'My grandfather,' Tiro answered, with more than a little pride in his voice, 'Marcus Tullius Tiro.' He craned his neck and looked towards the doorway, as if he could see through the red curtain to watch the old man's shuffling progress down the corridor. The embroidered bottom edge of the curtain wavered slightly, lifted by a breeze. Thus I deduced that the hallway to the left led somehow to fresh air and sky, probably to the atrium at the heart of the house, where presumably Master Cicero was taking comfort in the heat of the morning.

'Then your line has been serving the family for at least three generations?' I said.

'Yes, though my father died when I was very small, before I had the chance to know him. As did my mother. Old Tiro is the only family I have.'

'And how long ago did your master free him?' I asked, for it was Cicero's first and family names that the old man now bore in addition to his old slave name: Marcus Tullius Tiro, freed by Marcus Tullius Cicero. Such is the tradition, that an emancipated slave will take the first two names of the man who frees him, giving them precedence to his own.

'Going on five years now. Cicero's grandfather back in Arpinum owned him until that time. Owned me as well, though I've always been with Cicero, since we both were boys. The old master transferred ownership as a gift when Cicero completed his studies and set up his own household here in Rome. That was when Cicero freed him. Cicero's grandfather would never have bothered. He doesn't believe in manumission, no matter how old a slave becomes, no matter how long or how well he serves a master. The Tullius family may have come from Arpinum, but they're Roman to the core. They're a very stern and old-fashioned family.'

'And you?'

'Me?'

'Do you suppose Cicero will one day free you as well?'

Tiro coloured. 'You ask the strangest questions, sir.'

'Only because it's my nature. My profession, as well. You must have asked yourself the same question already, more than once.'

'Doesn't every slave?' There was no bitterness in Tiro's voice, only a pale and unassuming note of sadness, a particular melancholy I had met before. I knew then, in that instant, that young Tiro was one of those slaves, naturally intelligent and brought up amid wealth, who bears the curse of realizing how arbitrary and capricious are the whims of Fortune, which make one man a slave all his life and another a king, when at root there is no discernible difference between them. 'One of these days,' he said quietly, 'when my master is established, when I'm older. Anyway, what's the use of being free unless you want to start a family? It's the only advantage I can see. And that's something I don't think about. Not often, anyway.'

Tiro turned his face away, looking towards the doorway, staring at the spot where his grandfather had stepped through the curtain. He looked back at me and his face rearranged itself. It took me a moment to realize that he was smiling. 'Besides,' he said, 'better to wait until my grandfather dies. Otherwise there'll be two freedmen named Marcus Tullius Tiro, and how would men tell us apart?'

'How do they tell you apart now?'

'Tiro and Old Tiro, naturally.' He smiled a more genuine smile. 'Grandfather won't answer to the name Marcus. He thinks it's bad luck somehow if you call him that. Tempting the gods. Besides, he's too old to get used to a new name, even if he is proud of it.

And it's no use calling him, anyway. These days he'll answer the door and that's about it. He can take a very long time. I think my master likes it that way. Cicero thinks it's good manners to keep guests waiting at the door, and even better manners to keep them pacing here in the anteroom, at least on a first visit, while Old Tiro announces them.'

'Is that what we're doing now? Waiting to be announced?'

Tiro crossed his arms and nodded. I looked around the room. There was not even a bench to sit upon. Very Roman, I thought.

At length Old Tiro returned, lifting the curtain for his master. How shall I describe Marcus Tullius Cicero? The beautiful all look alike, but a plain man is plain according to his own peculiarity. Cicero had a large forehead, a fleshy nose, and thinning hair. He was of medium height, with a thin chest, narrow shoulders, and a long neck with a prominent knob protruding from the gullet. He looked considerably older than his twenty-six years.

'Gordianus,' Tiro said, introducing me. "The one they call the Finder.'

I nodded. Cicero smiled warmly. There was a restless, inquisitive sparkle in his eyes. I was immediately impressed, without quite knowing why.

And in the next instant dismayed when Cicero opened his mouth to speak. He said only two words, but that was enough. The voice that came from his throat was high and grating. Tiro, with his sweet modulations, should have been the orator. Cicero had a voice fit for an auctioneer or a comic actor, a voice as peculiar as his name. "This way,' he said, indicating that we should follow him through the red curtain.

The hallway was quite short, hardly a hallway at all. We walked between unadorned walls for only a few paces, and then both walls ended. To the right was a broad curtain of pale yellow gauze, so fine I could see straight through it into the small but immaculately kept atrium beyond. Open to the sun and sky, the atrium was like a well carved out of the house, a reservoir spilling over with heat and light. At its centre a tiny fountain splashed. The gauzy curtain rippled and billowed gently, like a mist disturbed by a puff of air, like a living membrane signing at the slightest breeze.

Facing the atrium was a large, airy room lit by narrow windows set high in the ceiling. The walls were of white plaster. The furniture was all of dark polished wood in rustic designs, embellished by subtle flourishes of woodwork, silver clasps, and inlays of mother-of-pearl, carnelian, and lapis.

The room was filled with an astonishing number of scrolls. This was Cicero's library and his study. Such rooms are often the most intimate in the homes of wealthy men, revealing more about their owners than do bedchambers or dining rooms, which are the domain of women and slaves. It was a private room, indelibly marked by its owner, but a public room as well — testifying to this were the number of chairs scattered about, some of.them pulled close together, as if they had just been vacated by a huddled group of visitors. Cicero gestured to a group of three chairs, seated himself, and indicated that we should do likewise. What kind of man greets guests in his library rather than in his dining room or veranda? A man with Greek pretensions, I thought. A scholar. A lover of knowledge and wisdom. A man who would open a conversation with a total stranger with a gambit such as this:

'Tell me something, Gordianus the Finder — have you ever considered murdering your father?'

What must my face have looked like? I suppose I gave a start, winced, looked askance. Cicero saw all and smiled in that demure way that orators smile whenever they successfully manipulate an audience. Actors (I have known more than a few) feel much the same sort of satisfaction, the same thrill of power. The herdsman reveals the truth to Oedipus, and with a single word elicits gasps of shock and dismay from a thousand throats, all responding on cue. Behind his mask the herdsman smiles and makes his exit.

I pretended to gaze with an abstracted air at some nearby scrolls; I could see from the corner of my eye that Cicero still watched me, intent on gauging my every reaction. Orators think they can control everyone and everything with their words. I strained to' bleed every hint of expression from my face.

'My father,' I began, and then had to pause to clear my throat, hating the interruption, for it seemed a sign of weakness. 'My father is already dead, esteemed Cicero. He died many years ago.' The mischief in his eyes receded. He frowned.