The performers were obviously meant to be Caesar and Cleopatra, and their buffoonish interaction grew progressively more suggestive. After a few obscene puns, including a comparison of Caesar's intimate anatomy to that of a Nile river-horse (the creature Herodotus called a hippos potamios), Cleopatra extended her arms, planted her feet well apart, and broke into a ribald dance. Every part of her body jiggled wildly, while her towering headdress remained rigidly upright and perfectly motionless; I suddenly realized it looked more like a phallus than an atef crown.

I found the dance both arousing and hilarious, all the more so because I had dealt with the real queen in Alexandria, who was nothing like her imitator. A more self-possessed young woman than Cleopatra I had never met; believing herself to be the living incarnation of the goddess Isis, she tended to take herself quite seriously, and the idea that she would ever perform such a lurid dance was as delightful as it was ludicrous. An alms collector for the troupe saw me laughing and quickly hurried over, extending a cup. I contributed a small coin.

I moved on, looking for the street where Calpurnia had told me I would find Hieronymus's apartment.

Years ago, when I lived in a ramshackle house on the Esquiline Hill above the Subura, I had walked through this neighborhood almost every day. I had known its meandering alleys like the veins on the back of my hand. Nowadays I visited the Subura less often, and much had changed over the years. The tall, crowded tenements, some of them soaring to six stories, were so cheaply constructed that they frequently collapsed and almost as frequently burned down. New buildings were quickly thrown up to take their place. Entire streets had become unrecognizable to me, and for a while I became lost.