At the far end of the chamber, magnificent upon her pedestal, stood Venus herself, as captured in marble by Arcesilaus, the most highly paid sculptor in the world. The goddess stood with one arm bent back to touch her shoulder and her other arm slightly extended; one of her breasts was bare. The molding of her serene features and the folds of her thin gown were extraordinarily delicate.
Next to Venus stood an equally impressive statue of Cleopatra, executed in bronze and covered with gold. The queen was portrayed not in the outlandish garb of the Pharaohs, which the Ptolemies had appropriated when they assumed the rule of Egypt, but in elegant Greek dress, more chastely covered than Venus and wearing a simple diadem on her brow. To Lucius’s eye, Cleopatra was not a particularly beautiful woman—certainly not as beautiful as the idealized image of Venus beside her—but the sculptor had nonetheless managed to capture that indefinable quality that had so captivated a man like Caesar. Caesar’s decision to place her statue in the new Temple of Venus had sparked intense speculation about his intentions. If the purpose of the temple was to honor his ancestress, what place did the queen of Egypt have there, unless Caesar intended to make her the mother of his own descendents?
Lucius had met the queen only once, when she first arrived in Roma for her state visit. During the feasting and entertainments, Lucius had been briefly introduced to her as one of Caesar’s young relatives. The queen had been gracious but aloof; Lucius had been completely tongue-tied. Since then, Caesar had installed Cleopatra at a sumptuous garden estate on the farther bank of the Tiber, where the queen had hosted a number of lavish dinners to introduce herself to the city’s elite.
Staring up at her statue, Lucius felt a sudden impulse to pay her a visit. Why not? Caesar’s overtures to him the previous night emboldened him. Lucius was not just one of the great man’s heirs; he was Caesar’s confidante. He had as much right to pay a social call on the queen of Egypt as any other Roman. To be sure, he was not formally outfitted in his toga, but he was wearing his best tunic. He turned about, left the temple, and headed for the bridge across the Tiber.
Passing through the marketplace in the Forum Boarium, he was surrounded by plebeians on their way to celebrate the Feast of Anna Perenna. There were so many of them heading out of the city that there was a queue to cross the bridge. On the other side, the picnickers drifted toward the public grounds along the riverbank, but Lucius pressed further on, toward the grand private estates that fronted the most desirable stretch of the Tiber. Here the wealthy of Roma had their second homes outside the city, where they could relax in their gardens, pursue the fashionable hobby of beekeeping, and go boating and swimming in the river.
At one of the grandest of these houses, owned by Caesar, Cleopatra had taken up residence. When Lucius knocked at the gate, an Egyptian slave, his eyes outlined with kohl, peered at him through the peephole. Lucius announced himself—“Lucius Pinarius, great-nephew of Gaius Julius Caesar”—and a few moments later the slave opened the gate.
The big man peered beyond him. “Only you?” he said in Greek.
Lucius laughed. “I suppose the queen has very few visitors who arrive without an entourage, and on foot. But yes, it’s only me. My uncle is otherwise engaged today, as the queen probably knows.”
He was conducted to a sunny garden with a view of the river. The garden was formally laid out, with manicured shrubs, gravel paths, and carefully pruned rose bushes. Tucked amid the shrubbery were quaint pieces of Greek statuary. Lucius noticed one of a winged Eros kneeling down to touch a butterfly, and another of a young boy absorbed in pulling a thorn from his foot. Lucius sat on a stone bench and gazed at the sparkles of morning sunlight on the river.
“You’re as pretty as a statue.”
Lucius stood and turned to see the queen standing nearby.
“Please, remain seated,” she said. “I was enjoying the sight of you. You looked like another statue in the garden: Roman Boy Contemplating the Tiber.”
“I’m not a boy, Your Majesty,” said Lucius, bristling slightly. “I would have worn my toga, but—”
“Roman men and their togas! I’m afraid they always look slightly ridiculous to me.”
“The men or the togas?”
Cleopatra smiled. “You’re a sharp one,” she said. “And of course you’re not a boy. I didn’t mean to offend you. I know how vexing it can be, when one is young but determined to be taken seriously.”
Cleopatra herself was no more than twenty-five. Her statue in the temple made her look older, Lucius thought, as had her royal raiment when he first met her. On this day she wore a simple, sleeveless linen gown tied at the waist with a gold-threaded sash. Her hair, usually pinned atop her head, hung down on either side of her face. She wore no diadem. The day was early, and the queen was not yet dressed for formal visitors.
“It’s good of you to receive me,” said Lucius.
“I could hardly turn away Caesar’s kinsman. Is there a celebration? My sentinels tell me that all sorts of people are out enjoying themselves along the river. Does it have something to do with Caesar’s pronouncement to the Senate?”
Lucius smiled at her mistake. “The Feast of Anna Perenna is an ancient plebeian holiday. It has nothing to do with me or with Caesar. He won’t be speaking to the Senate until later this morning.”
“I see. I have a great deal to learn about Roman customs. Perhaps you could instruct me.”
“I, Your Majesty?”
“By rights, the task should fall to Caesar. When he was in Alexandria, I educated him about Egyptian court protocol. But Caesar is much too busy. And there are so few people in the city I can trust.”
“But you’ve met many people since you arrived. All the best people come to the dinner parties here at your villa.”
“Yes, and they all go away utterly charmed by the queen of Egypt—or pretending to be so, to curry favor with Caesar. Occasionally, I receive word of their true reaction. That fellow Cicero, for example. To my face, the famous advocate was all smiles and flattery. Behind my back, he wrote a letter to a friend, complaining that he could hardly stand to be in the same room with me.”
“How do you know this?”
She shrugged. “One didn’t survive as a princess in Alexandria without learning how to discover the truth. Frankly, I don’t see why Caesar allows that man to keep his head. Didn’t Cicero oppose him in the civil war and fight for Pompeius?”
“Yes. Brutus opposed him, as well, but after Pharsalus, Caesar forgave them both. Caesar is famous for his clemency.”
The queen narrowed her eyes. “I suppose, operating in a republic, clemency was a tool of statecraft. Caesar will learn new ways to deal with his enemies when he finally puts the last vestiges of this primitive form of government behind him.”
“Primitive?” Lucius drew back his shoulders. More than ever he wished he had worn his toga; it gave a man a sense of authority. “Roma is much, much older than Alexandria. And I believe the Roman Republic predates the establishment of your dynasty by almost two hundred years.”
“Perhaps. But when my ancestor Ptolemy inherited control of Egypt from Alexander, he assumed the title, the royal insignia, and the divine status of the Pharaohs who preceded him. Their dynasties can be traced back thousands of years, to the very beginning of time. By comparison, the civilization of the Romans is very young; infantile, in fact. The great pyramids were built many centuries before the Greeks laid siege to Troy, and Roma was founded hundreds of years after Troy fell.”
She frowned. “The other day I hosted a group of Roman scholars, to discuss the holdings of the Library of Alexandria. We fell to talking about the origins of Roma, and they put forward a very novel theory. They said that a Trojan warrior, Aeneas, escaped the sack of the city, sailed to the shores of Italy, and settled near the Tiber, and thus the blood of Troy survives in the Romans. But when I asked for evidence, they had none. I have to wonder whether your scholars are taking a bit of license when they speak of this link between Roma and Troy.”