We might even be members of that awful cult that the devotee matrons ran at the Temple of Ceres, where they fussed around with ritual vessels and showed off to the public in fake ‘Greek rites’ at festivals … Laia bloody Gratiana. She would not fit in with us.

It was significant that we were women not girls; we had all lived. Graecina and I were the youngest, yet married and widowed, both familiar with work. Galla and Fauna might like to pretend, but they were both around ten years older. Fauna, for one, had had a hard life.

From what I had heard, I thought Mucia Lucilia would have made an easy fifth in our gathering.

I thought about the dead woman, as we sat in this bare courtyard that she can hardly have started to call ‘hers’. Her fresco improvements to the summer dining room implied she would have made this space better too. Out with the deadbeat gardener first (goodbye, Diomedes; anyone can see why you are doomed to sale!). Tie up and water the bedraggled climber. Better still, since it was only ivy, slash it down, dig up the roots and dump it. In with some big lily pots and oleanders, or at least lavender. Surround the yard with box hedges. Have roses. Position a fountain and water channels. Haul in proper, permanent benches so this garden area could be like all those other wonderful sitting places in Rome houses, where people met, rested, talked, ate and enjoyed a real social life.

The pockmarked pillars could have been mended, then if necessary rendered, maybe painted as mock-wood or mock-marble. If she could have winkled enough cash out of Aviola, or even used money of her own, the wall space between rooms could have had horticultural painting too: plants, birds and butterflies, with theatrical masks and musical windchimes dangling among them.

This was a woman embarking on a new life: new husband, new home – and if it made life easier, new staff. Old friends, though. She still valued those, and dined with a group of them before leaving town. That last dinner together had been important.

Mucia Lucilia was not rushing into change for change’s sake. Not ripping out everything all at once, but nurturing a project. A woman in her prime, still full of energy and lively ideas, she had brought something of value to her new husband. Aviola, who had been divorced for nearly twenty years, would have gained not only willing sex but conversation and companionship. Perhaps before they married, he had been lonely. I guessed she had.