King in Splendour

by George Shipway

  Myrmidons emerged from the welter, reduced in numbers and moving slowly. I stumbled down the hill, disregarded Talthybius’ remonstrances and drove to meet the valorous band.

  Four warriors carried Patroclus on a shield. His armour was stripped to stanch his wounds--wounds beyond help from mortal hands. His skull was crushed, a spear had torn his shoulder, another ripped his belly and spilled the entrails out. A hard-faced Myrmidon said through tears, ‘Patroclus drove in front and a javelin struck him down. A heavy chariot passed at a gallop, the Hero leaned out and speared him.’

  ‘Did you recognize the killer?’

  ‘No. How should I?’

  I touched the scar on a blood-smeared cheek. ‘Take him to Achilles. Say Hector himself slew Patroclus, that the Myrmidons lack a leader. Will he venture now to battle and avenge his lover’s death?’

  * * *

  Talthybius drove at a walk--any faster pace jarred my arm unbearably. I found our principal leaders and rallied scattered war-bands. Odysseus nursed a punctured calf where a spear had pierced the greave; Diomedes limped from yet another scrape. I learned Periphetes was dead. My Master of the Ships, chafed by inactivity, had fought with Nestor’s Pylians. No time to reckon casualties, count the bodies around wrecked chariots, number wounded warriors who staggered and crawled from the field. Our disordered Hosts held the ground beyond Thorn Hill and stood within ten bowshots of the enemy, so close we could distinguish individual chariots. A constant trickle of warriors mounted the escarpment and entered the Scaean Gate. Small separated parties--presumably Trojan allies--filtered round the citadel and made for the hills.

  Nestor reined at my wheel. The old king wept. ‘My son Antilochus is dead,’ he snuffled. ‘I was surrounded in a Trojan charge and like to be killed. Antilochus came to my rescue; a spear took him full in the mouth.’

  I made commiserating noises. ‘He fell like a Hero of old, giving his life for his father’s.’ To divert his grief I gestured to the enemy and said, ‘They show signs of retiring. What do you think we should do?’

  Nestor blinked away his tears--nothing, as I had surmised, appealed to the veteran more than giving advice. He peered at the hill and said, ‘In my opinion, tempered by years of warfare with and against the greatest living warriors, the forces at the plateau’s foot cover a general retreat. The time arrives, Agamemnon, to mount a concerted assault!’

  I regarded the shifting groups milling about the plain, searching for lost leaders, calling missing comrades, confusedly assembling Host by Host. ‘At the moment the army’s a rabble. We must wait till they’re mustered in order.’

  Nestor looked at the sun. ‘Middle afternoon. If you don’t attack now--‘

  Myrmidons swarmed through the fluid groups and cut his counsel short. Achilles’ crimson chariot reined in a flurry of dust. ‘Why do you dawdle?’ he gibbered. ‘Are you afraid? Follow me, you cowards--I’m going to avenge Patroclus and cut off Hector’s head!’

  Sickly features writhed in rage, his eyes were wild and staring, he looked like a man bereft of his reason. Mud and fronds of river weed streaked the ornate armour. (When Achilles learned of his catamite’s death he careered from camp and missed the way--solitary moping in a tent limited his knowledge of the Trojan plain’s topography--rode Scamander’s western bank and tried to cross by the ford. The current, swollen by autumnal rainfall on Mount Ida, swept his chariot away and all but drowned him.)

  I tried to soothe the madman and was answered by a torrent of invective. Achilles brandished his spear. Myrmidon cars and footmen trotted forward.

  ‘Follow!’ Nestor urged. ‘He’s advancing unsupported and is bound to be cut to pieces.’

  Which was all very well, but you can’t launch a general attack inside a dozen heartbeats. Against my better judgement I sent messengers at a gallop to bid our Hosts advance. War-bands in bits and pieces moved towards the Trojans. Before they were halfway there the Myrmidons struck home.

  I shall always maintain that the sight of our advancing Hosts--not Achilles’ charge alone--made the enemy give ground. Gradually at first, then in increasing numbers, they retreated up the slope, ebbed within the gates and finally scattered in panic before we could come to grips. Bellowing Myrmidons hammered the walls of Troy.

  I rode behind a Mycenaean screen which chased and dispatched some wounded Trojans slow in getting away. Resistance was everywhere broken except on a patch of level ground in front of the Scaean Gate where a single three-horsed chariot covered the last of the fugitives squeezing into shelter. The Hero fought like a champion, his Companion drove like a master, whirling the team to ride down opponents running towards the gate.

  He turned at last to escape, and the doors slammed shut on the stallions’ muzzles.

  Instantly the driver swung away, went horses at stretch down the road, burst through bands of Achaeans and made for the track that led round the slant to reach the Dardanian Gate. The Hero stooped from the heavy car and lanced a Spartan spearman. I heard his baying war-cry and saw his sunburned face.

  Hector.

  Myrmidon chariots fled in pursuit, raced skew-wise down the hillside to intercept his flight and forced him to fetch a wider arc in order to gain the gate. Broken ground near the washerwomen’s spring foiled his driver’s skill, the trace horse crashed and brought the wheelers down. Myrmidons closed on the chariot, spear shafts lifted and plunged.

  So perished noble Hector, the Trojans’ paramount paladin, whose fame will be sung in royal Halls for centuries to come.

  * * *

  A hasty Council of War decided to hold--at least for the night--the ground we had won; so by sunset all the war-bands mustered on the plain below Troy's citadel hill. Men badly hurt were carried to camp, the dead were left where they lay. Horses and Heroes stampeded to rivers to quench corroding thirsts. I posted an outpost line; behind that frail security exhausted warriors squatted in groups and talked in tired voices or stretched on the ground and slept. Followers arrived from camp, hacked bushes and branches and lighted fires, hooked cauldrons to tripods, cooked austere meals.

  An unsavoury incident marred the aftermath of victory. Achilles, after killing Hector, stripped the body naked, slit the tendons at the back of both his feet from heel to ankle, inserted leather straps and fastened them to his chariot, leaving the head to drag. In gathering dusk he galloped through the bivouacs, trawled his grisly burden back and forth between the fires and vanished in the gloom.

  Nestor grimaced, and touched his temple. ‘Patroclus’ death has robbed the fellow’s reason. An ungentlemanly way to treat a courageous foe.’

  ‘I doubt Achilles’ gentility. His father is a thoroughgoing rogue, his mother Thetis a horse-coper’s daughter.’

  I talked to keep my faltering senses afloat, for my wound was a pulsing torment. Machaon and Eurymedon came from camp; the squire unbuckled my armour. By a fire’s flickering light Machaon removed Talthybius’ blood-clotted wrapping, bathed the wound, smeared a greasy unguent, plugged the hole and bound a linen bandage. He was gentle as a woman, but regrettably I fainted. Talthybius revived me with rough red wine and passionately exhorted me to leave the field. They propped me against a chariot wheel and made me comfortable as might be. The night was a drawling penance of pain-tormented wakefulness and short-lived hideous dreams.

  A windy dawn brought Priam’s heralds proposing a truce to bury the dead. I granted permission--the last conscious act I remember for many days thereafter. Talthybius told me later they carried me babbling nonsensically back to camp and deposited me in bed under Machaon’s constant care.

  When consciousness returned I felt weak as a new-born babe--but the wound no more than an ache. Recollection returned in a rush. Brushing aside Machaon’s remonstrance I summoned Nestor who, the surgeon said, had taken command while I languished.

  Impolitely cutting short the old king’s wordy solicitude I asked how matters stood, had we resumed the attack, had Priam sued for peace?

  Nestor shook his head. ‘
The truce is extended indefinitely. Although we beat the enemy in open fight we’re no nearer taking the citadel. Stalemate, in fact. Moreover winter is upon us--no season for campaigning--the Hosts have suffered losses and need a space to recoup.’

  I feebly slapped the blanket. ‘Damn it, Nestor, the enemy’s casualties were as great or greater than ours! Surely a determined storm would have taken Troy?’

  ‘Not a chance. I went myself with a burial party close to the walls. The fortress is near impregnable. Only one slight weakness I could see: near the Tower of Ilion a stretch of the wall destroyed in the earthquake was poorly rebuilt. Joints in the masonry are roughly filled with clay and offer handholds. Otherwise--’ Nestor waggled fingers in the air. ‘You’ll need wings to surmount those ramparts!’

  ‘Why the blazes didn’t you try? We’ve yielded the fruits of victory! At least you’re holding the ground we took?’

  ‘No,’ said Nestor cheerfully. ‘What’s the point? The Hosts can’t spend the winter in unfortified camps in the open. There’s a truce, remember?--no more fighting till spring. We’re all settled comfortably behind our beach defences.’

  ‘And Thorn Hill?’

  ‘Evacuated.’

  I felt too weak for argument. Unprofitable to ponder might-have-beens. Had I been unwounded, still capable of command, and hurled Achaea’s troops at Troy at daybreak after the battle could we have stormed the citadel and ended the war after six moons’ fighting? Possibly--and maybe not.

  Now all remained to be done again.

  Nestor recounted losses. The two-day battle, surprisingly, had cost less than the plague. All our important leaders survived, while Hector’s death was a serious blow to the enemy.

  (Paris’ end, while delighting Menelaus, held no military significance.) According to information gained from contacts under the truce Aeneas the Dardanian commanded in Hector’s place.

  Nestor’s wheezy monologue was steadily inducing slumber. ‘After Achilles’ desecration,’ I said drowsily, ‘was Hector decently buried?’

  Nestor frowned. ‘Achilles repeated that disgusting performance for several days, dragging the body behind his chariot until it decomposed. Priam sent an envoy pleading his son’s remains be sent to him for burial. I had the bits dumped in a sack and sent to Troy.’

  ‘Achilles,’ I murmured, ‘behaved like a barbarian, worse than any Myrmidon he leads.’

  ‘Far worse--and more to come. Are you listening, Agamemnon? A camp-follower’s story, so I cannot vouch for absolute truth.’

  After the Hosts withdrew to the beaches, Achilles, so Nestor related, searched for battle plunder still ungathered. (As did many Heroes, ever hungry for loot.) A Mycenaean bronzesmith called Thersites--the name twanged a chord in my memory: where had I heard it before?--who was also hunting booty wandered into a gully and stumbled on a form that heaved and plunged. Recoiling in alarm he recognized Achilles copulating with a woman who had carried victuals to the Trojans on the night they attacked the camp.

  Achilles raped a corpse. The woman was two days dead.

  Thersites, horrified, gasped the tale to a friend before Achilles, in pursuit, could stop his mouth.

  I said, ‘I’d like to hear all this from Thersites himself.’

  ‘You can’t,’ said Nestor gloomily. ‘Achilles caught and killed him.’

  (Thersites. Ah, yes. That ugly hunchbacked agitator who had baited me in Council at Mycenae. Serve him damned well right!)

  ‘Ajax is behaving very oddly,’ Nestor continued. ‘Now there’s no more fighting he’s become solitary and surly, wanders around by himself and avoids his friends.’

  ‘Aftermath of the plague,’ I mumbled, all but asleep. ‘I’ll talk to him when I’m well.’

  ‘You’re far from well at present.’ Nestor patted my hand. ‘Rest, Agamemnon, and recover your strength.’

  * * *

  Leaning on a staff, I tottered round the camp. Winter gripped the land; rainstorms rode on the wings of the wind; breakers thrashed the beaches. Scamander cascaded in spate; sleepy Simoeis roared like a lion. Beyond the rivers’ flooding waters the plain was an ocean of mud; the heavy holding ground became a sticky snare for chariots.

  Few mariners dared the seas in winter, and supply convoys dwindled to infrequent ships which dodged across in calms between storms--a factor Gelon had foreseen. Towards the end of summer he had doubled the convoys and stockpiled supplies in wooden huts. Sufficient, he assured me, to feed the Hosts till spring, provided they practised economy. I set permanent guards on the store huts and imposed a rationing programme. People were hungry and lean by spring, but nobody starved, not the lowliest slave.

  A galley that ran the gauntlet disembarked, to my astonishment, the Spy. Since we landed on the Troad he had sent warily worded messages by the mouths of trusted servants: the sum could be epitomised as ‘nothing to report’. His rubicund countenance wore an expression of apprehensive anxiety, and I felt prophetic stirrings of misfortune.

  ‘Why are you here?’

  ‘I come to you in person, sire, because my information is too sensitive for an underling’s ears.’ He hesitated, licked his lips and said pleadingly, ‘The news is bad, my lord, for which I beg forgiveness.’

  ‘Of course, man,’ I said testily. (The old bogey of sudden death for messengers bringing unwelcome news.) ‘Speak freely--no harm shall befall you.’

  ‘Queen Clytemnaistra has banished the Regent Mecisteus and rules Mycenae in his place.’

  I kept my face inscrutable. ‘So. Does she’ I said tonelessly, ‘govern the kingdom well?’

  ‘She keeps a taut hand on the reins, sire.’

  ‘How do Mycenae’s Heroes react to this...unexpected change?’

  ‘They’re elderly men, sire, unfit for military service, disinclined to oppose a lady who is, after all, their queen.’

  ‘Understandable.’ I tapped fingers on my knee. ‘Hardly an earth-shaking event--she’ll probably govern better than old Mecisteus. Is that all you’ve crossed the seas to tell me?’

  ‘No.’ He looked at the ground, his fat jowls quivered. ‘Lord Aegisthus has returned from Crete, dwells in the palace and ... shares the queen’s bed.’

  Abruptly I stood. The Spy flinched. I attentively examined a square of pallid sunlight a window shed on the packed-earth floor. In a voice like a blunt saw’s rasp I said, ‘You are certain? There’s no doubt?’

  ‘Not a vestige, sire.’

  I wrestled with fury, beat it down and coldly assessed the news. The hell-bitch blatantly horned me; in Mycenae they chuckled at a shameful tale which soon would flit amid giggles from mouth to mouth in the Troad. A cuckolded king, men’s target for mirth. Momentarily I contemplated sending a loyal Hero home to kill the whore and her paramour, and dismissed the thought. The pair must perish, slowly, at no other hands but mine. Clytemnaistra and Aegisthus would look on my face while they died.

  ‘Return to Mycenae by the first ship sailing,’ I said. ‘Continue watching the queen and, when I return, report to me at Nauplia.’

  The Spy cringed. ‘She has discovered my role as your agent, sire; I barely escaped her assassins’ daggers. I beseech you, do not send me back!’

  ‘Very well. You can live in the followers’ lines--there’s always work for a tanner.’

  I existed in the shadow of indignity, suspected mocking glances, became curt and unapproachable and pretended my wound still painful. I beat a young Hero nearly to death because I surmised ridicule in his eyes. Thereafter men were careful to avoid me.

  At last Menelaus ventured to ring the bull He interrupted an exercise at arms--though the javelin wound no longer hurt, my sword arm’s muscles were damaged and I learned to fight left-handed--and said gruffly, ‘You become as morose as Ajax, brother--no state for a high commander. Everyone knows your trouble; I promise you nobody sneers. Do Heroes laugh at me because Helen skipped with Paris? Look about you: they’ve come to Troy in thousands to avenge me. Why should gentlemen jeer at a man whose w
ife, while he’s warring, deceives him?’

  Menelaus said much more that I cannot remember. His advice restored a crumbling pride. I energetically resumed my awkward left-hand practice; and afterwards stopped imagining leers on derisive faces.

  Maintaining morale and efficiency during those idle winter moons was a problem in itself. Because of the truce the men could not be occupied in raiding the lands round Troy; and storm-ravaged seas forbade forays to Thrace or the Troad coast. Leaders drilled war-bands, organized between rainstorms races and games and athletic contests. Gentlemen hunted--mostly afoot, the going still too heavy for wheels--and encountered Trojan Heroes also following hounds. They met Troy’s confederate warriors, Pelasgians, Alizones, Paeonians and others: barbarous, uncouth men from far-off lands who spoke in tongues that none could comprehend: a barrier that hindered mutual understanding between Trojans and their allies on and off the battlefield. These realms were bound to Troy by ties of commerce alone because, were the city destroyed, they would lose an important market and outlet for trade.

  Fraternization grew common, erstwhile enemies became friendly. While no one from our camp was permitted inside the citadel--save one, as I found out later--Trojans and Achaeans wandered the plain in company. I did not discourage the habit, which provided one definite asset: from gossip our warriors garnered Gelon produced an accurate map of the citadel’s houses and streets.

  To warm my blood one ice-fanged morning I walked to the washerwomen’s spring where a brown-haired, stocky Trojan idly watched the laundresses scouring garments in broad stone troughs. A bodyguard proved his consequence; four armed Heroes likewise dogged my steps. He nodded politely and introduced himself in gentlemanly fashion.

  ‘Aeneas son of Anchises King of Dardania son of Capys.’

  The man who had eluded Achilles and now led Priam’s Host: stern grey eyes under bushy brows and knobbled features that might have been chopped from rock. I announced my name and lineage; a casual conversation digressed to discussing the campaign--warfare, farming and pedigrees are Heroes’ favourite topics. I vaunted Achaea’s prowess and opined that, come the spring, Troy faced certain defeat: some of Priam’s allies--pointing to the hills--had struck their tents and gone.