“If the Etesian winds hold out, we should make Alexandria in twenty days or less,” the captain assured Pilate. “Every summer around the ides of July, the Etesians start blowing in from the northwest, and they keep at it for about forty days. We catch the wind at our backs and try to run before it all the way to Egypt.”
In less than two days they were at the Straits, the presumed location for Homer’s Scylla and Charybdis. As legendary navigational hazards, they failed to impress Pilate. The projecting rock from the Italian shore was hardly Scylla, the six-headed monster who dined on Ulysses’s sailors; and the lazy whirlpool on the Sicilian side was a rather poor Charybdis, which supposedly had a vortex so fierce that even the sea god Neptune was powerless against it. And running aground on either side would require some very sloppy navigation, since at their narrowest the straits were still some two and one-half miles wide. Still, no sailor liked to run the passage in a storm.
Once past Sicily, the Etesian winds resumed with magnificent tempo, carrying the ships out of sight of land for the first time. Mariners loved these winds because they rarely blew before noon, allowing ship repairs and servicing to be done mornings, and giving time for the seasick passengers to recuperate.
A week passed without sighting land. Pilate strolled back to the gubernator or helmsman, who controlled the twin paddles that rode astride the stern to steer the ship, and asked, “How do you do it? Aim for Egypt when you can’t see a thing?”
“Oh, but I can,” the pilot replied. “See that red streamer flying ahead of us from the rigging? It shows our wind’s direction, and we aim at just a slight bias from that.”
“Are the Etesians that constant?”
“Usually. But we have ways of checking on them.”
“How?”
“See this metal ring and pointer? We use it to gauge the height of the sun or stars, which helps fix our position.” Then the helmsman smiled. “This isn’t to say we never make mistakes. Notice that the other ships are strung out so far on both sides of us that we can’t even see them all? That’s intentional. If the Pillars of Hercules at the end of our port flank sights Crete, then they’ll signal from ship to ship that we’re too far north of course and we can correct accordingly. But if the Medusa to our starboard sights Africa, then we’re too far south. Of course, that’s not so bad, since then we can sail up to Alexandria without missing it.”
Pilate only hoped the man was jesting. At any rate, no warnings were flashed from the other ships; evidently they were making a proper passage.
Procula was not a very good sailor—her maritime experience had been limited to a rowboat excursion on Lake Nemi near Rome—and she was having trouble riding up and down with the choppy Mediterranean rollers. Even before Sicily she had had a touch of nausea, but that was as nothing compared with the lingering siege of seasickness that set in at mid-sea. Pilate pleaded with the ship’s officers for remedies, but every concoction from the galley confidently served to Procula she swallowed only temporarily and then surrendered to the Mediterranean. The one expedient which worked she discovered for herself. In the mornings, when the sea was calmer, she sat outside amidships and tried to imagine herself back in Rome.
On the evening of the eighteenth day came a glimmer of hope that her sufferings might end. The forewatch on the Trident called out, “Ho! Pharos ahead!”
Straining his eyes, Pilate could see only a tiny blemish of luminous orange on the southeastern horizon. But that speck grew in intensity and started flickering like the flame it was. Later on, many other lights came into view, all considerably lower than the original fireball, which now looked like the moon blazing out of control in some cosmic catastrophe.
“A-ve Pha-ros! A-ve Pha-ros!” the sailors reverently called out to the towering display of manmade pyrotechnics, which was the Pharos Lighthouse at Alexandria. The Trident assumed a steep list as passengers crowded the starboard rail to see one of the seven wonders of the world. But the good-natured helmsman claimed this list only assisted his sharp turn between the breakwaters into the Great Harbor of Alexandria.
The colossal lighthouse soared a staggering four hundred feet into the Egyptian night. Since it was constructed throughout of milk-colored marble, Pilate and Procula had no trouble discerning its great square base rising from a harbor island, the octagonal midsection, and its pillared upper stage. At the apex, a continual fire of pine logs blazed in front of highly polished metal mirrors to signal ships many miles at sea. Even more impressive than its obvious height was its age: by now the Pharos was three hundred years old, yet in perfect repair.
Since it was too late in the evening to make other arrangements, Pilate and his staff decided to stay on board ship for the night. Early the next morning, a company of Roman soldiers, marching in their unmistakable cadence, clattered onto the creaking deck of the Trident. “Pontius Pilatus, please identify yourself!” their centurion announced, his helmet pulled low over his forehead.
“I am he,” replied Pilate, as he stepped out of the rear cabin.
“You, sir, are under arrest.” The centurion spat out the words with frigid formality. “You have violated the emperor’s specific orders that no Roman of senatorial or higher equestrian rank is to set foot in Egypt without his written consent. This regulation was first made by the Divine Augustus to safeguard the grain supply from interference by—”
“But I have such written permission, Centurion.”
“Let me see it.”
Pilate retrieved the document from his cabin quarters, and the centurion spent some time scrutinizing it. Pilate studied his face more closely, then reached over to push up his helmet.
“Gaius Galerius!” he shouted.
“Pilate!” laughed the pseudo-centurion, as the two clasped arms. “And what might the Prefect of Upper and Lower Egypt be doing in the costume of a lowly centurion?”
“You don’t sound appreciative, Pilate. I’ve been scheming for days in order to provide you this reception.”
“Galerius, I’ve not had my nose tweaked so well since we served together with the Twelfth in Syria. And now you’re at the summit of success…imagine…ruler of Egypt, successor to the Pharaohs!”
“Only as representative of Tiberius, or we’ll haul you up for treason, too.” Galerius chuckled. “And who is this incarnation of Venus? Perhaps Cleopatra, freshly revived, come to reclaim her Egypt?”
“Gaius, this is Procula, my bride of four months,” said Pilate with quiet pride.
“May it go well with you.” She smiled.
“And with you.” Galerius bowed gracefully. “Now, Pilate, your ship for Judea doesn’t leave until next week, so I’d be delighted to have you as my guests at the Palace of the Ptolemies just across the harbor there,” he pointed. “Somewhere among its 150 rooms we just might be able to find enough space for your staff as well.”
They cheerfully accepted Galerius’s hospitality and spent a delightful week in the city that was second only to Rome, for Alexandria had replaced Athens as cultural capital of the East. In fact, in some respects Alexandria easily outdid Rome. Its grid-pattern streets were much wider, much straighter, and were illumined at night. Its magnificent civic buildings, parks, and gardens were better conceived; its hippodromes, gymnasia, and theaters more artistic. The great library at Alexandria was the finest in the world, boasting a half million papyrus scrolls, and the Museum adjacent to it was really a scholar’s university, staffed by the most outstanding scientists of the day.