The Novels of Alexander the Great

by Mary Renault

  “But that was old family business, not their own.”

  “It’s the King’s way, Pausanias must know it. That removes the affront.”

  And when they reached the fort, he did indeed go about his duties as usual. It was his office to keep the door while the King was feasting, not to sit down with the host. His meal would be served him later.

  The King’s train was hospitably looked after; he himself with his son and a few chief friends were led to the inner rooms. The fort was ruder, and little later, than the castle at Aigai, which was as old as Macedon itself. The Attalids were an ancient clan. Within, the rooms had been well decked out with Persian hangings and inlaid chairs. In supreme compliment to the honored guests, the ladies came in, to be presented and offer sweets.

  Alexander, whose eye had been drawn off by a Persian archer on the tapestry, heard his father say, “I never knew, Attalos, that you’d another daughter.”

  “Nor had I, King, till lately. The gods, who took away my brother, gave her to us. This is Eurydike, poor Bion’s child.”

  “Poor indeed,” said Philip, “to watch over such a child and die before her wedding.”

  Attalos said easily, “We don’t yet think of that; we’re too pleased with our new daughter to let her go.”

  At the first sound of his father’s voice, Alexander had turned like a house-dog at a stealthy footfall. The girl stood before Philip, with a polished silver sweet-bowl in her right hand. He had taken her left in his, as a kinsman might have done, and now released it, perhaps because he had seen her blush. She had a family look of Attalos, but with his defects all turned to graces: for gaunt cheeks, delicate hollows under fine bones; for straw hair, gold; he was lanky, she was willowy. Philip spoke some praise of her dead father; she made a little reverence, met his eyes and dropped hers; then went on with her silver bowl to Alexander. Her sweet bland smile fixed for a moment; she had looked before he was ready.

  Next day, their departure was delayed till noon, Attalos having revealed that it was a feast-day for some local river-nymphs, and the women would be singing. They came with their garlands; the girl’s voice was light, childish, but true. The clear water of the nymphs’ spring was tasted and praised.

  When they set out, the heat of the day was well advanced. A few miles on, Pausanias left the column. Another officer, seeing him go down towards a stream, called after him to wait a mile or two more for better water; here it got staled by cattle. He pretended not to hear, filled his cupped hands and drained them thirstily. He had neither eaten nor drunk, all the while he was at the house of Attalos.

  Alexander stood with Olympias under Zeuxis’ painting of the sack of Troy. Above her, Queen Hekabe rent her garments; behind his head spread like a crimson nimbus the blood of Priam and Astyanax. Winter firelight leaped in the painted flames, and drew hollows in the living faces.

  Olympias’ eyes were ringed with black, and her face was lined like a woman’s ten years older. Alexander’s mouth looked dry and set; he too had been sleepless, but showed it less.

  “Mother. Why send for me again? All’s said and you know it. What was true yesterday is true today. I shall have to go.”

  “Expediency Expediency. He has made a Greek of you. If he kills us for defying him, good, let him kill us. Let us die with our pride.”

  “You know he’d not kill us. We should be where our enemies want, that’s all. If I go to this wedding, if I give it countenance, everyone can see I rate it with all the rest, the Thracians and Illyrian girls and the other nobodies. Father knows that; can’t you see that’s why he asked me? He did it to save our faces.”

  “What? When you drink to my disgrace?”

  “Would I do so? Accept, since it’s true, that he won’t forgo this girl. Very well: she’s a Macedonian, the family’s as old as ours; of course they stand out for marriage. That’s why they threw her in his way, I knew it the first moment. Attalos has won this action. If we play into his hands, he’ll win the war.”

  “They will only think you are taking your father’s part against me, to keep his favor.”

  “They know me better.” This thought had tormented him half the night.

  “Feasting with his whore’s kindred.”

  “A virgin of fifteen. She’s only the bait, like the kid in a wolf-trap. Oh, she’ll do her part, she’s one of them; but in a year or two he’ll have seen a younger one. It’s Attalos who will use the time. Keep your mind on him.”

  “That we should come to this!” Though she spoke with bitter reproach, he took it as assent, having had enough.

  In his room he found Hephaistion waiting. Here, too, most things had been said. For some time they sat side by side on the bed in silence. At length Hephaistion said, “You will know your friends.”

  “I know them now.”

  “The King’s own friends should advise him. Can’t Parmenion do it?”

  “He tried, Philotas tells me…I know what Parmenion thinks. What I can’t tell Mother is that I understand it.”

  Hephaistion, after a long wait, said, “Yes?”

  “Since Father was sixteen, he’s been in love with one who’ll never have him. He’s sent her flowers, she’s thrown them out on the midden; he’s sung at her window, she’s emptied the chamber-pot on his head; he’s offered for her hand, she’s flaunted with his rivals. At last he couldn’t stand more, and struck her; but he couldn’t bear to see her lie at his feet, so he picked her up again. Then, though he’d mastered her, he was ashamed to go to her door; he sent me instead. Well, I went; and when all’s done she’s an old painted whore. And I pity him. I never thought I’d see the day, but it’s true, I pity him. He deserves better. This girl here, I wish she were a dancer or a flute-player, or a boy for that matter; then we’d be out of trouble. But since she’s what he wants…”

  “And that’s why you’re going?”

  “Oh, I can find better reasons. But that’s why.”

  The wedding feast was held at Attalos’ town house just outside Pella. He had just refurbished it, and not by halves; the columns were twined with gilded garlands, and statues of inlaid bronze had been shipped in from Samos. Nothing had been left out which could show that this marriage of the King’s was unlike all others, except the first. As Alexander entered with his friends, and they looked about them, all their eyes exchanged one thought. This was the mansion for a King’s father-in-law, not the uncle of a concubine.

  The bride sat throned among the splendors of her dowry and the groom’s gifts; Macedon kept up older customs than the south. Gold and silver cups, rolls of fine weaving, trinkets and necklaces spread out on linen coverlets, inlaid tables on which stood caskets of spices and phials of scent, filled the bridal dais. Robed in saffron and crowned with white roses, she sat looking down at her folded hands. The guests called ritual blessings on her; her aunt beside her spoke thanks on her behalf.

  In due time the women bore her off to the house prepared for her. The procession in the wedding car had been left out, as inappropriate. Alexander, viewing the kindred, felt sure that they had hankered for it. He had thought his anger was spent, till he saw their faces watching him.

  The meat from the marriage sacrifice, richly dressed, was eaten, and the kickshaws after. Though the chimney had a hood, the hot room grew smoky. He noticed he was being left alone a good deal with his own friends. He was glad to have Hephaistion next him; but it should have been a kinsman of the bride’s. Even the younger Attalids were clustered about the King.

  Alexander murmured to Hephaistion, “Hurry up, Dionysos, we need you badly.”

  In fact, however, when the wine came in he drank lightly, as usual, being as moderate in this as in eating. Macedon was a land of good springs with safe pure water. One need never come to table thirsty, as men did in the hot lands of Asia with their deadly streams.

  But, with no hosts in hearing, he and Hephaistion allowed themselves the kind of joke guests save for the journey home. The young men of his following, jealous that
he had been slighted, read their smiles, and followed their lead with less discretion. The banquet hall became tinged with a scent of faction.

  Alexander, growing uneasy at it, murmured to Hephaistion, “We had better make ourselves pleasant,” and turned towards the company. When the bridegroom left the feast, they could slip away. He looked at his father; and saw he was already drunk.

  His face was glazed and shining, he was bawling out old army songs with Attalos and Parmenion. Grease from the roast was streaked in his beard. He flung back to the company the immemorial jokes of defloration and prowess, showered on the bridegroom as ritually as the earlier raisins and grain. He had won his girl, he was among old friends, good fellowship prevailed, wine made his glad heart gladder. Alexander, scrupulously bathed, almost empty, and nearly sober, though not so sober as if he had eaten more, looked on in a silence which began to be felt around him.

  Hephaistion, controlling his own anger, talked to neighbors to draw off notice. No decent master, he thought, would have inflicted this ordeal on a slave. He was angry, too, with himself. How had he not foreseen all this, why had he said nothing to keep Alexander away? He had held his peace, because he had a kindness for Philip, because it had seemed politic, and—he faced it now—in order to spite Olympias. Alexander had made this sacrifice, in one of those flashes of reckless magnanimity for which Hephaistion loved him. He should have been protected; some friend should have stepped in. He had been betrayed.

  Through the rising noise he was saying something. “…she’s one of the clan, but she’s had no choice, she’s barely out of the nursery…”

  Hephaistion looked round startled. With all he had on his mind, this was one thing he had never thought of, that Alexander could be angry for the girl.

  “It’s mostly like this at weddings, you know that; it’s custom.”

  “She was scared when first she met him. She kept a good face, but I could see.”

  “Well, he’ll not be rough with her. It’s not like him. He’s used to women.”

  “Imagine it,” murmured Alexander into his wine cup. He emptied it quickly and held it out. The boy came with the snow-cooled rhyton; soon after, attentive to his duties, he returned to fill it again.

  “Save this one for the toasts,” said Hephaistion watchfully.

  Parmenion rose on the King’s behalf to praise the bride, properly the office of the groom’s nearest kinsman. Alexander’s ironic smile was noticed by his friends, and returned too openly.

  Parmenion had spoken at many weddings, some of them the King’s. He was correct, simple, careful and brief. Attalos, a huge ornate gold goblet in his hand, swung down from his supper couch to make the speech of bestowal. It was clear at once that he was as drunk as Philip, and not carrying it so well.

  His praise of the King was rambling and wordy, clumsiness defeating fulsomeness; the climaxes were maudlin and badly timed; the applause, which was rapturous, was a tribute to the King. It grew less carefree as the speech warmed up. Parmenion had wished luck to a man and woman. Attalos was wishing it, in all but the naked words, to a King and Queen.

  His supporters cheered, and knocked cups on tables. Alexander’s friends talked in undervoices meant to be heard. The uncommitted, taken by surprise, dismayed, were revealed by silence.

  Philip, not too drunk to know what it meant, fixed his bloodshot black eye on Attalos, wrestling with his own fuddled slowness, thinking how to stop the man. This was Macedon; he had quieted plenty of after-dinner brawls; but he had never had to deal before with a new father-in-law, self-styled or not. The others had known their places and been grateful. His eye slewed round to his son.

  “Don’t notice it,” Hephaistion was whispering. “The man’s soused, they all know it, they’ll all have forgotten by morning.” Early on in the speech he had made his way from his own supper couch to stand by Alexander’s, who, his eyes fixed on Attalos, felt hard and taut to the touch, like a catapult wound up.

  Philip, looking that way, saw under the flushed brow and the gold hair smoothed for the feast, the wide staring grey eyes pass from Attalos’ face to his. Olympias’ rage; no, but that boiled quickly, this was held in. Nonsense, I’m drunk, he’s drunk, we’re all drunk, and why not? Why can’t the boy take it easy like anyone else at a feast? Let him swallow it, and behave.

  Attalos was running on about the good old native blood of Macedon. He had conned his speech well; but lured on by smiling Dionysos, he knew he could now do better. In the person of this fair maiden, the dear homeland took back her King to her breast, with the blessing of the ancestral gods. “Let us pray to them,” he cried in sudden inspiration, “for a lawful, true-born heir.”

  There was an outbreak of muddled noise; applause, protest, dismay, clumsy efforts to smother danger in jollity. The voices changed, and checked. Attalos, instead of drinking the toast, had clapped his other hand to his head; blood showed between his fingers. Something bright, a silver drinking-cup, was clattering along the mosaic floor. Alexander leaned forward on his supper couch, propped upon one hand. He had thrown without getting up.

  Uproar began, echoing in the high hall. His voice, which had carried through the din of Cheironeia, called out, “You blackguard, are you calling me a bastard?” The young men, his friends, yelled out indignant applause. Attalos, perceiving what had hit him, made a choking sound, and hurled his heavy goblet at Alexander, who measured its course and did not trouble to move; it fell short halfway. Friends and kinsmen shouted; it began to sound like a battlefield. Philip, furious and knowing now where to vent his anger, roared over the clamor, “How dare you, boy? How dare you? Behave yourself or go home.”

  Alexander hardly raised his voice. Like his cup, it struck where it was aimed.

  “You filthy old goat. Will you never have any shame? All Hellas can wind your stink; what will you do in Asia? No wonder the Athenians laugh.”

  For a moment, the only answer was a sound of breathing like a laboring horse’s. The red of the King’s face deepened to purple. His hand fumbled about the couch. He alone here, in the ceremonial dress of the bridegroom, had a sword.

  “Son of a whore!” He swung off the couch, upsetting his taper-legged supper table. There was a crash of cups and dessert plates. He grasped his sword-hilt.

  “Alexander, Alexander,” muttered Hephaistion desperately. “Come away, quick, come.” As if he had not existed, Alexander slid neatly down on the far side of the couch, grasped the wood in both hands, and waited with a cold eager smile.

  Panting and limping, drawn sword in hand, Philip stumbled through the mess upon the floor towards his enemy. His foot slipped on a fruit-paring; he came down hard on the lame leg, skidded, and crashed headlong among sweets and sherds.

  Hephaistion took a step forward; for a moment, it had been instinct to help him up.

  Alexander came round the supper couch. Hands on belt, head tilted, he looked down at the red stertorous cursing man sprawling in spilled wine and reaching about for his sword. “Look, men. Look who is getting ready to cross from Europe into Asia. And he falls flat crossing from couch to couch.”

  Philip pushed himself up with both hands onto his good knee. He had cut his palm on a broken plate. Attalos and his kinsmen ran, stumbling over each other, to his aid. During the scramble, Alexander signed to his friends. They all followed him out, silently and promptly, as if in some night action at war.

  From his post at the doorway, which through all this he had made no move to leave, Pausanias gazed after Alexander. So might a traveler in a thirsty desert look after the man who gave him a cool delicious drink. No one noticed. Alexander, gathering up supporters, had never given him a thought. From the beginning, he had never been an easy man to talk to.

  Oxhead neighed in the courtyard; he had heard his master’s war-voice. The young men tossed their festal wreaths upon the midden furred with frost, mounted without waiting for service, and galloped off on the rutted track with its thin-iced puddles towards Pella. In the Palace courtyard, in
the glow of the night-flares, Alexander looked them over, reading all their faces.

  “I am taking my mother to her brother’s house in Epiros. Who will come with me?”

  “I for one,” said Ptolemy. “And that for their true-born heirs.”

  Harpalos, Niarchos and the others crowded up; from love, from loyalty, from ingrained faith in Alexander’s fortune, from fear that the King and Attalos had marked them down; or from shame at being seen by others to hold back.

  “No, not you, Philotas; you stay.”

  “I’ll come,” said Philotas quickly, looking around. “My father will forgive me, and if not what of it?”

  “No, he’s a better one than I have, you shan’t offend him for me. Listen, the rest of you.” His voice took the habit-formed note of brisk command. “We must get away now, before I’m locked up and my mother poisoned. Travel light, bring spare horses; all your weapons, what money you can lay your hands on; one day’s food; any good servants fit to bear arms, I’ll mount and arm them. All of you meet me here when the horn sounds for the next guard-change.”

  They dispersed, all but Hephaistion, who looked at him as someone in a sea without horizon looks at the steersman.

  “He’ll be sorry for this,” Alexander said. “He counted on Alexandros of Epiros. He put him on the throne, he’s been to a deal of trouble for that alliance. Now he can go whistle for it, till Mother has her rights.”

  “And you?” said Hephaistion blankly. “Where are we going?”

  “To Illyria. I can do more there. I understand the Illyrians. You remember Kossos? Father’s nothing to him, he rebelled once and he would again. It’s me he knows.”

  “You mean…?” said Hephaistion, wishing there were need to ask.

  “They’re good fighters. They might do better, if they had a general.”

  Done is done, thought Hephaistion; and what did I do to save him? “Very well, if you think that best.”

  “The others need not come on beyond Epiros, unless they choose. Today’s work today. We’ll see how the Supreme Commander of all the Greeks likes to start for Asia with Epiros doubtful and Illyria arming for war.”