by Talbot Mundy
There was a gallery around three sides; beneath it, half-hidden by the Babylonian draperies — on platforms rising nearly to the level of the throne — a drunkenness of color in subdued light — sat as many of the notables of Alexandria as could be crowded on the gilded seats, the women to the front for Caesar’s sake (and they were gloriously dressed, good-looking women for the most part, because the Alexandrian climate and the Macedonian strain diluted by the blood of many other races runs to exotic loveliness as long as youth lasts). From behind the gilded wooden grille that screened the gallery another thousand lesser notables looked on, including women who were doubtless much less beautiful.
The gilded cornices, the columns of assembled onyx pieced together to preserve the natural design, the dais built of marble, malachite and silver with the famous golden lions supporting thrones of glittering electrum, canopied with cloth of gold and backed by a screen of ivory set with emeralds, provided Olympian splendor fit for drama of the gods; and the thrones were vacant, which produced a strong thrill of expectancy.
By every column stood a Ptolemaic guardsman, gorgeous in brass and crimson — bigger, more important-looking and to the eye more dangerously armed than Caesar’s men, who stood in double lines in two detachments, one on either side of the great bronze entrance door, under the command of six decurions and Ahenobarbus the centurion. They had a standard with them and six trumpeters.
Ptolemy’s seat was alone, in front of fourteen ministers, all dressed like Romans with the far-fetched notion of persuading Caesar that he had to deal with men whose mentality was on a level with his own and who perfectly understood the Roman point of view; but they had the Alexandrian vivacity and restlessness, not lacking dignity but much less strong appearing than the Roman manner, making togas seem incongruous. Young Ptolemy was pale and blue beneath the eyes; his golden chain-mail, worn under the toga, made him appear fragile, and he found the golden bay-leaf chaplet that Potheinos had persuaded him to wear, too, as a compliment to Caesar, oppressively heavy; he kept moving it with waxy-looking fingers — motions that made the Alexandrians chuckle because they suggested caricatures of Caesar’s habit of adjusting his own scant fringe of hair with a forefinger.
Potheinos’ chair was exactly behind Ptolemy’s, where he could whisper to him, forward of the seats of fourteen other ministers, to the right of the throne-dais as one faced it from the entrance.
Caesar sat facing Ptolemy, with Calvinus beside him and twelve lictors in their red cloaks standing in a row between him and a table at which Faberius, Caesar’s secretary, sat with several assistants. Caesar’s imperator’s cloak, his golden wreath and aristocratic air of confidence, with sunlight streaming on him from a high-set window produced a cameo-like effect, exaggerated by contrast with Calvinus, who was a bronzed and bullet-headed veteran — a coarse man polished by promotion.
On Ptolemy’s side of the room, toward the door and therefore farther from the thrones, there had been set one lone and unimportant-looking chair. It was the only chair in sight unoccupied, and it was plainly meant for Cleopatra, who, if she should be so ill-advised as to appear and to accept that solitary seat, should look less like a queen than like a prisoner awaiting verdict. There were no tall ostrich-feather fans — no canopy, like that which had been stretched on gilded poles above Ptolemy’s seat. There was not even a footstool or a mark of royalty of any sort.
Caesar and Ptolemy faced each other across a carpet that was one of the notorious wonders of the world, though it was not a compliment to Caesar. Along the whole length of the wonderful mosaic floor it flowed, descending from a cataract, that was the throne steps, to a delta amid sculptured palm-trees by the bronze door; it represented River Nile, of Nile-blue, realistically swarming with the Nile-birds, fish, reeds, hippopotami and crocodiles, the Nile boats and the temples on the banks.
The slaves who wove it were a present from Orontes, King of Parthia, who had not so long ago defeated Crassus, capturing uncounted Roman standards — a defeat so shameful that the Romans set their teeth at mention of its name.
An interminable wait for Cleopatra had not produced any noticeable change in Caesar’s manner. Anticipation was straining all other nerves than his to the verge of hysteria, already aggravated by the stifling heat. When Ptolemy, responding to a whisper from Potheinos, stood up at last and a black slave struck a golden gong for silence Caesar appeared only mildly interested, but the fans beneath the balcony ceased swaying. There was breathless silence when the last reverberations of the gong died down amid the sculptured palm-leaf jungle of the ceiling. Ptolemy’s young, querulous, indignant voice rose like the plaint of a eunuch-priest in an Ephesian temple.
“I am offended by your lictors, Caesar. They are contrary to custom, and I know the Roman law about it; whether you are consul or dictator doesn’t matter; when you enter an allied and friendly state it is forbidden to bring lictors with you.”
Caesar remained seated. “An allied state,” he retorted calmly, “keeps the terms of its alliance. And a friendly state is one which does not harbor enemies of Rome or resist Rome by force of arms.”
Silence again. Potheinos began whispering to Ptolemy from behind him. Calvinus watched Caesar with the corner of his eye and with the grim ghost of a smile; folding his arms he thrust his legs out, patient but contemptuous. He shot one swift glance in the direction of Ahenobarbus at the door.
“I object, too,” Ptolemy continued, taking his words from his eunuch-minister, “to the spies and secret agents you have sent throughout the city spreading false reports. You have no right to misinform the populace and to try to set them-against me. I have twenty thous—”
Potheinos checked him. He turned to remonstrate.
He and Potheinos argued in angry undertones, the other ministers all leaning their heads toward them, trying to make it seem like an official and dignified conference. Caesar had plenty of time to frame his answer, but he kept it until they had finished arguing:
“They can hardly be said to be secret agents, since you say you know about them. I have been gratified to learn that certain Alexandrians — your subjects — who appreciate that I am here to settle the succession and to restore order, have been spreading news to that effect.”
Again Potheinos whispered, the other ministers all nodding confirmation. Ptolemy, with a grandiose gesture of ultimatum, shouted at Caesar:
“It is common knowledge that your way is to employ a horde of spies and that their business is to corrupt the people. They spread propaganda about your alleged invincibility. Your agents here are nearly all expatriated Romans, who would like to regain their citizenship by earning your good-will. You are welcome to every Roman in Alexandria. I wish you would take them all away with you.”
He threw the Roman toga from his shoulders and resumed his seat, glaring with indignation. Potheinos appealed to the crowd beneath the balconies by shrugging his eloquent hands and shoulders.
Caesar sat still, although Calvinus again glanced at Ahenobarbus, who strode out and stood on the carpet between the platoons, so that they now faced him from both sides and he could direct them instantly. There began to be a murmur in the gallery, but Caesar stood up, after he had thought a moment with his long lean fingers stroking at his chin. When he spoke his voice was unexcited:
“I am not here to discuss unimportant details of local government, but as the representative of Rome and the executor of the testament of King Neos Dionysos, Ptolemy the Thirteenth. Let the testament be read.”
He sat down, crossed a leg over his knee and carefully rearranged his tunic. A secretary at the table stood up and unrolled a scroll of parchment.
“Is that the original testament?” Potheinos asked.
There was no answer. Potheinos shook his head violently, but Caesar affected not to notice him; he held out a hand for his tablets, which a slave at the table passed to him, reaching between the rows of lictors. He began to make notes on a tablet and the secretary started reading in a singsong voice.<
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Whether or not he was deliberately chosen for the purpose, that secretary was a Gaul, who happened to know no more of Greek than how to read the alphabet and spell the words. He mispronounced it so abominably that it was next to impossible to understand a word of what he said. People ceased to try to listen. Someone cried out from the gallery that the whole proceeding was an insult. There began to be more than a murmur — a mob-note — a premonitory warning of the city’s temper, and there sounded the ominous clangor of swords on shields as, unseen from the throne-room, a platoon or two of Caesar’s legionaries drew attention to their presence in the gallery, their backs against the outer wall. In the midst of that excitement Potheinos stood up as if to speak.
But though his mouth was open not a word carne forth. A thumping on the bronze door interrupted him. He turned, like everybody else except Caesar and Calvinus, expecting to see Cleopatra enter — ready to enjoy her mortification when she should see the wretched seat provided. In the sudden hush the secretary’s voice seemed so loud that he grew embarrassed and subdued it, but he went on stammering and droning mispronunciation of the antiquated Greek.
Ahenobarbus barked his legionaries to attention. The throne-room echoed to the thump of spear-butts, grounded with Roman precision. Black slaves swung the double door wide — and there came a gasp from gallery and platform. Only Caesar did not look up; he was showing Calvinus the notes that he had written.
Framed in the open door, barbarically splendid, Tros stood, with a jeweled gold band binding the black hair that fell to his shoulders — dressed in his gold-embroidered crimson cloak above a purple and gold tunic — wearing his great green scabbard and its sword with the jeweled hilt. Behind him, even more extravagantly dressed in eastern silks, Esias stood; he stroked his gray beard, much less confident than Tros of the advisability of facing that assembly.
Tros’ voice rumbled something. Ahenobarbus, beckoning him forward, threw a hand up and announced him in the voice of a centurion on parade:
“The illustrious Lord Tros of Samothrace!”
There was a murmur of excited interest. Caesar glanced up, smiling a little grimly. It was almost better to watch Caesar’s face then, than to observe how Tros strode forth along the center of the carpet and, craftily bowing his thick neck for a moment in the direction of the vacant thrones, thus avoiding any personal obeisance, advanced with a deep-sea stride like some barbaric messenger from Neptune coming to enforce Olympian decrees.
Esias followed, but Esias appeared timid, and apparently in two minds between brazening it out and looking as obsequious as possible in spite of the fact that he was wearing silks worth a nobleman’s ransom.
Caesar remained seated. Tros saluted Caesar with an air of stubborn mistrust, which Caesar answered with an exquisitely calculated condescension, turning at once to order the two nearest lictors to set chairs beside his own. The throne-room gasped at that, but Caesar appeared to enjoy the sensation, perfectly aware that he was scandalizing Alexandrian society. None — not Caesar himself — knew yet what the arrival on the scene of Tros portended. Some thought Tros a pirate. Others, seeing him so fabulously and richly dressed, believed him an ambassador, perhaps with promises of military aid for Caesar. Some had heard a rumor that on Tros’ ship Cleopatra had returned to Alexandria to make her way to Caesar in the night. And some again had heard amazing tales of how Tros came near slaying Caesar when he warred against him amid far-off islands to the north of Gaul. All Alexandria had seen his ship and wondered at it.
But Tros might be explained away. Esias was an unforgivable offense. Receiving him, returning his salute with condescending cordiality — above all offering the Jew a seat beside his own, Caesar either betrayed his ignorance or else, as his smile appeared to indicate, deliberately flouted court and king.
It was the policy of Alexandrians to give the Jews exactly as much freedom as should make existence tolerable — not another privilege beyond that. They were rigidly restricted to the Jewish quarter. They were neither the equals of Alexandrians before the law nor were they ever admitted to reserved seats at the games. Society and law combined to give them no chance to impose a tyranny of money or to achieve that recognition that perhaps might lead to the control of the affairs of state. Jews did their business with the palace through an intermediary, they remaining at the outer gate. There were no exceptions.
Caesar began talking to Tros and presently to Esias in a low voice, smiling, seeming not to look into his eyes yet missing no shade of expression. Tros answered curtly; Esias nervously but with dignity; then they took the seats the lictors placed for them. The secretary, having read the testament, sat down then, neither he nor anyone the wiser. None had listened. Caesar spoke to Calvinus, the tribune nodding as if confirming information.
On the other side of the Nile-blue carpet Ptolemy was listening to Potheinos’ urgings Finally he seemed to assent to some proposal and Potheinos beckoned a slave; he sent him hurrying out through a door half hidden by a screen below the balcony. But Calvinus observed that; a moment later a decurion, two legionaries and a Greek slave went out through another door. Potheinos’ slave was brought back noisily protesting.
That was the spark that lit the conflagration. Shrugging his shoulders almost to the ears, and dropping them as if he let go all responsibility for what he knew was coming, Potheinos rose to his feet behind Ptolemy and, pointing a finger at Caesar, began:
“Most honorable Caesar—”
Caesar interrupted him. He stood, and in the voice with which he had so often stirred his legions — calm and yet thrilling with tremendous power — he sprang his first surprise:
“My information is: that those messengers you sent at my request to General Achillas to instruct him to disband his forces at Pelusium, were waylaid at your secret instruction and one was killed, the other wounded. Esias tells me that the wounded man was thrown into a shed belonging to himself, and that Achillas is advancing on Alexandria with twenty thousand men. I would appreciate your comments.”
But Potheinos made none. Caesar had stolen his thunder. Utterly bereft of a retort — aware now that his own mismanagement had risked a crowd of Alexandrians as hostages in Caesar’s hands within the palace, whence they could not possibly escape without the Roman’s leave, Potheinos sat still, choking his emotion.
“You had hoped,” said Caesar, after a dramatic pause, “to surprise me with that army under General Achillas. You assented to this conference to gain time, and expecting at the same time to allay any suspicion that I might feel. You brought these notables to witness such discourtesies as you should see fit to address to me either in person or through the lips of your young king, intending thereby to increase your own prestige. But I assure you I am capable of protecting myself and my friends, as well from your insolence as from that violence which you have had in preparation since the day those messengers were sent.”
He paused, his blue eyes casually glancing at Esias, the sardonic flicker of a smile escaping him as he observed the Jew’s embarrassment.
“I am much beholden to Esias for the information.”
Not having betrayed that information, which, in fact, had been reported to Caesar by his own spies, Esias made extravagant gestures of protest, but those convinced nobody; there was a rising murmur of execration, checked by Ahenobarbus, who ordered a trumpet-blast to restore order. Esias now had no alternative than to claim Caesar’s protection, and finance, to that extent at any rate, was now amenable to Rome. Not an Alexandrian was there who did not realize that situation perfectly. A voice yelled from the gallery:
“We will burn the Jews out! Then what?”
Caesar resumed as soon as there was silence. With a gesture he dismissed Potheinos from consideration and addressed himself directly to the young king, who glared with livid hatred:
“I am amazed to learn to what devices you, Prince Ptolemy, have stooped in order to deprive your sister of those equal rights which she inherited. That testament, just read, entrusted
to the Roman Senate and the Roman People full responsibility as its executors. That you have taken it upon yourself to overthrow by violence a scheme of government determined by your father under Roman auspices I find unfilial — unfriendly — and without a precedent, except in the recorded annals of those peoples whose unwise rulers, on the advice of ministers sometimes, and sometimes against the advice of ministers, have brought on their own heads ruin.”
He was irritating by intention. It was more his manner than his words that rankled. He was speaking — and he knew it — to a prince whose pedigree entitled him to precedence above all rulers of the known world. Notwithstanding parricide and misrule, not a family on earth was prouder than the line of Lagidae, to whom a Caesar was an upstart — a mere adventurer. And he rebuked him in the presence of nobility who, in spite of their delight in lampoon and all manner of irreverence, delighted equally in glamour of the throne and in monarchic principles.
Prince Ptolemy, flushing passionately and encouraged by the growing murmur, stood up and confronted him. Potheinos, well aware that Caesar for the moment had the upper hand, attempted to restrain the boy by tugging at his cloak, but Ptolemy shook his hand off petulantly:
“Caesar,” he shouted, “you should be ashamed to invade my palace like a robber and command me what to do, or not to do! My General Achillas shall discuss that with you — he and twenty thousand men! I cast my sister out. She has come back and deceived you, as she has deceived plenty of others by her witchcraft! Many besides you have had experience of her! But have her and welcome! Only go away!”
His golden armor and the over-heavy golden wreath — hereditary pride of gesture — childish anger — made him less absurd than pitiable; but Caesar did not spare him; he answered with disdain, more mortifying to the boy, and to his ministers, than if he had offered violence:
