"The plot? Deci! Is Deci in danger?" Lucius peered down at the consular box. Even Decimus Brutus, ever the ingratiating politician, had risen to his feet to applaud Diocles along with the rest of the crowd.

"I think your friend Decimus Brutus need not fear for his life. Unless the humiliation might kill him."

"Gordianus, what are you talking about?"

"Tell me, Lucius, why have you not wagered even once today? And what are those numbers you keep figuring on the back of your racing card?"

His florid face blushed even redder. "Well, if you must know, Gordianus, I… I'm afraid I… I've lost rather a lot of money today."

"How?"

"Something… something new. A betting circle… set up by perfectly respectable people." "You wagered ahead of time?"

"I put a little something on each race. Well, it makes sense, doesn't it? If you know the horses, and you place your bet on the best team ahead of time, with a cool head, rather than during the heat of the race…"

"Yet you've lost over and over today, far more often than you've won."

"Fortune is fickle."

I shook my head. "How many others are in this 'betting circle'?"

He shrugged. "Everyone I know. Well, everyone who is anyone. Only the best people-you know what I mean."

"Only the richest people. How much money did the organizers of this betting scheme take in today, I wonder? And how much will they actually have to pay out?"

"Gordianus, what are you getting at?"

"Lucius, consult your racing card. You've noted all the winners with a chalk mark. Read them off to me-not the color or the driver, just the horses' names."

"Suspicion-that was the first race. Then Lightning… Straight Arrow… Bright Eyes… Golden Dagger… Partridge… Oh! By Hercules! Gordianus, you don't think-that item in the Daily…"

I quoted from memory. " 'The bookworm pokes his head outside tomorrow. Easy prey for the sparrow, but partridges go hungry. Bright-eyed Sappho says: Be suspicious! A dagger strikes faster than lightning. Better yet: an arrow. Let Venus conquer all!' From 'Sappho' to 'Sparrow,' a list of horses-and every one a winner."

"But how could that be?"

"I know this much: Fortune had nothing to do with it."

I left the crowded stadium and hurried through the empty streets. Decimus Brutus would be detained by the closing ceremonies. I had perhaps an hour before he would arrive home.

The slave at the door recognized me. He frowned. "The master-"

"-is still at the Circus Maximus. I'll wait for him. In the meantime… please tell your mistress she has a visitor."

The slave raised an eyebrow but showed me into a reception room off the central garden. Lowering sunlight on the fountain splashing in the courtyard outside sent reflected lozenges of light dancing across the ceiling.

I did not have long to wait. Sempronia stepped into the room alone, without even a handmaiden. She was not smiling.

"The door slave announced you as Gordianus the Finder."

"Yes. We met… briefly… this morning."

"I remember. You're the fellow who went snooping for Deci last night, poking about at the Senian Baths and those awful places around the circus. Oh yes, word got back to me. I have my own informants. What are you doing here?"

"I'm trying to decide what I should tell your husband."

She gave me an appraising look. "What is it, exactly, that you think you know?"

"Decimus Brutus thinks that you and the charioteer Diocles are lovers."

"And what do you think, Finder?"

"I think he's right. But I have no proof."

She nodded. "Is that all?"

"You husband thinks you and Diocles were plotting to kill him today."

Sempronia laughed out loud. "Dear old bookworm!" She sighed. "Marrying Deci was the best thing that ever happened to me. I'm the consul's wife! Why in Hades would I want to kill him?"

I shrugged. "He misunderstood that blind item you put into the Daily Acts."

"Which… blind item?"

"There's been more than one? Of course. That makes sense. What better way to communicate with Diocles, since you've been confined here and he's been banned from your house. What I don't understand is how you ever convinced Diocles to fix today's races."

She crossed her arms and gave me a long, calculating look. "Diocles loves me; more than I love him, I'm afraid, but when was Venus ever fair? He did it for love, I suppose; and for money. Diocles stands to make a tremendous amount of money today, as do all the racers who took part in the fix. You can't imagine how much money. Millions. We worked on the scheme for months. Setting up the betting circle, bribing the racers…"

"'We'? Do you mean your whole circle was in on it?"

"Some of them. But mostly it was Diocles and myself." She frowned. "And then Deci had to throw his jealous fit. It couldn't have happened at a worse time, with the races less than a month away. I had to have some way to communicate with Diocles. The Daily was the answer."

"You must have extraordinary powers of…"

"Persuasion?"

"Organization, I was going to say." "Like a man?" She laughed.

"One thing puzzles me still. What will you do with millions of sesterces, Sempronia? You can't possibly hide that much money from your husband. He'd want to know where such a windfall came from."

She peered at me keenly. "What do you think I intend to do with the money?"

"I think you intend to… get rid of it."

"How?"

"I think you mean to… send it abroad."

"Where?"

"To Spain. To Quintus Sertorius, the rebel general." Her face became as pale as the pearls in her hair. "How much do you want, Gordianus?"

I shook my head. "I didn't come here to blackmail you."

"No? That's what Scorpus wanted."

"Your husband's man? Did he discover the truth?" "Only about the racing scheme. He seemed to think that entitled him to a portion of the takings."

"There must be plenty to go around."

She shook her head. "Scorpus would never have stopped wanting more."

"So he was drowned."

"Diocles arranged it. There are men around the circus who'll do that sort of job for next to nothing, especially for a fellow like Diocles. Blackmailers deserve nothing better."

"Is that a threat, Sempronia?"

"That depends. What do you want, Finder?"

I shrugged. "The truth. It's the only thing that ever seems to satisfy me. Why Sertorius? Why risk so much-everything-to help his rebellion in Spain? Do you have a family tie? A loved one who's thrown his lot with the rebels? Or is it that you and Sertorius are."

"Lovers?" She laughed without mirth. "Is that all you can think, that being a woman, I must be driven by passion? Can you not imagine that a woman might have her own politics, her own convictions, her own agenda, quite separate from a husband or a lover? I don't have to justify myself to you, Gordianus."

I nodded. Feeling her eyes on me, I paced the room. The sun was sinking. Flashes of warm sunlight reflected from the fountain outside caressed my face. Decimus Brutus would return home at any moment. What would I tell him?

I made up my mind. "You asked me what I want from you, Sempronia. Actually, there is the matter of a refund, which I think you must admit is only proper, given the circumstances… "

At noon the next day, I sat beside Lucius Claudius in his garden, sharing the sunlight and a cup of wine. His interest in that morning's Daily Acts had been eclipsed by the bags of coins I brought with me. Scooping the little scrolls off the table, he emptied the bags and collected the sesterces into heaping piles, gleefully counting and re-counting them.

"All here!" he announced, clapping his hands. "Every single sesterce I lost yesterday on the races. But Gordianus, how did you get my money back?"

"That, Lucius, must forever remain a secret."

"If you insist. But this has something to do with Sempronia and that charioteer, doesn't it?"