Lustrum

began to advance the argument of the stoics in defence of augury – that if there are gods, they must care for men, and that if they care for men, they must send us signs of their will – he cut me off with a laugh: 'Surely the gods, given their immortal powers, should be able to find more articulate means of communication than snowflakes. Why not send us a letter?' He turned back to his desk, shaking his head and chuckling at my credulity. 'Really, go and attend to your duties, Tiro, and make sure no one else bothers me.'

Chastened, I went away and checked the arrangements for the inaugural procession, and then made a start on his correspondence. I had been his secretary for sixteen years by this time and there was no aspect of his life, public or private, with which I was not familiar. My habit in those days was to work at a folding table just outside his study, fending off unwanted visitors and keeping an ear open for his summons. It was from this position that I could hear the noises of the household that morning: Terentia marching in and out of the dining room, snapping at the maids that the winter flowers were not good enough for her husband's new status, and berating the cook about the quality of that night's menu; little Marcus, now well into his second year, toddling unsteadily after her, and shouting in delight at the snow; and darling Tullia, thirteen and due to be married in the autumn, practising her Greek hexameters with her tutor.

Such was the extent of my work, it was not until after noon that I was able to put my head out of doors again. Despite the hour, the street for once was empty. The city felt muffled, ominous; as still as midnight. The sky was pale, the snowfall had stopped, and frost had formed a glittering white crust over the surface. Even now – for such are the peculiarities of memory in the very old – I can recall the sensation of breaking it with the tip of my shoe. I took a last breath of that freezing air and was just turning to go back in to the warmth when I heard, very faint in the hush, the crack of a whip and the sound of men crying and groaning. A few moments later a litter borne by four liveried slaves came swaying around the corner. An overseer trotting alongside waved his whip in my direction.

'Hey, you!' he shouted. 'Is that Cicero's house?'

When I replied that it was, he called over his shoulder – 'This is the street!' – and lashed out at the slave nearest him with such force the poor fellow nearly stumbled. To get through the snow he had to pull his knees up high to his waist, and in this way he floundered on towards me. Behind him a second litter appeared, then a third, and a fourth. They drew up outside the house, and the instant they had set down their burdens the porters all sank down in the snow, collapsing over the shafts like exhausted rowers at their oars. I did not care for the look of this at all.

'It may be Cicero's house,' I protested, 'but he is not receiving visitors.'

'He will receive us!' came a familiar voice from inside the first litter, and a bony hand clawed back the curtain to reveal the leader of the patrician faction in the senate, Q. Lutatius Catulus. He was wrapped in animal skins right up to his pointed chin, giving him the appearance of a large and malevolent weasel.

'Senator,' I said, bowing, 'I shall tell him you're here.'

'And not just I,' said Catulus.

I looked along the street. Clambering stiffly out of the next litter, and cursing his old soldier's bones, was the conqueror of Olympus and father of the senate, Vatia Isauricus, while nearby stood Cicero's great rival in the law courts, the patricians' favourite advocate, Q. Hortensius. He in turn was holding out his hand to a fourth senator, whose shrivelled, nut-brown, toothless face I could not place. He looked very decrepit. I guessed he must have stopped attending debates a long while ago.

'Distinguished gentlemen,' I said, in my most unctuous manner, 'please follow me and I shall inform the consul-elect.'

I whispered to the porter to show them into the tablinum and hurried towards Cicero's study. As I drew close, I could hear his voice in full declamatory flow – 'To the Roman people I say, enough!' – and when I opened the door I found him standing with his back to me, addressing my two junior secretaries, Sositheus and Laurea, his hand outstretched, his thumb and middle finger formed into a circle. 'And to you, Tiro,' he continued, without turning round, 'I say: not another damned interruption! What sign have the gods sent us now? A shower of frogs?'

The secretaries sniggered. On the brink of achieving his life's ambition, he had put the perturbations of the previous day out of his mind and was in a great good humour.

'There's a delegation from the senate to see you.'

'Now that's what I call an ominous portent. Who's in it?'

'Catulus, Isauricus, Hortensius, and another I don't recognise.'

'The cream of the aristocracy? Here?' He gave me a sharp look over his shoulder. 'And in this weather? It must be the smallest house they've ever set foot in! What do they want?'

'I don't know.'

'Well, be sure you make a thorough note.' He gathered his toga around him and stuck out his chin. 'How do I look?'

'Consular,' I assured him.

He stepped over the discarded drafts of his speech and made his way into the tablinum. The porter had fetched chairs for our visitors but only one was seated – the trembling old senator I did not recognise. The others stood together, each with his own attendant close at hand, clearly uncomfortable at finding themselves on the premises of this low-born 'new man' they had so reluctantly backed for consul. Hortensius actually had a handkerchief pressed to his nose, as if Cicero's lack of breeding might be catching.

'Catulus,' said Cicero affably, as he came into the room. 'Isauricus. Hortensius. I'm honoured.' He nodded to each of the former consuls, but when he reached the fourth senator I could see even his prodigious memory temporarily fail him. 'Rabirius,' he concluded after a brief struggle. 'Gaius Rabirius, isn't it?' He held out his hand but the old man did not react and Cicero smoothly turned the gesture into a sweeping indication of the room. 'Welcome to my home. This is a pleasure.'

'There's no pleasure in it,' said Catulus.

'It's an outrage,' said Hortensius.

'It's war,' asserted Isauricus, 'that's what it is.'

'Well, I'm very sorry to hear it,' replied Cicero pleasantly. He did not always take them seriously. Like many rich old men they tended to regard the slightest personal inconvenience as proof of the end of the world.

Hortensius clicked his fingers, and his attendant handed Cicero a legal document with a heavy seal. 'Yesterday the Board of Tribunes served this writ on Rabirius.'

At the mention of his name, Rabirius looked up. 'Can I go home?' he asked plaintively.

'Later,' said Hortensius in a stern voice, and the old man bowed his head.

'A writ on Rabirius?' repeated Cicero, looking at him with bemusement. 'And what conceivable crime is he capable of?' He read the writ aloud so I could make a note of it. '“The accused is herein charged with the murder of the tribune L. Saturninus and the violation of the sacred precincts of the senate house.”' He looked up in puzzlement. 'Saturninus? It must be – what? – forty years since he was killed.'

'Thirty-six,' corrected Catulus.

'And Catulus should know,' said Isauricus, 'because he was there. As was I.'

Catulus spat out his name as if it were poison. 'Saturninus! What a rogue! Killing him wasn't a crime – it was a public service.' He gazed into the distance as if surveying some grand historical mural on the wall of a temple: The Murder of Saturninus in the Senate House. 'I see him as plainly as I see you, Cicero. A rabble-rousing tribune of the very worst kind. He murdered our candidate for consul and the senate declared him a public enemy. After that, even the plebs deserted him. But before we could lay our hands on him, he and some of his gang barricaded themselves up on the Capitol. So we blocked the water pipes! That was your idea, Vatia.'

'It was.' The old general's eyes gleamed at the memory. 'I knew how to conduct a siege, even then.'

'Of course they surrendered after a couple of days, and were lodged in the senate house till their trial. But we didn't trust them not to escape again, so we got up on the roof and tore off the tiles and pelted them. There was no hiding place. They ran to and fro squealing like rats in a ditch. By the time Saturninus stopped twitching, you could barely tell who he was.'

'And Rabirius was with you both on the roof?' asked Cicero. Glancing up from my notes at the old man – his expression vacant, his head trembling slightly – it was impossible to imagine him involved in such an action.

'Oh yes, he was there,' confirmed Isauricus. 'There must have been about thirty of us. Those were the days,' he added, bunching his fingers into a gnarled fist, 'when we still had some juice in us!'