I was furious to see my private information about Helena being paraded, but the Emperor leapt in first: 'Leave the Camillus girl out of it!' (I had not told Anacrites Vespasian and Helena's father were on such friendly terms; he had not asked.)

'Very good, sir.' The spy adjusted his tone. 'After Nero, new Emperors rattled out like barroom dice; I imagine these misguided souls underestimated your staying power-'

'They want a snob with fancy ancestors!' Vespasian scoffed caustically. He was famous for his down-to-earth attitude.

'And a few touches of madness,' I murmured, 'to increase the Senate's confidence!' Vespasian pressed his mouth together. Like most people, he thought my republican passions indicated a cracked brain. A difficult moment prickled us all.

Eventually the Emperor remarked, 'What I will not excuse, is the fact that these traitors tried to seduce my younger son!' It was hard to credit serious contenders with trying to make young Domitian Caesar a puppet emperor; to Domitian, however, who had a popular and virile elder brother, usurping the natural order always seemed a brilliant idea. He was twenty; there were decades of disruption in him yet.

Anacrites and I stared down at the floor. Superior workmanship and oozing with good taste: Alexandrian mosaic-a big, bold, serpentine pattern in black and cream.

'You cannot blame me for defending my own!' the fond father insisted. We shook our heads sombrely. He knew we both thought Domitian Caesar was a toad. The old man restrained himself. Neither Vespasian nor his first son Titus ever criticized Domitian in public with so much as a sour look (though it's my belief they roughed him up fairly frankly behind closed doors).

The fact that Atius Pertinax had been in league with the Emperor's precious son was why Anacrites was tweaking over his papers with silver tongs. For one thing, if we found any evidence against his boy, Vespasian wanted it destroyed.

'So!' he exclaimed, growing bored with speculating. 'The plot's dead: forget it.' The tone of the briefing changed. 'Rome is stuck with me! My predecessor resigned with good grace-'

That was one view of it. The last Emperor Vitellius had been murdered by the Forum mob, his legions surrendered, his son was a babe in arms, and his daughter was swiftly married off by Vespasian with an enormous dowry that would tie her husband up for years, gratefully counting it.

Vespasian sucked his teeth in an angry mood. 'This fiasco has left me with four empty seats in the Senate. The rules are clear: senators must reside in Rome! Faustus Ferentinus has sailed away to drink julep with some ancient aunt in Lycia. I've sent him permission, in deference to the aunt-' Never imagine that his respect for elderly ladies meant Vespasian was soft; beneath that approachable exterior, a powerful will grumbled dangerously.

'Three other clowns are absenting themselves in the country; Gordianus and his brother Longinus have jumped into distant seaside priesthoods and Aufidius Crispus is sunning himself in the Bay of Neapolis on a yacht. If anyone wishes to greet my accession by retiring into private life,' Vespasian announced, 'I shall not object. But senators must account for themselves! Curtius Longinus has been recalled to Rome to give me an explanation, then I suppose I'll be obliged to grant him a favour he cannot forget- This seemed to be a secret Palace code word that had never been explained to me. 'He's lodging with the priests of the Little Temple of Hercules Gaditanus overnight and being interviewed tomorrow. Anacrites, I want you there-'

What I hated most about working here was finding myself excluded from whatever was really going on. Scowling, I scuffed my boot heel on the fine Alexandrian floor; then I decided to make my presence felt. 'We may have a problem, sir.'

I mentioned to the Emperor how I had been attacked in the warehouse, how I tailed Barnabas, and that I thought this link with the Pertinax household could be significant.

The Chief Spy shifted. 'You never mentioned this, Falco!'

'Sorry; slipped my mind.'

I enjoyed watching Anacrites torn between his irritation at me taking the initiative, and wanting to appear the kind of spy who was bound to have found out anyway. 'Just some crack-brained freedman thinking he owes his dead patron a gesture,' was his opinion, dismissing it.

'Could be,' I agreed. 'But I'd like to know whether anything in the Pertinax documentation has pointed to a gambit involving corn chandlery.'

'No,' Anacrites said crisply. 'And I won't commit expensive Palace resources on the word of a Transtiberina barmaid!'

'You have your methods, I'll have mine.'

'Which are?'

'Knowing that riverbank watering holes and Transtiberina wineshops can be the first places to catch the news!'

'Both of your methods are valid,' Vespasian broke in. 'That's why I'm employing you both!'

During our quarrel, the Emperor's brown eyes had grown very still. Anacrites looked embarrassed, but I was angry. Here we stood, discussing treason like trade figures from Cilicia or the price of Celtic beer, but Vespasian knew what I thought. He knew why. Six hours after I fumbled with that sagging corpse, I still had the stench of the dead man's body fat curdling my lungs. My hands seemed to reek still from handling his finger rings. His cadaverous face swam into my memory whenever I let myself relax. Today I had done the Empire no small favour, yet apparently I was only fit for disposals-work that was too sticky for manicured hands.

'If you're spending your time in wineshops, watch your liver!' warned Vespasian with his sardonic grin.

'No point,' I snapped. 'I mean, sir, there's no point me risking my health and innocence in cut-throat bars, collecting information no one will ever act upon!'

'What innocence? Patience, Falco. I'm reconciling the senate as my priority-and you're no diplomat!' I glared, but held my peace. Vespasian relaxed slightly. 'Can we lay hands on this fellow Barnabas?'

'I've arranged for him to see me at the Pertinax house, but I'm beginning to suspect he may not come. He's holed up near a tavern called the Setting Sun south of the Via Aurelia-'

A chamberlain broke into the room like a man who has had a good breakfast trotting out to the penny latrines.

'Caesar! The Temple of Hercules Gaditanus is on fire!'

Anacrites began to move; Vespasian stopped him. 'No. You get yourself down to the Transtiberina and apprehend this freedman. Put it to him plainly that the conspiracy has been broken up. Find out whether he knew anything, then let him go if you can-but make sure he grasps that stirring up any more sludge in the duckpond will not be well received.' I was suppressing a satirical vision of Vespasian as a great frog on a lily pad when he turned to me. 'Falco can go fire watching.'

Arson's a dirty business; it does not require diplomacy.