"If you want to make formal charges, you know how it's done," I said, "but a man under accusation of sacrilege cuts a poor figure in court." At this my supporters roared with laughter while Clodius grew scarlet in the face.
"Then perhaps we shouldn't bother the courts with this!"
I saw the glint of daggers being drawn among his mob, and behind me, my own followers gripped cudgels, stones and, no doubt, a few swords. I reached into my tunic and gripped my caestus. We had the makings of a full-scale riot here, and I was ready for one. The past few days had been frustrating, and a street brawl is a fine way to relieve tension, despite what the philosophers say. I have always held that excessive equanimity is unhealthy. We were about to come to blows when something unexpected happened.
The crowd in the street parted as if by magic as a herald came forward in his white robe, parting the mob with his ivy-wreathed staff. "Make way!" he shouted.
"Make way for the Pontifex Maximus!" The daggers disappeared as if they had never existed. I released my grip on my caestus and the crowd fell silent.
Caius Julius Caesar strode superbly into the space between the two hostile groups. He wore a magnificent formal toga, one fold of it drawn over his head as if he were engaged in one of his sacerdotal functions. He turned slowly in a full circle, and people fell back before his lordly eagle's frown. This was the first time I witnessed Caesar's easy mastery of crowds, and I was impressed. Now I could see why he was so influential before the huge public assemblies. In small gatherings, even before the Senate of his peers, Caesar's manner looked like bombastic posturing. In the midst of a great mob it was godlike. I began to have an inkling of what he would be like haranguing the troops before battle.
"Citizens!" he cried, at the precise moment when his speech would have the greatest dramatic effect. "This street has seen the murder of a noble youth of one of Rome's most ancient families, a patrician of the Claudii. Was this not enough? Would you anger the gods and bring their curse upon Rome by shedding civil blood before the Pontifex Maximus!" He ignored the minor lake of Nero's blood that spread over the cobbles. Maybe dried blood didn't count. People looked abashed, even Clodius's arena bait.
"Pontifex," Clodius said, "we would never offer you disrespect, but my kinsman has been foully murdered and I name him" -he jabbed a finger toward me-"as the guilty party."
"Rome is a republic of law," Caesar proclaimed. "Courts and magistrates and juries decide these questions, not mob action. I order that all here return to their houses. When your passions have calmed and you can behave as citizens should, then will be the time to try this matter publicly. Until that time, depart!" The last word snapped out like one of Jove's thunderbolts, and some of the Subura's most bloodstained ruffians fairly scurried to get out of his sight.
Clodius was so enraged that he was, for once, unable to speak. His face had darkened to crimson, and throbbing veins stood out on his brow. His eyeballs were red as a three-day hangover. If he had just stuck his tongue out, he would have been identical to those gorgons you see painted on old Greek shields. It was a most entertaining spectacle, but it could not last. Beneath Caesar's glare, Clodius's extravagant color began to fade. When he was self-possessed once more, he whirled and stalked off, followed by his uneasy entourage.
Within moments the street was empty except for Caesar. It was the most amazing thing I had seen in a good long while. He turned to where I stood in my gateway.
"How did this come about, Decius Caecilius?" he asked.
"Come inside and I'll tell you, Caius Julius," I said. Caesar came in. I didn't tell him everything, naturally, just about how I had met Nero and encountered him again at the herb-woman's booth and then at the house of Capito. I left out the parts about the attempted poisoning and coming upon the corpse the night before. Since I was as mystified as anyone else, I didn't need to fake it.
"None of this seems to make any sense," Caesar said.
"I could not agree with you more."
"Still, this is a disturbing thing," he mused. "Two murders, performed identically, and both victims patricians."
"Don't forget Capito's janitor," I reminded him. "He wasn't a patrician."
"He probably got a glimpse of the killer's face," Caesar said. "He must have been eliminated as a witness."
"I agree," I said. Then I told him what Asklepiodes had said about the wounds. Why was I speaking to Caesar so openly? Partly it was because I suspected him of being involved in some way and I hoped that he would betray complicity. Partly, also, it was because I had been ready for a mortal brawl with Clodius and Caesar had poured water on the fire. In a less frustrated state I might have been more cautious.
"This is strange indeed. Am I to understand that you have taken upon yourself one of your inimitable investigations?"
"It helps to pass the time," I said.
He grew very serious. "Decius, my friend, I have known many men who courted death for the sake of glory. Others do the same in pursuit of wealth, power or revenge. You are the only man I know who does so as a sort of intellectual exercise."
"Every man finds his pleasures where he will," I said, quoting an old saying I had often seen carved on tombstones.
"You are an intriguing man, Decius Caecilius. I wish there were more like you in Rome. Most men are boring drudges. My niece told me of your visit yesterday. She was quite taken with you."
This surprised me. But I answered without prevarication. "As I was with her."
He nodded approvingly. "I am glad to hear it. We must discuss this further at a future date. Just now, though, I am called elsewhere. Good day, Decius."
His words rattled me somewhat. Was he suggesting a match? Or was he trying to distract me? If the latter, he did not shake from my head the question that had been there since his appearance. "Caius Julius," I said.
He turned in the doorway. "Yes?"
"How did you happen to get here so quickly?"
He smiled. "Ever the inquirer, eh? As it happened, I was in the Temple of Libitina when Clodius's servant arrived to summon the undertakers."
"I see," I said. "Pontifical duties?"
"Arranging for some family obsequies," Caesar said. "The goddess is an aspect of the ancestress of my house." Caesar had just begun to stress the divine origins of the Julian clan. He omitted no opportunity to mention it. He left.
"That's a man to watch," said my old retainer Burrus. He had been waiting with the others in the atrium while Caesar and I conversed in my study. Burrus was a former centurion from the legion I had served with in Spain. He was gray as iron and had a face like a soldier's dolabra.
"Why do you say that, Burrus?" I knew why I was uneasy about Caesar, but I was curious to know how a man like Burrus would read him.
"I don't know the courts and the Senate like you, patron," he said, "but I know the legions. Give that man command of one or two good legions, and he'll work miracles."
This astonished me. "Why on earth do you say that?"
"I've heard him speak before the Concilium Plebis. You saw him out on the street just now? Well, he's always like that when addressing the plebs. Soldiers respond to a man who talks like that, sir. If he can soldier like he talks, they'll do anything for him."
I had thought that I knew Rome intimately, but here was something new to me. At the time I dismissed it. Talk was one thing, but the ability to endure the hard privations of a soldier's life? I knew how much I detested military life. Caesar's reputation for the love of ease and luxury exceeded my own by a wide margin, and my reputation in that area was by no means small. He could never amount to anything as a general. That was how much I knew.