She never understood why Caenis did it. Least of all for a steep rent. Paying money to a man for anything was a concept Veronica found ridiculous.

  Veronica herself had decided with the advent of Caligula that sharing the Palace with an emperor was not for her. For one thing, she was disgusted by the imperial bordello he devised. Having finely decorated a suite of rooms at the Palace, he threw them open to all comers, offering loans to the men who visited and shamelessly listing the income as donations to the imperial treasury. With such competition, how was a simple girl expected to make her way?

  Veronica had acted with alacrity. She understood that senators did not want compulsory brothels at the Palace, where Caligula’s idea of adding insult to the Senate—which he now passionately hated—was that they should be forced to bring their wives. A man enjoying offside relaxation wanted a different face than the one at home. Veronica purchased her freedom, skipped the Palace, and began to offer an establishment that was equally expensive without the political disadvantages and the risks. At Veronica’s there were no wives.

  She did not, of course, pay rent. She occupied a prestigious mansion, which she looked after for an octogenarian ex-consul who never visited Rome. The consul paid all the bills, and when he died he left Veronica the house. Meanwhile her success was assured. She let it be known that no one need apply who commanded less than a hundred million sesterces; rather than be thought too poor to attend her salon, clients flocked in.

  Veronica repeatedly asked Caenis to live with her. Caenis always refused. She did, however, go there sometimes in the evening. She liked Veronica’s house for the same reasons as the elderly gentlemen of conservative opinions who treated it like a military dining club: The place was warm, the cooks were excellent, the women were civilized, and the sanitation worked.

  Caenis came to be regarded as a kind of inky-fingered duenna. Her connections were respectable, and when she felt like it (not invariably) she made people laugh. She never slept with men, though for three years Veronica tenaciously shoveled men her way. If necessary, Caenis slid them off elsewhere. It was not always necessary. Many were grateful that she made no demands. Some men who patronize exclusive salons are frightened they cannot live up to expectations (Veronica agreed tartly that most could not). For them, talking to Caenis was polite and safe.

  Caenis herself did not altogether appreciate the arrangement. The men Veronica thought suitable for her all fell into a certain type: recent widowers with far too much to say now about their previously neglected wives, or bachelors so trying that their loneliness was all too understandable. The other thing they had in common, Caenis soon noticed, was that none of them was a man whom Veronica wanted to have to entertain herself. Being a convenience sometimes rankled.

  She put up with the situation. Caenis never lost her sense of humor entirely.

  Sometimes there was political talk. Veronica discouraged this. Treason could lead to trouble, and if things became too heated men lost their tempers and stormed off without wanting a girl, which reduced her income. Caenis, who only went there for something to eat and companionship, rather enjoyed the politics.

  On one occasion she thought Veronica would have a seizure; someone openly raised the question of disposing of the Emperor.

  Caenis noted that there was not the shocked silence that anyone who lived outside Rome would expect. By now Caligula had worn the purple for four years; he had also dressed up in silken robes encrusted with gemstones, theatrical costumes, elaborate military uniforms (usually with the breastplate of Alexander, which he claimed he had stolen from the hero’s tomb), and rather ordinary women’s dresses in colors that did not suit his pasty face. His behavior had been odd, baffling, and exorbitantly expensive. While staying at Antonia’s villa at Bauli, he dreamed up a plan to defy the old prophecy that he could as soon become Emperor as ride dry-shod over the sea at Baiae: He built a three-mile bridge of galleys, turfed it over, and for two days trundled in a chariot to and fro across the Gulf; several people cheering his entourage were knocked into the sea and drowned. He had bankrupted the Treasury with his constant Games and circuses; he brought business to a standstill and even canceled the rites of mourning so no one had an excuse not to attend his shows. His cruelties extended from the execution of his own cousin King Ptolemy of Mauretania (who had offended him at a gladiatorial display by winning the crowd’s applause for an elegant purple cloak), to dispatching common criminals in batches, without even a glance at the charge sheet, in order to feed their carcasses to his panthers and lions. He blighted trade with fierce taxation. He chained up the granaries when the populace was starving. No one forgot how he had worried his grandmother to death.

  People were now looking back fondly to the golden age of Augustus, a man who in retrospect had genuinely seemed to want to do right. People remembered that even under Tiberius the city and the provinces were efficiently run. After four years there was a slow groundswell of understanding in Rome that Caligula must be removed. He was still not yet thirty. People felt tired just thinking how long they might have to endure him if nothing was done. Needless to say, most people hoped somebody else would volunteer to risk doing it.

  There had been one plot, apparently brewed by his sister Agrippina. Drusilla, to whom he was most deeply attached, had died suddenly; her death caused a florid outburst of grief in the Emperor, who proclaimed Drusilla a goddess, established a cult for her, ordered public mourning on a scale that was disaster for small traders, and then fled to the country to soak himself in misery (mitigated by occasional gambling bouts).

  Afterward the position of the surviving sisters, Agrippina and Livilla, had declined. While accompanying their brother on a visit to Germany they found themselves accused—probably rightly—of plotting with Lepidus, Drusilla’s widower. He was executed and they were exiled, but first Agrippina was compelled to bring the cremated remains of Lepidus, who was allegedly her lover, back to Rome in a casket—a grim parody of her mother returning from Syria with the relics of the dead hero Germanicus. The Senate had had to frame its reaction cautiously, and since the plot had been put down, there was only one tactful course: One of the praetors issued congratulations to the Emperor on his expedition, then denounced Lepidus and suggested that his ashes should be denied the family mausoleum and cast out unburied.

  The praetor concerned was Flavius Vespasianus.

  * * *

  When plotting came up in conversation it was Caenis herself who said quietly, “There will always be the convention that the Senate creates the Emperor—then cannot be seen doing away with him.”

  There were senators in the room. Mostly they followed the pattern of slow, somber, self-opinionated men in late middle age. Now, after feeding on swan cunningly presented as porpoise, turbot in aspic, and suckling pig served with two wine sauces reduced to a delicate glaze, they were lying on their couches holding back belches while pontificating bitterly on the world’s decline. They thought this was daring enough.

  Caenis felt disinclined to let them get away with it. “It will be,” she suggested, “some disgusted individual who dares to plunge in the knife.” Veronica closed her eyes, gleaming silver with mercury. Caenis refused to take the hint. “Then the Senate, to excuse its own cowardice, will execute that individual for his courage.”

  She fell silent, having noticed with more interest than usual that her leg was touching the leg of the man to her left. It had been an accident, but she ignored what had happened, and so did he. He was Lucius Anicius, a knight who had made a fortune in charioteers; not her type at all. He spent a lot of time with the Praetorian Guards and was, Caenis realized afterward, probably the one person present who was fully aware of the burning hatred felt for Caligula by their current commander, Cassius Chaerea. Caligula was always giving obscene watchwords to Chaerea, a decent, proper man who had to pass them on straightfaced to the rest of the Guard.

  Anicius said, seeming to take her part, “The question seems to be, not whether a plot will succeed—but which one it will be.” Agreeing, people laughed and listed some of them: Aemilius Regulus, an unknown from Spain; a senator called Vinicianus who had been friendly with the dead Lepidus; Chaerea, the much-humiliated commander of the Praetorian Guard; members of the Emperor’s own household, particularly his freedman Callistus. . . . Those were the acknowledged plotters. Any moment someone here would be revealing the secret ones.

  Caenis saw Veronica signal to her waitresses to bring in towering platters of fruit. In a crisis she always ordered the dessert. Peeling it kept troublemakers quiet.

  “Personally,” mused Veronica, to lighten the atmosphere, “I think Incitatus is the only one who comes out of this reign at all well.”

  Incitatus was Caligula’s racehorse. He lived in his own house with a marble stable, purple horse blankets, jeweled saddlery, and troops of slaves to attend to his every need. There was a rumor that Caligula intended to award Incitatus a consulship.

  Caenis, who held there was no reason to believe Incitatus would do any worse than some of the legitimate candidates for consul, now relented and helped Veronica out. “Io! Incitatus is modest, hospitable, kind to his slaves—and rises above the glamour to run his heart out on the track. Have a pomegranate and don’t worry!” As she called cheerfully across the table, she finally shifted her leg. Lucius Anicius plundered the cornucopia, nodding for some wine. The wine at Veronica’s was tolerable, and her stewards had a knack of warming it pleasantly with herbs, but for good professional reasons she discouraged too much drink. While he waited for the rather slow service, Anicius helped Caenis to a handful of grapes.

  People were now talking about the Emperor’s military deeds in Germany. This was simple scandal, so Caenis saw Veronica relax. Caligula had rattled about Europe in spectacular battle dress, fleecing the good burghers of Lugdunum in Gaul at compulsory auctions of Palace furniture, throwing his uncle Claudius fully clad into the Rhine, taking hostages from a primary school, then chasing them like fugitives up a road, and finally marching home with a bunch of “German” prisoners of war who turned out to be just tall bemused Gauls with their hair and beards dyed red.

  “I do feel,” Caenis observed in an undertone to Anicius, “that a man who owes his position to the adoration of the army was unwise to take the field unless he could live up to the gallantry the army expects!”

  “Oh yes; he’s a bully—but also a complete coward.” Anicius poured wine for her from the flagon he had captured. He had not bothered to grab the water jug, so they tilted their cups together, and like hardened drinkers took it neat. They drank in silence, cynically observing the rest with hooded eyes.

  By now the older men were lathering themselves into fine indignation over the Emperor’s Ovation, a kind of secondary Triumph that he had been awarded for the British affair. After showing himself in Germany, Caligula had assembled a huge invasion force and fleet, announcing his intention of seizing the island that Julius Caesar had failed to keep. He accepted homage from a British princeling who had been exiled for arguing with his Celtic papa, and then announced Britain’s surrender without even setting foot in the place.

  Returning home, the Emperor abused the Senate roundly for omitting to vote him a full Triumph. It was a vicious circle; his express orders had been that they must not.

  “Antonia Caenis, I’ll tell you an amusing story about Britain,” muttered Anicius. “In a minute.”

  A praetor had smoothed things over by suggesting that special Games be held to celebrate the Emperor’s German campaign. This was all the more creditable to the praetor since as holder of that office he would be expected to help pay for the Games himself. He had no money, Caenis knew; it was Vespasian. He then gratified the Emperor by thanking him before the full Senate for his graciousness, simply because Caligula had invited him to dine at the Palace.

  Caenis heard this praetor’s name being scoffed at without a pang. “Poor lad!” she commented drily. “Dinner is going to test him a bit. He tends to nod off; Olympian Jove won’t like it if he dozes over the ambrosia.”

  Everyone laughed.

  Veronica, who was not a sentimentalist, remarked briskly, “I daresay if his eyes start to droop, his wife will give him a kick!” And without looking again at Caenis, she signaled to her waitresses to start clearing the tables and let in the Spanish dancing girls.

  Caenis hated Spanish dancers. She groaned in disgust. “Oh, Juno! Not the tambourines and castanets!”

  It was a cliché to have girls from Gades to entertain your dinner guests. That never prevented their popularity, sweeping the floor with their handsome hair, while furiously clicking and clattering.

  She knew what would happen next. Veronica was already bestowing her charm on the man at her side; he was faintly pink, thrilled at being singled out, but forgetting the premium he would have to pay. Soon there would be other pairings and disappearings, with or without the dancers whose moral reputation ranked only slightly above Syrian flute girls (who at least could play). Then Caenis would be left here to preside over noncombatants, taking charge in Veronica’s place while tiresome men tirelessly talked.

  For once a surge of resentment swept her. “Lucius Anicius, your funny story would be kind.”

  Assenting suavely, he stabbed his knife into a peach. “They are trying to keep this dark. Apparently the conquest of Britain involved much more than giving houseroom to some British king’s delinquent boy. God-on-earth conquered the Ocean.”

  Caenis gazed at him over the rim of her cup. “I heard God-on-earth built a lighthouse,” she offered.

  “True.” Anicius was leering at the dancing girls. “Very public-spirited in that wild part of the world—No; I think you’ll like this: I’m told he paraded all his soldiers on the beach, and commanded them to gather seashells in their helmets and tunic skirts. He’s brought it all back to the Capitol in chests, and presented it to the Senate as a tribute of the sea.”

  Caenis flashed her teeth against the cup. “Cowries and cuttlefish, winkles and whelks? Imagine the smell! Oh yes,” she agreed slowly. “Oh, I like that very much.”

  “Good!” responded Anicius, returning his attention lazily to her. He was the sort of man who spent a great deal of time wrestling and playing handball at the baths; he was built like a barrack wall. “This must be the first time I’ve seduced a woman by talking politics.”

  Caenis, who had enjoyed dressing for this evening more than she had done for a long time, tidied the folds of her gown with a well-manicured fingernail; for a moment she dipped her ochered eyes—then raised them and held his look. “Is that what you are doing?”

  “Am I not?”

  “Oh yes, I think so,” she murmured, though he was not her type at all. “Lord, why me?” she asked.

  She had wondered if he had instructions from Veronica, though if so his next reply was far too blunt. He laughed. “Lady, why not?”

  She laid her hand formally upon his iron fist as he helped her rise and led her from the room.

  * * *

  She had chosen well. She knew a disaster would end her confidence for good, but there was no danger of that. Anicius used his women with a vigor that bordered on force; Caenis, in wild mood, took and was taken with a spirit that matched his. It was over very quickly; she was glad of that.

  She conducted herself irreproachably. She avoided disgrace; she was free. No stranger would realize how detached she wanted to remain. Only when she thought herself awake alone afterward did she creep against a wall and give way to the relief of deep, convulsing, almost silent sobs.

  After she was still Lucius Anicius moved. It hardly mattered. She had no desire to see the man again; nor would he expect to seek her out. “Too much wine?” He was curt, but not rude.

  In a moment Caenis said quietly, “No. Sorry.”

  “Feeling all right?”

  “Wonderful, lord!”

  “What is the lady thinking then?”

  Drained of all feeling, Caenis spoke candidly, with her head against the wall. “That the saddest part of this stupid reign must be a decent man reduced to flattering a political grotesque.” The name of the praetor Vespasianus remained unsaid.

  She heard Anicius move again. Not without instinct, he asked wryly, “Do I take it we have just crossed your Rubicon?” Then, when she did not answer, he proved she had chosen someone more generous than she had thought, he whistled softly. “Why me?”

  Allowing her to fling it back to him—“Why not?”

  * * *

  After four mad years the Emperor Gaius, nicknamed Caligula, was to die during the Augustan Games in the Portico of the Danaids on the Palatine. The plot was so open, conspirators called out and wished each other luck as they took their seats. A mime was produced, which involved the death of a king and his daughter, with the use of much stage blood. Retiring for lunch, the Emperor declined to follow his uncle Claudius down the alley lined with imperial slaves, but paused to greet a group of young boys practicing to sing for him later, then took a shortcut down one of the covered passages. There Cassius Chaerea, the Guards commander, came to ask for the day’s password, and was given the usual obscene answer. Chaerea drew his sword and stabbed Caligula, after which the group he had organized rushed in to finish off their victim before his special cohort of German bodyguards, shut out from the corridor, could burst in to save him. The conspirators then fled through the nearby House of Livia.

  Chaos broke out. The German bodyguards ran amok and killed three senators. A group of Praetorian Guards invaded the imperial quarters, discovered Caesonia, the Emperor’s wife, murdered her, and dashed out the brains of Drusilla, her infant child. The Senate gathered on the Capitol, which was defensible, having had the forethought to take with them the State and Military Treasuries so they could pay their way out of trouble. The mob milled about in the Forum below, where they were harangued by men from noble families who wanted to claim they had not been involved in the plot.