Tiro and I took our leave without ceremony, to the smell of incense and the muffled wailing of the slaves within the sanctum.
'What a day!' Tiro sighed as we stepped inside his master's house. 'What a night!'
I wearily nodded. 'And now, if we're lucky, we might get an hour of sleep before the sun comes up.'
'Sleep? I can't possibly sleep. My head is spinning. To think, this morning Sextus Roscius was still alive. . and Sulla had never heard of Cicero… and I honestly believed—'
'Yes?'
In answer he only shook his head. Cicero had disappointed him terribly, but Tiro would not say a word against him. I followed him into his master's study, where alamp had been lit awaiting his return. He glanced about the room and walked to the pile of scrolls that Sulla had knocked from their table.
'I might as well straighten these now,' he sighed, kneeling down. 'Something to do.'
I smiled at his energy. I turned towards the atrium and studied the play of moonlight on the sand. I breathed deep and let out a great yawn.
'I'll be leaving with Bethesda tomorrow,' I said. 'I suppose I'll see you then; or perhaps not, if Cicero has some errand for you. It seems long ago that you came to my door, doesn't it, Tiro, though it's been only a few days. I can't remember a case with so many twists and turns. Perhaps Cicero will use me again, or perhaps he won't. Rome is a small place, in a way, but I might not see you again.' I suddenly had to clear my throat. It was the moonlight, I thought, making me sentimental. 'I suppose I should tell you now, Tiro — yes, here and now, while it's quiet and the two of us are alone — I should tell you that I think you're an exceedingly fine young man, Tiro. I speak from the heart, and I think Cicero would agree. You're fortunate to have a master who values you highly. Oh, I know, Cicero may sometimes seem brusque, but — Tiro?'
I turned about to see him lying on his side among the scattered scrolls on the floor, quietly snoring. I smiled and stepped softly towards him. In sleep, beneath the mingled lamplight and moonlight, he looked truly childlike. I knelt and touched the smooth skin of his brow and the shock of soft curls above. I took the scroll that lay in his hand. It was the crumpled copy of Euripides that Sulla had been reading and had thrown across the room. My eyes fell upon the chorus's summation:
The gods have many guises. The gods bring crises to climax while man surmises. The end anticipated has not been consummated. But god has found a way for what no man expected. So ends the play.
I was up by mid-morning, despite my late hour to bed. Bethesda was already long awake and had my few things gathered together. She hurried me into my clothes and watched me like a cat while I ate a few bites of bread and cheese; she was ready to be home.
While Bethesda waited impatiently in morning sunlight in the peristyle, Cicero called me into his study. Tiro was asleep in his room, he said, and so Cicero himself took down a box of silver and a bag of loose coins, and counted out my fee, exact to the last sesterce. 'Hortensius tells me it's customary to deduct for the meals and lodging I've given you,' he sighed, 'but I wouldn't think of it. Instead—' He smiled and added ten denarii to the pile.
It is not easy to put unpleasant questions to a man who has just paid you a handsome fee, and a substantial bonus as well. I modesdy lowered my eyes as I gathered up the coins and said, as offhandedly as I could, 'There are still a few points, Cicero, that puzzle me. Perhaps you could enlighten me.'
'Yes?' His bland smile was infuriating.
'Am I correct in assuming that you knew much more about this case than you told me when you hired me? That perhaps you even knew about the proscription of Sextus Roscius pater? That you knew Sulla was in some way tied to it all, and that there would be grave and immediate danger to any man investigating the whole squalid affair?'
He shrugged his narrow shoulders. 'Yes. No. Perhaps. Really, Gordianus, all I had to go on were whispers and fragments; no one would tell me all they knew, just as I didn't tell you everything I
knew. The Metelli thought they could use me. To some extent they did.'
'Just as you used me — as bait? To see if a stray dog sticking his nose in the Roscius affair would be threatened, attacked, killed? As I very nearly was, more than once.'
Cicero's eyes flashed, but his smile was indestructible.
'You've emerged unscathed, Gordianus.'
'Thanks to my wits.'
'Thanks to my protection.'
'And does it really not disturb you, Cicero, that the man you defended so successfully was guilty all along?'
'There is no dishonour in defending a guilty client — ask any advocate. And there is some honour in embarrassing a tyrant.'
'Murder means nothing to you?'
'Crime is common. Honour is rare. And now, Gordianus, I really must bid you farewell. You know the way out' Cicero turned and walked from the room.
The day was warm but not unpleasant. At first Bethesda seemed skittish back in the house on the Esquiline, but soon she was busy going from room to room, restoring the place to her liking. In the afternoon I accompanied her down to the marketplace. The bustle of the Subura swept about me — the cry of the vendors, the odour of fresh meat, the rush of half-familiar faces through the street I was happy to be home again.
Later, while Bethesda prepared my supper, I took a long, aimless stroll through the neighbourhood, feeling the warm breeze on my face and turning my eyes to the pale golden clouds above. My thoughts drifted to the rooftop of Titus Megarus's house beneath the stars; to the hot sunlight flooding Cicero's atrium; to the House of Swans and the depths of Electra's eyes; to a glimpse of young Roscia's naked thigh as Tiro desperately clutched her and moaned against her throat; to the broken body of Sextus Roscius, who had brought together all these disparate things and cemented them with his own blood and that of his father.
I felt a pang of hunger and was ready to be home again. I looked around, not recognizing my surroundings for a moment and then realized I had somehow ended up at the distant mouth of the Narrows. I had not meant to walk so far or to come anywhere near the place. Perhaps there is a god whose guiding hand can fall so lightly on a man's shoulder that he never knows it.
I turned towards home and began to walk.
I passed no one on the path, but every now and again I heard from windows above the sound of women calling their families to supper. The world seemed peaceful and content, until I heard the stamping of feet behind me.
Many feet, pounding against the paving stones, together with high-pitched shouts that echoed down the Narrows and the clatter of sticks being dragged against the uneven walls. For a moment I couldn't tell whether the noise came from behind or before me, so strange was the echo. It seemed to draw closer and closer, now from the front, now from the back, as if I had been surrounded on both sides by a shrieking mob.
Sulla lied, I thought. My house on the hill is in flames. Bethesda has been raped and murdered. Now his hired rabble have trapped me in the Narrows. They will beat me with sticks. They will tear my body apart. Gordianus the Finder will vanish from the earth and no one will know or care except his enemies, who will soon forget.
The noise became shrill and deafening. It came from behind me. The voices I heard were not the voices of men, but of boys. At that moment they appeared around a bend in the Narrows, smiling, screaming, laughing, and waving sticks, tripping over one another as they careened against the walls. They were chasing another boy, smaller than the rest and dressed in a blur of filthy rags, who ran headlong against me and burrowed into my tunic as if I were a tower where he might hide fiimself.