It was her shrieking I heard from within when a hulking slave opened the door at Antonia's house. A moment later, beyond the slave, a tiny naked figure streaked by, followed by a stooped, hobbling nurse unable keep up with her charge. "I will not! I will not!" the little girl cried, then screamed again. Is there anything so ear-piercing as the scream of a six-year-old girl? I covered my ears. The girl dashed off.

Before the door slave could ask our names or business, Antonia herself appeared, following after the child and the nurse. It was early in the day, so I was not surprised to see her wearing only a simple yellow stola without jewelry, and with her hair undressed, hanging down almost to her waist. With or without adornment, she was a beautiful woman. I thought of poor, plain Tullia, and wondered if the rumors about Dolabella and Antonia were true.

She looked past the door slave at Davus and me, put her hands on her hips, and raised an eyebrow. "Are you from my husband?"

"No. My name-"

She narrowed her eyes. "From Dolabella?"

"No."

"Then what business have you got knocking on my door at such an early hour? No, wait-I know you from somewhere, don't I? Ah, yes, you're the one who buried Cassandra."

"I am."

"Gordianus, isn't it? The so-called Finder? I've heard of you from my husband. You've got the son who goes about with Caesar, taking his dictation. Dictation from the dictator!" She uttered a crude laugh. I winced at this reference to Meto.

Before I could answer, the naked child came racing by in the opposite direction. Antonia stooped down, captured her, and held her wriggling until the nurse arrived. As the screaming child was led off, Antonia shook her head. "She's as willful as her father. The little monster inherited his temperament. And my looks, don't you think? Juno help the man who marries her!" She saw the nonplused expression on my face and laughed. Then her smile faded. "I suppose you're here to talk about Cassandra. Come along, then. There's a nice spot of sun in the garden, and peacocks to amuse us."

There were indeed peacocks in the garden, three of them, all strutting about with their fans in full display. Chairs were brought, along with pitchers of water and wine. Antonia had not yet taken her break fast; she told the serving slave to bring enough for all three of us. When I saw the plate of delicacies he delivered, I let out a gasp. I had not seen a date stuffed with almond paste in months; the plate was heaped with them. It seemed that the shortages that plagued ordinary citizens did not affect the household of Caesar's right-hand man.

Davus gobbled up a date. He licked his fingertips and was about to reach for another when I stopped him with a look.

Antonia laughed. "Let the big fellow eat his fill. I have more dates and figs and olives than I know what to do with. Before he left to join Caesar, my husband spent months traveling all over Italy-with that strum pet of his, for all the world to gawk at-and he did a very good job of gathering provisions. Rather like a squirrel gathering acorns for the winter. Ostensibly his mission was to cow the locals and impose great Caesar's will, but he was really just extorting everyone. He's a pirate at heart, you know. A lying, drinking, whoring pirate." She snapped her fingers and pointed to her empty cup. The slave poured a measure of wine. Antonia put it to her lips before he could add an equal measure of water.

"My husband won't last, you know. His days are numbered. I don't think Caesar much liked the way Antony ran Italy in his absence, parading about with his whore, bleeding the countryside, getting stinking drunk, and generally making a spectacle of himself. Once Caesar's disposed of Pompey, he'll come back to run the show himself. If they haven't been disposed of already, he'll deal in short order with this insurrection that Milo and Marcus Caelius are hatching. He won't need a drunken bully to do it for him. Antony shall simply be an embarrassment to him." She narrowed her eyes. "I should have divorced him before he left Italy. That would have been the smart thing to do. But perhaps, if I'm lucky, the gods will make me a widow soon enough and spare me the bother. Anything can happen on a battlefield, they say."

She paused in her tirade to drain her cup, then continued. "I only married him because my mother wanted me to. 'What a stroke of fortune!' she said. 'Fadia, that awful creature he married, is dead; and now's our chance to rehabilitate your dear cousin, and you're just the one to do it. The whole family is counting on you. You always got along so well as children.' Ha! I remember him pulling my hair. And I remember kicking him in the shins. If only I'd kicked him a bit higher up, hard enough to crack his eggs, I'd have done everyone a favor. What's the matter, big fellow? Don't you care for the pickled figs?"

Davus, caught with his mouth full, finished chewing and swallowed. "I prefer the dates," he said.

"As you wish. More dates!" she called to the slave. "And a bit more wine for me. To the brim! That's better. Where was I?" She looked at me crossly. "You're all alike, you men. Worthless. I'd divorce my cousin and marry Dolabella, but he's no better. I'd only be spoiling my own amusement. 'Good lovers make bad husbands,' as the saying goes. Poor Tullia! That stupid girl worships him. She has no idea; she must be blind and deaf. Dolabella treats her with utter contempt. I'd say she deserves it, the little fool, but didn't the gods curse her enough already by giving her that lout Cicero for a father? And Dolabella's no more promising than Antony in the long run. He's made a complete mess of the naval command Caesar gave him. He's likely to end up like wretched Curio, with his head on a stick-of no use to me whatsoever if that happens. Ah, well… but you didn't come here to talk about me, did you?"

She gave me a sidelong, heavy-lidded look. I began to suspect she had taken her first cup of wine even before we arrived. I had found her rather good-looking earlier, and her candor refreshing; but with every word she spoke and with each sip of wine she became more and more unattractive, until her vivacity seemed merely vulgar. A weakness for wine was her cousin's vice. Perhaps it ran in the family.

"I came here to talk about Cassandra," I said quietly.

"Ah, yes, Cassandra. Well, she never fooled me. Not for an instant."

I felt a prickling across the back of my neck, a premonition of something unpleasant. But I had come to seek the truth, after all, or at least Antonia's version of it. "What do you mean?"

"All that folderol, swooning and sputtering and rolling her eyes back in her head. Oh, she was very convincing, I'll grant her that."

"You're talking about her fits of prophecy?"

Antonia made a rude exhalation. "Prophecy! That's what she wanted everyone to believe. Well, I didn't fall for it. Oh, perhaps a little, at first. I'll admit I was curious. Who wasn't? Everyone was talking about her and how she'd been invited into some of the best homes in Rome because of her 'gift.' My dear husband himself was convinced of it. After Caesar, he was the first man in Rome to know about Curio's death; yet when he went to Fulvia to give her the bad news, Fulvia already knew because Cassandra had told her. Now that was a bit uncanny, I confess." She suddenly looked thoughtful, as if reconsidering her earlier judgment. Then she shook her head. "But no, the woman was mostly a fake. Perhaps not entirely. Perhaps there was a tiny bit of truth to this notion that she had a gift for prophecy. I'll say that she was nine parts a fake and one part genuine. What do you say to that?"

"I'm not sure."

"Didn't you know the truth about her, Finder? You buried her."

"If I knew everything about Cassandra already, believe me, I wouldn't be sitting here now."