Helen of Troy

by Margaret George

  Why should he be wrathful? So the selfish, demanding child was demanding even in death. Or perhaps it was not Achilles himself, but the memory he had left behind in the minds of others that was so unreasonably demanding. We go one further in our idols, our gods, making them require things they would not think of.

  Five men hoisted Polyxena aloft. She lay daintily in their arms, her ankles crossed modestly, her head back. She had bound her hair so that it would not impede their blades finding her throat. She had a dreamy look on her face, and had refused the blindfold.

  They bore her to the altar. There they halted.

  “You die to appease the gods!” cried one of the soldiers. I noticed—dreadful, the things you notice at such moments, odd splotches of calm—that no priest was present. Of course: the god demanding blood was Achilles, not any being of Olympus.

  Another of the soldiers pulled on her bound hair to extend her neck. She closed her eyes. I could see her lips moving. She was speaking to someone, addressing someone, but no one could hear.

  “Now!” A dagger came from nowhere, but did not hesitate; it slashed across her white throat and a gush of blood spurted up, hitting the soldier’s chin, dripping off, bright scarlet.

  She lay still. She did not struggle, or clutch at her throat, or convulse. Instead she was like a carved piece of ivory, utterly unmoving. Why did not her body rebel, heave, jerk? Had she commanded it to imitate the ivory?

  Her eyes were closed and stayed closed. Her lips were curved into a placid smile. Slowly they laid their burden down, let her lie on the altar bleeding to death. Still she did not move, not even a twitch. It was as if she had died the instant the blade had touched her, died by her own stern admonition.

  It was difficult to determine when she was dead. Gingerly they touched the soles of her feet with the point of the fatal dagger, and they did not curl upward. Someone put a feather in front of her nostrils to see if it stirred. It did not. Someone else laid a finger on her neck to test for a pulse.

  At length Neoptolemus shouted, “It is done! My father is satisfied!”

  Antenor stepped forward. “I shall convey the body to the waiting sepulcher, with all due respect.” Now I could see, from the way her body draped on the litter, that she was truly dead.

  Such courage. She was worthy of her warrior brothers. Her fame would last as long as Achilles or Patroclus or Hector’s. Fortunate, blessed daughter of Troy!

  Oh, what a world, when to die is deemed more noble than to live.

  For the rest of us, less noble: we must grace a celebratory banquet for the departure of the Greeks.

  “And now to the feast!” Agamemnon stood before the crowd like a ship’s prow. “To speed us on our way!”

  While we had been at the tumulus, soldiers had been readying the beach. For the high-ranking, makeshift tables had been set up, stools brought to allow worthy legs to rest. Resin-dipped torches, thrust into the sand, created a flickering yellow fence around the area. Huge fires were burning, several oxen—or something else?—roasting over them in varying stages of readiness. Amphoras of wine were lined up like trees in a forest, ready to be felled. Some youngsters were testing their flutes and older boys were plucking their lyres. The line of ships helped to cut off the worst of the wind.

  Night was falling; the sun had set and even the glow on the horizon had faded. A few stars were already appearing. Had Polyxena gone there? Was she among the stars—she who had been with us when the sun had risen? There were stories about people being carried up to live with the stars, or being changed into a star. But we know too little of this.

  The table of honor—inasmuch as it was a table—would seat Agamemnon, Odysseus, Menelaus, Nestor, Idomeneus, Diomedes, Philoctetes, and, shame of it all, Sinon, little Ajax, and Neoptolemus. Lesser men would be allowed to stand around it and share in the speeches and bantering. We captives were to stand farther back, serving as sauces for the meat, an appetite stimulant to help them digest their spoils. Had even the cattle come from Troy? Or were these men eating the flesh of the slain horses?

  Mercifully the dim light softened the faces of the flushed Greek warriors. I could see Agamemnon’s, turned red by the bonfire flames, his dark beard now streaked with white. As he talked and flashed his teeth, I could see that several were missing. Well, he was of that age. Nestor looked no older than he had when I first met him, but battle makes old men younger and young men older. Idomeneus—he seemed aged, and I had heard that he had lost his speed on the battlefield.

  Agamemnon walked down the table, distributing goblets. “Gold of Troy!” he said. “It is fitting!” He pulled one after another out of a sack and handed them to his men. They were all different, collected from looted Trojan homes. Some might have been Priam’s, but they might just as well have come from wealthy Trojan merchants. In his wake came servers pouring wine into them.

  The oxen were carved with much shouting and glee. Huge hunks of steaming meat were put on the men’s platters. None was offered to us, but we could not have eaten in any case. I looked on both sides of me, at Andromache, Laodice, Ilona, Hecuba. Their eyes were dull and their mouths set. They would endure: perseverance, that sad virtue of women.

  “My men!” Agamemnon was crying. “Did we ever truly believe this day would come? Troy is destroyed. We are victorious. It has been many a long year. But I am grateful for you who stood the course. We have lost many, and those of us who remain must remember them. Without them we would not be here to speak these words. Now, as for the treasure—”

  How quickly he got to that!

  “—as we cannot give due reward to those who have perished, it is fitting that we divide them amongst ourselves in their honor. We have gold, we have jewels, we have fine carvings, and armor, and many other things, all . . . rescued . . . from Troy.” At a nod from him, boys trotted out with litters heaped with booty. A large chest was laid at Agamemnon’s feet. He lifted the lid. “These are the special treasures, which I will personally award.” He bent down and scooped up a gold diadem. It must have belonged to Priam. “This is for you, brother.” He gestured to Menelaus. “When you return to your throne in Sparta, you will wear diadems once again.” Suddenly he broke off. “I know many kings have laid aside their diadems to fight here with me. Now you have your reward, and for the rest of your lives you can wear your diadems in peace.”

  Menelaus took the offered gold. Suddenly Hecuba screamed, “If you wear my husband’s diadem, death fastens itself around your head as you fasten it.”

  Agamemnon scowled. “Lady, if you cannot keep silent, you must be removed.”

  Hecuba let out a hideous cackle. “Removed? As Priam was, as Astyanax was, as my daughter was just this afternoon?”

  “If you had removed Paris as you intended, none of this would have come about.” Menelaus glared at her. “You could have been spared all this. As for your warning . . .” Calmly he tied the diadem around his head. “It fits nicely.”

  “A circlet of death!” she cried. “Good. Now you can wait for it.” She looked around at everyone. “When will it come? A sweet summer afternoon? A nasty, ill-howling winter’s evening? You cannot guard against it. It will be ugly. Priam will see to that. And waiting for it will make it all the worse.”

  “Take her away,” said Agamemnon.

  As the soldiers moved toward her, she laughed. “I take myself away!” she said, and seemed to shrink and become shadowy. The soldiers lunged for her, but all they caught was a black dog, yelping and biting.

  “Find her,” said Agamemnon grimly.

  “I wish to say that our brave men need to be saluted,” said Idomeneus, standing up, trying to rescue the feast and divert attention. “Especially those who brought about the ruse of the horse and those who secreted themselves within it. Odysseus, you mastermind, you must claim the invention of the horse as your own.”

  Grinning, Odysseus stood and bowed his head. “It was clear Troy could not be taken by force. Its warriors were too fierce, its walls too stron
g. But guile can win where direct attacks fail.”

  “And Epeius,” said Idomeneus. A short man stood up, eager to be acknowledged. “You constructed the horse.”

  “Indeed I did!” He grinned. “We went to Mount Ida for the wood, and if I may say so, we fashioned a lovely creation. And in a short time, too.”

  Agamemnon handed him a heap of golden things; I could not see what they were. “You deserve this and more,” he said. “I am only sorry that I cannot lay all of the spoils of Troy before you, for they would not be here without your cunning.”

  Epeius bowed and retreated with his hands brimming.

  “Sinon!” Agamemnon’s voice boomed out. The monkeylike Sinon appeared. “All hinged on you and your performance. You were willing to undergo harsh, disfiguring punishment in order to convince the Trojans we had mistreated you—as indeed we had. You did not falter or stumble, but carried our mission through to success. To you”—Agamemnon thrust a set of armor in his hands—“you deserve so much more than this, but take this as a token.”

  Sinon looked down at his prize. “Thank you, my lord,” he said. Undoubtedly he would demand more later, but, showman that he was, he would not spoil the moment.

  “Now we salute those who, at great risk to themselves, hid inside the horse. Menelaus!” Menelaus stood. “Odysseus!” We raise our glasses in salute to you!” Then followed Diomedes, Machaon, Epeius, Neoptolemus, little Ajax.

  Someone thrust a glass in my hand. A boy quickly followed, pouring wine. I turned mine out on the ground.

  “To Epeius! To Sinon! To the horse!”

  Everyone but the Trojan women drank.

  Agamemnon laughed exultantly. “We are for Greece, then.” He wiped his mouth. “Home again. Home. It is calling.”

  I saw Menelaus whisper in his ear. Agamemnon frowned, then turned to us.

  “The gods are pleased enough. We have not offended.”

  No one ever found Hecuba. Privately I thought she had rushed into the surf and drowned herself. As the feast concluded—the torches were doused, the tables dismantled, the empty amphoras dragged to the water and abandoned—we captive women were herded up and sent to our tent. Idomeneus suddenly appeared by my side.

  “Helen,” he said. “I have been here these many years yet have never beheld you, let alone spoken to you.”

  I looked at him, a kindly remnant of a vanished, ordered world. “Idomeneus. I am grateful for your good wishes.”

  “As I am for yours. Helen, I do not know what awaits you in Sparta. Only know that whatever it is, I am your friend. As I said long ago, in whatever age you reside, you are the supreme being. No other woman could command awe with gray hair.” He looked me in the eye. “You are Helen, the never-diminished.”

  I shook my head. “I am Troy, and Troy is me, and Troy is gone. So Helen is more than diminished. There is no more Helen.”

  The fools that were taking me back to Greece did not understand that.

  LXXIV

  The wind was rising; it made the last flaming torches dance and snuffed the rest out. It sent showers of sparks into the sky, new red stars against the old white ones. Sand flew into my mouth, and the men began to gather up the stools and full amphoras and prize armor.

  “At first light, men, we sail!” Agamemnon called to his men.

  I saw Menelaus tug on his shoulder. Agamemnon shook him off.

  “It wasn’t only the temple little Ajax polluted, it was Cassandra as well,” Menelaus warned him.

  “You call Cassandra polluted?” Now I could hear clearly, and so could the men around them.

  “What else can you call a woman who was raped?” Menelaus sounded as if he were glad of it.

  “Don’t you wish yours had been, instead of offering herself?”

  “And do you know what yours has been doing, in your absence?” Menelaus taunted him. I did not think he had it in him.

  “She wouldn’t dare,” said Agamemnon. “She can see—she has heard—what punishment I’ve wreaked on Troy, and on those who defied us.”

  “And how has she seen it, or even heard it?” Menelaus was turning himself on the sand, and I noticed that he seemed to limp, favoring his left side.

  “The beacons are ready to be fired. But the biggest beacon—smell that?” He stood on tiptoe and inhaled deeply, putting his fleshy hands on his belly.

  “It’s roasting Trojans!”

  “The fire is out,” said Menelaus. He was always so literal. But Agamemnon was right—Troy would burn forever.

  “It was a good war,” said Agamemnon. “For us. I am proud of it, even if you are not, little brother.”

  “I shall see you in Greece, then,” said Menelaus. “In only a few days. We will return to what we left so long ago. We will reclaim what is waiting for us.” Now he turned and made his way over to me, walking stiffly. Yes, he had an injury of some kind. I had not noticed it before. “Helen,” he said. “Your last night on Trojan soil, wife. I shall leave you to your thoughts. Tomorrow we sail for home—Sparta. I have thirty-one ships left. Only thirty-one, after the sixty that first touched this beach all those years ago. That is the price I—and many other warriors—have had to pay for your folly.”

  I had nothing to say. I stared at him in the dull light, seeing only the changes in him, superimposed over the wavering image of him as a young man. His face was lined now, his lips set, and he moved in the gingerly fashion of one guarding a weakness, not like the young athlete of long ago. The war had taken a grave toll on his body.

  I was taken back to the women’s quarters in the damp and decaying Achilles house and given a pallet to lie upon. The others were silent, except for muffled weeping. The place where Polyxena had been was screamingly empty.

  My last night in Troy. Menelaus had said it. This was the last time I would pillow my head on my arms and know that beneath lay Trojan soil. But Troy was a smoking mound, and when the sun rose I would have to behold those ugly streaks of smoke still sending their tendrils up into the sky, like beseeching fingers for a mercy that would not come.

  Polyxena had been brave, the last Trojan to die. I would have changed places with her, or so I wanted to believe. But I did not know if I had that courage. And now I would go back to Sparta as a prisoner.

  My promise to Hector! I had failed him. I had not been able to protect Andromache. You are a survivor, he had said. But that had not availed to save anyone else.

  Evadne. Gelanor. Where were they? Had they perished in the conflagration? Oh, I should have let Gelanor return as he had wished! Instead, out of my own need and vanity, I had kept him in Troy. His death was my horror.

  The brooch had wept blood, drops for the dead. I had killed so many. I felt their vexed ghosts crowding around me, prowling in the ruins of Troy. Because I had loved Paris, I had killed them, and him as well.

  Is this what you wanted, Aphrodite? I asked her. But she did not answer. She had promised to save me, and she had done that. Beyond that, there were no answers.

  I boarded the ship—as Evadne had foreseen, and I denied, so long ago. Menelaus was laughing, his head thrown back, standing at the stern as the shore was left behind. I did not stand and watch the land recede, nor behold the smudge and smoke from the noble ruin of what had once been Troy. I did not think I could bear it.

  I had my own quarters; Menelaus did not come near them. He kept to himself, his own bed up near the bow, beside the captain’s. I did not come to his, either. We barely spoke if we passed one another on the decks. Strange: this man who had been obsessed to possess me did not try, in any way, to act upon it. It was enough for him, apparently, that I was on his ship.

  I felt dead. I even wondered if I might, perhaps, be dead and be unaware of it. Sometimes the dead do not know they are dead. But the stinging sea air, the dips and stomach-roiling tossing of the ship told me well enough that I was here, a prisoner on the ship making resolutely for Sparta.

  What would I find when I returned? I only cared what I would see reflected in th
e eyes of Hermione.

  We did not reach Sparta as planned. Instead, a great storm accosted the fleet, scattering us in all directions. Where Agamemnon went, we did not know; we lost sight of him. The ship carrying little Ajax sank; the gods punished him for his desecration of the Pallas Athena and her temple. Twenty-six of Menelaus’s ships were lost, and we were driven helplessly before the wind for days. When we finally reached a shore, it was a flat and sandy coastline, fringed in palm trees. We had come to Egypt.

  Egypt. We staggered forth to behold a strange warm world of green, brown, and blue: the three colors of Egypt. Green along the riverbanks and the irrigation canals, brown in all the rest: the sand, the murky Nile water, the mud-brick houses. And blue above it all, a vivid and cloudless sky.

  Menelaus was immediately apprehended by soldiers of the Egyptian king—the pharaoh, who resided up the Nile in a place called Memphis. We had no choice but to go with them. Most of Menelaus’s soldiers had been lost with the ships, and he did not have the means to resist.

  The Nile was a broad, flat, slow-moving ribbon, very different from the Eurotas or the Scamander. The current was exactly balanced by the wind, which blew in the opposite direction at the same speed. If someone wished to sail down the Nile, he let it take him. If he wished to sail up it, he merely had to hoist a sail.

  The pharaoh and his wife received us kindly, but made no pretense that we were anything other than his prisoners. They knew little of the war at Troy; Egypt was insulated against what went on elsewhere. They listened with polite curiosity as Menelaus attempted to explain about it. I noticed that he did not betray the reason it had started. Perhaps he felt it reflected too badly on him.

  The pharaoh assigned us quarters together. Now I must sleep in the same room as Menelaus. I did not expect him to approach me, but I was taken aback when, as he stripped off his tunic, I saw the massive scar running from his thigh to his groin. Now I knew why he moved so carefully; he had lost part of his leg muscle.