"Is it? It seems to me exactly what one might expect from a woman as weak as Clodia, who allows herself to be dominated by whims and emotions. We Romans believe that a man must be the master of his appetites or he's no man at all, but we forgive such a defect in a woman. It wasn't so in the days of our ancestors. A woman like Clodia, enslaved by her neediness, would have been despised by everyone. Nowadays people call such a creature fascinating, and men as weak as she is make poems about her." She made an expression of disgust. It occurred to me that no one would ever make a poem about Calpurnia.

"As for Caelius," she said, "perhaps he never stopped loving Clodia, despite their falling out and her attempt to destroy him. Or perhaps, always the pragmatist, he simply saw some use for her in this scheme of his to win over the rabble and seize power. Who knows what drives such a man? The fellow's like quick silver."

I shook my head, trying to make sense of this. "If Cassandra, at your bidding, was supposed to dissuade Caelius and Milo from staging an armed insurrection, then she obviously failed," I said.

"I'm not sure what happened. The last time I spoke to Cassandra, which was several days before her death, she told me that she had made the acquaintance of both Clodia and Fausta. Fausta had told her that Milo was aware of her existence-it wasn't clear whether he was in Rome at the time or not-and that he wanted to seek her out for a prophecy. As I said, Cassandra was living in a building that I knew to be one of Caelius's strongholds in the city. I told her to stay there, where Caelius and Milo could find her if they wished. If that should happen, she was to stall the two of them as best she could. 'Put them off, keep them in the city, and send Rupa to me at once;' I told her. 'If you must give them a prophecy, then tell them that their plans for a revolution are doomed and their only hope is to give themselves up and throw themselves upon the bountiful mercy of Caesar.' That was the last time I saw Cassandra. Several days later, I learned that Caelius and Milo had come and gone, and Cassandra was dead. So far as I can reconstruct the sequence of events, she died only a few hours after they rode out of Rome together."

"And Rupa?"

"He was here with Cassandra when I last spoke to her. After that, I never saw him again. I don't know whether he's alive or dead."

"But you believe there was some connection between Caelius and Milo, and Cassandra's death?"

"It seems very likely. Exactly what that connection may have been, I don't know. Right now, all my efforts are bent toward containing this insurrection Milo and Caelius are trying to raise in the south, and making sure that the next time they arrive in Rome, it's with their heads on sticks. Cassandra's dead. She's of no further use to me. I don't have time to be concerned with who killed her or why. I leave that to you. I understand you have a nose for that sort of thing. If you do manage to sniff out the truth, come tell me. If she died in Caesar's service, then whoever killed her shall answer to Caesar's justice."

XVII

That night, Bethesda was delirious with fever. She shivered beneath her woolen coverlet and murmured incoherently. Diana prepared a concoction of brewed willow bark and a mild soporific that seemed to help; the fever lessened, and Bethesda fell into a fitful sleep. I stayed by her side, holding her hand, mopping her brow, and hardly slept at all.

Fever had not been a symptom of her malady before. I feared that it marked a new stage in her illness. I felt stupid and helpless.

Diana fell ill that day as well. I came upon her bent over in the garden, throwing up her break fast. Afterwards, she insisted that she felt perfectly well, but with a chill I wondered if her sickness was somehow connected to her mother's. What if both were to fall victim to the same lingering illness? I had no more money for physicians. Physicians had proved to be useless, anyway.

What would become of the household if both Bethesda and Diana were bedridden? What would happen when the banker Volumnius began pressing me for repayment of my loans? The first installment would fall due in a matter of days.

I fell into a black mood and did not stir from the house.

Days passed. After that first miserable night, Bethesda's fever lessened and receded. Diana seemed well, but there was something furtive in her manner. I sensed she was hiding something from me.

I might have kept pursuing my quest for the truth about Cassandra, but a kind of stasis of the will settled over me. Rome itself seemed gripped by a trancelike paralysis, awaiting news from Greece about Caesar and Pompey, awaiting news from the south about Caelius and Milo's insurrection. A sense of impending catastrophe loomed over the city, over my house, over my spirit. It clouded every moment, poisoned every breath.

Another thing stopped me from taking any further steps to find Cassandra's killer. By telling me what she knew, by charging me with the task of finding the truth, and by promising Caesar's justice, Calpurnia had effectively enlisted me to become yet another of her informants in the city. I had deliberately severed every tie to Caesar, even disowning Meto. Yet if I wished to see the search for Cassandra's killer through to the end, how could I do so without becoming a spy for Caesar?

It was Hieronymus who brought me the news.

One morning while I brooded in the garden, he came striding in, eyes flashing, slightly out of breath. I knew at once that something terrible had happened-terrible for someone, if not for Hieronymus. Mayhem and the suffering of others excited him.

"It's all over!" he announced.

"What's over?"

"They're dead. Both dead, and all their followers with them."

For a brief moment I thought he meant Caesar and Pompey, and I tried to imagine the immensity of the debacle that could wipe them both from the face of the earth along with their armies. Had Jupiter himself sent down lightning bolts, had Neptune flooded the mountains, and Hades opened chasms beneath them? I felt a cold spot in my heart in the place where my love of Meto had once resided.

Then I knew what he meant.

"Where?" I said. "How?"

"One hears conflicting details, but according to the best sources down in the Forum-"

Davus rushed in. "Milo and Caelius are dead!" he cried. "Both of them, dead! A huge crowd is gathering in the Forum. Some are celebrating. Some are weeping and tearing their hair. They say it's all over. The insurrection is over before it even began."

Hieronymus gave Davus a sour look. "As I was saying… it seems to have happened like this: Milo and Caelius headed south from Rome, but they split up to carry out separate actions. Milo started by going from town to town claiming he was acting on orders from Pompey, making wild promises and trying to get the town leaders to join him. But that got him nowhere. So he used his gladiators to set free a great number of field slaves, the type made to work under a whip and kept in pens along with animals or in barracks no better than cages-the most desperate of the desperate. Milo's ragtag army went on a rampage, plundering temples and shrines and farmhouses all around. Raising a war chest, Milo called it. He must have gathered a great number of slaves-hundreds, maybe thousands-because he dared to lay siege to a town called Compsa, garrisoned by a whole legion. But it all went wrong when Milo was struck down by a stone hurled from the ramparts. The rock hit him square in the forehead, shattered his skull, and killed him instantly. With no one to lead them, the slaves panicked and fled."

"And Caelius?"

"Caelius started by trying to raise a revolt among the gladiators in Neapolis. But the city magistrates got wind of the plot and put the ringleaders among the gladiators in chains before they could rally the rest. The magistrates tried to arrest Caelius as well, but he managed to slip through their trap. Word that he was an outlaw traveled ahead of him. No city would open its gates to him. He headed toward Compsa to join up with Milo, and learned of Milo's death from slaves who were fleeing the battle. Caelius tried to rally the slaves, but they wouldn't listen and ran off in all directions. How did one-armed Canininus put it? 'All those years bending to the lash and buggering sheep rendered them immune to Caelius's rhetoric.' Caelius headed farther south, practically alone-they say he had only a handful of supporters still with him, no more than five or six men. He pressed on until he came to the coast. Apparently there's a town called Thurii situated in the instep of Italy. That was where Caelius made his last stand."