The two real contrivers of the murder would have been more on their guard had they intended such a course.

It had been conceived that when the man was dead and his goods seized, the fear of Sulla's favorite, the still customary dread of the horrors of the time, would cause the son to shrink from inquiry.

Hitherto, when men had been killed and their goods taken, even if the killing and the taking had not been done strictly in accordance with Sulla's ordinance, it had been found safer to be silent and to endure; but this poor wretch, Sextus, had friends in Rome--friends who were friends of Sulla--of whom Chrysogonus and the Tituses had probably not bethought themselves.

When it came to pass that more stir was made than they had expected, then the accusation became necessary.
But, in order to obtain the needed official support and aid, Chrysogonus must be sought.

Sulla was then at Volaterra, in Etruria perhaps 150 miles north-west from Rome, and with him was his favorite Chrysogonus.
In four days from the time of this murder the news was earned thither, and, so Cicero states, by the same messenger--by Glaucia--who had taken it to Ameria.