Last Days With Cleopatra

by Jack Lindsay

  “I have come to speak with you,” said Herodes, simply and doggedly.

  “You waste your breath.” Antonius drew himself up. “I am of no account now. You might as well call one of these lads your lord as me. I trusted” He broke off, his nostrils quivered and his brows lifted and fell, his head sunk down into his shoulders, and he glanced sideways. Then he recovered. “ It doesn’t matter. Will you throw your crown into the harbour and stay here to drink with me? Or will you go?”

  “ I’ll do neither.” Herodes took the goblet of wine that Eros handed him. He bent forward. “You like me, Marcus Antonius, and I like you.” The wine from the disregarded goblet in his hand spilled on the floor. He stared with intense eyes at Antonius.

  Antonius said nothing, but sagged backward, and rolled his head heavily on his shoulders, as if sleepily feeling an itch. He seemed not to have heard what Herodes said, but to be stupefied by his eyes.

  Herodes noticed that he was spilling the wine. He raised the goblet and drank steadily, swallowing with a gurgling noise, but holding the goblet daintily with little-finger outstretched. He put the cup down and signed that he wanted no more, then settled back comfortably and glanced round the room.

  “I’ve never been the use to you that I might have been.”

  Antonius nodded and looked up under his sinking eyelids. Energy came back to him, and he sat up to face Herodes, who continued.

  “But not for the reasons you think. I’ve always given you loyal service, but nothing more. Now I’ve come to join with you altogether, body and soul. Do you hear? If you want me.”

  “What’s the price?” asked Antonius sullenly. His obsession and his drunkenness seemed to have faded, and for the first time for weeks he spoke in a completely normal voice.

  “My price?” said Herodes quietly. “Yes, I’ve got a price.” He paused and then burst out. “Your trust. Your heart. Your plans. All of you. You and I together.”

  “Go to Octavianus,” said Antonius in a stifled voice. “He has plans to share. I have none. My heart’s dried in my breast. Go to Octavianus. He’s the man for bargaining. Not me. I have no friend.”

  “Octavianus is not the man for this kind of bargain. Look at me as I sit here. You think I’m a half-barbarian, don’t you? I know you. Well, don’t you know that that’s what these fine-mannered Greek friends of yours say about you? Half-barbarian.” His voice fell to a hissing whisper that sent snakes of frigidity crawling through Victor’s veins towards the heart. “I heard someone...saying that about me...overheard...someone that I love...” He broke off and resumed his straightforward manner. “Is what they say of you so very different from what they say of me?”

  Antonius smote himself on the thigh.

  “By Hercules, I knew it.”

  “My blood comes out of the desert. It’s still got the desert in it. Yet I’m breaking my Jews into Greek culture, cleaning up Jerusalem and making it a noble city instead of a slum of God. Let them talk about their ancient glories. They don’t wash themselves and they loathe good architecture. My blood comes out of the desert, but it’s breaking them with a state too fine for their rancorous hearts. Have I ever said that to you before, Marcus Antonius?”

  “No.” Antonius had the appearance of a man awakening from deep sleep. “But I’ve always liked you. That’s why—” He stopped.

  “Finish,” said Herodes. “I know what you meant to say. That’s why you wouldn’t let Cleopatra have her way. She’s always hated me. She wanted to see me flung out or stabbed in the dark. You had only to say the word, and I was dethroned or dead. And she was your woman.”

  He halted and grew confused for the first time, but struck his hands vehemently over his head.

  “You didn’t say the word. You left me King of my Jews still. That’s why I’ve come to you now. An Idumxan King of the Jews to a Roman King of nothing.”

  “I’m glad I kept you on your throne,” said Antonius at last. “It was about the only good thing I did. Go and make your peace with Octavianus, and he’ll leave you there too. The Jews are a stiff-necked people, proud of their superior stink before God, and he’ll know that it’s hard to find the right man to grind them down, to give them baths and blasphemous architecture. So he won’t touch you—if you go to him now.”

  “But I’ve come to you,” answered Herodes quickly. There was another silence. Antonius stirred uneasily, then he cried out in a voice of suffering passion:

  “I wish you hadn’t come. I was peaceful, drinking myself to death. You’ve roused me with your cursed offer of loyalty when I was at peace in a world of traitors. I can’t bear your price, do you hear?”

  Herodes said nothing but stared commandingly at him. Antonius wrung his hands.

  “It tears the heart out of me, do you hear? It makes me want to weep again, and I thought I’d burned out my tears. It’s life you’re offering me. Madness, hope, friendship. Lies, lies. I can’t bear it.”

  Herodes still said nothing. Antonius subsided, panting.

  “Listen, Herodes,” he said after a while. “Here’s something you wouldn’t think of me, but perhaps you’ll know it from the desert that’s still in your own blood. I’ve found my desert. I’m lost in it. Nothing that you say makes any difference. I’m lost. I’m waiting to die. Everything else is a dream—part of the nightmare. I can’t wake up again. Let me wander in my desert.”

  Herodes leaned forward with the stealthy grace that shaped all his movements, and took in his hands the hands of Antonius.

  “I told you we were akin. We cannot give our hearts to these folk of the city and the ploughed lands. I’m a just ruler, by the One God. I’d flay the man that dared to say otherwise. I’ll put a naked Aphrodite of stone into my city of Jews and burn their eyes out with her beauty. But my heart’s not in it all. I’m a soldier, not a judge. It’s men like you and me that make the nations; and when the nation is made it’s time for the judge to do his work of appeasement and for the mason to build his marble houses. Join with me, and we will be brothers in everything. I swear it. I swear that I will have one soul and blood with you, and we will conquer the earth.”

  Antonius reached out a protesting arm to wave Herodes away, and covered his eyes with the other arm.

  “It’s dreadful,” he moaned. “How can you be so cruel?”

  “Do you want what I offer?” asked Herodes, and there was a depth of menace and love in his words that made Victor shudder.

  Antonius also shuddered, speaking from behind his raised arm.

  “There’s something that you’re hiding. Why didn’t you come to me before?”

  “Because you wouldn’t have listened.” Herodes lowered his voice and spoke with slow distinctness. “Because you wouldn’t have understood what I’ve said. Because you wouldn’t have listened to what I’m going to say...You had to be broken before you could meet me...in the desert.”

  “Speak...what is it?”

  There was a deep suppressed wail in the voice of Antonius. Victor saw two large tears roll down his cheeks, but the eyes were still covered, to ward off the blow—what blow? Antonius was like a man preparing for an attack which he was helpless to avert.

  “You know what it is.”

  “No, no,” cried Antonius wildly. “I only know that you’ve torn down the peace I had. I was dying in the one way that I can die. I’m a coward. I can’t cut my own throat. I can only drink myself to death. But now...”

  “Now you have a different choice. There is but one thing standing between you and the empire of the world. Do you think that I’d come if I wasn’t sure? Together we can organise the East. You never had the chance to do it properly.”

  “No,” said Antonius with set jaw, but still covering his face. “I didn’t.”

  “I know my own worth. I can do nothing alone—except hold Judaea. But I know what I can do to supplement your part, if we really work together.”

  “Yes...” Antonius swayed dizzily. His voice had grown thin. Victor stood ready to rush forwa
rd, sure that Antonius would fall from the couch in a faint.

  “Then kill her!” said Herodes in deep throaty tones.

  Antonius recoiled, sat quite still, dropped the hand from his eyes, and stared at Herodes. His eyes were darkly on flame; the pupils were so swollen that they filled almost the whole of the eye-space.

  “That’s enough,” he muttered thickly. “I won’t do it.” He saw that Herodes was about to speak again, and hastily interrupted.

  “Don’t talk. You’re right in all you say. It’s the only way out—with a man like you at my side. We could overrun the Empire. I’m as sure of it as I was when I led the legions out of Rome after Caesar was murdered and there was a hundred to one against me. I knew I’d win; and if I joined with you now, I’d win again. But I won’t do it.” His voice rose in a triumphant peal. “I won’t do it. Because we’d be a pack out of hell, smashing everything down. Get out of here.”

  Herodes stared back at him, and Antonius sustained the stare unflinchingly. Then, without another word, Herodes rose, swung his chair away with a crash against the wall, without looking at it—not out of anger, but lumberingly as if he felt crushed in by the walls of the room—and backed towards the door, still staring at Antonius.

  At the door he stopped and spoke in a constrained way.

  “Marcus Antonius, I could have had her poisoned, and then you would have been ready to join me. But I don’t want a broken creature. You’d have been useless. If you’d been ready to do it yourself, things would have been different.”

  “Yes, Herodes son of Antipatros, things would have been different. Now get out.”

  *

  As soon as the ante-door could be heard closing behind Herodes, Antonius sprang to his feet and rushed wildly about the room, uttering meaningless cries. Eros and Victor watched in paralysed weakness, afraid of attracting attention. At last Antonius grew exhausted and threw himself down on the couch. At once Eros was at his side, laying a wet napkin on his brow and laving his feet. Victor didn’t know what to do, and covered his ill-ease by tidying things, picking up the chair that Herodes had knocked aside, collecting the cups. He had wholly lost the instinct of devoted service which he had once shared with Eros, and merely felt revolted by his position.

  Antonius opened his eyes, and asked feebly, “Is he gone?”

  “Yes,” answered Eros tenderly.

  “Are you sure?...Go and make sure.”

  Eros obediently went away down the hall, and then returned, to soothe Antonius, with the news that Herodes could be seen making his way along the sea-front and that the door and all windows were shut.

  Antonius closed his eyes, and seemed to sleep. Victor started to tiptoe from the room, but Antonius immediately struggled up. Eros quieted him again, with a reproving look at Victor; and Antonius lay back. Victor did not dare to make another movement. He stood rooted in the middle of the floor, envying Eros his absorption in the service of their afflicted master. Try as he might, he could only feel scared and sick.

  After a while Antonius fell into an unmistakably deep sleep, and Victor crept out. He had promised to meet Daphne near the dock-gate, and he dashed from the Timonion, knowing that he was late. She was still waiting, very angry; but he hardly heard her taunts, so filled was he with the tale he had to tell. When she paused for a moment, he began telling her about Herodes and his effort to tempt Antonius.

  “I don’t care about such things,” she said, but listened, and relented, gave him a piece of cloth on which she’d embroidered a rose, which she had brought out to make him admire and for which he had no possible use.

  “I picked it up as I came out,” she explained.

  Victor was torn between his wish to talk more about Herodes and his fear that he’d seem ungrateful if he changed the subject from the embroidery; but after she’d snatched the embroidery away from him, and he’d begged it back again and kissed it, and both had said several times everything there was to say about it, they managed to make the transition to the perfidy of Herodes, and Daphne asked him to tell her about it all over again.

  They walked along, jostled by porters, wharf-officials, and bawdy sailors. A man was playing a flute of pierced ass-bone while a monkey danced. Daphne was enraptured, and stopped to watch, her hand on Victor’s shoulder. Her breath softly stirred his hair.

  What was going to happen? For the first time Victor realised that Antonius was doomed, and the thought made him feel more important instead of merely depressing him as it would have done a while ago. Now he had Daphne to consider, to look after...even though he had no claim whatever upon her and her father did all the looking-after required.

  Antonius was doomed. But nobody seemed to notice, nobody seemed to care. The world went on the same. And Daphne had pale gold hair glistening with little curls. Also her cheeks dimpled when she smiled.

  Two sailors fought; and the monkey skipped up on to his master’s head where he sat gripping at the hair and chattering. A mule with a load of glassware refused to budge, and the muleteer was frightened to beat it with his staff lest it should lie down and roll. A crowd surrounded him with ribald advice. He bought some vegetables from a passing barrow-vendor and tried vainly to lure the mule on. Somebody pushed a painted girl forward and suggested that she could help, having had much experience with ass-colts: a slang-term for the kind that constituted her clients. She had no objection to being the centre of attention; and after kissing the mule on the nose with great applause, she fed him with a cabbage-leaf. But still the mule did not budge. A gate-official arrived and blamed the girl for the disturbance, then found that a pickpocket had rifled the purse of ox-skin that hung at his side. He screamed his rage at the smiling girl, and in the midst of the uproar the muleteer, unnoticed, led his mule onward.

  “Go and tell that man that she didn’t have anything to do with it,” whispered Daphne fiercely. Victor wavered, but she insisted. “Go and do it, or I’ll never speak to you again.”

  “They’ll laugh at me...” He saw her whitening face and stepped irresolutely forward. “The girl didn’t have anything to do with the disturbance,” he began.

  “Then who are you?” shouted the official. He glared at Victor, his broad nostrils swelling. “If you’re the pimp of this piece, take her home and muzzle her.”

  “He’s an honest man,” said the girl, who moved smiling across to Victor and took his hand. “No wonder you can’t recognise him.”

  Daphne pushed into the front rank and pinched Victor vigorously.

  “Leave her alone,” she whispered.

  Victor stammered and tried to withdraw.

  “No, you don’t,” said the official. “What do you know about this young woman or whatever she calls herself? What do you mean by interfering with officers in the course of their duty?”

  “You shan’t hurt him,” cried the girl and threw her arm round Victor’s neck.

  Daphne at once pulled her hair, and the girl shrieked. “Enough of this!” shouted the official. “I’ll have you all arrested.”

  The two drunken sailors, who had given up trying to learn the cause of the trouble, started fighting again; and there was a general scrimmage. Victor succeeded in shoving away from the official, who was calling for reinforcements; but the painted girl stuck to him, still smiling and asking what the hurry was about.

  “Where are we going next, sweetheart?”

  “Get away, you beast,” said Daphne, who was holding Victor’s other arm.

  “Speak when you’re spoken to,” replied the girl shrilly. “I’ve got as many fingers and toes as you have. Not to mention legs and all the rest of it. Let him choose for himself. He’s old enough. Unless of course you’re his mother.”

  Victor felt helpless; and it was all Daphne’s fault.

  “We’re going somewhere,” he said vaguely, and tried to take Daphne’s arm. But she shook him off.

  “Tell this creature to behave herself.”

  Victor wanted to run, but the girl was hanging on to him. He s
ought to tear his arm from her grasp.

  “Let me go.”

  The girl laughed mischievously. Another crowd was assembling.

  “Can’t you do something?” said Daphne in disgust.

  Victor hadn’t brought any money with him or he would have offered it to the girl despite Daphne’s scorn. “Please leave us alone,” he said in miserable appeal.

  Daphne promptly gave the girl a savage push and sent her sprawling in the mud with kicking heels.

  “Come on, let’s run,” she said cheerfully, and sped round the corner.

  Victor followed, and found her laughing, to his surprise. “Kiss me, quickly,” she said.

  And he kissed her, in the middle of the street. Most of the passers paid no heed, a man with a truck shouted “Make way,” and a drunk cheered. It was the first time that Victor had kissed Daphne since she called him into the doorway of her flat after their second meeting.

  She disengaged herself and ran down the road.

  *

  Back in the Timonion, Victor heard the news about the ships of Herodes. Sails had been hoisted as soon as Herodes returned and the ship had sailed out into the harbour, presumably for the Royal Quay so that Herodes might offer homage to Cleopatra. But the ship had swung away through the harbour-mouth, clearing the moles and making northeast before the officer in the Pharosfort, worried also by lack of instructions, had time to train a catapult, to trumpet a command, or to run out the great chains that closed the harbour, linking the Pharos to the fort on the Lochias Point. Herodes was gone.

  Antonius still slept.

  He slept all that night, moaning at times for milk. Once, when wine was brought, he spat it out and called for milk, then for something bitter. “Wormwood,” he whimpered. He wanted wormwood-steeped water, but there was none in the house, though it was sold in the markets for keeping fleas away and for medicinal purposes. Then his cry changed.

  “Vinegar.” He was given vinegar, and seem satisfied. Then he slept again.

  Victor lay awake, trying to think of Daphne’s kiss but obscure fears harried him, though at the end of an hour he was unable to remember what he had been thinking. He drifted into a patchy sleep, awakening at dawn and falling back into a dream-daze of chases and involving terrors. He awoke again to hear water splashing. At first, in the disturbed images of half-dream, he thought that the rock was sinking under the waters and his ears deafened by the cataracts of drowning; then, climbing to the tower-top, he looked over the rampart and saw wine being emptied into the harbour, out of bottles, jars, and casks of every size. Each window was pouring with red wine, as if the house had somehow crushed its inhabitants and was now ejecting their blood.