He jumped up. ‘Marcus, my boy, can’t sit around chatting! Cassius will look after you. He’s around somewhere; he likes to flap and he loves being domestic! We have a grand treat laid on this evening - I do hope you will like it. Dinner is in your honour - and I’ve invited the Librarian.’

III

Once Fulvius had bustled out of earshot, Helena and I both groaned. Still drained by travel, we had been hoping for an early night. The last thing we wanted was to be paraded as Roman trophies in front of some uninterested provincial dignitary.

Don’t get me wrong. I love the provinces. They supply us with luxury commodities, slaves, spices, silks, curious ideas and people to despise. Egypt ships at least a third of Rome’s annual corn supply, plus doctors, marble, papyrus, exotic animals to kill in the arena, fabulous imports from remote parts of Africa, Arabia and India. It also provides a tourist destination that - even allowing for Greece - must be unparalleled. No Roman lives until he has scratched his name indelibly on a timeless Pharaonic column, visited a Canopus brothel and caught one of the hideous diseases that have led Alexandria to produce its world-famous medical practitioners. Some visitors pay up for the extra thrill of camel-riding. We could miss that. We had been to Syria and Libya. We already knew that to stand near a spitting camel is a loathsome experience, and one of the ways all those doctors keep in business.

‘Fulvius is only excited that we are here.’ Helena was the decent, kindly one in our partnership.

I stuck to vitriol. ‘No; he’s a social-climbing snob. He’ll have some reason to ingratiate himself with this big scroll-beetle; he’s using us as an excuse.’

‘Maybe Fulvius and the Librarian are best friends who play board games every Friday, Marcus.’

‘Where does that put Cassius?’

We soon found out where Cassius was: in a hot kitchen in the basement; in the middle of organising menus; and in a tizz. He had a cohort of puzzled staff working for him, or in some cases against him. Cassius had clear ideas how to run a party, and his system was not Egyptian. Since I believed Fulvius might have first met him cavorting with the worshippers of Cybele on the wilder shores of Asia Minor, his businesslike approach to a lie-down banquet surprised me.