THE END, MY FRIEND

It was a heavy evening after the scorching day; late summer, the month of the God Emperor Augustus. The air glowed, smoke from thousands of oil lamps and open fires catching the sun's fading power. The writer's eyes burnt as he stood on the balcony of his family domus on the Palatine Hill, watching the murmuring city stretched out below. He acknowledged a peculiar beauty in the wide sweep of wretched humanity huddled together; slums and tenements hugging the banks of the Tiber, hill after hill to the glimpse of distant, burning sea.

Later, a fat moon rose from behind the imposing home, cast its cold light over the dead day, the greatest city in history, the worried man. But the writer had a fire in his belly, a new idea burning, taking shape. At last, his simmering anger had found a purpose, some kind of direction.

'Beautiful, isn't it?' said his mother, touching his elbow and rubbing it fondly.

'From up here, yes. But it is a different life in the slums,' he answered. 'It stinks like a dead dog.' 'It's said there are a million souls in the city now, Marcus. A million. They are here by choice. This is the Golden City of Dreams. Dreams of wealth, success, excitement. You cannot blame our Senators or our Emperor for the squalor that success inevitably brings.'

'Especially since we have a Senator as guest this evening, mother?' quizzed Marcus, worried for his father.

'We must be gracious. Anyway, Maximus has been very kind to us. And he's your father's best friend in the Senate.'

'That's a very beautiful stola you're wearing, mother. Where did you get it? And is that black wig from India, perhaps? Has generals' pay risen again?'