The Queen was interrupted by a chamberlain, who announced the arrival of the men whom she had summoned, and Cleopatra bade him tell them that she was on her way to the council chamber.  Then she turned again to Iras and in rapid words commanded her to go at once in a closed carriage, accompanied by a reliable person, to Barine’s house.  She must be brought to the palace without the least delay—­Iras would understand—­even if it should be necessary to rouse her from her sleep.  “I wish to see her as if a storm had forced her suddenly upon the deck of a ship,” she said in conclusion.

Then snatching a small tablet from the dressing-table, she scrawled upon the wax with a rapid hand:  “Cleopatra, the Queen, desires to see Barine, the daughter of Leonax, without delay.  She must obey any command of Iras, Cleopatra’s messenger, and her companion.”

Then, closing the diptychon, she handed it to her attendant, asking: 

“Whom will you take?”

She answered without hesitation, “Alexas.”

“Very well,” answered Cleopatra.  “Do not allow her a moment for preparations, whatever they may be.  But do not forget—­I command you—­that she is a woman.”

With these words she turned to follow the chamberlain, but Iras hurried after her to adjust the diadem upon her head and arrange some of the folds of her robe.

Cleopatra submitted, saying kindly, “Something else, I see, is weighing on your heart.”

“O my mistress!” cried the girl.  “After these tempests of the soul, these harassing months, you are turning night into day and assuming fresh labours and anxieties.  If the leech Olympus—­”

“It must be,” interrupted Cleopatra kindly.  “The last two weeks seemed like a single long and gloomy night, during which I sometimes left my couch for a few hours.  One who seeks to drag what is dearest from the river does not consider whether the cold bath is agreeable.  If we succumb, it does not matter whether we are well or ill; if, on the contrary, we succeed in gathering another army and saving Egypt, let it cost health and life.  The minutes I intend to grant to the woman will be thrown into the bargain.  Whatever may come, I shall be ready to meet my fate.  I am at one of life’s great turning points.  At such a time we fulfil our obligations and demands, both great and small.”

A few minutes later Cleopatra entered the throne-room and saluted the men whom she had roused from their slumber in order to lay before them a bold plan which, in the lowest depths of misfortune, her yearning to offer fresh resistance to the victorious foe had caused her vigorous, restless mind to evoke.

When, many years before, the boy with whom, according to her father’s will, she shared the throne, and his guardian Pothinus, had compelled her to fly from Alexandria, she had found in the eastern frontier of the Delta, on the isthmus which united Egypt to Asia, the remains of the canal which the energetic Pharaohs of former times had constructed to connect the Mediterranean with the Red Sea.