Cicero to Atticus, written from Astura on the third day before the Kalends of April 709 AUC — 30 March 45 BC (the manuscript dateline: Scr.\ Asturae iii K.\ Apr.\ a.\ 709 (45)). After more than a month at Astura, Cicero is at last about to break the seclusion. Atticus has warned him to avoid being caught at Astura by the unnamed “that man” (almost certainly the elder Quintus, or possibly Caesar’s agent in the Silius business); since no fixed day for his departure is known, Cicero will come over himself. Tomorrow he expects to be at Sicca’s suburban estate, and from there at Ficulea — the staging post on the way to Rome.

The second section keeps the practical thread. The Silius purchase — the prospective horti for Tullia’s shrine — is still alive: Silius wants some particular plot cut out of the sale, and Cicero fears it may be the very plot that drew him to the property in the first place. He asks Atticus to keep him informed even on the day of arrival. The closing mention of Hirtius’ letter — “fresh and kindly written” — is one of the few warm notes in this sequence; Hirtius would die at Mutina two years later.