My neck was about to be snapped, and with each footstep my head thumped against the inside of the roll. That, added to the lack of air, began to deprive me of my senses. I saw little shooting stars before my eyes at each jolt.
Now we were stopped again. I heard low voices, then louder ones arguing. Then the creak of a door.
I stiffened; I could not help myself. I heard more voices. Then I felt the rug being placed on the floor, and a tug as the bindings were cut away. Suddenly there was a yank, and the entire rug shot out from around me, propelling me out and onto the slippery onyx floor. I slid several feet before I could free my hands to stop myself. As I looked up, I saw two lean and muscular legs, their feet encased in Roman military boots, right before me.
I sat up, my eyes following quickly up past the leather strips of the general's uniform and then over the cuirass, and then I was looking directly into his face: Caesar's face.
I recognized it from his busts and his portraits. The features were the same. But what none of them had captured was the reserved, deadly power of the man.
"Greetings," he said, and his voice was quiet, almost a whisper. But not the sort of whisper that is afraid of being overheard; it is the whisper of one who knows others will strain to catch his every word, and he need not deign to raise his voice to conversational level.
Still, I caught the shadow of surprise crossing his face; he was unsuccessful at hiding it entirely.
He reached down to take my hand and pull me up. I was struck with his utter assurance; how easily I could have slashed at him with a knife. Instead I merely rose and found myself facing him.
I forgot that I had been frightened, so puzzled was I by this man and by my surroundings. The hours inside the rug had left me dazed and unsteady on my feet. It was dark outside. Oil lamps had been lit in the room. Where had the time gone? How long had we waited in Alexandria? Caesar seemed to be alone. Could this be possible?
"A gift from the Queen of Egypt," Apollodoros was saying, gesturing to the unfurled rug. Caesar stepped on it. "But it is not Egyptian," he said. "I am the Egyptian," I said.
He was staring at me. He looked as if he knew well how to smile, but was deliberately withholding it. "You are not Egyptian either," he finally said, with virtually no expression. It was impossible to tell what he thought. Yet his lack of animation was not cold, but strangely teasing and luring.
"My ancestry, as Caesar well knows, is Macedonian, but as Queen of Egypt I have taken the spirit of Egypt for my own."
"Is that so?" Caesar walked around me as though I were a tree, rooted and growing in his--my--chamber. For I now found myself as an intruder in my very own apartments.
"Do you like the tortoiseshell doors in this chamber?" I asked, more boldly than I felt. "I was always most fond of them. Are you my guest, or am I yours?"
Now he laughed, but his face still held that peculiar reserve of power and watchfulness. "We are both one another's. You will have to educate me about these things. I am merely a Roman barbarian." He sat, selecting a hard-backed chair.
I chose not to answer that. "I am here, as you requested." I waited. He raised one eyebrow. "In good time, too. I am impressed. Most impressed." He nodded.
"I was told you respected speed." "Above almost all other things." "And what are the other things you respect?"
"Fortune, and the courage to grasp it." He leaned back and crossed his arms. They were brown, lean, and sinewy.
"I have heard you are a gambler. That you cried, 'Let the dice fly high!' as you crossed the Rubicon."
"You have heard much," he said.
"Your boldness was rewarded," I continued. The truth was, I had not heard much, and had almost come to the end of my knowledge of him. "As you hope yours will be," he said. "Yes."
Now, at long last, he almost smiled. "Boldness is its own reward. It belongs to only a select few."
It was as if I were hearing my own thoughts miraculously voiced aloud by another. "No, it brings rewards. For many rewards are grasped only by the bold," I answered.
"Enough words," he said, and waved for Apollodoros to depart.
He bowed and withdrew. Then Caesar turned to me.
Now was the moment. He was going to reach out and take me, just as he took Gaul and Rome. I braced myself. I was ready.
"Why did you send supplies to Pompey?" he suddenly asked.
I had had my eyes downcast, waiting. Now I looked up to see him watching me, well aware of what I had been expecting, but not interested in pursuing it. He even looked disgusted, or possibly only amused. It was impossible to tell with him.
"I had to," I said. "Magnus Pompey had been my father the King's patron."
"What about the son, Gnaeus Pompey?"
"What about him?"
"Is he your ally? What did you owe him?"
"Nothing."
"Good. I mean to kill him. And I would not have you be my enemy thereby." He said "I mean to kill him" as casually as a boy says, "I am going fishing." Then I remembered hearing once that Caesar had threatened a Roman tribune with death if he continued pestering him with questions about treasury funds, and that Caesar had then added, "And this, you know, young man, is more disagreeable for me to say than to do." Suddenly the story was absolutely believable.
"Do as you like," I heard myself saying.
"Oh, are you giving me permission?" he said. "Kind of you."
"I am not here to discuss Pompey. I am here because I have been unlawfully deposed from my throne, and because you have the power to set it right. My brother and his advisors are evil--"
He winced. "Please. That word is overused. Suffice it to say I don't care for them or for their manner of operation: inept and without honor. You shall have your throne back, never fear. I shall see to it." He paused. "As you said, boldness brings rewards. And you have proved most bold."
"I thank you," I said. But could I trust his word?
"Now all that is over," he said, smiling at last, "do I have your hand, as my loyal ally?"
I gave it to him. He grasped it in both his. I was surprised to find that he had small hands. "You will find my loyalty to be absolute," I said.
"A rare commodity. And even rarer among Ptolemies."
Now he seemed to have switched into another personality. His brittle demeanor had softened, but his dark brown eyes were still wary. He sat relaxed, and his hand was nowhere near his sword. "I wish to believe you," he said with all sincerity. "I myself always keep my word, but until now I have found no fellow in that."
"You will see," I assured him. And I kept that promise, being loyal to him until long after his dying breath.
"Yes," he said with that same smile, "I remember promising the Cilician pirates who kidnapped me that I would return and kill them. They didn't believe me, because I sang songs with them and kept good company around the camphre. But I kept my word."
I shuddered. "Do you mean you keep your word only about killing? I mean more than that when I give my word."
"I keep my word in all things, good and bad."
"What about your marriage vows?" I blurted out. How could the notorious adulterer claim to always be loyal?
"Well, where marriage is concerned, it is a different matter," he admitted. "In Rome the marriage vows are trampled on. But I was faithful to Cornelia." "The wife of your youth," I said.
"Yes. I loved her. Perhaps that is a capacity that one loses with age." He said it regretfully, and I almost believed him. "Perhaps all that is left after the age of fifty is loyalty and love for one's fellow soldiers."
"Do not think that way!" I heard myself saying. "That is worse than being defeated in a battle!"
Now he broke out into a true smile, not a half one. "Wait until you are defeated in a battle before you say that. There is nothing worse than being defeated in battle."
"Spoken like the conqueror of the world," I said, staring at him. He was the conqueror of the world, the new Alexander. Yet here he sat on a chair in my room, and he was not even a particularly la
rge man. "I hope you will utterly defeat my brother and his army!"
"Thus far nothing has happened. I have been sightseeing in your magnificent white city, going to the Museion, taking in lectures, reading in the Library. The Egyptian army is still guarding against you on the eastern frontier."
"When they find I have slipped through, they will be here soon enough." "Then I shall have quite a challenge. I have only four thousand men with me, and thirty-five ships. I understand there are twenty thousand men in the Egyptian army. I am outnumbered five to one." He said it cheerfully. "We shall defeat them!" I said fiercely.
"But in the meantime I shall send for reinforcements," he said. "Prudent," I said. Then we both laughed. "Let me show you your quarters, Imperator," I said. "I am familiar with them, as they were mine." "And can be again," he said. He crossed his lean arms. "I would appreciate that," I admitted. "I can find you very comfortable quarters in the building adjacent to the temple of Isis." "No, I meant that you should live here with me."
"With you? To share your couch?" Here it came, as I had expected. The conqueror must take all the spoils.
"Couches are uncomfortable. I prefer a bed. Show it to me." "Where have you been sleeping?"
"On the couch. I was waiting for you before I used the bed."
"You were waiting for me?" I was disappointed. Had I not surprised him? Was he not astounded with my ingenuity in coming to him through enemy lines?
"I was. I was informed that you were resourceful, clever, and passionate--at least that is what your enemies claimed! That made it a sort of test. I would have tried to find a way to get to Alexandria, were I in your place; I believed that you would, also, although I could not predict what method you would use. And so I waited. Knowing that if you came as I expected you to do, I would salute and admire you for it. And want you. And only then would I wish to use the bed. Show it to me." He stood up, his powerful lithe frame rising instantaneously.
The astonishing thing was, I wanted to. The terrible chore, the awful sacrifice--it was not to be that way. This was entirely unexpected. I could not explain it to myself.
"Come with me," I said. "Follow me wherever I take you." I took his hand, liking the feel of it.
"That is not something I am accustomed to: following."
We were traversing the rooms that lay between the general audience chamber and the innermost one of the royal bedchamber. Abruptly he stopped and pulled my hand.
"I go no step farther until you swear to me that this is of your own volition," he said in a very soft voice. "What I said in the audience chamber, about the bed, was a jest. I am no rapist, no pillager. I will support your claim to the throne regardless. You need not ever have anything to do with me personally." He paused. "I have never touched a woman who did not wish me to."
"It is my desire and wish," I assured him. It was true, but I could not understand it. This man was a stranger. I did not even know if he was right-or left-handed. Perhaps that was the thrill of it.
But no, I deceive myself. It was Caesar himself. Just looking at him--at his powerful frame, his straight bearing, his lean and tanned face--made me want to touch him. I had never touched or lingeringly stroked anything besides an animal before--only my horse, my dogs, my cats. Now I wished nothing more than to touch the flesh of this man standing before me. Had I gone mad?
As in a dream, I led him through the rooms. They were in darkness, except for a few corners where standing oil lamps had been lit.
We walked on onyx floors, slippery beneath our feet, with the lamplight reflecting but faintly in them, past pale rooms covered in ivory panels. I could hear the low hiss and murmur of the sea outside the eastern windows. Still I led him on wordlessly, I Orpheus and he Eurydice, until we reached my chamber.
It remained as I had left it months ago. The bed coverlet, steeped in rich Tyrian dye, looked brown, not purple, in the moonlight. A half-moon was setting outside the window, as if it hastened away and would not look.
Now, suddenly, I was at a loss as to what to do. I had brought him here, but this was so formal, so abrupt. It almost seemed like an initiation ceremony, one of the mysteries that were celebrated in secret rites. And it was a secret rite of which I was ignorant. What was I thinking of?
Caesar stood still, like a statue. And then I said--the thought suddenly came from nowhere--"You must wear the robes of Amun." Opening an ebony-inlaid trunk, I took out the ancient robes that the ruler kept in readiness for ceremonies at the temples. This one was shot through with gold thread, heavy with encrusted jewels, and woven with rare glistening colors.
"I am not a god," he said quietly, as I draped the robe over his shoulders. "Yet in Ephesus I was hailed as one." There was a wistfulness in his voice, faint, yet there.
"Tonight you are a god," I said. "You will come to me as Amun."
"And you? Who are you?"
"Isis," I said. My ceremonial robes were also at hand.
"Can we not merely be Julius Caesar and Cleopatra?" I had to strain to hear his voice.
"Tonight we are more than that, and we must embrace it," I said. I was frightened at what I had embarked on; I was not even sure I could complete it. Perhaps the costumes would serve to disguise my confusion.
He stood before me in the robes of the god. In the darkness his face was hidden, but his physical presence filled the robes and did them justice.
He bent down to kiss me, the first time anyone had ever done so. I almost flinched at his touch, it was so foreign to me to let anyone come that close. He touched my hair, bringing both hands up to do so; he embraced me gently, he kissed my neck. Each action was so slow and deliberate that it felt portentous, as if he were unbolting a sacred door or unsealing a shrine. He took my hands in his and guided them to embrace him as well, as if he knew I needed to be taught. And touching him, even just his shoulders, felt as forbidden as his touch on me: unpermitted, shocking, alien. Not only was he a stranger, but now I seemed a stranger to my very self. And yet. . . it was as if I did know him, in some fundamental, reassuring way. My fear evaporated, its place taken by eagerness and excitement.
He reached down and picked me up, more easily than Apollodoros had. I felt his arm bones, and I wanted them to be dedicated to me, to protecting me, to fighting for me. He took only two steps over to the bed.
The robes of Amun were heavy and smothering. Now he must throw them off. But no; he insisted on stripping off his military gear in a ritualistic manner, and lying naked beneath the robes.
I removed my gown in turn, and was glad to do so; once becoming, after the hard journey it was dirty and smelled of the rug and the bottom of the boat. With unsteady hands I drew the Isis robe around my shoulders and over my back.
"Ah." He put out a hand and touched me, as if in wonder. Had I not known better, I would have believed he had never seen a woman's body before. "You are beautiful." And I knew that tonight it was so.
Bolder now, I touched him, feeling his muscled chest, so different from the eunuch Mardian's--the only male I had ever embraced. I ran my hands over his shoulders, exploring like a child in a new room. He seemed amused.
"You must teach me," I whispered into his ear, freely admitting my lack of knowledge. I trusted him absolutely, a curious thing.
"Can Amun teach Isis?" he said. "No. They are both fully knowledgeable. A god and a goddess." Then he pulled gently and unfastened the clasp of my robe. The heavy costume slid off my shoulders. He kissed the place where the robe had lain. His lips made my skin rise in gooseflesh.
He bent his head and kissed my breasts, first the right, then the left. He touched them almost reverently.
"Even Venus is never portrayed with breasts this perfect," he murmured. He held me gently, as if he were still undecided whether to pursue this course of action. After what seemed a long, quiet time, he said, "You are young and offer me a great gift. But I would not rob your husband of it."
"I'm free to offer it as I will," I cried, suddenly afraid he would refuse me. "And fate
is unlikely ever to grant me a husband I want!" Certainly not my brother--I had no wish to save anything of my person for him, or even to let him touch me. "You must be my husband!" I insisted. "Yes, Amun to Isis--" Let me hide my unbidden and impolitic desire behind the conventions of the costumes.
"Then, for tonight--" At last he pressed himself against me, and we sank down together on the pillows. He was lying on me, the heavy Amun robes weighing us down. I was yearning for us to join together. Everything was gone from my mind but this desire. I did not remember that I had been afraid, or sought information from the prostitute or Olympos, only that I wanted to be physically possessed by Caesar.
"--I will be your husband."
"So be it," I said, with all my heart.
And I gave myself to him, and our destinies merged. He became my lord and partner, I his queen and wife.
He was gentle and patient with me; it was I who was eager and hungry, as if he had created an appetite in me that had never existed before. I was caught up in it, picked up and transported to another world, as I had heard happened to sages; afterwards they returned to earth babbling about the visions they had had, indescribable, ineffable, transforming. Sometimes these holy men claimed to have been sucked up into the clouds by whirling winds and carried great distances; sometimes they departed only from the utter quiet of their own chambers. Always they were changed when they returned, and so I was, as well. I had touched and been touched by another human being, had allowed someone beyond all my guarded gates of privacy, into my very self, so that there were no boundaries left. What I had dreaded all my life as annihilation I now experienced as completion. My world changed utterly in that instant. I clung to him as if I would never lose him. I wanted that revelation, that moment of transfiguration, never to fade. But it would; it did. So I learned two things that night, and the next day, from him: the perfection of a moment, and the fleeting nature of it.
Memoirs of Cleopatra (1997) Page 15
