afraid and hastened to shut herself into the mausoleum or tomb which she had built in preparation for her death.
She then bade servants go tell Antony that she was dead. Such tidings would, she knew, speedily change his anger into sorrow.
But she had not stayed to think to what desperate step his grief might drive Antony. He no sooner believed that she was dead, than he determined that he too would die.
'I am not troubled, Cleopatra,' he said, 'to be at present bereaved of you, for I shall soon be with you, but it distresses me that so great a general should be found of a tardier courage than a woman.' Then he called his servant Eros, who had sworn to put him to death when he should demand it, and bade him now fulfil his promise. Silently the faithful servant drew his sword, not to kill his master—that he found he could not do—but to slay himself.
When Antony saw that his servant was dead, he cried, 'It is well done, Eros; you show your master how to do what you had not the heart to do yourself.' He then threw himself upon his sword, but the wound did not at once cause his death.
As Antony lay dying upon his couch, a messenger came from Cleopatra to tell him that she was not dead, but alive and in the mausoleum.
The dying man begged to be taken to her, and his servants carried him to the door of the tomb.
Then the queen, looking out of her window, saw him lying below wounded and near to death.
She had only her two women Iras and Charmian with her, and so, instead of tarrying to open the heavy door with its numerous bolts, she let down cords from the window.
When these had been fastened round Antony, Cleopatra and her two women, slowly and painfully pulled up the wounded man and dragged him through the window into the mausoleum.
