Antony and Cleopatra by Colleen McCullough Read Free Book Online Page B

water, even salt,” the boy said, hip-deep now, scrubbing at his face with both hands.
    And there stood Caesar. No one could dispute the identity of the father after seeing the child. Is that why Antonius wants to present him to the Senate and petition it to confirm him King of Egypt? Let anyone in Rome who knew Caesar see this boy, and he’ll gather clients faster than a ship’s hull does barnacles. Marcus Antonius wants to unsettle Octavian, who can only ape Caesar with thick-soled boots and practiced Caesarean gestures. Caesarion is the real thing, Octavian a parody. Oh, clever Marcus Antonius! Bring Octavian down by showing Rome Caesar. The veteran soldiers will melt like ice in the sun, and they have so much power.
     
     
    Cleopatra, cleansed of her regal makeup by the more orthodox method of a bowl of warm water, burst out laughing. “Apollodorus, this is marvelous!” she cried, handing the papers she had read to Sosigenes. “Where did you get these?” she asked while Sosigenes pored his way through them, chuckling.
    “His scribe is fonder of money than statues, Daughter of Amun-Ra. The scribe made an extra copy and sold it to me.”
    “Did Dellius act on instructions, I wonder? Or is this merely a way of demonstrating to his master that he’s worth his salt?”
    “The latter, Your Majesty,” said Sosigenes, wiping his eyes. “It’s so silly! The statue of Serapis, painted by Nicias ? He was dead long before Bryaxis first poured bronze into a mold. And he missed the Praxiteles Apollo in the gymnasium—‘a sculpture of no great artistic worth’ he called it! Oh, Quintus Dellius, you are a fool!”
    “Let us not underestimate the man just because he doesn’t know a Phidias from a Neapolitan plaster copy,” Cleopatra said. “What his list tells me is that Antonius is desperate for money. Money that I, for one, do not intend to give him.”
    Cha’em pattered in, accompanied by his wife.
    “Tach’a, at last! What does the bowl say about Antonius?”
    The smoothly beautiful face remained impassive; Tach’a was a priestess of Ptah, trained almost from birth not to betray her emotions. “The lotus petals formed a pattern I have never seen, Daughter of Ra. No matter how many times I cast them on the water, the pattern always stayed the same. Yes, Isis approves of Marcus Antonius as the sire of your children, but it will not be easy, and it will not happen in Tarsus. In Egypt, only in Egypt. His seed is spread too thinly, he must be fed on the juices and fruits that strengthen a man’s seed.”
    “If the pattern is so unique, Tach’a my mother, how can you be sure that is what the petals are saying?”
    “Because I went to the holy archives, Pharaoh. My readings are only the last in three thousand years.”
    “Ought I refuse to go to Tarsus?” Cleopatra asked Cha’em.
    “No, Pharaoh. My own visions say that Tarsus is necessary. Antonius is not the God out of the West, but he has some of the same blood. Enough for our purposes, which are not to raise up a rival for Caesarion! What he needs are a sister to marry and some brothers who will be loyal subordinates.”
    Caesarion walked in, trailing water. “Mama, I’ve just talked to Quintus Dellius,” he said, flopping on a couch while a clucking Charmian hurried off to find towels.
    “Did you, now? Where was that?” Cleopatra asked, smiling.
    The wide eyes, greener than Caesar’s and lacking that piercing quality, creased up in amusement. “When I went for a swim. He was paddling. Can you imagine it? Paddling! He told me he couldn’t swim, and that confession told me that he was never a contubernalis in any army that mattered. He’s a couch soldier.”
    “Did you have an interesting conversation, my son?”
    “I led him astray, if that’s what you mean. He suspected that someone warned us he was coming, but by the time I left him, he was sure we’d been taken by surprise. It was the news that we’re sailing to Tarsus made him suspect.