Steven Saylor - A Mist of Prophecies

And yet, she had come to see Cassandra burn.

I sat on my folding chair in the shade and leaned back against a pillar. I narrowed my eyes and watched a hummingbird flit from flower to flower. I shut my eyes and listened to the buzzing of his wings as he circled the garden and flew over my head. I must have dozed, for the next thing I knew, Androcles had hold of my arm and was shaking me awake.

"Master, there's a man at the door asking for you, and a great litter out in the street, and bodyguards, lots and lots of bodyguards, and-"

"What? What are you talking about?"

"A visitor for you, Master."

I blinked, cleared my throat, and brushed my fingers through my hair. "Very well, send him in."

"No, he says that you must come to the door."

I felt a sudden chill. A great litter, an army of bodyguards, a high-handed summons to come to my own front door-who could it be? Only one person would be so presumptuous, I thought: the man who would own this house himself soon enough, once all my debts came due and I was found to be penniless. Why had Volumnius come to harass me now on this particular day?

"Where's Davus?" I asked.

"With Diana, in their room," said Androcles.

"Napping?"

"I don't think so. The door's shut, but I'm pretty sure they're not asleep."

"How can you tell?"

"All that noise they make! I'm surprised you can't hear them out here. He grunts and squeals like a boar with a spear in his side, and then she-"

"Enough, Mopsus! Never mind fetching Davus. Surely even Volumnius won't dare to have a Roman citizen beaten on his own doorstep," I declared; but as I rose, unbending my stiff knees, I had my doubts.

I made my way across the garden and through the atrium, with Androcles scurrying after me. The man in the foyer didn't have the look of a debt collector; he was too old and too small. He had the self-assured, sophisticated air one associates with slaves who act as personal secretaries to citizens of wealth and taste. With relief, I knew that it was not Volumnius who had come calling on me. Who, then? Something in the slave's manner suggested that he waited upon a mistress, not a master. A woman in a sumptuous litter, attended by many bodyguards…

In my experience, the gods in their whimsy so fashion the world that sometimes the thing that seems most unlikely is precisely the thing that occurs. I knew at once, and with absolute certainty, whom the slave represented.

"Will your mistress do me the honor of stepping inside?" I said.

The slave raised an eyebrow. "Alas, much as it would please her to grace your household with her presence, her schedule today will not permit it. But she very much wants to speak to you. If you'll follow me, there's a litter waiting. We think it best if you come alone."

"Of course. Androcles, when Davus and Diana… reappear… let them know that I've left in the company of Caesar's wife. And I shall be returning…?" I looked at the slave.

"You should be gone for no more than an hour or so," he assured me. "That's all the mistress can spare. May I?" He extended his open hands, almost touching me, and I realized he intended to search my person. I nodded and allowed him to run his hands over my tunic. Satisfied that I carried no weapons, he stepped back and allowed me to walk out the door ahead of him.

Two identical litters were waiting in the street, each fitted with a resplendent canopy made of ivory poles and white draperies that shimmered with golden threads, hemmed with a purple stripe. The drapes of the first litter were closed, concealing its occupant. I was ushered into the litter behind it. The slave joined me, closed the drapes, and settled back into the pile of cushions opposite me.

With a steady gracefulness that did credit to the bearers, the litter rose and began to move forward.

"Where are we going?" I said.

The slave smiled. "We'll be there very shortly."

I felt the motion of the litter each time we took a sharp turn, but we never seemed to go downhill. That meant we were still somewhere on the Palatine Hill when the litter came to a stop. I heard the sound of a heavy bar being lifted on a hinge and gates swinging open. We moved forward into a graveled courtyard; I could hear the stones crunching under the bearers' feet. The litter stopped. The gates swung shut, and the bar dropped back into place. The slave parted the drapes with his forefinger and peered out, awaiting a signal. At last he pushed back the drape and gestured for me to exit the litter.

As soon as my feet touched the gravel, I was flanked by two bodyguards who escorted me across the narrow courtyard, up a short flight of steps, and into a small but elegantly appointed foyer. The white walls were trimmed with blue and gold. A small bronze statue of Venus occupied a scalloped niche. The floor was decorated with a mosaic of Venus emerging naked from the sea. I was reminded that Caesar claimed Venus as his ancestress. It was Venus his soldiers called upon for victory.

The guards escorted me through an atrium where goldfish darted across the sunken pool. Ahead I caught a glimpse of sunlit greenery, a garden surrounded by a portico, but the guards led me to one side, down a short hallway, and into a small library. The far wall was lined with a tall book case, its pigeonholes filled with scrolls. Paintings depicting a battle covered the walls on either side. Arrayed across the wall to the right was the army of the ancient Greeks led by Alexander the Great, instantly recognizable by his chiseled features and his golden mane of hair. On the opposite wall was the army of the Persian king Darius, whom Alexander had defeated to become master of the world.

Seated before the book case, dominating the room despite the massive, dramatic pictures, was Calpurnia. She was handsome enough, though not a great beauty. She seemed oblivious of the latest fashions, with their Eastern and Egyptian influences; from her clothing, jewelry, and hairstyle, she might have been an austere Roman matron of a century ago. Her countenance was as severe as her costume; she looked like a mistress about to rebuke a wayward slave, and I reflexively braced myself. But before she spoke, she smiled, just enough to put me at ease-or to put me off my guard? — and I saw that she possessed a certain charm not unlike her husband's. Had she possessed it before Caesar met her, or had she learned it from him?

"Sit," she said. I turned my head to see that a chair had been placed behind me. The guards had discreetly withdrawn to a post just outside the door.

She waited until I was seated, then paused for several heartbeats before she spoke again. That, too, was a technique of Caesar's, never to seem rushed. "We've never met, Gordianus, but I know of your reputation and of my husband's high regard for you. You've had a long and interesting career in this city. I had thought that you were retired, but I understand that for the last few days you've been rather busy, crisscrossing Rome with that burly son-in-law of yours."

"You've had someone following us?"

The brusqueness of the question left her unfazed. "Let us say that you have been observed. One by one, you've been visiting each of the women who came to Cassandra's funeral. I was there, too. You must have seen my litter. Yet you haven't yet called on me."

"I intended to do so."

"Why didn't you come to me first?"

I cleared my throat. "Out of deference, I suppose. Great Caesar's wife must be a very busy woman, with little time to answer the queries of a humble citizen like myself. Or so I thought. May I ask where we are?"

"In a house tucked away on a little cul-de-sac on the Palatine Hill. You needn't know the exact location. My husband has owned this place for years, but only a very select few have ever stepped inside it. Even some of his closest advisors are unaware of its existence. It seemed an appropriate place for you and I to meet, since this was where Cassandra resided."