Pharaoh (14 page)

It is the express wish of Caesar that this missive had been delivered in his person to receive the delight of your smiles
and sympathies as you read of the tribulations of his public life. There is no other in whom he has ever wished to confide
or to seek comfort for life’s many difficulties. In the meanwhile and in his absence, he has written and dedicated a short
verse to you:

Venus, your placid countenance is a seduction, an illusion. From the waters of your canal flow Eros, who fills the ocean of
the heart, cresting like the cimmerian torrent of the Black Sea.

Yours, C. Julius Caesar

To: Gaius Julius Caesar, Dictator of Rome
From: Kleopatra VII, Queen of Egypt
My darling Caesar,

I have read your letter a thousand times and then a thousand times more to our son so that he might know of his fathers brilliance,
his glory, his wit, and to know that his father is not merely general and statesman but poet-a complete man by the definition
of the Greek philosophers. How I long to kidnap you and shelter you from your many worries. If you were here in Alexandria
with me, I would see that all evidence of the honor you deserve was heaped upon you every day of your life. And at the same
time, I would guard our private life together so that every day I might sit upon your lap and listen to your stories
of foreign lands and of battles fought and won and of the friendships and adversaries you face in your capital city. That
you continue to unburden yourself to me is my joy. I think often of the happiness of our few days together after the war when
you began to reveal to me the contents of your mind. Would that I could do more than receive your distant thoughts in letters.
For it pains me to know that time and distance stand between us and I am not able to know what you are thinking at this very
moment, nor to share with you my thoughts and ideas as they take form and then quickly transform into the next. We are made
anew each moment, are we not? I have found, dear General, that that is your particular genius-the fact that you approach each
of life’s many hurdles with a fresh mind, always open to the inspiration of the gods as to how to solve a particular situation.
Was it Venus herself who directed you to shame your soldiers by addressing them as citizens? It seems to me that you and I
share in common that the gods whisper directly into our ears. Perhaps it is because we are sanctioned by the Divine as leaders
of men. You are every day a new man, and that is why those who cling to the old ways fear you. I believe this is another of
our common traits-the desire to part with traditions that are no longer relevant to present-day realities. The changes, of
course, are not simply to serve ourselves, but to further all mankind.

I fret over your health, dear one. I worry that someday in the heat of battle or in the throes of debate on the senate floor,
you shall be overtaken by your malady. Why am I not there to watch over you, to hold you to me while you make your strange
voyage to some unseen place, and then to mop your brow with my own handkerchief while you take shallow breaths and return
to the earthly realm? I treasure the moments I spent with your head in my lap, watching you come back to me from your journey
to the unknown. Do you recall what you said? It seemed to me that you were still lost in the place between this world and
that one when you looked at me with misty and distant eyes and said, “She is you and you are she.” And then you closed your
eyes again and your hands went limp at your sides, sliding off your chest, and you fell into a peaceful sleep as if you were
just a small boy taking comfort in his mothers safe and tranquil presence.

I have seen the same look now on the small face of our son. He is strong, like both his parents. Though he is but three months
old, he holds his head tall, looking intently at all who attend him as if he wished to impart to them the secrets of life
that he has carried forth from his time with the gods. I have spoken to him at length about his position in life, so that
he seems to have absorbed
it into his very being. His countenance expresses the seriousness and the weight of his lineage and all that to which he is
heir. His eyes are a dark blue; I cannot say that they are yet the gray of Alexander, and they are shrouded by rather heavy
and sensuous lids. His brow is well-defined for an infant. He has a philosophers thinness despite his vehement enthusiasm
at the breast. I nursed him myself for two months for that is the Egyptian way. The native midwives say that precious life-enhancing
fluids are passed to the child from the mothers milk in the early months, and so like a peasant I held him at my breast before
releasing him to a wet nurse. I find the Egyptian women’s knowledge of spells and remedies far in advance of those of Greek
women. For example, I have bathed in donkeys milk brought back from Aswan under the advice of the wife of the Egyptian priest,
and already my skin has recovered its youthfulness after the birth. (I hope I am not boring the General with these tedious
details. I feel certain that if he were here, I would share every thought in my head with him from the profound to the banal
and he would indulge all of them as if I, too, were his child.)

I long to hear more of you, though the financial demands you placed upon me before you left keep me busy day and night with
enterprises that will replen-ish my treasury. I have increased the laborers in the Cypriot copper mines so that our revenues
from that territory you restored to us should double in the coming months. Duties on merchants have increased, much to their
chagrin. I have toured the linen factories myself and with the craftsmen have invented new dyes that are sure to bring greater
demand for our cloth from rich Roman ladies, and have granted new licenses for the export of jewelry and other adornments
to a whole new generation of merchants. When you see a lovely Roman girl wearing Egyptian finery, do think of me. I was tempted
to raise the price of beer, but was assured that public opinion would sway very far away from me if I did.

So you see, dear General, despite the burden you placed upon my people, I am still your devoted one. (I do hope the money
has finally placated Rabirius and that he plagues you no more with his demands.) I live only for your hap-piness, for my sons
future, and for our future together. Though we must tolerate this lapse in our togetherness, when next we meet I am certain
that it shall be as if we had not spent a day apart.

Yours, Kleopatra

From: Hammonius in the city of Rome
To: Kleopatra VII, Queen of Egypt
My dear Majesty,

Your old friend and faithful servant reports to you on the conditions in the city of his exile. Ye, ye, I can see your smile
spread as you read of my woe, and I do admit that I have grown as prosperous as a king while in the service of your father
and your Royal Person here in this strange and ghastly land. But Your Majesty, please believe me when I say that no amount
of gold can truly compensate for not having ones two big feet planted firmly on olive-drenched Greek soil.

Your Majesty, I believe I can explain the recent silence of Julius Caesar. One month ago he was pulled away from the problems
in the city to face his enemies on African shores, where the sons and remaining allies of Pompey united with King Juba of
Numidia to continue the Roman Civil War. The dissenters were mighty in numbers, for they had the many thousands of the kings
archers and horsemen and another army that rode into battle on fearsome ele-phants. Once again, Caesar was outnumbered by
his enemies. It is said that food and supplies were so depleted that he forced his soldiers to dismiss their slaves, and was
reduced to feeding seaweed to his horses. And yet, as the gods would have it, Caesar was victorious. The soldiers say that
he drilled the newer recruits in the arts of war himself, demonstrating the finer, more subtle artistry of sword-play, when
to advance and retreat, and how to maneuver one efficient mortal blow This personal instruction from so great a man made his
young soldiers fiercely loyal to him. The African soldiers had no real loyalty to the Pompeians, who demanded much of them
and promised little, and the fearsome reputation of Caesar was enough for whole legions and towns to come over to him at his
request. Still, the sheer multitude of the enemy was awesome, and at the onset of the deciding battle, some of the less-experienced
men tried to run away. It is said that Caesar stood back so that he might catch them in their retreat and personally point
them in the direction of the battle. The deciding battle was fought at Thapsus, and then Caesar moved on to Utica, where his
enemies easily surrendered to him, but for Cato, who died by his own sword.

And now, Caesar has made a glorious reentry into the city. The rabble was represented in record numbers in the streets of
Rome for the forty-day Thanksgiving festival (twice longer than any victor has previously enjoyed) accorded to Caesar for
his victories abroad. Caesar was given permission to cel-ebrate Four Triumphs: over Gaul, Egypt, Pontus, and Africa. His victories
over
his fellow Romans go unmentioned, or at least uncelebrated. The senate was extremely indulgent of Caesar upon his return to
Rome, voting him dictator for another ten years and inventing a new office for him, Overseer of Public Morality, through which
he is vowed to restore discipline. His opinion will heretofore be delivered first at all senate meetings. He will not only
nominate all magistrates, but himself will sit on the magistrates’ bench. And he will give the opening signal at all public
games, which will undoubtedly thrill his throng of common admirers.

I witnessed each spectacle staged for the Triumphs, and I attended a banquet for the public where I sat at one of twenty-two
thousand dining couches and feasted until my rebellious spleen sent me running to the public latrines. There was no end to
the food served. I believe that millions, not thousands, of tender sea eels, quails, pigs, geese, goats, lambs, hares, cows,
chickens, and ducks were eaten by the population at large, while the more fortunate of us with high political connections
were also treated to peacock (eaten to encourage immortality), oysters, and even tender morsels of songbird, once said to
be a favorite of Darius the Persian. You will also be pleased to know that rare spices imported from Egyptian merchants at
great expense peppered each dish. And then Caesar made a great store of giving two thousand denariis to each legionary, claiming
it was more than twice what they would have received from Pompey, and that he aimed to be “rich
with
the Roman people, not their robber.”

The parades called to mind the Grand Procession of your ancestors, revived by your father when you were but a girl of nine.
But the Romans added the ingredient of cruelty, missing from our more festive and holy Greek and Egyptian celebrations, for
people and animals lost their lives brutally. One such was a huge blond creature whom Caesar had defeated in Gaul. He was
strangled for the crime of defending his tribe against the Romans. Your own sister Arsinoe was marched in chains along with
a four-year-old African prince, who amused the crowd with his playfulness. He obviously thought the festival had been staged
in his honor, so generous was he in waving to the throng. But soldiers who complained that the cost of the celebration was
eating into their settlements were beheaded! Gladiators murdered their opponents in blood-drenched reenactments of the battles
won by the Romans. And I, an old man who has seen so much inhumanity, turned my head away from the slaughter of hundreds of
lions and giraffes done only for the pleasure of cruelty. This awful display lacked any of the noble intentions of manly sport
and took all honor and dignity from hunter and animal alike.

Caesar himself was escorted in his parade by seventy-two high official, whose slaves carried vats of burning perfume to neutralize
the fetid odor of a large mob on a hot day. He had a boy with him, Gaius Octavian, his grandnephew, grand-son of his sister
Julia. The boy is thin and pale and looks perhaps to be about eighteen years old. I inquired of him, thinking he had performed
valiantly in Caesars service, though his appearance betrays not a trace of military ability or potential. I was told that
he had not participated in any war, and those with whom I spoke were also puzzled as to the place of honor he was given in
the Triumph, when the great Marcus Antonius, who committed impossible feats of heroism in the war, was given no special honors
at all.