Catilina's riddle

'Claudia,' I said, taking her proffered hand and kissing her rouged cheek. I would hardly have recognized her had I not heard her voice, for instead of the common, rather mannish country dress she wore on her farm, she was draped in an exquisite purple stola, the dark draperies of which elegantly accommodated the generous contours of her body. Her wispy hair had been rinsed with henna to give it a darker shade and arranged atop her head in a pillar so high that it must have grazed the door frame when she entered. Nor did she seem her usual relaxed self, but was exuberant to the point of bubbling over. She had been talking to a city neighbour of ours, a mousy little woman who had taken a friendly interest in Meto and Diana over the years and who had met Lucius Claudius a few times when he had come to visit. The little woman seemed completely overawed by Claudia's presence, and looked more relieved than offended when Claudia abruptly turned to me and thus gave her a chance to quietly escape.

'Gordianus, I never expected such splendid trappings. The food is superb — but not Congrio's cooking, I think. Your son Eco's cook, or some slave he's brought in especially for the occasion, am I right? Yes, I can usually tell one cook's touch from another; my palate is quite sensitive that way. And Meto looks so handsome in his toga! Though I notice that he does seem to have a bit of trouble keeping it properly draped over his left arm — there, you see how it's slipped down and he keeps tugging it up with his right hand and shrugging his left shoulder. But he’ll get the hang of it, I'm sure. Oh, thank you for letting me come, though I can hardly claim to be family or even an old friend. Perhaps you can think of me as representing dear old Lucius, who wouldn't have missed this event for anything.'

'Lucius and I sat together and sipped wine many times in this very garden,' I said.

'Charming, charming,' said Claudia absently. 'Of course I shouldn't be here at all. I'm leaving Rome for the farm this afternoon, and given the congestion on the roads—'

'Leaving Rome? I thought you planned to spend the whole month of Quinctilis here in the city, refurbishing Lucius's town house.'

'Ah, that's just it. I find myself more confused than ever over what I want to do with the property. I'm at such an impasse that I think the only thing to do is go straight back to the farm and collect my wits before trying to come to a decision. Yes, I know, I’ll miss the excitement of the election tomorrow, but thank Jupiter for that! I'm a woman and the family doesn't need me for voting, anyway. Besides, I've had more than enough of the city already. The idea of spending a whole month here — well, you can see how deranged it makes me. I feel like a complete impostor all made up like this; I'd feel much more comfortable in an old sack, and I get so rattled I can't stop talking…'

She suddenly laughed and took a deep breath. 'Well, you're seeing proof of that! And quite frankly, I've had more than enough of my cousin Manius and his shrill wife. They're the ones who have the property north of you but spend most of their time, here in Rome. They insist on dropping by to see me every day and inviting me to their house every night, and I've had enough. Their cook is a disaster, to begin with, and their politics are too conservative even for me. You can imagine all the ranting and raving in such a household, what with the elections going on.'

Claudia lowered her voice and brought her face close to mine. 'But my stay with Manius has borne at least some good fruit, dear Gordianus, and it has to do with you. In fact, that's why I stayed in Rome until now, and today came here first instead of heading straight home to Etruria, Gordianus, promise that you won't be angry, but I took the liberty of bringing cousin Manius with me today. Presumptuous of me, I know, but the opportunity seemed just right and I said to myself) "Do it!" So I did And I think it will all be for the best. There he is — Manius! Yes, cousin, come and meet our host.'

She was calling to someone over my shoulder. When I turned around, whom should I see but the greybeard who had been pilfering stuffed grape leaves and honeyed dates! No wonder my imperfect recollection of him had made me uneasy; he had been present in the court when Cicero had defended my inheritance from Lucius Claudius, though he was so nondescript that his face had made little impression on me. I remembered him now, and I also remembered the comments about me that Congrio's assistant had overheard him make at Claudia's family gathering: 'Stupid nobody with no ancestors, who should be put in a cage and carted back to Rome!' What was such a man doing in our house on Meto's toga day? Claudia was mad to have brought him with her. Had I been a superstitious sort like Rufus, I would have found his presence an ill omen indeed.

Claudia seemed to read my thoughts. As Manius approached, she gripped my elbow and spoke in my ear. 'Now, Gordianus, it serves no one's interests to have bad blood between our families. Manius resented your good fortune and has spoken ill of you in the past, as have all my cousins, but he and I have had many a conversation on the subject during my stay in Rome and I think I've convinced him to make peace. That's why he's here. You will be hospitable, won't you?'

I was given little choice, for the next moment the man was standing before me, with a sour expression on his face and his eyes averted 'So you're Gordianus,' he said, finally looking up. 'My cousin Claudia seems to drink we should be friends.' He made the word drip with sarcasm.

'Now, Manius,' cautioned Claudia, smiling apprehensively.

I took a deep breath. ‘Friend is an exalted word, Manius Claudius, not to be bestowed lightly. I was a friend of your late cousin Lucius, and of that I'm very proud. By his will, you and I are now neighbours, if not friends; yet it seems to me that neighbours can at least strive for harmony and the common good. And since we are neighbours—'

'Only through a legal accident and a lapse in my late cousin Lucius's good judgment, not to say good taste,' said Manius sourly.

I bit my tongue for several heartbeats. 'Claudia, I thought you said—'

'Yes, I did, Gordianus, and I don't understand,' said Claudia through gritted teeth. 'Manius, before we left the house this morning I thought it was agreed—'

'All that I agreed to, Claudia, was that I would come to this house, behave in a civil manner, and see for myself whether or not I found the family of Gordianus to be respectable, charming and, to use your words, "entirely the sort of people one would desire for neighbours". Well, I have come, Claudia. I have behaved with the same decorum as if I were in my own home. And I have failed to be charmed. Indeed, quite the opposite; my very worst suspicions of these people have been confirmed.'

'Oh, dear,' said Claudia quiedy, putting her fingers to her lips.

'I have been conversing with some of the other guests,' Manius went on. "There are far too many people here of the radical, populist, rabble-rousing sort. But then, there are too many people of that sort everywhere in Rome, for my taste. I won't deny that there are a handful of respectable people here, even some fellow patricians, though what they should be doing in such a house and at such a gathering escapes me. The standards of those with whom one does and does not mix have fallen considerably since I was young. Collapsed altogether, I should say.'

'Manius, stop!' gasped Claudia.

But Manius did not stop. 'As I was saying, I have conversed with others here, and discovered just what sort of family inhabits this house and now resides on Lucius's farm. Last year I took no particular interest in investigating the nature of our opposition when Lucius's estate was being settled. I didn't care what sort of person this Gordianus was, only that he be stopped from absconding with a share of the family's inheritance. I did know that he was a plebeian with no ancestors to speak of and engaged in some sort of shady enterprise or other, but I had no idea what sort of family he had spawned. A most irregular family indeed! Of his own parentage, no one seems to know a thing, which says a great deal in itself. His wife is not Roman at all, but half Egyptian and half Jew, and was once upon a time his slave and concubine! Their elder son, the one who now lives in this house, was born Roman, apparently, but not to Gordianus and his slave woman; this Eco — such a preposterous and uncouth name! — was an abandoned beggar boy adopted off the streets. As for the lad whose birthday and corning of age is being celebrated today, it appears he was born a slave down in Baiae, probably of Greek origin. A slave! And now look at him, standing over there in his toga. In the days of our grandparents, the great days of the Republic, such a desecration would have been utterly unthinkable. No wonder the boy can't seem to make the toga sit correctly on his shoulders!'

I listened to this tirade at first speechless, then with burning ears, then with my fists tightly clenched to keep them from flying through the air. At some point Claudia, her gaze nervously flitting from Manius to me, timidly laid her hand on my elbow. Her gentle restraint was unnecessary, for I had no intention of resorting to violence in my own home and spoiling the harmony of Meto's celebration. Instead I kept my hands at my sides and let the fury boil inside me while Manius continued.

'Last and least there is a daughter, I understand, born free and apparently of both parents. A Roman girl, legally, and no doubt she will someday marry into a Roman house — bringing the Egyptian and Jewish blood of her slave-born mother with her. Is it any wonder the Republic is collapsing into chaos at such a swift rate? Who stands up for me Roman family and the values it once aspired to? Even a fine Claudian like our cousin Lucius was apparently taken in — to use your word, Claudia, "charmed" — by all this barnyard decadence, but then, Lucius was always eccentric. I suppose that's your excuse as well, Claudia — eccentricity. If you find such an association congenial, then you're welcome to it, but please keep it to yourself. I came here today as an act of goodwill, and as a favour to you, Claudia, but I see now that I was gravely mistaken. I allowed soft words from a woman to weaken my resolve and taint my judgment. My time here has been completely wasted.'

An instant later he would have turned on his heel and departed in smug triumph, leaving me gasping with anger and facing no choice but to swallow my fury or run after him and make a spectacle of myself before our guests. But sometimes, in such moments, Nemesis takes a hand and makes fools of those who deserve it.

'Oh, your visit hasn't been a complete waste, surely,' I said, not even knowing yet what I meant. The menace in my voice must have alerted Manius, for he stepped back, but not quickly enough. From the comer of his eye he must have glimpsed the upward flicking movement of my hand; he raised his arms to deflect a blow that never landed, for I made no attempt to strike his face or his vulnerable middle. Instead, without conscious intention, I aimed for that place where earlier I had seen his hand disappear into his toga while he pilfered delicacies from the tables. I slapped at a hard, bulging spot hidden within the hanging folds. Manius grunted in alarm Claudia's hands went to her mouth and she uttered a little shriek, just loud enough to turn the heads of a small circle around us. An instant later, the little cloth bag that had been hidden beneath Manius's toga, tied to his waist, fell at his feet and burst open at the seams. Honeyed dates, stuffed grape leaves, roasted nuts, and sesame cakes spilled onto the ground as if from a cornucopia.

Claudia, who before had shrieked with alarm, now shrieked with laughter, as did not a few of the women gathered around, and there was plentiful laughter in the lower registers as well. Manius Claudius turned so red that I thought he might burst open like the sack at his feet, and his whole body seemed to twitch, as if he desperately wanted to bolt from the garden but was rooted to the spot. He fixed me with a smouldering stare and at last managed to raise his arm and make an inchoate gesture in the air, accompanied by a sputtering, incoherent curse. He spun around and might have exited with some of his dignity intact had not his stamping foot landed on a honeyed date. The slippery misstep sent him sprawling quite as effectively as if I had planted the kick I longed to deliver on his backside. He did not fall — not quite — but his awkward, bumbling withdrawal left him without a foot to stand on, metaphorically at least. He did not grace us with another look at his face, but I could see that his ears were bright scarlet. I could easily imagine streams of smoke pouring from his nostrils.

I began to laugh, so hard that when Eco and Meto rushed to my side, thinking I was choking, it was impossible for me to explain what had transpired. I laughed so hard I wept, and all the bitterness and anger than Manius had stirred up inside me became as sweet as honey.

When at last I managed to catch my breath and wipe the tears from my eyes, I saw that Claudia had vanished, with less fanfare than her cousin but probably with no less embarrassment. Poor Claudia, I thought, you meant well, but all your efforts to make peace between our families have come to naught.

XVIII

I was not allowed either to brood or gloat over the incident with Manius Claudius, for the party continued and the demands on the paterfamilias went on. I greeted, charmed, said farewells. Eventually, after a few embarrassing lapses, I insisted that Eco stay close by my side, as if I were a politician in the Forum and he were my nomenclator, whispering in my ear the names I couldn't quite remember. The number of people one has met after living continuously for more than twenty years in a city like Rome is staggering. A profession such as mine had brought me into intimate contact with an ever-expanding circle of well-connected clients, and Eco had carried on my work. The remarkable thing was how respectable we seemed to have become. I could remember a time when orators and advocates would never deign to enter my house or invite me into theirs; they dealt with me through their slaves instead. But perseverance and prosperity lend credibility, and over the years I suppose any line of endeavour can become respectable so long as it succeeds and survives, and especially if it brings profit to the right class of people.

My feet began to ache from so much standing. I ate far too much for the middle of a hot summer day, and I drank too much wine (because my throat was dry from so much talking — at least that was my excuse). And yet, altogether, I was elated. I felt light as a feather. I was at the party, and yet I also observed the party, detached and amused, like a visitor from Olympus. It was the wine, I told myself or the succession of flattering accolades bestowed on myself and on Meto, or the lingering glow of Manius Claudius's humiliation — it was these things, I told myself, that accounted for my mood, which became happier and happier as the day progressed. It had nothing to do with the simple fact of being back in Rome, of feeling myself at the very centre of the greatest concentration of humanity in the world, of sensing all around me the power and passion of those who live, love, connive, suffer, triumph, and the every day in such a mad place. I no longer loved Rome, I told myself; we had been lovers once, but that was over now, once and for all. I might return to her from time to time, but merely as a visitor, free of the torrid, squalid, jubilant memory of our tumultuous marriage. I loved Rome no longer, I told myself, and almost believed it.

No moment of all the moments in that day was more purely joyous than the one in which a certain booming laugh struck my ears and stirred my memory to instant recognition. I looked up from whatever superficial conversation I was engaged in and searched for the source of the laughter, but in the crowd I could not discern the face I looked for. Then I heard the same laugh close at hand and turned to see Meto being squeezed in the bearish grip of a broadly smiling, stoutly muscled man with a thick beard all black and white like variegated marble. Behind the bearish man stood another figure in a toga, a strikingly handsome younger man with an enigmatic smile on his lips, like a Greek statue in Roman dress.

At last the man released Meto, who caught his breath and dazedly tried to straighten the folds of his toga. Meto felt my gaze and returned it with a strange expression on his face. 'Papa,' he called, with an odd quaver in his voice, 'look who's here!'

'As usual, I heard you before I saw you!' I said, laughing and striding towards the newcomer. I braced myself for the ironlike hug of my old friend Marcus Mummius.

It was Mummius who had defied the will of Marcus Crassus, sought out Meto in Sicily and saved him from a life of slavery chasing after crows in a dusty field. Mummius had delivered Meto to this house on the very day that Diana was born. In my heart he would always have a special place.

Meto had not been the only one of Crassus's slaves whom Mummius had made a special endeavour to save. Behind him now stood Apollonius, whom Crassus had sold to a cruel Egyptian master. Mummius had sailed across the inland sea to rescue the slave, had brought him back to Rome and had ultimately set him free. Apollonius remained in Mummius's household as his freedman and constant companion. How Crassus had despised the passion that had driven his lieutenant to care so deeply for the fate of a mere slave! That discord had been the wedge that drove Crassus and Mummius further and further apart until Mummius at last switched his allegiance to Pompey — which was just as well, for only in the service of Pompey, scourge of the sea pirates and conqueror of the East, could a military man like Mummius exercise his true genius.

'Marcus!' I cried. 'And Apollonius! How good to see you both, especially on this of all days. But what a surprise! I should have thought you were still in the East with Pompey.'

'What, with no more fighting to be done?' said Mummius. 'Mithridates is finished, the lesser kingdoms have been brought under Roman control — there's nothing left to do but make political settlements. Playing Jupiter, I call it, moving petty princes about like knucklebones on a playing board. Pompey loves that sort of work, but you know I haven't the patience for it. It's taking an army into battle that I'm good at, though I think I must be getting too old and slow to be a soldier much longer, unless that's how I want to die. Here, just look at this!'

Without hesitation he hoisted up his purple-bordered senator's toga to show his burly thighs. Since the wearing of a toga entails the absence of any sort of underclothes that might constrict the private parts — a man could hardly tend to the call of nature with his left arm draped, all the folds of a toga to contend with, and a loincloth as well — Mummius was dangerously near to exposing himself. As I recalled, there was quite a bit of him to be exposed. I looked about a little nervously and gestured with my hands as if I were putting out a fire, but one might as well try to stop a bear from scratching its stomach as try to stop Marcus Mummius from showing off a war wound. Fortunately the only woman who happened to be passing by was Bethesda, heading towards the kitchen with an officious air. At the spectacle of Mummius showing off his burly legs, she paused, cocked her head, and cast a cool, calculating stare as if she were passing judgment on a purchase at the butcher's market.

'Here, see this one!' Mummius pointed to a long, thin scar that ran from the pale flesh of his upper thigh down to the region of his knee, where the skin was tanned as dark as an Egyptian's. Amid the furlike covering of hair, the pink, denuded strip of flesh stood out vividly. Mummius flexed the muscles beneath and made the long scar writhe like a snake. He seemed to find this uproariously amusing, to judge by his raucous laughter. I glanced over his shoulder at Apollonius, who rolled his eyes but smiled indulgently. No doubt he had witnessed the scene many times before.

'Battle of the Abas River!' Muroinius declared, dropping the hem of his toga. 'And I was a fool to let it happen. I was on horseback and the Albanian was on foot, wearing nothing but a bearskin and rushing at me with his sword drawn, screaming at the top of his lungs. I saw him coming — had plenty of time to knock him flat with the blunt end of my spear, or else impale him on the point, or draw my sword and parry his blows, r osimply give my horse a good kick to get out of his way. The problem was, I had too much time to think — couldn't settle on one choice or the other. Should have been pure reflex, but on that day I found out that my reflexes are as dead as Carthage. Found out the hard way. Oh, the burning when that blade broke the flesh and then tore straight down! I was the one screaming then.'

'What did you do?' said Meto, who had always loved soldiers' tales.

'Where before I had done nothing, now I did everything at once! Banged the fellow's helmet with the blunt end of my spear, whipped it around and stabbed him in the chest with the point, unsheathed my sword with my other hand and slashed his throat, then gave my horse a hard kick and headed straight into the enemy ranks! It all happened in the blink of an eye.'

'You went towards the enemy, not away? Even wounded as you were?' said Meto.

'I had no choice. Something I've learned in battles before — if you take a bad wound, the worst thing to do is stop. That's the one thing you mustn't do, because then the pain'll come crashing down on you all at once and that's the end of you. I've seen many a man die from a wound that shouldn't have killed him, just because he stopped what he was doing and gave in to the thing. No, you open your mouth in a scream to let the Furies come inside you, and you plunge into the thick of it. That way you never even feel the wound at all, and you don't bleed to death either, because all the blood rushes into your head and your sword arm, instead of pouring out of the cut'

Meto stared at him, awed.

'You know, they say there were Amazons fighting with the Albanians in that battle, though I didn't see any, and there were no women found among the dead. I'm no t sure I'd care to go up against a woman in combat… But here I am talking about myself, as usual, when this day belongs to young Meto! What a sight you make in your manly toga! Why, I remember when you were a small thing, running about the villa at Baiae, carrying messages and pestering the other — the others…'

The last word came out oddly. 'Other slaves,' he had meant to say.

I saw again the strange look that had crossed Meto's face on Mummius's arrival. So long as Mummius carried on in his usual bluff manner, boasting of his battles, Meto could simply listen in fascination, but as soon as the conversation turned to the past, Mummius became a palpable reminder of the very circumstances from which he had rescued Meto long ago. Meto's cheeks turned red, but not as red as those of Mummius, who realized that he had trod upon uncertain ground. He attempted a hasty retreat, but found himself mired.

'I mean to say — do you remember what Gordianus said of you then — that you were the eyes and ears of the household? You slipped about hardly noticed, seeing and hearing all An arm of Nemesis, he called you afterwards, for the part you played in saving all the other — the others…' Once again, like the general who finds himself lost in a fog and unwittingly circles back into the same ambush from which he had fled, Mummius stumbled over the forbidden word. I groaned.

'The other slaves,' Meto said, very quietly.

'What?' stammered Mummius, who could hardly have failed to hear.

'The other slaves, you meant to say,' said Meto. 'You were speaking of my part in saving the other slaves — meaning the others who were slaves, like myself, of Crassus.'

Mummius twisted his mouth into various shapes. Was he ever this tongue-tied when addressing his troops? 'Well — yes, I suppose that's what I'm trying to say.' Or trying not to say, I thought.

Meto lowered his eyes. 'It's all right, Marcus Mummius. There's no point in obscuring the truth; so my father has taught me. If we hide what is true, then we see only what is false.' He raised his eyes, and his gaze was steady and strong. 'We have all been many things on the way to becoming what we are. This toga does not hide what I was; that is not its purpose. It clothes what I am. I am the son of Gordianus. Today I become a man and a full citizen of Rome.'

Mummius drew back and raised his eyebrows. Then his face burst into a smile. 'Splendid!' he cried out. 'What a splendid way you have with words! You shall do us all proud in years to come, I know it!'

The tension was broken. There were smiles all around. Eco gripped Meto's shoulder and squeezed it. My sons have never been very physically demonstrative with each other, and this spontaneous gesture of affection gratified and surprised me.

'You must be very proud,' said a voice dose to my ear.

I turned to see the handsome face of a young man with a bland smile and a mischievous glint in his dark eyes, framed by a chin-strap beard and a fashionable haircut. The face was out of place and its owner most certainly uninvited; for a brief instant I was disoriented, hardly believing he was there.

'Marcus Caelius! What are you doing here?' I glanced over my shoulder. Meto and Eco were talking together in low voices. Mummius and Apollonius had turned to pay their respects to Bethesda. I seized Caelius's elbow and took him aside.

He raised one eyebrow. 'If I were of a sensitive nature I might think you were unhappy to see me.'

'Spare your wit for the Forum, Caelius.'

'Really, Gordianus do you think I would waste my wit on politicians? I find that poets and prostitutes appreciate it far more.'

'I don't think you were invited here today,' I said, trying to keep my voice steady.

'No, but Cicero was. Your elder son Eco made sure that the consul received an invitation months in advance. But Cicero cannot come today. Too busy taking advantage of his last chance to harangue the voters down in the Forum before tomorrow's election. And of course he could hardly be seen attending this party, given the fictitious state of discord between the two of you. I've been doing my best to sow those rumours of grave unhappiness between Cicero and Gordianus — all to convince Catilina that he can trust you, of course.'

'That's all over now, Caelius. Or will be with tomorrow's election.'

'All over, Gordianus? I think not. Just beginning, I imagine. Anyway, Cicero sends his regrets, knowing that you'll understand why he can't come himself. Officially, of course, to anyone who should happen to ask, I'm here on behalf of Catilina, to extend his respects on the occasion of your son's coming of age.'

'How many masters do you have, Marcus Caelius?' I used the word 'master' deliberately to insult him, but Caelius was unfazed.

'Catilina knows that I'm loyal only to him. So does Cicero. But with Cicero it happens to be true.'

'I wonder.'

His face changed. The crooked smile, like that of a schoolboy with a secret, faded from his lips, and the mischievous glint in his eyes vanished. He lowered his voice. 'Forgive me, Gordianus. We're all wrought up after the last few days here in Rome, especially those of us closest to Cicero. Imagine what it's like for me shuttling back and forth between him and Catilina, pretending to serve them both. I tend to behave facetiously when the strain becomes too great.'

'Marcus Caelius, why are you here?' I asked wearily.

'For the reasons I've just stated. To convey regards from Catilina, who believes I represent him when in fact I do not, and to give to you Cicero's apologies for his absence, since the pretence of your estrangement from Cicero must be maintained.'

'Maintained? But why? I've done as you and Cicero demanded; I opened my doors to Catilina, though for what purpose I still don't know. Tomorrow the voters will decide Catilina's future, and then I'm finished with all of you, for good. Whether Catilina wins or loses, I'll have done as you asked. My debt to Cicero is discharged, and that's the end of it.’

'Not quite,' said Caelius.

'What do you mean?'

'I mean that things are not as simple as that, Gordianus. I mean that tomorrow's election — if indeed Cicero doesn't manage this afternoon to convince the Senate to postpone it again — is only the opening gambit in the contest to come.'

'What contest? Are you saying that Cicero still expects me to carry on this charade of being friendly with Catilina?'

'Your cooperation is more important now than ever before.'

'Marcus Caelius, — you're beginning to make me angry.'

'Forgive me, Gordianus. I’ll depart.'

'Caelius—'

'Yes?'

'Caelius, what do you know of the body that was left in my barn?'

'A body?' said Caelius, without expression.

'Right after your visit to my farm, right after you posed a riddle about bodies without heads, and heads without bodies. Catilina's riddle, you called it. And then the body appeared on my property. The body without its head.'

Caelius wrinkled his brow. Was his consternation real or feigned? Under my scrutiny the light seemed to fade from his eyes so that they became entirely opaque, and I could no more discern the truth in them than I could by looking into the painted eyes of a statue. 'I know nothing about a body,' he said.

'Would Cicero say the same if I asked him? Would Catilina?' 'Believe me, Cicero would know no more than I do. As for Catilina 'Yes?'

He shook his head. 'I see no reason why you should suspect Catilina of such an atrocity.'

'When I hesitated to respond to your demand that I play host to Catilina, the body appeared, headless, as in the riddle — as if to persuade me.'

'Gordianus, I know nothing about this, I swear to Hercules. It makes no sense…'

The harder I looked into his eyes, the more impossible he became to fathom. Was he lying? And if so, on whose behalf?

'But if you wish to hear Catilina's riddle complete…'

'Yes?’

'Wait until Catilina's rebuttal to Cicero in the Senate this afternoon. What Catilina has to say will be on everyone's lips. Everyone in Rome will know the riddle then.'

'Tell it to me now, Marcus Caelius—'

At that moment a hush fell over the garden, and heads turned towards the hallway that led to the private chambers, from which Rufus had emerged in augur's dress. He was resplendent in his trabea, a woollen robe ornamented with a purple border and saffron-coloured stripes. In his right hand he carried a long, slender wand made of ivory and decorated with carvings of ravens, crows, owls, eagles, vultures, and chickens, as well as foxes, wolves, horses, and dogs — all the various birds and quadrupeds from whose actions the augurs interpret the will of the gods.

Rufus spoke, his voice full of authority. "The time has come for Meto to set foot in the Forum wearing his manly toga, and to ascend with me to the Temple of Jupiter for the reading of the auspices.'

I looked around and saw that Marcus Caelius was gone.

XIX

With many wishes of goodwill, the guests dispersed. The kitchen slaves, brooded over by Bethesda and Menenia, began to clear the tables and return the uneaten food to earthen jars. Eco summoned the rest of the household slaves and looked them over to be sure they were clean and presentable. A Roman commands no respect in the Forum unless he has a retinue — the longer the retinue, the greater the respect — and as Cicero says, a slave takes up as much space as a citizen. Our retinue would be small, but with Rums at its head it would be distinguished. Mummius, too, declared that he and Apollonius would walk with us. Making up the balance were a few other citizens and freedmen, men who owed favours to Eco or had long been bonded to our family by ties of mutual obligation.

We departed down the narrow pathway to the Subura, where our hired litters waited. Diana was left at home (and hardly protested, thanks to some soothing from Menenia), so I shared my litter with Bethesda. Eco rode with Menenia, and Meto, in the foremost litter, with Rufus. I felt some chagrin at having no place to offer Marcus Mummius, but he forestalled my apologies by declaring he would never accept a ride on the back of slaves so long as he still had two good legs to walk on. There followed the predictable boasting about great distances traversed while on campaign; Mummius claimed to have once covered sixty miles in a single day on a rocky mountain road, wearing battle armour.

We settled ourselves in the Utters and were lifted above the crowd. The carriers bore us into the Subura Way with our retinue following behind.

Bethesda was silent for a while, watching the people on the street and scrutinizing the vendors and their wares. She missed the bustle of the city, I thought 'It went very well,' she finally said.

'Yes.'

"The food was excellent'

'Quite. Even by our usual standards, and Congrio spoils us.' 'The yellow canopy was a good idea.' 'Yes, the sun is strong today.' 'And the litters are rather fun.'

'A treat,' I agreed. For such a light conversation, Bethesda's voice was oddly flat, and her face was pensive as she watched the people of the Subura go by. 'I saw that our neighbour Claudia made an appearance.'

'Didn't she speak to you?'

'No.'

'Well, she left abruptly. She made the mistake of bringing along her cousin Manius. He was rather abusive and made a bit of a scene, but it ended badly for him. Did you see it?'

'No, I must have been busy in the kitchen. But I heard about it later. Eco says the man made a fool of himself. Was he really slipping food into his toga?'

'I'm afraid so.'

'How absurd! He must be as rich as Crassus.'

'You exaggerate, I'm sure, but I doubt that Manius ever goes hungry. These country Claudii are an odd lot They appear to have an exceedingly grasping and stubborn nature.' Even Claudia, I thought, was distinguished by her miserly hatred of waste.

'And there was someone else who came to the party…'

'Yes?'I said

'That young man who visited us some while ago. The one who prevailed upon you to play host to Catilina. The handsome one.' 'Marcus Caelius.'

'Yes. I had no chance to speak to him, either.'

I tried not to smile. 'Now, Bethesda, I understand your regret at missing a second opportunity to charm such a good-looking young man—'

She turned her face from the street. Her expression stopped me cold.

'Husband do you really think I would brood this way over a lost chance to flirt? What was Marcus Caelius doing in our house today?'

Her face was drawn, like a garment worn too tightly, and her eyes had a haunted look that turned my heart to water. She was not angry, but frightened.

'Bethesda!' I reached out to put my arm around her, but she shrugged off my embrace.

'Don't coddle me like a slave. Tell me why that man came to Meto's party. What did he want from you?'

‘Very well. He came, he said, to deliver apologies from Cicero for not coming in person.'

'Did he ask more favours of you?' When I hesitated to answer, Bethesda's eyes flashed. 'I knew it! What will he have us doing this time? Does this involve Catilina again?'

'Bethesda, I told Caelius in no uncertain terms that my obligation was already discharged.'

'And did that satisfy him?'

Again I hesitated, and the spark in her eyes ignited. 'I knew it! More trouble!'

'Not necessarily, Bethesda.'

'How can you say that! Do you know how I've worried since Diana found that horrible body in the stable? I will not have such things going on around us!'

'Then we should probably do whatever Caelius demands.'

'No!'

'Yes! Satisfy him — and whomever he really represents, whether it's Cicero or Catilina or—' For the first time it occurred to me that Caelius might actually be representing some other party.

'You must not deal with him,' Bethesda insisted.

'He asks very little.'

'So far! But it will come to something horrible. When we left the city, you said you would leave such things behind.'

'I did leave them, Bethesda. They followed me.' 'But this is different. This is not your way, to do things without knowing why. You've always been an open and honest man, even when you worked in secret.'

'That doesn't quite make sense, Bethesda.'

'You know what I mean!'

I sighed. 'Yes, I do. The duplicity that Caelius forces on me doesn't sit well with me, either. In truth, I dread it.' Without intention, as naturally as a child, I reached for her hand and twined my fingers with hers. 'I'm frightened, too, Bethesda. Frightened and dismayed and a little disgusted — and proud and elated and sentimental, because this is Meto's toga day! If only our lives could be one thing at a time, instead of this mad jumble’

It was my turn to become pensive and watch the street pass by. 'Bethesda, when I was young and beginning to make my way in the world pursuing the work that my father did, there was one thing he made me promise that I would never do — use my skills to capture runaway slaves. It was an easy promise for me to make, and I've never broken it, for I have no appetite for such work. Over the years I added another promise to myself— that I would not become a spy for the state, or ever become a dictator's secret policeman if the Republic should fall prey to another Sulla, Jupiter forbid.

'There are times when I have done things of which I'm not particularly proud, and times when distinguishing right from wrong has confounded me — thus did the gods make this world, of multiple uncertainties and questions without answers. But I've always been able to sleep at night and to look at myself in a mirror without shame. Now I find myself compelled to be a spy, or at least to consort with spies, and I'm not even certain for whom I'm working. Am I the agent of Cicero and the Optimates, which is to say the state? Or am I the unwitting tool of Catilina, who would surely make himself a dictator if he could, for how else can be bring about the changes he promises his disinherited and disenfranchised followers? In the end, I tell myself, I don't care so long as my family is left in peace — and my own cynicism distresses me! Am I wise, or merely apathetic — or a coward?'

Bethesda looked at me steadily and squeezed my hand. 'You are not a coward.'

'Ah, but I don't hear you reassuring me that I'm wise!'

She cooled a bit and slid her hand from mine. She rested her chin on her knuckles and gazed out at the street. She spoke in a tone that was at once detached and determined and that allowed no contradiction. 'In your own heart you know what I know: that something terrible looms over us. I'm a woman, what can I do? Meto is barely a man. Eco, too, is very young and has his own life here in the city. It is up to you, husband. All up to you.'

I blinked and sighed, and wondered: was this woman ever really my slave?

The litters deposited us at the eastern end of the Forum, not far from the Senian Baths. By custom, the women stayed behind to await our return. Meto set foot upon the Sacred Way wearing a happy smile along with his toga. Whatever he had been talking about with Rufus, it must have been on happier topics than my conversation with Bethesda.

Led by Rufus in his augur's vestments, our little party made its way through the very heart of Rome. Amid the throngs of vendors, voters, politicians, and vagrants, we passed the House of the Pontifex Maximus, where young Caesar now held office, and the adjoining House of the Vestal Virgins, the scene of Catilina's indiscretion ten years before. We passed the Temple of Vesta, where the sacred fire burns eternally in the hearth of the goddess, and the Temple of Castor and Pollux, where the scales and measures of the state are kept. We passed the tribunal of the commissioners, where justice had been served in the case of Asuvius and the forged will — my first adventure with Lucius Claudius. We came to the Rostra, the orator's platform decorated with the beaks of ships captured in war, from which politicians harangue the masses, and advocates argue their cases before the courts of law. Here young Cicero had pleaded the case that established his career, defending Sextus Roscius from the charge of parricide; I served as his investigator. At that time, a great equestrian statue of the dictator Sulla dominated the square, but no longer; the Senate had ordered it removed only a few years ago. Behind the Rostra stood the Senate House, where today Cicero, as consul of Rome, would be arguing for another postponement of the consular election, and Catilina would be defending himself from charges of disrupting the state.

The square was thronged with people. A politician was speaking from the Rostra to an audience of voters — one of the Optimates' candidates for consul, to judge from his rhetoric, though I couldn't tell whether it was Murena or Silanus — but there were plenty of other speakers all around to vie for the voters' ears. Wherever a flight of steps or a wall allowed a man to stand and be seen above the crowd, there appeared to be a politician addressing anyone within hearing. In places the discourse seemed to be more a debate than an address, with members of the crowd shouting questions or accusations at the speaker or even booing him from his platform. Within the crowd, insults were hurled, men were spat upon, and scuffles erupted here and there. Rome on the eve of an election!

Obviously, the larger a speaker's retinue, the greater his security and the more effective his rhetoric, and so each politician was surrounded by as many of his supporters as he could muster, not to mention freedmen, slaves, and bodyguards. The square had the appearance of warring factions intermingling for no discernible reason, except to cheer for their own favourite and jeer at the others. The threat of violence hung heavy in the air; I thought of a seething pot on the verge of boiling.

With Rufus at its head, our retinue commanded respect. His saffron-striped trabea was immediately recognizable; men parted and made way for the augur. Many in the crowd knew him by name, and hailed him cheerfully; his youth and charm, unusual for an augur, no doubt contributed to his popularity. Mummius, too, cut a familiar and popular figure with the crowd; people still remembered his role in putting down the Spartacan slave revolt, and his more recent service with Pompey earned him even more respect.

Meto was not ignored. The purpose of our retinue was evident at a glance to many in the crowd — an augur, father, son, and followers headed for the Capitoline — and there were spontaneous outbursts of applause for the young man taking his first walk as an adult through the Forum. Meto, smiling happily, eyes wide, seemed dazzled. I was not even sure if he realized that the bursts of applause were for him.

The press of bodies was so dense that several times we had to stop and wait for an opening before proceeding. All around, from one end of the Forum to the other, I caught snatches of heated conversations. Near the Temple of Castor and Pollux two men were discussing an incident in the theatre. The mention of Cicero caught my ear.

'—and the speech he made afterwards was the best he's ever made!' said the first man.

'Absurd!' countered the second. 'It was the low point of his career. Cicero should have resigned in disgrace! Defending such an unfair and un-Roman practice! Once upon a time the theatre was the one place where Romans were truly equal. When I was a boy, the rich and poor all sat shoulder to shoulder. We booed the villains and laughed at the clowns and lusted after the young lovers as a single body.'

'Everyone equal in the theatre? The first four rows have always been for senators.'

'Because being in the Senate is a mark of achievement and distinguished ancestry. But why should there be special seats for certain people just because they have money? They're common folk, the same as I am. We should all sit together, like family, instead of splitting ourselves up between rich andpoor. What, do I smell too strong from honest sweat for a perfumed merchant to sit next to me? Otho's law is a scandal, it's bad for Rome, and for Cicero to defend it—'

'Otho's law makes perfect sense, as you would know if you had really listened to Cicero's speech.'

'I'd rather listen to an actor reciting Plautus — and from the best seats in the theatre, if I make the effort to show up early enough to get them, rather than being shooed away because I don't happen to be of the rich equestrian class, like Cicero's ramify! Why should I have to sit behind some rat-headed equestrian who blocks my view?'

'Obviously you'd rather spit venom than deal in cogent argument.'

'Very well, dismiss me because I never had schooling in rhetoric! Perhaps a fist in your nose would be more convincing?'

Fortunately, an opening in the throng allowed us to pass at that moment. I leaned towards Rufus. 'What is all this scandal about an incident in the theatre? You mentioned it before.'

'You haven't heard about it?'

'No.'

He rolled his eyes. 'It's been the talk of the city for months. It never stops! The easiest way to pick an argument in Rome! You know how it goes sometimes — a simple little incident suddenly attracts everyone's attention, ignites a controversy and becomes the rallying point for issues far greater than anything inherent in the incident itself Well, a few years ago Lucius Roscius Otho was tribune and passed a bill reserving fourteen rows of seats in the theatre for the wealthy equestrians.'

'Yes, I remember.'

'It seemed a liberal measure at the time, at least within the Senate. There havealways been at least four rows reserved for senators; therefore, Otho argued, why not reserve some rows for equestrians? The moneyed set who can't get into the Senate were very pleased, and they've been financing Otho's political career ever since. This year he's serving a term as praetor, and as such he's made sure that his seating law has been scrupulously enforced at all the public festivals. Well, it was in the month of Aprilis, at the very start of the theatre season during the Megalesian Games, at a performance of The Girl from Andros, when Otho himself appeared in the audience. A bunch of young rowdies at the back of the theatre began to boo and hiss, saying they wanted better seats, and why couldn't they sit in some empty seats up in the equestrian rows? They shouted epithets at Otho. In response a contingent in the equestrian section began to applaud Otho. This was taken as an insult by the rowdies, who saw the equestrians' applause as a way of thanking Otho for not forcing them to sit with such trash. More hissing, more cheering, and soon there were threats and spitballs being hurled. The crowd was on the verge of a riot

'Almost immediately, word of the incident got to Cicero in his house on the Palatine — Cicero's eyes and ears are everywhere, and nothing important happens in the city that he doesn't know about at once. A short while later the consul himself appeared at the theatre, with an armed bodyguard. He summoned everyone in the place to the Temple of Bellona and delivered a splendid speech that ended with the whole crowd cheering Otho and returning to their seats to watch the play without further interruption.'

'What did Cicero say?'

'I wasn't there to hear it myself, but I'm sure that Cicero's secretary Tiro transcribed a copy, if you care to read it. Cicero cannot open his mouth without Tiro's scribbling every utterance, as if his master were an oracle. You know that Cicero can be quite convincing when he defends privilege and order. I believe he dwelled upon Otho's honourable service to the state, and scolded those who would be so crude as to hiss and boo an upstanding Roman magistrate. Then he defended extending privileges to the equestrians; not hard for him to do — he comes from the equestrian class himself, of course,' said Rufus, with a patrician's disdainful lift of the eyebrow. 'It's my theory that the more hot-blooded members of the crowd simply got bored and ran off to expend their energies elsewhere, while the more sedate audience members sheepishly returned to enjoy the comedy. Cicero counted the affair as a personal triumph.'

'From the argument we just overheard, there must be those who disagree.'

"The controversy rages on and on. It's always little things that prick at people. Catilina has picked it up as a campaign issue, naturally. Catilina is always ready to be the champion of the discontented.'

A little later I overheard another argument, this one between an orator on a makeshift wooden pedestal and a citizen who refused to let him deliver his speech, engaging him in a heated debate instead.

'The Rullan land reform would have changed everything for the better!' insisted the orator.

'Nonsense!' shouted the citizen. 'It was one of the most poorly thought-out pieces of legislation ever proposed, and Cicero was right to speak out against it'

'Cicero is nothing more than a mouthpiece for the Optimates.'

'And why not? It's up to the Best People to speak out against these mad schemes put forward by Caesar simply to curry favour with the mob — and to get his hands on Egypt, into the deal.'

'It was Rullus who proposed the law, not Caesar.'

'Rullus opens his mouth and Caesar's words come out'

'Very well, then, we agree that the argument was not Rullus against Cicero, but Caesar against the Optimates,' said the orator.

'Exactly!'

'And you must also agree that if the Rullan bill had become law, there could have been redistribution of land to the people who need it without recourse to violence or unfair confiscation.'

'Absurd! It would never have worked. Who in Rome wants to head out for the countryside and become a farmer, anyway, when here in the city there's the circus and the festivals and the free grain dole?'

'It's attitudes like that that are ruining the Republic'

'It's Romans who are ruining the Republic, because they've grown soft and lazy. That's why we need the Optimates to keep their hands on the tiller.'

'Their hands in the till, you mean. Better to have the hands of the common man on a plough.'

'Ridiculous — look at the mess up in Etruria with Sulla's veterans. Not one in ten of them turned out to be a decent farmer. Now they're all bankrupt and looking to that demagogue Catilina to bail them out, with fire and sword if he has to.'

'So you don't want land reform, you don't like Catilina—'

'I despise him! He and his circle of pampered, well-born, irresponsible dilettantes. They've had their chance to lead decent lives and they've wasted themselves instead — going hopelessly into debt to more responsible and upright citizens. This whole radical scheme of his to forgive debts is no favour to the masses — it's a way to get himself and his friends off the hook, and to plunder the property of those who deserve to keep what they and their ancestors have accumulated. If schemers like Catilina end up powerless and impoverished, it's no more than they deserve. And if the voters of Rome have no more sense than to go along with their crazy ideas—'

'All right, all right, far be it from me to stand up for Catilina. But you seem to have just as low an opinion of Caesar—'

'Who is just as much in debt! No wonder they both suck up to the famous millionaire. Catilina and Caesar are like twin babies hanging off Crassus's teats. Ha! Like Romulus and Remus suckling the she-wolf!' The speaker made obscene popping noises with his lips.

This last elicited equal parts of laughter and hissing from the crowd, who were either amused or offended by such blasphemy.

'Very well, citizen, you insult Catilina, you insult Caesar and Crassus — I suppose you cling to Pompey.'

'I have no use for Pompey either. They're all wild horses trying to break from the chariot. They're in a race with each other, and they care nothing at all for the common good.'

'And Cicero does?' sneered the orator.

'Yes, Cicero does. Catilina, Caesar, Crassus, Pompey — every one of them would make himself dictator if he could, and cut off the heads of the rest. You can't say that about a man like Cicero. He's spoken against tyranny since the dictatorship of Sulla, when it took a brave man to do so. A mouthpiece, you call him — very well, that's what a consul should be, speaking out for those in the Senate whose families made the Republic what it is and have been running it ever since the kings were thrown down. We don't need rule by the mob, or rule by dictators, but the steady, slow, sure rule of those who know best.'

This last set off a round of jeering from some newcomers who had just arrived in the crowd, and the debate degenerated into a shouting match. Fortunately, the agitation in the crowd provided an opening, and we were able to press on. A moment later Meto drew beside me with an earnest look on his face.

'Papa, I couldn't follow their argument at all!'

'I could, but only barely. Land reform! The populists all promise it, but they can't make it come true. The Optimates turn it into a dirty word.'

'What was the Rullan bill they were talking about?'

'Something that was proposed earlier this year. I remember our neighbour Claudia railing against it. I really don't know the details,' I admitted.

Rufus turned towards us. 'One of Caesar's ideas, in conjunction with Crassus, and typically brilliant. The problem: how to find land for those who need it here in Italy. The solution: sell public lands we've conquered in distant countries and set aside those proceeds to buy land in Italy on which to settle the poor in agricultural colonies. Not a wholesale confiscation and redistribution of land from rich to poor, as Catilina proposes, but the expenditure of public funds to effect a fair reapportionment.'

'Why did the man bring up Egypt?' said Meto.

"The foreign lands to be sold include those in Egypt, which the late

Alexander II bequeathed to Rome. The Rullan law proposed setting up a special commission of ten men who would oversee the project, including its administration in Egypt—'

'And Caesar would have been one of the commissioners,' said Mummius dryly, joining the discussion. 'He'd have picked Egypt like a fig from a tree.'

'If you like,' Rufus conceded. 'Crassus would have been on the commission as well, since his support was vital With Egypt under their sway, they'd have had a bastion against Pompey's power in the East, you see. You'd have thought the Optimates would like that, since they fear Pompey, too. But as long as Pompey is away from Rome and campaigning in the East, the Optimates fear Caesar and Crassus more.'

'Not to mention Catilina and the mob,' I said.

'Yes, but Catilina intentionally distanced himself from the Rullan bill. Too mild for him; to have been seen as a force behind it would have compromised his radical reputation. Nor would his support have been an asset to the bill; his enthusiasm would have further alarmed the Optimates, who were already suspicious of the idea.'

'Even so, I imagine Catilina would have accepted an appointment as one of the new land commissioners, along with Caesar and Crassus.'

Rufus smiled wryly. 'Your grasp of politics is more subtle than you let on, Gordianus.'

'But the bill was defeated,' said Meto.

'Yes. The Optimates saw it as merely a tool for Caesar and Crassus, and yes, perhaps Catilina, to increase their power, and any talk of land reform immediately sets them on edge. They always pretend to support the idea in the abstract, but no concrete proposal ever satisfies them. Cicero became their spokesman, as he has been since they rallied to support him for the consulship. But he didn't limit himself to debating the matter in the Senate. He came here, to the Forum, and brought the issue directly to the people.'

'But it's the sort of bill the people like, isn't it? That's why they call Caesar a populist, isn't it?' asked Meto. 'Why would Cicero debate against the bill before the very people it's meant to help?'

'Because Cicero could talk a condemned man into chopping off his own head,' said Rufus. 'He knows how to make a speech; he knows what arguments will impress the mob. First, he said that the law was directed against Pompey, even though Pompey was specifically excluded from the investigations that were to be made into the acquisitions of other generals abroad. The people don't like it when they hear that something will hurt Pompey. Pompey is the darling of the mob; successful generals always are. To denigrate Pompey is to denigrate the people of Rome, to call Pompey into question is to insult Rome's favourite son, et cetera, et cetera. Then Cicero took aim at the commission itself, saying it would become a little court of ten despots. They would embezzle the funds they raised, robbing the Roman people of their own wealth; they would punish their enemies by forcing them to sell their lands, which would be almost as wicked as the proscriptions and confiscations that Sulla carried out; they would forcibly move the contented urban poor onto barren tracts of land where they would starve. Well, you know how persuasive Cicero can be, especially when it comes to convincing people to work against their own interests. I do believe he could convince a beggar that a rock is better than a coin because it weighs more, and an empty stomach is better than a full one because it causes no indigestion.'

'But Rullus must have defended the law,' said Meto.

‘Yes, and Rullus was pounded into dust — rhetorically speaking. Caesar and Crassus each wet a finger, held it in the wind, and decided to keep quiet, though in debate either one is a match for Cicero, at least to my ear. The time was simply not right, and the law was dropped. Soon people got distracted by other matters, like the incident in the theatre, and Catilina's new campaign for consul.'

'You say the time was not right for such reform,' I said. 'In Rome, and with the Optimates in control of the Senate, when is it ever the right time for change?'

'Nunquam,' said Rufus, smiling ruefully: never.

Our destination was the summit of the Capitoline Hill, where Rufus would perform his augury. We at last managed to cross the densely crowded area in front of the Rostra and came to the wide, paved path that ascends in winding stages to the summit of the Capitoline. Here we had to pause again, for a large group of men was descending the path, so many in number that they blocked any opportunity to ascend. As the group drew nearer, Rufus's face brightened. His eyes were better than mine, for he had already made out the faces of the two men who walked side by side at the head of their respective retinues. One was dressed in a senatorial toga, white bordered with purple; the other wore a toga with the much broader purple border of the Pontifex Maximus.

They smiled in return when they recognized Rufus, and nodded to Marcus Mummius. For the moment Meto and myself and the rest were invisible to them. Those who wear purple acknowledge one another first; others come later.

'Rufus!' said the Pontifex Maximus.

'Caesar!' said Rufus, bowing his head. He made the same gesture of obeisance to the white-bearded augur who stood beside the Pontifex Maximus, dressed like Rufus in a trabea with saffron stripes. Within their college a younger augur always defers to an elder.

I took a close look at the face of our Pontifex Maximus. Not yet forty, Gaius Julius Caesar had already established himself as a force to be reckoned with in the Republic. His patrician heritage was impeccable; his family ties to the dictator Sulla's old enemy Marius, once a death sentence, had become a part of his credentials as a leader of the populist movement. If Cicero was the master of rhetoric, able to get what he wanted by the sheer force of argument, Caesar was said to be the master of pure politics, a genius at comprehending the multitudinous and often obscure strands of the ages-old web that bound together the state and the priesthoods. He understood the most arcane and cumbersome rules of procedure within the Senate, and could invoke them at the most unexpected moments to the consternation of his enemies; he knew the intricate workings of the ever-growing bureaucracy that carried out (or as often confounded) the will of the Senate and the people; as Pontifex Maximus he oversaw the maze of religious offices and brotherhoods that interpreted omens and sacred texts and thus exercised power over the Senate, the army, and commerce by allowing or not allowing these institutions to function on a given day.

Caesar was not a handsome man, but in no sense was he plain. His narrow face was striking, but beauty did not figure into it. It was the vitality of his eyes that impressed, along with the patrician austerity of his high cheekbones and forehead, and the drawn tension of his thin lips, that seemed perpetually to smile at some ironic jest. His erect carriage and steady gait marked him as a man in absolute control of his every movement, fully conscious of his own fluid grace and quietly pleased with the image he presented to the world. I have met only a handful of men (and some women) with such a way about them, and they have all been either wealthy, eminently well-educated patricians, or else slaves who possess the natural charm of the unlearned along with the remarkable beauty that sweeps every other consideration before it. We mortals in the middle can never hope to possess the perfect grace of these god-blessed others higher and lower than ourselves. It conies from power, I suppose, political or sexual — not simply possessing it, but instinctively knowing how to use it, and having the capacity to enjoy using it. Catilina had a measure of that grace, but in him it was mixed with something else, an imperfection of some sort that made him all the more fascinating. In Caesar, that grace was undiluted. He seemed to me to be power personified, and thus he projected (like the beautiful) the illusion of being indestructible and immortal. Rend his mortal vessel with wounds, cut him open to show the blood and bones within, slice his head from his shoulders — still, it seemed, his lips would wear that same effortless smile.

Somehow I had glimpsed his companion from the corner of my eye, or perhaps had recognized his gait from a distance, for I knew that the man was Marcus Licinius Crassus before I reluctantly set my eyes on him. There were few men whom I less desired to meet by chance on this of all days. As Rufus turned to greet him, Crassus's restless gaze fell on me. He knew me in an instant, though it had been almost nine years since the affair at Baiae. Things there had not gone as he had wished, thanks to me, and Crassus was a man accustomed to having his own way in everything to do with lesser men; from the glint in his eye I saw that the memory still rankled. Catilina had indicated that Crassus respected me in a begrudging way, but if so, he was good at concealing it. His eyes had a cold gleam without a trace of humour.

He had grown noticeably older since I had last seen him so close — older and richer and more powerful, his ambitions held in check only by the conflicting ambitions of men as shrewd and ruthless as himself. His hair was half-grey and his face was too stern to be handsome. His countenance displayed a perpetual discontent; he was a man who could never succeed enough for his own satisfaction. 'Crassus, Crassus, rich as Croesus,' went the popular ditty, comparing him to the miser of legend, but to me he was Sisyphus, forever rolling the boulder uphill, watching it tumble down and beginning again, achieving wealth and influence far beyond the measure of other men but never achieving enough to earn his rest. He had been vying for power with Pompey for years; with Caesar he seemed to be on excellent terms, at the moment at least.

'We've just come down from the Arx,' said Caesar, meaning the northern summit of the Capitoline Hill. Like the acropolis in Athens, the Arx was the high place chosen by Rome's founders on which to build their citadel and their most sacred temples. From the Arx a man can see all Rome below, and can in turn be seen unobstructed by the gods.

'We've been taking the auspices for today's convocation of the Senate. A pity that you weren't available to perform the augury, Rufus.'

'Today I perform a private augury,' said Rufus, indicating those of us behind him with the slightest tilt of his head. 'I take it that the auspices for the Senate were favourable, as you wished?'

"They were indeed,' said Caesar. The ironic smile seemed to say that the auspices could hardly have been otherwise. 'A hawk flew up from the west, and then dipped towards the north. The augur Festus assures us this presages a good day for the Senate to convene.'

'For myself' said Crassus dryly, 'I thought it more significant that a crow flew over the Senate House, cackling and complaining but going in circles, as if he were not going to have his way no matter how much he squawked. That crow reminded me of someone — could it be Cicero? But then I'm not privy to the secret knowledge of the augurs and am hardly qualified to make an interpretation.' His smile did little to soften his sarcasm.

Rufus ignored this veiled insult to his profession. 'Will things go well in the debate today?' he asked Caesar.

'Oh, yes,' Caesar said with a sigh. 'Cicero hasn't the votes to censure Catilina, and he certainly hasn't the support he needs to postpone the elections again. It's not what happens today, but what the voters will do tomorrow that's worrisome. We shall see. But what's this you're up to, a young man's coming of age?' He smiled and nodded amiably in our direction, but did not press for an introduction. 'Speaking of Cicero, if you're on your way up to the Arx, you'll pass both of our esteemed consuls on their way down.' He glanced over his shoulder. 'Cicero should be right behind us; he was eager enough to have the auspices done with so that he could convene the Senate. The debate will begin at any moment. You will miss the opening arguments, Rufus, and you as well, Marcus Mummius.'

'We'll come later,' said Rufus.

'It's likely to be brief. Cicero is just doing it for show; he’ll want to get it over with and make use of what's left of the day to harangue the crowd in the Forum — his last chance to sway the voters against Catilina. You should use the day to do some final campaigningyourself, Rufus. I intend to. I'm counting on you to serve with me as praetor next year.'

'Don't worry, after I've performed my augury I shall change into my candidate's toga at once!' Rufus laughed.

Caesar and Crassus began to move on. Our little party stepped aside to make way for their retinues. Crassus had not said a word to his estranged confederate Mummius, and apparently did not intend to. But he did look steadily at me as he stepped past, then paused as his eyes fell on Meto.

'Don't I know you, young man?' he said.

I looked at Meto and felt a pang of dread, remembering his nightmare. An uncertain emotion lit his eyes, but his face remained impassive. 'You knew me once, citizen,' he said. His voice was quiet but steady.

'Did I?' said Crassus, cocking his head and drawing up his shoulders. 'Yes, so I did, however scarcely. So you are a freedman now, Meto?'

'Yes.'

"The adopted son of Gordianus?'

I moved my lips to answer, but Meto answered first. 'I am.'

'How interesting. Yes, only recently a friend of mine happened to inform me of your circumstances.' Did he mean Catilina? Or could it have been his once-protege, Marcus Caelius? Whichever, I did not like the idea of my family being discussed behind my back. 'Odd, how this detail of your manumission and adoption had somehow escaped my attention all these years.'

'It hardly seems a matter worthy of concern to a man as eminent as yourself, citizen,' said Meto, returning Crassus's scrutiny with an unwavering gaze. I looked at Meto, slighdy awed. Not only had he said exactly what I would have said, but he had said it just as I would have tried to, with the very same, deliberately straightforward inflection, neither contemptuous nor servile. Sometimes we open our mouths and hear our parents speak; sometimes our children open their mouths and our own voices come out

'The last I knew of you, Meto, you were in Sicily, where I had arranged for you to be,' said Crassus, delicately avoiding the crass vocabulary of commerce and ownership. 'Just as I had arranged for that one to be off to Egypt,' he added, indicating Apollonius and casting a sharp glance at Mummius. 'What part did Marcus Mummius play in frustrating those delicate arrangements, I wonder? Never mind. Now I meet you in a toga, Meto, on your way up to the Arx to celebrate your citizenship.' His lips compressed into the thinnest of smiles. He narrowed his eyes and shifted them between me and Meto. 'The goddess Fortune has smiled on you, Meto. May she smile on you always,' he said in a hollow voice, and turned away, summoning his retinue after him.

Perhaps he meant it, for above and beyond the triumph of the individual will, a Roman respects and bows to the incomprehensible caprices of Fortune, and to a man like Crassus the salvation of a boy like Meto, in the face of all Crassus's efforts to the contrary, might very well seem a supernatural occurrence, evidence of the intervention of the gods and thus an occasion for respect and the humble expression of goodwill. Who knows, after all, when the goddess Fortune might turn her back even on the richest man in Rome?

The lengthy retinues passed. We pressed onward and upward, only to encounter another retinue. Coming down from the citadel, following Crassus and Caesar, was Cicero himself, together with his fellow consul, the notorious nonentity y Gaius Antonius. At the party, Rufus had said something in passing about Cicero wearing armour — 'that absurd breast-plate’ he had called it, and had then passed on to another subject without explaining. Now I saw what he had meant, for covering Cicero's chest and reflecting the harsh gleam of the afternoon sun was a burnished breastplate such as a general might wear in combat Cicero's consular toga was loosened at the neck and throat so that the boldly shaped pectorals of the hammered and filigreed metal were fully displayed. Around him hovered a bodyguard of armed men, surly-looking fellows who walked with their hands on the hilts of their sheathed daggers. It struck me that such a display was less worthy of a consul of the Republic than of a suspicious autocrat — even the dictator Sulla had gone about the Forum unarmed and unguarded, trusting the gods to protect him.

Before I could ask Rums to explain the breastplate and the heavy bodyguard, Cicero was upon us. In the middle of conversing with Antonius he caught sight of Rufus. His expression passed through rapid changes. He looked at first genuinely pleased, then grave and doubtful, then almost playfully shrewd — the face of a mentor who has lost the allegiance of a once-devoted pupil but does not despair of regaining it. 'Dear Rufus!' he said, smiling broadly.

'Cicero,' said Rufus in return, without emotion.

'And Marcus Mummius, back from serving Pompey in the East.

And Gordianus,' said Cicero, finally seeing me. His voice went

flat for a moment, then took on a politician's affable familiarity. 'Ah, yes, you've come to take the auspices for young Meto's coming of age. We're all getting older, aren't we, Gordianus?'

Some more than others, I thought, though the years had actually done much to soften Cicero's unlovely features. The thin, sharp nose was now rather fleshy; the slender neck with its prominent knob was now padded with rings of fat; the pointed chin had become lost in jowls. The man whose delicate constitution would hardly allow him to eat in the heat of the day had nevertheless managed to grow portly. Cicero had never been handsome, but he had managed to acquire a look of prosperity and self-assurance. His voice, once grating and unpleasant, had been trained and transformed over the years into a melodious instrument. 'How I regret that I was unable to attend your party,' he said. 'The demands of being consul are unending — you understand, I'm sure. But I did send Marcus Caelius to offer my apologies. He did deliver his message, did he not?' The look in his eyes gave a deeper meaning to the question.

'Caelius came,' I said. 'But his message was misdirected. He left dissatisfied.'

'Oh?' Cicero sounded unconcerned, but his eyes flashed. 'Well, my fellow consul and I must hurry on — we have pressing business in the Senate. Good luck in your campaign, Rufus! Good fortune to you, Meto!'

As they passed, I said in a low voice to Rufus, 'Well, augur, what did you make of that flicker of lightning — the one in Cicero's eyes?' 'Is there trouble between you?'

"There's likely to be. But what is this business of his wearing a breastplate? And going about with such a formidable bodyguard?'

'He looks absurd!' bellowed Mummius. 'like a mockery of a military man. Does he dare to mock Pompey?'

'Hardly,' said Rufus. 'He began to wear it the day he postponed the elections, saying that Catilina was plotting to murder him in the confusion of voting day — "To save his own life, the consul of the Roman Republic must resort to wearing armour and surrounding himself with armed men," et cetera. It's a tactic to get the crowd's attention and alarm the voters; it's political theatre, spectacle, nothing more. After what Cicero and his brother did to Catilina's good name in the consular campaign last year, no one would be surprised if Catilina wanted to murder him. Who knows, perhaps there is a plot to assassinate Cicero; but for Cicero it's just more grist for the mill of his shrill rhetoric'

'Politics!' Mummius barked. 'I had enough of it the year I served as praetor. Give me orders to follow and men to order, and I'm happy.'

'Well,' I said, huffing and puffing from the exertion of the steep ascent, 'for the moment, at least, let us put all such unworthy matters behind us.' Quite literally behind us, and beneath us as well, I thought, turning my head to glance down at the teeming Forum far below. ‘We have arrived at the summit. There is nothing but blue sky between us and the eyes of Jupiter. Here in this place, my son becomes a man.'

XX

On battlefields and in the countryside, where there is no permanent place for performing auguries, a sacred tent must be pitched before the augur may begin his work. High up on the Arx in Rome, above a steep semicircular cliff with an expansive view of the whole northern horizon, there is a paved place open to the sky called the Auguraculum, especially consecrated for the taking of the auspices. The only structure is a permanently pitched tent maintained by the college of augurs. Like the special robes they wear, it has a purple border and is shot with stripes of saffron. It is a small tent, so small that one would have to stoop to step inside, though so far as I know no one ever goes inside.

Why a tent? I do not know, especially since the taking of the auspices by definition must be performed outdoors with a view of the sky. Perhaps it is the ancient linkage of the augurs with military campaigns, where their approval of the omens must still be sought before a general can engage his troops in battle. Perhaps it is because the augurs study not only the flights of birds and peregrinations of quadrupeds, but also the occurrence of lightning bolts, the study of which dates back to the Etruscans and beyond; where there is lightning, after all, there is likely to be rain, and thus the need for a tent.

However it may be, we found ourselves gathered on the Arx before the sacred tent. Rufus took up his ivory wand and with it marked out a section of the heavens from which he would take the auspices, like an invisible window frame set into the sky. Through it I could see most of the Field of Mars, a wide bend of the Tiber, and a great swathe of land beyond.

The augurs divide birds into two classes, those whose cry signifies

the divine win, including the raven, the crow, the owl, and the woodpecker, and those whose flight may be read for the same significations, including the vulture, the hawk, and the eagle, Jupiter's favourite bird. On military expeditions, where an omen may be needed on short notice and wild fowl may be scarce, chickens are taken along in special cages. To determine the will of the gods, the doors of the coop are thrown open and a handful of grain is thrown on the ground. A strong show of appetite on the part of the hens is deemed a good sign, especially if they drop little bits of food from their beaks onto the ground. A reluctance to leave the cage or a show of finickiness is a bad sign. As for the reading of lightning, it has always been my understanding that lightning on the left is good, but on the right is bad. Or is it the other way around?

There are those, like Cicero, who believe that augury is utter nonsense, and will say so in private letters and conversations. There are those politicians like Caesar who see augury as a useful tool, and have no more or less contempt for it than they do for any other device of power, such as elections, taxation, or courts of law. And there are those like Rufus who sincerely believe in the manifestation of divine will in various phenomena and in their own ability to perceive and interpret those manifestations.

For myself, standing in the hot sun and wishing I had thought to bring my broad-brimmed hat, I began to wish that the ceremonial tent behind us contained a chicken coop so that we could get on with the divination. All the birds of Rome appeared to be napping, and there was not a thundercloud in sight.

An augury takes as long as an augury takes. The divine will is not at the beck and call of even the youngest and most charming of the augurs. The gods have other things to do than to make a raven cackle or send a vulture soaring on the hot wind. Patience is the first duty of the pious.

Even so, I found my thoughts wandering. My eyes strayed from the designated section of the heavens to the eastern escarpment of the Arx, over which, if I stood on my toes, I could glimpse the Forum below. It was still full of people, but a stillness and a hush had fallen on the crowd. "Within the Senate House the senators were debating, and the men of Rome awaited word of their leaders' decision. Cicero was probably speaking even now. Caesar and Crassus might join in the argument, if it suited their ends to do so, as might Cato, with his heavy moralizing, and the troublemaker Clodius, and the year's forgotten consul, the nonentity Antonius. Catilina would be there as well, to defend himself, to strike back at Cicero, to demand that the election proceed. Was it really possible that he could be elected consul? And if so, could he force the Senate to implement his radical programmes? Would Caesar and Crassus support him — to a point? Would the state come to a standstill? Be torn apart? Descend again into bloody civil war? And who then would pick up the pieces — Crassus, Caesar, Pompey.. Catilina?

'There!' cried a hushed voice behind me. It was Eco, who had spotted something with wings in the sky. I shook my head, drowsy from the heat and trying to remember where my thoughts had wandered. I blinked and stared at the dark spot that hovered above the city. Unfortunately, it flew about in a low spiral and then descended, never having entered the designated section of the sky. Not an omen, after all. Around me I heard a collective sigh of disappointment. Rufus stood near the precipice, his back to us, so that I could not see his face. But his shoulders remained erect, his chin upraised and confident. He had faith in his science, and patience with the gods.

I should not have eaten so much at Meto's party, I thought. Cicero was correct: a man should eat only the lightest of meals at midday. But then, Cicero had always had a complaining belly. I felt no discomfort, only a heavy fullness, and a great sleepiness from the heat and from the tiring ascent to the Arx. I could barely keep my eyes open…

The last time Rome had been plunged into civil war the result had been disastrous. Sulla had triumphed, and with him the most reactionary elements in the state. Laws giving power to the populace had been repealed. The constitution had been reformed to give the wealthy greater influence over popular elections and law courts, and within the upper classes Sulla had done his best to exterminate the opposition. A generation later the state was in greater chaos than ever. Many of Sulla's reforms had been repealed and populist forces were on the move again, but Sulla's legacy lived on in the deprivation of the children of his victims and in the wholesale failure of his agrarian policy — the veterans he had intended to become farmers had ruined their land and were now rallying in desperation behind Catilina. Discontent was everywhere, except among that tiny handful who always had and always would possess more wealth and power than they could ever hope to use in a lifetime. Their comfortable state had been given to them by the gods, they believed; perhaps Cicero had been given to them as well, a sweet voice that could sing the turbulent masses to sleep…

Worst of all had been the heads, I thought. The heads of Sulla's enemies, spitted on poles and lined up in the Forum for all to see. Bounty hunters cut off the heads and brought them to Sulla for a reward. For the bodies they had no use. What had become of all the bodies, the bodies without heads? Suddenly, as clearly as on the day Diana found it, I saw the body of Nemo beneath me on the straw, with the blood all clotted about the stump of his neck. The shock of it was so great that I gasped and my shoulders convulsed.

'Yes! At last' whispered Eco in my ear, his hand on the back of my neck. 'There, flying up swiftly from the river.'

I blinked, confused and dazed by the brightness. White stones blazed at my feet and the sun seemed to have filled up the sky. In the midst of so much light a tiny black form took shape, flying from left to right and growing larger until it resolved itself into a body with long, outstretched wings.

'A hawk,' whispered Eco.

'No,' said Mummius, 'an eagle!'

The bird circled once over the Field of Mars and then grew larger and larger as it approached. Its speed was stunning; no horse could have galloped so fast across the sky. A moment later it landed so close to Rufus that he could have bent down to touch it if he dared. We stood transfixed and silent. We stared at the eagle, and the eagle stared back. I had never seen one so close. Then, as suddenly as it had landed, it spread its giant wings and ascended over our heads, straight up into the sun.

I lowered my eyes, blinking and half-blind. Rufus turned towards us with a look of awe on his face. 'The omen,' I said. 'Was it good?'

'Good?' He frowned at me quizzically, then broke into a smile. 'It could not possibly have been better!'

Had the city not already been consumed with the immediate controversies swirling around Catilina and the elections, perhaps the prodigious omen that landed at Rufus's feet would have excited great comment. Had it occurred on a lazy summer day when nothing else of importance was happening in the Forum, the gossip would have spread through the squares and taverns — Jupiter's bird, an eagle, alighting at the Auguraculum for a boy's simple passage to manhood, and a boy who had once been a slave, at that! The superstitious would have found it either inspiring or fearsome, a sign of the gods' displeasure or their benediction. But in the general chaos of that day, the incident went unremarked except among those who were there.

On the path back down to the Forum, Marcus Mummius was greatly excited. 'An eagle, a military bird! It portends a great career in the army!' I noticed Meto smiling at such talk, and I wished that Mummius would be silent.

I turned to Rufus, who had changed from his augur's trabea back into his candidate's toga. 'Is that what it means, Rufus?'

'Not necessarily.' Meto overheard and his smile faded, for which I was glad. I wanted no thoughts of military glory going through his head. I had not rescued the boy from slavery to see him spill his blood for some ambitious general.

Rufus slowed his pace and let the others go ahead of us. He touched my arm to signal that I should stay back with him. His expression was uneasy. His initial ebullience at the eagle's landing had vanished, replaced by uncertainty. 'It's a powerful portent, Gordianus. Never has such a thing happened to me, and not to any other augur so far as I know.'

'But it's a good portent?' I said hopefully. 'You seemed to think so at the time it happened.'

'Yes, but what I felt was a kind of religious awe. That can blind a man, even an augur. All omens are awesome, because they come from the gods, but what they mean for mortal men does not always bring us happiness.'

'Rufus, what are you saying?'

'I almost wish the auspices had been less prodigious. A simple sighting of a vulture, a crow flying in an upward spiral—'

'But an eagle sent from Jupiter, surely that's good—'

'Such a powerful omen, appearing at such a modest occasion — it worries me. It seems out of place, out of balance. We live in a time when small men are drawn into great events — sometimes elevated to greatness themselves by those events, but more often crushed by them. Meto is so simple and good-natured, what can it mean that such a potent auspice should attend his coming of age? It worries me.'

'Oh, Rufus—' I almost forgot myself and would have scoffed in his face, but my respect for him was too great. Still, I felt myself in sympathy with disbelievers like Cicero, who in private shake their heads at the hand-wringing of the pious. Or was I only putting a good face on my own anxiety? 'Perhaps the omen was misdirected. Perhaps it has something to do with Catilina or Cicero. Perhaps it was meant tor the consuls and arrived an hour too late! The gods do make mistakes from time to time — all the poets say so.'

'You won't hear a priest or an augur say so,' said Rufus, unamused.

We proceeded down the path. The noise from the Forum rose to greet us. Ahead of us, Mummius had one arm around Meto's shoulders and was enthusiastically gesturing with the other. 'When Romans go into battle with flags waving, you'll always see an eagle atop the standards. Pompey wears a golden breastplate with an eagle embossed across the pectorals, its wings spread open — like a great bird come to snatch Mithridates' kingdom from him! Oh, and I remember, before the battle of the Colline Gate, back when I was a young lieutenant for Crassus and we fought for Sulla, the augurs saw three eagles circling over Rome.. Meto seemed completely captivated by such talk.

I was somewhat relieved, then, when we came to the foot of the Capitoline and Mummius took his leave of us, saying he wanted to catch the last of the debate in the Senate House. He did not tarry over farewells, but gave Meto and Eco each a crushing hug and departed at a quick marching pace, with Apollonius following him.

It seemed a good time for the whole retinue to disperse; I thanked the friends and well-wishers who had accompanied us and released them to go on about any business they might have in the Forum. It would be enough, I thought, for Meto to be accompanied by his father and brother as we crossed the Forum on our way back to the women.

But Rufus had another plan. 'Remember, earlier I said I might have a surprise for Meto.' He seemed to have put aside his misgivings and smiled slyly, or as slyly as his nature allowed. 'I am going to take you into the Senate House with me!'

'What?' My heart sank.

'To hear the senators debate?' said Meto, who seemed almost as interested in this news as he had been in Mummius's military talk.

"The idea came to me as soon as Eco asked me to preside as augur for you. Of course, in the normal course of things the Senate might not be convening at all on this day, but as it turns out, the occasion could hardly be better. The chamber will be full, and you may see quite a spectacle. We are running late, but still

'But, Rufus, only sons and grandsons of senators themselves are allowed to attend.'

'Not so. There are plenty of secretaries scurrying about.'

'But surely the likes of the Gordiani will not be allowed into the Senate House,'I said.

'Accompanied by me, you will.' He seemed completely certain. Patricians can be very sure of themselves, usually with good reason.

'Oh, Rufus, it is an honour, of course, but I think that we must decline,' I said.

Meto looked at me as if I had carelessly thrown one of his birthday presents into the Tiber. 'But, Papa, why not?' 'Yes, Papa, why not?' said Eco.

'Because — well, surely, Meto, you would feel self-conscious in such a place.'

Meto wrinkled his brow. Rufus answered for him. 'We shall hang back in the shadows. No one will even notice us.'

'But, Rufus, we shall only be in your way. We've already kept you from your business as a senator by accepting your services as augur.'

'And you're keeping me from my business now, by arguing to no purpose. Come, Gordianus, this is the day, the very hour in which Meto has become a full citizen of Rome. What better way to celebrate than to take him into the very heart of the Republic? How could you deny your son such an invaluable lesson in citizenship? I confess, I remained a little uncertain about doing this myself, up until the arrival of the eagle at the Auguraculum. Now I am convinced that it must be the right thing to do. Come, then, let's hurry, before the senators conclude their business and rush back into the Forum to beg for votes!'

He turned and pressed into the crowd. Meto looked at me with a mixture of boyish entreaty and manly impatience. Eco stared at me sympathetically, for he knew me well enough to know how deeply revolted I was by the idea of immersing myself and my family in a sea of politicians, and at the same time he knew that I had no reasonable excuse to refuse Rufus's generous and thoughtful offer, or to deny Meto the opportunity to see such a thing with his own eyes. I suppose I might have left my sons with Rufus and gone skulking back to the women — but then I would not have heard Catilina pose his riddle.

Abroad flight of steps leads up to the porch of the Senate House, where great columns flank the doorway. Loitering on the steps were various retainers of the senators within; among them I recognized some of the burly bodyguards who had accompanied Cicero in his retinue. Other guards, attached to the Senate House itself, flanked the tall doors, which by law remained open so as not to hide the proceedings within from the eyes of the gods. Again it struck me as unlikely that we would be allowed into such a place, even accompanied by Rufus, but that was because I thought the Senate House had only one entrance. Rums knew better.

Next to the Senate House and attached to it is another, less impressive building which houses various offices of the state. I had never been inside, and in fact had hardly ever noticed it. The wooden doors of the entrance stood open on such a hot day and there was no one to stop us from entering.

Within, a broad hallway ran the length of the building with rows of small rooms on either side. The rooms were full of scrolls stacked in cases against the walls and piled on tables. A few sleepy clerks moved lethargically among the documents, like shepherds tending a docile flock. They took no notice of us.

At the centre of the building a flight of steps ascended to a second storey and then to a third. Rufus led us through a succession of small, plain rooms. I began to hear echoey voices speaking in loud, oratorical tones, interrupted occasionally by an indistinct roar that might have been jeering or laughter. The sounds grew louder as we passed from room to room, until we came to an iron door that stood half-open. Rufus put a finger to his lips, though none of us had said a word since we began to follow him; then he slipped through the doorway. With one hand he gestured for us to follow.

The Senate House is not an old building, having been rebuilt and refurbished by Sulla during his dictatorship. The materials within reflect the despot's impeccable taste — the decorative walls of coloured marble, the beautifully carved columns, the ornately coffered ceiling. A vestibule separates the meeting room from the main entrance. The great chamber is rectangular,illuminated at night or in stormy weather by great lamps that hang from the ceiling, and on a bright, sunlit afternoon such as this by tall, unshuttered windows placed high up in the walls and covered by bronze lattices. Against the longer walls and in a semicircle against the short wall opposite the vestibule are three tiers of seats, so that the rows of carved wooden chairs follow the shape of the letter U. We had entered near the left-hand prong of the U, between the vestibule on our left and the tiers of seats on our right. In this inconspicuous place stood some ten or more clerks who kept attentive eyes upon the senators in case they should be summoned to fetch some document or carry a message. A few of the clerks noticed our arrival and gave us a suspicious glance, but when they saw that we were with Rufus they paid us no more attention. They seemed too engrossed by what was happening on the floor of the Senate.

Cicero stood at the very centre of the room, surrounded by the seated senators like a gladiator in the circus. If Meto needed instruction by example on how to comport himself in a toga, he could have learned much that day from Cicero, who seemed to be able to speak with his entire body, subtly turning and twisting his neck, gesticulating with one arm and clutching the other to his midriff as if it held a shield. He had come a long way from the impassioned but rather stiff orator I had met many years ago. One hardly even had to hear him to feel the force of his eloquence.

He was not delivering a set speech at the moment, but seemed instead to be engaged in a spontaneous debate with one of the senators in the tiers. From where we stood I had to crane my neck to catch a glimpse of the man, but when I heard his voice, I had no need to see him: it was Catilina.

Sulla, when he rebuilt the Senate House, had used not only his impeccable eye but his ear as well. The great lover of music and the theatre had learned a thing or two from those famous Greek theatres where an actor's whisper can be clearly heard from the farthest seat. Every word that Cicero and Catilina exchanged pealed as clear as if we had stood between them.

'Catilina, Catilina!’ Cicero cried in a mock-wounded tone. 'I ask not that the elections be postponed to jeopardize your chances of being elected, if that is the will of the people. I would do nothing to jeopardize the will of the Roman people! But so long as I have been entrusted with the guidance of tile state, I will do everything possible to see that the state and the people are preserved from harm.’ That goes as well for the members of this august body! As it stands now, if the voting is held tomorrow, we are likely to have not an election but a bloodbath!'

At this there was another mild uproar. Thanks to the room's extraordinary acoustics, I could hear quite distinctly the mingled shouts of scoffing and agreement within the general roar.

'Cicero is obsessed with the idea that blood will be spilled on election day,' shouted Catilina, 'only because he fears it will be his own.'

'And do you deny that I have every reason to fear?' said Cicero. Did I see his eyebrows go up, or was it the posturing of his whole body that expressed such eloquent irony? 'I have asked you already about the reports that have come to us that you are conspiring against the person of the consul—’

'And I have roundly denied them, and I ask you again: what reports, and from what sources?'

'You are the one who is here to answer questions, Catilina!'

'I am not on trial!'

'You mean to say that you have not been formally charged with a crime, but only because you have not yet had the opportunity to commit it,'

This brought on another uproar.

Above the din, Cicero shouted: 'And that is only because of the vigilance of your intended victim!' He crossed his arms and drew back his shoulders, wrapping himself in his toga as if to wrap himself in virtue, then seized the folds of cloth about his neck and drew them down to expose the glittering breastplate.

This provoked an even more raucous uproar. A group of the senators surrounding Catilina, presumably his allies, rose to their feet, some laughing, some shaking their fists and jeering. Instead of retreating, Cicero actually stepped towards them, baring more of his breastplate. Such brazenness only provoked an even louder uproar.

'This is worse than the mob in the Forum,' I whispered to Rufus.

'I've never seen it quite so chaotic,' he murmured. 'Even in the most passionate debates there's always a modicum of order and mutual respect, some humour to leaven the animosities, but today the whole chamber seems on the verge of a riot.'

Above the continued shouting of Catilina's supporters Cicero managed to make his voice heard. The power of his lungs was astounding. 'Do you deny that you have conspired to assassinate members of this august body?'

'Where is your evidence?' Catilina shouted back, barely audible above the roar of his own supporters.

'Do you deny that you have plotted to murder the duly elected consul of the Republic, and to do it on the next consular election day?'

'Again, where is your evidence?'

'Do you, Lucius Sergius Catilina, deny that your ultimate goal is to dismantle the state as we know it, and to do so by whatever means are necessary, no matter how violent or illegal?'

Catilina responded, but his voice was drowned out by his own supporters, giving Cicero, with his trumpet-like voice, the advantage. At last Catilina managed to quiet his own adherents, who returned to their seats. Catilina remained standing. 'With all due respect, the esteemed consul's accusations are deranged! He frets over the safety of the Republic like a mother afraid to let her child leave the house. Is the Republic so delicate that an honest election might kill it? Is he himself so vital to the state, is his insight so unique, that we would become blind men without him? Ah, yes, Cicero sees things that other men do not — but I ask you, is that good or bad?' This provoked some scattered laughter, and with it a marked lessening of tension. 'Contrary to what this New Man may think, the history of this Republic did not begin and will not end with his consulship.' At this there was more laughter and even some cheering.

Catilina smiled bitterly. 'It is not I who seek to thwart the will of the people, Cicero, but you!' At this there were catcalls and booing from the opposite side of the chamber. ‘Yes, for who else but Cicero is determined to keep postponing the election? And why? Because he fears for his own life? This is absurd! If a man had cause to kill our esteemed consul, why wait until election day?'

'To spread chaos,' Cicero answered. 'To frighten decent voters from the polls so that your own adherents can steal the election.'

'Absurd, I say! The true theft is occurring beneath our noses, and at the consul's behest, for by making the date of the election uncertain you disenfranchise those who must travel here to vote and cannot take up lodgings indefinitely in the city. The election has already been postponed once. Do not postpone it any further!'

'The election was postponed because of the auspices,' said Cicero. "The earth quaked, thunderbolts creased the sky—' At this there were scattered moans and jeers, presumably from sceptics, followed by a second wave of jeering from the pious who hissed at the doubters.

'Typically, Cicero, you change the subject, hoping to divert our attention from the real issue! The first postponement is over and done with. The auspices now are favourable. You have no religious reason to deny the election any longer.' At this, even some of the senators who had so far been silent murmured agreement and nodded gravely.

'Come, Cicero, you have debated long enough,' cried one of the older senators. This cry was taken up by many others. Cicero stepped back and surveyed the tiers, as if assessing his strength. He appeared dissatisfied, but as the calls grew louder for the debate to end, he stepped back and gestured to his fellow consul, Gaius Antonius, who commenced the reading of a proposal to postpone again the consular election and to censure Catilina for 'disrupting the state.' Those in favour were instructed to take seats on the left-hand side of the room; those against were to gather on the opposite side, where Catilina and his supporters already sat.

At this point Rufus left us to join his fellow senators in opposition to the proposal. I noticed that Marcus Mummius was of the same faction, as were Caesar and Crassus and their adherents. When all were settled, even without a strict counting it was clear that Cicero had been thwarted and the election would proceed. Gaius Antonius announced the result and summarily dismissed the assembly.

A murmur of conversation filled the chamber, above which could be heard Cicero's trumpeting voice: 'On the morrow we shall see who spoke wisdom. I foresee dangerous times for this Republic!'

'What eyes you have, Cicero, to see so much more than the rest of us!' called Catilina.

Many of the milling senators stopped their conversations to listen. They might not have had enough of their two colleagues' debate, but I had. I gestured to Meto and Eco that it was time to go, before we were caught loitering in the chamber without Rufus to vouch for us. We slipped through the half-open door by which we had entered. Catilina's voice echoed behind us. 'And do you know what I see, Cicero? Do you know what my eyes perceive when I study this Republic? I see two bodies—'

I stopped, suddenly alert, and turned back to listen. Meto was puzzled, but I saw in Eco's eyes that he, too, had heard.

Catilina's voice was echoey and distorted, like a voice from a dream. ‘I see two bodies, one thin and wasted, but with a swollen head, the other headless, but big and strong. The invalid with a head leads the big headless one about like an animal on a chain. Ask yourself, what is there so dreadful about it, if I myself become the head of the body which needs one? The story would be quite different then!'

Told in context, the meaning of the riddle was clear. I sucked in my breath at Catilina's audacity. Having had his way on proceeding with the election, now he dared to mock not only Cicero but the Senate itself, and in its very house. For what could the withered body with a swollen head represent but the Senate? And what was the strong, headless body but the leaderless masses, of whom Catilina proposed to become the head, and whose discontent he would harness towards his own ends?

Eco also understood. 'The man must be mad,' he said.

'Or very sure of his success,' I said.

'Or both,' said Meto gravely.

XXI

After the Senate dispersed, the space in front of the Senate House became almost impassable as the various senators' retinues regrouped around their leaders. I had no desire to press into the throng to make our way through the Forum. Instead we retreated into the maze of narrow, winding side streets just north of the Forum until we emerged at the place where we had left the women.

No excuses for the length of our absence were needed, for Bethesda herself had just returned from shopping at the various markets all around the Forum. For Diana she had purchased a clay doll with eyes of green glass, for Menenia a blue and yellow scarf, and for herself a small ivory comb. I groaned inwardly at these small extravagances, thinking of all the hay that had been lost to rust and wondering how I would manage the finances of the farm through the winter. But how could I deny Bethesda the pleasure of an afternoon of shopping when she had been away from such opportunities for so long?

The litters carried us back to the house on the Esquiline, where Eco dismissed the bearers. Our dinner that night was eaten in formal courses, on couches gathered in the dining room beside the garden. Only the family was there. The women wore their stolas, and we men kept on our togas. Meto was given the place of honour. He had never reclined upon a couch and eaten a meal in formal dress, but he managed with hardly any awkwardness and did not spill a drop of wine on his toga.

The conversation was chiefly of family matters — Menenia's and Eco's refurbishment of.the house, how things were faring on the farm, Eco's relations with his in-laws. There was some discussion of the augury that afternoon, which we all agreed was uncommonly auspicious — all except Bethesda, who has always professed to find Roman religion simplistic compared to her own Egyptian sensibilities. Graciously, she did not criticize the ceremony; her only comment on the appearance of the eagle at the Auguraculum was to ask if it had any human features. Menenia, equally gracious, hid her smile behind a papyrus fan.

There was no talk of Cicero or Catilina, no mention of elections or of bodies without heads. For this I was glad.

After the rest of the household went to bed, I was wakeful and restless and went to the garden instead. The yellow canopy had been removed and the garden was filled with bright moonlight. I listened to the soft splashing of the fountain and studied the broken moon and wavering stars reflected in the black water. The moonlight turned the hard paving stones to shimmering silver and seemed to cover the flowers with a soft coating of grey ash.

How many nights had I found peace and escape from the cares of the city in this garden? In a way I felt as far from the turmoil of the Forum in this place as I did at the farm in Etruria; in some ways I felt even safer and more removed. I sat on a stone bench beside the fountain and leaned against a pillar. I gazed up at the moon and the dome of stars all around it.

I heard the sound of bare feet from the portico, so familiar that I did not have to look. 'Meto,' I said quietly.

'Papa.' He stepped into the garden. His toga had been put away, and he wore only a loincloth about his hips. He stepped nearer and I indicated that he should sit beside me, but instead he sat on a bench a few feet away, facing me.

'Can't you sleep, Meto? Or is it too hot?'

'No, it's not the heat.' The angle of the moonlight obscured his face, casting his eyes in shadow, glancing off his nose and making his cheeks and lips look as if they were carved from marble.

'The excitement of the day, then,' I suggested.

He was silent for a long moment 'Papa, I'm a man now.'

'I know, Meto.'

'I'm not a boy any longer.'

'Yes, Meto, I know.'

'Then why do you still treat me like a boy?' 'Because — what do you mean?'

‘You hide things from me. You talk behind my back. You tell Eco everything; you share everything with him.' 'Because Eco is…'

'Because Eco is a man, and I am a boy.'

'No, Meto, it's not that.'

'Because Eco was born free and I wasn't.'

'Not that, either,' I said, wearily shaking my head.

‘But I am a man, Papa. The law says so, and so do the gods. Why don't you believe it?'

I looked at his smooth, unblemished cheeks, the colour of white roses in the moonlight, which the barber had shaved for the first time that day. I looked at his slender arms and narrow chest, as smooth and hairless as a girl's. But his arms were not really as slender as I had thought; in a year's time the work of the farm had put some muscle into them. Nor was his chest any longer the flat, narrow chest of a child; it had begun to broaden and take shape. The moonlight clearly etched the square prominence of his pectorals and the ridges of his belly. His legs were still long for his body, but they were not spindly; his calves and thighs were hard with muscle.

When had this happened? It was as if I gazed at a stranger beneath the moonlight, or as if the moon itself had transformed him in that moment before my eyes.

'You treat me like a child, Papa. You know this is true. This whole matter of not wanting me to go inside the Senate House—'

"That had nothing to do with you, Meto. It was my own aversion.'

'But what about the body we found in the stables? You treated me the same way you treated Diana.'

'I did not. I sent her away, but to you I showed what one could learn from observing the corpse — although, as I remember, you were almost too squeamish to look.'

'But I did look! And I'm not talking about letting me study the body with you. I'm talking about afterwards, when you began to brood over it. You never confided in me. You sent for Eco to come all the way from Rome so that you could share your thoughts with him.'

‘I didn't send for Eco.'

"That's not what he says.'

'Oh, I see, the two of you have been talking behind my back.' 'Confiding in each other, Papa, as brothers should. And as I wish you would confide in me. Because I am a man now.

Because you need me, to help protect you and Mother and Diana—'

'Protect me!’ The image of the little boy I met in Baiae protecting me from some hulking assassin was so absurd that I shook my head. It was my duty to protect him, as I always had. Of course, he was not really so little any more. But I was still stronger than he was, at least I thought so, though he might be faster, and his stamina might be greater than mine.

'Your body has changed, Meto, that's true, but in other ways—'

'In other ways I'm still a child. I know that's what you think, but where is your evidence?' These words rang strangely in my ears. Where had he picked them up? 'It's just not true, Papa. You don't know what sort of things I think about when I'm alone. I worry, too, about the body we found, and Catilina coming to our house, and the terrible things happening in Rome. I saw Marcus Caelius talking to you at the party today. I saw the look on your face. What were you talking about? What did he want? Why don't you tell me, so that I can help? You'll tell Eco, won't you?'

'Oh, Meto, how can I ask for your help when I don't know myself what needs to be done?'

'But that's just it, Papa Perhaps ‘ might think of something.'

He lifted his face into the moonlight-and in that moment he no longer looked transformed at all. He was a mere child again, gangly and awkward, earnest and innocent and eager to please. I could barely resist an urge to reach out and tousle his hair. How could I treat him as something he was not?

'Papa, I ask for your respect. Whatever danger faces us, I want to know about it. I want to do my part. I want to be included. I have the right to expect that, now that I'm a man. Can't you understand?'

'Yes, Meto, I understand.'

'And you'll treat me differently in the future?'

I took a deep breath. 'I shall try.'

'Good. Then we can begin by going to see the election tomorrow.' 'Oh, Meto,' I groaned.

'But, Papa, how can I learn if I can't see with my own eyes? That's why today was so extraordinary. Going into the Senate House, hearing him speak — I shall never forget it!'

'Hearing Cicero?'

'No, Catilina! It meant even more to me than the ceremony at the

Auguraculum. I must see what happens tomorrow.' He lowered his eyes. 'I could go alone—'

'Never! Gangs, knives, riots—'

'Then we shall go together?'

I wrinkled my brow. 'I shall sleep on it.'

'Papa…'

'Oh, very well.' I sighed. 'If you must see Rome at her worst…'

"Thank you, Papa!' He gripped my hands in his and then departed for bed. A few moments later I did the same, since I would not be sleeping late after all.

When I was a boy, the northwestern portion of the city outside the Servian Wall, called the Field of Mars, was still largely undeveloped. Chariot racers trained their horses and military units practised their drills on the unobstructed plain, with so much room that they did not even have to breathe one another's clouds of dust. At the far end of the Field, above a sweeping bend in the River Tiber, are the medicinal hot springs at Tarentum, where my father liked to go to ease his joints; I remember walking to the springs through wooded areas where goats chewed the grass alongside the road, with hardly a house in sight, as if one were in the country. Perhaps my boyish eyes exaggerated these pastoral expanses.

Of course, the southern portion of the Field of Mars nearest the Servian Wall has long been built up. The morning shadows of the Capitoline Hill have for many years fallen across warehouses and wharves on the Tiber, the teeming vegetable markets of the Forum Holitorium, crowded tenements, and the cluster of shops and baths around the Circus Flaminius, still the most conspicuous structure anywhere outside the Servian Wall. Even so, in my lifetime I have seen the entire Field of Mars become much more developed — more warehouses have gone up on the river, new and taller tenements have been squeezed between the old ones, the few remaining groves have been cleared and built over, new roads have been laid out. The chariot racers and drilling soldiers have been pressed closer together, so that their clouds of dust mingle in the air. The road to Tarentum is no longer like a brief respite in the countryside, but is surrounded by city all the way. There are even rumours that Pompey, having secured a large tract of public land in the heart of the Field of Mars, is planning to build a great theatre of stucco and marble. This has excited great controversy, for if built, the structure will be the first permanent theatre in Rome, a city where makeshift stages erected for festivals have always been deemed more proper than the temple-like theatres of the decadent, drama-worshipping Greeks.

Because it lies outside the city walls, and because of its flat expanse (as compared to the city's seven hills and the valleys between them), the Field of Mars has from very early days been the gathering place for assemblies too large (and often too unruly) to be accommodated in the Forum. From the time of the founding of the Republic, Romans have gathered there to do their voting.

So it was, very early the next morning, that Meto and I set out for the Field of Mars. I decided to take Belbo with us; if Cicero was right in his prediction of violence, I wanted a bodyguard. We ate a hurried but extravagant breakfast of leftovers from the party and took a bundle of food and a skin of watered wine with us. The sky was pale with dawn as we made our way through the Subura towards the Fontinal Gate. There were already groups of men in the street, all heading in the same direction. We were just passing through the gate when I heard the trumpets being blown to call the people to assemble.

Just off the Flaminian Way, between the built-up, southern area of the Field of Mars and the more open spaces to the north, is the Villa Publica. The walled enclosure is very old, as are the buildings within. Besides housing the offices of the census takers, who keep the registries of voters, the Villa Publica serves the city of Rome as a vestibule or foyer serves a house; foreign ambassadors are lodged there, as are Roman generals who must reside outside the city before making their triumphal entries. It is also the place where candidates withdraw to await the election results.

Adjoining the Villa Publica is another walled enclosure called, without ostentation, the Sheep Pen. On election day ropes are stretched across its length to split the space into aisles. To cast their ballots the voters are guided through the Pen like sheep through a run. It does not require a great wit to extrapolate the metaphors.

Under the rising sun citizens thronged to the open fields around the Villa Publica. Roman voters are split into various classes according to their wealth, and within those classes are assigned to voting units, or centuries. Organizers within each century were working doggedly to gather their members together; many of the centuries obviously had predetermined meeting places, but in such a vast crowd there was still considerable confusion. Compounding this was the weather.

It had not rained for several days, and there was a great deal of dust in the air. The morning was already warm and likely to get much warmer. The atmosphere was not unlike that of a great feedlot on a hot summer day.

It did not take long for me to see signs of outright bribery. I recognized a number of disreputable types in the crowd and I watched them move among the century leaders, smiling and clasping hands and brazenly handing out small, lumpy sacks that could only have been filled with coins. A few of these agents I recognized as henchmen of Crassus, and at least one of them I had noticed in Caesar's retinue the day before, but there were many more whose allegiance I did not know.

There were a few scattered instances of violence, but no general disruptions. We saw a country farmer and his sons beaten and run off by a gang of youths. We watched two red-faced, grey-haired Optimates engaged in a blustering fistfight with each other (one supported Murena, the other Silanus — who but an Optimate could tell the difference?); their attendant slaves stood back helplessly and looked on, variously appalled, alarmed, and amused. We came upon the aftermath of a duel with knives that ended with both parties being carried off, bleeding and moaning, by their friends. All in all, it was a more peaceful crowd than I had expected. Of course, these were only the violent episodes that we happened to witness; within the great milling throng there must have been many more.

A tumult of shouting moved towards us through the crowd, and I turned to see that Cicero and his fellow consul Gaius Antonius were arriving. Cicero was surrounded by his armed bodyguard and wore his toga open to show the breastplate across his chest, a last reminder to the voters of the presumed treachery of Catilina. They disappeared within the gates of the Villa Publica and eventually reappeared at the podium built into the wall. Antonius announced that the auspices had been duly observed by the augurs in the Villa Publica and had been declared acceptable. Without an earthquake and with a blue sky above, it could hardly have been otherwise, I thought, especially since the Senate had made its desires in the matter very clear on the previous day. The election could proceed.

Shortly thereafter the candidates arrived. Each was attended by a long retinue of supporters who pushed and shoved their way through the crowd. Each made an appearance on the podium before disappearing into the Villa Publica. There were mingled hisses and cheers for Murena and Silanus, the Optimate favourites, who appeared one after the other.

As the candidates left the podium, the grey-haired fistfighters, who had called a truce while their favourites were on stage, fell to cursing and striking each other again.

A number of other candidates paraded across the podium, none of them eliciting more than a smattering of applause or angry catcalls. Then Catilina arrived.

We heard his approach long before we saw him. It began with a roar of sound that seemed to come all the way from the Fontinal Gate and grew louder and louder at it approached the Villa Publica. The sound was like a wall, palpable and impenetrable, as if one might be crushed beneath it. What it was made of was hard to tell at first — the aggregate of booing, hissing, cheering, applauding, jeering, cursing was blended into a single roar. Nor was the physical reaction of the crowd easy to determine. When the retinue passed by, men opened their mouths to shout, but were they cursing or cheering? They thrust their arms into the air, but did a clenched fist signal hatred or support? Through the throng I glimpsed Catilina himself, and from the smile on his face one might have thought that every voice was cheering and every upraised fist was his to command.

When he stood upon the podium, the uproar was deafening. The crowd began to chant his name: 'Catilina! Catilina!' Around me young men jumped up and down, waving their arms. It seemed to me that the whole crowd adored him, and that all their jeering and cursing must have been not for Catilina, but for his enemies. Cicero, meanwhile, withdrew to the farthest corner of the podium and turned his face away.

Catilina withdrew into the Villa Publica with his rivals, and the voting commenced. The wealthier classes, which vote first, had already gathered outside the Sheep Pen. At the entrance each voter was given a wooden tablet and a stylus with which to write the name of his candidate; the styluses and tablets were gathered up at the end of each roped aisle and the tablets deposited in an urn for counting after the entire century had voted; the overall choice of each century counted for a single vote. In all, there are just under two hundred centuries, of which the two very wealthiest classes claim over a hundred. The lower classes have many more individual voters, but control far fewer centuries. The very poorest class, who might arguably make up a majority of Romans, have only five centuries among them. Often, by the time their turn to vote arrives, the outcome has already been decided and they are not allowed to vote at all; not surprisingly, they come to the elections more to view the spectacle than to vote, if they come at all.

We had found a shady spot and were sitting against the west wall of the Villa Publica, where I was explaining these matters to Meto, when Belbo, scratching his straw-coloured hair, asked, 'And what class do you belong to, Master?'

I looked askance at his bovine race, but Meto pressed the question. 'Yes, Papa, what class? You've never told me.'

'Because I haven't bothered to vote for a very long time.'

'But you must know.'

'Actually, yes. We changed classes this year, thanks to my inheritance from Lucius Claudius. Where before we were members of the Fifth Class — which is to say just above the poor — we are now members of the Third Class, just below the rich, along with most other families who own a single farm and a dwelling in the city.'

'And which century do we vote with?'

'If we voted, we would gather with those of the Second Century of the Third Class.'

'And I would be able to vote as well?' I made a face. ‘You would if—' 'I want to see it.' To see what?'

'The Second Century of the Third Class. The other voters of our century.' 'But why?’

'Papa…' He had only to speak with a certain inflection to remind me of our conversation of the night before.

'Very well. But there's no hurry. It's not quite noon, and the first two classes can't have completed their voting yet. And after them, the equestrians, who have their own special class of eighteen centuries, will vote, and then the Third Class. We'll have some wine and a bite to eat, and then we shall go find our fellow voters. The crowd will have shrunk by then; people will start to leave from the heat and the dust and the boredom'

Which was not true, for when we rejoined the crowd, it seemed, if anything, to have grown. Nor was there a feeling of boredom in the air, but rather a charge of excitement, like the rush of wind before a thunderstorm. Men moved about restlessly, with the hush of anticipation in their voices.

At length the Third Class was called upon to vote. A large group of men, better dressed than most but not with the polished look of patricians or the ostentation of equestrian landowners or merchants, gathered outside the Sheep Pen. The First Century filed into the first aisle, the Second Century into the second aisle, and so on.

'There,' said Meto, 'that would be our century, wouldn't it?'

'Yes—’

'Come, Papa, I want to see!'

We moved into the milling throng that was slowly being funnelled into the Sheep Pen. 'But, Meto, there's nothing to see—'

'No slaves here, only citizens!' said an election official posted outside the enclosure. He was looking at Belbo, who nodded and backed away.

'But there's no need.' I protested. 'He can stay with us. We're only—'

'For Catilina!' a voice whispered in my ear. At the same time a newly minted coin was pressed into my palm.

I looked around and saw the face of one of the crowd workers I had recognized before, one of Crassus's henchmen. He recognized me as well.

"The Finder! I thought you'd left Rome for good.' 'I have.'

'And I thought you never voted.' 'I don't.'

‘Well, then!' He snatched the coin out of my palm.

Without meaning to, I found that I was shuffling forwards with everyone else, hemmed in by the crowd and heading for the second aisle of the Sheep Pen. Meto was ahead of me. He was looking down at a shiny coin held between his forefinger and thumb.

'Meto, we need to—'

‘But, Papa, we're almost there.'

And so we were. Before I knew it, we were at the entrance to the voting aisle, and a bored-looking census officer holding a scroll was scmtinizing Meto. 'Family name?' he demanded wearily.

'Gordianus,' said Meto.

'Gordianus, Gordianus — yes, here it is. Not many of you. And which one are you — you hardly look old enough, to vote.' 'I'm sixteen,' protested Meto, 'as of yesterday.'

'Oh, yes, so you are,' said the official, squinting at the list 'Here,

take your tablet and stylus. And you're Gordianus, the pater?' he asked,looking up at me.

^‘Yes. but-'

'Here, your tablet and stylus. Next' — And so, like a sheep, I found myself being driven to the voting urn. Ahead of me Meto scribbled on his tablet. We shuffled forward. Another officer at the end of the line collected our styluses and watched us cast our ballots into the urn. As I did so, the officer gave me an odd look.

We stepped out of the Sheep Pen, where Belbo was waiting for us. I breathed a sigh of relief, then heard a shout behind me. 'You, citizen! With the beard!' I turned around. 'Yes, you!'

The officer had plucked my tablet from the urn and was holding it up. You've made a mistake, citizen!' he laughed. 'There's no "Nemo" in the race for consul'

I shrugged. 'Even so, that's whom I'm voting for.'

Meto would not say for whom he had voted, protesting that his ballot was secret, but it was obvious from the despondent look on his face when it was announced that our century had gone for Silanus. And so he received his first bitter disappointment as a voter.

The disappointment was even more bitter for many in the crowd assembled before the Villa Publica when later that afternoon it was announced that the centuries of the Fifth Class and the free poor would not be needed to determine the outcome. Silanus and Murena had won. The Optimates had maintained their control of the consulships. For the second time in two years, Catilina had been repudiated at the polls. All around us I heard muttered curses and even cries of despair amid the general applause, and I felt a sudden tension in the air.

Silanus and Murena appeared on the podium, along with Cicero and Antonius. Following tradition, the consuls-elect would say a few brief words to the assembled citizenry, but when Murena stepped forward to speak he was drowned out by a sudden uproar. Catilina had emerged from the gates of the Villa Publica.

From the reaction of those around him, Catilina might have been the winner of the election, not a two-time loser. His partisans rushed to him, cheering, tearful, many of them reaching out to touch him, chanting his name in unison: 'Catilina! Catilina!' His own expression was stoic as he strode forward with his jaw set and his eyes straight ahead. From the podium, Cicero gazed down with a tight smile on his lips.

Once Catilina. had passed, Murena and Silanus were finally able to speak. Their comments were predictably banal and were greeted by tepid applause, afterwards Cicero announced that the voting for the praetors would begin immediately. I might have actually cared enough to stay and vote for my friend Rufus, but Meto suddenly lost heart and decided he had learned enough about politics for one day. We left the crowd and made our way back through the deserted streets of the Subura.

Back at Eco's house, Bethesda noticed that Meto seemed unusually withdrawn and pensive. She attributed this to the natural depression that comes the day after a big event such as a toga party, but I knew that Meto's disappointment sprang from something deeper than that.

XXII

We dined informally that evening, with everyone raiding the kitchen for leftovers from the day before. The heat of the day cast the whole household into a mood of easy lassitude. The slaves went sluggishly about their errands, and even Bethesda was too hot to reprimand them. The sun itself seemed lazy, and took an unusually long time to set beyond the horizon. The sky deepened to a rich, dark blue. Meto withdrew to his room to be alone. Diana snuggled against her mother and dozed on our sleeping couch. Eco and Menenia retired to another room at the back of the house to do whatever it is that young newlyweds do to amuse themselves on long, sultry summer evenings. I was left alone again in the garden, which suited my mood.

The first handful of stars were beginning to sparkle in the heavens when Belbo announced that there was a caller outside the front door.

'For Eco?' I asked, thinking he would hardly care to be disturbed at the moment.

'No, he's come to see you, Master. But I don't like the looks of

it.’

'Why is that, Belbo?'

'Too many bodyguards, for one thing — one for every finger at least — and they're all carrying big daggers in their hands, not even sheathed.'

My heartbeat sped up a bit What in Jupiter's name had I done now? Why could I not be left in peace? 'Who is this visitor, Belbo?'

'I'm not sure. He doesn't give a name, and he stands back among his bodyguards so that I can't see him properly. His toga has purple on it, though.'

'Yes?' I pursed my lips, puzzled.

'And he's armed himself. Or at least he's wearing armour. I can see what looks like a breastplate underneath his toga—'

'I see. Yes, Belbo, I suppose I had better see this visitor. But ask him to leave his bodyguards outside. He has nothing to fear in this house.'

Belbo withdrew. A few moments later I was joined in the garden by Marcus Tullius Cicero.

'Gordianus!' he said, giving me a warm, lingering look as if I were a long-lost friend, or perhaps an undecided voter. 'Such a long time since I've seen you!'

'Not so very long. You saw me yesterday on the path to the Arx.'

'I wouldn't count that, would you, given the circumstances? If I was brusque or distant yesterday — well, you understand. I was unable to acknowledge you as I should and will acknowledge you when all this is over.'

' "All this?"'

'You know what I mean.' 'Do I?'

'Gordianus!' he said in a sweetly chiding tone. 'Difficult as always.'

'What is it you want, Cicero?' 'And so very curt!'

'I'm not an orator, like you. I have to say what I mean.'

'Oh, Gordianus! You must still be very weary after the hard journey down from your beautiful farm. You must feel out of sorts here, away from the fields and the lowing oxen. I know how the rigors of the Forum wear on a man — believe me, I know! — not to mention the ordeal of election day. But this election went rather well, don't you think?'

'For those who won.'

'Today Rome won. If things had gone otherwise, we'd have all been the losers, yourself included.’

'There were plenty of citzens outside the Villa Publica who seemed to think otherwise.'

'Yes, there are riots going on even now in scattered parts of the city; you're wise to have retired early and shuttered your windows. Catilina's supporters crave any excuse to turn to violence and looting.'

'Perhaps they're overcome with hopelessness and frustration.'

'Surely you don't sympathize with that rabble, Gordianus! A clever man like you, and now a man of property, as well? I'm very proud of that, you know, helping you inherit what was rightfully yours. The gods and Lucius Claudius decreed that you should move up in this world, and I was happy to do my part. Most men get what they deserve in this world, in the long run.'

'Do they?'

'Take my brother Quintus, for example. Elected praetor this afternoon, following in my footsteps!' 'How did Rufus fare?’

'He won a praetorship as well, and good for him!' Cicero's smile did not seem entirely insincere. He could afford to be generous. 'And Gaius Julius Caesar?'

Cicero did not smile. 'He, too, won a praetorship. But then, no one can say he didn't earn it, one way or another, though he may be a long time paying off the debt. But you were there, weren't you? I thought I glimpsed you in the crowd.'

'We left early. My son Meto wanted to see the voting. After a while he had seen enough.'

'Ah, the duties of fatherhood. My own son is only two, but already quite an orator! His lungs are stronger than mine!'

'I doubt that, Cicero. But tell me, why are you here? Don't misunderstand, it's not that I'm unhappy to be paid a visit by the consul of Rome, or that I object to having his bodyguard camped outside my door — I'm deeply honoured, of course. But you say there are mobs in the street. Surely the danger—'

'I care nothing about danger. You should know that already, Gordianus. Didn't I defy Sulla himself at the very outset of my career? You were there, you saw how I stood up to his tyranny. Do you think I would allow a disorganized rabble to prevent me from going about my duties as consul? Never!'

'Yet there must be something you fear, to make you wear such heavy armour, to surround yourself with so many bodyguards, everywhere you go.'

'Armour frees a man from fear. As for my bodyguards, they are all fine young men of the equestrian class. They follow me because they love me, as they love Rome. Yes, certainly there is danger. There always is, when a man stands up for what is right — you know that. But a true Roman sets his eyes on his course and is not swayed from it, either by a rabble with sticks and stones or by conspirators with torches and daggers.'

'Evenso, I thought you had deemed it best that you and I shouldn't see each other openly; so Marcus Caelius indicated. Should I take it that your coming here tonight signals an end to our feigned estrangement?'

'Not… exactly,' he said.

'But the crisis, if there ever was a crisis, is over.'

'Not so long as certain parties still threaten the state—'

'But Catilina is finished. You've bested him again. He won't be able to run for consul a third time — he's too much in debt. His allies will desert him now, and so will his friends with money. Two losses in a row mean no more coins left to press into the sweaty palms of the voters. Catilina is finished.'

'You're mistaken, Gordianus. The enemy of Rome is not finished. Not yet.' In Cicero's eyes I saw a predatory gleam. 'What is more dangerous in the woods than a boar, Gordianus?'

'Please, not a riddle, like Catilina!'

'A wounded boar. Today Catilina was wounded, but he's far from finished. His resources are greater than you imagine. His "allies", as you call them, are more dangerous than you know. You're right, after today hell be cut off from the more legitimate sources of finance, but it's steel that he's counting on now, not silver.'

'Cicero, you must not ask me for another favour’ I said wearily. 'Why not? Do you not love the farm I secured for you?' 'Cicero, gratitude can go only so far.'

'I'm not talking about gratitude, Gordianus. I appeal not to your sense of obligation but of self-interest. If Catilina isn't stopped, you're exactly the sort of landowner who stands to suffer most.'

'Cicero—' I shook my head and held up my hand.

'And you love your family, don't you? Think of them, and their future.'

'That's precisely what I am thinking of!' I checked myself and lowered my voice. 'I'm tired of putting them in danger. And I'm very tired of being threatened and intimidated.'

"The threat comes from Catilina.'

'Does it?’

Cicero wrinkled his brow, finally perceiving that while he spoke in vague generalities, I was referring to something quite specific. 'What do you mean?'

'I mean the headless body that was left in my stable when I failed to respond to Caelius's demands quickly enough.'

'Ah, yes, the headless body. Caelius told me you said something about this to him yesterday, but he didn't know what you were talking about, and neither do I. It must have been something thought up by Catilina—'

'But if Catilina was responsible, and Caelius poses as his agent, then why didn't Caelius know about it?'.

‘Because, I suppose…' Cicero frowned.

'Or could it be that Caelius knows things that he doesn't tell you? In that case, how can you really trust him? And if you can't trust him, then neither can I!'

Cicero thought for a long moment before he answered. 'Gordianus, I understand your concern in this matter'—'

'Or perhaps it's Catilina who doesn't trust Caelius. Could that be it? Could it be that Caelius's pretence of loyalty has failed to fool Catilina, who knows that Caelius is your spy, not his? That would mean that Catilina knows that I'm your agent, as well. That puts my family in even graver danger.'

'Clearly, Gordianus, these are deep waters. But there is no way to stay afloat unless you kick! Do nothing and you'll sink — well aU sink! The state is a life raft. I am steering that raft. The rudder has been entrusted to me. Catilina will set fire to it if he isn't stopped, dooming us all. I must do whatever I can to keep it afloat. But I need your help. I am reaching out to pull you aboard, if only you'll give me your hand.'

'What a lovely metaphor. Such fluid rhetoric—'

'Gordianus! You try my patience!' I had angered him at last. I could impugn his courage and satirize his pompous demeanour and he remained aloof, but he would not stand for me to beHtde the mastery of his tongue. 'Whether you like it or not, whether or not you understand its importance, you must continue to do what I ask of you. Catilina is too vicious a threat for me to bow to your apathy.'

'Is he so vicious, really? Under my roof I sometimes thought he seemed more sentimental than seditious.'

'Gordianus, you cannot be so naive!' Suddenly his smile returned. 'Oh, I begin to see the problem. You like Catilina! But of course, we have all liked Catilina at one time or another, everyone has, and eventually, inevitably, to their regret. Ask the shade of his murdered brother-in-law, or the shade of his murdered son, or the miserable families of the young men and women he's corrupted. Before he destroys his victims, Catilina must always make sure that they like him.

'Oh, Gordianus, I know that you find your old friend Cicero a bit pompous and vain; you always have. You have a sharp, unforgiving eye for anything pretentious — that's one of your gifts — and I confess that in my success I have grown perhaps a bit too overbearing and self-important. You see through the veils of men's vanity. How can you not see through Catilina at once? Could it be that his conceit is so enormous, so monstrous, that you simply can't perceive it, the way that a man who looks at the sea cannot see a drop of water? Has he seduced you, Gordianus?'

'You're talking nonsense, Cicero. But at least your metaphors are consistent — you have me completely at sea.'

He paused and looked at me shrewdly. When he lowered his head that way, the thick fold of fat in his neck pressed up against his chin like a pillow, and his eyes seemed to recede into the puffiness of his cheeks. I thought of how he had looked when I first met him — thin, almost frail, with a neck that seemed barely sturdy enough to hold up his broad-browed head. His girth had grown with his ambition.

'Oh, I can imagine how he went to work on you, Gordianus. Catilina can see into other men's hearts. He senses their needs and desires, and he plays on that knowledge like a piper. Tell me if I hit the mark. He sees at once how to flatter you — he compliments your farm and family. He takes note of your unorthodox household, senses you have a soft spot for the disenfranchised and dispossessed, and so he tells you he is a man of the people, too, and wants to shake things up at Rome to give the wretched masses a better chance in life. He rails against the unfairness of the Optimates and their devious ways — never mind that Catilina would be an Optimate himself if he hadn't squandered his reputation along with his fortune and earned the disdain of every decent man in the Senate. Having insinuated himself into your personal life and warmed you with his politics, especially tailored to suit your own, he then confides some personal secret to you and you alone, letting you see that he trusts you implicitly, that you are very special to him.'

I thought of Catilina's confession regarding the Vestal Fabia and felt a prickle of discomfort.

'Catilina will tell you whatever you want to hear. Catilina will be your special confidant, Catilina will cast his spell over you with your eyes wide open, if you let him. I admit it: Catilina is channing. For years I thought so myself, until I saw through him.

'While I, alas, am utterly without charm. Don'tyou think I know this? You have shown your hostility to me very clearly tonight, Gordianus. You find me irritating and overbearing, and you wish I would simply go away. I annoy you. I have no charm, and I never have had; I was born without it and it cannot be counterfeited. That's precisely why I must rely on rhetoric and persuasion — clumsy tools next to the natural charm of a man like Catilina, who is halfway to winning an argument before he says a word, thanks to that handsome face and that endearing, irresistible, infuriating smile of his. Beside him I must seem very crude and shrill. But think, Gordianus! What is the value of charm if it hides the ugly truth? I speak that ugly truth and you wrinkle your nose. Catilina smiles and murmurs pretty lies and you find him intriguing. Gordianus, you know better!'

What can be worse, for a man of my age, than to begin to doubt his own judgment? Had Catilina cast a spell over me, made me dull and dreamy? Or was it Cicero who was practising his own wicked magic, using what he knew of Catilina and of me to find the exact words that would disconcert me and bend me to his will?

'Do my words make sense to you, Gordianus? Do you hear the urgency in my voice? Will you not continue to render the single favour I ask of you, to play host to Catilina when he desires it? Do this for the good of Rome. Do this for the sake of your children.'

When I didn't answer, Cicero sighed and slumped his shoulders. Was he acting, or was he genuinely weary? And why could I not tell for certain — I, who possessed such a sharp, unforgiving eye for pretence?

"Think on it, Gordianus. When you go back to that lovely, peaceful farm, think on it and remember that Rome is still here, in terrible danger. And if Rome burns, never doubt that the conflagration will spread across the countryside.' He lowered his face, thickening the fold of fat in his neck. He studied me for a long moment, but I had nothing to say. 'I won't see you face to face again, not until the crisis is resolved. Marcus Caelius will be my messenger, as before. It was a risk, coming to see you here tonight, but my watchers tell me that Catilina's eyes are elsewhere this evening, and Caelius told me that you were wavering, and I hoped that I might prevail upon your better judgment if I could speak to you man to man.' He turned away. The stiff folds of his toga rusded softly in the still, warm air of the garden.

'I’ll go now. There are many calls I must pay tonight before I sleep. No one is safe with Catilina's rabble rioting in the streets, but I can't let that deter me. I know my duty to Rome; I only wish it were as easy and simple as yours.' With that he departed.

I sat on a bench by the fountain. The sky was dark and the stars were bright overhead. The moon had begun to rise, its silver light glinting across the tiled roof of the portico. 'You may come out now, Meto,' I said softly.

He stepped from behind the curtain to his room and into the shadows of the portico.

'Did Bethesda hear?' I said.

'No. I could hear her snoring now arid then through the wall.' He stepped into the moonlight. He was wearing only his loincloth. It occurred to me that he was of an age to begin wearing more clothing about the house.

'Good. Eco and Menenia seem to be asleep, or else too busy to have paid any attention to voices from the garden. Only you and I know of Cicero's visit.'

'How did you know I was listening? I was so careful not to make the curtain move.'

'Yes, but the big toe on your left foot showed beneath the curtain's edge. A bit of starlight glinted on your toenail. In the wrong circumstances such carelessness could be fatal.'

'Do you think Cicero noticed?' he asked.

I had to laugh. 'I don't think so. Otherwise he'd have summoned his bodyguards from outside and you'd have been full of daggers before I could've said a word.'

Meto looked alarmed, then sceptical.

'Well, what do you think of our esteemed consul, Meto?'

He hesitated for a moment. ‘I think Cicero is a windbag.'

I smiled. 'So do I, but that doesn't mean he's not telling the truth.'

'Will you do what he wants, then?' I was so long in answering that Meto asked again, will you, Papa?' 'I only wish I knew.'

XXIII

After the election we spent five more days in Rome. I enjoyed myself more than I thought I would, strolling about the seven hills, seeing old friends, savouring the delicacies of the food vendors in the markets, observing the comings and goings of every sort of man and woman through the streets of the Subura and feeling swallowed up by the never-ending pulse of life in the great city.

Not all was pleasure. One morning, while Bethesda browsed in the shops on the Street of the Silversmiths, I consulted with the advocate who was defending my rights to the stream against Publius Claudius's challenge. His name was Volumenus, and his office was on the second floor of a squat, ugly brick building just a stone's throw from the Forum. The whole building was populated by lawyers and breathed the musty smell of old parchment. The walls of Volumenus's cramped little office were covered with scrolls in pigeonholes. He was rather like a scroll himself, tall and straight with a long face and a very dry manner.

No progress had been made towards having the matter of my water rights heard by the courts, he told me, though he assured me he was doing all he could on my behalf

'Why must it take so long?' I complained. 'When the Claudii challenged my inheritance of the farm, that was surely a more complicated matter, but Cicero managed to have the case settled in a matter of days, not months or years.'

The corner ofVolumenus's mouth twitched slightly. "Then perhaps you would prefer to have Cicero handle all your legal affairs,' he said wryly. 'Oh, or is he too busy for that? Really, I'm doing all I can. Yes, if I happened to be one of the most powerful politicians in Rome,

then I'm sure I could arrange for the courts to expedite this matter, but I'm only an honest advocate—' 'I understand.'

'No, really, if you think you can get the mighty Cicero to take over this case, you're more than welcome—'

"That was a special favour. If you tell me that you're doing all you can—'

'Oh, but Cicero could do more, I'm sure, and better, and more quickly—'

I eventually managed to smooth his ruffled feathers before I left. I stepped back onto the street feeling not so much dissatisfied with his efforts as reminded of just how great a debt I owed to Cicero. Without his assistance and his powerful connections, the question of my inheritance, if not settled against me outright, could easily have been held up in the courts for years while I stayed in Rome and watched my beard turn grey.

On the evening of our seventh day in Rome we packed for the trip home, and set out early the next morning.

We arrived at the farm late in the afternoon, stiff and dusty. Diana leaped from the wagon at once and ran from pen to pen to give a hug and kiss to her favourite lambs and kids. Meto, his energy pent up all day, hiked at once to the ridgetop. Bethesda set about seeing how much damage the household slaves had done in her absence, and then, having perfunctorily scolded them, went to her jewellery box in our bedroom and deposited her new acquisitions.

I withdrew to my study and consulted with Aratus over what had transpired in my absence, which was little enough. The stream had dwindled even more, which he assured me was normal for the season. 'I would hardly bother to mention it,' he said, 'except that there might be a problem with the well…'

"What sort of problem?' I asked.

'The taste of the water is off. I noticed yesterday. Perhaps a cat managed to squeeze through the iron grate, or perhaps some burrowing animal dug through the wall of the shaft, fell into the water and drowned.'

'You mean there's a dead animal in the well?'

'I suspect as much. The taste of the water, as I said—'

'What have you done about it?'

From the way he tilted his head back I could tell I was speaking too harshly. 'The first thing to do in such a case is to lift off the grate, lower a bucket or a hook, and try to lift out the carcass. Dead bodies float, after all—' 'Did you do this?'

'I did. But we were unable to lift anything. At one point the hook became trapped. It took two men to pull it free. It may be that some stones have become dislodged. It could even be that a considerable portion of the wall has fallen in. If that is the case, the foul taste could have been introduced when the dislodgment took place — a burrowing animal may have been crushed or drowned, you see. If the damage is extensive — and that any damage at all has occurred is only a supposition — this could be rather serious. Major repairs to the well would prevent it from being used, and with the stream running so low…'

'How will we know whether it's damaged or not?'

'Someone will have to go down into the well.'

'Why wasn't this done yesterday? Or this morning? Meanwhile, the dead ferret or weasel or whatever just keeps rotting away, poisoning the water.'

He folded his hands and lowered his eyes. 'Yesterday, by the time our efforts to use the hook had failed, it was too dark to send anyone down into the shaft. This morning there were storm clouds approaching from the west, and it seemed to me that it was more important to bring the bales of hay from the north field into the barn, to prevent them from getting wet'

"There were bales of hay sitting outside? I thought all the hay had been brought in already.'

'It had, Master, but a few days ago I ordered the men to take the hay back out into the sun. The bales that were not lost to the blight may yet succumb, but this might be prevented by exposing the hay to the hot sunlight.'

I shook my head, dubious of his judgment once again. 'And did it rain this morning?'

He twisted his mouth. 'No. But the clouds were quite dark and threatening, and we did hear thunder nearby. Even if the slaves had not been occupied with the hay, I would have hesitated to send a man down into the well with a storm threatening, considering the danger. I know how you value your slaves, Master, and I would not squander them.'

'Very well,' I said glumly. 'Is there still time to send someone down into the well before it gets dark?'

'I was about to do that when you arrived, Master.'

I went out to the well with Aratus, where a group of slaves was already gathered. They had made a kind of harness out of rope and had tied it to a much longer rope. One of the men would put himself into the harness while the others lowered him down.

Meto joined us, smiling and red-cheeked from his climb up to the ridge and back. When I explained what was happening, he immediately volunteered to go down into the well himself.

'No, Meto.'

'But why not, Papa? I'm the perfect size, I'm agile and I'm not heavy.'

'Don't be foolish, Meto.'

'But, Papa, I think it would be interesting.'

'Meto, don't be ridiculous.' I lowered my voice. 'It's far too dangerous. I wouldn't even consider allowing you to do it. That's—' I caught myself. I had almost said; 'That's what the slaves are for,' then realized how the words would strike his ears.

Then, in the next instant, I realized how the sentiment struck my own ears. Had I really grown so callous towards the men I owned? I had inherited a farm; along with it, had I also inherited the contemptuous attitudes of slave owners like Publius Claudius or dead Cato? Use a human tool until it breaks, says Cato in his book, and then discard it for a new one. I had always despised men like Crassus, who attached no value at all to the lives of slaves, only to their utility. And yet, I thought, give a man a farm and watch him turn into a little Cato; give him mines and property and sailing ships and he becomes a little Crassus, no doubt I had turned away from Cicero precisely because it seemed to me that he had become the very thing he had once despised. But perhaps such a course is inevitable in life — wealth necessarily makes a man greedy, success makes him vain, and even the least measure of power makes him careless of others. Could I say I was any different?

These thoughts flashed through my head like a bolt of lightning. ‘You can't go down into the well, Meto, because I'm going down myself' The words surprised me almost as much as they did Meto.

'Oh, Papa, now who's being foolish?' he protested. 'I should go. I'm so much younger and more supple.' The slaves, meanwhile, looked at us in frank astonishment.

Aratus laid a hand on each of our shoulders and took us aside. 'Master, I would advise you against doing such a thing. Much too dangerous. That's what the slaves are for. If you take on such a task, you'll only confuse them.'

"The slaves are here to do as I tell them, or in my absence, as Meto tells them,' I corrected him. 'And while I'm down in the well, it's Meto who will make sure that you oversee them properly, Aratus.'

He grimaced. 'Master, if you were to be hurt — may the gods forbid such a tragedy! — the slaves would be liable for terrible punishments. For their sake, I ask you to let one of them perform this task.'

'No, Aratus, I've made up my mind. Don't contradict me again. Now, how does this harness fit?'

Did I hope to prove something by this escapade? If I wanted to demonstrate that I was not like every other slave owner, I could hardly have chosen a less thoughtful way to show it, for the slaves were anxious and miserable. If I needed to prove to myself that I was still young enough to face danger without flinching, I should have looked in a mirror to bring myself back to reality. Perhaps I thought to earn Meto's renewed respect, when in fact I was once again shunting aside his assertion of his own manhood. I acted on a wild impulse, and only later I thought, Ibis seems the sort of mad thing that Catilina might do!

Aratus, looking glummer than I had ever seen him, oversaw the mechanics of the operation, testing the ropes and fitting the harness over my shoulders. Meto, looking disappointed, was left with little to do. The slaves removed the iron grate from the well and then winced as I climbed into the breach. I was handed a torch. The slaves formed a line and took up the rope, then fed it towards me hand over hand. As I descended step by step, the edge of the well rose and the sky shrank to a round hole above me.

It was not as hard as I had thought it would be. I simply walked backwards down the side of the well, carefully placing one foot behind the other. The rope stayed taut, steadying my weight. Above me I could see Aratus and Meto peering down at me, both of them frowning and blinking at the bits of ash that rose from my burning torch.

'Master, be careful!' Aratus moaned.

'Yes, Papa, do be careful,' echoed Meto.

The hole above grew smaller and smaller, until it was the size of a small plate. 'More rope?' called Aratus.

I glanced over my shoulder. I still could not see the water. 'Yes, more rope.'

I descended step by step and kept peering over my shoulder until at last the circle of water glistened beneath me, flashing like liquid fire where it was lit by the ruddy torchlight and as black as obsidian where it was covered by the shadow of my body. There appeared to be something smooth and pale in the water, like a large stone showing just above the surface. The walls all around were undamaged. The closer I got, the harder it became to twist my neck far enough around to see the water.

I descended until I was just above the surface. 'Keep the rope taut!' I called.

'Yes, Master!' cried Aratus, his voice echoing down the shaft. His face was a dark spot amid the small circle of bright light above.

I intended to turn over, taking small steps until I faced the water. I had almost succeeded when my foot encountered a loose stone in the wall. With a splash, my legs swung downwards.

The slaves holding the rope were not ready for the sudden tug. The rope went slack for just an instant and I slipped into the water up to my neck. The rope went taut again, pulling my shoulders above the surface. Water splashed my face. I sputtered and coughed.

I had managed to keep the torch above the water. The fiery light caught on the jagged stone walls and the splashing water, creating a jumbled array of light and shadow all around. With my free arm I thrashed about for something to hold on to. There was a large object in the water with me, lodged stiffly between opposite walls of the well. It gave way as I clutched at it, then it began to bob alongside me. It was cold and fleshy to the touch. I shuddered and felt my bile rise.

I cried out — not a scream of terror but a sharp yelping cry such as a dog makes when its tail is stepped on. Echoing up to the mouth of the well, it must have sounded quite hideous. The slaves above heard it and panicked. The rope jerked hard at my shoulders and I began to rise against my will.

I cried out for them to stop, but perhaps the well twisted my words and they thought I was crying for help. I clutched at the thing in the water, repulsed by it but not afraid of it. The weight of it held me down. The slaves pulled harder, sending a hot stab of pain through my back, but I held fast to the thing in the water. I thought I understood what I had seen, but I had to be sure.

The slaves pulled so hard that I began to rise out of the water, bringing the thing with me. I clutched it with both hands, keeping hold of the torch as well so that its flame flickered close to my face. Before the agony in my shoulders compelled me to release the thing, letting the heavy weight slip back into the water, I was sure of what I had seen.

From somewhere above I heard Aratus cry, 'Heave!' I surged upwards so swiftly that the torch slipped from my hand. It bounced off my foot and twirled flaming into the water, where it expired in an explosion of steam.

Heaving and straining, the slaves lifted me up, like a deus ex machina on a stage. I careened from side to side in the darkness, legs flailing, shoulders banging against the walls. I hardly felt the pain and the jarring in my teeth. My head was too full of the thing I had seen in the water.

It was a body. And it had no head.

Part Three

Conundrum

XXIV

Darkness had fallen by the time the body was removed from the well.

On the first attempt, a slave was lowered into the shaft carrying with him a second rope, which he harnessed around the corpse's shoulders. The shivering slave was pulled up, looking queasy and pale, and then the body. The sight of the naked, bloated, headless corpse emerging from the well was so grotesque that several of the slaves cried out in horror and loosened their grip on the rope. The rope escaped, sliding like prickling fire through the hands of those who tried to hold it, whipping through the air like a mad serpent. From deep inside the well came the sound of a great splash. An instant later the end of the rope followed the body down the shaft, like a snake disappearing into its hole with a contemptuous nick of its tail.

This disaster unnerved the more superstitious of the slaves. I heard voices all around me whisper the word 'lemur'. Looking about in the uncertain light of dusk, I couldn't tell which of the slaves had said it. They all looked equally frightened. It was as if the word had been whispered by the warm, dry breeze itself.

It was then that I realized that the well had been doubly poisoned. First, by the pollution of the corpse's bloated, decaying flesh. Then again by the very fact of its presence in the well. The slaves would consider the spot unholy now. They would shun the place, avoid any errands that sent them there, avert their eyes when they passed, perhaps refuse even to drink from it again, fearing it was haunted by the dead man's shade.

It was only thanks to Aratus's mastery at dealing with the other

slaves that we were able to stage a second attempt, even as the sun was setting. The slave who had descended the well balked at doing so again. None of the other slaves was willing to volunteer. Aratus selected one of the men, who quailed at the task. Aratus threatened him with a beating and even struck him across the back. The slave acquiesced and allowed himself to be fitted into the harness. What other choice was there? To go myself was out of the question after the wrenching that had been done to my back and shoulders, and I refused to let Meto make the attempt. In the end, I acted as any other slave owner would have and allowed my foreman to coerce one of the slaves into doing it against his will. I could almost hear the shade of dead Cato mocking me.

This time, the shock of the corpse's appearance was not so great, and the men managed to keep their grip. Still, the sight was unnerving — the waxiness of the bloated flesh, the gaping wound at the neck, the terrible absence where the head should have been. The body was pulled onto the paving stones. A pool of water gathered beneath it and trickled in various directions. The slaves cried out and jumped back rather than let the water touch their feet.

I looked towards the house and saw Bethesda's silhouette at one of the windows. I had sent word to her to keep Diana away, and to keep herself away as well. What was she thinking now, gazing out at the group of frightened slaves gathered around the well in the gathering gloom? She would know the truth soon enough. Everyone on the farm would know — there was no way to keep the catastrophe a secret, as I had with Nemo.

I called on Aratus to bring more torches so that I could see the body by a better light. The slaves milled restlessly about, eager to be gone from the place. I told Aratus to dismiss them for now, but to see that all the slaves were gathered together outside the stable within an hour. I stooped beside the body, wincing at the stabbing pain in my shoulders and at the cuts on my elbows and knees where the rough walls of the well had scraped the flesh. Meto, holding a torch, knelt beside me.

'Well, Meto, what can you see?'

He swallowed hard. Even by the ruddy torchlight he looked pale. The flesh is so bloated, it's hard to say. I'm not sure where to begin.'

'Make a list in your head. Either-or, as the philosophers say. Man or woman?'

'Man, of course.' 'Old or young?'

'About the same as Nemo?' he said uncertainly. 'Why do you say that?'

'The grey hairs among the black ones on his chest. And the way his joints are all knobby. Not a boy, but not an old man either.' 'Dark or fair?'

'It's hard to tell much about his skin, the way it's all swollen and discoloured, though I would say it looks weathered by the sun. The hair around his sex is dark.'

'Slave or free?'

'Slave,' he said, without hesitation. 'Because?'

'From where I was standing I saw his back as the slaves pulled him out.'

I reached down to turn the body over but the weight was too much for my injured shoulders. Meto put down his torch, knelt beside me, and helped me tip the corpse.

'There,' he said, picking up his torch and pointing. By its lurid glow we saw the proof of the man's slavery. His back and shoulders were covered with scars. Some were old, almost faded away, while others were vivid and fresh. He had been regularly beaten while he was alive.

'What caused his death?' I asked.

Meto bowed his head, considering. 'Obviously he was killed before he was put in the well, since his head is off. Unless his head is down there, too.' He glanced at the well and swallowed hard.

'I think not. I didn't see it, and neither did the slaves who went down after me. But again, as with Nemo, you're assuming he was murdered. We don't know that. There's no visible wound, except where the head's been cut off, and as with Nemo, that probably happened after he was dead. Who's to say how he died?'

'Unless we can find out who he is.'

'And where he came from.'

'Surely, whoever left Nemo in the barn also left…' Meto frowned. 'What shall we call this one, Papa?'

I looked down at the wretched, lifeless mass of flesh. 'Ignotus,' I said: Unknown.

* * *

A few moments later a slave arrived from the house. The mistress is eager for you to come,' he said, casting furtive glances at the naked corpse. 'And Congrio says that your dinner is getting cold.'

'Tell your mistress that I have no appetite tonight. And while you're at it, tell Aratus to gather all the slaves outside the stable.'

'Even Congrio?'

'Yes, even Congrio.'

By the light of Meto's torch we made our way through the gathering darkness to the stable. The slaves began to assemble and whispered among themselves. A moment later Aratus came down from the house, followed by the kitchen slaves and Congrio.

Aratus stepped beside me and spoke in a low voice. 'They're all here. Do you want to address them yourself^ Master, or shall I?'

'I'll speak to them.'

Aratus stepped forward. 'Quiet! Something important has happened, and the Master wants to speak to us all together.' He stepped away from me but did not join the other slaves, keeping himself apart. Congrio, too, stood off to one side, while his underlings from the kitchen joined the others. Even among slaves there are the high and the low.

I had not addressed the slaves as a group since I had first come to the farm. In the glow of the torches I could see their faces clearly. They looked back at me anxiously. Lucius Claudius had been a lenient master before me. I had been, if anything, more lenient; perhaps too much so, considering that one or more of them must have betrayed me.

'A dead body has been found in the well,' I said. This came as a surprise to no one, since word had already spread among them, but still there was a murmur of excitement. 'Who among you knows how it got there?'

No one spoke. 'Do you mean to tell me that not one of you has any idea how it happened, or when, or who did it?'

They looked at me and at one another evasively, cleared their throats, shook their heads. At last one of them meekly raised his hand and stepped forward. It was the oldest slave on the farm, a greybeard called Clementus.

'Yes, speak up,' I said.

'A few nights ago I thought I heard something…' 'Yes?'

'A sound coming from the well. I often wake up in the night — I never sleep straight through. I always have to rise in the night to pass water. It's been like that since I was a young man. Others always chide me and say I have a small bladder, but it makes no difference whether it's full when I go to bed or not, and as I've gotten older¹—'

'Get to the point' said Aratus. 'What did you hear?'

'It was late at night, closer to dawn than sundown. The moon had already set, and it was very dark. I was sleeping beneath the lean-to behind the barn when I woke. It was a sound that woke me — a splash coming from somewhere. From the direction of the well, I think. A big splash, but not loud, rather muffled, just as if something large had been dropped down the shaft of the well. I roused myself to piss into the pot I use, then went back to sleep.'

'What night was this?' I asked.

"Three nights ago, I think. Or maybe four. I'd forgotten all about it. It only came back to me just now, hearing about this body dropped down the well.'

'Ridiculous!' snapped Aratus. 'He wakes up needing to relieve himself and hears the sound of splashing! He was dreaming.'

'It seems to me that you cut him short for no reason, Aratus,' I said sharply. 'Why shouldn't he have heard the splash, and why not in the middle of the night? After the splash, Clementus, did you see or hear anything else?'

He scratched his beard. 'Did I? It seems there was someone walking about in the dark after I relieved myself, but I didn't think anything of it at the time. It was a hot night, the kind that keeps people awake, and I don't suppose I'm the only one with a weak bladder. Why shouldn't one of the slaves be up and walking about in the dark?'

'But did you see this man? Do you remember anything about him? Did he speak, or hum a tune? Was he dressed in a certain way or have a certain gait?'

Clementus scratched his beard thoughtfully again, but finally shook his head. 'No, I don't remember anything like that. I only seem to remember someone walking about out in the open area by the well. Perhaps I only dreamed it, or perhaps that was a different night altogether.'

'Useless,' muttered Aratus.

'On the contrary, he seems more alert and aware of what's going on than those who should be responsible for the proper running of this farm and the safety of those who live here,' I said in a low voice.

No one else came forward. No one but Clementus had seen or heard anything. I might as well have been questioning a congregation of the blind and deaf I warned them that I would not hesitate to punish any slave who I later discovered had withheld the truth from me; I searched for flashes of guilt in their eyes, but saw only the natural fear of slaves. I assured them that the well would be purified — as head of the household, the ritual duty would fall to me, though I had no idea how to perform it. So far as I knew, Cato did not cover the subject in his book. Nor did I know how the well might be purified in fact as well as in ritual. What sort of pollution had Ignotus left in the water, and how long would the danger last? I had only Aratus to consult, and as always I didn't fully trust him. I could ask Claudia, but I hardly wanted to share the incident with her.

I charged a group of slaves to take the body of Ignotus to a little shed beside the stable, and dismissed the rest. As they dispersed, Aratus drew closer.

'They should be tortured, Master.'

'What?'

'They're slaves, Master. You talk to them as if they were soldiers, or free men in a marketplace. Common slaves like these never tell the truth unless it's forced from them.There's no telling what they know, and no way of getting it except by forcing it out of them. You know what the law says: you can't trust the evidence of a slave unless it's obtained under torture.'

'By that logic, I should begin the torture with you, Aratus. What do you say to that?'

He blanched, not sure whether I was serious or not, I was not quite sure myself.

It may have been hot outside, but it was chilly in my bedroom that night. Bethesda was quietly furious. She consented to put a soothing balm on my scraped elbows and knees and even massaged my shoulders, but when I spoke to her, she wouldn't answer. In our bed she turned her back on me and finally spoke. 'Whatever it is they want from you, give it to them No more headless bodies, do you understand? Swallow your pride and think of your children. And no more foolishness like climbing down wells!'

I did not sleep well that night In my dreams headless phantoms arose from the well and went walking about the fields.

In the morning Meto woke me. His tunic was crooked and his hair was still mussed from sleep. He was breathing hard, as if he had been running. 'Papa, wake up!'

I shrugged his hand away and looked up at him blearily.

'Papa, I know the truth. I woke up knowing it! I just ran out to have a look at his body to make sure’ 'What are you talking about? Ignotus?'

'Not Ignotus, Papa. Not any longer. I know his name, and so do you. Come, I'll show you. I'll prove it to you.'

He waited impatiently while I put on my sandals and slipped a tunic over my shoulders. Bethesda pulled the coverlet over her head.

Meto led the way to the shed, running ahead of me in his eagerness, then waiting for me to catch up. Inside, the body of Ignotus had been laid on a low bench. His odour permeated the little room. He would have to be moved before the sun got much higher, or else we would never get rid of his stench.

'There, Papa, do you see?'

‘What?'

"There, on the back of his left hand!'

I stooped, groaning at the ache in my muscles. The lifeless hand was bent so that I had to twist my head to see the little mark on the back. It was roughly triangular in shape and hardly larger than a coin, of a rich purple colour like the dye of the murex.

'A birthmark’1 acknowledged. 'Yes, I noticed it last night, I thought I would allow you to remark on it, but you never did, and I never got around to mentioning it myself Yes, it could be a valuable bit of evidence if we ever have the chance to identify him.'

'But I already have. Didn't you hear me? I know who it is. When I saw the birthmark last night I knew it reminded me of something, but I couldn't think of what. You kept asking me those either-or questions and it went out of my head. But this morning I woke up remembering. Does that ever happen to you, Papa?'

'I begin every day with great revelations.'

'I'm not joking, Papa. So you don't remember where we've seen that birthmark before? I do!' He seemed very pleased with himself

'If I've ever seen that birthmark before, you're right, I don't remember. But you think you've seen it?' I said sceptically.

'Yes, I know I have, and if you had been observant, so would you. It's Forfex!'

'Forfex?' I muttered, trying to place the name.

'The goatherd over on Mount Argentum. The slave of Gnaeus Claudius, the one who took us to see the old silver mine and hurt his head.'

"The one who took Catilina, you mean. We only went along as an afterthought.' I stared at the birthmark. 'No, I don't remember seeing this mark on the back of his hand.'.

'But I do! I noticed it that day. I remember thinking it looked like a spot of blood, as if he'd pricked himself. When I saw it yesterday I couldn't place the memory, but this morning I woke up remembering. I thought you surely would have noticed, too. You notice everything, Papa.'

'Forfex!' I remembered the slave's wheedling manner and the panic that had driven him from the mine, the blood streaming from his head and his master's displeasure. I shook my head doubtfully. 'Is there anything else to identify him?' I studied the body. It was roughly of the same age as Forfex, and roughly the same size, and of the right colouration. The dead flesh before us was so horribly different from the living slave who had taken us up the mountain that I could hardly reconcile the transformation, though the same might be said of any man and the corpse he becomes.

'And the marks on his back, Papa! Do you remember how Gnaeus Claudius began to beat him as we were departing? He's the type of master who would beat his slaves often, don't you think? So it's no surprise to see all those scars on Forfex's back.'

'Yes, I remember the beating. But not the birthmark…'

'Well, what does it matter, so long as one of us remembers it? The important thing is that now we know who he was, and where his body came from. It's Forfex, and somehow he came here from Gnaeus Claudius's estate.'

'If we could only be sure of that…'

'But we can be! How could two different men have exactly the same birthmark? It must be Forfex, don't you see?' He smiled at me expectandy, then frowned when he saw the lingering doubt on my face. 'You don't believe me, do you, Papa?'

'No, it's not that…'

'You don't trust my memory. You doubt my judgment.' 'If you truly remembered me birthmark, why did you not recall it last night?'

'Because last night was—' He sought for the words and could not find them 'Because I didn't, that's all! But I do now.'

'Meto, memory changes over time and can't always be trusted—' 'Oh, Papa, you always have a saying for everything.' He was quite angry. 'If it were Eco telling you this instead of me, you'd believe him in an instant! You wouldn't doubt him at all'

I took a deep breath. ‘Perhaps.' Because Eco is Eco, and you are you, I wanted to say.

'You're jealous!' said Meto. 'What?’

'Yes, because you don't remember it yourself. You never noticed the birthmark at all, you weren't observant enough, but I was. Or else you noticed and then you forgot, but I noticed and I remembered! For once my eyes and my memory are sharper than yours, and you won't admit it!'

This accusation struck me as quite absurd. It only offered more proof, if any were needed, that Meto was still more a boy than a man. Even so, I felt a slight prickle of unease. What can be worse, for a man of my age, than to begin to doubt his own judgment?

It was possible, of course, that Meto was right — that he had seen the birthmark on Foxfex's hand, had forgotten it until this morning, and now had proof of the slave's identity. If that was so, then I would be obliged to demand an explanation from Gnaeus Claudius. But what if Meto was mistaken? What if he had seized upon a false memory and now clung to it out of pride? How far could I press my complaint against Gnaeus based on Meto's memory, which I myself mistrusted?

And if it was Forfex — what then? Had Gnaeus Claudius been responsible for putting Nemo in my stable, as well? Who among the slaves had helped him? Was his motive merely to harass me, to drive me from the farm? What of the link with Catilina's riddle — could it be mere coincidence? Or was the more inexplicable coincidence that fact that Catilina and Forfex had known and dealt with each other? Even if the body belonged to Forfex, the link might run not to his master but to Catilina — or by extension to Marcus Caelius — or to Cicero…

I found my thoughts racing in the same rutted circles they had worn since we discovered Nemo. Had I always been so helpless at thinking things through, and was Meto right to imply that I had become dull and careless? I was not a young man any longer, and while there are those whose minds grow sharper with age, there are plenty of people for whom the opposite is true.

I realized I had been staring intently for several moments at the purple mark on the corpse's hand. I looked up to see that Meto was watching me, his arms tightly crossed, his eyes narrowed, his foot tapping the ground, waiting for me to respond.

'For now,' I said quietly, 'we shall assume that Ignotus is Forfex. If

Gnaeus Claudius is responsible, we may expect that he will disclaim responsibility, so first we should attempt to get the truth from his slaves, if we can.'

I had not realized how tense Meto had been until he loosened his shoulders and stopped clutching his arms. I thought he might smile at his little triumph, but instead he looked closer to tears. 'You'll see, Papa,' he said in a very earnest voice. 'You'll see that I'm right and I do remember.'

'I hope so,'I said, but I still doubted.

XXV

"We could confront him directly,' suggested Meto, as he climbed onto his horse.

'Not before we try getting the truth from his slaves,' I said, gripping the reins and calming my mount.

'But how shall we avoid him? There's only the one road that leads from the Cassian Way onto his property. If Gnaeus is there, he may see us ride up, or else one of the slaves may run and inform him. He didn't seem like the sort of master whose slaves would let strangers onto the estate without telling him.'

'No? Forfex allowed Catilina and us to climb all over the mountain.'

'Yes, and now you see what's happened to Forfex.'

If indeed the corpse is Forfex, I thought. We rode away from the stable on the long, straight road to the highway. 'As for our approach,' I said, 'I have an idea. We won't take the main road that leads to the house of the goatherds and Gnaeus's villa.'

'What then? The rocky hills alongside the Cassian Way are too steep and rough to take our horses, and hard going on foot'

'But there's another way. Do you remember when we were on the hillside watching Catilina and Tongilius?'

'And Claudia came up and joined us?'

'Yes. Catalina knew from Forfex that another path, long disused and hidden from sight beneath the trees, cuts from the Cassian Way and winds up the mountainside. He must have found it, for after a bit of searching he disappeared and then reappeared high up on the hill. I think I remember where he disappeared among the rocks and trees.

I think we can find the path he took. We can avoid Gnaeus's house altogether and go hunting for a lonely goatherd among the rocks and brambles.'

We came to the Cassian Way and turned not left, which would have taken us to the main gate to Gnaeus's land, but right, towards Rome. We passed the ridge on our right, and I felt curiously vulnerable, knowing how visible we were to anyone up on the hill where I so often sat and gazed over the landscape. But no one would be there to see us, of course, except possibly Claudia, and Claudia would know what had transpired quickly enough if I discovered that Gnaeus had put Ignotus down my well.

There was no traffic at all on the Cassian Way. At the high point of the saddle where the road passed between the foot of the mountain and the foot of the ridge, I paused and looked around. Before us I saw nothing but the long ribbon of road disappearing towards the south. Behind us there was a smudge on the horizon that might have been a team of slaves or cattle being driven towards Rome, but it was too far away to worry about. We moved on. The ridge fell away on our right, but low hills still hid our view of Claudia's farm. On our left the land rose sharply. High trees and tumbled rocks obscured any view of the steep mountainside looming above.

'Somewhere close…' I murmured. We slowed our horses and together gazed into the underbrush. The tangle seemed impenetrable and undisturbed. We rode slowly on until I was certain that we had passed the place where Catilina and Tongilius had disappeared. The low hills on our right had fallen away, and I could see the slaves at work in Claudia's fields.

'We've gone too far,' said Meto.

'Yes. We'll double back.'

The view on our return was no different from before, and I began to think that we would have to give it up, or else go thrashing through the underbrush as Catilina had. Then I heard the clatter of hooves on paving stones and looked up to see a young deer on the road ahead. A swaying branch showed where it had emerged from the woods at the base of the ridge. It saw us and for a long moment stood as still as a statue, then bounded towards the mountainside. Off the road, its hooves made a crackling noise in the dry grass. It passed between some scattered young trees into a zone of dappled shadow and sunlight, then seemed trapped against a wall of dense brush. Nonetheless it disappeared into a narrow space between a great boulder and the thick trunk of an ancient oak. Had I blinked I would have thought it vanished in a beam of sunlight. It was a sign such as the poets speak of, a portent.

'Where the deer go,' I said quietly, 'there often is a trail.'

We rode to the boulder and dismounted. The passage was just wide enough for us to slip through and to pull our horses after us. A narrow, open space curved around the boulder and opened onto a small clearing behind it, completely hidden from the road. From this spot we were able to see traces of an old path that headed steeply up the lull.

'The boulder must have fallen at some time,' I said, 'loosened by rains or an earthquake, blocking the end of the path and hiding it completely from the Cassian Way. The path itself is strewn with rocks, suitable for deer perhaps, but not for horses. We shall have to tie the horses here and proceed on foot.'

The way was steep and rugged. Disused as a path, it had reverted to a runnel, and over the years the scouring water had left much debris and damage in its wake. In places the way was overgrown so that we had to stoop and bend and push branches out of the way. Here and there, small branches had recently been broken; someone else had been using the trail.

The path was steep at its beginning and then became absurdly steep. The rocks in the runnel were like steps carved for a Titan. Even Meto began to breathe hard and to sweat, though I could tell that he was holding back and could have been far ahead of me had he proceeded at his own pace. As it was, my heart was pounding and my feet had turned to lead by the time we came to the open space where I had first seen the path from its opposite end and Forfex had explained its existence. We were now on the road we had taken before with Catilina and Tongilius. To our left the narrow road would lead downwards back to Gnaeus's house and the house of the goatherds. To our right the footpath proceeded up the mountain, past the waterfall, and up to the mine.

My body protested the folly of taking another step uphill, but it was there that we would most likely find a wandering goatherd, preferably alone and off his guard.

It did not take long. As we approached the steep stone steps that led up to the head of the waterfall, amid the sound of rushing water I heard the bleating of a kid, and in counterpoint to it the voice of a goatherd calling in gentle tones. We stepped off the path, towards the sound of falling water. The splashing of the falls grew louder, but so did the bleating and the voice of the goatherd.

We stepped through a mass of hanging vines and leaves and found ourselves at the base of the waterfall, on the bank of a foaming green pool. The place was deeply shadowed by high trees and the cliff above. Scattered about in rocky crevices and caught in the tangles of great tree roots were the skulls and bones that we had previously seen from above. A shiver passed through me; the place was dank and cool, even on a hot summer day.

Only a few steps away we saw the goatherd. He was only a boy, younger than Meto, dressed in a ragged tunic and worn shoes barely held on his feet by scraps of leather. He had found the kid he was seeking. The animal was draped over his shoulders, its legs crossed over his chest and held tight in his fists. The sound of the waterfall had covered our quiet footsteps. When he saw us, the young slave gave a start and drew back, so suddenly that he almost lost his balance. For a moment he teetered on the edge of a rock and might have fallen into the pool if Meto had not stepped forward to grab his elbow.

The young goatherd recovered his balance and jerked free of Meto's grip. He drew back. The kid struggled and bleated. The slave tightened his grip on the beast's forelegs until his knuckles were as white as the animal's fleece. He stared from Meto's face to mine with fear in his eyes. 'Who are you?' he finally stammered. 'Are you alive or dead?'

A curious question, I thought, until I remembered that the pool with all its bones and skulls was haunted by the lemures of dead slaves. Forfex himself had told us so. 'We are very much alive,' I said, and meant it; surely lemures do not feel stiffness in their joints and soreness in their legs as living men do.

The slave looked at us from beneath drawn brows and kept his distance. 'I suppose your hand felt warm enough on my arm,' he said, glancing at Meto. 'But what are you doing here? Friends of the Master?'

'What are you doing here?' I countered.

"They made me come, because I'm the youngest. Somebody heard one of the kids bleating down here by the pool, so they made me come after it Sure enough, it had one of its hooves trapped between two rocks down by the water. Nobody likes to come down here, because of them' He looked about at the scattered bones.

'Who sent you?' I said. 'Was it Forfex?'

'Forfex?' He made the name into a stifled gasp.

'Yes, isn't Forfex chief among the goatherds?'

'Not anymore. Not after—' He looked at us with renewed suspicion. 'Does the Master know you're here?'

'Tell us what happened to Forfex,' I said, putting as much authority into my voice as I could. The slaves of Gnaeus Claudius were of the sort that responded to such a tone of voice — easily intimidated and unable to press their own questions, even against a trespasser. This said much about their master and the way he treated them.

'Forfex — the Master didn't mean to do it, not really. He gets around to beating all of us sooner or later, but he's never before — at least not with his own hands — or not since I've been here, and I've been here since I was a boy…'

'You're saying that Gnaeus Claudius killed Forfex, aren't you?' demanded Meto, glancing at me with a hint of a smile on his lips. He might have cause to feel vindicated, but his interruption was a mistake. He was neither old nor fearsome enough to make the young slave quail. The goatherd again drew back, unsure whether he was more afraid of answering or of not answering. The kid across his shoulders bleated pathetically.

'How did your master kill Forfex?' I asked sternly, stepping forward and pinning the goatherd with my gaze. He was only a boy, and a slave, and regularly abused by his master. He had no defence against a direct interrogation, even from a man who had no right to administer it, so long as I held him with my eyes and hardened my voice.

'His head — Forfex had already hurt his head not long ago…'

I remembered Forfex's striking his forehead against the rock in the mine — the blood streaming down his face, his visions of lemures, his pitiful moaning as we carried him down the mountainside. 'Yes, go on,' I said.

'After that he became a bit addled — slower than usual, not always making sense, with an ache in his head that came and went, sometimes so bad he woke up at night bleating like a kid.'

Poor Forfex, I thought. If only Catilina had not bribed you into going where your deepest fears warned you not to go.

'The Master isn't very patient. He was always beating Forfex for being stupid, anyway, but after the accident he was often really furious with him. He blamed Forfex for hurting himself, saying that he should never have taken it on himself to show the mine to strangers in the first place — but then, you must be…' He peered at us with a dawning awareness in his eyes.

'Never mind, go on!' I snapped.