saying, Gordianus? What is it you see?"

"I see the pearls around his neck-look, he reaches up to touch them while he makes his victory lap. How he must love her. What man can blame him for that! But to be used by her in such a way… "

"The plot? Deci! Is Deci in danger?" Lucius peered down at the consular box. Even Decimus Brutus, ever the ingratiating politician, had risen to his feet to applaud Diocles along with the rest of the crowd.

"I think your friend Decimus Brutus need not fear for his life. Unless the humiliation might kill him."

"Gordianus, what are you talking about?"

"Tell me, Lucius, why have you not wagered even once today? And what are those numbers you keep figuring on the back of your racing card?"

His florid face blushed even redder. "Well, if you must know, Gordianus, I… I'm afraid I… I've lost rather a lot of money today."

"How?"

"Something… something new. A betting circle… set up by perfectly respectable people." "You wagered ahead of time?"

"I put a little something on each race. Well, it makes sense, doesn't it? If you know the horses, and you place your bet on the best team ahead of time, with a cool head, rather than during the heat of the race…"

"Yet you've lost over and over today, far more often than you've won."

"Fortune is fickle."

I shook my head. "How many others are in this 'betting circle'?"

He shrugged. "Everyone I know. Well, everyone who is anyone. Only the best people-you know what I mean."

"Only the richest people. How much money did the organizers of this betting scheme take in today, I wonder? And how much will they actually have to pay out?"

"Gordianus, what are you getting at?"

"Lucius, consult your racing card. You've noted all the winners with a chalk mark. Read them off to me-not the color or the driver, just the horses' names."

"Suspicion-that was the first race. Then Lightning… Straight Arrow… Bright Eyes… Golden Dagger… Partridge… Oh! By Hercules! Gordianus, you don't think-that item in the Daily…"

I quoted from memory. " 'The bookworm pokes his head outside tomorrow. Easy prey for the sparrow, but partridges go hungry. Bright-eyed Sappho says: Be suspicious! A dagger strikes faster than lightning. Better yet: an arrow. Let Venus conquer all!' From 'Sappho' to 'Sparrow,' a list of horses-and every one a winner."

"But how could that be?"

"I know this much: Fortune had nothing to do with it."

I left the crowded stadium and hurried through the empty streets. Decimus Brutus would be detained by the closing ceremonies. I had perhaps an hour before he would arrive home.

The slave at the door recognized me. He frowned. "The master-"

"— is still at the Circus Maximus. I'll wait for him. In the meantime… please tell your mistress she has a visitor."

The slave raised an eyebrow but showed me into a reception room off the central garden. Lowering sunlight on the fountain splashing in the courtyard outside sent reflected lozenges of light dancing across the ceiling.

I did not have long to wait. Sempronia stepped into the room alone, without even a handmaiden. She was not smiling.

"The door slave announced you as Gordianus the Finder."

"Yes. We met… briefly… this morning."

"I remember. You're the fellow who went snooping for Deci last night, poking about at the Senian Baths and those awful places around the circus. Oh yes, word got back to me. I have my own informants. What are you doing here?"

"I'm trying to decide what I should tell your husband."

She gave me an appraising look. "What is it, exactly, that you think you know?"

"Decimus Brutus thinks that you and the charioteer Diocles are lovers."

"And what do you think, Finder?"

"I think he's right. But I have no proof."

She nodded. "Is that all?"

"You husband thinks you and Diocles were plotting to kill him today."

Sempronia laughed out loud. "Dear old bookworm!" She sighed. "Marrying Deci was the best thing that ever happened to me. I'm the consul's wife! Why in Hades would I want to kill him?"

I shrugged. "He misunderstood that blind item you put into the Daily Acts."

"Which… blind item?"

"There's been more than one? Of course. That makes sense. What better way to communicate with Diocles, since you've been confined here and he's been banned from your house. What I don't understand is how you ever convinced Diocles to fix today's races."

She crossed her arms and gave me a long, calculating look. "Diocles loves me; more than I love him, I'm afraid, but when was Venus ever fair? He did it for love, I suppose; and for money. Diocles stands to make a tremendous amount of money today, as do all the racers who took part in the fix. You can't imagine how much money. Millions. We worked on the scheme for months. Setting up the betting circle, bribing the racers…"

"'We'? Do you mean your whole circle was in on it?"

"Some of them. But mostly it was Diocles and myself." She frowned. "And then Deci had to throw his jealous fit. It couldn't have happened at a worse time, with the races less than a month away. I had to have some way to communicate with Diocles. The Daily was the answer."

"You must have extraordinary powers of…"

"Persuasion?"

"Organization, I was going to say." "Like a man?" She laughed.

"One thing puzzles me still. What will you do with millions of sesterces, Sempronia? You can't possibly hide that much money from your husband. He'd want to know where such a windfall came from."

She peered at me keenly. "What do you think I intend to do with the money?"

"I think you intend to… get rid of it."

"How?"

"I think you mean to… send it abroad."

"Where?"

"To Spain. To Quintus Sertorius, the rebel general." Her face became as pale as the pearls in her hair. "How much do you want, Gordianus?"

I shook my head. "I didn't come here to blackmail you."

"No? That's what Scorpus wanted."

"Your husband's man? Did he discover the truth?" "Only about the racing scheme. He seemed to think that entitled him to a portion of the takings."

"There must be plenty to go around."

She shook her head. "Scorpus would never have stopped wanting more."

"So he was drowned."

"Diocles arranged it. There are men around the circus who'll do that sort of job for next to nothing, especially for a fellow like Diocles. Blackmailers deserve nothing better."

"Is that a threat, Sempronia?"

"That depends. What do you want, Finder?"

I shrugged. "The truth. It's the only thing that ever seems to satisfy me. Why Sertorius? Why risk so much-everything-to help his rebellion in Spain? Do you have a family tie? A loved one who's thrown his lot with the rebels? Or is it that you and Sertorius are."

"Lovers?" She laughed without mirth. "Is that all you can think, that being a woman, I must be driven by passion? Can you not imagine that a woman might have her own politics, her own convictions, her own agenda, quite separate from a husband or a lover? I don't have to justify myself to you, Gordianus."

I nodded. Feeling her eyes on me, I paced the room. The sun was sinking. Flashes of warm sunlight reflected from the fountain outside caressed my face. Decimus Brutus would return home at any moment. What would I tell him?

I made up my mind. "You asked me what I want from you, Sempronia. Actually, there is the matter of a refund, which I think you must admit is only proper, given the circumstances… "

At noon the next day, I sat beside Lucius Claudius in his garden, sharing the sunlight and a cup of wine. His interest in that morning's Daily Acts had been eclipsed by the bags of coins I brought with me. Scooping the little scrolls off the table, he emptied the bags and collected the sesterces into heaping piles, gleefully counting and re-counting them.

"All here!" he announced, clapping his hands. "Every single sesterce I lost yesterday on the races. But Gordianus, how did you get my money back?"

"That, Lucius, must forever remain a secret."

"If you insist. But this has something to do with Sempronia and that charioteer, doesn't it?"

"A secret is a secret, Lucius."

He sighed. "Your discretion is exasperating, Gordianus. But I've learned my lesson. I shall never again be drawn into a betting scheme like that!"

"I only wish I could have arranged for every person who was cheated yesterday to get his money back," I said. "Alas, their lessons shall be more costly than yours. I don't think this particular set of plotters will attempt to pull off such a scheme a second time. Hopefully, Roman racing can return to its pristine innocence."

Lucius nodded. "The important thing is, Deci is safe and out of danger."

"He was always safe; never in danger."

"Rude of him, though, not to pay you the balance of your fee."

I shrugged. "When I saw him at his house yesterday evening, after the races, I had nothing more to report to him. He hired me to uncover a plot against his life. I failed to do so."

And what, I thought, if I had reported everything to the consul-Sempronia's adultery, the racing fix, the betting scheme, Scorpus's attempted blackmail and his murder, Sempronia's seditious support of Sertorius? Terrified of scandal, Decimus Brutus would merely have hushed it all up. Sempronia would have been no more faithful to him than before, and no one's wagers would have been returned. No, I had been hired to save the consul's life, discreetly; and as far as I was concerned, my duty to Decimus Brutus ended when I discovered there was no plot against his life after all. My discretion would continue.

"Still, Gordianus, it was niggardly of Deci not to pay you… "

Discretion forbade me from telling Lucius that the other half of my fee had indeed been paid-by Sempronia. It was the only way I could see to save my own neck. I had convinced her that by paying the fee for my investigation she purchased my discretion. Thus I avoided the same fate as Scorpus.

At the same time, I had requested a refund of Lucius's wagers, which seemed only fair.

Lucius cupped his hands around a pile of coins, as if they emitted a warming glow. He smiled ruefully. "I tell you what, Gordianus-as commission for recouping my gambling losses, what if I give you… five percent of the total?"

I sucked in a breath and eyed the coins on the table. Bethesda would be greatly pleased to see the household coffer filled to overflowing. I smiled at Lucius and raised an eyebrow.

"Gordianus, don't give me that look!"

"What look?"

"Oh, very well! I shall give you ten percent. But not a sesterce more.