Hand of Isis (3 page)

I hurried to do so. I wanted the word for birds.

A
POLLODORUS WAS NOT A STRICT TEACHER
, and I know now that he well understood how a young child’s mind works, that there must be play and fascination rather than drudgery if there is to be real love of learning engendered. And if there was anything that was the birthright of a Ptolemy, it was learning.

When we were eight, and had learned to write ourselves, Apollodorus took us to the great Library. In that day it held more than seven hundred thousand scrolls, in five great buildings built to house them since the day that the second Ptolemy, Ptolemy Philadelphos, had decreed that the scholars of Alexandria should collect every book in the world that had ever been written, so that anyone who would study all mankind had ever achieved should find it in one place within these halls. The catalogs were nineteen hundred scrolls long. Separate buildings held different disciplines, different languages. All in all, Apollodorus told us, there were more than twenty written languages understood in the Library, and dozens more known where people had produced no books.

“What do they produce then?” Iras asked, her long black braids swinging against her neck as she looked up at the ranked rolls of scrolls that went nearly to the ceiling, daughter of a people that had produced books for three thousand years.

“Other things,” Cleopatra said, standing free of us in the middle of the hall. “Grain and melons. Ships and tin and bronze and machines.”

“You can’t produce machines without books,” Iras said.

“Stories,” I said.

Apollodorus smiled. “Every people produces stories. And there are many stories written down here that are told by people who have never learned to write and have no symbols in their language. But they have told their stories to priests or scholars, and those stories are kept here too, because we never know when we may need their wisdom.”

“You can produce machines without books,” Cleopatra appealed to Apollodorus. “Can’t you? An inclined plane is a machine, you said, and it doesn’t take a book to see how that would work. Anyone with a brain can figure it out.”

“An inclined plane is a simple machine,” Apollodorus acknowledged. “Like a lever, a pulley, and a screw. And there are people who use simple machines without a written language. However, once you move beyond simple machines into something more mathematically complex like Archimedes’ Screw, you need a symbolic language to per-form calculations. So you are both right in a way. It’s not books you need. It’s math.”

Which of course was another part of our study. By the time two years were past, I could do great columns of figures in my head, though Iras and Cleopatra were both faster and I did not enjoy it as they did. It was only interesting to me if it did something.

T
HE NEXT YEAR
, Apollodorus deemed us old enough to take to the theater. We had seen scenes performed in the little palace theater, comic sketches put on for the court, and often acted in by amateurs who enjoyed that sort of thing, but at nine Apollodorus considered us old enough for Aeschylus. There was a production of
The Myrmidons
at the Theater of Ptolemy Soter, and so it was decided we should attend.

We left the palace fairly early in the morning, bringing with us our lunches, for we would eat in our seats at the inter-act.

There were seats in the front for the Royal Family, of course. Ptolemy Soter had built the theater, being a great patron of plays. It was said that Thettalos had played Alexandria in his last years, he who had been Alexander’s player. I wondered if he had done the play we should see, and if whoever had the role now would be half as good.

We weren’t sitting in the royal seats. One small legitimate daughter of Ptolemy, her handmaidens, and her tutor didn’t rate the royal seats and the full pomp and ceremony Pharaoh did. Instead we spread our himations on the stone seats, which were still chilly from the morning air, halfway down the tiers facing the stage. Mine was green, Cleopatra’s violet, and Iras’ yellow. Cleopatra’s was a finer material, but other than that you could not have told any difference. Apollodorus got out honey cakes, and we feasted under the clear blue sky of morning, chattering like little birds, and throwing the remains of our cakes to the finch that enterprisingly came to investigate us. He stood with his head to the side, his eyes evaluating, then hopped quickly toward me.

“He knows you’ve the softest touch,” Cleopatra said.

“I am,” I said, tossing him a crumb covered in sesame seeds.

As the theater began to fill, there was a rustle, and a boy descended the tiers above, jumping between people and leaping from seat to seat, like a bird himself. He landed beside Apollodorus, grinning. “Hello, Master Apollodorus,” he said.

I looked up in surprise. He was a bit older than ourselves, eleven or twelve maybe, but still a boy, not a youth. His dark hair was neatly cut and trimmed, and his chiton was good, worked material with a border, but he somehow managed to look unkempt for all that.

“I saw you down here,” he said, “and thought I’d see if anything interesting was happening.”

“Hello, Dion,” Apollodorus said mildly. “Run off from your tutor again?”

Dion winced. “Recitation,” he said. “Nothing new. Just the same lines from the
Odyssey
until I could do them in my sleep. Thought I’d find something different to do with my day.”

“I could tell your father, you know,” Apollodorus said.

“You won’t.” The boy gave him a sideways smile. “Not when I’m the most brilliant mathematician you’ve ever seen.”

“I never meant that for your hearing,” Apollodorus said, but he smiled too. “Stand up straight now, and let me introduce the young ladies. Charmian, Iras, Cleopatra, this is Dion. He’s the son of a friend of mine at the Museum, and a hopeless scapegrace.”

“Hello,” said Cleopatra politely. Iras and I said nothing, somewhat annoyed at this boy barging into our long-awaited special day.

“Hello,” Dion said, and plopped down on the seats on the other side of Apollodorus. He leaned across him. “Have you seen the play before?”

“Not this one,” Iras said quickly, forestalling my comment that I had never seen a play. She spoke strict truth, but gave him no room for superiority.

“They do the gods with the crane here,” Dion said. “They don’t do it in every theater. Lots of them use the god walk above the stage instead. But this one even has fire effects for evening shows. It’s really impressive in
The Furies.
I saw that last spring. Lots of people get ripped apart on stage too, and there’s a big sword fight and then the rain comes down and . . .”

He was prevented from giving us a complete description of the effects of every play he’d ever seen by the beginning of the play. I don’t, frankly, remember what I thought of it.
The Myrmidons
is not one of my favorite plays, and I have seen it half a dozen times since. Or perhaps the thing that was most memorable was Dion.

He was never quiet. All through the play he kept up a running commentary on how this effect and that effect was achieved, critiquing with knowing eyes the workings of the crane and the sets, the thunder effect that announced the death of Patroclus. I got the brunt of it, as I was sitting next to him. I wanted to slap him.

As soon as the play ended, Cleopatra gathered her himation about her shoulders, though the day was warm. “It’s been very nice,” she said, sounding like the best possible imitation of Asetnefer. “But we had best be going now.”

We made our way up the tiers and out of the theater into the busy street, Dion sticking to us like a burr. “Athena’s my favorite,” he said. “Though she never gets lowered out of the sky. It’s usually Hermes. One time one of his lines snapped. They wear several, you know, so they won’t fall. Anyway, one of them broke and he descended from the clouds almost upside down. Everybody laughed.”

I was trying to visualize that when I heard a roaring sound. Around us, the crowd was scattering, people going one way and another, trying to dash back inside the theater portico, or into one of the shops on the opposite side of the street.

Up the main street came a huge mob, fighting and shouting, waving sticks and screaming for blood. One was waving something that might have been a man’s arm, blood dripping down his chiton. They were screaming and yelling.

Apollodorus grabbed Iras’ hand, as she was closest. “Hold hands!” he shouted. “Hold hands and get back!”

Iras grabbed Cleopatra’s hand, and Cleopatra mine. Dion grabbed my other hand just as the mob broke over us like a wave, pushing us before them with shoppers, theatergoers, and anyone who happened to be in the streets, running to stay ahead of the crowd.

My new green himation fell from my shoulders. I saw it trampled underfoot as the crowd surged forward. Cleopatra screamed as someone shoved her hard, but she stayed upright, caught between Iras’ hand and mine. And then we were all pushed together, the mob surging around a corner.

Dion was pressed up against my back so tightly I could feel his heart pounding. It gave me some comfort to know he was as frightened as I was.

“Hold hands!” Apollodorus shouted again. “Don’t let go!” I couldn’t see him in the press. Everyone else was bigger than me. If I fell, they would step on me.

“To their gates! Impious ones!” a man shouted almost in my ear. “Killers! Impious ones!”

I had no idea who had done what impiety. I wished we could push our way into one of the shops, but the shopkeepers who could had bolted their doors and closed their shutters. A vegetable seller who hadn’t been able to stood pressed against his own door, shouting imprecations while his stock was trod underfoot, ripe melons sending up a heady fragrance into the air, mixed with the smell of fear and blood. As I watched, one of the rioters picked up a melon and threw it at him. “Oh, shut up,” he yelled. “Roman lover!”

“What has happened?” I shouted to the world at large, Dion’s elbows in my ribs.

“A Roman killed a cat.” One of the rioters looked at me, no doubt an honest drover or workman. “He killed a cat for sport and then went and hid in their ambassador’s house when he was caught. So we’re going to burn him out.”

“A cat?” I gaped. I couldn’t imagine who could be so stupid as to kill a cat, thereby calling down Isis’ wrath upon himself.

“We’re going to break down the gates and light the Roman embassy on fire,” he said, “if they won’t turn him over to Pharaoh’s justice. Romans think they can go anywhere and do anything, and that we’ll all just roll over and kiss their pricks. Er . . .” He stopped, embarrassed no doubt to have used such rude language in front of a well-brought-up girl. Even with my hair falling from its pins, there was no mistaking my Koine or my dress.

The crowd shoved us apart, splitting where the Canopic Way divided and the crowd must take one of two smaller streets toward their goal.

Two large men shoved in opposite directions, half-crushing Cleopatra between them. My hand was numb in hers, and I heard her struggling to get her breath. The bones in my fingers ground together.

And then she was free, shooting out like a cork bobbing up in water, staggering against me and Dion. She and Iras had let go.

D
azed, the three of us clung together in front of a potter’s stall. Fragments of household pottery littered the street where vessels had been broken by the mob. Only the biggest pots were untouched, the tall ones half my size meant for storing lentils or beans. Above us, the red and white awning hung from its poles. The door to the shop behind us was closed.

Cleopatra tried it, and Dion joined her, shoving with his elbow, while the mob still pressed us tighter and tighter. Too many people were trying to fit into the square, or were carried there by the pressure of the crowd with nowhere to go. The door didn’t open. The shopkeeper had barred it. It was only a matter of time, I thought, before we were separated, or crushed beneath the press of feet.

A woman shoved Dion, and he staggered back against one of the pots and nearly fell.

I seized his arm. He had filth all over his chiton from something someone was throwing. I had to shout for him to hear me. “Up!” I said, pointing at the awning.

The poles were only meant to hold cloth, and would never take the weight of a full-grown man, but we were three children. Above the awning was a second story, windows with the shutters closed, but there was a ladder to the roof. Doubtless the shopkeeper lived above his shop.

Dion followed my eyes, and I saw he took my meaning instantly. He grabbed Cleopatra. “I can boost you up!” he shouted.

She nodded, hitching up her skirts. Dion lifted her, and she got her belly over the pole. He gave her a shove, and she got one foot on the bar, reached up, and grabbed the awning where it fastened at the top. Luckily, it was good sturdy canvas. She hauled herself up, then looked about, judging the distance to the bottom of the ladder. The toe of one sandal found purchase, but the other didn’t, and she kicked the sandal free. Without it, her toes wrapped around the bar, and she stood, stretching. It took a second to get the ladder, and she was up.

“Now you,” Dion said.

Over the din of the crowd, we heard trumpets, and the wild whinnies of horses. Pharaoh had sent out troops to control the riot. They were fighting into the square, blue headdresses above the fray, laying about with the flats of their swords. People were screaming and trying to get out of the way, but there was nowhere to go.

I kicked off my sandals and put my foot in Dion’s hands. He boosted me up. I clung to the bar, and I don’t think I would have been able to get to my feet if my sister had not reached for me. “I’ve got you,” she said, leaning down from the ladder that was fixed to the wall by the shuttered windows. “It’s not far. Come on.”

The cavalry was trying to sweep toward us. Of course they would protect Cleopatra with their lives if they knew who she was, but there was no chance to explain.

I seized her hand, and nearly fell. The skirt of my long chiton caught on a nail, and I heard it rip as Cleopatra pulled me as hard as she could. I grabbed the ladder.

“Climb!” Dion yelled. Nearby, a man went down beneath one of the plunging horses. We saw his blood on the stones of the street, the horse dancing to avoid stepping on him.

Cleopatra started climbing above me, and I hung three rungs below. Dion swung himself up onto the bar as nimbly as an acrobat, barefooted and sure. That was all I needed to see. I started climbing after my sister, thinking irrelevantly that she had one shoe on, and that Asetnefer would be furious at us for losing them. Our sandals were good leather and expensive.

We clambered onto the roof, and dropped over the low railing. There were some floor mats up there and a few cushions. The shopkeeper’s family must use this as a cool place to sit or sleep on hideously hot nights. Many people did that, because you could catch the ocean breeze. I lay on a faded red cushion, trying to get my breath back.

Dion clambered over the rail and skidded to a stop on a mat. His eyes were wide.

Cleopatra was sitting cross-legged, her arms behind her and her face to the sky, taking deep breaths.

“Everybody all right?” Dion asked.

I nodded. I wasn’t sure I could talk yet.

Below there was clamor and screaming. We didn’t look.

At last Cleopatra said, “What happened?”

“A Roman killed a cat,” I answered. “That’s what a man said to me.”

“Who would kill a cat?” she asked. It was as much a rhetorical question for her as for me.

Dion looked solemn. “Someone who doesn’t know. There are lots of people who don’t, in other countries.”

“If they come here, you’d think they’d learn,” she said. “It’s stupid to go somewhere and wander around offending their gods and people.”

“He was Roman,” I said.

Dion snorted. “Which means he didn’t care.” We looked at him, and he went on. “That’s what my father says. He says the Romans don’t care anything for the customs of other people, and that they don’t even want other people to worship their own gods. That the worst thing that can happen to a people is to come under Roman rule.”

“Why would you care who your subjects worship?” Cleopatra said practically. “As long as they pay their taxes and don’t rebel? I mean, most people worship Isis and Serapis at least some, but if they don’t it’s not like there’s anything bad that happens to them.”

“Like the Jews,” I said, thinking of the most prominent group that didn’t worship Isis and Serapis. Jews had been in Alexandria forever, but there never had been any kind of problem with them.

Dion nodded. He looked very serious. “Since Rome annexed Judea four years ago, lots and lots more Jews have come to Alexandria. Haven’t you noticed?”

I hadn’t, but didn’t say so. I didn’t know a huge amount about Judea, truth to tell, though of course I knew about Queen Salome, who had only died seven years before and had been the most powerful queen in generations. Since her death, her country had fallen into all kinds of disarray.

“The Roman Pompeius Magnus even went into the Temple, into the Holy of Holies,” Dion said. “It was his way of showing that he could do whatever he wanted.”

That was serious, I thought. Almost all temples had an inner sanctum, where no one but priests were allowed. It was horribly blasphemous for anyone else to go in, and it certainly would never have occurred to Auletes to do it, even in the temples of our own gods. And it’s always a bad idea to offend other people’s gods. You never knew what might happen.

Cleopatra must have been thinking the same thing. “What happened?” she asked.

Dion shrugged. “Jews hate Pompeius. And lots and lots have come to Alexandria since then, bringing their money and their crafts.”

“And so their economy is hurt and ours benefits,” Cleopatra said with satisfaction, her question answered. “My father would never do any such thing, and people know it.”

“They do,” Dion said. He gave her a smile. “And neither would you, if you were queen.”

“I wouldn’t,” she said seriously. “But I’m not going to be queen. I have two older sisters, and my father says that when the time comes I will be married to someone advantageous.”

“Maybe even in Judea,” Dion said. “Queen Salome’s grandsons are in Rome and might be made kings—you never know. One of them would make a good husband for you.”

Cleopatra considered, her head to the side. I did too. If she married a foreign prince, in Judea or wherever, we should go with her as her handmaidens, Iras and I. I didn’t think I would mind Judea. Jerusalem or Ashkelon were not the ends of the earth.

“I wonder where Iras is,” I said.

Cleopatra sat up straight, and Dion crawled over to the edge of the roof. “I don’t know,” he said.

“I couldn’t hold on,” my sister said. Her brow furrowed. “I’m sorry. I couldn’t hold on even though Apollodorus told us to.”

“He’s probably with Iras,” I said. “I thought they got pushed that way in the crowd, back toward the Palace Quarter.”

“Apollodorus is a lot bigger than us, and he pushes better,” Cleopatra said.

“Then they’re probably fine,” Dion said cheerfully. “Apollodorus could look after Iras. They’re probably worried about you.”

No doubt, I thought. Apollodorus was probably frantic. He had no way of knowing where we were, or if we were safe. Here we were on somebody’s roof, with no shoes, and a riot between us and the palace. The last thing we wanted to do was wade back into that, especially with the troops out, and I said as much.

Dion nodded, looking at Cleopatra’s white feet, one in a sandal, one bare. “We can’t go too far,” he said. “We could go to my house. It’s not a long way, and my mother will know what to do. She might be able to send a slave to Apollodorus, or when my father comes home he could take you back to the palace.”

That seemed reasonable to us. After all, Apollodorus had said that he knew Dion’s father because he worked at the Museum, so he must be a trustworthy person.

Dion had told the truth that his house was not far away. Though I had never been in this part of the city before, I knew we were in the neighborhoods south and east of the Soma, because I could see the Soma’s dome occasionally over the rooftops. The houses were fairly large, with courtyard gates on the street, and trees and vines just visible over the walls. Most of them didn’t have shops on the ground floor, except on corners, where there might be a larger apartment building with rooms above. Even those looked nice, I thought, with communal courtyards and awnings on the balconies, a couch or two put out where people might catch the sea breezes.

Dion’s house was one of the freestanding ones on a quiet street. There was an old slave watching by the courtyard door, doubtless because of the riot. He looked dismayed when he saw Dion. Or maybe it was the state of Dion’s chiton, and the fact he was barefooted.

“Nothing to worry about, Eucherios,” Dion said breezily as we limped past him. “Is my mother home? I’ve rescued some young ladies who are in need of refreshment.” He didn’t wait for an answer, just guided us past the slave and into the courtyard.

I looked about with satisfaction. It was nothing like the palace, of course, but the courtyard was almost completely shaded by two massive terebinth trees and a weeping almond. There were three couches arranged in a semicircle on the flagstones beneath them, a mosaic table with geometric patterns set by, and the tripod for a krater. On summer nights, it must be a lovely place for a dinner party. The garden was beautiful. Oddly enough, though, there were no statues.

“Mother!” Dion called, motioning us to follow after. “Mother? I was in a riot, but I’m fine!”

At this a woman came hurrying from the back of the house, dusting off her hands on her skirts. She was older than I expected, with gray streaking her dark hair, but the shape of her face and her laughing eyes were the same as Dion’s. “You were what?”

“In a riot,” Dion explained.

“Dion was very brave,” Cleopatra said helpfully. “I’m sure we would have been killed if it weren’t for him.”

His mother seemed to be hiding a smile, something one did around Dion frequently, I thought. “Come and sit down, girls,” she said. “I’m sure you’d like some water, and to get the filth of the streets off your feet.” She gave Dion a look that said more clearly than words: I’ll deal with you later, young man.

“And some more lunch,” Dion supplied helpfully. His mother glared at him and he shrugged. “I would hate for the Princess Cleopatra to think our hospitality is lacking.”

“The what?”

Now if looks could have killed, it would have been Cleopatra laying Dion out. “I’m Cleopatra,” she said. “Apollodorus’ student. My father is Ptolemy Auletes. And this is my handmaiden Charmian.” She gave Dion’s mother her best smile. “Please don’t distress yourself on my account. We are already beholden to your family for the great service Dion has done us.”

Dion stood up a little straighter, as though anticipating that he’d gotten out of the caning he richly deserved for running off from his tutor.

His mother shook her head. “I’m sure Dion gave perfect satisfaction.” She called for a slave to come wash our feet, and another to bring fruit and fresh bread and cheese.

I was hungrier than I thought, and sat beside my sister nibbling apricots on one of the seats in the public room overlooking the garden. It was nice and cool, though the day was getting quite warm, and the terebinth trees gave off a pleasant, resinous scent.

Dion chattered on about this and that, while Cleopatra nodded. My chiton was a mess. There was a long tear down the side where it had caught on the nail, and it was streaked with various stains. Asetnefer would be none too pleased either. I supposed mothers were like that. But for now, it was wonderful to have someone wash my torn feet with cool water, and to eat apricots somewhere safe.