by George Moore
Enough it is for this evening to tell thee how one night, whilst walking like thee here beneath the pyramid dreaming of the great king, his benefactor, my ancestor raised his eyes, and what he saw was the door wide open, with a ladder reaching to it. Robbers are rifling the king’s coffin! he said, and without giving a thought to the builder who had escaped the massacre and revealed the secret, or to what might be his own fate if he interrupted the robbers in their work, he ascended the ladder of some thirty rungs (the exact height needed) and stepped within the pyramid. No sooner was he within it than hands were laid upon him and a scimitar drawn to strike off his head, but the chiefest of the band said: Not here, for this man was the trusted friend of Cheops, and if he is not seen in Thebes again, a search will be made. Better it will be to load him with as much as he can carry and proceed with him into the desert — And in a safe place cut off his head! cried a robber. No, a safer plan will be to give him part of the spoil, the chief answered, thereby making him no less guilty than ourselves. But he will deny his guilt! cried another robber. We can make his denial useless, said the chief, by inscribing his confession on his skin with the point of a dagger and rubbing into the wounds a fluid that will keep it plain as long as his flesh holds together; and it was not until his confession was beyond hope of effacement that my ancestor was released. How he died is not known, nor why the manuscript was not sold before it came into my hands.
A great sum of money would be needed to buy the manuscript, I said. No more than twenty golden talents, the stranger answered, and whilst walking towards the Sphinx I considered the amount. We know nothing of the Sphinx! cried Thrasillos, and Kebren replied that the Sphinx was a great rock carved into the shape of a lioness with a woman’s head. Only the head now shows above the sand — How then do we know that the body is a lioness’s? Thou’lt hear more of the Sphinx, Thrasillos, during the course of the story. The stranger wore a great dagger in his girdle, and seeing that his hand often went to it I spoke of the desert as a tryst for robbers, adding that I was not afraid, for I carried but a few small coins in my pocket. Nobody but a fool would walk about the desert with twenty golden talents packed on his back, he answered. All the same, he proposed to return to the pyramid, having little taste for solitary places, and my confidence in him being thereby restored I said that my father-in-law, though a rich man, would be unwilling to buy the manuscript unless it could be shown that the robbers of the pyramid had left much behind that they could not carry away. My good sir, we should have to open the pyramid to show that, he replied, bringing with us a ladder thirty feet high, which was done by the first robbers, but which is not easy to do to-day. It matters little to thee whether the hoard be in the pyramid or in the Sphinx; the manuscript tells that if a pit be dug in a certain spot in the sand a stairway will be discovered leading to a temple carved in the Sphinx herself, and it is in this temple that a great part of Cheops’s wealth will be found. I must have my father-in-law’s consent before buying a manuscript so costly, I answered, and will ask for a month’s delay; but to assure thee of my good faith I will buy a less costly manuscript of thee for my own collection. Thyself art warrant of thy good faith, sir, he replied, and the name of thy father-in-law, Otanes, the great trader of Aulis, is known and honoured from Egypt to the Pillars of Hercules. Moreover, I have at present no complete manuscript, merely fragments — torn, frayed and blotted fragments, nothing that I’d care to offer to a scholar. I have no claim to scholarship in Egypt, I answered him, and he replied: The manuscript I shall reserve for thee and for Otanes will come with a Greek translation, made by my grandfather. Thou speakest fairly, I said. I leave Thebes to-morrow for Carthage in the hope of getting several concessions important to our trade, and in a month from now thou’lt find me at the very spot on which we now stand.
On our way back to Thebes I heard him chattering as one hears a bird, for my mind was away, and we parted as people part in a dream, abruptly, with the words: In a month! on our lips. I doubted not he would keep the manuscript for me, even if he were offered as much money as he expected to receive for it, and all the way to Carthage my mind was torn with thoughts how I might persuade Otanes. Even in speech, I said to myself, it would be difficult to make him see and hear as I saw and heard. A letter hath never convinced anybody, won anybody over. He will throw it aside. I should have gone to him myself. In Carthage I thought of little but the manuscript and hastened back to Thebes hoping to find a letter from Otanes at my factor’s. There was one, but not a word in it about the manuscript. All the same, I spent evening after evening at the pyramid, wondering what might have happened. At last I heard footsteps and turned, but the man I saw was a stranger, who asked: Art here to buy a manuscript? and without waiting for my reply, he continued: The dealer is dead; robbers broke in. But, father, how could he know all this unless he was the robber? If he were the robber, Thrasillos, he would have offered to sell me the manuscript. Let us go to Egypt, father, for a great search. I would indeed take you with me to Egypt, Kebren answered, if I were not trading in the Euxine. The captain calls to me. Good-bye, dear sons. As he advanced towards the gangway he repeated: Good-bye, dear sons. I leave you on a happy morning.... Bring us back stories from Egypt, from Persia! the youths cried, but the ship was in midstream, too far for them to get an answer, and laggard they returned to Aulis before the crowing of the first cock. As sleepy-headed as ourselves, Rhesos said, to encourage Thrasillos into speech. But they had been so long out of bed that they could think only of sleep, and it was not till next morning, when Biote reproved them for being late for the morning meal, that Rhesos began to consider how he might withstand his mother.
They were going to Athens to help Phidias and Kallikrates and Iktinos to complete the Parthenon, and he was impatient to make this plain to her; but the body of the hall being filled with house-servants and slaves, he postponed his challenge. Biote, too, postponed hers. She knew that Rhesos would not consent to her coming to Athens; even if he did, how was she to bring her father with her? Somebody must remain to look after the business. All the same, she could not and would not consent to their going to Athens alone. Kebren was gone and would not return for two or three years, and she raged sullenly against him. At last the slaves and servants rose from their seats to return to their work in little groups and singly; the decisive moment had come. I do not know why we are all so silent, said Thrasillos. Why indeed?’ said Rhesos. We have father to talk about, who must now be in the Hellespont. Biote did not reply, and Rhesos asked how many hours of sailing there were between Aulis and the plains of Troy. She answered that it depended upon the wind, and this simple answer perplexed her sons. But the question how they were to go to Athens had to be decided, and to rouse his mother Rhesos spoke of a little wind that had sprung up at dawn. But you were in your beds at dawn! No, mother, we were on the wharf, said Thrasillos. Father would have been disappointed, Rhesos added, if he had not found somebody to bid him good-bye, and we were not more than three hours out of the house Three hours on the wharf waiting for the Calypso to sail! she cried. Father told us the story of the pyramid and the hoard in the body of the Sphinx, Rhesos answered, with the intention of soothing her, and with the same intention Thrasillos said: The story did not come to an end till the captain called from the Calypso that they were about to loose. We would have liked father to tell us another story, but the sail was set —
And the captain would not lower it, Biote interjected. Father might have sailed in another ship, Thrasillos continued. We begged him to take us with him — But you knew your father would remain away for two or three years. Now I am beginning to understand! You planned to meet your father on the wharf not to bid him good-bye but to persuade him to take you away, leaving me to spend my life in Aulis without husband or sons. Not so, mother; we tried to detain him! But as if she had not heard Rhesos, she continued her outcry.
Biote, I beg of thee not to speak words that will poison their memory of these last days, said Otanes. Poison it is for me to hear t
hat my sons escaped from this house to plan their departure with their father! and walking up and down, restless as a caged panther, she asked Otanes if her sons had had any thought for her when they proposed to leave Aulis with their father. Without waiting for his answer she continued striding along and across the hall, stopping at a table or a pillar to fling from her the imaginations of what her life would be in Aulis robbed of her husband and her children year after year, waiting for the day when it would be their pleasure to return, if they ever returned. I beg thee to lower thy voice, Biote; the servants will hear thee. But without heeding her father she continued: They have not even brought back a message from Kebren saying how long he will be away. Biote, I beseech thee to believe Thrasillos; he confesses to having asked his father to take them away, but he did not consider his words any more than thou art considering thine. I am considering my words, she replied, and I am not ashamed of them — Biote, I beg thee to listen. Father, I will not have thee deny me the right to speak my mind in my own house, and I will not have Rhesos and Thrasillos try to deceive me with a story about Egypt and the pyramids. They left the house last night without my knowledge to meet their father, who hath gone to the Euxine keeping the secret of his return from me, to whom he owes everything: home, children, fortune. He came here without a drachma in his pocket — Come, Thrasillos, we will leave thy mother and brother to their quarrel.... If thou’lt listen, mother, Rhesos said; we did not go to the wharf to plan against thee, I swear it — assurances that were answered by the crash of a statuette against the wall. To contend was impossible, yet he must say something, and picking up a piece of the statuette he said: A poor specimen of the work done at Tanagra; I always disliked it and am glad it is broken — words that again raised up Biote’s temper. Thou hast no thought for me, Rhesos, only for marble. The statuette is of clay, mother; and thinking that marble was more trustworthy than his mother’s temper, he left the hall, with “The Golden Fell” in his mind as a residence for the next three or four days. But were he to go to “The Golden Fell” all Aulis would know of the quarrel, and his thoughts began to shape themselves into a letter to his mother. His letter remained unanswered, and he began to feel that if she persisted in her injustice he might come to hate her. Would she have us renounce our callings? And if we did, would she be satisfied?
He knew his mother too well to believe that she would, and he waited for three days in the hope of a change in her humour; but on going to her room to bid her good-bye he heard a tone of grief in her voice, and when he opened the door her face told him that she had suffered in the last three days as much as he had. A careless word, and the wound will open again, he said to himself; better to say only: Mother, we must not part in anger. At these words she rose and would have thrown herself into his arms if Timotheus had not come to ask Rhesos if he had any instructions to give about Ajax. The interruption relieved the strain, and Rhesos was able to beg his mother to look after Ajax in his absence. He is as tame as a dog, he said, and far more affectionate, and he’ll recognise thee as a relation of his master. Let us go together to visit him. We shall find him lolloping up and down the paddock in front of his den, and when thou callest: Ajax! back will go his ears, for he loves his name.... We think all animals live in ignorance, he said, as they walked down the valley, but they have their own knowledge. And so have birds, replied Biote, and she began to tell a story of a flock of geese that had just waddled past, saying: One gander to three geese is the allowance. The gander will tread all three, but he fertilises nearly all the eggs of the one he loves best, eight out of ten, and of the others not more than four. In the flock that hath just gone by there are three little families of four and five and eight goslings, and each family follows the goose that hatched it. But they know the gander quite well; he helps to keep them out of the woods, where they would be picked up by foxes and wolves, and always leads them back at nightfall. But one night no blandishments, no sticks, could persuade the gander into the pen with the other geese. At last the attempt was relinquished, and in the morning, what dost thou think? He was found sitting by his beloved goose with all the little goslings about them. Now, the gander had known the goslings would be hatched that night, and no food or fear of sticks could persuade him away from her. He wished to see his goslings come out of their shells, perhaps to help them out when he heard them pecking inside.... The Gods had much to think of when they created the world, said Rhesos.
Biote pondered on her son’s face as he spoke. Thou hast been thinking deeply of things beside thy sculpture, Rhesos. Yes, mother, and listening perforce to father and grandfather, who often talk of the seers of Babylon, adding a bit to their talk. But here we are. Biote asked him why he spoke in an undertone, and he answered that if he raised his voice Ajax, who was doubtless in his den asleep, would awaken And I’d have him see thee first. To rush out upon me? Rushing out is only his play, mother; there is no danger. But, Rhesos, thou wouldst not have me go in alone! And then from vanity or to prove her courage to him, she said: I will go in alone since thou tellest me I shall not be torn or bitten or roughly treated. Rhesos raised his voice, and the wolf with ears erect came forth to see his master. Rhesos cried to him two or three times, and every time Ajax stopped and laid back his ears. The animal’s delight was plain, and encouraged by it Rhesos opened the door and let his mother into the garden. The wolf rushed forward and Biote screamed, but Ajax gained some knowledge of his visitor even as he raced, and raising himself on his hind-legs he put his paws round Biote’s neck and licked her sweetly. He is asking thee to plead with me that he shall be taken for a walk, and that if I have not time to take him, thou wilt. But he looks doubtfully at his chain and his collar, thinking that it would be pleasanter to romp in front of us and return when he hears his name. Ajax! And at the sound of his name the wolf relinquished Biote to fondle his master. Now, promise me, mother, that thou’lt never be afraid of him again, that thou’lt feed him every morning and come to see him sometimes. The days will seem long, and the nights, too, if he have no visitors. I promise thee he shall want for nothing, she answered, and the three walked together up the sunlit valley, Ajax giving some little trouble in his anxiety to escape into the woods. He tussled a little, and once or twice Rhesos thought the animal would overpower him, but in the end Ajax preferred good behaviour to liberty and returned with them, seemingly satisfied, to his paddock, where Thrasillos met them, saying that the horses that were to take them to Athens waited in the laneway.
Good-bye, mother. We shall see thee again soon. Front Athens to Aulis is but a day’s ride.
CHAPTER XI
AS SHE RAN into the house burdened with tears and grief she stopped to speak with Otanes. We must try to bear with each other, Biote, and with indulgence for each other’s faults and failings the time will pass smoothly till Kebren returns. But before we part for the day’s business I would warn thee not to trust thyself to the humours of a wild beast, for though apparently tame, even docile, there lingers always a remembrance of the original forest. Very faint are his memories, if he have any, she answered, and she looked forward to bringing Ajax his breakfast on the morrow, saying to herself: Smiles and a cheerful voice will deceive him; he’ll think that his master cannot be far away; and the accustomed hand, she added, will be forgotten in the glut of food I shall bring him. All the same, the wolf’s onset was not a little terrifying, so swiftly did he rush from his den to drive off the intruder; but recognising her as a friend of Rhesos, anger vanished from his eyes, and standing on his hind-legs he wooed her, his paws about her shoulders. Lovely indeed are his teeth, and Rhesos was right when he said that his jaws are masterpieces of sculpture! She watched him gobble, lifting his eyes now and again, afraid lest she should leave him; and then on a sudden thought that it would be wise to keep some of the good things for a meal later, he carried large pieces into his den, hid them, and came back to sniff the basket over and to beg her to take him for a run. Thou hast in mind our long walk down the valley, Ajax, but I cannot take thee
; thou’rt too strong for me; and the scent of a wandering bitch might turn thee upon me. The wolf put his paws on her shoulders, begging for another hug. If Rhesos were here thou wouldst leave me for him, for a memory still lingers in thee of the days when he suckled thee on a rag dipped in milk. So did he win thy love, and it is plain that once thy love is given it is given for ever. Art sorry for me, a poor makeshift mother, with only a share in thee, the right to feed thee, to talk to thee of thy master?
In every succeeding colloquy she confided a little more of her troubles to Ajax, telling him that ships arrived in the port from Athens, but not one brought a letter or a message from Rhesos, who was forgetful of them both in the delight of shaping images. He heeds not the hours nor the days nor the weeks; we are forgotten, Ajax. The wolf howled, and enjoying his sorrow (a sweet mixture it was with her own), she said: Now, dear friend, I’ll tell thee a secret: I suffer as much as thou. I love him better than Kebren, than Otanes, better than Thrasillos. Ah, here is Timotheus! and feeling that something must have happened to bring him to her, she ran to the gate and learnt that Thrasillos had arrived from Athens, charged by Rhesos to return with Ajax. To return with Ajax! she repeated. Does he think me unworthy of the charge? The wolf looked up at her, asking with his eyes if his master were back. No, darling, he is not here, but Thrasillos hath come... ah, I cannot tell thee, yet I must: Rhesos would have thee in Athens. But he must come to fetch thee himself, which he will not do. And opening the gate she passed out, leaving Ajax to whine for a moment and then to retire to his den to dig up the bones he had buried.
