Cleopatra — Chapter 13 Part 2

The freedman however gave him no rest.

He represented how quickly the harbour could be reached from his island, that fish were brought thence from it daily, and he would therefore always have news of what was passing.

His sons were like him, and never used any unnecessary words;

talking did not suit them.

The women of the household rarely left the island.

So long as it sheltered their beloved guest, they should not set foot away from it.

If occasion should require, the master could be in Alexandria again quickly enough to put anything right.

This suggestion pleased the architect, who joined in the conversation to urge the freedman's request.

But Dion, for Barine's sake, obstinately refused, until Anukis, who had long been anxious to go in pursuit of Archibius, thought it time to give _her_ opinion.

"Go with the man, my lord!"

she cried.

"I know what I know.

I will tell our Barine of your faithful resolution; but how can she show her gratitude for it if you are a dead man?"

This question and the information which followed it turned the scale;

and, as soon as Dion had consented to accompany the freedman, the Nubian prepared to continue her errands, but the wounded man detained her to give many messages for Barine, and then she was stopped by the architect, who thought he had found in her the right assistant for numerous plans he had in his mind.

He had returned early that morning from Heroonpolis, where, with other members of his profession, he had inspected the newly constructed waterway.

The result of the first investigation had been unfavourable to the verge of discouragement; and, in behalf of the others, he had gone to the Queen to persuade her to give up the enterprise which, though so full of promise, was impracticable in the short time at their disposal.

He had travelled all night, and was received as soon as Cleopatra rose from her couch.

He had driven from the Lochias in the carriage placed at his disposal because he had business at the arsenal and various points where building was going on, in order to inspect the wall erected for Antony on the Choma, and the Temple of Isis at the Corner of the Muses, to which Cleopatra desired to add a new building.

But scarcely had he quitted the Bruchium when he was detained by the crowd assailing the house of Didymus with beams and rams, and at the same time keeping off the Ephebi who had attacked them.

He had forced his way through the raging mob to aid the old couple and their granddaughter.

The slave Phryx had been busily preparing the boats which lay moored in the harbour of the seawashed estate, but Gorgias had found it difficult to persuade the grey-haired philosopher to go with him and his family to the shore.

He was ready to face the enraged rioters and--though it should cost his life--cry out that they were shamefully deceived and were staining themselves with a disgraceful crime.

Not until the architect represented that it was unworthy of a Didymus to expose to bestial violence a life on which helpless women and the whole world--to whom his writings were guide-posts to the realms of truth--possessed a claim, could he be induced to yield.

Nevertheless, the sage and his relatives almost fell into the hands of the furious rabble, for Didymus would not depart until he had saved this, that, and the other precious book, till the number reached twenty or thirty.

Besides, his old deaf wife, who usually submitted quietly when her defective hearing prevented her comprehension of many things, insisted upon knowing what was occurring.

She ordered everybody who came near her to explain what had happened, thus detaining her granddaughter Helena, who was trying to save the most valuable articles in the dwelling.

So the departure was delayed, and only the brave defence of young Philotas, Didymus's assistant, and some of the Ephebi, who joined him, enabled them to escape unharmed.

The Scythian guards, which at last put a stop to the frantic rage of the deluded populace, arrived too late to prevent the destruction of the house, but they saved Philotas and the other youths from the fists and stones of the rabble.

When the boats had gone farther out into the harbour the question of finding a home for the philosopher and his family was discussed.

Berenike's house was also threatened, and the rules of the museum prevented the reception of women.

Five servants had accompanied the family, and none of Didymus's learned friends had room for so many guests.

When the old man and Helena began to enumerate the lodgings of which they could think, Gorgias interposed with an entreaty that they would come to his house.

He had inherited the dwelling from his father.

It was very large and spacious, almost empty, and they could reach it speedily, as it stood on the seashore, north of the Forum.

The fugitives would be entirely at liberty there, since he had work on hand which would permit him to spend no time under his own roof except at night.

He soon overcame the trivial objections made by the philosopher and, fifteen minutes after they had left the Corner of the Muses, he was permitted to open the door of his house to his guests, and he did so with genuine pleasure.

The old housekeeper and the grey-haired steward, who had been in his father's service, looked surprised, but worked zealously after Gorgias had confided the visitors to their charge.

The pressure of business forbade his fulfilling the duties of host in his own person.

Didymus and his family had reason to be grateful; and when the old sage found in the large library which the architect placed at his disposal many excellent books and among them some of his own, he ceased his restless pacing to and fro and forced himself to settle down.

Then he remembered that, by the advice of a friend, he had placed his property in the keeping of a reliable banker and, though life still seemed dark grey, it no longer looked as black as before.

Gorgias briefly related all this to the Nubian, and Dion added that she would find Archibius with his Roman friend at the house of Berenike's brother, the philosopher Arius.

Like himself, the latter was suffering from an injury inflicted by a reckless trick of Antyllus.

Barine's mother was there also, so Anukis could inform them of the fate of Didymus and his brother, and tell them that he, Dion, intended to leave her house and the city an hour after sunset.

"But," interrupted Gorgias, "no one, not even your hostess Berenike and her brother, must know your destination.

--You look as if you could keep a secret, woman."

"Though she owes her nickname Aisopion to her nimble tongue," replied Dion.

"But this tongue is like the little silver fish with scarlet spots in the palace garden," said Anukis.

"They dart to and fro nimbly enough;

but as soon as danger threatens they keep as quiet in the water as though they were nailed fast.

And--by mighty Isis!

--we have no lack of peril in these trying times.

Would you like to see the lady Berenike and the others before your departure?"

"Berenike, yes; but the sons of Arius--they are fine fellows--would be wise to keep aloof from this house to-day."

"Yes indeed!"

the architect chimed in.

"It will be prudent for their father, too, to seek some hiding-place.

He is too closely connected with Octavianus.

It may indeed happen that the Queen will desire to make use of him.

In that case he may be able to aid Barine, who is his sister's child.

Timagenes, too, who comes from Rome as a mediator, may have some influence."

"The same thoughts entered my poor brain also," said Anukis.

"I am now going to show the gentlemen the danger which threatens her, and if I succeed---- Yet what could a serving-woman of my appearance accomplish?

Still--my house is nearer to the brink of the stream than the dwelling of most others, and if I fling in a loaf, perhaps the current will bear it to the majestic sea."

"Wise Aisopion!"

cried Dion; but the worthy maid-servant shrugged her crooked shoulders, saying: "We needn't be free-born to find pleasure in what is right; and if being wise means using one's brains to think, with the intention of promoting right and justice, you can always call me so.

Then you will start after sundown?"

With these words she was about to leave the room, but the architect, who had watched her every movement, had formed a plan and begged her to follow him.

When they reached the next room he asked for a faithful account of Barine and the dangers threatening her.

After consulting her as if she were an equal, he held out his hand in farewell, saying: "If it is possible to bring her to the Temple of Isis unseen, these clouds may scatter.

I shall be in the sanctuary of the goddess from the first hour after sunset.

I have some measurements to take there.

When you say you know that the immortals will have pity on the innocent woman whom they have led to the verge of the abyss, perhaps you may be right.

It seems as if matters here were combining in a way which would be apt to rob the story-teller of his listener's faith."

After Aisopion had gone, Gorgias returned to Dion's room and asked the freedman to be ready with his boat at a place on the shore which he carefully described.

The friends were again alone.

Gorgias had his hands full of work, but he could not help expressing his surprise at the calm bearing which Dion maintained.

"You behave as if you were going to an oyster supper at Kanopus," he said, shaking his head as though perplexed by some incomprehensible problem.

"What else would you have me do?"

asked the Macedonian.

"The vivid imagination of you artists shows you the future according to your own varying moods.

If you hope, you transform a pleasant garden into the Elysian fields; if you fear anything you behold in a burning roof the conflagration of a world.

We, from whose cradle the Muse was absent, who use only sober reason to provide for the welfare of the household and the state, as well as for our own, see facts as they are and treat them like figures in a sum.

I know that Barine is in danger.

That might drive me frantic; but beyond her I see Archibius and Charmian spreading their protecting wings over her head; I perceive the fear of my faction, including the museum, of the council of which I am a member, of my clients and the conditions of the times, which precludes arousing the wrath of the citizens.

The product which results from the correct addition of all these known quantities----" "Will be correct," interrupted his friend, "so long as the most incalculable of all factors, passion, does not blend with them--the passion of a woman--and the Queen belongs to the sex which is certainly more powerful in that domain."

"Granted!

But as soon as Mark Antony returns it will be proved that her jealousy was needless."

"We will hope so.

It is only the misled, deceived, abused Cleopatra whom I fear; for she herself is matchless in divine goodness.

The charm by which she ensnares hearts is indescribable, and the iron power of her intellect!

I tell you, Dion----" "Friend, friend," was the laughing interruption.

"How high your wishes soar!

For three years I have kept an account of the conflagrations in your heart.

I believe we had reached seventeen; but this last one is equal to two."

"Folly!"

cried Gorgias in an irritated tone: "May not a man admire what is magnificent, wonderful, unique?

She is all these things!

Just now--how long ago is it?

--she appeared before me in a radiance of beauty----" "Which should have made you shade both eyes.

Yet you have been speaking so warmly of your young guest, her loving caution, her gentle calmness in the midst of peril----" "Do you suppose I wish to recall a single syllable?"

the architect indignantly broke in.

"Helena has no peer among the maidens of Alexandria--but the other--Cleopatra--is elevated in her divine majesty above all ordinary mortals.

You might spare me and yourself that scornful curl of the lip.

Had she gazed into your face with those tearful, sorrowful eyes, as she did into mine, and spoken of her misery, you would have gone through fire and water, hand in hand with me, for her sake.

I am not a man who is easily moved, and since my father's death the only tears I have seen have been shed by others; but when she talked of the mausoleum I was to build for her because Fate, she knew not how soon, might force her to seek refuge in the arms of death, my calmness vanished.

Then, when she cumbered me among the friends on whom she could rely and held out her hand--a matchless hand--oh!

laugh if you choose--I felt I know not how, and kneeling at her feet I kissed it; it was wet with my tears.

I am not ashamed of this emotion, and my lips seem consecrated since they touched the little white hand which spoke a language of its own and stands before my eyes wherever I gaze."

Pushing back his thick locks from his brow as he spoke, he shook his head as though dissatisfied with himself and, in an altered tone, hurriedly continued: "But this is a time ill-suited for such ebullitions of feeling.

I mentioned the mausoleum, whose erection the Queen desires.

She will see the first hasty sketch to-morrow.

It is already before my mind's eye.

She wished to have it adjoin the Temple of Isis, her goddess---- I proposed the great sanctuary in the Rhakotis quarter, but she objected--she wished to have it close to the palace at Lochias.

She had thought of the temple at the Corner of the Muses, but the house occupied by Didymus stood in the way of a larger structure.

If this were removed it would be possible to carry the street through the old man's garden, perhaps even to the sea-shore, and we should have had space for a gigantic edifice and still left room for a fine garden.

But we had learned how the philosopher loved his family estate.

The Queen is unwilling to use violence towards the old man---- She is just, and perhaps other reasons, of which I am ignorant, influence her.

So I promised to look for another site, though I saw how much she desired to have her tomb connected with the sanctuary of her favourite goddess---- Then--I have already told the clever brown witch--then the immortals, Divinity, Fate, or whatever we call the power which guides the world and our lives according to eternal laws and its own mysterious, omnipotent will, permitted a rascally deed, from which I think may come deliverance for you and a source of pleasure to the Queen in these days of trial."

"Man, man!

Where will this new passion lead you?

The horses are stamping impatiently outside; duty summons the most faithful of men, and he stands like a prophet, indulging in mysterious sayings!"

"Whose meaning and purport, spite of your calm calculations of existing circumstances, will soon seem no less wonderful to you than to me, whose unruly artist nature, according to your opinion, is playing me a trick," retorted the architect.

"Now listen to this explanation: Didymus's house will be occupied at once by my workmen, but I shall examine the lower rooms of the Temple of Isis.

I have with me a document requiring obedience to my orders.

Cleopatra herself laid the plans before me, even the secret portion showing the course of the subterranean chambers.

It will cast some light upon my mysterious sayings if I bear you away from the enemy through one of the secret corridors.

They were right in concealing from you by how slender a thread, spite of the power of your example in mathematics, the sword hangs above your head.

Now that I see a possibility of removing it, I can show it to you.

Tomorrow you would have fallen, without hope of rescue, into the hands of cruel foes and been shamefully abandoned by your own weak uncle, had not the most implacable of all your enemies permitted himself the infamous pleasure of laying hands on an old man's house, and the Queen, in consequence of an agitating message, had the idea suggested of building her own mausoleum.

The corridor"--here he lowered his voice--"of which I spoke leads to the sea at a spot close beside Didymus's garden, and through it I will guide you, and, if possible, Barine also, to the shore.

This could be accomplished in the usual way only by the greatest risk.

If we use the passage we can reach a dark place on the strand unseen, and unless some special misfortune pursues us our flight will be unnoticed.

The litters and your tottering gait would betray everything if we were to enter the boat anywhere else in the great harbour."

"And we, sensible folk, refuse to believe in miracles!"

cried Dion, holding out his wan hand to the architect.

"How shall I thank you, you dear, clever, most loyal of friends to your male friends, though your heart is so faithless to fair ones?

Add that malicious speech to the former ones, for which I now crave your pardon.

What you intend to accomplish for Barine and me gives you a right to do and say to me whatever ill you choose all the rest of my life.

Anxiety for her would surely have bound me to this house and the city when the time came to make the escape, for without her my life would now be valueless.

But when I think that she might follow me to Pyrrhus's cliff----" "Don't flatter yourself with this hope," pleaded Gorgias.

"Serious obstacles may interpose.

I am to have another talk with the Nubian later.

With no offence to others, I believe her advice will be the best.

She knows how matters stand with the lofty, and yet herself belongs to the lowly.

Besides, through Charmian the way to the Queen lies open, and nothing which happens at court escapes her notice.

She showed me that we must consider Barine's delivery to Alexas a piece of good fortune.

How easily jealousy might have led to a fatal crime one whose wish promptly becomes action, unless she curbs the undue zeal of her living tools!

Those on whom Fate inflicts so many blows rarely are in haste to spare others.

Would the anxieties which weigh upon her like mountains interpose between the Queen and the jealous rancour which is too petty for her great soul?"

"What is great or petty to the heart of a loving woman?"

asked Dion.

"In any case you will do what you can to remove Barine from the power of the enraged princess--I know."

Gorgias pressed his friend's hand closely, then, yielding to a sudden impulse, kissed him on the forehead and hurried to the door.

On the threshold a faint moan from the wounded man stopped him.

Would he be strong enough to follow the long passage leading to the sea?

Dion protested that he confidently expected to do so, but his deeply flushed face betrayed that the fever which had once been conquered had returned.

Gorgias's eyes sought the floor in deep thought.

Many sick persons were borne to the temple in the hope of cure; so Dion's appearance would cause no special surprise.

On the other hand, to have strangers carry him through the passage seemed perilous.

He himself was strong, but even the strongest person would have found it impossible to support the heavy burden of a grown man to the sea, for the gallery was low and of considerable length.

Still, if necessary, he would try.

With the comforting exclamation, "If your strength does not suffice, another way will be found," he took his leave, gave Barine's maid and the wounded man's body-slave the necessary directions, commanded the door-keeper to admit no one save the physician, and stepped into the open air.

A little band of Ephebi were pacing to and fro before the house.

Others had flung themselves down in an open space surrounded by shrubbery in the Paneum garden, and were drinking the choice wine which Dion's cellarer, by his orders, had brought and was pouring out for the crowd.

It was an animated scene, for the clients of the sufferer, who, after expressing their sympathy, had been dismissed by the porter, and bedizened girls had joined the youths.

There was no lack of jests and laughter, and when some pretty young mother or female slave passed by leading children, with whom the garden was a favourite playground, many a merry word was exchanged.

Gorgias waved his hands gaily to the youths, pleased with the cheerfulness with which the brave fellows transformed duty into a festival, and many raised their wine-cups, shouting a joyous "Io" and "Evoe," to drink the health of the famous artist who not long ago had been one of themselves.

The others were led by a slender youth, the student Philotas, from Amphissa, Didymus's assistant, whom the architect, a few days before, had helped to liberate from the demons of wine.

Even while Gorgias was beckoning to him from the two-wheeled chariot, the thought entered his mind that yonder handsome youth, who had so deeply wronged Barine and Dion, would be the very person to help carry his friend through the low-roofed passage to the sea.

If Philotas was the person Gorgias believed him to be, he would deem it a special favour to make amends for his crime to those whom he had injured, and he was not mistaken; for, after the youth had taken a solemn oath not to betray the secret to any one, the architect asked him to aid in Dion's rescue.

Philotas, overflowing with joyful gratitude, protested his willingness to do so, and promised to wait at the appointed spot in the Temple of Isis at the time mentioned.