I ordered the remaining warships to sail to the spot where the neck of land separating the Mediterranean from the Red Sea is at its narrowest, some twenty miles. There, after devices were built for hoisting them from the water, they were to be hauled across the sands on frames mounted on log-rollers, to be relaunched in the Red Sea. There my fleet would be safe from Octavian, and I could have it ready for eastern voyages. I was thinking more and more that the safety of my children could only be guaranteed in the east, somewhere beyond Rome’s reach.
At the same time I ordered more ships to be built to replace the ones lost at Actium. When Octavian arrived, we would fight again, and this time my fleet would not have been held captive in a hellhole first.
It was one thing to be busy all day, attending to these vital matters. It was another at night, alone in my chamber. Then the dark would close over me like a fist, shutting out all hope and comfort. Antony’s quarters stood empty, awaiting a master I feared would never return. Sometimes I would go there, lie down on his bed, as if by so doing I could will him back. How forlorn are rooms forsaken—spurned, as it were. I was sure he gave no thought to them anymore. Instead he paced out his time in exile at Paraetonium. Was it a struggle for him to live through each day? When the sun came up, did he steel himself to make it his last sunrise? And at sunset, the same? What is it about one particular day that whispers persuasively, Today is the day you seek? Every morning I awoke in dread that it was his last, and that a black-sailed ship would soon land in Alexandria, carrying a mournful cargo.
And then what would I do? It would be like Caesar’s funeral, only worse, because there would be no Antony to speak this time. That voice would be stilled.
Should I send a ship and soldiers to bring him back? No. Of all the indignities he had suffered, this would be one of the worst: to be fetched home under armed guard, protected from himself like a lunatic who might inadvertently come to harm. It would mean I felt he did not know himself, did not know what was best for himself, was not in his right mind. How could I inflict that on him?
I must see to it that another tomb vault was constructed next to mine in the mausoleum. Now there was only one; strange that when I was very young I had first set about fashioning my tomb, when I had thought I had no need of it. Then it had been almost a game. But I had thought no more about it as I acquired a family: my four children and my husband.
Antony would lie in Alexandria after all. The request in the will that had caused him such problems in Rome would now be fulfilled, partly because of the very animosity it had aroused. Well, then. It must be worthy of the sacrifice he had made to achieve it.
These horrible thoughts kept me awake night after night. During the day I was exhausted, my head spinning, and each day I would think, Tonight I will sleep soundly, only to be cheated again.
The days belonged to my duties as a queen, the nights to my loss as a woman. The hardest truth for me was that Antony’s and my destinies now had split. He had come to the end of his, whereas I still had mine to traverse.
He had been called to a high place—to be Caesar’s successor, to rule Rome—had pursued it to the best of his ability, and had failed. He was right. It was over. I had been called to preserve and protect Egypt. That, too, I had done my utmost to achieve. But it was not finished yet. There was still a chance to fulfill my mission. Not a big chance, but a chance nonetheless. And that was all I asked: just the tiniest chance.
So much depended on Octavian now. What would he do? Would he pursue me to the gates of Egypt? Or would he turn back, like a dog that gives up chasing a cart? He had much to do in Rome; and what would he do with Egypt if he took it? A wise Roman had once noted that Egypt would be “a loss if destroyed, a problem to govern, a risk to annex.” All this had given Rome pause before. Perhaps it would again.
And if Octavian arrived, would the Roman legions stationed here obey me, with Antony dead? Or would they go and surrender straightway? I could count on my fleet, and on my Egyptian soldiers, but perhaps on no one else.
There was a garrison at Pelusium guarding the eastern approach, just as Paraetonium guarded the west. But enemies would approach on three sides, from the sea and from both directions on land. All would converge on me here at Alexandria. I would have to meet them alone. No Caesar, no Antony. My male protectors, once so mighty with their Roman power, had fallen, leaving me standing on the battlefield by myself, as I had begun, almost twenty years ago. Then it had been Pothinus and the Regency Council I faced. Now it was the entire Roman army, of some…how many legions? With Antony’s added to Octavian’s, some thirty-five or so.
I almost laughed to imagine thirty-five legions bearing down on me, a hundred fifty thousand men with javelins and swords, come out to take one woman…. It was a compliment. I hoped they would not be disappointed when they finally confronted their quarry in person. Even standing as tall as possible, I was not very big.
And then what would they do? Take me back to Rome, to march in Octavian’s Triumph, as Caesar had taken Arsinoe? To wear silver chains and trudge behind the chariot, to be spat on, then taken to the underground prison, strangled, and thrown into the sewer? No, I knew I would never allow that. And that lay in my hands to prevent. It must be prevented, not only for my own pride as a queen, but out of respect for Caesar. Never should his chosen love, and the mother of his son, meet such a fate. It was not a fitting end for the mate of a god. There would be those in the crowd who would remember when I walked beside him, honored and sharing in his glories.
No, Rome, I will never see you with these eyes again, I vowed.
For several weeks there was no news at all. Mardian dutifully kept me informed of every scrap of gossip, every whisper on the wind. My head aching, I would sit with him at the work table in my quarters, hearing reports about our crops, our tax-collecting, the progress of the ships…until at last one day there was something.
“Octavian is in Athens,” he said, reading the letter. “All of Greece has pledged allegiance to him, except for Corinth.” He laughed. “He has been inducted into the Eleusinian mysteries.”
That made me laugh, too. I could not imagine Octavian believing in it; it was far too emotional and otherworldly for his like. But I supposed he did it to seem properly Grecian.
“He has disbanded large numbers of the soldiers and sent them back to Italy,” Mardian read on.
So now there might be only seventy-five thousand men after me. What a comfort!
“How he will pay them…now there’s the problem,” Mardian mused.
“He’ll pay them by taking Egypt,” I said. And suddenly I knew that was true. It was essential that he get his hands on my treasury, against which all the problems of governing or annexing Egypt were nothing. He had financed his entire career on promises; now he would have to render payment. And it must come from me.
I must pay for my own defeat!
No, I would never let him have it! I would destroy it first!
How quickly all the issues were resolving themselves, I thought. The choices grew fewer and fewer.
Ten days later Mardian was reading another dispatch. Now Octavian had removed himself to Samos and was establishing winter quarters there.
“That means he plans to march on us in the spring,” I said. “Unless he makes it sooner.” So little time! So little time left!
“Hmmm—” Mardian looked pained, and kept fidgeting with the brooch fastening his cloak. “Hmmm—”
“If it’s too painful for you to read, let me have it!” I said.
“Very well.” He handed it to me.
Octavian had been receiving the client kings and reordering the appointments. The ones who convinced him their conversion was genuine were allowed to stay on. Thus Amyntas of Galatia was confirmed, as were the newly loyal Polemo of Pontus and Archelaus of Cappadocia. I could not blame them; Antony had disappeared. What else could they do?
It had not been the sea battle of Actium that was decisive, but the surrender of the land army.
It had stripped Antony of his position as leader of a Roman party, as he had realized.
And then I read about Armenia. Although I had taken care of Artavasdes—he was executed—his son Artaxes had seized the throne the moment Actium was over, and gleefully massacred all the Romans in the area. The Roman province of Armenia was no longer Roman. Antony’s gift to Rome, the trophy of his wars, had been snatched back.
“Is he to have no lasting monument at all?” I cried.
Only the monument in my mausoleum? For a man who had owned half the world, rearranging kingdoms and principalities as a housewife rearranges furniture? Was nothing of his to endure? That seemed the cruelest punishment of all, extending far beyond a lifetime.
“It is the fate of the vanquished,” said Mardian slowly. “The victors appropriate what they like, and rescind what they don’t.” He sighed. “You know in our own country one Pharaoh erased the name of his predecessor often enough. Some names have vanished completely, so that we don’t even know they ever existed.”
Yes, but for it to happen to us!
The Nile had swelled to his greatest extent, flooding the fields, and now began to recede. Mardian proudly presented me with the projections of the harvest to come.
“It will be the most bountiful in recent memory,” he assured me. “That is, if nothing interferes, such as locusts.” He had brought some cakes flavored with honey, dark and runny, from the islands off Spain.
“Just in time to enrich Octavian,” I said. I nibbled on a cake, which was very messy. There was no way to avoid having sticky fingers and a smeared face.
There had been new reports on his whereabouts. It seemed that the veterans he had recently sent back to Italy were rioting, demanding their payment and plots of land immediately. Even Agrippa had lost control of them, and so Octavian had had to rush back there, though it was winter, and risky sailing. I felt great relief knowing he had left our corner of the world. Perhaps he would find himself so embroiled in trouble he would tarry there a long while, giving us time to rally….
But it also meant his eventual arrival was now a certainty. His time of promises had run out, and only gold could keep him in power. My gold. He would have to come and get it.
It is the fate of the vanquished…names erased…no existence…nothing to endure…. There had to be a way to outsmart Octavian, to cheat him of his final victory over our memories, our very existence. Already I had seen how he created his own version of events to flatter himself and to blacken us—as in his pretense that the soldiers had fought on bravely until Canidius deserted them. And as in another story now circulating: that I had fled Actium in cowardice, with Antony following because he was blinded with love. And after it was all over, Octavian would compose his own history of our struggle, while ours would be obliterated.
So it was then, in those bleak days of late autumn, with the sea rising in storms and sealing Alexandria shut, that I began this history of myself and my purposes. I was determined to record it, so that there would exist a record of what had truly happened, to refute the later lies. And I would not be so stupid as to deposit it in some public place, as Antony had done with his will! What is easier than to seize and search the official archives? No, this story, this statement, this confession would be put in a very safe place, where Octavian would not seek it. I would have it conveyed to Philae, there to be committed to Isis in her sanctuary; and another copy would be taken even farther south, to my sister ruler, the Kandake. It would lie beyond the reach of Rome, waiting until its day came, when there would be ears to hear and believe our side. For in time, they would come, and listen. Isis would know the moment to reveal it.
The Kandake…she had warned me about the Romans, long ago. Now she would be the final refuge of my truth.
And so I took two trusted scribes, and told the story you have read, beginning with “To Isis, my mother, my refuge…” and coming at last to…this.
I found it filled my days in strange ways, reliving my own past, threading events together like beads on a necklace, hoping they made a pattern. For we imagine they must make a pattern, which must be comprehensible from a great distance. Perhaps that great distance can only be time, which means it is impossible for me to grasp the meaning of my own life while I am still living it. I have tried to be honest, to record exactly what happened. It will not be contemporaries who read it, after all, but others who may be ignorant of the surrounding events, and therefore bring an open mind to them.
There were more things to be attended to; there was the future as well as the past. I must impart to Caesarion what it was essential he know in the days to follow. Rather than call him for a formal meeting, I waited until the moment arose naturally, although there was nothing natural in my careful compilation of ideas. I needed to study him carefully, assess what he would be capable of. I must not assume he was a replica of either me or Caesar—that was sentimental thinking, and it could prove costly.
I knew he had a keen interest in weaponry and mechanics—I remembered the miniature trireme he had played with—and under the pretext of wishing a demonstration of the bending properties of the spearheads in the newest javelins (which were tempered in only two crucial places, making them hang at awkward angles when they struck), I was able to spend several mornings with him. He observed the javelins and I observed him, while pretending to be utterly fascinated with the weapons.
Well, he had a good head for mathematics; he was able to do calculations easily, and he had no trouble figuring the trajectories of missiles or the volume of water displaced by boats. Strange how we can love our children and know so little about their actual talents and weaknesses. I had never known this about him.
I mentioned certain military records, which were in other tongues. Together we read them, and I was pleased with his grasp of Syriac, native Egyptian, and Hebrew. Of course his Latin was better than mine. He had practically memorized all of Caesar’s writings.
“His writing is so fine,” he said with a sigh, lying on the floor, propped up on his elbows, staring at Caesar’s Treatise on Analogy. “Better than Cicero’s, I think. Even Cicero admitted Caesar’s vocabulary was ‘so varied and yet so exact.’ I wish I had inherited that. I have to use three words to hit the target, where he could select one.”
“Still, as long as you hit it…” I made him laugh.
He laughed easily; he was naturally friendly, which was essential in a ruler. It is something that cannot be learned, or forced.
How odd to sit there, analyzing my successor. This is good, this needs help, this won’t work at all. Had my father done the same with me? The lighthearted excursions we had made together might not have been so lighthearted on his part, after all.
He lay full-length, cradling his head on his arms. He had grace of person, a pleasing spontaneity, and lack of self-consciousness. His fair hair flopped over his brow, almost in his eyes. Perhaps Caesar’s had been like that at that age. How we search for traits that might linger on in our offspring.
While his earlier resemblance to his father had not faded, and would recall Caesar to anyone who saw him, he was not a duplicate. No one is, in spite of parents’ fond wishes. Each of us has only one lifetime.
I enjoyed the hours with him, for they are never enough when you must carry high duties of state. I had been separated from him too often.
The wind had risen, and the door leading out to the rooftop terrace blew open. He sprang up to close it, and as he pulled the door shut, at once the image of Caesar doing exactly that—the same gesture, the same door, the same half-turn of the body—came back to me. It was the day we had first talked about our child, and now that child—a man—stood in his father’s place. How the days melt down, when seen over the years; how quickly we spring up and vanish. How young I had been then, not much older than Caesarion now. How adult I had felt! My heart grieved for that eager, naive young woman, happy in her ignorance.
Yet I was not old now. I had not even passed the age of childbearing. But feeling
my life needed a summary, making provisions for death, for my successor—that killed youth, regardless of the actual years I counted.
“Nasty weather,” he said. To him the door was just a door that needed to be closed, not a symbol.
“It keeps Octavian away,” I said. The moment had come. I got up and went over to him. “You must know that he will eventually come. And when he approaches, I intend to surrender my crown and scepter to him, as is traditional with client kings.”
His mouth fell open. He must learn to hide his feelings better, the judge in me thought. “No!”
“I will ask him to confirm you in my place. It is a time-honored custom. He is likely to do it. I know him; he wants proper respect paid, but he may prefer to take the easy way out and leave a Ptolemy on the throne.” I looked directly at him. “Now I need you to tell me, and tell me truthfully: Do you feel ready to take this on? You will be seventeen, only a year younger than I was when I became Queen.”
He looked uncomfortable; a frown crossed his face, and he chewed on his lip. Another mannerism he would have to conquer. But we would work on that later. Finally he said, “But…where will you be?”
How astute of him to ask that crucial question. And I must answer it. “I am afraid that as long as I live, he will prove…intransigent.”
“You mustn’t think of such a thing! No, I won’t allow it!” He looked horrified, and I realized that my death would leave him an orphan. Even Antony would be gone. Seventeen is young to be all alone, too early to have started a family of his own to comfort him.
“Please don’t make this any more difficult!” I cried, feeling cruel.
“I don’t want the throne, if you have first to grovel to Octavian and then kill yourself. What do you think I am made of?”
The Memoirs of Cleopatra Page 126