‘He had sad eyes, a grim look and hair the colour of flames. He walked as if he carried a great weight on his shoulders.’
‘Diomedes,’ I muttered to myself, ‘Diomedes of Argus.’
‘What did you say?’
‘Nothing, pai, nothing. Just old memories.’
17
WE WENT ON TALKING until late. Telemachus had a lot to tell me and I had so much to say to him, but I didn’t tell him everything. Not all I’d told the Phaeacians and their king. I just couldn’t go back.
There was one thing that I hadn’t been able to cast from my thoughts since I’d landed on my island: the prophecy that Nausicaa had announced to me, the annihilation that threatened the city and its people if they helped a man who came from the sea to return to his homeland. I continued to hope that the blue god would choose not to fulfil the prophecy. It was in his power and those people were his own descendants. But who can probe the mind of a god? In the past, whenever I’d had a narrow escape or one of my adventures was over, I would manage to tuck away my suffering in a hidden corner of my heart and find the strength to go on. Not any more.
Telemachus picked up from where he’d left off.
‘After that, with every day that passed, the hope of seeing you became more remote. But I had never seen you, so it was different for me. It was much harder on Grandfather and on Mother. Grandmother Anticlea sank into a state of such hopelessness that she wouldn’t speak. She never left her room, and many times if I went to visit she wouldn’t even open the door. If I found it open and went in, I’d see her sitting at the window and watching the sea with her clear, liquid eyes.’ Telemachus’ voice was trembling. ‘I’d ask her if she felt like talking, tell her that I’d been hunting that day. ‘Tomorrow I’m taking a boat over to Same. What can I bring you back that you’d like?’ I’d say. Never an answer. When the first fruits ripened, I’d bring her something: a fig, some berries, whatever I’d find. But she’d just look at me without saying anything. Sometimes she’d smile like little children do, when they laugh or cry for no reason at all.’
I lowered my head so as not to cry myself. How much pain I’d left behind me, how many disappointed hopes, how many tears . . .
Telemachus stared at the flames crackling in the hearth. ‘When she died, Grandfather had a solemn funeral prepared for her. He dressed her in her most beautiful gown. Weepers came from the continent to mourn the queen mother and the flute players sounded their lament. Her handmaids cut off locks of their hair to toss onto the pyre and Mother threw a precious amber necklace that had been part of her dowry into the flames. King Autolykos her father appeared suddenly out of nowhere, his white hair gathered at his neck with a leather tie. He wore a black floor-length cloak with a silver-studded belt and the crowd parted to let him pass. There was utter silence. The flute players and the weepers hushed and the thunder that had been rumbling in the distance hushed as well. Autolykos threw an object of little value onto the fire, a doll or something that looked like one. Later he was seen boarding his ship at the port and sailing west. We never heard from him again.
‘The years passed and everyone began to say that you had died. Many of the warriors who had brought down Troy had come back, thousands of them, but none from Ithaca or Same or Dulichium or even Zacynthus. I made sure of this as I travelled among the islands. Perhaps, I thought, my father the hero Odysseus stopped on his return voyage with his men to sack some city, to carry off their wealth and their women. And maybe the inhabitants gathered in great number, filled with rage, and killed them all or took them prisoner or sold them off into slavery. So those men would never see their homes again. What else could have possibly happened?
‘I wasn’t the only son mourning his lost father. Many other youths on this island were thinking the same things I was.
‘The only person who never gave up was Queen Penelope, my mother. She refused to raise a mound on the seashore and celebrate your funeral rites. She said that you had promised her you would return and that you always kept your promises. From that moment on, she became known far and wide as the unyielding protectress of your house and your bed, and her hope in your return became legendary. A great number of vagabonds and vagrants, freeloaders all, took advantage of her over the years. All they needed to do was hint that they’d seen the king of Ithaca or heard that he was alive and they’d be guaranteed hospitality, abundant food and a comfortable place to sleep under the palace portico. They told my mother what she wanted to hear. And even if her hopes were always shattered, she never gave up. She wouldn’t miss an opportunity to keep her dreams alive. She has suffered greatly.’
‘But now everything has changed, I hear.’
‘That’s right, for the worse. It was two years ago when the princes came: from Ithaca, all the islands around us and even from the continent. They bore wedding gifts in great quantity. They demanded that my mother declare publicly that she was a widow and that she choose a husband from among them. That was when King Laertes left the palace. He couldn’t vanquish them and he couldn’t stand them. He left for his farm in the country where he grows olives and grapes. He lives like the poorest of men. In the winter he sleeps in the house next to the hearth but in the summer he sleeps in the fields, wherever he happens to find himself, on a heap of dry leaves. I’ve seen him myself. Anything is more bearable than living in shame in your own house.’
I watched my son and listened to him, the heart in my chest snarling in rage at what I was hearing.
‘Eumeus told me they were planning to ambush me at sea, behind the island of Asteria. They wanted to sink my ship, to see me die with all my men. Well here I am, fine as ever, and so are my comrades.’
With every passing instant, the image and the voice of my son entered my eyes and flowed into my heart, so that I felt that I loved him as though we had never lived a moment apart.
‘Tell me more about your mother. How has she managed to put off the suitors?’
‘She’s the worthy wife of Odysseus, the man of the multicoloured mind. Did you know that the minstrels call you that? Since they were becoming more and more insistent, she came up with a stratagem. She said she would not make her choice until she had finished weaving a funeral shroud for the hero Laertes. No one would dare to oppose such a request. My mother wove the cloth by day and unravelled it by night .. .’
I smiled at her cunning and I remembered the girl with the deep, bright eyes that I’d fallen in love with so many years ago in Sparta.
‘. . . but one of the handmaids, who has become the lover of Antinous, their leader, discovered the trick and she told the suitors, who broke into the women’s quarters at night, brazenly violating their seclusion.’
My blood boiled in my veins at hearing those words. ‘They’ll pay for this. I’ll slaughter them all, from the first to the last,’ I muttered.
But Telemachus had not finished. ‘At that point she could feign no longer. I tried to appeal to the assembly, but the princes are powerful, and they’re well armed. No one dares to take a stand against them, and I’m not strong enough to do it on my own... Forgive me, Father,’ he said, bowing his head.
‘You have nothing to be ashamed of. You did what you could.’
‘Some of them have even importuned Grandfather Icarius in Sparta, offering even richer wedding gifts to convince him to intervene and declare that his daughter is a widow. If you hadn’t returned, I don’t think she would have been able to hold them off any longer.’
‘It’s true. She wouldn’t have been able to put off a decision. But why did you return from your voyage so soon? You told me that King Nestor and King Menelaus were willing to extend their hospitality for as long as you wanted.’
‘I heard a voice calling me home, and Theoclymenus, the seer, swore to me that you were on the island. The heart in my chest was dancing with joy. Do you believe me?’
‘I do, pai, and I myself can’t wait to see King Laertes my father again, to console him for so many bitter years. But first . . . first the suitors w
ill have to pay. And you will help me.’
‘You and I alone? Atta, there are fifty of them, sometimes even more; strong, young, armed men. Many of my mother’s handmaids are their concubines. They know all there is to know about the palace. Mai hates them because they don’t respect her.’
‘I destroyed Troy. Do you think fifty young men should worry me?’
Eumeus entered. His hair was tousled by the wind and he held two baskets in his hands, with bread, cheese and spits of roasted meat.
‘Eumeus,’ I asked him, ‘would you be willing to do battle?’
‘Even now, wanax,’ he replied, setting down the baskets and laying his two big fists on the table.
‘Who else can we count on?’
‘Philoetius, the cowherd. He’s strong as an ox and with an axe in his hand he’s a fury. He’d throw himself into the fire for you.’
‘No one else?’
‘Maybe . . . but it’s better not to take risks. Unless you want to call on your father King Laertes. He may not be as strong as he once was, but I’ll wager that he’s raring to put on his armour.’
‘No, better not. He’ll know that I’ve returned when it’s time. Now listen to me, both of you: the plan is clear in my mind. You, Telemachus, will leave tomorrow at dawn. Go to see your mother as soon as you can. She must be going mad with anguish and worry. Let her see that you’re alive and that no one has harmed you. Eumeus, you and I will leave later, and go to the palace. I’ll remain, to beg for something to eat from the princes. You’ll head back after you’ve paid your respects to the queen. I want to get to know them one by one, watch what they do, how they act, what they’re scheming.
‘Even if the two of you see them insult me or humiliate me, don’t make a move. Don’t open your mouths, don’t interfere. I’ll know what to do.’
‘What about my mother?’ asked Telemachus.
‘Your mother must know nothing until the time is right.’ Trust no one, not even your wife, say one thing and think another . . . ‘My decision may seem harsh to you, but it’s necessary. No one in my house can know that I’ve returned. You’ll tell your mother that you went ashore at the secret port and that you spent the night at Eumeus’. She won’t ask about anything else. She’ll be filled with joy at just seeing you.’
Telemachus regarded me with a bewildered look for a moment, but then instantly regained control over his heart. He nodded to let me know that he’d do as I asked him.
‘I love your mother, pai. I love her more than I love my own life and I’ve never stopped thinking about her all these years, every day, every night. But we can’t tell her anything yet. Trust me. She could give herself away without meaning to, and that would give me away. A look is all it would take, a gesture . . . We can’t make a single mistake or we’re lost.’
My words seemed to reassure him. Eumeus passed the roasted meat and the bread, first to me and then to Telemachus. He poured us wine as well, serving himself last. We were all three as tense as a bowstring before the arrow is let fly, but in my heart I felt stronger than ever before because I knew I’d crossed the wall of fog in my sleep as the Phaeacians brought me home in their helmless ship. It had followed a mysterious course of its own making on the pathless, limitless sea, ploughing the waves swiftly, covering an infinite distance in a single night. And it had delivered me here, to the world I knew, governed by human and divine forces. Here there were no inscrutable, hidden forces, no monstrous presences which, real or not real, had been capable of murder, annihilation, devastation in that world. This was my world, where I could count the swords and the spears and the sharp, merciless arrows.
Our hearts were light as we ate and spoke of times past, long ago for Eumeus and I, not so long ago for Telemachus. He seemed so young, so unseasoned in my eyes. Perhaps living alone with his mother for all these years had made him that way.
‘Who trained you for combat?’ I asked him.
‘King Laertes my grandfather. Your father.’
‘My father?’
‘He was a great teacher.’
‘Have you ever been in combat?’
‘No. This will be the first time.’
A cold shiver ran under my skin. What if things went badly? Where was the flute I’d heard playing in the night? My goddess had already disappeared from my life once. Could it happen again?
‘Aren’t you afraid?’
‘A little. There are only four of us.’
‘Five,’ I replied.
‘Five? Who have I forgotten?’
‘My goddess. Athena will be with us. It was she who called me back here from a remote, unreachable land. I wouldn’t have been able to return otherwise. She alone is worth hundreds, thousands of warriors. Perhaps we won’t see her, but she will give me the strength I need.’
Telemachus and I finally lay down to get some rest next to the hearth, close to one another, still talking in the dark.
‘Mentor. Do you know who he is?’
‘Certainly, atta. He was the advisor who was your friend while you were in Ithaca, before you left for the war.’
‘So he’s not here any more? Tell me, how long has it been since you’ve seen him?’
‘It’s strange, I don’t remember. But he has a seat in the assembly. Sometimes he’s there, sometimes he’s not.’
A long silence. I could hear the sound of my son’s breathing, light and serene. The breath that brings on sleep. Many were the things I still wanted to tell him, ask him, but it was better that he rest. For now.
I wondered whether it was right to lead him into combat, to make him spill blood, but it was too late to turn back now. I remembered what it had been like for me to kill a man for the first time. It was on the fields of Troy. I ran him through from side to side, my bronze tearing into his bowels. I’d never done it before and it felt like I had run myself through. A sense of bewilderment and incredulity. Then pain, and fear, and the sense that I had crossed a limit beyond which the land of horror lay. But I was at the head of many men and twelve ships, and everyone had to see what I was worth, especially those of my companions who had already accomplished great deeds, like Diomedes who had avenged his father at Thebes of the Seven Gates.
In the end, I was alone in the dark, turning over a thousand thoughts in my heart. How would I present myself at the palace the next day? How would my heart bear up at the sight of my wife? How I would surprise the arrogant suitors and kill them all without anyone in the city hearing their cries of agony?
I went outside for a while to look at the sky and to listen to the sounds of the woodland at night. I heard the soft chirping of birds who had come home to their nests and their chicks, the rustling of leaves, and then, a song. It was so soft that it seemed to be drifting in on the wings of the wind from a very faraway place. There were fragments of words, of sounds, and I couldn’t make sense of it. The voice of a young boy . . . or of a woman? Yes, a woman, perhaps . . . when the wind picked up I felt it was becoming easier to understand, or was it the opposite? Then, when for a few instants the wind blew in from a different direction, so that the leaves stopped rustling, I could hear it clearly, I could make out the words:
‘. . . sting of nostalgia . . . bring him home . . .’
My eyes filled with tears. Was it she? She who still remembered me, hadn’t lost hope . . . was that possible? Or was I just bent on believing that, with all my heart? When had I last heard that song? Could I still call it up in my mind? Go back in time? Suffer the pangs of separation again with such intense longing, feel that same passion . . . Could I still feel such passion? The wind dropped and left a sky dotted with a myriad of stars, as bright as the eyes of nymphs in the darkness, like fireflies in the woods on a night in May. I couldn’t understand what was going through my heart, how I felt under that starry sky. I knew I was with my son whom I’d left barely talking and who now slept and thought and dreamt close by. It was too much, even for someone who had suffered, seen, experienced as much as I had. I needed to lie down in
the dark in a little round hut next to my sleeping son, and there await Dawn.
That’s what I did. I passed Eumeus, who was slumbering in the shelter of the rock, crossed the courtyard and went back in. The embers were almost completely covered with ash, and it was sweet to stretch out on the sheepskin, under a cover of woven wool. Sleep descended on my eyelids as well, finally, and the voice of the wind started to sing again, faintly. It lulled me like mai’s singing had, when I was just a little boy.
THE LIGHT of dawn woke me. The sun was rising from behind the Thesprotian mountains. Outside I could hear the voices of Telemachus and Eumeus.
‘Be careful, son!’ my good friend was saying. ‘They’ll be furious when they realize they’ve failed to kill you. They’ll want to try again. Enter boldly, in the full light of day, after the suitors have all settled in and the handmaids and servants are busy preparing their meal. Go directly upstairs to your mother. She’ll hear your footsteps and recognize them and her heart will leap with joy. Let the princes know you knew what they were plotting but don’t say anything outright. Stay cheerful. That will increase their consternation. I want them to start feeling afraid.’
‘I’ll do as you say, Eumeus. My father was still sleeping when I got up. He must have been terribly tired. Let him rest.’
‘How do you feel?’
‘I don’t know. I still can’t believe it. It seems like a dream, like the ones I had when I was little. I would dream that he was home and that I could run into his arms.’
‘I’ve prepared a sack for you with bread, roasted meat, cheese and a small skin of wine. The dogs will accompany you for a stretch. Take care. The day of revenge is at hand.’
I could hear the dogs yelping outside. I went to the door, which was half open, and looked out. Eumeus was putting a spear into the boy’s hand, and a sheathed sword over his shoulder. The dogs ran alongside him across the courtyard and down the path, until Eumeus called them back with a whistle.
I walked out into the light of a radiant day.
Odysseus: The Return Page 22
