"No," he said, and there was no mistakingthe sadness in his voice. "I'm letting my brother continue playingthe part. Besides," he finished bitterly, "he already haseverything I want."
I knew he was referring to his brother'swife, who was initially betrothed to my friend, but when hefollowed his oldest brother, enlisting in the so-called army ofCatiline, he threw all of that away. His oldest brother was killed,and Sextus went on the run, moving from one place to another, untilhe decided to enlist in the 10th Legion, along with meand Vibius. Despite reconnecting with his father years later, whoforgave him his transgression and asked him to come home,Scribonius had chosen to stay in the army. While I know that ourfriendship played a role in it, I was sure the real reason that henever returned was because he had learned that his love had marriedhis brother. Regardless, it was still touching to realize that hewas unwilling to put me in any more jeopardy by claiming what byrights was his. Diocles and I followed Scribonius to the rear ofthe villa, where the stables were located, and entered through theback entrance. Immediately, I could sense the presence of death.Certainly a great deal of my perception was due to the manner inwhich the slaves were acting, and while I found it interesting, Iwas not surprised that they appeared to be genuinely sorrowful. Ifthe father was anything like the son, I thought, then it is easy tosee why they are so sad. However, I have long since learned thatdeath has a certain smell, one that a person actually exudes themoment they expire, or perhaps even in their last moments, as theinevitable happens. It is a smell of decay; subtle, at least inthose early moments, but still overpowering, and even from where weentered and passing through the kitchens, I was sure I detected it.At first, I thought it was my imagination, but out of the corner ofmy eye, I noticed Diocles wrinkling his nose. Scribonius, notsurprisingly, either did not notice or chose to ignore it, as heled us to a room that, he informed us, was once his bedroom. Hishouse was not nearly the size of that of Octavian, but it was stilla good size, and it took us several twists and turns to get there.Showing us into the room, he pointed to a small desk with a chair,and a small couch sitting next to it against the wall.
"Make yourselves comfortable," he told us."I don't know how long it will be before the Claudii show up. And,"he gave us a tight grin, "I don't know how I'm going to get theyounger away and in here. But I'll think of something."
Just before he turned to go, I called tohim.
"Can you send some wine?" I asked. "I thinkI'm going to need it."
While we waited, it gave me time to thinkthrough all that I had learned from Scribonius. As usual, hisknowledge of the incredibly entwined and complex composition of theRoman upper classes provided a deeper explanation of what was goingon. When I first met the young Tribune Claudius, I had heard fromsome source I no longer remember that he was of a minor branch ofthat family. That, as far as it went, was true. However, the pieceof information that I either was not given or did not hear wasthat, while not as famous, in the current world of Roman politicsClaudius' father had something even more important; the favor ofOctavian. As it turned out, Claudius' father was the natural nephewand adopted son of Appius Claudius Pulcher, and while born as GaiusClaudius Pulcher, he understandably took the name of the man whowas famous for being a Consul and the prosecutor of Milo after hemurdered Clodius. In the immediate aftermath of Caesar'sassassination, this Appius Claudius Pulcher had been sympathetic tothe cause of The Liberators. Then, sniffing the changing winds, hehad changed his allegiance to that of Marcus Antonius, but had beenone of the first patricians to defect to the side of Octavian, onceit became clear that the two men were headed for a showdown.Octavian had clearly believed that his support was genuine; sevenyears before the final fall of the last Triumvir at Actium, AppiusClaudius Pulcher the younger had been Consul. What this told me wasthat the Tribune's father was clearly a very skilled navigator ofthe treacherous waters of Roman politics, and, apparently, he hadhuge ambitions for his son. Whatever dreams he held for the youngClaudius, he obviously felt that I represented a threat to them,but honestly, I was still having trouble understanding why. Surely,I reasoned, there were more scandalous matters than a Tribuneparticipating in the skimming of money from a Legion. The fact thatI did not think
