Roman Blood Read Free Page B

heads. I glanced down into the pond and saw the two of us reflected in a patch of clear water sparkling in the sunlight. I was taller than Tiro, broader in the shoulders and heavier in the middle; my jaw was more prominent, my nose flatter and more hooked, and my eyes, far from being lavender, were a staid Roman brown. All we seemed to have in common were the same unruly black curls; mine were beginning to show strands of gray.
    " Y o u mentioned Quintus Hortensius," Tiro said. " H o w did you know that it was he who recommended you to Cicero?"
    1 laughed softly. "1 didn't know. Not for certain. That was a guess, but a good one. The look of amazement on your face immediately confirmed that I was right. Once I knew for a fact that Hortensius was involved, everything became clear to me.
    "Let me explain. One of Hortensius's men was here, perhaps ten days ago, sounding me out about a case. The one who always comes to me when Hortensius needs my help—just thinking of the creature makes me shudder. Where do men like Hortensius find such abominable specimens?
    Why do they all end up in Rome, cutting one another's throats? But of course you wouldn't know about that side of the legal profession. Not yet.
    " A t any rate, this man from Hortensius comes to my door. Asks me all sorts of unrelated questions, tells me nothing—lots of mystery, lots of posing, the sort of wheedling these types engage in when they want to know if the opposition has already approached you about a case. They 13

    always think the enemy has gotten to you first, that you'll go along and pretend to help them anyway, then stab them in the back at the last moment. I suppose it's what they themselves would do in my place.
    "Finally he goes his way, leaving a smell in the foyer that Bethesda can't eradicate with three days' scrubbing, along with only two clues as to what he was talking about: The name Roscius, and the town of Ameria—did I know the one, had I ever been to the other? Roscius is the name of a famous comedian, of course, one of Sulla's favorites, everybody knows that. But that's not whom he meant. Ameria is a little town up in the Umbrian hill country, fifty miles or so north of Rome.
    Not much reason to go there, unless you want to take up farming. So my answer was no, and no again.
    "A day or two passed. Hortensius's handyman didn't come back. I was intrigued. A few questions here and there—it didn't take much checking to uncover what it was all about: the parricide case upcoming at the Rostra. Sextus Roscius of the town of Ameria stands accused of plotting the murder of his own father here in Rome. Odd—no one seems to know much about the matter, but everyone tells me I'm better off staying clear of it. An ugly crime, they say, certain to be an ugly trial. I kept expecting Hortensius to contact me again, but his creature never reappeared. T w o days ago I heard that Hortensius had withdrawn from the defense."
    I gave Tiro a sidelong glance. He kept his eyes on the ground as we walked, hardly looking at me, yet I could almost feel the intensity of his concentration. He was an excellent listener. Had he been other than a slave, what a fine pupil he would have made, I thought; and perhaps, in another life, in another world, I might have made a fine teacher of young men.
    I shook my head. "Hortensius and his creature and this mysterious trial—I had put it out of my thoughts completely. Then you showed up at my door, telling me I'd been 'recommended.' By whom? Possibly, I thought, by Hortensius, who seems to have thought it wiser to pass along the parricide case to someone else. To a younger advocate, probably, someone less experienced. A beginning lawyer who would be excited at the prospect of a major case, or at least a case with such a harrowing penalty. An advocate who wouldn't know any better—who wouldn't be in a position to know whatever it is that Hortensius knows. Once you confirmed that it was Hortensius who'd recommended me, it was