by Jack Lindsay
He bent down to fix the stool, but straightened up without warning and grasped Sara’s arm.
“What did Jiar say?” He whispered, pointing to the cat. “Did you hear?”
The cat was lazily turning over, and Marius sank down on his stool. “There is no need to be afraid,” he went on, reassuringly. “There is no danger now. I am glad for your sake. Me nothing can hurt.”
Sara watched him closely, unable to decide if he was crazed or acting. “I come from the Queen,” he repeated, feeling that it would never do to compromise his mistress with this man.
“Ah yes,” said Marius, turning to him, and his eyes were clear and intelligently keen. “What has the Queen to say to her humble servant?”
“She sends you her congratulations for your defence of our dead Lord Caesar, and wishes to aid you in the good work.”
“She is welcome,” said Marius, solemnly. “All are welcome. I reject none, though I have been rejected. I scorn none, though I have been scorned. I slay none —” He broke off and looked cunningly at the cat, as if he had almost been tripped into revealing a secret. Then his eyes cleared again, and he spoke in his tones of shrewd comprehension.
“I am at the Queen’s service.”
“Caesar left a son,” said Sara, meaningly. “There is a child named Caesarion.”
Marius considered the statement. “It is just that the son should succeed to the patrimony. I shall make Caesarion the king of the earth. You can tell your mistress that I shall do her will, because it is not her will alone.”
“She would like to hear further what plans you have.”
“I have no plans,” said Marius, eagerly. “I act as the voice bids me. I have built an altar to the manifest God. I have summoned the people to destroy their oppressors, the murderers of God. I shall come and go with armies across the world, and the son of Caesar I shall crown King in the Capitol. More I cannot say. Beyond that the veil is drawn.”
Sara watched him intently. The man was mad, but he could rouse the mob. In him spoke the voice of the eastern provinces, tortured into action.
“For myself,” resumed Marius, sharply, as if he were now expounding the only difficult part of his programme, “I demand only one thing, but nothing less will satisfy me. I demand the Arpinate villa of my ancestors. No one shall thwart me.”
“And you will tell the people about the son of Caesar?”
Marius bowed his head. “So it is written in the leaves of the Sibyl and the book of the Stars. It is weary work, but I must not falter. Righteousness must be fulfilled.”
Sara slipped a heavy purse into his hand. “To help on the good work. From the son of Caesar.”
Marius threw the chinkling wallet on to the table. “It will serve its purpose. Tell your mistress to have no fears.”
Sara backed out of the room, somehow afraid to turn from Marius.
Marius sat looking into the brazier flames, his eyes glittering. After a while the girl re-entered, “Isn’t it time yet to feed Jiar?”
“Yes, yes,” cried Marius, springing up, his face distorted with glee. He seized the cat by the slack of its neck, and, lifting open the girl’s upper-dress, thrust the cat down into her bosom, holding the folds tight up against her throat so that the cat couldn’t exit that way. The girl screamed as the frantic cat tore at her skin and dress, fighting to escape. She leaped and twisted, held by the hand of Marius grasping her dress, until at last the cat slid its way out and dropped at her feet.
“Bring Jiar some milk now,” commanded Marius, and let the girl go. “And take that trash there.” He indicated the purse of gold on the table. “Distribute it among the poor.”
“I’m bleeding,” sobbed the girl. “I’m torn and scratched all over.”
Marius took no notice, and, picking up the purse, she crept out of the room. The cat, who had been standing with fur and tail erect and with teeth bared, sat down and began licking its back paws. Marius stared into the flames.
*
Next day Gallus awoke feeling very sick; but Leonidas dosed him with cabbage-water mixed with ingredients that he refused to divulge, having been sworn to secrecy by the witch from whom he had bought the recipe. After that Gallus retched, ate some meal-porridge, and felt better. He must face Cytheris, or he would be driven to drink again. Without allowing himself to think any more about the interview, he caught up the papyri on which the envenomed elegies were transcribed, and set out.
Cytheris was in. Indeed she was still lying in bed, and permitted Gallus to be admitted to her bedroom. Her hair was down over her shoulders, untidily rich with gold of the early sun. Without looking at him she played with the hanging at her side, and said, “Why did you come?”
“To show you what I’ve written, something more for you to recite.”
He swayed on his feet, his mind blank except for the rehearsed gesture of contempt. He thrust the papers into her hand. She held them away for a moment, and then began reading. As she read, he looked at her face, and realised what he had forgotten. He loved her and didn’t care what she had done or would do, as long as she loved him in return. He snatched the papers away.
“It isn’t true,” he said, thickly. “It’s only suffering. I love you. I love you. I love you.”
He threw himself over her feet and covered his face with his hands. There was a bliss in feeling her feet against his ribs, though tunic and sheets lay between; her toes, her ankles, her shinbones, her kneecap, he loved them all; he loved every minute hair on her body. How unfair life was.
She gazed down at him. It would always be thus. He was a weakling. But she didn’t care. She loved him too — for the moment anyway. Doubtless it wouldn’t last. But neither did life. One took what one could, while one could. She reached down and stroked his head.
He looked up incredulously and saw her faint smile. In another pulse their mouths had met.
It all happened so easily, when it happened, so simply. It was his poem come true. It was life suddenly perfected, life become expression balanced and rhythmic. Only thus, writing and loving, was the wound of loss staunched and the maimed body given freedom. He had lived for this meeting moment. Down so many streets of time, through so many winding adventures and mishaps, through so many fragments of misery and joy, they had both been treading life for this moment which gave significance at last to all that went before and all that came after. It was strange.
They both felt they had known each other like this infinities ago. In the first throb of male and female seeds mating in the timeless womb.
Love is so easy a thing: a little sigh,
a body leaning closer in the dark,
the opening warmth where man and woman lie
touching like fluttering wings
*
When Sara came with a message from Cleopatra, Antonius discovered how restive he had grown. “Are you afraid?” she asked through Sara’s mouth. “Leave a sealed message with someone you trust, to be opened in case you don’t return by morning. But I don’t think you’re so very much afraid of me.”
Antonius looked at Sara, and his lips felt dry and he longed for the touch of Cleopatra. Faithful two whole years, and he had to fight his wife before he got a kiss out of her. He hadn’t even tried a house-slave, and no one thought anything of a man taking his own house-slaves.
“What does she want to discuss?”
Sara humped his back helplessly. “How should I know, save that she told me it involved the future of Rome?”
Antonius had a fair idea what her theme would be, but he wanted to excuse himself by pretending that he was acting for state reasons. The invitation was irresistible; he saw himself again catching her hands, and the paenula lifted and falling open, her surrendering looseness before she had called on Sara to produce his dagger. He would promise anything; promises were only breath. Still, she might have something to divulge after all. She, if anyone, had been Caesar’s confidante.
He licked his lips. “I’ll come,” he said, and glanced r
ound furtively. Looking up he saw that Sara had observed him. That was the final touch; this menial would laugh behind his back. It was absurd that he should be so tethered; he must make a move of independence; nothing short of a visit to Cleopatra would vindicate his manhood.
“I’ll come,” he repeated, loudly, to show that he wasn’t afraid; but without stirring he listened to the echoes. How far would the sound carry — surely not to Fulvia’s ears. But nothing would stop him. He would go. He wouldn’t be unfaithful; he would go merely to prove himself not enslaved by Fulvia. He would go as a spy on Cleopatra. She was a dangerous woman; it would be advisable to hear what she was scheming.
*
When it was nearing dusk, Cytheris sent Gallus home, saying that she had an appointment to recite, which she couldn’t afford to let pass. Gallus questioned her with his eyes, unable to express his fears more definitely; and she kissed his eyes and told him not to be foolish. She was his now, and she would be no one else’s. Tomorrow morning he could come to see her again. It was true that she had the appointment; but as soon as Gallus had gone with scores of farewell kisses and returning protestations, she knew that she had no intention of going out. She wanted to think, to be alone.
Was it the harlot’s wisdom, that men tired and must be kept at arm’s length? No, she answered her heart. It was fear that she would betray herself, that she would give herself irrevocably. Even with Antonius she had felt free, mistress of herself; and she couldn’t bear to feel that reserve breaking down. She had always stood aside and calmly criticised her actions, however much she might have seemed carried away and corybantic. It was that which had preserved, led her through to her present affluence and liberty. It was by dint of astute calculation that she had brought herself to the notice of her owner Volumnius and become his mistress while still a child. She had amused him with her powers of mimicry and wheedled him into affording her proper training; she had worked hard till she was at the head of her profession; she had set out to capture Antonius and had done so. For years she had been his acknowledged mistress; he had introduced her as Volumnia his wife while on official tours in the municipalities, and made his dear, feckless old mother accept her as a daughter-in-law.
She looked back coldly over her life. She hadn’t given herself always out of mere calculation; there had been many men whose kisses she had allowed because she liked them, and they seemed to want her dreadfully in a way she had never wanted a man; but she had given no more than that idling pity, and next moment she had forgotten the men. Was Gallus to destroy the whole plan of her life — and give what in return?
Yet how was she to withdraw now? She should never have permitted him to call after he had first left. And yet she wasn’t sorry. She took her left breast in her palm and pressed it up till she could just manage to touch it with her lips. Somehow she loved her body in a new way, not merely as an instrument, but as an entirely intimate possession — a sense that she had only known before in vagueness of toilet dreams.
*
Would he come? Would he stay away? Cleopatra shredded the petals of a rose and threw the scattering petals at one of her girls, Thatris. She had been sponged all over with olive-oil scented with balsam, and then bathed in warm rose-water; and she felt increasingly restless. If he didn’t come, she didn’t know what she’d do with herself. Already she had signs of a headache, but that had passed when she was bathed. Yet if he did not come ...
“Is there any of the slaves you like more than another?” she asked Thatris.
“No,” said the girl, warily, a frail girl, olivine with heavy eyelashes.
“Call in the first male-slave that passes,” commanded Cleopatra, yawning.
The girl went to the door and beckoned. A sinewy Greek entered. Cleopatra gesticulated and said a few words.
“No, no,” cried Thatris, reddening. She drew closer to Cleopatra. “Not him, anyway.” She faltered. “I like Hilarion better.”
“Call Hilarion then.”
Thatris pushed the sinewy and disappointed Greek out of the room with her hands on his shoulder blades, whispering to him. Then she leaned against the doorpost, as if her strength had gone. In a few moments Hilarion entered, a gold-haired lad dressed in page’s uniform.
“Tell him what he has to do,” said Cleopatra. “Come on now, don’t be bashful.”
Thatris whispered again. The lad started, laid his hand on the small dagger at his side, and then bowed. He unbuckled his belt.
“Come on now.” Cleopatra repeated her orders. “I’ve waited long enough.” She yawned.
With expressionless face she watched. So had that friend of her brother’s watched on a night four years ago, but he had had an ugly grin on his face. Well, he was dead now. Dead; and yet the dance of life still went on. Lovers clasped in fear of the dark, scraping a little warmth from the platters to hearten their starved bellies. Would she look as ungraceful and lumpish as Thatris — in an hour’s time when Antonius arrived, if he ever arrived? Would she gasp as stupidly, closing her eyes to bring nearer the darkness that was fear, the darkness that no lamp could burn clear of ghosts and rat-presences? Only the lamps of warm blood kept the darkness at bay; but they had little power. They guttered and faded as soon as the ardours of touch slackened. Thus was the ancient flame lighted, by two sticks rubbed together; patiently rubbed until the glow of gold, a new life, smouldered and burst redly out, dying away as soon as the friction ceased.
“You can go now,” she said to Hilarion. Then, yawning again without any effort to hide her teeth, she called to Thatris. “Come and dab some scent behind my ears. Press gently into the roots of the hair. Gently.”
The girl’s hands were trembling.
*
Antonius was met at the gate by Sara, who had been waiting behind a rhododendron-bush. He was attended by a single slave and muffled up in a thick military abolla. Sara led him to a side-door; and once inside the house Antonius threw off the abolla and revealed himself in a light Greek shift. “I have left a note with my brother to be opened at midnight if I haven’t returned,” he said warningly to Sara; and Sara nodded and led him down a corridor, halting before some lofty curtains. As he parted them, the sound of music and a woman’s voice was heard; and Antonius, placing a hand on his shoulder, bade him wait.
It was Cleopatra’s voice, and she was singing to the lyre. The voice was not powerful, neither was it particularly sweet or melodious; but it was clear, rather deep-toned, and disturbingly vibrant. She sang an Alexandrian song.
The waters follow the moon
but the fishes do not always go with the tide.
I am wholly Clearista’s
but there are thoughts swimming in my blood
that turn to other girls.
Nevertheless I am wholly Clearista’s.
Come and sit on my lap without a chemise.
Antonius smiled. It was the kind of song he liked. Swinging Sara aside, he opened the curtains and entered.
Cleopatra was sitting on a backless chair, half-turned away, the lyre resting in her lap. She did not look to see who was entering.
“You are welcome, consul Marcus Antonius,” she said, and dropped the lyre on a cushion. Her voice was surprisingly soft after the deeper tones of the song. Antonius stood facing her. She was dressed in a single-piece robe of Coan stuff dyed pale gold and trimmed with purple bands. He felt that she was the most desirable woman he had ever seen, and yet he did not want to want her. Always it was his fate nowadays to be entangled with women who wanted to use him for their own ulterior purposes. But it was women like Cytheris he really desired, women who wished to make no claim upon him, giving and taking, and accepting the moment as paid for by the moment’s experience. Then he forgot Cytheris and forgot Fulvia, and forgot everything except that he was looking into Cleopatra’s eyes.
She rose and moved towards the couch, sat down and made room for him at her side.
“What is it you want this time?” he heard himself asking, bluntly.
“Perhaps it is justice again,” she replied, in a tender voice, half-jestingly. “What do we all ask but justice — and perhaps our complaints show that it is what we get. Maybe the gods deliberately misunderstand, and when we pray for justice against our transgressors, they pretend we are asking to have our own transgressions judged.” She paused, and added even more lightly, “Perhaps I want nothing except to have a visitor. No one calls on me nowadays.”
He felt drugged, heavy. He could not speak. He clasped and unclasped his hands over his knees, leaning back.
She went on. “Perhaps I want to offer something this time instead of asking. But first you must have some wine to drink. Some wine from Egypt.” She clapped her hands and Thatris entered with a cedar-tray ranged with jugs and glasses.
“Alexandrian work,” said Cleopatra, picking up a jug of intricate and delicately blown glass, green and white. Frail crystalline birds clustered around it, their eyes set with emeralds. “What have you to say of a town that produces such craftwork? But you have seen Alexandria. Have you seen our Museum and our Library? Have you talked with the professors in the Medical School? Have you called at the government-offices and seen how industry is ordered in Egypt — how we have escaped the problems of your Roman world; how we, the government, own monopolies of all the main industries and sources of production; how all our industries and trades are subdivided and standardised? The Nile abets us, and we control agriculture as you folk that pray to a wilful Sky-god cannot guess. Did you see all this at Alexandria besides the lean hairless legs of the girls in the Rhacotis?”
She spoke mockingly, and Antonius could not follow her meaning. He answered dully. “I was there only a few days, and tired after riding through the desert.”
She watched him out of the corner of her eyes. What should she do with this man who had failed to rescue or avenge Caesar? She was inclined to insult him and turn him out. She had a seal on her body, the seal of Caesar; and she would never be able to break it, for Caesar had no equal. She dropped back into the cushions, her hands falling nervelessly into her lap. Her body shook faintly from head to foot.
