The Whipper and the Binder hustled me through the halls and past goggling slaves, then down a flight of steps to the cellar. There they bolted a neck-ring on me and chained me to the wall. They talked to each other merrily in some barbarous tongue, their bronze-studded belts scraping my abused hide as they disposed of me. With their big bellies and thick, leather-banded arms, they looked like apes imitating men. Well, one doesn't employ disciplinarians for their refinements. With a final test of my bonds, they left me to my thoughts. These were not pleasant.

Somehow, I had been neatly bagged. I was not sure how this had been done, but it seemed to have been done with my fullest cooperation. I was now assumed by everyone to be a murderer. The victim had been a free woman and a resident of Alexandria, although of foreign origin. At the very best, Ptolemy would allow me to be quietly shipped off to Rome. I had no doubt that Creticus would make good on his threat to impeach me before the Senate. Roman officials were allowed a certain license in foreign lands, but for a member of a diplomatic mission to disgrace the Republic was unconscionable.

How to get out of this? It had all been so sudden, and my mind so benumbed, that I had not been able to take in the circumstances, much less devise a defense. I knew a few basic facts: The woman was Hypatia, she was in my bed and she was unquestionably dead. What, if anything, was in my favor?

The knife buried in her body was not mine. I remembered with relief that I had locked my weapons away before retiring. Perhaps something could be made of that. I certainly had no reason to kill her, but I had enough experience with murder trials to know that a motive is the least of considerations, especially when evidence of culpability is strong. It was certainly strong in this case.

How had this been carried out? All too easily. The whole Palace had been sound asleep, and I had been too sodden to notice the arrival of marauding Gauls. Poor Hypatia had simply been deposited in my bed and the murderers or their lackeys had strolled away, all of it as casual as tradesmen making a delivery.

But why had they not simply killed me? If Achillas and Ataxas were determined to put an end to my investigation, it seemed to me that the simplest thing would have been to deposit the dagger in my heart, not in some innocent woman's. Not that Hypatia had been terribly innocent, either in her professional life or in her intentions toward the conspirators. A dungeon is an excellent place to mull over questions like this, free as it is from distractions. I don't recommend it as a regular practice.

I wished that I could consult my friends Cicero and Milo on this. Between Cicero's legal expertise and Milo's criminal genius, they would have cracked this problem within minutes. Cicero had once told me that many men in legal difficulties failed to understand their situation because they always assumed themselves to be the focus of the problem. Each man exists at the center of his own personal cosmos and believes that he must be the foremost concern of gods and men. This is a grievous fallacy and must be guarded against.

I suspected that Achillas was behind everything. Ataxas was his accomplice and cat's-paw. Milo had told me that he overcame the other gang leaders in Rome by simply thinking like them. In this way he could anticipate their every attack. The difficult part, he said, was in duplicating the thought processes of someone more stupid than oneself, which was always the case.

Achillas wanted me out of the way, but was I all that important? This was a man who lusted for the throne of Egypt. My investigation was causing him annoyance, threatening to upset his plans, but what was that in the context of his greater agenda? For more than a century it had been understood that the ruler of Egypt would be the one favored by Rome, and Rome had, for the sake of stability and consistency, opted to support the weak, foolish but traditional Ptolemies. I was not Achillas's problem. Rome was his problem. And I had very thoughtfully given him a wonderful weapon to use against Rome. I, a Roman diplomat, had murdered a free woman of Alexandria. And I had done it, not merely in the city, but within the Palace itself. The city was already poised to erupt in anti-Roman riots, and I had poured oil on the coals.

And there was that old Gaulish saying about two birds with one arrow or something of the sort. The traitorous Hypatia had to be disposed of anyway, so why not let her be my poor, innocent victim? And that turned my mind down other channels. Had her treachery been detected, or had it been planned by Achillas from the start?

She might have been given a role to play, not understanding, of course, that she was to be paid with a dagger through the heart. An Athenian hetaira receives training comparable to an actor's, and she knew well how to keep me off guard, lusting for the mysterious book and her skilled body alternately. And she knew that a beautiful woman cannot fail to control a young man by letting him know that she finds him irresistible. Or an old one either, for that matter.

I was distracted by a noise from the top of the stairs. The door opened and shut and there was a glow from the top step.

"Whoever you are, I hope you've come to let me go. I am innocent!"

"It's Julia."

"How did you get here?" I asked.

"I walked, idiot."

"Oh. Ah, Julia, it might not be a good idea to bring that lamp too close. They dragged me from bed and didn't give me a chance to dress. I'm, well, the only way to describe my condition is naked."

She came on relentlessly. "If we're to be married, I'll have to learn the awful truth sooner or later. Besides, I believe that was also the state of that poor woman they found in your bed. Oh, Decius, what have you done now? I knew that you were reckless, but you've never murdered anyone before."

"Do you believe I did?" If my betrothed thought I was a murderer, I was really in trouble.

"I know it can't be, but the circumstances are so damning! The story is all over the Palace."

"And I'll bet I know who's spreading it. Julia, Asklepiodes has to examine that woman's body while it's still in my room, if it hasn't been moved already. I think Rufus has gone to get him, but I can't be sure."

"I'll see about it," she said. "Now tell me everything that happened." So I did. She frowned deeply when got to the part about going to the Daphne.

"You are telling me that you took a prostitute to Alexandria's most notorious scene of debauchery?"

"Julia," I protested, "she was my informant! I had to keep her happy!"

"How convenient! Would you have felt so compelled if she had been old and ugly?"

"Julia, don't speak foolishly. Would the Parthian ambassador have an old and ugly concubine?"

"Listen to me, Decius. I will do what I can to get you out of this alive, but I am beginning to doubt your sanity. A man who can get himself into a situation this grotesque makes a very doubtful prospect as a husband, even without consorting with prostitutes."

"I have to get that book, Julia," I insisted. "It must be the key! With that I can prove the conspiracy, I will earn the gratitude of Ptolemy, I'll be the latest savior of Rome and all will be forgiven!"

"You are pinning a lot of hopes on very little. The woman may have been lying about the book."

"I don't think so. I think this was a case where telling the truth was the easiest lure."

"You are in no position to get hold of it," she pointed out.

"Alas, yes. Not only am I chained like a recalcitrant slave, but security is probably tighter at the Parthian embassy than it is at the Roman." Then something occurred to me. "Julia, didn't the Parthian ambassador depend on Hypatia to help him in translating correspondence?"

"According to her, yes."