“What happened to the goslings, Marcus?” asked his wife with amusement.

“I found them a good home,” I answered soberly, not mentioning that the home was ours. Helena eyed me trickily.

“And are you expecting more trouble from the man-or is there some other reason for enquiring?”

“There’s a child in his family whom they expect to be chosen as the next Vestal. I gather the Laelii can mystically influence the lottery.” I aimed the last comment at Decimus.

He raised an eyebrow, this time pretending to be shocked at the imputation of fixing. “Well,” he scoffed. “We wouldn’t want any little unscrubbed plebeian to emerge as the winner, when there are maidens with mile-long patrician pedigrees yearning to carry the water from the shrine of Egeria.”

“Famous for their antique chastity?”

“Absolutely notorious for their purity and simplicity!” concluded Helena dryly.

“No, no. It cannot be,” Julia Justa corrected me. “Being a daughter of a flamen counts as an exemption from the lottery.”

“She is the Flamen’s granddaughter, actually.”

“Then the father must have opted out of the priesthood.” Julia Justa laughed briefly. For a moment, she sounded like Helena. “I bet that went down well!” In explanation she went on, “That family are known for regarding the priesthood as their personal prerogative. The late Flaminica was notorious for her snobbery about it. My mother was a keen attendant at the rites of the Good Goddess-remember she took you once, Helena.”

“Yes. I’ve told Marcus it was just a sewing circle with dainty almond cakes.”

“Oh, of course!”

They were teasing Decimus and me. The festival of the Bona Dea was a famously secretive gathering of matrons, nocturnal and forbidden to men. All sorts of suspicions circulated about what went on there. Women took over the house of the senior magistrate-turfing him out-and then enjoyed letting their menfolk sweat over what kind of orgy they had organized.