“Did you know that, periodically, the aediles or censors expel all fortune-tellers from Rome?”
“I was unaware of this. Why?”
“Because they can influence politics here in Rome. It isn’t just bored noblewomen. The common people of Rome are passionately devoted to all sorts of fortune-telling. They are easy prey for any kind of fraud and if one of those persons predicts a particular outcome to an election or prophesies when a great person is going to die, it can affect public matters in unpredictable ways.”
“Yet you have your official augurs and haruspices. You take the omens for every sort of official business.”
“Precisely. Our augurs are public officials, but they, and the haruspices, emphatically do not predict the future. All they can pronounce upon is the will of the gods at that particular moment. The gods, of course, are free to change their minds. That calls for further omen taking. That’s the way we like it, with supernatural matters under competent official control. We don’t like unpredictable factors, like fortune-tellers, even if they are learned stargazers from Alexandria.”
“You are telling me that some of my colleagues may have embroiled themselves, however innocently, in Rome’s political intrigues?”
“I knew that a man of your acumen would understand. I am still puzzled by the role of Demades in all this because he was of the rationalist faction.”
“I wish I could help you there but I am just as puzzled as you. Polasser or Gupta or the Arab (he used the unpronounceable name), certainly. This is their art. But Demades was as unlikely as I to take part in these affairs. We were colleagues, but not confidants.”
“Sosigenes,” I said, “as much as I esteem you and your company, I think that it would be best if you and your friends were to leave Rome. Caesar may seem to have things under control, but that is far from the truth. There are all manner of intrigues and plots under way, and should you get entangled in them you will have little hope, being foreigners. The calendar is done. Why not just take your leave and return to the far more congenial milieu of the Museum?”
He sighed and made a Greek gesture of the hands and shoulders. “Personally, I would be most happy to go, but the choice is not mine. It lies with my queen and Caesar. We are here at their behest, and we will go only with their leave.”
“Why are they keeping you around?” I asked him.
“I do not know. At the moment we are continuing projects begun in Egypt, where the conditions for observing are better than here. We give lectures, or, a few of us, indulge in the activities that you have described.”
It seemed to make little sense, yet the great people of Rome tended to behave in senseless ways sometimes. I knew men who bought tremendously expensive and skilled architects, and then never built anything. Many owned impressively skilled slaves and never made use of them. It was a way of showing off their wealth and importance, that they could waste money in such an extravagant fashion. I supposed that keeping a gaggle of philosophers around doing nothing of importance was the same sort of foolishness.
“Well, you-” at that point we were distracted by a high-pitched shriek from somewhere toward the southern tip of the island. Moments later the high priest came running.
“Senator! There has been another murder! I will stand for no more of this!”
I got to my feet. “Yes, the serenity of your sanctuary has been taking a bit of a beating lately, hasn’t it? Who’s dead? Oh, well, let’s just go look. I like surprises.”
The Tiber Island has many little terraces like the one where Sosigenes and I had been enjoying the view before the rude interruption. On one of these, just below the temple on the City side, not far from the bridge, we found another corpse, seemingly fresh this time and not decently covered. Most of the little crowd staring down at it were astronomers. The Arab was there, and Gupta the Indian, turban off and long hair streaming, and quite a number of Greeks.
“Where’s Polasser?” I asked. “Oh, that’s him there on the ground, isn’t it?” Indeed it was the fake Babylonian, lying peacefully if somewhat grotesquely with his neck broken. “What a pity.”
“You sound saddened, Senator,” said the high priest.
“This eliminates him as a suspect in the murder of Demades, and he was the one I thought the most likely. Oh, well, I should have known better than to think this job would be easy. Who found him?”
“My chamber is just over there,” Gupta said, pointing to a row of doorways a few dozen steps away set into the base of the temple. He babbled nervously, his Greek almost incoherent. “I was meditating, as I always do at this hour. I heard a strangled cry that seemed unnatural and I threw on a robe to come see what it was.” Strangely, he blushed. “I fear I am not decent.” He took a long, yellow band from inside his robe and with incredible swiftness and efficiency would it around his head, completely covering his long hair.
“Men of Gupta’s sect are forbidden to cut their hair,” Sosigenes explained. “When meditating, they remove their turbans, robes, and sandals and wear only white cotton loincloths. They think it indecent to go out in public with their hair uncovered.”
“Well, I know of stranger customs. How did everybody get here so fast?”
“Most of us, great lord,” said the Arab, “have quarters nearby. But in fact Polasser sent a servant to summon us here, saying that he had news of import that concerned us all. Some of us were already on our way.”
“Well, he’s not going to deliver this news. Where is the servant?” They looked around, then at each other. There was much shrugging. “Had anyone seen this servant before?” More shrugs.
“Why was I not sent for?” Sosigenes demanded.
“Maybe he was going to say bad things about you,” I hazarded. “I want a search made for this servant.” I turned to the priest. “Can you take care of that? Get a description from these gentlemen, but round up any servant-looking person on the island who cannot be accounted for.”
“I will do so, Senator,” he said with ill grace, but of course, an hour later no such person had been found.
Before noon I was in front of Caesar in the Domus Publica, his residence in the Forum in his capacity as pontifex maximus. “Things are getting out of hand. At this rate you’ll be completely out of astronomers soon.”
“They do seem to suffer a high mortality rate. Have you any suspects?”
“My best one is dead. I have a few leads I am following.”
“What sort of leads?”
I knew better than to mention Servilia and her coterie of star enthusiasts. There were some matters one did not bring up to Caesar without a pile of corroborating evidence. He was a sensitive man about some things, things touching his personal life being high on the list.
“I hesitate to bring them up without further investigation,” I told him.
“Well, I have little time for suppositions and wild guesses. Come back when you have evidence worthy of a trial. And make sure that it is soon.”
I took my leave of Caesar with great relief. He was an uncomfortable man to be around in those days and it was a bad idea to displease him. I wandered out into the Forum and amused myself for a while looking at the many monuments to the old heroes. There were Romulus and Numa, Severus, Horatius, Cincinattus and Curtius and Marcellus and Regulus. It seemed to me that they had lived in better, simpler times when choices were plain and simple.
This is probably an idle conceit, doubtless their lives seemed as complex and frustrating to them as my own did to me. They must have engaged in plots and intrigues as devious as any practiced in the time of Caesar. I had known nothing all my life but the greed and grasping of great men who wished to be greater than they already were. No doubt it had been the same in the time of Rome’s old heroes.
Before long Hermes found me with news.
“Cleopatra’s back in Rome. She moved back into her house last night.”