At the entrance to the palace, Hippasus, the master of the house, awaited him, accompanied by one of his sons. The old man had been the lawagetas when Atreus reigned over Mycenae, and Menelaus had restored him to a place of dignity in his palace. Next to him was the king’s nurse, Marpessa. She was a woman of great age, but she had always run the household. She still had authority over the handmaids and the servants and she managed them with a steady hand.
‘Your uncle the king and the queen await you for dinner,’ said Hippasus and ordered that the youth’s spear and sword be put in the armoury. ‘They are impatient to see you and embrace you. But please follow the nurse first; she will take you to the bath chamber and give you fresh clothing.’
Marpessa kissed his forehead and eyes: ‘You are as beautiful as the sun, my boy,’ she said, ‘but you stink of sweat and you’re covered with dust. The water is perfectly hot; the maids have kept the fire going under the cauldron all day since we did not know when you would arrive. Come, the princess herself will help you wash and prepare for dinner.’ She was already striding down the dark corridor with a quicker step than one would expect for a woman her age, and the young prince followed her. ‘How long has it been since you saw your cousin?’ she asked. ‘Oh, I imagine she was still wetting her bed the last time you saw her. Much time has passed. You’ll see, she’s as lovely as the morning star, with skin as white as the moon, her mother’s deep black eyes and the flaming hair of her father the king.’
The youth entered the bath chamber and the handmaids approached immediately to undress him. As soon as he was immersed in the tub, Princess Hermione appeared. She was so beautiful she took his breath away and left him without words.
‘Welcome to our home,’ said the girl. ‘We have been waiting anxiously for you. I hope you are well and that your journey was a good one.’
‘I am well, Hermione,’ he said, ‘and happy to see you. I had been told that you were as beautiful as your mother, but now that I’ve seen you, I’d say you were beyond compare.’
The girl lowered her head with a little smile, then approached him; taking a sponge, she dipped it in the hot water and squeezed it over his head, his back and his shoulders, as he closed his eyes and stretched out his legs in the stone tub, savouring the pleasure of the water’s warm caress.
Hermione passed the sponge to one of the handmaids, who continued to wash the prince, and she sat down to supervise the guest’s bath, as befitted her rank.
‘You know,’ she said, ‘just a short time ago Telemachus, the son of Ulysses, bathed in that tub. It was a day of celebration; I was about to depart with my dowry, to become Pyrrhus’s bride at Phthia in Thessaly. Telemachus had arrived from Pylus together with Pisistratus and we offered him hospitality here at the palace; he was seeking news of Ulysses. But my father did not have much to tell him. He did offer to help throw out the suitors who invade his father’s house, but Telemachus refused. He said that he was sure that his father would return and annihilate them all. He is a nice boy, Telemachus, gentle and good. Pisistratus has become his good friend, and I hope that one day he will find a bride worthy of him.’
‘If you were about to go to Phthia that day, how is it that you are still here?’ asked Orestes with a certain anxiety.
‘Because Pyrrhus is no longer there. His grandfather Peleus refused to keep him in his house, and he left for Buthrotum in Epirus. It would have been too long and dangerous a journey for me. I will go later, if we win the war; he will come here to fetch me.’
Orestes couldn’t take his eyes off her as she was speaking. When he had finished, he stood up, and the handmaids covered him with a big linen cloth that Marpessa had taken from a chest. They dried him and dressed him with a fresh tunic, handsomely embroidered in bright colours at the hem. Helen’s brother Castor had worn it one day, before the gods had called him to their abode. Orestes turned towards the nurse and said: ‘Grandmother, prince Pylades will have unharnessed the horses by now and he will be entering the palace. Go receive him as well, please, and have a bath prepared for him.’
The old woman nodded and walked away down the corridor. Orestes drew close to Hermione as the handmaids were dressing him and pouring perfume on his hair. He touched her cheek with a light caress. ‘If you were not already promised,’ he said, ‘I’d ask for you myself.’
The girl started slightly. ‘Do you mean that?’ she asked.
The prince answered with a look worth more than many words. He remained silent, contemplating her, and then said: ‘Have you ever seen him?’
‘No,’ said the girl. ‘But if we want to win this war, his strength is indispensable. That’s what my father the king says.’
‘We’ll win in any case,’ said Orestes. ‘We have justice on our side.’
‘If Pyrrhus fights with us, the conflict will be shorter. The king believes that we can also thus prevent others from convincing him to join them against us. The scale will be tipped in favour of whoever he takes sides with. Those who have seen him fight say he is an invincible fury. Like his father,’ she said, her voice growing softer, ‘but. . fiercer, more cruel.’
Orestes took her hand and clasped it between his own. ‘I would treasure you like a precious gem,’ he said, ‘like ripe grapes in the vineyard. .’
Hermione’s gaze trembled, her dark, shiny eyes became moist. ‘If the war is shorter, there will be fewer losses, less blood spilt, understand? Too much has already been shed.’
Orestes tried to say something else, but his voice died in his throat. Hermione pulled back her hand, gently, and went towards the door that led to her apartments. Before disappearing, she turned back towards him and bade him farewell with a look. In the uncertain light of the lamps, the prince thought he saw a tear glittering on her ivory cheek.
‘He won’t have you,’ he said.
The king himself, Menelaus the Atreid, came to receive him at the door of the great hall. He was flanked by two warriors from the army of Ilium, for they were the only ones he trusted.
The king strode towards him and greeted him with a warm embrace, then preceded him into the banquet room. Marpessa reappeared and gave orders to bring tables and food, and the prince began to eat eagerly, because he hadn’t stopped during the day and the bath had made him hungry.
‘Prince Pylades is with me,’ he said. ‘He will lead the Phocian army at our side.’
‘Excellent,’ said the king. ‘He will be a welcome guest in Hippasus’s house tonight; they will see to the plan of battle. King Nestor of Pylus will be sending the warriors who fought at Ilium under the command of Pisistratus, the strongest of his sons. Another allied army is descending from Epirus; it is led by the son of Achilles, Pyrrhus, who has sworn to help us. You will lead the chariot charge with me, if they dare to challenge us on an open field.’ Orestes listened, but his eyes seemed to drift away at times. When they had finished dinner, the king had the tables cleared but had them leave the wine.
‘Your aunt, the queen,’ said Menelaus, ‘regrets that she was not with me to receive you at the door, but she will be joining us soon.’
Orestes seemed disconcerted; a troubled look crossed his eyes, an ill-concealed embarrassment.
‘I understand,’ said the king, ‘I know what you are thinking. .’
‘My sister Iphigeneia. . and my father died because of her,’ said the prince, a sudden chill in his voice.
‘It’s not the way you think,’ said the king. ‘And it is time that you know the truth. That’s why I had you come.’
The queen entered at that moment and greeted him: ‘Welcome to this house, son.’ But Orestes barely managed to bow his head. Her presence obviously created deep discomfort in the boy.
‘The tunic of my beloved brother fits you well,’ observed the queen. Her gaze was veiled with sadness and regret.
‘Helen was not the cause,’ said Menelaus. ‘She was, instead, one of the combatants. Perhaps the most formidable of us all.’
The youth gave the queen an ast
onished look. She seemed not to notice, lowered herself into a chair and put her feet up on an elegant ivory-adorned stool.
The prince shook his head, bewildered. The king rose, poured wine into the young man’s cup and waited until he had drunk it, then said: ‘Get up and come with me.’
Orestes followed him without understanding what was happening. Before starting down the corridor, he turned back a moment to see the queen sitting there, as lovely as a goddess; she smiled at him. They soon reached a sort of gallery, closed off by screened shutters.
‘Come,’ said the king. ‘Look.’
Orestes neared the screen from which a reddish glow filtered. The room he saw was illuminated; there was a girl there, playing a lyre and singing, while others around her spun wool of beautiful colours. At the centre, sitting at a large loom, was a woman whose head was covered with a light blue veil. He could only see her hands, her long, delicate fingers flying swiftly over the weft, passing the reel back and forth. Woven into the top part of the cloth was a peaceful scene, a shepherd guiding his sheep to a blue-watered spring. Green meadows surrounded them. The lower part showed a scene of war: a ship leaving port with warriors seated at the thwarts, manning the oars; they were departing to wreak destruction across the sea. Weeping women waved at them from the beach, their heads covered by black veils as if they were following a funeral litter.
The lyre suddenly stopped, the woman’s sweet voice fell still and the lights dimmed. The woman sitting at the loom rose to her feet and turned around: it was Helen of Sparta, the bride of Menelaus the Atreid.
‘Helen never went to Ilium,’ said the king behind him. ‘She never left the land of the Achaeans. The whole time we were at war she was hidden away at Delos, protected by an impenetrable secret.’
‘I. . I cannot believe what I see,’ said the prince, and his eyes were full of stupor. ‘How can this be? Is it a prodigy of the gods? A trick. . an illusion for the eyes?’
‘She is as you see her,’ said the king. And he returned on his steps. Orestes, still as stone, couldn’t take his eyes off the queen, her soft, proud step as she crossed the shadowy room, as the oil that the handmaids had poured into the lamps was consumed. A moment later, the divine Helen disappeared into a dark corridor. Her maidservants followed her as the lamps went out, one by one. The last one remained lit for a while, illuminating the marvellous weaving. The quivering light licked at the lamenting women and in the silence that enveloped the great house, the young prince thought he heard weeping.
They returned to the banquet hall and the prince approached the woman who was still sitting there. She held a golden cup that the handmaids had brought her in her hands; it was full of wine.
‘This is the woman who followed Paris to Ilium,’ said Menelaus behind him. Orestes drew nearer until he was very close. Her gaze was unperturbed, her lips curling in a slight smile, her forehead very smooth and perfectly white. She touched his face with a caress and said: ‘Welcome to our home, son.’
‘But. . but this is the same person,’ stammered the prince.
‘No,’ said the king. ‘Look, the mole she has on her right shoulder has been tattooed. A priest from Asia came all this way to do it. No one here in the land of the Achaeans knows this art.’ He brushed it with his fingers. ‘See? It is not a mole, it is perfectly flat. Otherwise she is the very portrait of your aunt.’
‘But that can’t be. . the gods cannot have created the most beautiful woman in the world twice.’
‘I saw her by chance among a group of slaves that a Ponikjo ship had unloaded at the market on the seashore. She was dirty and ragged, her hands were black and her nails broken. She was full of bruises and wounds and yet I was awed by her beauty and, above all, by how much she resembled the queen. I couldn’t understand why she was in such a sorry state. Even the stupidest of merchants realizes that a slave in those conditions isn’t worth half her real price.
‘I thought that if I cured her, washed her and fed her, the resemblance would be perfect. I bought her without haggling over the price those greedy pirates wanted. I thought that somehow this marvellous resemblance could prove useful to me. . and I knew that. .’
Orestes listened as if he were beside himself, still not able to accept what his eyes were telling him. He turned again and again towards the woman seated so close to him; she had caressed him, she had called Castor her ‘beloved brother’, she had said ‘our home’ as only a queen can say, she sat and spoke like only a queen can sit and speak. And then he turned towards the king who was continuing his story, but in his eyes a light of ire and suspicion was growing.
‘I knew that. . in any case, she had to belong to me. I could not bear the thought that another man might, sooner or later, discover her beauty and take his pleasure with her as I take my pleasure with my legitimate bride.’
The woman got up just then, took a pitcher from the table and poured wine into two golden cups, which she handed to the prince and King Menelaus. She then said to Orestes: ‘It is time for me to retire to my rooms and leave you alone, but first I will have your bed made up myself. May the gods grant you a good night.’
She took her leave of the king with a slight nod of her head and a smile, and went off.
The house was enveloped in night and silence. The only sounds to be heard were the steps of the warriors on sentry duty in the great outer portico, their voices as they exchanged orders and the barking of the guard dogs. The king’s gaze was far away, his brow clouded over. Perhaps in that moment it was the call of the sentinels on the ramparts built to defend the ships from the fury of Hector and Aeneas that rang in his ears; perhaps he heard the groans of the wounded and the shrieks of the dying.
The prince stared into his absent eyes: ‘You set off the war to recapture a slave. . the kings of the Achaeans suffered injury, pain and death over a slave. . kingdoms overturned, thrones bloodied. . all of this. . for nothing more than a slave!’ He pounded his fist on the table, jolting the cups. ‘I want nothing from you. I do not want your help and I will not remain in this house another instant.’ He sprang to his feet but the king barred his way, towering over him, and the sudden movement of his head stirred up his long red hair like a vortex of flames.
‘That was not the reason, I told you!’ Menelaus’s voice blared out suddenly in the silence like a war horn. ‘She was not the reason the war was fought,’ he said again, his voice lower after the prince had blanched and dropped his head. ‘She was a combatant. . more fearsome than the cunning of Ulysses, than the ire of Achilles, than the might of Great Ajax!’
‘But you told me. .’ began Orestes.
‘Yes, I told you that I could not bear the thought that another man might take his pleasure with the living image of my bride. And that’s all. That’s all I was thinking of when I had her brought to a secret place where she was washed, nursed to health and cared for. Every day I had her served the same food and the same drink as the queen. In the same identical quantities, at the same times. When I saw her again, months later, I was dazzled: she was the perfect image of my bride. I even thought. .’
‘That she was her twin sister?’ asked the prince.
‘Yes, I thought so. Castor and Pollux, Helen’s brothers, were twins. If the gods had created a prodigy once, could they not do it again?’
‘Yes,’ said Orestes. ‘Why not twice?’
Menelaus approached him, put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed tightly: ‘You are tired, son. .’ he said, ‘and you are so young. . perhaps you would like to sleep. I sleep little and poorly, prey to nightmares.’
‘I do not wish to sleep,’ said the prince and he placed his hand over the king’s. ‘I have come to learn everything, before doing what must be done. You must not hide anything from me, if I am to be the one who leads the charge of the chariots over the plains of Mycenae, if I must raise my sword over the body. .’ He did not have the strength to say another word.
Menelaus poured more wine into the cups then, and continued. ‘The queen’
s nurse was still alive then and I met with her one winter’s night in the little house near the river where she lived alone and unwell, cared for by a handmaid whom Helen had ordered to stay with her as long as she lived and never leave her wanting for anything. The queen loved her nurse dearly, and often went to visit her, bringing her the sweets and fruits that she was so fond of. No one could have noticed me, for I was dressed as a farmer, and rode a mule loaded with bundles of sticks.
‘When I entered, the servant recognized me as soon as I bared my head; she kissed my hand, and Helen’s nurse recognized me then as well. She was ailing, and breathing with difficulty, but her eyes lit up when she saw me. I sat beside her bed and said: “Mother, I have bought a slave from some Ponikjo merchants. She was dirty and ragged, and her body was full of bruises, as happens with those slaves who won’t accept their condition and rebel against their masters or try to escape. I handed her over to people I trust, so she would be treated well and cared for. Now, mother, that slave is the perfect image of Helen. So perfect she looks like the same person.”
‘The old woman’s expression changed suddenly; her lips trembled and her hand gripped mine, squeezing it with surprising strength. She said: “Where was the Ponikjo ship coming from, son? Where had it been?” Her breath came in short gasps, whistling as it left her bosom.
‘I answered, “I do not know, mother. The Ponikjo journey among all peoples, and cross the sea wherever they please.”
‘The nurse fell back upon the bed but her breathing was becoming more strained, and came in painful gasps. Her eyes were lost in time, as if searching for long-buried images. She made an effort and clasped my arm again: “Where did the Ponikjo ship go then? Has it ever returned to our port?”
‘ “I don’t know where it went and we’ve never seen those merchants since. Tell me, I beg of you, what are you thinking? Why is your breath so short? What causes you such distress?”
Heroes Page 22
