Free The Catiline Conspiracy by John Maddox Roberts Page B

farmers, all manner of small merchants and mountebanks had set up shop. I availed myself of one of these, a public barber. While he scraped my bristled face smooth, I watched the bustling scene. The fortune-tellers' booths were well attended. Fortunetellers were expelled from the city regularly, but they always came back. Near the barber's stool, an old woman sat on the ground, selling herbs and philters from a display laid out on a blanket.
    "Look at those two," the barber said. I followed the direction of his nod and saw a pair of young men going into a fortune-teller's booth. Both wore full beards, a fashion ordinarily affected only by barbarians and philosophers, but enjoying something of a vogue among the city youth.
    "Disgusting to see Roman youths bearded up like so many Gauls. Bad for business, too," he added.
    "Gauls wear mustaches, not beards," I said. "Anyway, at that age, they're just enthralled with being
able
to raise a beard."
    "They're all troublemakers," the barber asserted stoutly. "Those bearded ones are the brawlers and drunks. They come of decent families, mind you. You can tell that by the quality of their clothes. But then, that's why they wear the beards, so they won't look respectable."
    I paid the barber and made my way among the stalls, being careful where I stepped. Since the barber called it to my attention, it seemed that I could not look anywhere without seeing bearded young men. There were not really that many of them, but once a thing impinges itself on my consciousness, I tend to seek it out without conscious volition. It was unlikely to be a sign of mourning, for none of the youths wore the shabby clothes one wears while mourning, going unshaven and unshorn in the process.
    Among the stalls of the craftsmen I found what I was looking for: a cutlery merchant. I did not want one who sold only his own wares, but one who traveled, buying and selling the wares of others. The one I found sold edged implements from a number of display cases, the sort that stand up, with doors that swing wide and are themselves lined with racks. These cases glittered with kitchen knives, butcher's cleavers, scissors and shears, awls, sickles and pruning knives and other farm implements, and a few daggers and short swords.
    "Are you looking for anything in particular, sir?" the merchant asked. "I have some elegant military weaponry still packed away. A gentleman of your evident rank must spend time with the legions. I have swords decorated with gold and silver and parade pieces inlaid with carved amber, some with hilts of ivory. This is a largely rustic crowd, so I did not take them out. However, if you are interested, my slave can--"
    "Actually," I interrupted, "I was wondering if you could tell me anything about this." I took out the snake-hilted dagger and handed it to him. His look of disappointment was so piercing that I thought it best to brighten his day.
    "I am the
Quaestor
Decius Caecilius Metellus and I am investigating a murder. This is the murder weapon." Actually I had no authority whatever, but there was no need to tell him that.
    "A murder!" He examined the dagger eagerly. People are always willing to lend you their expertise if they can feel important by doing so. He turned it over in his hands, admiring the discolorations left where the blood had been wiped off.
    "Can you tell anything about it?" I asked impatiently.
    "Well, it's African. You see this kind of heavy central spine on blades made there. And I've seen this kind of serpent carving before. They had some sort of serpent-god in Carthage, and they still make hilts like this around Utica and Thapsus."
    "Do you see them very often?"
    "Just the occasional souvenir brought back by a soldier. There were a lot of them brought back after the war with Jugurtha, but that's getting on toward fifty years ago, so you don't see many of those left. There's no demand for them here, since better knives are made here in Italy, and in Gaul."
    "I thank you. This