Antony and Cleopatra

by Colleen McCullough

  His voice changed, took on a steely edge. “I have dealt with Sextus Pompeius’s land troops as harshly as I have with his sailors and oarsmen. Those of slave status have been returned to their masters with a request that they never be freed. If their former masters could not be found because Sextus Pompeius had killed them, these slaves have been impaled. Yes, true impalement! A stake driven up through the rectum into the vital organs. Freedmen and foreigners have been flogged and branded on the forehead. Admirals have been executed. The ex-Triumvir Marcus Lepidus wanted to draw them into his legions, but Rome neither needs nor should tolerate such scum. They have died or face a life of slavery, as is right and proper.

  “Rome’s consuls, praetors, aediles, quaestors, and tribunes of the soldiers have certain duties which they will acquit with zeal and efficiency. The consuls frame laws and authorize enterprises. The praetors hear lawsuits, civil and criminal. The quaestors take care of Rome’s moneys, be they attached to the Treasury or to some governor, port, or other. The aediles attend to Rome herself by seeing that the water supply, sewerage, markets, buildings, and temples are cared for. As Triumvir in charge of Rome and Italia, I will be watching these magistrates closely, and expect them to be good magistrates.”

  He smiled, teeth flashing white, and looked a little impish. “I appreciate the gilded statue of me placed in the Forum that says I have restored order on land and sea, but I appreciate good governance more. Nor is Rome yet so rich that she can afford to dedicate statues out of her revenues. Spend wisely, conscript fathers!”

  He went for a stroll down the floor, then returned to the dais and stood to make what everyone expected to be his peroration, very relieved that it was a short—if rather terrifying—speech.

  “Last, but by no means least, conscript fathers, it has come to my attention that Imperator Marcus Antonius has won great victories in the East, that his brow is wreathed in laurels and his plunder massive. He penetrated the lands of the Parthian King as far as Phraaspa, a mere two hundred miles from Ecbatana, and everywhere was triumphant. Armenia and Media lie under his foot, their kings his vassals. Therefore let us vote him a thanksgiving of twenty days for his valorous deeds! All who agree, say aye!”

  The roar of “Aye!” was drowned by cheers and drumming feet; Octavian’s eyes roamed the tiers, counting. Yes, still about seven hundred adherents.

  “I got in first,” he said complacently to Livia Drusilla when he returned home, “and left his creatures no opportunity to shout the news of Antonius’s deeds from the benches.”

  “Does no one know yet of Antonius’s failure?” she asked.

  “It seems not. By moving that he be given a thanksgiving, I made it impossible for anybody to argue.”

  “And averted any motions to vote him victory games or things that would become public knowledge right down to the Head Count,” she said, satisfied. “Excellent, my love, excellent!”

  He pulled her against his side on the couch and kissed her eyelids, her cheeks, her delicious mouth. “I feel like making love,” he murmured into her ear.

  “Then let us,” she whispered, taking his hand.

  Entwined, they left Livia Drusilla’s sitting room to enter her sleeping cubicle. Now, while he was alight with pleasure! Now, now! she thought, pulling off their clothes and stretching out on the bed voluptuously. Kiss my breasts, kiss my belly, kiss what lies beneath, cover me in kisses, fill me with your seed!

  Six nundinae later, Octavian convened the Senate again, armed with a mountain of evidence he knew he wouldn’t need, but must have on hand just in case. This time he commenced by announcing that there was sufficient in the Treasury to remit some taxes and reduce others, and followed that up by declaring that proper Republican government would return as soon as the campaign in Illyricum was concluded. Triumvirs would not be necessary, consular candidates could put up their names without triumviral approval, the Senate would reign supreme, the Assemblies meet regularly. All of this was greeted with cheers and loud applause.

  “However,” he said to the House in ringing tones, “before I conclude I must discuss affairs in the East. That is, the affairs of Imperator Marcus Antonius. First of all, Rome has received very little in tribute from Marcus Antonius’s provinces since he assumed his triumvirate in the East shortly after Philippi, some six and a half years ago. That I, Triumvir in Rome, Italia, and the Islands, have just been able to reduce some taxes and remit others, is by my own endeavor, with no contribution or help from Marcus Antonius. And before someone on the front or middle benches leaps up to tell me that Marcus Antonius donated a hundred and twenty ships to me for the campaign against Sextus Pompeius, I must tell all of you that he charged Rome for the use of those ships. Yes, he charged Rome! Do I hear you ask, How much? Forty-four thousand talents, conscript fathers! A sum that represents forty percent of the hoard in Sextus Pompeius’s vaults! The other sixty-six thousand talents went to Rome, not to me. I repeat, not to me! They went to pay massive public debts and regulate the grain supply. I am Rome’s servant and have no wish to be Rome’s master! I profit from her only if that profit be a time-honored custom. Those hundred and twenty ships cost three hundred and sixty-six talents apiece, and were loaned by Antonius, not given. A new quinquereme costs a hundred talents, but we had to hire Marcus Antonius’s fleet. There was no money in the Treasury, and we couldn’t afford to postpone our campaign against Sextus Pompeius for yet another year. So, in Rome’s name, I agreed to this extortion—for extortion it is!”

  By this time the benches were in turmoil, their occupants yelling insults or praise, Antony’s seven hundred tame senators aware that they were on the defensive, and doubly vocal because of it. Face composed, Octavian waited the furore out.

  “Ah, but did the Treasury get those sixty-six thousand silver talents?” Poplicola asked. “No! Only fifty thousand talents were deposited! What happened to the other sixteen thousand? Didn’t they wind up in your vaults, Octavianus?”

  “They did not,” said Octavian, voice gentle. “They were paid to Rome’s legions to avert a very serious mutiny. A subject that I intend to discuss with the members of this House on another occasion, for it must stop. Today the House is discussing Marcus Antonius’s administration of the East. It is a sham, conscript fathers! A sham! Rome’s magistrates from me on down get no news of Antonius’s activities in the East, any more than Rome’s Treasury gets tribute from the East!”

  He paused to survey the benches, first to the right, then to the left, eyes resting longest on the Antonians, who were starting to shrink. Yes, he thought, they know. Did they think I wouldn’t find out? Did they think me sincere when I had them vote Antonius a thanksgiving?

  “Everything in the East is a sham,” he said loudly, “up to and including Marcus Antonius’s reported victories against the Parthians. There have been no victories, conscript fathers. None at all. Instead, Antonius has gone down in defeat. Before he took up his triumvirate, the summer palace of the King of the Parthians at Ecbatana held seven Roman Eagles, lost when Marcus Crassus and seven legions were exterminated at Carrhae. A shame that all true Romans deplore! The loss of an Eagle means the loss of a legion in circumstances where the enemy holds and controls the field after the battle is over. These seven Eagles stand for Rome’s shame, for they were the only ones an enemy holds. Yes, I use the past tense! On purpose! For in the six and a half years during which Marcus Antonius has governed the East, four more of our Eagles have gone to the summer palace in Ecbatana! Lost by Marcus Antonius! The first two belonged to the two legions Gaius Cassius left in Syria, to whom Antonius entrusted Syria’s defence when he roistered his way to Athens after the Parthians invaded. But what was his duty? Why, to remain in Syria and drive the enemy out! He did not. He fled to Athens to continue his dissolute style of life. His governor, Saxa, was killed. So was Saxa’s brother. Did Antonius return to avenge them? No, he did not! He governed what he had left of the East from Athens, and when the Parthians were driven out, their conqueror was Publi
us Ventidius, a common muleteer! A good man, a superb general, a man of whom Rome can be proud, proud, proud! While his chief roistered in Athens and made little trips across the Adriatic to torment me, a colleague, for not achieving my objectives as stated in our agreement. But I have achieved my objectives, and when the time came I was there in person. That I entrusted command in my campaign to Marcus Agrippa was pure common sense. He’s a far better general than I am—or, I suspect, than Marcus Antonius is! For I gave Marcus Agrippa a free hand, while Antonius strapped Ventidius hand and foot. He was to hold the Parthians in readiness for his chief when his chief felt like getting off his overmuscled arse, be that five months or five years! Luckily for Rome, Ventidius ignored his orders and threw the Parthians out. For I cannot help but think, conscript fathers, that if Ventidius had obeyed his orders, Antonius would have led the legions to defeat! Just as now!”

  He stopped speaking, for no other reason than to wallow in the profound silence of eight hundred men, most of them Antonians, stricken, wondering how much Octavian knew, dreading the coming denouement. No bellows of protest, not one!

  “Last May,” Octavian said in ordinary tones, “Antonius led a mighty force from Carana in Little Armenia eastward on a long march. Sixteen Roman legions—ninety-six thousand men—and an auxiliary force of cavalry and infantry from his provinces, another fifty thousand strong—paused in Artaxata, the capital of Armenia, before embarking on a journey into unknown country guided by some Armenians whom Antonius trusted. One of the tragedies of my story, conscript fathers, is that Marcus Antonius demonstrated an uncanny ability to trust the wrong men. His advisers could protest until the skies fell, but Antonius would not listen to sage counsel. He trusted where he ought not to have trusted, commencing with the King of Armenia, and then the King of Media. The two Artavasdes first pulled the wool over his eyes, then fleeced him. Our poor sheep Antonius lost his baggage train, the largest ever assembled by a Roman commander, and in the process lost two stout legions led by Gaius Oppius Statianus of the eminent banking family. Two more silver Eagles went to Ecbatana, making four lost by Antonius for a total of eleven adorning King Phraates’s summer palace! A tragedy? Yes, of course. But more than that, conscript fathers—a calamity! What foreign foe is going to fear the might of Rome when Roman troops lose their Eagles?”

  This time the silence was broken by soft sobs; by no means all of the senators had heard the story, and even most who had, had not heard the details.

  Octavian resumed. “Without his siege equipment, spirited away by King Artavasdes of Media along with the rest of the baggage, Marcus Antonius sat futilely before the city of Phraaspa for more than a hundred days, unable to take it. His foraging parties were at the mercy of the lurking Parthians, led by one Monaeses, the Parthian whom Antonius had trusted completely. When autumn came, Antonius had no choice but to retreat. Five hundred miles to Artaxata, dogged by Monaeses and the Parthian horde, who picked off the stragglers in thousands. Mostly his auxiliary troops, who couldn’t march at the rate of a Roman legion. But a Roman governor who employs auxiliary troops is honor-bound to protect them as if they were Roman, and Antonius deliberately abandoned them to save his legions. Perhaps I or Marcus Agrippa would have done the same in similar circumstances, but I doubt either of us would have lost a baggage train by letting it lag hundreds of miles behind the army.

  “The retreat was accomplished and the army put into temporary camp in Carana at the end of November. Antonius then fled to a small Syrian port, Leuke Kome, leaving Publius Canidius to bring the troops, who were in desperate need of succor. Some perished on that last march in the aftermath of terrible cold, many had lost fingers and toes to frostbite. Of his hundred and forty-five thousand men, over a third died, the vast majority of them auxiliaries. Rome’s honor was tainted, conscript fathers. I mention the loss of one particular man, a client-king appointed by Marcus Antonius—Polemon of Pontus, who had greatly contributed to the victories of Publius Ventidius, and generously given forces to Antonius, including his own person. I add that I have, on Rome’s behalf, decided that a little of Sextus Pompeius’s hoard be spent on ransoming King Polemon, who does not deserve to die a Parthian captive. He will cost the Treasury a pittance—twenty talents.”

  The weeping was audible now, many of the senators sitting with folds of toga pulled over their heads. A dark day for Rome.

  “I said that Antonius’s army was in desperate need of succor. But to whom did Antonius turn for succor? Where did he go for succor? Did he send to you, conscript fathers? Did he send to me? No, he did not! He sent to Cleopatra of Egypt! A foreigner, a woman who worships beast-gods, a non-Roman! Yes, he sent to her! And while he waited, did he inform the Senate and People of this disastrous campaign? No, he did not! He drank himself insensible for two solid months, only pausing dozens of times each day to rush outside his tent and ask, ‘Is she coming?’ like a little boy crying for his mama. ‘I want my mama!’ is what he really said, over and over again. ‘I want my mama, I want my mama!’ Little boy Marcus Antonius, Triumvir of the East.

  “And eventually she did come, conscript fathers of the Senate. The Queen of Beasts came bearing food, wine, physicians, healing herbs, bandages, exotic fruits, all the plenty of Egypt! And as the soldiers limped into Leuke Kome, she ministered to them. Not in Rome’s name, but in Egypt’s name! While Marcus Antonius, drunk, put his head in her lap and blubbered! Yes, blubbered!”

  Poplicola leaped to his feet. “That’s not true!” he shouted. “You lie, Octavianus!”

  Again Octavian patiently waited for the hubbub to cease, a faint smile playing about his lips, sunlight on water. It was a beginning; yes, definitely it was a beginning. A few of the less wholeheartedly Antonian senators were angry enough to abandon him and his cause. All it had taken was the word blubbered.

  “Do you have a motion to move?” asked Quintus Laronius, one of Octavian’s supporters.

  “No, Laronius, I do not,” said Octavian strongly. “I came to my divine father’s Curia Hostilia today to tell a story, set the record straight. I have said many times before—and I repeat it now!—I will not go to war against a fellow Roman! For no reason, even this, will I so much as contemplate war against the Triumvir Marcus Antonius! Let him stew in his own juice! Let him continue to make mistake after mistake, until this House decides that, like Marcus Lepidus, he should be removed from his magistracies and his provinces. I will not move that, conscript fathers, now or in the future.” He paused to look sorrowful. “Unless, that is, Marcus Antonius rejects his citizenship and his homeland. Let us offer to Quirinus and Sol Indiges that Marcus Antonius never does that. There will be no debate today. This meeting is dismissed.”

  He descended from the dais and walked down the black-and-white diamonds of the floor to the great bronze doors at the end, where his lictors and his Germans bunched around him. The doors had not been closed, a clever ploy, and, unsuspecting, the consuls had not insisted they were; the listeners outside, who also frequented the Forum Romanum, had heard it all. Within an hour, most of Rome would know that Marcus Antonius was no hero at all.

  “I see a glimmer of hope,” he said to Livia Drusilla, Agrippa, and Maecenas over dinner that afternoon.

  “Hope?” his wife asked. “Hope of what, Caesar?”

  “Have you guessed?” he asked Maecenas.

  “No, Caesar. Enlighten us, please.”

  “Have you guessed, Agrippa?”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Yes, it would be you. You were with me at Philippi, heard much I’ve not voiced to anyone else.” Octavian fell silent.

  “Please, Caesar!” Maecenas cried.

  “It came to me suddenly, while I was speaking in the Senate. Extempore, given the subject matter. It’s fun to tell stories, which should not be orated. Of course I’ve known Marcus Antonius all my life, and at one time I quite liked him, really. He was my antithesis—big, burly, friendly. The sort of fellow my health told me I couldn’t be. But then, I suppose in pace with m
y divine father, I became disillusioned. Especially after Antonius massacred eight hundred citizens in the Forum Romanum and suborned my divine father’s legions. Such heartbreaks! He couldn’t be allowed to inherit. The worst of it was that he had absolutely no doubt that he would inherit, so I came as the rudest shock of his life. He set out to ruin me—but you know all this, so I’ll skip to the present.”

  He chose an olive carefully, popped it in his mouth, chewed, and swallowed, while the others watched with bated breath.

  “It was the bit where I likened Antonius to a little boy crying for his mother—‘I want my mama!’ And suddenly I saw a vision of the future, but dimly, as through a slice of amber. It all depends on two things. The first is Antonius’s career of bad disappointments, from being cut out of Caesar's will to the Parthian expedition. He can’t cope with disappointment, it shatters him. Destroys his ability to think clearly, exacerbates his temper, causes him to lean heavily upon his panders, and brings on a drinking binge.”

  He sat up straight on his couch, held up one of his small, unlovely hands. “The second is Queen Cleopatra of Egypt. It is upon her that everything turns, from his fate to my fate. If she comes to represent his mother to Antonius in literal fact, he will obey her every whim, dictate, request. That is his nature, perhaps because his real mother is such a—disappointment. Cleopatra is regnant, and born to it. Since the death of Divus Julius, she has been minus advice or assistance. And she has a small history with Antonius already—he dallied a winter in Alexandria, and she bore him a boy and a girl. Last winter she was with him in Antioch, and has borne him another boy. Under ordinary circumstances I would have simply listed her as one of Antonius’s many royal conquests, but his behavior in Leuke Kome suggests that he sees her as someone he cannot do without—as his mama.”