Cleopatra

  CHAPTER VIII

  OF THE AWAKING OF HARMACHIS; OF THE SIGHT OF DEATH; OF THE COMING OFCLEOPATRA; AND OF HER COMFORTABLE WORDS

  Once more I woke; it was to find myself in my own chamber. I started up.Surely, I, too, had dreamed a dream? It could be nothing but a dream?It could not be that I woke to know myself a _traitor!_ That theopportunity had gone for ever! That I had betrayed the cause, and thatlast night those brave men, headed by my uncle, had waited in vainat the outer gate! That Egypt from Abu to Athu was even nowwaiting--waiting in vain! Nay, whatever else might be, this could notbe! Oh, it was an awful dream which I had dreamed! a second such wouldslay a man. It were better to die than face such another vision sentfrom hell. But, though the thing was naught but a hateful phantasy of amind o'er-strained, where was I now? Where was I now? I should be in theAlabaster Hall, waiting till Charmion came forth.

  Where was I? and O ye Gods! what was that dreadful thing, whose shapewas the shape of a man?--that thing draped in bloodstained white andhuddled in a hideous heap at the foot of the couch on which I seemed tolie?

  I sprang at it with a shriek, as a lion springs, and struck with all mystrength. The blow fell heavily, and beneath its weight the thingrolled over upon its side. Half mad with terror, I rent away the whitecovering; and there, his knees bound beneath his hanging jaw, was thenaked body of a man--and that man the Roman Captain Paulus! There helay, through his heart a dagger--my dagger, handled with the sphinx ofgold!--and pinned by its blade to his broad breast a scroll, and on thescroll, writing in the Roman character. I drew near and read, and thiswas the writing:

  HARMACHIDI.SALVERE.EGO.SUM.QUEM.SUBDERE.NORASPAULUS.ROMANUS.DISCE.HINC.QUID.PRODERE.PROSIT.

  "Greeting, Harmachis! I was that Roman Paulus whom thou didst suborn.Learn now how blessed are traitors!"

  Sick and faint I staggered back from the sight of that white corpsestained with its own blood. Sick and faint I staggered back, till thewall stayed me, while without the birds sang a merry greeting to theday. So it was no dream, and I was lost! lost!

  I thought of my aged father, Amenemhat. Yes, the vision of him flashedinto my mind, as he would be, when they came to tell him his son's shameand the ruin of all his hopes. I thought of that patriot priest, myuncle Sepa, waiting the long night through for the signal which nevercame. Ah, and another thought followed swift! How would it go withthem? I was not the only traitor. I, too, had been betrayed. By whom? Byyonder Paulus, perchance. If it were Paulus, he knew but little ofthose who conspired with me. But the secret lists had been in my robe. OOsiris! they were gone! and the fate of Paulus would be the fate of allthe patriots in Egypt. And at this thought my mind gave way. I sank andswooned even where I stood.

  My sense came back to me, and the lengthening shadows told me that itwas afternoon. I staggered to my feet; the corpse of Paulus was stillthere, keeping its awful watch above me. I ran desperately to the door.It was barred, and without I heard the tramp of sentinels. As I stoodthey challenged and grounded their spears. Then the bolts were shotback, the door opened, and radiant, clad in royal attire, came theconquering Cleopatra. She came alone, and the door was shut behind her.I stood like one distraught; but she swept on till she was face to facewith me.

  "Greeting, Harmachis," she said, smiling sweetly. "So, my messenger hasfound thee!" and she pointed to the corpse of Paulus. "Pah! he has anugly look. Ho! guards!"

  The door was opened, and two armed Gauls stepped across the threshold.

  "Take away this carrion," said Cleopatra, "and fling it to the kites.Stay, draw that dagger from his traitor breast." The men bowed low, andthe knife, rusted red with blood, was dragged from the heart of Paulusand laid upon the table. Then they seized him by the head and body andstaggered thence, and I heard their heavy footfalls as they bore himdown the stairs.

  "Methinks, Harmachis, thou art in an evil case," she said, when thesound of the footfalls had died away. "How strangely the wheel ofFortune turns! But for that traitor," and she nodded towards the doorthrough which the corpse of Paulus had been carried, "I should now be asill a thing to look on as he is, and the red rust on yonder knife wouldhave been gathered from _my_ heart."

  So it was Paulus who had betrayed me.

  "Ay," she went on, "and when thou camest to me last night, I _knew_ thatthou camest to slay. When, time upon time, thou didst place thy handwithin thy robe, I knew that it grasped a dagger hilt, and that thouwast gathering thy courage to the deed which thou didst little loveto do. Oh! it was a strange wild hour, well worth the living, andI wondered greatly, from moment to moment, which of us twain wouldconquer, as we matched guile with guile and force to force!

  "Yea, Harmachis, the guards tramp before thy door, but be not deceived.Did I not know that I hold thee to me by bonds more strong than prisonchains--did I not know that I am hedged from ill at thy hands by a fenceof honour harder for thee to pass than all the spears of all my legions,thou hadst been dead ere now, Harmachis. See, here is thy knife," andshe handed me the dagger; "now slay me if thou canst," and she drewnear, tore open the bosom of her robe, and stood waiting with calm eyes.

  "Thou canst not slay me," she went on; "for there are things, as I knowwell, that no man--no man such as thou art--may do and live: and this isthe chief of them--to slay the woman who is all his own. Nay, stay thyhand! Turn not that dagger against thy breast, for if thou mayst notslay me, by how much more mayst thou not slay thyself, O thou forswornPriest of Isis! Art thou, then, so eager to face that outraged Majestyin Amenti? With what eyes, thinkest thou, will the Heavenly Mother lookupon Her son, who, shamed in all things and false to his most sacredvow, comes to greet Her, his life-blood on his hands? Where, then, willbe the space for thy atonement?--if, indeed, thou mayest atone!"

  Then I could bear no more, for my heart was broken. Alas! it was tootrue--I dared not die! I was come to such a pass that I did not evendare to die! I flung myself upon the couch and wept--wept tears of bloodand anguish.

  But Cleopatra came to me, and, seating herself beside me, she strove tocomfort me, throwing her arms about my neck.

  "Nay, love, look up," she said; "all is not lost for thee, nor am Iangered against thee. We did play a mighty game; but, as I warned thee,I matched my woman's magic against thine, and I have conquered. But Iwill be open with thee. Both as Queen and woman thou hast my pity--ay,and more; nor do I love to see thee plunged in sorrow. It was welland right that thou shouldst strive to win back that throne my fathersseized, and the ancient liberty of Egypt. Myself as lawful Queen haddone the same, nor shrunk from the deed of darkness to which I wassworn. Therein, then, thou hast my sympathy, that ever goes out to whatis great and bold. It is well also that thou shouldst grieve over thegreatness of thy fall. Therein, then, as woman--as loving woman--thouhast my sympathy. Nor is all lost. Thy plan was foolish--for, as I hold,Egypt could never have stood alone--for though thou hadst won the crownand country--as without a doubt thou must have done--yet there was theRoman to be reckoned with. And for thy hope learn this: I am littleknown. There is no heart in this wide land that beats with a truerlove for ancient Khem than does this heart of mine--nay, not thineown, Harmachis. Yet I have been heavily shackled heretofore--for wars,rebellions, envies, plots, have hemmed me in on every side, so that Imight not serve my people as I would. But thou, Harmachis, shalt showme how. Thou shalt be my counsellor and my love. Is it a little thing,Harmachis, to have won the heart of Cleopatra; that heart--fie onthee!--that thou wouldst have stilled? Yes, _thou_ shalt unite me to mypeople and we will reign together, thus linking in one the new kingdomand the old and the new thought and the old. So do all things work forgood--ay, for the very best: and thus, by another and a gentler road,thou shalt climb to Pharaoh's throne.

  "See thou this, Harmachis: thy treachery shall be cloaked about asmuch as may be. Was it, then, thy fault that a Roman knave betrayed thyplans? that, thereon, thou wast drugged, thy secret papers stolen andtheir key guessed? Will it, then, be a blame to thee, the great plotbeing broken and those who
built it scattered, that thou, still faithfulto thy trust, didst serve thee of such means as Nature gave thee, andwin the heart of Egypt's Queen, that, through her gentle love, thoumightest yet attain thy ends and spread thy wings of power across theland of Nile? Am I an ill-counsellor, thinkest thou, Harmachis?"

  I lifted my head, and a ray of hope crept into the darkness of my heart;for when men fall they grasp at feathers. Then, I spoke for the firsttime:

  "And those with me--those who trusted me--what of them?"

  "Ay," she answered, "Amenemhat, thy father, the aged Priest of Abouthis;and Sepa, thy uncle, that fiery patriot, whose great heart is hidbeneath so common a shell of form; and----"

  I thought she would have said Charmion, but she named her not.

  "And many others--oh, I know them all!"

  "Ay!" I said, "what of them?"

  "Hear now, Harmachis," she answered, rising and placing her hand uponmy arm, "for thy sake I will show mercy to them. I will do no more thanmust be done. I swear by my throne and by all the Gods of Egypt that notone hair of thy aged father's head shall be harmed by me; and, if it benot too late, I will also spare thy uncle Sepa, ay, and the others. Iwill not do as did my forefather, Epiphanes, who, when the Egyptiansrose against him, dragged Athinis, Pausiras, Chesuphus, and Irobasthus,bound to his chariot--not as Achilles dragged Hector, but yetliving--round the city walls. I will spare them all, save the Hebrews,if there be any Hebrews; for the Jews I hate."

  "There are no Hebrews," I said.

  "It is well," she said, "for no Hebrew will I ever spare. Am I then,indeed, so cruel a woman as they say? In thy list, Harmachis, weremany doomed to die; and I have but taken the life of one Roman knave,a double traitor, for he betrayed both me and thee. Art thou notoverwhelmed, Harmachis, with the weight of mercy which I give thee,because--such are a woman's reasons--thou pleasest me, Harmachis? Nay,by Serapis!" she added with a little laugh, "I'll change my mind; I willnot give thee so much for nothing. Thou shalt buy it from me, and theprice shall be a heavy one--it shall be a kiss, Harmachis."

  "Nay," I said, turning from that fair temptress, "the price is tooheavy; I kiss no more."

  "Bethink thee," she answered, with a heavy frown. "Bethink thee andchoose. I am but a woman, Harmachis, and one who is not wont to sue tomen. Do as thou wilt; but this I say to thee--if thou dost put me away,I will gather up the mercy I have meted out. Therefore, most virtuouspriest, choose thou between the heavy burden of my love and the swiftdeath of thy aged father and of all those who plotted with him."

  I glanced at her and saw that she was angered, for her eyes shone andher bosom heaved. So, I sighed and kissed her, thereby setting the sealupon my shame and bondage. Then, smiling like the triumphant Aphroditeof the Greeks, she went thence, bearing the dagger with her.

  I knew not yet how deeply I was betrayed; or why I was still left todraw the breath of life; or why Cleopatra, the tiger-hearted, had grownmerciful. I did not know that she feared to slay me, lest, so strong wasthe plot and so feeble her hold upon the Double Crown, the tumult thatmight tread hard upon the tidings of my murder should shake her from thethrone--even when I was no more. I did not know that because of fearand the weight of policy only she showed scant mercy to those whom Ihad betrayed, or that because of cunning and not for the holy sake ofwoman's love--though, in truth, she liked me well enough--she choserather to bind me to her by the fibres of my heart. And yet I will saythis in her behalf: even when the danger-cloud had melted from hersky she kept faith, nor, save Paulus and one other, did any sufferthe utmost penalty of death for their part in the great plot againstCleopatra's crown and dynasty. But they suffered many other things.

  And so she went, leaving the vision of her glory to strive with theshame and sorrow in my heart. Oh, bitter were the hours that could notnow be made light with prayer. For the link between me and the Divinewas snapped, and Isis communed with Her Priest no more. Bitter were thehours and dark, but ever through their darkness shone the starry eyes ofCleopatra, and came the echo of her whispered love. For not yet was thecup of sorrow full. Hope still lingered in my heart, and I could almostthink that I had failed to some higher end, and that in the depths ofruin I should find another and more flowery path to triumph.

  For thus those who sin deceive themselves, striving to lay the burdenof their evil deeds upon the back of Fate, striving to believe theirwickedness may compass good, and to murder Conscience with the sharpplea of Necessity. But it can avail nothing, for hand in hand down thepath of sin rush Remorse and Ruin, and woe to him they follow! Ay, andwoe to me who of all sinners am the chief!