"Who, me?" said Fortex.

"Yes. Do it at once."

Fortex made a face, then dismounted, muttering, and looked about for something to use as a shovel.

While we waited, I let my horse wander idly along the edge of the road, looking for tender grass amid the tombs of the Pompeii. I shut my eyes, feeling the warmth of morning sunlight on my eyelids and enjoying the casual, uncontrolled movements of the beast beneath me. Behind me I heard the slave climb onto the brazen roof, then the sound of scraping, followed by the soft impact of dung hitting the road.

I must have dozed. The moment slid out of ordinary time. When I opened my eyes, before me I saw the tomb of Numerius Pompeius.

It was a simple stele of the ready-made sort, engraved with a horse's head, symbol of death's departure. It was a little way off the road, behind a row of more conspicuous tombs. Compared to its neighbors, it was small and insignificant. I would never have noticed it, passing by on the road. How strange that the horse should have brought me directly to it, and that the first thing I should see when I opened my eyes were the words newly chiseled in the narrow, five-line space reserved for personalizing the monument:

Those words would have come from his mother. Having no one else to blame for his death, Maecia blamed the gods. I felt a twinge of shame.

I looked down. It was not so inexplicable after all that my mount had wandered to this spot. At the foot of the stele someone- Maecia, of course- had planted flowers, not yet budding. The horse found the tender foliage to his liking and had already eaten most of it to the ground.

I pulled on the rein and scolded him. At the same moment I saw a movement from the corner of my eye. A figure emerged from behind a nearby monument.

My heart lurched inside my chest. The shadows had lifted with the dawn, but something uncanny seemed still to lurk amid the tombs. Perversely, it seemed somehow appropriate that the lemur of Numerius would emerge from the underworld to confront me just as birds began to sing and the whole world stirred to life.

But the ragged creature who emerged from behind the monument was not a lemur. Nor were the others, three at least, who quickly joined him. I wheeled my horse about in the difficult space between the crowded monuments. "Tiro!" I shouted. "Bandits!"

Certain stretches of the Appian Way are notoriously unsafe. The area around the tomb of Basilius, situated far beyond the city wall and marking the true beginning of the countryside, is especially dangerous; I myself had been ambushed there once and kidnapped. But we had not gone nearly that far, and I had never heard of bandits this close to the Capena Gate. How desperate men were these, and how little order was left in Rome, that they should dare to attack travelers practically within shouting distance of the city! It was our own fault. Tiro should never have sent our single bodyguard on a fool's errand to shovel horse dung. I should never have shut my eyes and allowed my horse to wander. The bandits saw us lower our guard and decided to strike.

I frantically attempted to guide my mount back onto the road. Just a moment before, I had been scolding him for eating Maecia's flowers. Now he balked, confused. A hand gripped my ankle. I kicked and lost my balance. I swayed, nearly fell, and grazed my head against a stone obelisk. Another hand gripped my foot. I turned and saw an ugly, gap-toothed face glaring up at me. There is a certain look a man has when he's worked himself up to kill, if necessary. I saw that look in his eyes.

An instant later, a scrap of dung, sun-hardened to make a suitable missile, struck the man square between the eyes. He gave a squeal and released his grip on me. Finally sure of himself, my mount galloped between the monuments and onto the road.

Tiro was wheeling about, a long dagger in his hand. Fortex gave a whoop, leaped off the roof of the shrine, and mounted his horse in a single fluid motion. One of the bandits came up behind him. The startled horse kicked the man in the chest. He flew through the air like a thrown doll, struck his head against the wall of the shrine, and crumpled lifeless to the ground.

They came at us from both sides of the road, a gang of ten men at least, maybe more. In the next instant they might have swarmed over us and pulled us from our horses. But they seemed to have no leader, and the sight of one of their number lying dead caused them to hesitate. As one, the three of us turned our horses and set off with a great clattering of hooves.

Some of the bandits ran after us. One of them managed to grab Tiro's ankle. I saw a glint of steel, felt drops of blood strike my face and heard a scream that rapidly receded. I turned my head. The stricken man stood clutching his arm. Several of his companions kept running after us. None of them seemed to have weapons, except stones, one of which struck Fortex's mount on the rump. The beast neighed and lurched, but never slowed its pace.

One by one the men gave up the chase. I watched them grow distant and dwindle, like the Capena Gate beyond them, like the shrines of Clodius and the elder Pompey. The stele of Numerius Pompeius was lost amid so many others.

Alongside me, Fortex suddenly laughed and gave a whoop. A moment later, Tiro broke into a grin and did the same. What excuse had they for joy? What had just occurred could be read as an omen, and a very bad omen at that. Only moments into a journey of many days, we had let down our guard and very nearly lost out lives. The gods had pointed me to the tomb of Numerius Pompeius and then unleashed a desperate horde upon us. It had been a grim episode, ending in bloodshed and death.

But the exhilaration was contagious. A moment later I began to laugh and whoop along with them. It was the morning of a new day, the sun shone brightly across the fields, and we were alive! Not only alive, but putting Rome behind us- leaving behind Numerius's mourning mother and his pregnant lover, leaving behind my weeping daughter and scolding wife, leaving behind the glum shopkeepers and the daily panics in the Forum, shaking off the chilly gloom of the city and galloping into the future with the bracing wind in our faces.

I knew that such a feeling of freedom couldn't last; it never does. But I knew, too, that it might be the last time I ever tasted such exhilaration. I urged my horse to gallop even faster. I drew ahead of Tiro and Fortex, until I had the illusion of being alone on the road, a single rider, invincible, unrestrainable. I threw back my head and cried out to heaven.