A Friend of Cæsar: A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C.

by William Stearns Davis

  Chapter XXIII

  Bitterness and Joy

  I

  Cornelia knew not whether to be merry or to weep when the report ofthe fate of Pompeius reached her. That she would be delivered up toher uncle was no longer to be dreaded; but into the hands of whatmanner of men had she herself fallen? Her own life and that of Fabia,she realized, would be snuffed out in a twinkling, by Pothinus and hisconfederates, the instant they saw in such a deed the least advantage.The splendid life of the court at the garrison city went on; there wasan unending round of fetes, contests in the gymnasium and stadium;chariot races; contests of poets and actors for prizes in dramaticart. To the outward eye nothing could be more decorous and magnificentthan the pleasures of the Egyptian king. And so some days passed whileCornelia crushed her fears, and waited for the news that she was surewould come--that Caesar was pressing on the tracks of his rival.

  Late one afternoon, as the king and his suite were just returned froma visit by boat up the river to inspect a temple under restoration atSethroe, Agias sought the private apartment of his patroness. His facewas extremely grave, and Cornelia at once realized that he broughtserious news.

  "Domina," he said, speaking in Latin to evade the curiosity of themaids present, "when you are at leisure, I have a curious story totell you."

  Cornelia presently found pretexts to get rid of all her women. Agiasreconnoitred, made certain that there was no eavesdropper, and beganafresh.

  "What I have to say is so different from that which we feared a fewdays since, that I scarce know how you will receive it. I have justlearned that your uncle Lucius Lentulus and Lucius Ahenobarbus made alanding on the coast the day after Pompeius was murdered; they havebeen quietly arrested and the matter hushed up. I believe thatPothinus intends to execute them without your knowledge. Only by afriendship with some of the officers of the guard did I get at this."

  Cornelia's lips twitched; her hands pressed on her cheeks till thepale skin flushed red. In her heart a hundred conflicting emotionsheld sway. She said nothing for a long time, and then it was only toask where the prisoners were confined.

  "They are in the dungeon of the fortress," said Agias. "That is allthat I can discover."

  "I must see them at once," declared the lady.

  "I do not know how Pothinus will take this," replied the youngfreedman; "the discovery of his secret will be rightly attributed tome, and your ladyship would not care to imperil my life unlesssomething very great is to be gained thereby."

  "I shall miss you very much," said Cornelia, soberly. "But thoughLucius Lentulus has done me grievous ill, he is my uncle. You mustleave Pelusium this very night, and keep out of danger untilPothinus's vexation can abate. In the morning I shall demand to seethe prisoners and to learn the eunuch's intentions touching them."

  Agias accordingly fared away, much to Cornelia's regret; but not quiteso much to his own, because his enforced journeying would take him tothe Nile villa, where was the pretty Artemisia. Early on the followingday Cornelia boldly went to Pothinus, and, without any explanations,demanded to see her uncle. The regent, who had tried to keep thematter profoundly secret, first was irate, then equivocated, and triedto deny that he had any Roman prisoners; then, driven to bay byCornelia's persistency and quiet inflexibility before his denials andprotests, gave her permission to be taken to the prison and see thecaptives.

  To pass from the palace of Pelusium to the fortress-prison was topass, by a few steps, from the Oriental life, in all its sensuoussplendour, to Orientalism in its most degraded savagery. The prisonwas a half-underground kennel of stone and brick, on which theparching sun beat pitilessly, and made the galleries and cells like somany furnaces in heat. The fetid odour of human beings confined in themost limited space in which life can be maintained; the rattle offetters; the grating of ponderous doors on slow-turning pivots; thecoarse oaths and brutish aspect of both jailers and prisoners; theindescribable squalor, filth, misery,--these may not be enlarged upon.The attendants led Cornelia to the cell, hardly better than the rest,wherein Lentulus and Ahenobarbus were confined.

  But another had been before Cornelia to visit the unfortunates. As thelady drew toward the open door she saw the graceful, easy form ofPratinas on the threshold, one hand carelessly thrust in the folds ofhis himation, the other gesturing animatedly, while he leaned againstthe stone casing.

  Lucius Lentulus, his purple-lined tunic dirty and torn, his hairdisordered, his face knitted into a bitter frown, crouched on a stoolin the little low-ceiled room, confronting the Hellene. Cowering on amass of filthy straw, his head bowed, his body quaking in a paroxysmof fear, was another whose name Cornelia knew full well.

  Pratinas was evidently just concluding a series of remarks.

  "And so, my friends, amici, as we say at Rome," he was jauntilyvapouring, "I regret indeed that the atomic theory,--which my goodAhenobarbus, I am sure, holds in common with myself,--can leave us nohope of meeting in a future world, where I can expect to win any moreof his good sesterces with loaded dice. But let him console himself!He will shortly cease from any pangs of consciousness that our goodfriend Quintus Drusus will, in all probability, enjoy the fortune thathe has inherited from his father, and marry the lady for whose handthe very noble Ahenobarbus for some time disputed. Therefore let mewish you both a safe voyage to the kingdom of Hades; and if you needmoney for the ferryman, accept now, as always, the use of my poorcredit."

  "May all the infernal gods requite you!" broke forth Lentulus, halfrising, and uplifting his fettered hands to call down a solemn curse.

  "It has been often observed by philosophers," said Pratinas, with asmile, "that even among the most sceptical, in times of greatextremity, there exists a certain belief in the existence of gods.Your excellency sees how the observation is confirmed."

  "The gods blast you!" howled Lentulus, in impotent fury. Beforefurther words could pass, Cornelia put Pratinas aside, and entered thecell.

  "Your presence, sir," she said haughtily, to the Hellene, "is neededno longer." And she pointed down the gallery.

  Pratinas flushed, hesitated as if for once at a loss, and nimblyvanished. Lentulus sat in speechless astonishment "Uncle," continuedCornelia, "what may I do for you? I did not know till last eveningthat you were here."

  But ere the other could reply the figure in the corner had sprung up,and flung itself at the lady's feet.

  "Save me! save me! By all that you hold dear, save my life! I haveloved you. I thought once that you loved me. Plead for me! Pray forme! Anything that I may but live!"

  "_Vah_, wretch!" cried the consular; and he spurned Ahenobarbus withhis foot. "It is indeed well that you have not married into family ofmine! If you can do naught else, you can at least die with dignity asbecomes a Roman patrician--and not beg intercession from this womanwho has cut herself off from all her kin by disobedience."

  "Uncle," cried Cornelia in distress, "must we be foes to the end? Mustour last words be of bitterness?"

  "Girl," thundered the unbending Lentulus, "when a Roman maidendisobeys, there is no expiation. You are no niece of mine. I care nothow you came here. I accept nothing at your hands. I will not hearyour story. If I must die, it is to die cursing your name. Go! I haveno more words for you!"

  But Ahenobarbus caught the skirt of Cornelia's robe, and pleaded andmoaned. "Let them imprison him in the lowest dungeons, load him withthe heaviest fetters; place upon him the most toilsome labour--onlylet him still see the light and breathe the air!"

  "Uncle," said Cornelia, "I will plead for you despite yourwrath---though little may my effort avail. You are my father'sbrother, and neither act of yours nor of mine can make you otherwise.But as for you, Lucius Ahenobarbus,"--and her words came hot andthick, as she hissed out her contempt,--"though I beg for your life,know this, that if I despised you less I would not so do. I despiseyou too much to hate; and if I ask to have you live, it is because Iknow the pains of a base and ignoble life are a myriad fold more thanthose of a swift and honourable death. Were
I your judge--I would doomyou; doom you _to live_ and know the sting of your ignominy!"

  She left them; and hatred and pity, triumph and anguish, mingledwithin her. She went to the young King Ptolemaeus and besought him tospare the prisoners; the lad professed his inability to take a stepwithout the initiative of Pothinus. She went to Pothinus; the eunuchlistened to her courteously, then as courteously told her that gravereasons of state made it impossible to comply with the request--much,as he blandly added, it would delight him personally to gratify her.Cornelia could do no more. Pratinas she would not appeal to, though hehad great influence with Pothinus. She went back to her rooms to spendthe day with Fabia, very heavy of heart. The world, as a whole, shebeheld as a thing very evil; treachery, guile, wrath, hatred, wereeverywhere. The sight of Ahenobarbus had filled her with loathsomememories of past days. The sunlight fell in bright warm panels overthe rich rugs on the floor of her room. The sea-breeze sweeping infrom the north blew fresh and sweet; out against the azure light, intowhich she could gaze, a swarm of swallows was in silhouette--blackdots crawling along across the dome of light. Out in one of the publicsquares of the city great crowds of people were gathering. Corneliaknew the reason of the concourse--the heads of two noble Romans, justdecapitated, were being exposed to the gibes and howls of the coarseGreek and Egyptian mob. And Cornelia wished that she were herself aswallow, and might fly up into the face of the sun, until the earthbeneath her had vanished.

  But while she leaned from the parapet by the window of the room,footsteps sounded on the mosaic pavement without; the drapery in thedoorway was flung aside; Agias entered, and after him--another.

  II

  Drusus ran to Cornelia and caught her in his arms; and she--neitherfainted nor turned pale, but gave a little laugh, and cried softly:--

  "I always knew you were coming!"

  What more followed Agias did not know; his little affair withArtemisia had taught him that his Hellenic inquisitiveness sometimeswould do more harm than good.

  Very different from the good-humoured, careless, half-boyish studentyouth who had driven down the Praeneste road two years before, was thesoldierly figure that Cornelia pressed to her heart. The campaigninglife had left its mark upon Drusus. Half of a little finger the strokeof a Spanish sword had cleft away at Ilerda; across his forehead wasthe broad scar left by the fight at Pharsalus, from a blow that he hadnever felt in the heat of the battle. During the forced marchings andvoyages no razor had touched his cheeks, and he was thickly bearded.But what cared Cornelia? Had not her ideal, her idol, gone forth intothe great world and stood its storm and stress, and fought in itsbattles, and won due glory? Was he not alive, and safe, and in healthof mind and body after ten thousand had fallen around him? Were notthe clouds sped away, the lightnings ceased? And she? She was happy.

  So Drusus told her of all that had befallen him since the day heescaped out of Lucius Ahenobarbus's hands at Baiae. And Cornelia toldof her imprisonment at the villa, and how Demetrius had saved her, andhow it came to pass that she was here at the Egyptian court. In turnDrusus related how Caesar had pursued Pompeius into Asia, and then,hearing that the Magnus had fled to Egypt, placed two legions onshipboard and sailed straight for Alexandria.

  "And when he landed," continued the young officer, "the magistrates ofthe city came to Caesar, and gave him first Pompeius's seal-ring of alion holding a sword in his paw, and then another black-faced andblack-hearted Egyptian, without noticing the distress the Imperatorwas in, came up and uncovered something he had wrapped in a mantle. Iwas beside the general when the bundle was unwrapped. I am sickenedwhen I speak of it. It was the head of Pompeius Magnus. The foolsthought to give Caesar a great delight."

  "And what did the Imperator do or say?" asked Cornelia.

  "He shrank back from the horror as though the Egyptian had been amurderer, as indeed all of his race are. Caesar said nothing. Yet allsaw how great was his grief and anger. Soon or late he will requitethe men who slew thus foully the husband of his daughter Julia."

  "You must take me away from them," said Cornelia, shuddering; "I amafraid every hour."

  "And I, till you are safe among our troops at Alexandria," repliedDrusus. "I doubt if they would have let me see you, but for Agias. Hemet us on the road from Alexandria and told me about you. I hadreceived a special despatch from Caesar to bear with all haste to theking. So across the Delta I started, hardly waiting for the troops todisembark, for there was need for speed. Agias I took back with me,and my first demand when I came here was to see the king and delivermy letter, which was easily done an hour ago; and my next to see you.Whereat that nasty sheep Pothinus declared that you had been sent somedays before up the river on a trip to the Memphis palace to see thepyramids. But Agias was close at hand, and I gave the eunuch the liewithout difficulty. The rascal blandly said, 'that he had not seen youof late; had only spoken by hearsay about you, and he might have beenmisinformed;' and so--What do I look like?"

  "You look like Quintus Livius Drusus, the Roman soldier," saidCornelia, "and I would not have you otherwise than what you are."

  "_Eho!_" replied Drusus, passing his hand over her hair. "Do you wantme to tell you something?"

  "What is it?" said Cornelia, pressing closer.

  "I can never write a cosmology. I shall never be able to evolve a newsystem of ethics. I cannot improve on Plato's ideal state. I know I ama very ignorant man, with only a few ideas worth uttering, with a handthat is very heavy, with a mind that works to little purpose save whenit deals with politics and war. In short"--and Drusus's voice grewreally pathetic--"all my learning carries me no farther than did thewisdom of Socrates, 'I know that I know nothing;' and I have no timeto spend in advancing beyond that stage."

  "But Socrates," said Cornelia, laughing, "was the wisest man inGreece, and for that very reason."

  "Well," said Drusus, ignoring the compliment, as a certain type of menwill when the mood is on them, "what do you wish me to make ofmyself?"

  "I wish you to make nothing different," was her reply, "for you areprecisely what I have always wanted you to be. When you have read asmuch as I have," this with an air of utter weariness, "you willrealize the futility of philosophic study."

  "_Eho!_" remarked Drusus again. "So you would have me feel that I amturning my back on nothing very great, after all?"

  "And so I mean."

  "Seriously?"

  "I am serious, Quintus." And indeed Cornelia was. "I can readAristotle and Plato, and Zeno and Cleanthes, and Pyrrho, and a scoreof others. I can spin out of my own brain a hundred theories of theuniverse as good as theirs, but my heart will not be the happier, ifthings outside make me sad. I am sick of the learning that is nolearning, that answers our questions by other questions that are moreriddling."

  "Ah, scoffer at the wise," laughed Drusus, "what do you wish, then?"He spoke in Greek.

  "Speak in Latin, in Latin, Quintus," was her retort. "I am weary ofthis fine, sweet language that tinkles so delicately, every word ofwhich hides a hundred meanings, every sentence attuned like the notesfor a harp. Let us have our own language, blunt and to the point; thelanguage, not of men who wonder what they ought to do, but who _do_.We are Romans, not Greeks. We have to rule the world, not growl as tohow Jupiter made it. When you came back from Athens I said, 'I loveQuintus Drusus, but I would love him more if he were less a Hellene.'And, now I see you wholly Roman, I love you wholly. And for myself, Iwish neither to be a Sappho, nor an Aspasia, nor a Semiramis, butCornelia the Roman matron, who obeys her husband, Quintus Drusus, whocares for his house, and whom, in turn, her household fears andobeys."

  "_O tempora! O mores!_" cried the young soldier, in delight. "When hadever a woman such ambition in these degenerate days? _Eu!_ Then I willburn my books, if you can get no profit out of them."

  "I do not think books are bad," said Cornelia, still soberly, "but Iknow that they can never make me happy."

  "What can?" demanded her tormenter.

  "_You!_"

 
* * * * *

  So the hours of the afternoon ran on, and the lovers gave them littleheed. But they were not too selfish to refuse to Fabia's sharing intheir joy; and Drusus knew that he was dear no less, thoughdifferently, in the eyes of his aunt than of his betrothed. And therewere duties to perform that not even the long-deferred delights of theafternoon could postpone. Chief of these were the arrangements for theimmediate departure of the Roman ladies for Alexandria. Agias, who wascalled into the council, was invaluable in information and suggestion.He said that Pothinus had acted at Pratinas's advice, when he tookFabia and Cornelia to the palace. The eunuch had expected to use themhalf as hostages, half as captives to be put to ransom. If Caesar haddelayed a few days, Pothinus would not have lied when he made excusethat the ladies had been sent up the river. But now Agias believedthat the regent was afraid, having overreached himself, and it wasbest to make a prompt demand for conveyance to Alexandria. This,indeed, proved advantageous policy. The eunuch made difficulties andsuggested obstacles, but Drusus made his native Italian haughtinessstand him in good stead. It would largely depend, he saidinsinuatingly, on the way in which his demand was complied with, whatsort of a report he made to Caesar touching the execution of LuciusLentulus and Ahenobarbus. During his interview with Pothinus, theRoman came face to face with Pratinas. No words were exchanged, butDrusus noticed that the elegant Hellene flushed, and then turned pale,when he fastened upon him a gaze steady and half menacing. Pothinusended by yielding everything--the use of the royal chariots andhorses, the use of the Nile boats needed for swift transit across theDelta, and orders on the local garrisons and governors to provideentertainment and assistance.

  As a result Cornelia speedily found herself again journeying, not thistime in a slow barge following the main branches of the Nile, but bymore rapid, if less luxurious, conveyance, now by land, now by water,hurrying westward. They passed through Sethroe and Tanis, Mendes andSebennytus, Xais and Sais, where were the tomb of Osiris and the greatEgyptian university in this the capital of the mighty Pharaohs who hadwrested the nation from the clutches of Assyria. Then they fared upthe Nile to the old Milesian trading factory of Naucratis,--nowdropping into decline beside the thriving Alexandria,--and then byboat they pressed on to the capital itself. Never more delightfuljourney for Cornelia or for Drusus; they saw the strange land throughone another's eyes; they expressed their own thoughts through oneanother's lips; they were happy together, as if children at play; andFabia was their never exacting, ever beneficent, guardian goddess.

  Drusus and Cornelia were neither of them the same young persons whohad met in the gardens of the villa of the Lentuli two short yearsbefore. They saw life with a soberer gaze; they had both the wisdomthat experience teaches. Yet for the time not a cloud was driftingacross their sky. Their passions and hates had been too fierce, toopagan, to feel the death of even Cornelia's uncle very keenly. LuciusAhenobarbus was dead--they had no more thought for him than for a deadviper. Lucius Domitius was dead. Gabinius and Dumnorix were dead.Pompeius, the tool of guiltier men than himself, was dead. Pratinasalone of all those who had crossed their path remained; but the wilyGreek was a mere creature of self-interest--what had he to gain bypressing his animosity, if he had any, against them? Caesar wastriumphant. His enemies were barely lifting their heads in Africa.Doubtless there was stern work awaiting the Imperator there, but whatof it? Was he not invincible? Was he not about to commence a new orderof things in the world, to tear down the old and decaying, to raise upa steadfast fabric? Therefore the little party took its pleasure, andenjoyed every ancient temple of the Amenhoteps, Thothmeses, andRamesides that they hurriedly visited; won the favour of the wrinkledold priests by their plentiful votives of bright philippi; heard ahundred time-honoured tales that they knew not whether to believe orlaugh at; speculated among themselves as to the sources of the Nile,the cause of the vocal Memnon, and fifty more darkened wonders, andresolved to solve every mystery during a second and more prolongedvisit.

  So they came to Alexandria, but on the way called at the Nile villawhere was Artemisia, and, to the great satisfaction of that young ladyand of Agias, carried her along with them to the house of Cleomenes,where that affable host and Berenice and Monime received them withopen arms.

  Their pleasure at this reunion, however, began to abate when theyrealized the disturbed state of the city.

  "I can't say I like the situation," admitted Cleomenes, as soon as hehad been introduced to Drusus, and the first greetings were over; "youknow when Caesar landed he took his consular insignia with him, and themob made this mean that he was intending to overthrow the governmentand make Egypt a Roman province. If you had not left for Pelusium sohastily, you would have been present at a very serious riot, that waswith great difficulty put down. The soldiers of the royal garrison arein an ugly mood, and so are the people. I suspect the king, or ratherPothinus, is doing nothing to quiet them. There have been slight riotsfor several days past, and a good many Roman soldiers who havestraggled away from the palace into the lower quarters of the cityhave been murdered."

  "I am glad," replied Drusus, "that I can leave Cornelia and my auntunder your protection, for my duty may keep me continuously with theImperator."

  The young officer at once hastened to the palace and reported forservice. Caesar questioned him as to the situation at Pelusium, andDrusus described the unpromising attitude of Pothinus, and alsomentioned how he had found Cornelia and his aunt.

  The general, engrossed as he was with his business of state andthreatening war, put all his duties aside and at once went to thehouse of Cleomenes. It was the first time Cornelia had ever met theman whose career had exerted such an influence upon her own life. Shehad at first known of him only through the filthy, slanderous versesof such oligarchs as Catullus and Calvus; then through her lover shehad come to look upon Caesar as an incarnation as it were ofomniscience, omnipotence, and benevolence--the man for whom everythingwas worth sacrificing, from whom every noble thing was to be expected.

  She met the conquerer of Ariovistus, Vercingetorix, and Pompeius likethe frank-hearted, patrician maiden that she was, without shyness,without servility.

  "My father died in your army," she said on meeting; "my affiancedhusband has taught me to admire you, as he himself does. Let us befriends!"

  And Caesar bowed as became the polished gentleman, who had been thecentre of the most brilliant salons of Rome, and took the hand sheoffered, and replied:--

  "Ah! Lady Cornelia, we have been friends long, though never we metbefore! But I am doubly the friend of whosoever is the friend ofQuintus Livius Drusus."

  Whereupon Cornelia was more completely the vassal of the Imperatorthan ever, and words flew fast between them. In short, just as in thecase with Cleopatra, she opened her heart before she knew that she hadsaid anything, and told of all her life, with its shadows andbrightness; and Caesar listened and sympathized as might a father; andDrusus perfectly realized, if Cornelia could not--how many-sided wasthe man who could thus turn from weighing the fate of empires toentering unfeignedly into a sharing of the hopes and fears of a veryyoung, and still quite unsophisticated, woman.

  When the Imperator departed Drusus accompanied him to the palace.Neither of the two, general nor subaltern, spoke for a long while; atlast Caesar remarked:--

  "Do you know what is uppermost in my mind, after meeting women likeFabia or Cornelia?"

  Drusus shook his head.

  "I believe that there are gods, who bring such creatures into theworld. They are not chance accretions of atoms." And then Caesar added,half dreamily: "You ought to be a very happy man. I was once--it wasmany years ago. Her name was Cornelia also."

  * * * * *

  Serious and more serious, grew the situation at Alexandria. KingPtolemaeus and Pothinus came to the city from Pelusium. Caesar hadannounced that he intended to examine the title of the young monarchto the undivided crown, and make him show cause why he had expelledCleopatra. This t
he will of Ptolemaeus Auletes had enjoined the Romangovernment to do; for in it he had commissioned his allies to see thathis oldest children shared the inheritance equally.

  But Pothinus came to Alexandria, and trouble came with him. He threwevery possible obstacle in Caesar's way when the latter tried tocollect a heavy loan due the Romans by the late king. The etesianwinds made it impossible to bring up reenforcements, and Caesar's forcewas very small. Pothinus grew more insolent each day. For the firsttime, Drusus observed that his general was nervous, and suspiciouslest he be assassinated. Finally the Imperator determined to force acrisis. To leave Egypt without humbling Pothinus meant a greatlowering of prestige. He sent off a private message to Palestine thatCleopatra should come to Alexandria.

  Cleopatra came, not in royal procession, for she knew too well thefinesse of the regent's underlings; but entered the harbour indisguise in a small boat; and Apollodorus, her Sicilian confidant,carried her into Caesar's presence wrapped in a bale of bedding whichhe had slung across his back.

  The queen's suit was won. Cleopatra and the Imperator met, and the twostrong personalities recognized each other's affinity instantly. Hercoming was as a thunder-clap to Pothinus and his puppet Ptolemaeus.They could only cringe and acquiesce when Caesar ordered them to bereconciled with the queen, and seal her restoration by a splendidcourt banquet.

  The palace servants made ready for the feast. The rich and noble ofAlexandria were invited. The stores of gold and silver vesselstreasured in the vaults of the Lagidae were brought forth. The archesand columns of the palace were festooned with flowers. The best pipersand harpers of the great city were summoned to delight with theirmusic. Precious wine of Tanis was ready to flow like water.

  Drusus saw the preparations with a glad heart. Cornelia would bepresent in all her radiancy; and who there would be more radiant thanshe?