Until Antony’s funeral speech, the people had been frightened by what had happened, uncertain what to believe or who to support. But Antony had made things easy. Now they were sure Caesar had been a hero, and that the plotters should pay dearly for what they’d done. The mobs knew where Brutus and Cassius and the others lived, and by the evening their houses were burning, the flames lighting the sky over the city. Most of the plotters managed to escape, fleeing with little more than the clothes they wore, but some were caught and torn limb from limb. One man – the poet Cinna – was unlucky enough to die because he had the same name as a plotter. Mark Antony stood at the window of his grand villa watching the blood-red sky. Lying on couches behind him were Octavius and Lepidus, a man older than the other two, and much richer as well. Lepidus wore a toga, but Antony had changed into his military uniform, his breastplate reflecting the distant fires, his short sword – the gladius of the legions – in a scabbard at his side.
