“It sounds seditious,” said Nero. “If these Christians hate Roma so much, let them go back to dusty Judaea and await the end of the world there. Didn’t Claudius banish the Jews?”

“That edict proved to be impractical,” said Seneca. “It was short-lived and only haphazardly carried out, but it did serve as a warning to the Jewish sects in the city to keep the peace. They no longer stone each other in public, much less riot in the streets. They’ve learned to keep their feuds to themselves, at least here in the city. As a result, you don’t hear much about the Christians these days.”

“And that includes this mysterious Christian brother of Senator Pinarius,” said Nero. “But of Titus Pinarius I suspect we will be seeing much more in the years to come.” Nero bestowed on Titus his most charming smile.

On the day in late March that news reached Roma of the death of the young emperor’s mother, Titus Pinarius lit candles in the vestibule of his house and whispered a prayer before each of the wax masks of his ancestors, thanking them for his good fortune.

Long ago, his late cousin Claudius had scolded him for knowing so little of his family’s past. “A man must honour his ancestors,” Claudius had said. “Who else made us, and how else did we come to exist?” Since that time, Titus had devoted himself to studying his ancestors, discovering all he could about them, learning from their examples, and paying homage to them like a dutiful Roman, trying to make his own life something of which his forebears would be proud.

At the age of forty-one, Titus was more prosperous and well regarded than ever – and glad to still be alive. It had not been easy in the six years since Claudius had died, navigating the treacherous politics of an imperial court split between a ruthless mother and a young son struggling to break free of her.

But now Agrippina was dead. In some ways, her death was a more profound event than the death of Claudius, for Claudius seemed to fade gradually away, while Agrippina still had her wits about her and might yet have regained control of Nero and the court. What a woman she was, and how little she allowed her womanhood to limit her ambitions! Titus recalled the incident when Armenian envoys had pleaded their cause before Nero, and Agrippina emerged from behind the screen where she customarily remained hidden and actually seemed about to mount the emperor’s tribunal and preside along with him; while the whole court was paralysed with alarm, Seneca hissed at Nero to intercept his mother, and so a scandalous scene was averted.

Agrippina! The world would not be the same without her. A new age would begin.

So deeply did Titus feel the impact of the news that he found himself unable to contemplate the activities of a normal day. Only some unplanned and irregular activity would be suitable to such a strange day. Following this impulse, he decided to discharge an onerous duty that had long been weighing on him. On this day, he would visit his brother.

Once every year or two he forced himself to see Kaeso, to offer his brother yet another chance to return to a normal, respectable way of life. Titus felt he owed that duty to the shade of their father, if not to Kaeso, who always refused him.

He left his house with a small retinue, as befitted a senator of his standing. There was a scribe with a wax tablet to take down memoranda. There was another slave who was versed in all the streets and byways of the city, so that Titus need never wonder where the closest tavern or silver shop or eatery might be. There was another slave who knew the names not just of every senator and magistrate in the city but of every person Titus was likely to meet, no matter how important or inconsequential, so that Titus need never search his memory in vain for a name or a title. And of course there were a number of brawny bodyguards, well-behaved fellows whose sheer size was so intimidating that they seldom had to use force to defend their master or to clear a way for him through a crowd.

The day was typical of late March, bright and spring-like one moment, blustery and overcast the next. Titus found the changeable weather invigorating and walked with a spring in his step. Agrippina was dead! The news had not taken Titus completely by surprise. Recently, Nero had summoned Titus to consult him about omens regarding his mother’s and his own immediate future; the young emperor said nothing of what he had in mind, but he was clearly desperate to finally rid himself of Agrippina. Thank the gods it was Nero who trusted and consulted Titus at that precarious stage of the power struggle, and not Agrippina! Like many in the court, Titus had walked a tightrope between mother and son for years, afraid to offend either party or to irrevocably throw his lot with one or the other.

The story of Agrippina’s demise had played out like a comedy of errors. According to rumours, Nero had tried on more than one occasion to poison her, but each time Agrippina had either been forewarned or had taken an antidote to save herself. Then the ceiling had fallen in above her bed – surely not by accident – and Agrippina escaped being crushed only because she happened to have been lying next to the headboard.

Then, saying that he wanted to patch things up with her, Nero invited Agrippina to his seaside villa at Baiae to celebrate the feast of Minerva. There he presented her with a splendid pleasure barge and persuaded her to take a cruise on the bay despite the blustery weather. But this was not an ordinary ship: one of Nero’s engineers had devised it to collapse on itself and sink without a trace, a circumstance that could be blamed on the choppy waves or a sudden squall but surely not on the young emperor. The ship duly collapsed and sank, but Agrippina – who had once supported herself by diving for sponges – was such a strong swimmer that she made her way to shore. Nero decided that his desperate mother, like a wounded tigress, needed to be disposed of straightaway. In the beach house where the bedraggled Agrippina took refuge, assassins arrived and did away with her once and for all.

An astrologer had once told Agrippina that her son would become emperor, but that she would have to pay for his greatness with her own life. Agrippina had flippantly replied, “Let him kill his mother, then, so long as he is emperor.” So it had come to pass.

Walking along the riverfront and through the Forum, Titus let himself be distracted by the sights and sounds of the city. Despite the constant tension and turmoil within the imperial household, for Roma and the empire the last few years had been a golden age. Seneca had taken charge of the actual running of the empire and had done a splendid job. Taxes had been reduced even as the services of the state had been improved. Nero’s love of music and poetry, his youthful enthusiasm, his theatrical personality, and his love of spectacle pervaded the culture. He had devised extraordinary entertainments for the populace, made all the more extraordinary by the fact that they were bloodless; though gladiator games were still a part of many holidays and festivals, Nero had decreed that no one should be put to death in the arena, not even criminals.

Roma thrived. It seemed to Titus that the world had never known a better moment. And now that the discord in the imperial house had come to an end with Agrippina’s death, who could say to what glorious heights Nero might ascend?

Titus left behind the gleaming marble and travertine monuments of the Forum and entered the Subura with its narrow, filthy streets. He was glad to have his retinue around him, especially his bodyguards. As a younger man he had dared to walk through the Subura at all hours alone and unarmed, but those days were long past. Yet even here, he thought, conditions had improved since Nero had taken power, thanks to the general prosperity of the empire and Seneca’s efficient city administration.