The army of Achillas, which was already on its way during the reconciliation banquet, reached Alexandria in only a few days, twenty thousand strong. Caesar sent out envoys to Achillas, who were killed rather than being answered.
“So,” said Caesar in that quiet voice, “he not only kills when it seems a matter of political advantage, as with Pompey, but does not recognize time-honored diplomatic rules. I need have no mercy on him, then.”
I marveled at how he seemed to contain his anger, if indeed he felt anger. Perhaps he was past the stage where vile behavior was anything other than expected; perhaps to him it was loyalty and honor that were the rare finds. I also marveled at how he assumed he would beat Achillas and his large army of old Roman legionaries, runaway slaves, pirates, outlaws, and exiles—a motley, desperate bunch.
My own army, abandoned in Gaza, had dissolved for want of action and pay, and could not help. Earlier, Caesar had sent for reinforcements from Syria and Cilicia, but for now he would have to fortify the eastern section of Alexandria and try to make it secure, particularly the part where the palace was located on its peninsula. Safe inside the eastern harbor were his ten Rhodian warships among his others. I could see them from my windows, as they anchored inside the breakwaters. In the western harbor was the Egyptian fleet, which Ptolemy and I commanded: seventy-two warships.
Achillas and his forces, with the help of the excitable citizens, built gigantic triple barricades of stone blocks forty feet high across the streets, so that the magnificent Canopic Way was no longer passable, nor the wide north-south Street of the Soma. They hastily constructed mobile towers ten feet high, which could be pulled by ropes to any location they wished. Arms factories were established in the middle of the city, and the adult slaves were armed, while their veteran cohorts were centrally located, to be rushed to whatever site needed them. They were able to reproduce any arms they captured from our side, so cleverly that it seemed ours were the copies instead.
In the meantime, Caesar turned the banqueting room into his military headquarters, where he spread out his maps and reports on the long marble table and held conferences with his centurions and commanders. I insisted on attending the meetings, as I found myself fascinated to learn how the most disciplined and advanced army in the world operated.
“We must take the offensive,” said Caesar, after the first week of fighting. He tapped the diagram of the city tied up between two of the pillars in the hall.
One of his officers gave a snort. Caesar shot him a look.
“Not the entire city,” he said. “But we must capture the island and the Lighthouse so that our reinforcements can reach us from the sea. We are pinned in here, and must keep this sea side open.”
Was this the sort of daring for which he was renowned?
“How do we attack?” one of the centurions asked.
“There is only a little stretch of the waterfront between our barricades and theirs that controls the causeway. At the signal, we will rush from our section and storm the waterfront. We will fight our way there and then onto the causeway, then all the way to the Lighthouse.”
At midday after this conference, Caesar held his customary meal with me, my siblings, and his officers. The table was set with wooden platters, moldy bread, and cheap, yellowish Taeniotic wine—standing orders from Pothinus.
“See how the King and Queen of Egypt, and the rulers of Cyprus, dine,” said Caesar, gesturing to the table. “Soldiers’ fare after a long campaign?”
“Pothinus said there was nothing left for us to eat because of the Romans,” complained “big” Ptolemy in his whiny voice. “He said it was all devoured by your soldiers! And they melted down all our gold plate!”
“Pothinus will tell no more lies,” said Caesar. “And I am pleased to see that you are voluntarily eating such sparse fare, when there are fine foods aplenty in the kitchens. It will build your character. A man shouldn’t care overmuch about food. I myself once accidentally poured ointment over a vegetable dish and didn’t notice—even after I ate it.”
“Barbarian,” muttered Arsinoe.
“What’s that, my dear?” asked Caesar. “Barbarian? Yes, perhaps so. I came to have great respect for them in the nine years I fought them in Gaul. They have a different mentality from some of the degenerate minds of the east. For example, they do not kill their chiefs.”
Arsinoe gave a sour smile that still did nothing to ruin her beauty. Caesar lifted his wine goblet to her and took a sip.
“I do not feel well,” she said, putting hers down. “I must return to my quarters to rest.”
That night she escaped from the palace, accompanied by her eunuch-tutor Ganymedes, and went to join Achillas and his forces.
I expected Caesar to be angry, now that he could no longer claim the Egyptian troops were simply a treasonous faction in rebellion against the entire royal family, but he was not, even when the troops proclaimed Arsinoe their queen.
“Well, she’s lost Cyprus,” he said. “And she never even went to visit it. You and I must do that when the war is over. Venus was born on the seafoam and washed ashore there; it would be most fitting for us to be together there.” He gave that seemingly lighthearted smile that did not extend to his eyes.
When the war was over…how certain he was of victory!
That night, before retiring, he stood a long time on the roof of the palace, looking at the harbor and its configuration. His lined hands gripped the railings, and I could see the muscles pulling in his arms as he clenched and then relaxed his fingers.
“It will not be easy,” he conceded. “It is a long way, and the width will not allow very many men on it at any one time.”
Behind us the servants were lighting the evening torches, and the sun was sinking, turning what would be tomorrow’s battlefield into a basin of red.
“Tonight the sun, tomorrow the blood of men will color it,” he said.
“How can you ever get used to it?” I wondered. “How can you accustom yourself to death in advance?”
“Death,” he finally said. “Perhaps I am like that king of Pergamon who had a garden of poisonous plants that he enjoyed cultivating. Perhaps I surround myself with death in order to accustom myself to it.”
“And does it?”
“I think so,” he said. “I can honestly say death holds no terror for me, only sadness—sadness at what I must leave behind.” He turned and looked directly in my eyes. Even in the failing light I was riveted by the intense expression on his face. “I would hate to leave you so soon. We have so much to talk about, to see, to explore together. It is just the beginning for us. When I set out for Gaul, I was forty-two. It was a new world, an infinite green expanse—forests, mountains, lakes, rivers, all unknown and waiting for me. What happened to me there in those nine years should be enough for any man. But now I want more, not less. It built fires, it did not quench them.” He turned back to look at the harbor, growing blue and dim now. “Down there, tomorrow—it seems unthinkable that a short little piece of polished metal could put out my fire.”
I put my arm around him and leaned against him. “Don’t you Romans believe there are three immortal sisters who control your span of days? One who spins your thread of life, one who measures it, and one who cuts it? Your life is not measured yet.”
“Such is the skill of the sisters that one does not feel the thread being drawn out, or perceive the scissors being opened.” Then his tone of voice changed. “This sort of talk is bad luck! Come!” Abruptly he quit the rooftop and went inside.
Such was the oddness of the Alexandrian War that I was able to station myself on the roof to have a commanding view of the action the next day. I did not want to watch it, and yet I had to, for I needed to know what happened, and not from any messenger.
Early in the morning, before the sun’s rays had even reached beyond the tops of the temples, and when the streets were still dark, Caesar and his men poured from the palace grounds in full force, taking the enemy by surprise. The
streets were quickly theirs, and by the time the sun was shining fully on the waterfront, I could see fierce fighting by the docks. The Romans were easy to spot because of their helmets and their distinctive military attire, in contrast to the forces of Achillas in their varying, pieced-together costumes. I could see Caesar himself in his purple general’s cloak, and although I wished I could look elsewhere, I could not for a second take my eyes from him.
I saw how he led the men into the most thinly guarded and dangerous areas, putting heart into them by his reckless bravery. He did not spare himself, but rushed out into the thick of the fighting. But then the superior numbers of Achillas began to tell, and suddenly the Romans seemed to be swallowed up. I felt a horrible cold fear as Caesar disappeared from view under a swirl of swords and shields. The tumult of metal against metal, of stones being lobbed and smashing against the docks and houses, and the screams of dying men, rose, like the cry of a monster, all the way up to my rooftop.
I saw a trace of fire arcing across the dock; someone had thrown a torch. Others followed, and suddenly one of the warships was on fire. The flames caught in the rigging and quickly spread to the deck.
One of my warships! I gasped. No!
The flames spread so fast it was obvious that tar and pitch on board had caught fire. Men poured from the ship and dived into the water. Then the ship next to that one caught fire. Screams rose as the water filled with escaping sailors. The fighting on the docks continued as furiously as ever.
My ships were aflame! My navy was being destroyed! I watched in horror as the entire fleet caught fire, and my pride and wealth of sea power vanished. But then—the wind carried sparks from the burning ships and set fire to warehouses on the docks. Well I knew what was in the warehouses—grain, oil, but most precious of all, manuscripts for the Library. An entire warehouse of manuscripts was being annihilated! I began to scream in helpless horror, but I went on watching.
The fires distracted the Alexandrians, which gave Caesar and his men their opportunity to make for the causeway. They swarmed down it and out to the Lighthouse, where I soon saw more smoke and fire rising in the midst of hand-to-hand combat.
It was impossible to tell what was happening, who was winning, until after what seemed hours, when the glint of the sun on the returning Roman helmets told the tale: They had subdued the island and were now going to secure the length of the causeway. The men spread out, and now—thanks be to you, Isis, and to all the gods who held him in their care—I saw the flash of Caesar’s purple cloak. He was out in front, leading the men back across the causeway and toward the waterfront.
Suddenly, almost out of nowhere, an enemy warship laden with soldiers sailed through the burning hulks of my ships in the western harbor, and made for the middle of the causeway, cutting the Romans in the forefront off from the rest of their troops, stranding them in one section of the causeway. It was Caesar they were after; they meant to hem him in and destroy him. The newly landed soldiers advanced on him, while the ones from the shore closed in on the other side.
The Romans decided to retreat to their ships, but the ships had pulled in their gangplanks and cast anchors to prevent themselves from being boarded by the enemy. The Romans dived into the water and began swimming to the ships; I saw Caesar plunge in and make for the nearest ship, but it was so overladen it was near capsizing, so he was forced to swim to one far distant, all the time dodging a hail of arrows and missiles. His progress was slowed by the fact that he was swimming one-handed, holding up a sheaf of papers—what could be so important, I wondered—and trailing his heavy general’s cloak behind him, determined not to yield the enemy that trophy. But at length I saw him throw off the cloak and swim free of it to the ship. The cloak floated back toward the causeway, where it was retrieved by the enemy with jeers and jubilation.
He was safe. He was safe. The sweetness of realizing that he would return from that day’s fighting almost overwhelmed me with gratitude.
He sat in our private room, hunched over his charts. His hair was matted, and he was shivering from exhaustion and the cold water. His arms were covered with cuts, and his legs were bruised, and he kept shaking his head.
“Four hundred men lost,” he was saying. “Four hundred!”
“But you won,” I said. “You won. And you did everything you set out to do. You captured the island and the Lighthouse.”
“And burnt a fleet!” He sounded bitter. “Forgive me! But it had to be done. I could see they were going to capture it, and that would have given them a navy, which they do not now have.”
“So it was you who threw that brand!” I said. “It was no accident!”
“No, of course not,” he said. “It was my decision. And a good one, too. Look at the damage they managed to do with only one ship!” Again he shook his head. “I lost four hundred men,” he repeated softly. “And my general’s cloak. They got that.”
“At least it was not you they got,” I said. “And why did you persist in trying to protect those papers? What was so important in them that was worth risking your life for?”
“Military plans,” he said. “Ciphers. Codes. Those must not be lost by us, or gained by them.” He withdrew them from inside his sodden leather jerkin and threw them on the table, heaving a deep sigh of relief. “There.”
“Manuscripts were lost that were on the docks, waiting to be transferred to the Library,” I said.
“I am sorry,” he said. “The burning of the warehouses was a true accident.”
“Yes,” I said. “An accident of war. I can see that war, once launched, is not very easily controlled. It goes wherever it pleases, like a mad but cunning animal. Even the great Caesar cannot keep it leashed!”
“I am sorry,” he repeated, throwing off the last of his soaked, tattered clothing and lying down on the bed.
“You are safe,” I said. “That is all that ultimately matters.”
And as I watched him slide into sleep, I knew that was true for me. He was safe tonight. But tomorrow, when the fighting commenced again?
The Roman civil wars that had spread to us now seemed to infect everything. It did not take long for the murdered Pompey’s ghost to exact his final revenge: Achillas did not outlive Pothinus by many days, because Arsinoe killed him and turned the army over to Ganymedes. The knives that the assassins had used against Pompey had now found their way home into their masters’ entrails.
Jubilant with power, Ganymedes launched a direct attack on the palace. Caesar and I were dining in the private apartments a week after the fighting on the island when a burning missile was lobbed right onto our balcony, followed by a rain of arrows with messages attached.
Caesar pulled one out of the wooden sun canopy and held it up for me to see.
Surrender, you Roman dogs! it read.
“How original,” I said.
“Here’s another,” said Caesar, bending down to pick one up.
A gold piece for every soldier who comes over to Arsinoe, it promised.
That was more dangerous.
“They have no money to pay,” I said scornfully.
“The common soldier does not know that,” said Caesar. “I must go below and rally them.” He hastened away.
Within a few days the furious ingenuity of Ganymedes was manifested directly in our water supply. Unable to storm the palace or to dislodge us from our holdings in the city and the island, he resolved to drive us out by thirst.
The cooks had discovered that the water in the conduits had turned salty and brackish, and the soldiers stationed in town reported that all the water in the local households had the same problem, which had mysteriously developed overnight.
“How did they manage to do it?” Caesar marveled. “How did they taint all our water without hurting their own?”
I called in our engineers, and the answer was soon clear. Alexandria’s water supply comes from underground tunnels that channel Nile water through the city. Ganymedes had divided the water flow, protecting his own, and
pumping seawater into ours.
“This war has not been easy,” Caesar admitted. “The enemy is resourceful and clever. They force us to be more so. I will speak to the troops.” I thought he sounded tired, and nearer the end of his resources than he would wish to sound.
From the upper balcony of the palace he addressed his officers and men, as they waited in the open space below.
“The cowardly Ganymedes and his put-together army of pirates and slaves and corrupted Romans have the knowledge to construct giant waterwheels to draw seawater up to higher ground,” he shouted. “How clever! How impressive! Does he think by this to conquer us? By a boy’s toys?”
From the way the men were restlessly moving, I could see how uncomfortable they were. They were thirsty. They had probably drunk all the wine available, and now there was nothing.
“A boy should not go to war! A boy’s toys cannot triumph over an experienced man’s knowledge, and the determination and courage of his troops! You see, I know where there is water to be found, and easily. There are always veins of fresh water in beaches, and not far below the surface. A few hours’ digging will yield us all the water we wish!”
Was this true? Or was he merely hoping?
“And furthermore, even if there is no water there, we hold command of the sea, and it is an easy matter to sail forth in either direction and bring back a supply of water. So fear not, but get out your shovels!”
The men did not give their usual cheers. They craved an orderly retreat, to sail away from this mess.
“Think not of abandoning your posts! If they see us boarding ships, they will rush our barricades. An orderly withdrawal is not possible for us now.” He paused. “Nor is it necessary! To the shovels!” He hoisted one up and flourished it. “To the beach!”
The Memoirs of Cleopatra Page 18