‘Well, I really don’t see why you shouldn’t,’ said the Doctor, ‘it’s all quite true.’
‘Possibly it is. I have travelled far in my life upon what you would probably call deplorable adventures. And they have brought me into contact with a great many deplorable persons who have told me various outrageous stories of myths and monsters. But not one of them has had the effrontery to strain my credulity as you have done. Therefore, I think your story is probably true – otherwise you could not have dared to tell it. And so, I propose to release you.’
‘Well,’ said Steven, relieved, ‘I think that’s very nice of you.’
‘Oh, no, it isn’t! You haven’t heard what I have in mind for you yet. There are, you see, certain conditions.’
‘Conditions, indeed!’ said the Doctor, ‘And what, pray are they?’
‘Why, that you use this almost supernatural power of yours to devise a scheme for the capture of Troy!’
‘But I’m afraid I can’t do that! Oh, no – I make it a rule never to meddle in the affairs of others!’
‘Then I would advise you to break it on this occasion.’
‘So would I,’ gulped Steven.
‘Quite so. You see, I am getting more than a little tired of this interminable war. My wife, Penelope, will never believe that it has lasted this long. So already I had half decided to sail for home; but it does seem a pity to have wasted all this time, without so much as a priceless Trojan goblet to show for it. I promised the boys booty, and booty they shall have! So I am going to give you forty-eight hours to think of something really ingenious.’
‘Two days?’ calculated the Doctor, gulping in his turn. ‘That isn’t long...’
‘It should be enough if you are as clever as you say you are.’
Ever the realist, Steven asked, ‘What happens if we fail?’
‘I shouldn’t enquire if I were you. It would only upset you. Because if you fail, I shall have been foolish to have believed your story, and I would hate to be made to seem a fool. I should be very, very angry.’
As he said this, Odysseus sliced through their bonds with a backhand sweep of his cutlass, and then drove his two protesting prisoners back the way they had come.
It seemed pointless to follow them for the moment. I had learned quite enough astonishing new facts for one morning, and I wanted to digest the implications.
I mean, if time travel were really possible, why – what a collaborator the Doctor would make. Already half a dozen ideas for new books were clamouring for attention in my reeling mind – science fiction, I thought I might call them; at least, until a better notion occurred.
Besides, I thought it was time for somebody to see what might be happening inside the city of Troy for a change. How would they cope with a time-machine, I wondered.
So, I went to find out.
Chapter 11
Paris Draws the Line
It wasn’t as difficult to get into Troy as you might suppose, considering all the heavy weather the Greeks were making of it. However to be fair, I have to admit that an army is one thing and an inconspicuous, casually dressed poet, quite another.
At all events, I arrived outside the main gates – very impressive they were, I must say – solid bronze by the look of them, with brass ornamentations, just as Prince Paris and his men were man-handling the TARDIS through there.
Considering all the stertorous breathing, groaning and so forth that was going on, I calculated that they might be glad of some assistance, however modest; so I rolled up my sleeves and lent a shoulder. No one so much as raised an eyebrow; in fact, I was cheerfully accepted as a colleague by one and all. And in no time, there we were in the main square, the gates were barred and bolted behind us, and a crowd of miscellaneous spectators were giving us a bit of a cheer. Nothing to it.
Except that – my word! – the thing was as heavy as lead, and that removed any doubts I might have had about the Doctor’s story. Quite obviously, there was far more of it inside, then met the eye from outside – if you follow me? So we were all extremely glad to set it down.
Prince Paris was pleased with himself no end – you could tell that! He strutted about the little building like a peacock in full courtship display. Well, he could afford to; he hadn’t been doing a lot of work, and wasn’t as fagged out as the rest of us.
But an interesting looking man, all the same. By no means a bully-boy, like his deceased elder brother, and with what I believe is called a sensitive face. Intelligent, anyway – and I wondered if half the stories one heard about him were true.
He didn’t look like a debauchee – far from it. No, more like an unwilling conscript, prepared to make the best of things for the sake of family tradition, and all that. The sort of man you wouldn’t at all have minded having a drink with – except that it would have been a reasonable bet that he’d have left his money in his other uniform.
Anyway, it was obvious at the moment, that he thought he’d pulled off rather a coup. ‘Halt!’ he commanded, shortly after we’d just done so. ‘Cast off the ropes, there!’ Yes, we’d done that as well. So he thought for a moment, and added, ‘Sound the trumpets!’
Well, that was new, at any rate, and after a short pause, while the surprised warriors fumbled about for the instruments, knocked the moths, fluff et cetera out of them, the most God-awful noise broke out. A fanfare of sorts, I took it to be, and possibly just the thing to stiffen the sinews – if you hadn’t been up all night, downwind of Agamemnon’s tent, as I had.
As it was, I couldn’t take it at that hour in the morning, and I scurried away to suitable cover. Nobody had thanked me for my help, but you don’t really expect that these days. And as I cowered behind a giant pilaster with flowered finials, or whatever it was – a great stone column anyway, outside what I took to be the palace, another light sleeper emerged.
‘What is it now?’ King Priam asked irritably. ‘By the Great Horse of Asia is none of us to rest? Who’s there?’
You could sense at once that he was a Trojan of the old school, accustomed to getting his own way, or knowing the reason why. In his mid-sixties, I should think, but well-preserved and still formidable.
Paris pranced proudly forwards, like a war-horse saying ‘ha-ha!’ to the trumpets: ‘It’s Paris, father, returned from patrol.’
‘Well, why can’t you do it quietly ? What news, boy? Have you avenged your brother, Hector, yet? Have you killed Achilles?’
‘Ah,’ said Paris, ‘I sought Achilles, father, even to the Graecian lines. I flung my challenge at him, but he skulked within his tent and feared to face me.’
A likely story, I must say, and not at all good enough, as it proved.
‘Well, you go back and wait until he gets his courage up! Upon my soul, what sort of brother are you? And, furthermore, what sort of son?’ He noticed the TARDIS for the first time. ‘What’s that you’ve got there?’
‘A prize, father, captured from the Greeks.’
‘Captured, you say? I should think they were glad to see the back of it. What is it?’
Paris had been rather afraid of that. He wasn’t sure – and you couldn’t blame him. But he did his best. ‘It’s a sort of shrine, it seems..
‘And what, may I ask, do you propose to do with this seeming shrine?’
Paris tilted his helmet over one eye, and scratched his head. ‘You don’t like it where it is?’
‘I do not. Right in everybody’s way! How are the chariots meant to get around it?’
‘Ah, I hadn’t thought of that.’
‘Think about it now.’
‘Right ho! Then how about if we put it in the temple?’
Not a bad solution, I’d have thought, but at this moment there was an interruption to the steady flow of reasoned argument.
‘You are not putting that thing in my temple,’ snarled a shrill voice from the opposite side of the square, and there was Paris’s sister, Cassandra, standing on the steps of the temple in question.
A b
ad woman to cross, Cassandra; put me in mind of her brother Hector in drag, if you can imagine such a thing. Paris quailed before her.
‘Ah, there you are,’ he said. ‘Well, the point is, old thing, Father and I were rather hoping, we could, perhaps...’
‘Nothing of the kind!’ snapped Priam, obviously glad to let him down. ‘Don’t drag me into it. Honestly, bringing back blessed shrines that nobody wants. Go and bring Achilles’ body, if you want to do something useful! Get back to the war!’
‘And take that thing with you,’ added Cassandra, with as much vehemence as she could muster, which was always considerable. But, as is well known, there are limits, and she had now reached them, as far as Paris was concerned.
‘No, I say, really Cassandra, if you knew the weight of it! Can’t I just move it to the side of the square, and leave it for the moment? As a sort of – well, as a monument, if you like?’
‘A monument to what?’ asked Cassandra, rudely, not letting the matter rest.
‘Well, to my initiative, for instance. After all, it’s the first sizeable trophy we’ve captured since the war started. It seems a pity not to make some use of it, don’t you think?’
‘And what sort of use would you suggest?’
‘Well, I don’t know, do I? Once we’ve examined it thoroughly, it will probably prove to have all sorts of uses.’
‘Yes, I’m quite sure it will; uses to the Greeks.’
‘Now what on earth do you mean by that? The Greeks haven’t got it anymore, have they? I have.’
She sneered, offensively: ‘And why do you imagine they allowed you to capture it?’
This was going too far – even from a sister one has known from infancy.
‘ Allowed me to? Now, look here, Cassandra, I don’t think you quite appreciate the sort of effort that went into –’
She ignored his local outburst. ‘ Where did you find it?’ she persevered, not letting up for an instant.
‘Now, where do you think? Out there on the plain, for goodness sake.’
‘Unguarded, I suppose?’
‘Well as a matter of fact, yes. They’re getting very careless these days.’
‘I thought as much! Don’t you see, you were meant to bring it into Troy?’
‘No, I don’t frankly. And furthermore...’
‘I think I’m beginning to,’ contributed Priam, gloomily.
Paris was now thoroughly on the defensive: ‘Now, just what are you both getting at? Always have to try and spoil everything for me, don’t you?’
Cassandra struck a dramatic pose, as though it had offended her in some way. ‘This has broken my dream! The auguries were bad today, I awoke full of foreboding!’
‘I never knew you when you didn’t.’
‘Paris,’ said Priam, ‘your sister is high priestess; let her speak.’
‘Ah, very well, very well,’ said Paris, yawning behind his chin-guard, ‘what was this dream of yours, Cassandra?’
‘Thank you! I dreamed that on the plain the Greeks had left a gift, and although what it was remained unclear, we brought it into Troy. Then in the night, from out its belly soldiers came, and fell upon us as we slept.’
‘That’s it?’ asked Paris. ‘Yes – well, I hardly think you need to interpret that one! Really, Cassandra, have you taken a good look at this gift – as you call it? Go on, take your time – examine it carefully – that’s right. Now, just how many soldiers do you think are lurking in it? A regiment, perhaps? I hate to disappoint you, old thing, but you’d be lucky to prise even two small Spartans out of that.’
‘Fools! Even one man could unbar the gates, and so admit an army! It’s exactly the sort of scheme Odysseus would think of!’
‘Then I hope I’m not being too practical for everybody,’ returned Priam, reasonably, ‘but why don’t we open the thing and see?’
‘Well, that’s rather the trouble,’ said Paris. ‘There does seem to be a sort of door – but it won’t open...’
‘What did I tell you?’ shrieked Cassandra, like an owl stuck in a chimney, ‘It’s locked from the inside!’ And she beat her breast, in what must have been rather a painful way.
‘Oh, is it?’ Priam seized Paris’s sword, ‘Stand back! I have a short way with locks.’ And he attacked the door of the TARDIS with ill-concealed malevolence. Not a dent or a blemish, however.
Paris swallowed a smug smile. ‘Perhaps you’ll believe me, next time? Cassandra, would you like to try?’
She rejected the offer with dignity. ‘The thing need not be opened. Bring branches, fire and sacrificial oil! We will make of it an offering to the gods of Troy – and if there be someone within, so much the greater gift.’
While attendants, servitors and scullions scurried about to fetch the necessary, Paris had one final go at saving his hard-earned trophy.
‘Now wait a moment all of you! Whatever it may be, the thing is mine – I found it! So leave it alone, can’t you?’
But Priam’s blood was really up now. He’d not only hurt his thumb on the door; but like Odysseus and Agamemnon before him, he resented being made a fool of, in front of the staff. ‘Out of the way, boy! The thing must be destroyed before it harms us! Further.’ he added, inspecting his damaged digit. Then, brandishing a burning branch, in a somewhat irresponsible manner, I thought, with so much sacrificial oil splashing about the place, he prepared to set fire to the TARDIS.
Chapter 12
Small Prophet, Quick Return
From what I had heard the Doctor tell Odysseus, I suspected that the machine was pretty well indestructible anyway, but on the other hand, at the last count, one of our time travellers was missing. Or so Steven had told the Doctor; a young girl, if memory served – and naturally I didn’t want her to be barbecued in her prime. So I mingled with the mob, and raised my voice among the general hubbub; and I raised it in quite a long speech too, because, if you notice, people are so used to short, snappy slogans on these occasions, that, in my experience, nobody pays a blind bit of attention to them. I mean ‘Funeral pyre, out, out, out!’ would simply fail to grip. So, clearing my throat, I said:
‘Wait! It’s not for me to tell you how to run things, of course, but before you actually initiate an irreversible conflagration, should we not pause to ascertain if such a gift would be acceptable to the gods? It may, of course, be exactly what they’ve always wanted, but, on the other hand, if it does harbour treachery, as Cassandra maintains, then might it not seem as if you’re trying to shuffle it off on them? Because they’d hardly be likely to thank you for that, would they? Just an idea – thought I’d mention it.’
Not easy to say that sort of thing in a populist bellow, but I managed fairly well, I think, because it certainly held them for the moment. Paris tipped me the wink and gave me the thumbs up, and even Priam stopped in mid-ignition to consider my remarks.
‘Yes, that is a point – we don’t want a lot of offended gods to deal with, on top of everything else. Have a word with them, will you, Cassandra? Better to be on the safe side.’
She wasn’t that pleased, but could hardly refuse, under the circumstances. Once more she struck that long-suffering attitude of hers. ‘O, hear me, you Horses of the Heavens, who gallop with our destiny! If you would have us take this gift, then let us see a sign. Show us your will, I pray you, for we are merely mortal, and we need your guidance.’
Well, Vicki, as I had hoped, must have been glued attentively to the scanners watching the preparations for her incineration with some concern, because she very sensibly took Cassandra’s harangue as a cue to come amongst us. She stepped out through the doors like a sylph from a sauna, and inquired politely, ‘You need my guidance? I shall be prepared to help in any way I can.’
The effect was electric. Paris beamed and would certainly have twirled a moustache, if he’d had one about him. ‘This is no Horse of Heaven,’ he noticed approvingly.
‘This is no Spartan soldier either,’ Priam observed.
‘Then who is she
?’ demanded Cassandra, obviously prepared to object, whoever she was.
‘Ah, I’m no one of any importance,’ said Vicki, decisively, ‘but I do know a bit about the future, if that’s what interests you?’
Well, of course it did – like anything! Except that Cassandra naturally felt that she should have a monopoly on that sort of thing, and bristled accordingly. ‘How do you so? You are no Trojan goddess. You are some puny, pagan goddess of the Greeks.’
‘Don’t be silly – of course I’m not! I’m every bit as human as you are.’
‘How comes it then, that you claim to know the future?’
‘Oh, really, Cassandra,’ said Paris, before Vicki could answer, ‘you know you’re always going on about it yourself.’
Having already bristled, Cassandra now bridled. ‘I am a priestess, skilled in augury!’
‘Yes, yes, yes – all those dreary entrails, flights of birds and so on. We know. Well, perhaps this young lady’s read the same ones?’
‘Are you a priestess?’ demanded Cassandra, prepared to make an issue of it.
‘Not as far as I know. I mean, I never took any examinations, or anything.’
‘Then how dare you practice prophecy?’
‘Well, I haven’t done yet, have I?’ said Vicki, reasonably.
‘You are some drab of Agamemnon’s sent to spread dissension.’
It was Vicki’s turn to bristle or bridle. She did both. ‘What an idea! I’m nothing of the sort. Don’t be coarse.’
‘Of course she isn’t,’ said Paris ‘I can tell.’
‘Why, I’ve never even seen Agamemnon,’ persisted Vicki, ‘I wish I had, but I haven’t.’
‘Oh, you wouldn’t like him at all,’ said Paris, ‘not at all your type.’
Priam coughed. ‘Your judgement of young women, Paris, is notoriously unsound!’
Paris joined the bridling bristlers. ‘Well, I don’t care what anyone says – she’s as innocent as she’s pretty!’
‘Then you’d better give her a golden apple, and get it over,’ said Priam making an obscure classical reference. He turned to Vicki. ‘Come here, child – I wish to question you.’
Doctor Who: The Myth Makers Page 5
