by Allan Massie
"You might think so, but she wasn't, and her father and brothers were very angry. They rose up against the King and drove him out of the city."
"Yes," he said, "I understand that. So they made themselves kings."
"Not exactly. The Romans then decided kings were a bad idea. Don't ask me why. They just did. So they decided to have a new, different form of government. Instead of one man being king for life, they would divide the government between two men who would be equal to each other, and who would only hold power for a year. They weren't called kings, but consuls."
"Were they killed at the end of the year?"
"No."
"Then how did they persuade them to give up power?" "They just did. Those were the rules." "And this still happens?"
"We still have consuls. I should have been consul myself next year."
"And now you're not. You're here instead." "Yes. Only nowadays the consuls don't have much real power."
"I understand. This way of doing things doesn't work."
"It worked well for a long time. Very well. Too well perhaps. Rome became great and powerful. You know that, you have felt our power. We conquered other countries and tribes and extended our Empire."
"Yes, you kill people and call it peace."
"If you say so, but that's not how we see it. Anyway the Empire became so big that generals had to command armies and provinces for a long time, and in the end the generals became more powerful than the consuls."
"So the generals became kings."
"Not exactly."
Sometimes I wonder if Artixes is quite as ingenuous as he seems to be. He has after all lived in Rome, admittedly in a species of detention. He must know more about Roman politics than he pretends. But when he looks at me with his blue eyes wide open, and smiles in that frank admiring fashion, I can't think him other than innocent.
And yet… I put my arm round his shoulder.
"Artixes, you know all this, I think."
He smiled again.
"Well, some of it," he said.
"So it's a game."
"It's interesting to hear how you explain it. And I do want to know about Caesar, and why you followed him until… And these women. I've heard of the Queen of Egypt. Men say she's ravishingly beautiful."
"Cleopatra? No, she's not that. She's more interesting than that."
"Tell me about her."
CHAPTER 3
Most Romans loathe Egypt and the Egyptians. There is something about the place that disturbs us. It is, I think, on account of the ever-present consciousness of magic. Everything seems to come from the primeval slime of the Nile. The Egyptians worship animal gods, and one cult, I have been informed, expresses devotion for a dung-beetle. A stench of corruption pervades the country, and few Romans manage to get through a day without looking nervously over their shoulder or seeking reassurance that some witch has not cast a spell on them. It is foolishness, but it is infectious foolishness. Even Mark Antony was affected. He displayed a nervous anxiety which was foreign to his nature.
It is something to do with the landscape. Even though Rome is so great a city, we Romans are by instinct and inheritance country-dwellers. We are comforted by trees, mountains, rivers, lakes, and the sea. Our rivers are friendly things compared to the brooding presence of the Nile. We are happiest, and most at ease, in our country villas. The gods of our country districts are friendly beings; every grove and spring has its tutelary spirit, and it is easy to live in harmony with such beings: easy and pleasant. There is no country, no landscape, in Egypt: instead, a waste of sands interrupted only by monuments to the dead. We Romans have a proper reverence for our ancestors, and proudly display the masks of those who have achieved renown in the service of the Republic. The Egyptians, intoxicated by the idea of death, abase themselves before the wary spirits of their dead. The land is in thrall to the idea of death.
Of course, Alexandria is a great city, the most wonderful in the world. Alexandria, being Greek in its foundation, is not characteristic of Egypt: with its libraries, law-courts, miles of warehouses, harbours busy with the shipping of all nations of the civilised world, there is much to delight, little — it might seem — to dismay the visitor. Yet, even Alexandria has been infected by the poison of Egypt. There was an old woman in the marketplace who was said to be two hundred years old; she sold magic potions to ensure longevity. My cousin Marcus Brutus wished her to be prosecuted for fraud; Caesar only laughed. "She does no harm," he said; erroneously. Our arrival was horrid.
After the victory at Pharsalus, where Pompey's chief army was utterly destroyed, the Great One had fled to Egypt. The country is of course nominally independent, but Roman influence has long been considerable there, and Pompey had formerly championed the cause of King Ptolemy when he was driven out of his country by rebels. Ptolemy had come to Rome, where Pompey had spoken for him in the Senate, and the King had employed lavish bribery to win still more support; he had further contrived to assassinate various members of the opposing party who had also come to Rome to plead their case. No Egyptian thinks anything of assassination, and it was said that the King's success in this enterprise regained much of the respect which he had lost. Even so, he was not successful in his main endeavour, for at that time Pompey had many enemies himself in the Senate, who feared that the restoration of Ptolemy by Roman arms would only add to Pompey's power, since Ptolemy, understanding little about our Constitution, would feel indebted to the Great One rather than to the Senate. So nothing was done on his behalf, until, as a result of the famous meeting between Pompey, Caesar and the millionaire booby Marcus Crassus at Lucca, the three of them formed what Cicero (in private) described as "a criminal conspiracy to share sovereignty and dominate the Republic". Then, as a result of their new ascendancy, Pompey's policy was put into practice, and Gabinius was ordered to lead his army from Syria and restore King Ptolemy. This he did, for he was an efficient officer, despite being also a habitual drunkard; and in any case the Egyptian army was no match for Roman legions. King Ptolemy was now dead, but had been succeeded by his two children, a boy also called Ptolemy, and a daughter Cleopatra.
In the Egyptian fashion, these were married to each other. It is very strange. As you may know, the Egyptian royal family is really Greek, the first Ptolemy having been one of Alexander the Great's generals, but they have so far adapted themselves to the base customs of the country they rule as to be quite happy to practise incest. Normally Greeks, however degenerate, are as averse to incest as we Romans are. The prohibition of incest is apparently of great antiquity, and I would have thought it innate in mankind; and yet the Egyptians appear to find it natural. Certainly they take no exception to it.
Marriage did not, however, appear to exclude the rivalry which one generally finds when there are two contenders to a throne — you know how common such rivalry is in Gaul, Artixes — and the young Ptolemy and Cleopatra were said to be on such bad terms with each other (no doubt fomented by partisans) that there were even rumours of civil war.
At any rate Pompey fled to Egypt confident that the heir of Ptolemy would show gratitude to the man who had re — established his father on the throne. Perhaps he forgot that the Ptolemies were now Orientals, and therefore unacquainted with that noble sentiment.
Caesar was slow in pursuit, for reasons which I could not fathom and which he did not trouble himself to explain. Instead of following Pompey directly, he delayed, and made a diversion to Troy. I was among those whom he chose to invite to accompany him.
Naturally, even though I was alarmed by his procrastination, which I feared would allow Pompey to reassemble an army and thus prolong the civil war, even perhaps reverse its course (perhaps Caesar had information which he denied me), I was honoured to be chosen, and delighted to have the opportunity to see Troy. My mother had instilled a love of Homer in me from my earliest boyhood, and of the two great epics, it has always been the Iliad to which I responded most warmly.
My first feeling was of disappointment. L
ittle remains of the proud towers and mighty ramparts. The scene is melancholy, the famed Scamander sluggish. Mount Ida was invisible, veiled in mist. A chill wind blew from the sea. There were mud-flats and rushes where the Greeks had camped.
"Ten years to capture this," Trebonius said. "Homer's Greeks must have been rare incompetents."
Trebonius always had a habit of looking down his nose at the world. Now he sneered, "And Agamemnon, Ajax and Achilles rare boobies."
"You think so?" Caesar said.
"Well, don't you, General? When you think of what you yourself achieved at Avaricum and Alesia, Troy looks small beer, a wretched place that wouldn't detain us seven days."
"You are right of course, Trebonius." I could see that Caesar was annoyed. He was flexing his fingers as was his habit when he strove to control his irritation. "With command of the sea, with modern siege weapons and a trained army, we would have made short work of these poor Trojans. Is that your opinion also, Mouse?"
Unlike Trebonius, I was responsive to Caesar's moods. I remembered how he loved to boast of his descent from Venus; I recalled that it was in those groves of oak and chestnut above Troy that she had coupled with Anchises, and given birth to the hero Aeneas, who later, guided by his mother and the other gods, escaped the burning city and sailed by slow and arduous stages to Italy, taking with him his little son lulus, from whom Caesar claimed direct descent, though all true Romans are the children of Aeneas. And so I said:
"It is a mistake, surely, to judge antiquity by the standards of our own age. Certainly one cannot believe that either the Greeks or the Trojans would have long withstood our legions. Nevertheless, it is barbarous to laugh at them. If men ever cease to be moved by Homer, that will be the time to despair of humanity. Then we will be right to abandon all dreams of greatness. In Homer we see greatness yoked to strange infirmity, honour wrestling with dishonour in a single breast; we see all that is great and ennobling in war, and all that is terrible and abominable too. Is it not a mark of Homer's transcendent power that we weep for both Hector and Achilles? Is it not eternally true — the picture that he offers — of the unending struggle between men's will and the pressing weight of necessity? Yes, Trebonius is right: a modern army would make short work of Troy. On the other hand, what poet of today is capable of moving us as Homer does? For that reason we should venerate the sad remains of Ilium. For that reason, we come here to weep and to pay homage to the glorious dead."
"Bravo, Mouse," Caesar said, and pinched my ear.
And yet, though I knew I had spoken as he wished me to speak, and said the words that he desired to hear, I could not escape the certainty that he was laughing at me, even as he applauded.
"You are becoming quite a little master of rhetoric," Casca said to me that evening.
He sprawled in his tent, with a goblet of wine in his hand. His face was ruddy with drink. Diosippus knelt beside him, between his open knees, massaging his fleshy thighs, while Casca's left hand played with the boy's curls. Nicander stood behind his master, oiling his neck and shoulders, and scowling at Diosippus.
"You have learned how to flatter Caesar," Casca said. I felt myself flush and looked away.
"But I meant all I said, cous in. I cannot endure to hear Tre bonius sneer at Homer. If we abandon trust in poetry, why, then we become…" I paused, searching for words.
"We become sensible men," Casca said. He leaned forward and kissed Diosippus on the mouth. "There is more honey in a boy's lips than in all the words of Homer. But you are wise to flatter Caesar: for your own sake. I only ask you to remember the old proverb: whom the gods wish to destroy, they first make mad."
"What do you mean?"
He stood up, letting the towel that covered his midriff fall to the ground. His belly sagged. He waddled to the couch and lay face down. The boys followed him and resumed their massage. He turned his face towards me:
"Has Caesar spoken of his plans for a new Troy, a new Rome?"
"No, he has said nothing about that. What do you mean?"
"What does he mean? That is the question. Now bugger off, Mouse. You too, Dio. Leave me with Nicky."
He stretched out his hand and thrust it between Nicander's shapely legs, pulling the boy towards him.
We sat on deck under a starry sky. It had been rough and was now calm. My nausea had abated. Caesar was in relaxed and friendly mood. He sipped wine mixed with water and talked of literature, and then idly of philosophy.
Our enterprise was audacious. It had been confirmed that Pompey was in Egypt. Our own force was small. We had perhaps four thousand legionaries and eight hundred cavalry. The islanders of Rhodes had been constrained to furnish us with ten warships. Our intelligence was defective. It was rumoured that Pompey had a considerable fleet, the remnants of those legions which had survived Pharsalus, and some two or three thousand armed slaves. But we couldn't know for sure. He might have had three times that force. Yet Caesar did not appear concerned. He spoke of the effect of the prestige won by Pharsalus. "It is worth two legions," he said.
"I was pleased, Mouse, to hear you speak of Homer as you did. I have never trusted the man who is deaf to poetry."
"Trebonius is a good officer and devoted to your service."
"I would trust him in the field, certainly. But he is a mean fellow, a lean fellow, a crabbit soul. Look at the stars, Mouse, look at the stars. Keep your gaze fixed on them. That is a golden rule of life and politics. The man who forgets the stars is no favourite of Destiny. He is doomed to petty struggles, capable of taking only a short view of things. The stars are my friend, Mouse. Whenever I feel the temptation to despair, I have only to gaze upward on such a night as this to recover my even and confident tenor of mind. Serenity.. " his voice drifted away. We sat in silence, only the waves lapping against the prow.
"What is Rome?" Caesar said. "A city, an idea… has it ever occurred to you to wonder why we Romans have been so favoured by Fortune? Have you considered that all history leads to this moment when Rome is the mistress of the world, and I am Rome's master?"
"Pompey still lives, Caesar, and he has sons with armies."
"Poor Pompey. I was fond of him, you know, Mouse. I truly thought of him as my friend, my last friend… and he betrayed my faith."
"Caesar has many friends."
"Caesar has no friends, for, with Pompey eclipsed, he has no equals, and friendship is possible only between equals. Does that seem very arrogant to you, Mouse?"
There was no land in sight, merely the limitless sea, dark purple shading into dense night, but the stars clear above.
"Answer me, Mouse. Does that seem very arrogant to you?"
But I could not answer. I saw the truth of what he said, and I hated it, and would not acknowledge it.
"Marcus Crassus thought he was my friend, because I owed him so much money. He was only my creditor. You know the story of his death."
Of course I did. Everyone knew it and had been horrified by it, even though at the same time we were ashamed.
Crassus had led his army against Parthia across the great desert of Arabia. Somewhere in the sands, his intelligence faulty, he had found himself surrounded by the horse archers of the enemy. Keeping out of range of our weapons, they had teased Crassus' mighty army like boys baiting a bear tied to a stake. The Romans pressed together. Many fell exhausted by the heat and the congestion. At last, Crassus, never famous for courage, roared (they say) like a wounded bull and led a mad charge. He was stopped by an arrow in the throat. His body was stripped and left for the fowls of the air, the dark birds that cast their shadows over the sands. But his head was cut off and carried to the camp of the Parthian king, who was, as it happened, watching a performance of The Bacchae. (Thus do barbarian kings imitate the practice of civilised men.) When the head of King Pentheus is brought on to the stage, some vile but ingenious actor substituted the head of old Crassus.
Carrhae was the greatest disaster Roman arms had suffered since Hannibal's victory at Cannae almost two hund
red years ago. It was strange that Caesar should brood on it now.
"One day," he said, "I shall avenge Crassus."
My mother used to speak with horror of Crassus' campaign against the leader of the slaves' revolt, Spartacus, of how, when he had defeated the slaves, he had six thousand of them crucified along the Appian Way. They lined the road from Capua to Rome. The sight and stench of the bodies, rotting in attitudes that indicated the nature of their agony, disgusted her, she used to say; for eighteen months she had been unable to bring herself to revisit our estates in the south on account of the horror that she would be compelled to see. Why did I think of this now?
"My conquest of Gaul was glorious," Caesar said, "and yet what is Gaul, compared to the splendour of the East? Alexander never thought to carry his conquests to the West. Some day Rome must dominate Parthia. I thought, when we were at Troy, of a new Rome, born from a colony planted there on the site where our race was nurtured. From such a base. After all, Rome cannot be the centre of the world. Things come full circle, Mouse. It may be that my Destiny is to retrace the path taken by my ancestor Aeneas, and then… but I am already twenty years older than Alexander when he died… still, Destiny
… It is a paradox, Mouse, which you have understood in Homer. We act by reason of the force of our will, and yet Destiny governs all. What shall I do with Pompey when I take him, Mouse?"
That was another question I found hard. With what crime could Pompey be charged? Though we were sure that Caesar's decision to invade Italy was justified, nevertheless Pompey had opposed us by the will, the explicit order, of the Senate. I could not conceive of any legal action that could be brought against him, and I could not believe that Caesar would willingly order any Roman citizen — least of all Pompey, who had once been married to his daughter Julia — to be put to death without trial. Besides, how often had I heard Caesar deplore the conduct of Sulla who had restored order to Rome after an earlier civil war by murdering his enemies.
