The Phoenician shook his head. 'Then it makes everything we've been talking about seem a bit meaningless,' he said, 'don't you think? I mean, if you can't tell truth from lies or good from bad when events are happening right in front of your eyes, how the hell can you be sure that anything handed down in memory's going to have even a tiny speck of truth in it?'
There was a moment's bemused silence. Then Cratus said, 'Are they all as naïve as you in Phoenicia?'
'We have writing,' said the Phoenician stiffly. 'And laws, and judges. If this terrible thing you've just told me about had happened in my country, the prince would have arrested everybody and held them for trial; then he'd have sent out his men to find out what really happened, if there'd been a robbery or not, if the bandits had committed any other crimes in other parts of the country; the district magistrate for your city would have sent a written -' (here the Phoenician used a word the Greeks didn't understand) '- to confirm that you were who you said you were, with all the relevant information about you. The truth would have come out, quickly and efficiently, and the matter would have been dealt with in accordance with law and justice.'
There was a long silence; after which Cratus said, 'Apparently, the answer to my question is "yes". No offence,' he added quickly, 'but anybody with half a brain can see the flaws in that system. Each to his own, I suppose, but I'm glad I don't live in your country. And to be fair,' he added with a grin, 'I'm sure your people are glad that people like me don't live in your country. Anyway, it's just as well we're not all alike, or it'd be a very boring world.'
The Phoenician looked like he wanted to say something else, but he didn't. Cratus poured himself a drink, and went on with his story.
From Mila (Cratus continued), we went to Pylos.
Everybody, me included, was thrilled to bits at the thought of going to Pylos. Sarpedon pretended he'd been there once, when he was very young, but we didn't believe him; he seemed just as excited as the rest of us, which suggested he hadn't been there either. Didn't matter; we knew all about Pylos, because we'd all been brought up on stories about the glorious sons of Nestor, the great palaces, the lofty granaries and water-towers, the streets so wide that two chariots could pass each other without slowing down. As for our mission, we knew we were on to a good thing, because there was no more famous chariot-racer in the whole of the Peloponnese, or among all the Sons of the Achaeans, than Demophoon of Pylos.
The only thing that could possibly go wrong, that we could think of in our hearts, was Alastor getting there first and having time to do a really thorough job of turning the king against us; but that was a risk we were prepared to take, since we'd have the tactical advantage of the last word, and anyway, it was such a remote possibility that we couldn't force ourselves to worry about it. Demophoon wasn't just famous for racing chariots; mostly he was known for his wisdom, a trait that ran in the family, since his great-great-however-many-times-grandfather Nestor had been the wisest man in the world at the time of the Trojan war, and people said that Demophoon was just like him in that respect, once you'd allowed for the fact that the men of today are necessarily inferior to the men of the past.
So we didn't dawdle, but we didn't rush either. We followed the coast most of the way, keeping ourselves to ourselves since we still had all that food that Onesimus had given us, and stopping anywhere would only have meant delay. All of us wanted to get to Pylos, as if some wonderful thing was waiting for us there; a hot bath, a warm bed covered in sleek fox-furs, a hearty meal that wasn't just enormous chunks of spit-roast pork, a true oracle from the gods, the divine ambrosia. At Pylos, all our troubles would be over.
And yet - at nightfall on the last leg of the journey, we were only a couple of thousand paces from the city (according to Tachys, who'd never been there but had been told the way in detail by his grandfather); we could have pressed on, but we didn't. Our hearts told us to put off the fulfilment of our desires just a little longer, so that we could savour them when we were fresh and easy. There was a wonderful feeling of contentment around our fire that night; we lay on our backs gazing at the stars, like herd-boys up in the mountains in summer, relishing the freedom and the space. I remember listening to Sarpedon telling Dusa how to make a shield - I can't imagine she wanted to know, but she made plenty of interested noises, as Uncle described in loving detail how you steam the willow laths to curve the frame, then boil the seven ox hides to make them malleable before tacking them in place; then finally the sheet bronze, slapped on before the boiled leather's had a chance to harden, so that all eight layers will fuse into one. There was something spellbinding about the sound of his voice, the assured way in which he described the process, even I couldn't help taking an interest. Tachys was fast asleep all this while; I expect that if he'd been awake he'd have been fretting over some anticipated problem, which would've spoilt the mood. As it was, his soft snoring was a soothing background, like crickets or the distant drone of a shepherd's pipes.
Cleander, who was lying on his stomach beside me, rolled over and grinned; I could see his face, red with the firelight.
'Pylos tomorrow,' he said.
'Yes,' I replied - didn't seem much else I could say.
'Pylos to Corone,' he went on, 'then a bit of a hike to Sparta, across the Eurotas to Amyclae and Therapne, round the foot of the mountains to Prasiae, then up the coast to Tegea; Argos, detour to Troezen before heading up to Corinth, then Megara and Athens. We're getting there, you know.'
I nodded. 'Slowly but surely,' I replied drowsily. 'Barring accidents.'
'Yes, well. Let's not go asking the gods for attention. You know, if we handle it right, we might be able to get Demophoon to come with us.'
'You reckon?'
Cleander nodded. 'It's worth a try,' he said. 'And - well, the King of Pylos, you don't say no to him in a hurry.'
'True,' I said. 'What's he like, do you know?'
'A good man, by all accounts. Very wise.'
'Ah.'
Of course, he knew precisely as much about King Demophoon as I did, namely spit; but it did us both good, I think, to talk about him as if we'd known him since we were kids scrumping apples together. By the time we both dropped off to sleep, we'd talked him into coming with us and providing an armed escort of a hundred men-at-arms, plus fifty mules laden with food and presents and a couple of large portable pavilions. He was a pushover. It was all very encouraging.
That night, for some reason, I dreamed about making love to a drunk woman, who giggled a lot and fell asleep at exactly the wrong moment. With hindsight, I don't think the dream signified anything at all.
We were all awake before dawn the next day (Cratus went on), excited as children whose fathers have promised to take them to the city. We combed our hair and beards, brushed the dust off our knees and set off for Pylos.
We went slowly, strolling rather than marching - we didn't really want to arrive too early, when the king's house would still be waking up and the hall would be full of servants rolling up the bedding and pulling out the benches, and Demophoon would be briefing his stewards with the day's work. On the other hand, if we were too late, there was always the chance of missing him; if, say, he wanted to walk up to the top steadings to look over the pigs or the goat-pens, or see how the olives were coming along. If we missed him at the start of the morning, we might have to wait until he'd got home and heard the day's petitions and lawsuits; by which time he might be in a foul mood and not receptive to what we had to say.
But we reckoned we'd pitched it about right when we climbed over the little scatter of rocks that Pylos had been hiding behind all morning, and started to walk down through the home fields. I shall always remember that first glimpse of the place, as the land rolled back and the site rose up towards us.
Pylos had been burned to the ground; it wasn't there any more. Oh, it was plain enough where it had been; there were dark shapes and lines in the lie of the coarse grass, here and there the occasional spike of stone or timber poking up, like an
arrowhead that's gone right through and out the other side. The plain was empty; not so much as a wild goat or a hare flolloping around among the bumps and tussocks - apart, that is, from a mob of crows, pitched in the middle of a square outline, picking out grass-seeds.
None of us said anything. There wasn't any point in talking.
We walked down through the skeleton of the home fields, boundary-stones half sunk in grass, olive and fig trees with this year's burgeoning crop sharing the branches with the pecked and shrivelled husks of the previous crop gone over. Through some instinctive sense of what was right and proper, we entered the dead city through the main gate - you know that Pylos means gate, don't you? - and followed the memory of the main street up to the grassy rectangle where the palace had been. That was when we saw the signs of burning: blackened log-ends poking out from under wreaths of firewort and creeper, here and there a green and sparkling door-hinge or nail-head poking up through the grass, as if a new city was coming into bud. We found bones too, men and horses and pigs and goats - wasn't there a story about something like that? That's it - when Jason went to Colchis to get the Golden Fleece, the bad king burned the dragon Jason had killed, picked out the monster's teeth and sowed them, and men sprang up out of the earth like barley-shoots. Well, the crop had failed at Pylos; like the field out back of our place which my father said would only grow stones, only dead men seemed to grow in the ashes of Pylos.
'Bugger,' Sarpedon said. It was the first word anybody had spoken since we came over the crest.
Dusa sat down on the ruins of the central pillar of the hall - it had crumbled down to just the right height for her to perch on -and cupped her chin in her hands. 'Pity about that,' she said. 'I wonder what happened.'
'Anybody's guess,' Sarpedon replied. 'Could have been war, or pirates, or just a stray spark from the fire catching in the bedding and taking in the thatch before anybody woke up. Given a stiff breeze, it could spread across the roofs as quick as bad news. No way of telling, really.'
'Somebody's bound to know,' Cleander said. 'I mean, a city like Pylos doesn't just vanish without somebody knowing what became of it.'
I shrugged. 'Does it matter?' I said. 'One thing's clear enough, we aren't going to find any games-players here. Or, come to that, any food to see us through to Corone.'
'That's a very good point,' muttered Tachys. 'Food, and a change of boots. The sole of my left boot's almost completely worn through.'
I sighed. 'Some people have no consideration,' I said.
'Well, it's important,' Tachys said irritably. 'All right, maybe it's not as important in the eyes of the gods as the fall of Pylos, but it's a damn sight more important to me than a load of burned-out houses. And what if I go lame and slow us down and we never get to Athens? The whole mission could turn on something like that.'
'Oh, shut up, Tachys,' Dusa said. 'You're not helping.'
'All right,' Tachys replied, 'I'm just saying, that's all. I'd hate for generations yet unborn to remember that the great adventure of the games all failed just for want of a pair of boots.'
Sarpedon stood up. 'I'll patch your boot with your tongue in a moment,' he said. 'Come on, let's get out of here. This place is starting to get on my nerves.'
Mine too. I was trying to picture the city as it was, trying to get an image in my mind based on these flat marks in the grass, but I couldn't. I'll tell you something, my friend; that's the image that came into my mind when you were talking yesterday about this scratching-marks business of yours, where you scribe the little signs in wax? That's what I reckon that must be like, the overgrown ruins of walls and streets laid out in the flat; tells you there was once a city there, but you'd never be able to picture it - the colours, the smells, the sound of the people's voices. There was nothing left of Pylos except a fact; and that'd only be there until the wind and frost broke up what the locals didn't filch to build barns with.
Well, anyway.
We held a brief assembly (Cratus continued), like a very small convocation of the Sons of the Achaeans, and decided to miss out Corone altogether. Instead, we'd head straight for Sparta, trying to keep up a good pace and hoping we could make the food we'd had from Onesimus last out. There was no reason to suppose it wouldn't, if we went easy on the rations; and once we reached Sparta, of course, that particular problem would be solved.
'Assuming Sparta's still there,' Dusa grumbled.
Why we decided to miss out Corone, I have no idea. I guess it seemed like a good idea at the time, though I can't remember why. It'd only have been a short hike out of our way; there was a games player there (Eurycleides, a reasonable discus-thrower and long jumper), not to mention food and, of course, boots. I guess we felt we'd come into a desperate situation and needed to take desperate action, even if it wasn't particularly appropriate.
Anyone here been to Sparta? Not by road, I'll bet. What we should have done, of course, was pottered across to Corone and begged passage on a ship going east; hopped off again when we reached the other side of the gulf, spared ourselves that gruelling tramp across the head of the bay. We'd still have had the long trudge round the Taygetus mountains, of course, but we'd have been that much fresher when we started. All in all, we got that part of the journey badly wrong; no excuses, some god took away our wits and that's all there is to it.
Nevertheless... I often wonder what becomes of the people who make up proverbs; everybody knows the words themselves, but who the hell remembers the man who first thought of them? Well, if ever you hear the proverb 'You have to climb a lot of hills if you want to get to Sparta', please bear in mind that I made that one up, and give credit where it's due.
(The point being, yes, we had a very rough journey, thank you very much, but whichever direction you come from and whichever route you take, you're going to eat a lot of dust and wear out a good pair of boots getting there, simply because of where it is. We didn't make the best possible fist of getting there, but we could have done worse.)
And you know what? It was worth it. There's no place like Sparta in the whole world for gracious living (or you could call it nauseating decadence, but only if you're dead miserable, like our colleague Tachys. Tachys didn't like Sparta one bit). The city lies in a flat, pleasant plain under the shelter of the Taygetus mountains, with the Eurotas river running in smooth, elegant curves on the other side. The best place to take in the beauty of the city is the hill on the other side of the river, near the village of Amyclae; it's where the great hero Menelaus and his wife, Helen of Troy, are reckoned to be buried, and if you've got to be buried somewhere, I guess there are worse places. From there, you look down over a steepish slope covered with yellow flowers, across the plain with its olive-groves and patchwork of fields, past the silvery silt of the river-bed to the town and the grandeur of the mountains beyond. Just gazing at that view gives you a feeling of well-being, of peace, plenty and easy living -which, of course, is what Sparta is all about.
It's not just the landscape, or the buildings, for that matter; it's the people. Now, I don't know why it is, though I can hazard a guess or two, but some places are inhabited by mostly ugly people, while in other places they're all tall and rounded and good-looking. Sparta's one of the good-looking places. You don't see many sunburned women in Sparta, or cripples, or men with only one remaining tooth; no twisted backs or bandy legs or goitres or unsightly birthmarks. You don't see children with sticks for arms, or little old women permanently bent in two at the waist. There are a lot of people living on that plain; from the vantage-point I've described to you, it's hard to pick out a patch of workable land that hasn't been neatly trimmed and hemmed and put to use, and all the Spartans we came across were pretty much the same. They moved slowly, talked slowly, took their time, like men savouring a good meal - here in Elis we scurry about like ants a lot of the time, as if the hopeless odds against a man being able to make a living oppress our hearts and make us frantic. Not in Sparta. It's the same difference you find between a mountain stream tumbling down o
ver rocks, and a broad, lazy river winding through a level plain. The Spartans know where they're going and know they've got plenty of time to get there. It's a nice attitude; it's a nice city. I liked it a lot.
So picture us, if you will, trudging wearily across this pretty wonderful plain, and suddenly catching sight of a sparkle in the sky. None of us could think what the hell it might be, but a few hundred paces further on we ran into a woman filling a pitcher at a well, and we asked her.
She grinned. 'You're not from around here,' she said.
'No, we're not.'
'Ah.' She thought about that for a moment. 'Chances are,' she said, 'what you saw was the sun catching the gilded pillars of the Great House. On a clear day you can see it from miles away. Proper beautiful it is, close to.'
Well, we were too polite to call her a liar to her face, so we changed the subject. 'As it happens,' said Cleander, 'we're on our way to see the prince. Prince Theopompus. Where might we find him?'
She grinned again. 'At the Great House, most like,' she said. 'That'll be easy enough to find, I reckon. Just go through the gates and follow your nose.'
She was right about that. There was no danger at all of mistaking the palace for anything else; and that's not to say the other buildings there were plain or drab, not at all. But the palace - well.
The exterior was enough to make you think you'd died and ended up in the Happy Islands. Surrounding the courtyard, where we tied up the mules, there's this wonderful orchard, marked off with crisply trimmed hedges, and it's full of precisely ordered trees lined up like members of the household at a ceremony; pears and apples and figs and pomegranates, with rows of vines interplanted between the files of trees; and another vineyard on the other side of the courtyard, with a fountain in the middle, feeding a stream that runs out across the courtyard and under the threshold of the house, and comes up again out in the street, so that people can fill their pitchers from it.
Olympiad Tom Holt Page 15
