"I don't think it would be wise to put incriminating information about my wife in a letter."
"You can always burn it afterward. Don't you often do that, anyway?"
I sometimes think my sons know me too well. I asked Eco to show me where he kept his writing tools.
I sat in his little study and stared at the blank parchment for a long time, then finally wrote:
To my beloved son Meto, serving under the command of Gaius Julius Caesar in Gaul, from his loving father in Rome, may Fortune be with you.
I write this letter on the Nones of Aprilis, the second day of the Great Mother festival…
I put down the stylus and stared again at the parchment. There was a sound from the doorway. I looked up and saw Meto looking back at me. The gods delight in catching us off our guard. The threads of our lives weave back and forth across one another, intersecting in a pattern no mortal can discern: my thoughts had turned to Meto and now he stood before me in the flesh, as if my desire had conjured him up.
"By Hercules!" I whispered. "What are you doing here?"
His older brother suddenly appeared behind him. They both burst out laughing.
"You knew, Eco!" I said. "He was already here when you suggested I write the letter!"
"Of course! I couldn't resist the joke. Meto arrived right after you left for Clodia's house. When we heard you coming back, I made him go and hide. You should see the look on your face!"
"Playing tricks on your father is despicable."
"Yes, but at least you're smiling," said Eco.
I pushed the parchment away from me. "A good thing you're here, Meto. Writing it all down would have been impossible!"
He smiled and sat down beside me. "I'm lucky to be here in one piece."
I put my hand over his and drew in a breath. I was always worried for him, knowing the dangers he faced in Gaul. But that wasn't what he meant.
"The riot, over near the Forum," he explained.
"Surely it's still going on. Didn't you see it on your way back from the Palatine?" "I took a roundabout route… "
"There's a play being put on for the festival," Eco interjected. "Apparently some of Clodius's hooligans commandeered the stage and set off a riot. Instant revenge for the nasty things that were said about him at the trial yesterday."
"Put a man like Clodius in charge of a festival and he'll use it for his own petty ends," said Meto in disgust. "Politicians are all the same. But what's this business about a trial?"
I tried to explain as succinctly as I could, but after a moment Meto held up his hand. "It's all too complicated. Give me military strategy any day!"
I laughed. "But what are you doing in Rome? Is Caesar here?"
"He's up in Ravenna, actually, but you never heard me say that. Having a secret meeting with Crassus. Then he's going to Luca to meet with Pompey. Caesar wants to appoint more generals and raise four legions; he'll need the help of those two to get the Senate to approve the expenditures and to quash complaints that he's becoming too powerful. If you ask me, the three of them are going to resurrect the Triumvirate, and make it work this time. It's inevitable. Sooner or later, the Senate will become entirely defunct. The Senate can't rule itself, much less an empire! It's nothing more than a hindrance now, another obstacle in Caesar's way. A rotten limb that needs to be pruned. All this judicial haggling, politicians constantly dragging each other into court-this nonsense has to stop sooner or later. From what you've said, this trial of Caelius is just one more example of how far the standard has fallen." "But what's the alternative?" said Eco.
Meto looked at his brother blandly. "Caesar, of course."
"You're talking about a dictator, like Sulla," I said, shaking my
head.
"Or worse," said Eco, "an outright king, like Ptolemy."
"I'm talking about a man who can lead. I've seen with my own eyes what Caesar can do. All this petty squabbling in Rome seems quite absurd when you're up in Gaul, watching Romans conquer the world."
"Pompey and Crassus are hardly petty," I said.
"That's why a triumvirate is the answer," said Meto. "Temporarily, anyway. But you never heard me say that."
"What about men like Clodius and Milo?" said Eco. "Or Cicero, for that matter? Or Caelius?"
Meto made an expression to show that such men were beneath contempt. What had his service to Caesar done to my son?
I had only a moment to ponder the question, for the twins suddenly rushed into the room in a burst of laughter and golden hair. Meto might know a thing or two about military strategy, but he was no match for his niece and nephew. Titania advanced from the left, Titus from the right. Each grabbed hold of an arm and climbed onto him.
"When did they get so big? And so strong!" Meto laughed.
"They intend to wrestle you, I think," said Eco, chagrined.
"Or at least immobilize you," I said.
"They've succeeded." Meto grunted. The twins squealed with triumph.
"You'd better give up now, while you can," I suggested. "Gaul-fighting Uncle Meto can take a lot rougher treatment than their delicate old grandpa, and they know it."
"I give up!" gasped Meto. The twins released him at once and then turned to mount a skirmish against me. Their attack turned out to be an assault of harmless hugs and kisses, to which I submitted without a struggle.
"But what's this?" I said.
"What?" said Titania.
"This piece of jewelry pinned on your tunic?"
"A gorgon's eye!" cried Titus. "It gives her magical powers, and I have to get it away from her, even if I have to chop her head off!"
"But where did it come from?" My mouth was suddenly dry. It was an earring of simple design, a silver crook with a green glass bead-the twin of the earring which had been used to force the lock of my strongbox, and which had been carelessly dropped inside when the poison was taken.
"It came from the land of Libya, where the Gorgons live," said Titania. "It can make you invisible. That's what Titus says."
"Yes, but how did you come to have it?" From the tone of my voice she knew I wanted a serious answer.
"She gave it to me," said Titania. "She told me she'd lost the other one and she didn't want it anymore."
"Who gave it to you?"
Titania told me. My heart sped up.
"And will it really make me invisible?" she said.
"No." My voice shook. "I mean, yes. Why not? The other earring made her invisible. To my eyes, anyway. It made me think I saw the truth, when I couldn't begin to see it. Oh, Cybele!"
Eco furrowed his brow. "Papa, what are you talking about?"
"I have to go home now. I think I may have been very, very wrong about something."
Belbo answered the front door. At the sight of me he broke into a grin. "Master! Thank the gods you're here!" "Is something wrong?"
"No, nothing at all… now that you're back." "Has her mood been that terrible?"
Belbo rolled his eyes in answer, then jumped at the voice from behind him.
"Whose mood?" Bethesda's voice was like frost in the springtime.
I nodded to dismiss Belbo, who quickly disappeared. Bethesda and I looked at each other in silence for a long moment. "Where have you been?" she finally said.
"I spent the night at Eco's house."
"And the night before that?"
"I was in bed with a drunken poet, actually."
She snorted. "Did you see the trial yesterday?"
"Yes."
"Quite a spectacle, wasn't it?" "You were there?"
"Of course. Belbo held me a place at the very front. I never saw you, though."