The Temple of the Muses Read Online Free PDF Page B

own ambition,” she sniffed.
    “Oh, look!” Julia said. “Is that the Paneum?” The weird, artificial hill with its spiral path and its circular temple was just visible in the distance.
    “That it is,” I said. “It has the most outrageous statue in it. But here’s the embassy.”
    “Is this all part of the Palace?” Julia asked as I helped her from the litter. I was forced to kick a slave aside in order to perform even this simple, agreeable task.
    “It is. In fact, for all matters involving practical power, the Roman embassy is the court. Come along, I’ll see you to your quarters.”
    But I was not to be permitted even this. No sooner had we reached the atrium than a mass of courtiers entered, complete with riotous musicians, oiled Nubians leading leashed cheetahs, a tame lion, a pack of baboons dressed in livery, chiton-clad adolescent girls bearing baskets of rose petals which they scattered promiscuously, and, in the midst of them all, a young woman to whom all deferred.
    “I hear that we have visitors,” the young woman said. “If I had heard sooner, I would have come to the royal harbor to welcome you!”
    I bowed as deeply as Roman dignity permitted. “You honor us with your presence, Princess Berenice. May I present the lady Fausta Cornelia, daughter of the late, illustrious Dictator Lucius Cornelius Sulla, and the lady Julia Minor, daughter of the reverend
Senator Lucius Julius Caesar.” She embraced both ladies while the courtiers cooed and twittered.
    The Roman ladies displayed creditable aplomb, accepting these royal embraces with coolness and dignity. Aplomb was called for, as Berenice was one of the Ptolemies who favored Egyptian fashions. On her upper body she wore only a cape of gauze, which was quite transparent. What she wore below that would have got a dancing-girl drubbed out of Rome for indecency. Her jewelry, on the other hand, would have rivaled a legionary’s armor for weight and bulk.
    “We are at a disadvantage, Highness,” Fausta protested. “We are not prepared to receive royalty.”
    “Oh, think nothing of that,” Berenice said. “I never get interesting women to entertain, just tiresome men with their politics and their foolish intrigues.” She waved a hand that took in the whole Roman embassy, me included.
    “And the foreign queens and princesses who come here are all ignorant and illiterate, no more than well-dressed peasants. But two genuine patrician ladies all to myself! Come along, you aren’t staying here. You’re going to stay in my palace.” Yes, there was yet another palace within the Palace, this one belonging to Berenice. And so she shepherded them out like two new additions to her menagerie. I wondered if she would try to leash them as well.
    Creticus came in just as the mob disappeared. “What was that all about?” he asked.
    “Berenice has spirited away our ladies,” I said. “They may never see Rome again.”
    “Well,” he said practically, “that takes care of that problem. New toys for the princess instead of a headache for us. They’ll need to be squired about the city by a Roman male of high lineage, though. Wouldn’t be proper otherwise. That’s your job.”
    “I shall be diligent,” I promised.
    Berenice was thoughtful enough to give her two new acquisitions an evening to recover from their ordeal at the hands of Neptune;
then she threw a lavish reception for them, inviting all the luminaries of the Museum as well as the most fashionable people of Alexandria. As you might expect, this made for a fairly grotesque mixture. Since the Museum was owned and financed wholly by the Palace, Berenice’s invitation had the authority of a summons. Thus every last star-gazing, number-torturing, book-annotating scholar in Alexandria was there, along with actors, charioteers, foreign ambassadors, cult leaders and half the nobility of Egypt, who were as decadent a pack of lunatics as one could wish for.
    As they assembled, I spotted the one face