Render Unto Caesar by Gillian Bradshaw

TARIUS RUFUS, CONSUL OF THE ROMANS, VERY MANY GREETINGS.
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    My lord, you do not know me, but you have had dealings with an uncle of mine. He has recently deceased, and I am his heir. He has bequeathed me some business which involves yourself, and since I am eager to resolve all his commitments and set his estate in order, I have come to Rome to see you. I hope that you will grant me an appointment to discuss this business with you at your convenience. I am staying in the house of Titus Fiducius Crispus on the Via Tusculana.
    I pray that the gods grant you health.
    He read the letter over, then gave a nod of satisfaction. He had written in Greek, since his Latin spelling tended to the erratic, but that should present no difficulty. Rufus undoubtedly spoke Greek, and would certainly have a secretary to deal with his Greek correspondence. And the tone was right. Rufus would probably think the “business” involved a legacy of some kind, and grant an early audience. He rolled and sealed this letter as well, then went back to the sleeping cubicle to put on his belt, cloak, and sandals.
    When he came back to the dayroom, Menestor and Phormion had arrived. With them was Crispus’s cupbearer, Hyakinthos.
    â€œStentor says you need pilot,” said the boy in clumsy Greek. “In order that you not lost. I speak Greek.”
    Hermogenes regarded him a moment. The boy was about thirteen, tall and slender, with long black hair and dark eyes. He wore a fine orange tunic, short enough to show more of his thighs than was really respectable. He shifted uneasily under the scrutiny.
    â€œI hope it is no trouble to you,” Hermogenes told him.
    â€œNo,” replied the boy, relaxing a little. “I like to go to the forum.”
    â€œWe do need a guide,” said Menestor approvingly. “Sir, Stentor says that if you want to leave your letter on the table, he’ll have someone collect it later. Titus Fiducius shares a courier service with some other men of business, and he sends letters out every day.”
    Hermogenes nodded and left the letters on the table. He turned to the big trunk, which had been set against the wall next to the lampstand, fished out the key on its chain around his neck, unlocked the chest, and took out the box of documents relating to the debt—the original documents, of which the ones in the basket were copies. He handed it to Menestor; after a moment’s thought he added the papers that proved his own citizenship, and the party set out.
    The center of Rome was, indeed, very much grander than its outskirts. It was also, plainly, grander than it had been a generation before, and in another generation would be grander still: everywhere there was building work. Old brick temples along the Sacra Via were being renovated in marble; new porticoes, new basilicas, and new monuments sprouted like mushrooms. Hyakinthos pointed them out in his rudimentary Greek: “That up, on the Palatine—that the Temple of Apollo,” “That the Parthian Arch. Two year old,” “That the Temple of Caesar the God.”
    The morning streets were crowded, quite different from their shadowed emptiness the previous afternoon. Slaves in plain tunics, carrying baskets of shopping, rubbed elbows with citizen-women in their long fringed stoles. Occasionally there was a male citizen draped in a snowy toga, hurrying about on business. Water sellers and pastry vendors competed to cry their wares; sedan chairs lurched along the road, usually with a togaed gentleman swaying high above the sweating bearers. The occasional covered litter sailed past like a merchant ship among the small craft, carried smoothly upon the shoulders of eight bearers, its occupant invisible behind fine curtains.
    Foreigners were common. Hermogenes spotted a couple of northern barbarians before they’d even reached the Sacra Via—Germans or perhaps Celts, fair-haired men with beards, dressed in breeches.