‘You all know what’s been going on here in the palace with that mob of lazy wasters practically hanging round my mother’s neck and using their so-called courting as an excuse to justify their sponging and their lust for power. They could have approached her father formally and correctly, but instead they’ve elected to fleece me of my inheritance, eat us out of house and home and drink us dry. Suitors? They’re scum, filthy parasites. Yes, my masters, it’s your sons I’m talking about – many of them here among us. In the name of shame, and for decency’s sake, I ask you to call them off and let them go back to frittering away their own inheritances instead of mine, and to squandering their own estates – your estates – if that’s the way you’re happy for them to behave. And if you won’t do it, then I will. I’m giving them formal notice to quit my house – now!’
Telemachus finished speaking, flung his staff on the ground, and burst into tears.
Silence.
The leaders had never heard a word from him in public, let alone an outburst like this. Nobody knew quite what to say. At last Antinous, the chief parasite, replied on behalf of the suitors. His face was dark with rage.
‘That was some speech, Telemachus, ugly and spiteful as it was! And I’m telling you right here and now we won’t accept it. Everybody knows it’s not us to blame, it’s your mother. You know very well what I’m referring to, don’t you?’
Of course, the old story, Penelope’s shroud for Laertes, the winding-sheet that got wound down by night, spun up again by day and wound down again in the dark, night after night until the ruse was discovered.
‘Well now we’re calling her bluff. And yours, Telemachus. The years of nocturnal unravelling are over, my boy, and she’s been made to finish the web. Now you can send her back to her father, if that’s what you want, and let the pair of them make the choice and reach a decision, instead of this endless shilly-shallying. That’s what’s eating up your estate, young fellow, not our greed, or lust, or politics, but your mother’s devious and infernal procrastination.’
Applause, loud and prolonged – which did not perturb Telemachus in the least.
‘So, Antinous, you ask me to push my mother out into the street, do you? A fine thing for a man to do to the mother who bore him. Would you do it? Yes, very likely you would. But I’m not tarred with your brush. Carry on as you are, then, do as you are doing, fatten yourselves up for the kill. You’ll be so soft and fat you won’t be able to lift a finger – wait till I cut you down in the house you’re trying your best to ruin with your profligacy and riot!’
‘What the –?’
There would indeed have been a riot if Zeus hadn’t capped that stirring speech by sending down a couple of eagles to wheel about the meeting place right above everybody’s heads. Down the wind they swooped and screamed, wing to wing, feathertips touching, and with terror in their eyes. Then they started ripping into each other with beaks and talons as they swung off eastward over the rooftops of the town, over the sounding sea. The whole Assembly stood stunned into silence, till one of the elders, Haliserthes, made a pronouncement. He was a scholarly soothsayer and a respected birdlorist.
‘Friends, you’ve seen the portent with your own eyes, and it is a portent. Now I shall interpret it, and advise these suitors accordingly. A day of doom is approaching for them and for us all. Odysseus is close. And if these young men wish to avoid disaster, they should go back to their homes while they can and never set foot in the palace again. Indeed, we ought to compel them to this course of action. Even then they may not escape what’s coming to them.’
Some of the suitors went green about the gills, but their other spokesman, Eurymachus, stood up to the prophet and saved the day for them. So they thought.
‘Off you totter, old man. Your grandchildren are waiting for a story. You can give them the one you’ve just told us, the one about the birds – which, by the way, go about their business in the clear skies without a thought in their feathered heads for us. What they do has absolutely no bearing on human affairs, except in your superstitious old skull. We don’t buy your divinations and your pathetic mumblings. Odysseus? Pity you didn’t go to Troy and perish alongside him. Why didn’t you warn him not to go if you’re so clever? A goose could have told him! But now you’ll be expecting a backhander from Telemachus for sucking up to him against us. Let me tell you something: your speech just now was an incitement to violence, and if that happens you’ll face the consequence – a hefty fine, one that will break your heart besides your back. Have you got that? Now get out of here before you come to harm!’
There was applause from the cronies. Haliserthes turned away, subdued. Eurymachus carried on.
‘As for you, Telemachus, here’s my advice. We’re supporting Antinous’s perfectly reasonable proposal to you to send your mother back to her father and let them sort out a wedding between them. Until that happens, we’re staying in the palace, and we don’t care what you think about it. Do you see us shaking in our sandals? A milksop and a greybeard? No, you don’t scare us with your rhetoric, or with your daft prophecies, for that matter. Here we are, and here we stay. And unless Penelope stops giving us the runaround and acts honestly and responsibly, we’re going nowhere, and neither are you, pipsqueak, because there will be no inheritance for you, my lad. We’ll eat you all up!’
Roars of approval from the youngsters and applause from the elders. And an end to Telemachus’s little rebellion, crushed in its infancy, or so they imagined, little knowing that a goddess was giving him speech.
‘Going nowhere, am I? That’s where you’re wrong, Eurymachus. The fact is, I’m going to Pylos, and to Sparta. And I’m going tomorrow. I want a speedy vessel and twenty good men to crew her, and I’m going to find out once and for all about my father. Somebody must know something. If I find Odysseus is dead, I’ll build him a mound and my mother can re-marry. If he’s still alive somewhere, then I might just resign myself to your daylight robbery for a little longer – until he returns to rip out your livers and throw your noses to the dogs! That’s it. The people have heard my case. I’ve no more to say.’
‘But I have!’ shouted old Mentor above the uproar. ‘I want to say that I don’t give much thought to these suitors – it’s their own necks they’re sticking out, and if they’re for the chop, fair enough, that’s their affair. They’ve been asking for it. Why should we care if they come to a bad end? No, I reserve my rage for you spineless individuals who’ve been letting them get away with it. Even now, you’ve kept your mouths shut, with never a word of reproval or restraint, not a syllable. In my mind, you’re even guiltier than them. They’re in the minority, and you have the numbers and the authority to control them, yet you let the abuse continue. How can you call yourselves leaders?’
Up sprang Leiocritus. ‘I’ve heard enough of this inflammatory talk against us. It’s just as Eurymachus has said – here we are, and here we remain, until Penelope puts an end to this procrastination.’
‘And if Odysseus does appear?’ asked Mentor.
‘And what if he does? Are we going to run from a broken-down old veteran? Maybe with one eye by now, an arm missing, or a leg, or whatever’s left of him? A bunch of young bloods like us? I think we’d see him off soon enough, if he even had the nerve to take us on. Penelope may have missed him in bed, but she’ll get little action between the sheets from a corpse – which is what he’ll be in the very first minute if he really thinks he can take on all of us at once. He can’t. It doesn’t matter what he did at Troy, or what he says he did, or what he thinks he did. We’re just too many for him here, so let’s relax. And by all means, let Telemachus go stravaiging off to Sparta if that’s what he wants. He’s got the time to waste, and the cruise might bring him to his senses. Maybe the sea air will do him good, clear his mind. I know exactly what we’re going to do. We’re going back to the palace right now and we’re going to order up the biggest banquet ever for tonight. We’re going to feed like fighting cocks!’
The me
eting dispersed, leaving Telemachus to seek the solace of the shore, where the sounding sea pounded the sands and ground the shingle. He looked out helplessly over the grey waste. He’d tried his best, but he’d been bullied and thwarted at every turn. He wetted his hands in the bubbling surf and held them high over his head, lifted in prayer.
Athene heard him and came at once. She appeared in the person of Mentor, but he knew who it really was.
‘Telemachus, take heart. You’ve spoken well today and you’re no milksop. Most sons are pale shadows of their fathers, but you’re a credit to yours. The suitors? They’re fools and dead men. Forget them, their days are numbered. Go back home, ignore them, let them tie the noose tighter round their miserable necks. Their end will be bloody, believe me. And tomorrow, set sail. Don’t worry, I’ll pick a crew for you and rig out the ship. You see to the provisions. By sunrise I want you well away, out on the open sea.’
The words of the goddess struck fire from Telemachus. When he reached home, he found the suitors skinning and singeing goats and fatted hogs, preparing for yet another riotous night at the palace’s expense. Antinous, who’d had a few drinks already, tried to offer him one to calm him down and charm him into a spirit of camaraderie, but Telemachus cut him dead.
‘No, Antinous, I gave you your chance, and you threw it back in my teeth. Now I’m going to let loose all hell on you, either from here or from Pylos or Sparta. You’ve been warned.’
Hoots, curses, howls of derision.
‘We’re trembling.’
‘My hair’s turning white.’
‘He’s up to no good, that lad.’
‘Bollocks. He’s all bluff.’
‘He’s asking for it.’
‘You heard him say it: he wants our blood.’
‘We should have his – before he gets Nestor’s men to come and cut our throats.’
‘Or sets the Spartans on us.’
‘Maybe he’s off to the faraway islands, on the lookout for charms and drugs to spike our drinks.’
‘And rub us out while we’re sleeping it off.’
‘Or perhaps he’ll pay a visit to the poison people in Ephyre, then slip us something really deadly that’ll do for us in one go, lay us all out cold, ready for our shrouds.’
‘We’d better do for him first, then.’
‘Yes, it’s a bad business when your host won’t drink with you because he’s thirsty for your blood instead.’
‘Self-confessed. A would-be murderer. It’s the motive that counts.’
‘It’s in his heart.’
‘It’s in his blood.’
‘Just like his old man.’
‘But just like him, he might get lost at sea and never come back.’
‘Another useless sailor.’
‘A chip off the old block. Couldn’t even find his way back home.’
‘Back to Ithaca.’
‘And that’s what’ll happen to the sprog.’
‘You can count on it.’
‘Especially if we were to make it happen.’
‘If we went after him, for instance.’
‘Or lay in wait for him.’
‘We’d soon cut short his sudden taste for sea travel.’
‘Then we’d have to go to the trouble of sharing out all his property among us.’
‘What a nuisance, eh?’
‘What a chore!’
‘Some father.’
‘Some son.’
A voice whispered in Telemachus’s ear.
‘Let them gibber – it’s what they do; it’s all they’re good for. Soon they’ll be gibbering for mercy. And there’ll be none given. Then they’ll just be gibbering ghosts. It’s all over for them.’
So Telemachus left them to get drunker still and to brag in their cups. He called on Eurycleia and told her his plan, asking her to help him prepare the provisions for the next day’s voyage, the jars of oil, the amphoras of old rich wine, the copper keg of honey, the wheat, the barley and bronze.
The faithful old crone burst into tears. ‘My poor little mite, what madness is this? Who put this scheme into your noodle? It will never work, this voyage of yours. Your father never came home from the sea. Do you want to imitate a dead man? You won’t last five minutes, I tell you. The minute they see the back of you, these louts will be plotting your downfall. They’ll stab you in the back first chance they get. Don’t give it to them. Stay where you are and keep an eye on them. My god, they could follow you in a ship of their own, launch a surprise attack and sink you like a stone, with only the seagulls as witnesses – and the fishes, who have no tongues. Don’t do it, I beg you.’
Telemachus put his arms around his old nurse and wiped away her tears. ‘Listen, old mother, you’ve no call to worry about me. I’m not worried about myself. Do you know why? A goddess watches over me. A bright-eyed goddess with golden hair.’
And indeed Athene was always either at his elbow, or she was bustling about town disguised as Telemachus himself, appearing with such a blaze of authority that there was no lack of volunteers, and each one of the twenty crewmen felt honoured to be sailing with the king’s son, young as he was. Everything was arranged before nightfall. The goddess ran the ship into the black water, stowed all the gear, moored her, assembled the crew and issued their orders. After that, she returned to the palace and lulled the suitors into a state of sleepiness and drunken stupor that had them keeling over the benches, the wine cups slipping from their fingers. Asleep on their unsteady feet, they staggered off home.
Eurycleia was sworn to secrecy. Penelope was not to know what her son was up to, not for a dozen days at least, unless she found out on the palace grapevine. And Telemachus now left the palace and made his way down to the shore, where the long-haired crew manned the vessel and awaited his orders. They cast off the hawsers, sat down on the benches and prepared to pull on the oars of polished pine.
They didn’t have to. Out of the west came a sudden wind, called up by the bright-haired goddess of the flashing eyes. The wind thumped the stern of the ship and sent it bobbing out onto deep water, singing across the wine-dark sea, plunging and coursing through the waves, hissing like a snake. All hands on deck. They hauled up the mast and hoisted the sail, pulling on the plaited ropes of dark oxhide. And now, hit by the wind, the sail swelled like a pregnant woman in the marketplace, proudly presenting her big belly as she strides steady-footed among all the round-eyed virgins who have never been struck by the seed. So the wind now struck the ship, speeding her through the choppy waters all night long and into the pink streamers of the dawn as she ploughed her way to Pylos.
FIFTY
In Pylos, the citadel was sending up its early morning smoke, and the appetising aroma of roast meat scented the air. Nestor’s people were assembled on the beach, offering up jet-black bulls to Poseidon. Nine companies, five hundred men to a company, and each offering nine bulls. Nestor was doing Poseidon proud. The old charioteer of Gerenian fame was a busy man this morning, but his etiquette never left him. As soon as he saw the trim ship and the strangers disembarking, he had them brought to the feast, seating them on fleeces on the sands and putting into their tired hands refreshing wine cups, sparkling gold and brimming with the best wine.
When he understood that his guests were from Ithaca and that he was looking at the grown-up son of his old comrade, Odysseus, the old man lapsed into nostalgia, not unmingled with bitterness. Telemachus urged him to tell him all he knew.
‘Troy. My god, what scenes that name evokes! What memories! What men! But I’d be lying if I didn’t admit to the miseries we Greeks suffered there on the misty seas, on the windy plains, under the wheels of the Trojan charioteers and the rain of their archers – though I fancy we were superior spearmen and better at the hand-to-hand. Even so, we couldn’t bring them down. Our best men fell before those walls, or were wounded – Ajax, Achilles, Patroclus, my own lovely boy Antilochus, who was so dear to me and was the swiftest of them all, so fleet of foot and such a brave
fighter. And now the light-footed lad lies out there all alone and far from home. Oh yes, it was a costly war, and it broke our hearts. And after nine years the city still stood. But in the tenth year, your father came up with the stratagem of the wooden horse and brought the proud towers tumbling down. We sacked the city and sailed for home. And that was nine years ago, nearly ten.’
The old soldier fell into a pensive silence and wiped away a tear. Telemachus cleared his throat and gently suggested that as the story was so stirring, he might be good enough to take it up again, possibly with some news of his father. Nestor said he would get to that part.
He took his time over it, telling the whole story of how Athene had sparked the bitter quarrel between the sons of Atreus, so that Agamemnon stayed on at Troy, while the rest of the fleet, laden with spoils and captive women, their girdles round their hips, sailed for home, Nestor himself along with Diomedes – with Menelaus, now split from his brother, following in their wake.
‘He caught us up at Lesbos. We were wavering there, unsure about our best route. Should we opt for the long passage along the rugged coast of Chios and so on by the isle of Psyrie, keeping it to port, or should we cut inside Chios instead, past the windy heights of Mimas? We prayed for guidance, and the gods gave us the answer: sail straight across the open sea to Euboea and escape danger. It was a good answer. Menelaus joined us and we all whistled down the freeways of the fish and made Geraestus in the dark.
‘On the fourth day, Diomedes anchored in Argos. I kept my own course for Pylos. The Myrmidons reached Phthia, Idomeneus arrived in Crete without a casualty, and the sea took nothing either from Philoctetes, not a man lost, except all those who had not survived the war.’
‘And Odysseus?’
Telemachus nudged the remembering veteran as politely as possible, at the same time hoping to coax the precious words out of the remembering mouth.
‘Ah, Odysseus, yes – no, he’d left us by that time. We were all at loggerheads, you see, and he turned his twelve ships round at Tenedos.’
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