Cleopatra Confesses

by Carolyn Meyer

  Once the lengths of cloth have been loosened enough that I will not suffocate and the ends of the roll bound just tightly enough that I am completely hidden, the assistant is summoned and the two men pick up their bundle and begin the walk from the harem to the king’s palace. The assistant says nothing about the additional weight of the bundle, though surely he notices.

  Guards have been set up all around the palace, and I can hear their muffled voices as the merchant and his assistant make their way through the crowd. I wish I could see where we are and what is happening, but I must trust that this merchant will not decide to turn me over to the soldiers for a price. It has not been explained to me how Lady Amandaris knows this man. I have come to expect treasonous plots, and I experience a moment of panic, nearly shouting for Apollodorus to set me down here and let me take my chances.

  But then I hear the great wooden doors of the king’s palace creak open on their iron hinges, the slap of leather sandals on the stone floor, exchanges in Latin between Apollodorus and members of Caesar’s special guard. Apollodorus does his best to persuade the guard that Caesar has ordered the linens to be delivered at once, this very evening. The guard is skeptical, unconvinced.

  I strain to hear the murmured reply when a commanding voice calls out, “Enter!”

  That, I think, must be Caesar. Now that the plan is in motion, my nervousness has disappeared, and I feel calm and confident.

  We are moving forward again, and the bundle, with me wrapped inside it, is lowered carefully to the floor. The assistant is dismissed. Apollodorus takes his time unrolling the linens, explaining as he does so the fine quality of the flax, the excellence of the weave. With a final flourish, the bundle is opened and I tumble out.

  Sprawled on the cool marble floor, I gaze up at the startled man peering down at me with raised eyebrows. Not a young man—perhaps fifty or more—and not handsome, certainly, with thinning hair and a weathered face, but tall and well proportioned, strong featured, and possessing great elegance. And those eyes! They are filled with intelligence and humor.

  So this is Caesar!

  “Well now, what is this?” he asks.

  “Hail, noble Caesar!” I greet him in Latin, rising gracefully, as dancers are taught to do. My gown has slipped off one shoulder, and I hurriedly straighten it. My hair has come unbound and falls loose on my shoulders. “I am Queen Cleopatra VII,” I tell him with my most engaging smile. “Welcome to my kingdom.”

  This is my introduction to Julius Caesar, and his to me. Caesar recovers his composure quickly—he never really lost it—and sends Apollodorus away with thanks and, I imagine, a more than generous payment. He calls for refreshments and dismisses his servants and guards. I wonder briefly if he has at least one guard concealed nearby. But I think not. Caesar is not afraid of me. I doubt that he is afraid of anyone.

  I know Caesar’s reputation. My father spoke of his brilliant oratory and the skill with which he controlled the Roman senate. King Ptolemy did not like Caesar, but he could not help admiring him. “He succeeds in everything he undertakes,” Father once told me.

  We begin to talk. We have a great deal to talk about. We discuss the crop failures and the famine that plagues Egypt but not of the military aid I once pledged to his fallen enemy, Pompey. And neither of us mentions my brother.

  Somewhere in Alexandria’s royal quarter, Ptolemy XIII no doubt sleeps peacefully, believing that I am safely out of the way and that he alone will rule Egypt. Because of him, I need Caesar’s support to assure my place on the throne of Egypt. I hope that Caesar also needs me.

  Neither of us touches the food in front of us, and we have little interest in the wine. I am here to charm Caesar and to persuade him. It is not my plan to seduce him. Though I am twenty-one, an age at which most women, even queens, have married and borne children, I am inexperienced in the art of love, and Caesar is a man who enjoys a well-deserved reputation for romantic conquests.

  As the night goes on, the magnetism between us grows as strong as the pull of the moon on the tides. By the next morning I am Caesar’s mistress, confident that he is now bound to me by silken cords of desire.

  I am not Caesar’s conquest. He is mine.

  Chapter 48

  BROTHER-HUSBAND

  The morning after my first meeting with Caesar, Ptolemy XIII awakens to discover that he has been fooled. When he realizes that I have eluded Achillas’s blockade at Pelusium, slipped past Pothinus’s warships in the Great Harbor of Alexandria, and somehow arrived in Caesar’s bed, my brother unleashes a tantrum. He dashes out into the forecourt of his palace in a rage, flinging his golden diadem to the ground and kicking it aside. This incites an angry outcry from the crowd milling outside the palace gates. I did not foresee this, and I wonder aloud if I should arrange to be smuggled out of the palace in much the same way as I was smuggled in.

  But Caesar is unperturbed by the uproar. “I will handle it, Cleopatra,” he says calmly. “You are the queen, and you shall remain the queen. Your brother will not displace you. But you must marry him and rule together. It is your father’s will and my wish.”

  This is surely not my wish, but I realize that Caesar is right. It is what Father intended.

  He steps out onto a balcony and addresses the crowd, demanding order and respect. Once he has quieted the shouting mob and assured them that he will act in their best interests, he orders the guards to disperse them and returns to the bed we shared the previous night.

  He gazes down at me. “I want you here with me, Cleopatra,” he tells me. He buries his fingers in my hair and breathes in the perfumed scent.

  From this time on, events unfold swiftly. The suite of rooms adjoining Caesar’s in the king’s palace will now be mine. My brother and Pothinus have ordered all my possessions—gowns, robes, cosmetics, jewels, everything—to be tossed into an empty storage granary. I send for Irisi and Monifa, who spent the night in the harem with Charmion, and instruct them to get whatever help they need to move my belongings into my new quarters. If my servants are surprised by this sudden change in my living arrangements, they say nothing but begin to set things right.

  I wonder what Charmion is thinking. She surely did not expect this turn of events. But I will wager Lady Amandaris is not at all surprised.

  Late that afternoon Caesar summons the ranking noblemen and high officials of Alexandria to gather in the throne room. On Caesar’s orders I am seated at his right hand, Ptolemy XIII at his left. My brother, red faced and so angry he can scarcely contain himself, writhes in his chair and refuses to look at me. Two of his regents, Pothinus and Theodotus, are present as well. Achillas is still in Pelusium, fending off my hired troops. Arsinoë and our younger brother, Ptolemy XIV, sit off to the side, staring at us wide-eyed. Grand Vizier Yuya’s bland face registers nothing of what he is thinking.

  Magnificent in his gold-trimmed robe of rich purple, Caesar rises and announces that he is about to read aloud the will of King Ptolemy XII. “I am well acquainted with the terms of the will,” he says, his voice deep and resonant, “as I was with its author. It is my intent, as well as my solemn duty, to see that the terms of the will drawn up by your late king are carried out.”

  Caesar reads out the document, which is quite brief. This is the second time the will has been read publicly since Father’s death three years earlier. My brother was ten years old then, and I intended to delay formalizing any marriage for as long as I could. But it may no longer be possible. There can be no arguing with my father’s wishes or with Caesar’s decision: Ptolemy XIII and Cleopatra VII are to rule together as husband and wife and as equals. This does not please Ptolemy any more than it pleases me. He throws me a look of pure hatred. But Ptolemy is still just thirteen, and were he not controlled by his scheming regents, I would not consider the unhappy arrangement anything but a minor problem.

  Caesar has something more to say: Arsinoë and eleven-year-old Ptolemy XIV are to become king and queen of Cyprus. They look at each other, stunned. Tho
ugh I had not expected this, I welcome it. I no longer trust Arsinoë any more than I did Tryphaena or Berenike, and I will feel much safer with my troublesome younger sister sent away to rule a distant kingdom.

  A month after Caesar makes this announcement, a public celebration accompanies my marriage to my brother. The ceremony involves only placing our signatures on a papyrus scroll, but the common people of Alexandria expect wine to flow in the streets, animals to be slaughtered and roasted in open pits, and street musicians to provide entertainment, and so I order it.

  Before the so-called celebration begins, Charmion comes to me, the first I have seen her since Lady Amandaris arranged my delivery to Caesar’s quarters. She bows low and then kneels. “I humbly request your permission to speak, my queen,” she says, and I know from the formal words and respectful tone that things have again changed between us. I wonder if she disapproves of my new life with Caesar.

  I take her hands and raise her to her feet. “Charmion, I’m so glad you’ve come. I’ve longed to talk to you. So much has happened!”

  “You had only to send for me, mistress,” she says with a note of reproach.

  “You’re right,” I concede with a sigh. “But everything is so much different with Caesar in my life. Nothing is quite what I expected. Though my brother is now officially my husband, I dislike him more than ever, and he is even less fond of me.”

  “I know. And that is why I have come today, my queen. To beg you to excuse me from performing tonight at your banquet.”

  “But I need to have at least one friend there!” I cry.

  “You have Caesar!” For a moment we gaze at each other. Then she says, “As you wish, my queen. I shall dance.”

  The banquet is scarcely bearable. I regret asking Charmion to do something she does not want to do. My brother-husband gets drunk and vomits. I can hardly wait for it to end so that I can shut myself in my quarters. I do not even want to talk to Caesar.

  But later that night when Caesar comes to my rooms, I open the door to him and welcome him into my embrace.

  Chapter 49

  ARSINOË

  I wish I could say that matters turn out well, but they do not. My marriage to Ptolemy XIII is little more than a month old, but we can scarcely tolerate the sight of each other.

  He is the least of my worries. Caesar has learned that the abominable Pothinus smuggled a secret message to Achillas, advising him to march westward to Alexandria from Pelusium with Ptolemy’s army. Now Achillas, with twenty thousand Egyptian foot soldiers and a cavalry of two thousand horsemen under his command, approaches the city walls; Caesar’s forces number only four thousand Roman soldiers. I had warned him that this was likely to happen, but Caesar is not used to taking advice from a woman—even one who is well acquainted with the warlike nature of men.

  Caesar orders Pothinus seized and brought to him. The guards drag him in and fling him at Caesar’s feet. Seated at a table studying a scroll, Caesar barely glances at Pothinus, a quivering mass of flesh begging for his life. “You do not deserve to live,” Caesar says, and signals the guards. “Take him away.”

  “Shall we hold him prisoner, sir?” asks the guard in charge.

  Caesar, frowning, shakes his head, his attention again on the scroll. “No. Kill him. He is a traitor.”

  Pothinus weeps piteously as the guards haul him away. Soon after, the guard returns and presents Caesar with a bloody knife. “The blood of the traitor, my lord,” he says.

  I am present for all of this, and I have not a single moment of regret that Pothinus is dead.

  The fighting between Egyptians and Romans goes on month after month. During this awful time, we are all living in the king’s palace as the guests—or maybe as the prisoners—of the Roman general: my angry brother-husband, my bewildered younger brother Ptolemy XIV, my haughty sister Arsinoë, soon to be twenty—and I. The twenty-second anniversary of my birth passes unnoticed, although I make special offerings to Isis to honor her festival.

  I will be relieved when Ptolemy XIV and Arsinoë finally sail for Cyprus, for my sister has grown increasingly argumentative. “This is all your fault!” she screeches at me. “You seduced Caesar and brought all of this down on us!”

  “No, it is not my fault,” I tell her wearily. “I have not caused this to happen, and I can do nothing to stop it.”

  Arsinoë does not listen. I hardly expect her to. But why has Caesar not sent her away?

  Her mentor, Ganymede, is clearly behind Arsinoë’s rebelliousness. I have underestimated this man. He is of average height and displays an ordinary appearance and on most occasions an unremarkable manner, but his intellect is of the highest order. Ganymede is both cunning and vicious. His loyalty is entirely to himself.

  Ganymede helps Arsinoë to escape from the palace. For reasons I cannot fathom, she has become popular among the Egyptians, and soon the crowds are swarming through the streets, shouting her name and proclaiming her their queen and pharaoh.

  I am cast aside by my people, while Arsinoë sits in her encampment by the city walls and calls herself queen.

  “Surely this is not what my father wanted!” I rave, livid with anger but powerless to change a thing.

  Chapter 50

  GANYMEDE

  Caesar is absent for days at a time, mounting defensive positions against Achillas and his men, who outnumber Caesar’s army five to one. I remain in the king’s palace, now Caesar’s—for my own safety, Caesar says. Am I Caesar’s prisoner or his lover? I am not quite sure.

  Irisi makes her usual rounds at the marketplace and reports that Caesar has ordered stone barricades built around the palace quarter. For a while I do feel safer. Then, only days later, Monifa rushes in, breathless and alarmed. “Caesar has sent an expedition into the harbor with orders to set fire to the Egyptian ships anchored there! They are burning, mistress!”

  I rush up to the roof of the palace, from which I have a clear view of the spectacle in the harbor. But what I see horrifies me. The fire has spread from the harbor to the shore. Prevailing winds from the north have swept blazing timbers from the burning ships into the royal quarter. A sudden burst of sparks leaps skyward, followed by a massive tongue of fire and a billowing plume of black smoke. I cry out, for I know exactly where those flames are coming from. Alexandria’s Great Library is burning.

  I send Yafeu to find Charmion. My messenger is gone for such a long time that I fear for his safety as well as hers. Much later, Charmion, smeared with soot, races up the stairs to the roof, where, alone and distraught, I have kept watch for hours.

  “I’m so glad you received my message!” I exclaim as we embrace.

  “Message? I have no message from you, Cleopatra. But I knew you would need me, and so I came.”

  She brings me the crushing news that a large part of the Library of Alexandria and much of the world’s finest collection of literature, art, and science, hundreds of thousands of papyrus scrolls gathered by my Ptolemy ancestors, has been reduced to a pile of glowing ash.

  “No doubt it can be rebuilt, mistress,” she says, trying to comfort me. “I am sure you can find ways to replace many of the scrolls.”

  “And I will,” I promise her, “as soon as I am in power again.” Whenever that will be.

  Arsinoë blames Achillas for this disaster. At her encampment she orders the general arrested, tried, and beheaded, all in the space of a single afternoon, and installs Ganymede at the head of the Egyptian forces. Ganymede quickly proves to be an exceptional general—almost as gifted as Caesar. He builds catapults and other war machines and launches a fierce attack on the Roman defenses. At the same time he manages to divert seawater into the underground aqueducts that carry fresh water from the Nile to vast cisterns supplying the entire city. This is far worse in military terms than the burning of the library.

  Caesar paces restlessly. “Never have I faced such a clever adversary as this Ganymede!” he fumes, pounding his fist into his palm.

  An idea strikes me, and I i
nterrupt his pacing and seize his hands. “Listen to me, my love!” I tell him urgently. “Alexandria is built on limestone. I learned that long ago from Demetrius, my old tutor. Limestone holds water. If you dig into it, Demetrius used to say, you will find fresh water.”

  Caesar stares at me. Then he sweeps me into his arms, lifts me off my feet, and kisses me hard. “Brilliant, Cleopatra! We shall start digging at once!”

  He gathers all the men under his command and orders wells to be dug in every part of the city. As I predicted, he finds an abundance of fresh water—just in time, too, for thirst and panic have already begun to undermine his troops. Within days of the water crisis being resolved, military reinforcements arrive from Rome. Caesar is jubilant.

  But his jubilation is short-lived. Ganymede is reportedly rebuilding his burned-out Egyptian navy, commandeering ships from up and down the Mediterranean coast, even resorting to stripping the wooden roofs from houses to build more ships. Caesar and I are dining alone, discussing this development, when Irisi bursts in, tearful and breathless: “My queen,” she cries, her voice breaking, “the royal boat! It has been destroyed! Captain Mshai was stabbed to death and his body thrown into the lake. Ganymede has ordered his men to use the wood from your boat to build his own warship.”

  I have scarcely taken in the devastating news when a messenger informs Caesar that Ganymede’s navy is preparing to attack. “At sunrise tomorrow, my lord,” says the messenger.

  “How is this possible?” I want to know. “It is almost beyond belief that he has the ships for such an attack!”

  “And the foolhardiness to try it,” Caesar replies angrily. He calls for a servant to bring him his cloak of imperial purple. “This is the battle that will end the war,” he declares, fastening the gold clasp.