days before.

We could not avoid following Colgius about Rome, round the Palatine, the
Colosseum and the Baths of Titus and through the Forums of Vespasian,
Nerva, Augustus and Trajan. At Trajan's Temple he reiterated his regrets
that we dare not go on to the stables of the Reds, and turned back through
Trajan's Forum, the Forum of the Divine Julius and the Great Forum. Of
course, I was quaking with dread for fear some lifelong acquaintance would
recognize me, even in my coarse attire. But none did: in fact I set eyes
on no one I knew, except Faltonius Bambilio, who was pompously lecturing
ten victims in the Ulpian Basilica. I was certain that his eyes were only
on his auditors; the sight of him did not alarm me, he never paid any
attention to those he considered his inferiors.

All along Agathemer and I were bursting with suppressed giggles: Colgius
paid very little attention to the Palace, the Great Amphitheater, the
magnificent public baths, the temples or to any of the glories about us;
he was all for cook-shops and hauled us into cook-shops without number,
sometimes presenting his Gallic friends, Asper and Felix, to his good
friend, the proprietor, sometimes bursting into invectives against the bad
cookery, infinitesimal portions or absurd prices of his enemies'
establishments. In cook-shops Agathemer and I felt safe, near a cook-shop
we felt almost safe, between cook-shops, companioned by Colgius and any
cook-shop frequenters we met, we felt more than a little safe. To our
thinking no spy, informer or secret service agent would feel suspicious
towards Colgius and his friends, nor towards us in their company, and he
presented us to idlers, loafers, louts, betting agents, sellers of tips on
the races, friends of jockeys, cousins of hostlers and such like to an
amazing number.

We found all Rome, as we saw it in the company of Colgius, humming with
two names and we made sure that, if they buzzed in such company as we were
in they also formed the chief topics of conversation in all parts of the
city and at every level of society from the senators down.

One name we had heard when in Rome with Maternus, but had barely heard it;
now we heard it everywhere; the name of Palus, the charioteer; Palus, the
incomparable jockey; Palus, the king of horsemasters; Palus the chum of
Commodus. Both of him, and about him, not only from the men who talked to
us, but also from bystanders, diners and idlers, who never noticed us or