The palatial building in which he had invested so much of his wealth and prestige had been entirely pulled down; nine tenths of the huge plot was weeds and rubble; it was barely possible to discern the original layout of the walls through the tangled overgrowth. Cicero stooped to pick up one of the scorched bricks poking from the ground. “Until this place is restored to me, we shall be entirely at their mercy—no money, no dignity, no independence…Every time I step outdoors I shall have to look up here and be reminded of my humiliation.” The edges of the brick crumbled in his hands and the red dust trickled through his fingers like dried blood.At the far end of the plot a statue of a young woman had been set up on top of a high plinth. Fresh offerings of flowers were piled around the base. By consecrating the site as a shrine to Liberty, Clodius believed he had made it inviolable and thus impossible for Cicero to reclaim. The marble figure was shapely in the morning light, with long tresses and a diaphanous dress slipping down to expose a naked breast.
