So I went alone. And I was alone, therefore, when the subdued slaves at my father’s house told me the next piece of bad news. On the same day that I lost my son, I lost my father too.

II

As I turned off the informal roadway into Pa’s rough carriage drive, nothing appeared amiss. No smoke came from the new bath house. There was no one in sight; the gardeners had clearly decided that late afternoon was their time to down tools. The gardens, designed by Helena when we lived here, were looking in good fettle. Since Pa was an auctioneer, the statuary was exquisite. I thought Pa must be down in Rome, at his warehouse or his office in the Saepta Julia; otherwise on a warm summer evening I would expect to hear a low buzz and chinking wine paraphernalia as he entertained associates or neighbours, sprawling on the benches that permanently stood out beneath the old pine trees.

I had come in a closed litter. The dead baby lay in a basket on the opposite seat. I left it there temporarily. The bearers dropped me by the short flight of steps in the porch. I banged my fist on the big double doors to announce my presence and went straight indoors.

A peculiar scene met me. All the household slaves and freedmen stood assembled in the atrium as if they had been waiting for me.

I was startled. I was even more startled by the size of the sombre crowd filling the hallway. Tray-toters, pillow-plumpers, earwax-extractors, dust-dampers. I had never realised how many staff Pa kept. My father was missing from the scene. My heart started pounding unevenly.

I was wearing a black tunic instead of my usual hues. Still lost in the horror of the baby’s death, I must have looked grim. The slaves seemed prepared for it, and oddly relieved to see me. ‘Marcus Didius — you heard!’

‘I heard nothing.’

Throats were cleared. ‘Our dear master passed away.’

I was taken aback by that crazy phrase ‘dear master’. Most people knew Pa as ‘that bastard, Favonius’ or even ‘Geminus — may he rot in Hades with a bald crow perpetually eating his liver’. The bird would be pecking sooner than expected, apparently.