“No, that would be too obvious. This is unobtrusive beneath a toga. A blind man wouldn’t miss a sword. And find my oldest toga. It won’t look dignified, but I won’t miss it, either.” A toga is nothing but an encumbrance to a fieeing man. If I should need to run, I would have to abandon it, and the formal garment I had worn in public since assuming office was far too expensive to throw away.
I picked up a five-foot, cylindrical case of leather. It contained a half-dozen light javelins. I tossed it to Hermes. “Here. Take this up to the roof and keep an eye on everyone who gets near the gate. If they look like they’re going to try to break it down, skewer one or two of them.”
He slung it over his shoulder by its carrying strap. “As you yourself keep reminding me, I can be crucified for touching arms within the walls.”
“I won’t tell anyone if you won’t. Besides, any slave can pick up arms to defend his master’s house. Out on the street is another matter. Now get up there. Send word if anyone comes by, even if they look friendly.”
I sat at my desk and began to go through the tablets and scrolls from the Tabularium. It was bureaucratic record keeping of the dullest sort, mostly the censors’ copies of contracts let to various publicani, much of it for work that I had never known came under the purview of the office. There were, for instance, contractors who hauled off dead horses and oxen from the City’s streets and squares. There were perfumers who paid handsomely just to sweep up the fiower petals after a festival. The fullers were licensed to empty the public pisspots. I didn’t even like to think what those people did to my togas with that stuff.
I glanced at a small scroll written in a fine hand and was about to set it aside when an unexpected name caught my eye. I was about to examine it more closely when Hermes appeared at the doorway.
“A pack of Milo’s gang are at the gate,” he reported.
For a moment, I felt a pang of betrayal. Surely Milo hadn’t turned against me! “How many and what do they want?”
“Ten of them, but it looks like they’ve just cleared the way for Fausta.”
“Oh. Well, back up to the roof then.” He trotted off, and I set the little scroll aside for later examination.
In the atrium, I saw Milo’s boys taking their ease, dressed in their new, white tunics. They were not bothering to disguise their occupation these days. Each man had his forearms wrapped in studded leather straps, all wore military-style boots, and each wore a skullcap of iron, bronze, or hardened leather. They carried five-foot oak staves in gnarled hands, and some of them wore spiked caesti as well. It looked as if Milo’s men had shifted to wartime status, unless this was some special treatment Fausta had insisted upon. When she traveled the streets of Rome in her oversized sedan chair, it was like a warship cruising toward the enemy. It was get out of the way or be rammed.
I found Julia and Fausta by the pool, looking at the statue. Fausta was squatting unself-consciously, her gown hiked well up her long thighs.
“This is no copy,” she reported. “It’s an original, at least two hundred years old, from Aphrodisias.” That Greek colony in Asia produces the finest sculpture currently made. “You can tell by the detail work. I’ve seen clever Greeks who can provide that polish, and the subtle gilding is something I’ve seen in high-quality copies, but look at this.” Julia squatted to see what she was pointing at. “Look at Pan’s scrotum. Every tiniest wrinkle is carefully carved in. Only a master includes such careful detail where nobody is likely to look.” Trust Fausta to spot something like that.
“And her toenails aren’t marble. They’re alabaster, slotted into place.” She stood. “Unless I miss my guess, this is the original Aphrodite Fastening Her Sandal, by Aristobulus the Second. As I recall, it was commissioned by one of the Seleucid monarchs, Antiochus Epiphanes or one of those.”
“How did it end up here?” I asked. I wasn’t accepting her evaluation all that easily. Fausta loved to show off and pretend that her knowledge of cultural matters was comprehensive. She might have made up the whole thing on the spot.
“Considering what part of the world it resided in, it may have ended up with old Mithridates, and Lucullus came home with most of his property. But for years the East has been our biggest source of Greek art since we conquered Greece itself. Gabinius could have plundered this or Pompey. It couldn’t have been one of my father’s acquisitions; he’d have kept it. But it could have been extorted by one of our governors or given as a bribe to a proconsul. Who knows? It might have been bought as an investment by a traveling businessman.” A simple commercial transaction would be the last thing to occur to a daughter of Sulla.