Of course I was not going near her, now more than ever. I said I was in despair that I could not rejoice my eyes with her gracious presence; but I dared not attend the harem without the King's command. He nodded gravely. It is not usual, anywhere, to bring people of my looks into a harem, even when cut; Darius had never sent me once without him. I could see the eunuch uneasy with his errand. Perhaps, I asked, he could tell me why his lady had wished to see me?
"As I understand," he said, looking me up and down, "she wished to ask why, since you are a dancer, you would not dance at her wedding, to bring good fortune to her and to your master."
"Dance at her wedding?" I must have stared like a fool. "It is the custom of our country," he said, "for a eunuch to do so in woman's dress."
"You may tell your lady that I did not refuse to dance; the King did not command me. It is not a custom of his people." Someone must have performed after I left the hall. So he had crossed her will on his wedding eve, rather than give me pain. Had she known then, already?
He came back soon after.
His forerunners came at noon, he himself at sunset. No doubt he excused himself to Oxyartes on account of his late return; he dined in camp, with a few friends, and the officers he'd had with him.
They did not sit long over the wine. They fought the campaign over, debating how long it would have taken if the garrison had held out; then he said he was going to bed. Nobody asked him where.
He came inside. I had everything ready as he liked it. He greeted me with a kiss, and it was a little more than a greeting; but I did not presume on that. What if he goes over there, I thought, as soon as he has bathed? I will not invite the cruelties of hope.
I bathed him; I rubbed him dry. Would he ask for fresh clothes? No. I turned back the bed for him.
Going about the sleeping-place, folding his things, kindling the night-lamp and putting out the great one, I felt his eyes; At last I ceased to rebuke my heart for singing. All the same, he would have to ask.
I stood the night-lamp by the bed, and said, "Is there anything else, my lord?" He answered, "You know well."
As his arm received me, he gave a little sigh; just as when he came back from a fight and a long ride, dusty and bruised, and found his bath just right for him. A hundred verses of tenderest love, sung to the lute, could not have given me half the joy.
Next day, he set about the great pile of business that had come in while he was gone; envoys from cities of western Asia, men who'd ridden for leagues with grievances against satraps; letters from Greece, from Macedon, from his new cities. He was at it all day and on into the night. I don't know if he got in a courtesy call at the harem. At night he just dropped into bed and slept.
The day after, I heard that someone was asking for me at my tent. Here a young boy, whom I'd never seen, put in my hands an inlaid silver dish. Lifting the lid, he showed it was full of sweetmeats; with a slip of parchment in a fine Greek script. It read, A GIFT FROM ALEXANDER.
I gazed in surprise. When I looked again for the boy, he'd gone.
I took the dish inside. Though I knew all his things, it was new to me. It was costly, but unrefined in style; it would have been thrown out of doors at Susa. It looked to me like Sogdian work.
The note was odd. He used no ceremony with me. Anything like this, he'd just send by a servant, whom I would know, with a message by mouth that he hoped I would enjoy it. The writing was delicate, nothing like his impatient hand. Recognition came to me. I thought that I understood.
I went out, and threw a sweet to the wretchedest of the pi-dogs that hung about the camp. He followed me, in the hope of more. In my tent I gave him half the dishful. I had no need to tie him; the poor mangy creature sat down on my carpet, believing that at last he'd found a master to care for him. When he jerked about, and died with yellow foam upon his jaws, I felt like a host who has murdered a trusting guest.
I stared at the corpse, and thought of what I had planned once at Zadrakarta. Who was I to be angry? But at least I had not done it.
He will have to know, I thought; and not only because I want to go on living. Who can tell what next? By now, I doubt if the shock will kill him.
I went to his tent as his day's business was done, showed him the dish and told my story. He listened in silence, only his eyes looking deeper-set. "This came in the dish, Alexander," I said, and handed him the writing.
He took it between finger and thumb, as if it were poisoned too. "Who wrote this? This is a scholar's hand."
"My lord, it was Philostratos." He stared at me. I said, "I showed it him and he owned it freely. He could not understand how I came to have it. He wrote out a dozen, he said, for the Lady Roxane, to put in her chest with your wedding gifts to her. What must have happened," I said, looking down, "is that someone stole it." I added, "I told him nothing, my lord; I thought it best."
He nodded, frowning. "Yes, say nothing more to him. I shall not have him questioned." He covered the dish and put it in a coffer. "Eat only from the common table till I give you word. Drink nothing that has stood in your tent unwatched. Tell no one. I shall see to this myself."
It was remarked that the King found leisure that afternoon to visit the harem. He was gone some time, which all thought proper in a bridegroom. At bedtime he said, "You can feel safe now; I've dealt with it."
I thought that would be all; but presently he said, "We are bound in love; you have a right to know. Come and sit here." I sat by him on the bed. He was tired, it would be a night for sleep. "I took the sweets to her, and I could see she knew them. I offered her one, smiling at first. When she refused, I looked angry, and made as if to force her. She did not plead, she flung them down and trampled them. She has spirit, at least." He spoke not without approval.
"But the time had come to tell her what she must not do. And here I met a difficulty. I could not bring in an interpreter to hear of such a business. The only one I could have trusted would have been yourself, and that would have been too much. She is, after all, my wife."
I agreed that this was so. There was a lengthening silence. At last I dared to say, "So, my lord, how did you manage?"
"I beat her. It was necessary. Nothing else was possible."
Deprived of speech, I looked about the room. What had he used? He did not own a whip. Neither Oxhead nor Peritas had known the touch of one. But there it was on the table, with ten years' wear on it, borrowed, as I guessed, from a huntsman. She must have been awed by the use that it had seen.
Since there was nothing at all that could be said, I held my peace.
"She thought the more of me. I hadn't considered that."
So that was why he'd been so long gone! I pulled my face straight in time. "My lord, the Sogdian ladies have a great regard for strength."
He eyed me sideways, considering whether he could permit himself to share the joke, and deciding it would be improper. I rose gravely and smoothed the bedclothes. "Sleep well, Al'skander. You have labored and earned your rest."
Later I thought about it. He was warm, not hot; gentle, in giving and taking; his pace was slow, he liked the pauses of tenderness. I'm sure he had never asked himself whether we suited so well because I was what I was. I could imagine the care he would take with a young maiden. So now he knew that she'd simply thought him soft.
Soon after this, the camp was struck. The bride bade her kin farewell, and was received into her wagon train. We were bound west for Baktria, to put the province in order. Some of its satraps and governors had failed their trust; and all must be left secure, before the march to India.
19
HE VISITED his new cities, heard causes, removed a governor here and there who was extortionate, corrupt or weak. Except for a few short forays, against robber bands that were preying on the trade roads, the court went with him. Now, besides the usual horde, there was the long wagon train of Roxane, with her ladies and maids and eunuchs.
At first, he used to visit her pretty often, mostly in the afternoon. It soon appeared that he did not like sleeping the night there. He liked to have his own things around him, among them me; to retire late if he wished, and sleep on undisturbed next morning. In the afternoon, he could exchange civilities in such Greek as the lady had, perform his husband's duty, and go away.
She was not with child. Such things are not long a secret. Those who had known him from a boy in Macedon, said he had never yet had offspring; but then, they added, he had never cared for women, so that meant little.
No doubt her kin awaited the news with eagerness; but I saw none elsewhere. The Macedonians had not grown to love the Sogdians, having found them brave, but cruel, and not averse to treachery. True, the King was now kin to half the noble Sogdians, and the province was at peace. But the soldiers, who wanted no Sogdian heir to rule their sons, were hoping she would be barren.
Still they followed him. He drew them as a comet draws its tail, by his light and fire. Besides, he was head of their family. They could come to him as if to their tribal chief at home. Half his business was about their affairs. All who had campaigned with him, Macedonian, hired Greek, wild painted Thracian, knew some tale like that about the frozen soldier he'd set in his own chair by the fire. And he was undefeated. That above all.
As for me, my grief was healing. True, when he'd been with her he had nothing for me but his love; but I could live well on that, and I guessed my fasts would shorten. She tired him out. I could tell, though he never said so. He did two men's work, a king's and a general's; often enough a fighting soldier's as well. I had always been content with whatever the day's toil left him; he could come to me for a little drowsy pleasure, given with love, followed by rest; and I would slip away to let him sleep at ease. I don't think in the harem tent it was quite so simple. Perhaps the beating had raised false hopes.
Little by little, at any rate, his visits grew less frequent; or he was out again in barely the time it needed to ask after her health.
Philostratos had a box of new books, just come from Ephesos. He had been too poor to order from a good copying-house, and pay the costly cartage, till I'd asked Alexander to make him that first present. He unpacked them like an eager child; now, he said, we could read Greek verse.
It was strange after the Persian; sparer in language, stricter in form; but in time yielding up its treasures. When I first read the entrance of Hippolytos, offering his mountain flowers to the pure goddess he alone can see, my eyes ran over. Philostratos, somewhat awkwardly, patted my hand, supposing I wept for my former life—who knows, perhaps even for my present one.
Not all my thoughts were on Euripides. In the next tent—the camp slaves always pitched them the same way—Kallisthenes taught the squires. I heard things as I passed; even where I sat, if he forgot to keep his voice down.
Ismenios, though he had kept his word with honor, would talk to me when he could. One day I asked him what he thought of the lessons. He laughed. "I've not been for a three-month. I got sick and tired of them."
"Truly? When I missed you, I thought you must be on duty. Do you mean he's never told on you? You could be punished, surely?"
"Oh, yes. I suppose he's glad to be rid of me; he thinks I'm too stupid for philosophy. It's all we get now; meaning his opinions, of which I've had enough. When first we joined, we used to learn something useful."
Too stupid, or too loyal? Yes, maybe his absence was welcome. He was simple, compared with me who had served at Susa. Hearing what he disliked, he went away, when I would have stayed to listen.
My Greek was so fluent now, that Alexander was telling me not quite to lose my Persian accent, which he had grown fond of. But if Kallisthenes passed, I was always mute. It pleased him that a young barbarian could not master the tongue of Zeus' chosen race. I don't suppose it entered his head that Alexander ever talked to me.
I was indeed scarcely worth attention. The Persian boy was an old story; nothing in outrage, compared with the Sogdian wife.
Since the wedding, Kallisthenes had flaunted his austerity. He had been absent from the feast, pleading sickness, though he was about next day. Alexander, still willing to patch things up, even asked him to supper later, but got the same excuse. Few people were asking him anywhere; he was dour company and killed the mirth. Had I known it then, he was acting the new Athenian philosopher (old Sokrates, they say, was a good man at a party); and if I'd known more of Greece, perhaps I'd have guessed why. Even in my ignorance, I thought he called for watching, and would dawdle as I passed his class. For certain matters, he used a different voice.
Spring had broken. White flowers scented like jasmine opened on wayside thorns; lilies grew by the streams. Icy winds still whistled down the gorges. I remember a night when Alexander and I lay wound together; he disapproved of extra blankets, which he thought were softening, but did not object to me.
"Al'skander," I said, "who were Harmodios and Aristogeiton?"
"Lovers," he said sleepily. "Famous Athenian lovers. You must have seen their statues on the terrace at Susa. Xerxes took them from Athens."
"The ones with the daggers? The man and boy?"
"Yes. It's in Thukydides . . . What's the matter?"
"What were the daggers for?"
"Killing the tyrant Hippias. Though they never did it. They only got his brother, which made him more tyrannical." He roused himself to tell the story. "But they died with honor. The Athenians set great store by them. I'll send them back sometime. Very old statues. Stiff. The beautiful Harmodios, he's not fit to do up your shoes."
He would be asleep in a few more moments. "Al’skander. I heard Kallisthenes telling the squires they killed the tyrant, and it was a noble work."
"Did he? Thukydides says it's a common error in Athens. There's an old song, I've heard it, about how they freed the city."
