Caesar sighed. "Meto has seen me at my best-and at my worst. Over the years, I've learned to trust him, to take off my armor in his presence, so to speak-not an easy thing for an old warrior to do. He's as close to me as a son-yet in no way have I ever presumed that I could take the place of his father."

"Meto is not of my blood. I adopted him."

"And yet you are as surely Meto's father as if you had made him yourself. I envy you that, Gordianus-having a son, especially a son like Meto."

"Does Caesar have no son?" I thought of Cleopatra.

He was silent for a long moment. "That… is a complicated question. Ironic, isn't it? One man produces a son-at long last!-yet hesitates to call himself the boy's father, while another man adopts a boy not of his blood and becomes a father in every way that matters to gods and mortals."

Caesarion was his son, then-or so he believed. Caesar breathed deeply. "Do you know, this is the first time I've come to a complete halt in… well, I have no idea how long it's been! I can't relax like this in my own garden. Servants are always hovering, supplicants are in the vestibule, senators are at the door, my wife is forever fussing and fretting over me…"

"Your wife?" Did he know of Calpurnia's fears and the divinations of her haruspex?

"Calpurnia, the old dear. No man could have asked for a better wife in wartime. While I was away from the city, Calpurnia did everything necessary to see that my home was well run. She watched the other women of Rome with a careful eye; she made sure that any conspiracies against me came to nothing. There is the world of the bloody battlefield, and there is the world of the hearth and the loom, and any war-especially a civil war-must be waged in both arenas. Calpurnia was my commander for the home front, and she conducted herself brilliantly.

"But now that the peace has been won…" He shook his head. "She's become a different woman. She fills her head with superstitious nonsense. She pesters me with dreams and portents. I wonder if it's not the influence of that crazy uncle of hers. Gnaeus Calpurnius is always in the house these days. The old fellow's a priest, and takes himself very seriously-so proud of his descent from King Numa!"

I nodded, and considered the irony that the master of the world should be so unaware of events in his own household. From what I had observed, Uncle Gnaeus disapproved of his niece's obsession with the "superstitious nonsense" fostered by the haruspex Porsenna, of whom Caesar appeared to know nothing.

He laughed softly. "But why am I telling you all this? It must be that gift you possess."

"Gift?"

"Your special gift-the power to compel the truth from others. Cicero warned me about it a long time ago. Catilina said the same thing-do you remember him?-and Meto confirmed it. The gift of Gordianus-that must be what's loosened my tongue. Or perhaps… perhaps I'm just tired."

The moon had risen above the roofline. Its blue light gleamed on Caesar's bald pate. He turned his face upward into the moonbeam, and I saw that his eyes were closed. He fell silent and breathed so deeply that I thought he might have fallen asleep, until he sighed and spoke again.

"Ah, but I've strayed from the point of my visit. I wanted to give you this."

He produced a thin, square token carved from bone. I took it from him. Squinting under the moonlight, I saw there was a letter and a number painted on it.

"What's this, Dictator? What does 'F XII' refer to?"

"It's the section reserved for you and your family in the viewing stands. I'm told the seats are quite good. They're rather high up, but that's what you want for a spectacle, isn't it? A bit of distance? You wouldn't want to be too close; you're not the sort to make a rush at the captives as they pass or to bait the exotic animals. Just show that token to the usher, and he'll lead you and your family to your seats. They're reserved for tomorrow's triumph, and for the next two triumphs as well."

"This is for Meto's sake?"

"Because Meto cannot be here, yes, I'll honor Meto's father and family in his stead. But you deserve a seat on your own merits, Gordianus, at least for tomorrow's Egyptian Triumph. You were there in Alexandria, after all. You witnessed history in the making. Now you can witness the celebration."

I began to object, but Caesar silenced me with a gesture. "No, don't thank me! You've earned this favor, Gordianus. It's the least I can do." He stood and straightened his toga. "I meant to ask: did you manage to find good seats for the Gallic Triumph on your own?"

"As a matter of fact, yes. There's a little ledge at Lucullus's Temple of Fortuna that affords a good view of the route."

"Ah, yes." He nodded, then his face grew long. "If you were at the Temple of Fortuna, then you must have seen the… unexpected interruption."

"When the axle of the chariot broke? Yes. But I thought you handled it very well. The episode provided a bit of relief from all that grandiose formality. Your soldiers must love you very much indeed to think they can tease you so mercilessly."

"Yes," he said, his tone a bit cool. "A funny thing, that-the axle breaking. When we examined it later, it appeared almost as if someone had tampered with it."

"Tampered?"

"Caused it to break intentionally. It looked to me as if the wood had been partially sawed through. But it was impossible to be sure, the way the wood had splintered."

"Sabotage? But who would have done such a thing?"

He shook his head. "It was probably a simple accident, after all. And now I really must be going. Calpurnia becomes especially worried if I'm not home after dark."

I accompanied him through the house and into the vestibule, where the family still gathered, suspending their normal activities as long as the dictator was among us. Diana nudged Davus, who nudged Mopsus, who gave his little brother a kick. Androcles rushed to open the door, and Caesar, his thoughts now elsewhere, departed without another word.

The family gathered around me. While they peppered me with questions, I peered at the token in the palm of my hand. I would have preferred to stay at home the next day, avoiding the Egyptian Triumph altogether, but now that Caesar himself had gone to the effort to present this gift to me, I could hardly be absent. On the morrow, I would have an excellent view of the princess Arsinoe and her minister Ganymedes as they took their final walk on this earth.

XIII

Bethesda was quite pleased when I showed her the token Caesar had given me and explained what it was good for. Such signs of favor from a social superior always seemed to matter to her far more than they did to me, perhaps because of her origins. She had been born a foreigner and a slave; now she was a Roman matron and proud of it, despite clinging to certain foreign ways.

My own attitude toward the elite and the favors they could bestow was more problematical. Though born a Roman, I had realized from an early age that I would never become one of the so-called nobilitas, "those who are known" for having won public office; I never expected even to be allowed into the homes of such people. Now, after a lifetime of serving them, I was still not the sort of person they cared to invite to dinner. Rome's noble families are few in number and they closely guard their privileges, though outsiders of exceptional ability and ambition can occasionally join their ranks; Cicero was the prime example of such a New Man, the first of the Tullius family to be elected to office and set upon the Course of Honor in the quest to become consul for a year.

Many of those nobles, who had thought me barely worthy to serve them and certainly unworthy of their friendship, were dead now, while I, a humble citizen of no distinction, was still alive. For those aristocrats who had survived, what did the Course of Honor or nobility itself mean now, with one man installed in a permanent position at the apex of power?