"Trouble!" said Eco. I nodded, then realized the hushed remark was a signal to his bodyguards. They tightened their ranks around us. We pressed on at a faster pace.

"So where -" gasped the man at the window, barely able to speak for his laughter, "where is everybody headed in such a hot rush? To a celebration?"

The group in the street erupted in angry shouts. Some raised their fists. Others stooped over, searching for rocks. Even on the Palatine Hill, with its immaculate streets and elegant houses, there are loose stones to be found. The man at the window kept laughing, then suddenly yelped. "My head! Oh, my head! You filthy bastards!" He slammed his shutters on a hail of rocks.

We hurried on and turned a corner. "Do you think it's true, Eco?"

"About Clodius being dead? We'll know soon enough. Isn't that his house, straight ahead? Look at all the torches gathered in the street! That's what brought me out tonight – we could see the glow reflected off the clouds. Menenia called me up on the rooftop to see. She thought the whole Palatine Hill must be on fire."

"So you thought you'd come see if your Papa was singed?"

Eco smiled, then his face turned grim. "On the way, down in the Subura, I saw people everywhere in the streets. Gathered at corners, listening to speakers. Huddled in doorways, talking in low voices. Some ranting, some weeping. Hundreds of men heading for the Palatine, like a river rushing uphill. And all saying the same thing: Clodius is dead."

The house of Publius Clodius – his new house, for he had purchased the place and moved in only a few months before – was one of the city's architectural marvels, or monsters, depending on one's point of view. The houses of the rich on the Palatine Hill grow larger and more ostentatious every year, like great preening animals devouring the little houses around them and displaying ever more sumptuous coats.