Gods below, I really need a drink. But he could not get too drunk. It would not do to arrive in the camp tomorrow morning with a bad hangover. The baths down by the river were the answer: a massage, a cold plunge, have a couple of drinks listening to whatever philosopher or sophist might be giving a lecture. With luck, there might be a half-decent poet. Even in this backwater there were always one or two itinerant intellectuals haunting the public buildings, seeking an audience. As Lucian had written in one of his satires, it was easier to fall over in a rowing boat and not hit a plank than avoid being accosted by some down-at-heel man of words.

By the time Valens had negotiated the steps down to the town, he had changed his mind. There was a bar on the waterfront, close to his lodgings. It was nothing special, but it was dark and cool, and the wine was not too bad.

He stood for a moment in the doorway, letting his eyes adjust to the gloom. A bar ran along the right-hand wall. Across the back was a worn staircase, up which the customers might take whichever of the serving girls was working. A door under the stairs led out to a privy in a small courtyard. The rest of the room contained four tables with benches. At one of them sat two stevedores. In the furthest corner was an extraordinary figure clad in yellow-and- green striped trousers and a blue tunic. His cloak, also sky blue, was folded neatly on the bench next to him, and a long ebony cane was propped against his table. The man had been a regular at the bar over the last few days. As ever he was eating fruit, and not drinking wine, but plain water.

As Valens entered, the man looked up. His huge domed head was entirely hairless, lacking even eyebrows. His oddly small features were those of a contented baby. He nodded to the newcomer. Valens nodded back. The man ate a piece of melon, then broke wind loudly, with evident satisfaction.

Taking a stool at the bar, Valens called for a jug of the best wine. The owner claimed that it was from Chios. Valens doubted that. He poured himself a drink, adding an equal part of water. Not wanting to get drunk, he took some coins from the wallet tied to his belt, and paid.

Valens studied his own reflection in the tarnished mirror behind the bar. Short haired and clean shaven, he looked younger than his twenty-five years. His tunic was plain, but of good material. He wore no jewellery, except a signet ring, the seal set in silver. There was nothing left of the dandyish gilded youth of Rome. His appearance fitted his role as the nephew of a moderately well-to-do provincial merchant.