The Memoirs of Cleopatra (37 page)

“Yes,” said Caesar, “and the Pontiff is going to exercise one of his prerogatives and reform the calendar.”

There were sharp intakes of breath all around the tables.

“It is time! Our calendar no longer bears any resemblance to the natural one. We celebrate harvest festivals while it is yet summer, and midsummer when the days are shorter than the nights. The priests who had the duty of regulating it have failed. So I shall revise it. It falls within my purview.”

“But, Caesar,” said Brutus, “it is not something for an ordinary man, no matter how well intentioned. It requires knowledge of astronomy and mathematics and other calendar systems that have been tried, and failed.” I watched his face; it was hard to tell whether he thought Caesar a fool or was just trying to warn him.

“In Alexandria we have a man who excels at that, and is world-renowned among scholars,” I said. “Sosigenes. You have heard of him?”

Nodding heads told me they had.

“I will send for him straightway, Caesar,” I said. “I place him at your service.” Suddenly I remembered what I had heard about a month being named in his honor. “Is it true that the new calendar will bear a newly named month?” I asked.

“There has been mention of perhaps renaming my birth month, Quintilis, in my honor, but—” He shrugged.

“It is just a rumor!” said Brutus, scowling. “The months are properly numbered, or named after gods, not human beings. Rome would not permit such a thing.”

“Nonetheless I have heard it spoken of,” said Octavian. He looked, unblinking and adoring, at his uncle. Did he wish it to be true? Or would it offend his fierce sense of propriety?

His very intensity made his finely chiseled features seem to take on yet more beauty. I had heard of the characteristic “Julian beauty,” had heard that all the faces of that family were known to be delicate, with an exquisite bone structure. Even though Octavian did not look like Caesar, they did share that characteristic. I looked at Octavia. Again, she did not resemble the other two, but her features were likewise elegant and well formed. I noticed she wore a wedding ring on one of her long, graceful hands. I wondered where her husband was.

“He has honors enough,” said Brutus. “A thanksgiving of forty days for his victories has been proclaimed, there will be four successive Triumphs, he has been appointed ‘Prefect of Morals’ and Dictator for ten years, and his Triumphal chariot will be placed on the Capitoline Hill opposite Jupiter’s. He has no need of a month of ‘Julius.’ He has more than a month already, all his!”

“Brutus, do you begrudge me these things?”

That awful silence, only just dispelled, descended again. And I heard in Caesar’s voice such sorrow, such pain, that it hurt me to hear it. What was Brutus to him, that his disapproval should rend him so?

“No, of course not.” It was not Brutus who spoke but Servilia, his mother.

“Brutus?” Caesar asked again.

“No,” he mumbled, looking away and not at Caesar.

“My Caesar has been away from Rome eleven of the past twelve years,” said Calpurnia. “If Rome wishes to honor him for what he has done for her, toiling so far afield, why should we object?” She had a pleasing voice, I had to admit. “Since we have been married, thirteen years ago, he has been at my side only a few weeks.”

As she spoke, I realized that he had spent more time with me than with her.

I picked at my mackerel and waited for the remark to pass.

“It is difficult, now, to know what is noble in Rome and must be preserved, and what has served its time and must be replaced,” said Octavian thoughtfully.

“Young Octavian is a fierce guardian of all things traditional,” said Caesar. “If anything passes his scrutiny, it is sure to be proper.”

“In Egypt it seems we have nothing but tradition,” said Ptolemy suddenly. “We are surrounded by things made so long ago they seem divine. Everywhere there are tombs, statues…ghosts.”

“But Alexandria is a new city,” said Octavia, beside him. “All new, and very beautiful, from what I have heard.”

“Yes,” I said proudly. “It is the most modern city in the world, and it was planned by the Great Alexander.”

Servers began removing the plates of the
gustum
and made ready to bring out the main course, the
mensa prima
. The rattling of the utensils, and the busyness of the attendants, made us pause in the conversation. I looked at Caesar and noticed that he had not touched his wine. Then I remembered he had told me he seldom drank it, lest it provoke his condition. He also had eaten very little.

“Did you enjoy Alexandria?” Calpurnia asked Caesar in a loud voice.

He started, taken by surprise. Clearly such bluntness was out of character for Calpurnia; she must be very angry. He cleared his throat, thinking hard. “I enjoy all battlefields,” he finally said. “And Alexandria was a battlefield; it required all my resources to teach myself how to fight in city streets, with a civilian population all around. Especially as any mistakes could cost innocent people dear.”

Calpurnia opened her mouth to press further, but lost her nerve.

Just then the new courses were brought out, arranged on silver platters. There was a rich, dark pork stew with apples. I was most curious to try it, as pork is not eaten in Egypt. There was also a kid, prepared Parthian style, and a dish of stuffed thrushes fed with myrtle. Then, to the sighs of the guests, came a platter with a gigantic red roasted mullet on it, accompanied by a pickle sauce.

“Did you go down and bid on the mullet?” asked Agrippa, laughing. It seemed that mullet had become a passion with Romans, and prominent houses bid in auctions for them at the fish market. “How did you ever outbid Marc Antony? He goes down every day, determined to carry off the best.”

“What, in person?” Octavian sounded scandalized.

“It’s no worse than the other things he does. Carrying on with that retinue of actors and actresses, drinking, living in Pompey’s house without paying for it,” said Brutus. “But I speak of the man you appointed to take charge of Rome in your absence, Caesar.”

“He did not perform well,” said Caesar. “I was disappointed. He was dismissed. There’s an end to it. What he does with his drink and his actresses concerns me not.”

“But is he not related to us? Is he not part of the Julian house?” Octavian sounded distressed.

“Distantly,” said Caesar.

“Not distantly enough,” said Octavia.

“Why speak any further of him?” said Caesar. “He has his merits, and they have served me well in the past. He failed in this latest task. But he is a great general, nonetheless. He has a deep intuitive sense of tactics. There is no man I would sooner have with me on the battlefield.”

“I met Marc Antony once,” I said. “It was when he came to Egypt with Gabinius.” I remembered the laughing young cavalry officer who had refrained from making fun of my drunken father when the other Romans looked at him askance. He had been kind.

“That was ten years ago or more,” said Brutus. “He has changed since then.” He speared a large chunk of meat with his knife, and transferred it, dripping, to his platter. Splatters of sauce fell on the napkin.

More dishes followed: boiled cucumber and what Caesar announced was “squash, Alexandrian style.” It was something I had never tasted before, but obviously it fit what Romans imagined about us. It was filled with cinnamon and honey.

“This is new to me,” I confessed. “There is much we do not know about one another’s customs. I have found many things in Rome puzzling. For example, the lictors and the bundles of branches they carry. What do they mean? And the ranks of senators, the
quaestors
and
praetors
and people called
curule aediles—
what responsibilities do they have?”

“You ask questions like a child,” said Brutus. “Is this how a queen receives knowledge?”

“It is how all wise people do, Brutus,” Caesar reproved him. Then he turned to me. “I see that you need someone to explain things that are foreign to you. Very well—who better than Octavian, that Roman through-and-through?”

Not his nephew! It would be irksome to have this boy trailing around after me, I could tell. Nonetheless I smiled and said, “No, Octavian must not leave his duties at the College of Pontiffs.”

“Oh, but this will be good training for him! He can clarify his own thoughts in explaining things to you,” said Caesar. “He must venture out in public. He is, after all, to ride in a chariot in my Triumphs.”

“Even though he did not join you on the battlefield,” said Agrippa. “Well, next time we’ll both be there!” He chewed heartily on a piece of kid.

I bent to my plate and enjoyed tasting the pork. It is a robust meat, with a rich flavor. This particular animal had been fed on acorns in Brutus’s province, so he said.

“Brutus may soon remarry,” said Servilia abruptly. “He may marry my niece Porcia, Cato’s daughter.”

Caesar put down his knife and looked steadily at Brutus. “Perhaps you will wish to reconsider,” he said slowly.

“We have no king in Rome from whom I must ask permission,” he answered. “Or does the Prefect of Morals control all the marriages?”

“Of course not,” said Caesar lightly. “But marrying within one’s own family can get monotonous. One has heard all the same family stories, knows all the jokes and all the same recipes. No novelty.”

“Well, we Ptolemies like it that way!” said my brother. “We’ve practiced brother-sister marriages for generations, just like the Pharaohs! That’s because we’re divine!”

Everyone stared at him.

“We don’t believe in that in Rome,” said Servilia quietly.

“In brothers marrying sisters?” Ptolemy asked.

“No. In kings, and in people claiming to be divine. We have a republic here—all citizens are equal.”

“What a funny idea!” Ptolemy laughed.

“It is a western idea,” I said quickly to him. “People in the east feel differently. In our part of the world, kings are the tradition. And we believe that gods mingle with men on many levels.”

“Yes, particularly in bed,” said Agrippa. But there was no malice in his voice. “Zeus seems to spend most of his time attacking mortal women in one guise or another—first as a golden shower, then as a swan—and creating hordes of half-divine offspring. Bastards.”

“Men do enough of that on their own,” said Calpurnia. “They need no help from the gods.”

Clearly she was alluding to me and Caesarion. So it was known all over Rome. Now it was up to Caesar to say something. Let him speak!

But he refused to rise to the bait. The moment passed, and the servants began removing the plates and getting ready for our last course, the
mensa secunda—
a selection of rich, sweet treats. We would drink
passum
with them, a heavy raisin wine.

On little trays they brought out honey custard, made with Attic honey, and a preserve of pears. Last they brought a platter heaped high with pomegranates. Caesar took the topmost one off the pile and put it directly on my plate, looking knowingly at me.

At last I have found someone who is exactly like me. We are two halves of a pomegranate, and each section fits perfectly together
. I remembered those words he had spoken in Alexandria. Yet here, in Rome, surrounded by his family—was he more like them, or more like me? Which was he, truly?

“What will happen?” I asked, so low that only he could hear it. I saw now that nothing was settled, nothing safe. The master of the world, who had swept aside all the playing pieces in Egypt with one quick brush of his hand, was just a man at a dinner in Rome, surrounded by cold, unfriendly friends. And beyond them lurked—genuine animosity. I sensed it.
We don’t believe in that in Rome
. What could be Caesar’s ultimate place here?

“I know not,” he answered, equally softly.

I had thought the dinner was over, but I was surprised to hear the musicians begin playing new tunes, and Caesar said, “Friends, I wish you to be the first to hear the beginning of a composition on the Alexandrian War. My good friend, the
praetor
Aulus Hirtius, has begun to recount it, and I invited him to join us and bring both his account and his famous mulberries in sapa.”

Everyone murmured expectantly, and I later was told that Hirtius was well known for his refined tastes in food. His mulberries, it seemed, would be far superior to regular ones.

A pleasant-looking man strode into the room, a slave following him with a silver serving dish. I could see the deep reddish purple berries inside.

“It is my honor to give my humble recounting of the war before those who lived it,” he said. “Your Majesties, I beg you to correct anything I say that is wrong. As you know full well, I was not there.” He nodded to us, looked around at the company, then stepped back and began reciting. “ ‘
Bello Alexandrino conflato Caesar Rhodo atque ex Syria Ciliciaque omnem classem arcessit: Creta sagittarios, equites ab rege….
’ ”

Caesar frowned. He knew Ptolemy and I could not follow it. Yet I wished he would just let Hirtius continue. It gave me an opportunity to look carefully at the others, to study them without the constant necessity of being on my guard and responding to comments and questions.

My wish was not to be granted. Caesar held up his hand. “I pray you, our royal guests are not as practiced in Latin as the rest of the company. I believe they could better enjoy it in Greek.”

“Oh yes. Of course.” Hirtius shut his eyes and went back to the beginning. “ ‘When the Alexandrian War flared up, Caesar summoned every fleet from Rhodes and Syria and Cilicia; from Crete he raised archers, and cavalry from…’ ”

The berries had been ladled out into small, multicolored glass dishes. Multicolored glassware was an Alexandrian specialty. Who had thought of this touch—Caesar or Hirtius? I tasted the berries, finding them tart and pungent.

“ ‘Highly productive and abundantly supplied as it was, the city furnished equipment of all kinds. The people themselves were clever and very shrewd….’ ” Hirtius’s voice droned on. I had trouble following him; my mind kept wandering. I felt a slight breeze coming from the open garden opening off the dining room; it was heavy and scented with unknown leaves, dusty and vaguely sweet.