7 Greeks
Page 13
Damn! He’s dragging him along like a sack.
He treats him as if he was a robber,
And him his buddy! Pyrrhiês! You lout!
You like bullying him tied up like that,
Don’t you, dragging him off to be tortured.
These two eyes will see you not five days off
Sporting Akhaian chains on your ankles.
Antidoros has fitted them on you
At the smithy before, and will again.
It’s not that long since you were wearing them.
BITINNA
(To Pyrrhiês.)
You! Bring him back, keep him tied, dump him here.
Go fetch Kosis and his tattoo needles,
And his ink.
(To Gastron.)
He will decorate your hide
All over and make the one job of it,
Without let or stint, hanging, trussed, and gagged,
Like any proud Davos of a butler.
KYDlLLA
(Interfering boldly.)
No, please, Missy, just this one time be kind.
Give a thought to Batyllis, her wedding,
Sweet grandbabies to dandle on your lap.
For this happy thought pardon him this once.
I beg you.
BITINNA
Quit pestering, Kydilla,
Before I boot you one out of the house.
(Draws herself to full height and quivers.)
Let this slave seven times over get off!
No, the world would be right to spit in my face.
No, by the Great Mother of us all, no.
He cannot help being a man. he says.
He knows that much, and he will know some more
When we, to remind him he is a man,
Tattoo KNOW THYSELF all over his face.
KYDILLA
(Counting on her fingers.)
The Gerenia is only four days off!
(Happy to have remembered a religious law.)
Today’s the twentieth. You can’t…
BITINNA
(Thwarted, and perhaps welcoming a way out.)
Yes, well.
(With a patient sigh.)
I’ll let you escape this once. You can thank
Kydilla for it. If she can get around me,
It is because I raised her in these arms.
I love her as I love my Batyllis,
Like a daughter.
(Grimly, savoring a new revenge.)
After the festival,
After we have drunk to the sleeping dead,
You can look forward to as much pleasure
As theirs, day after day, my fine fellow.
You have tasted your last of the honey.
(Snaps her fingers in haughty triumph.)
VI. A Private Talk Between Friends
(The actor impersonates two women seated on stools. He has but to switch from one stool to the other and change shawls of distinctive design to be alternately the two. Their shoes should be in fashion, and their conversation that of women of the world in the swim of things.)
KORITTO
(Welcoming her friend, who has come to visit.)
Do have a seat, Metro.
((Realizes that there is none. Wheels on her servant girl, shouting and making hysterical gestures with her arms.)
Get up! A stool
For this lady! Must I say what to do
Or you don’t lift a finger? Is that it?
Are you some kind of rock, or a servant?
The liveliness of a corpse! Except, of course,
When I measure out your ration of meal.
You count the grains. If I spill a little,
You grumble and pout until I wonder
The walls don’t sigh in sympathy, and fall.
(Ominous pause. Finds new angle of attack.)
Just now wiping the stool clean, aren’t you?
And why, pray, hasn’t it been kept dusted?
You can be very thankful there’s a guest,
Else wouldn’t you taste the flat of my hand!
METRO
(Sympathetically, complacently.)
We wear the same yoke, my dear Koritto.
I have to bark like a dog day and night
At these lazy and unspeakable oafs.
(Pulls her stool closer.)
What I’ve come about…
KORTTO
(Suddenly jumps up and runs toward servants, flapping her dress.)
Out from underfoot, all you shiftless sluts!
You sneaks and gossips! All ears and tongues
And nothing else to you but idle butts!
(Sits. Composes herself.)
METRO
(Tries again.)
You must tell me now,
Korino dear, who made you your dildo,
The beautifully stitched red leather one.
KORITTO
(Agape with surprise.)
But how now, when, where can you have seen it?
METRO
Erinna’s daughter had it given her
Day before yesterday, Nossis, you know.
What a beautiful present for a girl.
KORITTO
(Befuddled and alarmed.)
Nossis? Who gave it to her?
METRO
If I tell,
Will you tell on me?
KORITTO
(Touching eyelids with fingers.)
These sweet eyes, Metro!
Koritto’s mouth lets out naught.
METRO
Eubylé,
Bitas’ wife, gave it to her. Promised her,
What’s more, nobody would be the wiser.
KORITTO
Women! That woman will uproot me yet.
I let her have it because she begged me.
Metro, I hadn’t yet used it myself!
And she treats it like something she has found,
And makes an improper present of it.
Goodbye and goodbye to a friend like, her,
Is what I say. She can find other friends.
She has lent my property to Nossis!
Adresteia forgive me for speaking
Stronger than a woman should. But Nossis!
I wouldn’t give her my old worn-out one
Even if I still had a thousand more.
METRO
Now, now, Koritto. Keep your dander down.
Better to enjoy an even temper.
I shouldn’t have babbled. I talk too much.
It would be an improvement all around
Were I to lose my tongue. But, to get back,
Who did make it? Do tell me, as a friend.
(Taken aback a bit.)
Why are you looking at me so funny?
I’m Metro, not a stranger, after all.
What is this prudishness? Be a sport, now.
Who’s the craftsman that made it? What’s his name?
KORITTO
(Laughing.)
What a pitiful plea! Kerdon made it.
METRO
Which Kerdon? The grey-eyed one, the Kerdon
Who’s Kylaithis’ Myrtalinê’s neighbor?
He couldn’t make a plectrum for a harp.
Near Hermodoros’ apartment house
Off Main Street, there’s another, somebody
In his day but getting old, I would think.
He used to do it with Pylaithis when
She was living. Gone but not forgotten,
Poor dear, if her kin ever think of her.
KORITTO
Neither of those, Metro, as you’ve figured.
This one is Khian or Erythraian,
One or the other, baldheaded and little.
He is the spit image of Prexinos
But talks altogether different, though.
He does his work at home behind closed doors,
You never know where revenue spies lurk.
Real Khoan, his stitching and polishing.
You’d think Athena h
ad done it, not Kerdon.
Well, I—he brought me two of them, Metro—
thought my eyes would pop out with staring.
I can tell you this, we are all alone,
No man was ever hung like these beauties,
So long and stiff, and as smooth as a dream,
And the leather straps are as soft as wool.
What a godsend to women, this cobbler!
METRO
Why didn’t you buy the other one too?
KORITTO
What didn’t I do to get it, Metro!
I tried every persuasion, I kissed him,
Fondled his bald head, gave him a sweet drink,
Called him my pet, tickled his hairy ears,
Everything but open my legs to him.
METRO
But you should have, if that’s what he wanted.
KORITTO
Yes, but I really didn’t have the chance.
Bitas’ Euboulé was here grinding meal
On my millstone, as she does day and night,
Wearing it out, I’ll need a new one soon,
I swear, Bitas being too tightfisted
To spend four obols for one of his own.
METRO
How did he know to come here, Koritto?
Don’t fib.
KORITTO
Artemis sent him, Kandas’ wife,
She showed him my house.
METRO
Aiei! Artemis,
She’s always into things, more than Thallo,
Especially with anything sexy.
But if he wouldn’t sell you both of them,
Didn’t you ask who ordered the other?
KORITTO
Yes I did. He wasn’t about to tell.
Somebody he hopes to seduce, I’ll vow.
METRO
(Rising, arranging her shawl for the street.)
Well, I think I’d better be leaving you.
I just might happen upon Artemis
And find out when I can find Kerdon in.
(Blows a kiss.)
Wish me luck, Korino.
(Breaks into a salacious grin.)
A sweet longing
Buzzes around in a certain person.
(Lellves.)
KORITTO
(To a servant.)
Go close the front door, you fool of a girl,
And then go count the chickens in the yard,
And throw them some darnel while you’re there.
People steal anything nowadays, for sure,
Even your pet hen and her on your lap.
VII. The Shoemaker
(The actor wears a cobbler’s smock over which he can put an ample stole to be his customer Metro, as hard-to-get-along-with a shopper as ever drove a shoe clerk to distraction. The women who have come with Metro can be indicated by gestures toward them, nudges, winks, and smirks.)
METRO
(Expansively, with middle-class condescension toward an inferior.)
Kerdon, I bring you these women friends here
To look at some of your beautiful work.
KERDON
(Overdoing it, as with all his fawning.)
No wonder, Metro, I’m your admirer!
(To a servant.)
Put the settle outside for these ladies.
(Nothing happens.)
It’s you I mean, Drimylos. Are you deaf?
Asleep again!
(To another servant.)
Hit him on the nose, you!
Pistos! Kick the sleep out of that sad lout!
The behind! The neck! Twist both his arms off!
(To Drimylos.)
Up, you scoundrel! We can make it rougher.
(Seethes. More scandal.)
Dusting the bench, are you, at this late date?
Why, you white-assed punk, wasn’t it kept clean?
I’ll dust your seat, just you wait, with a plank.
(To the women.)
Be seated, Metro, do.
(To a servant.)
That cabinet,
Pistos, open it up. No, not that one,
The other one up there on the third shelf.
Bring us those beauties here. What luck, Metro!
What shoes you’re going to see.
(To Pistos.)
Careful,
You pig, with that showcase.
(To the women.)
This shoe, Metro,
Perfectly shaped from various leathers,
Is a dandy. See, ladies, these firm soles,
These neat straps, the rounding off of the toe.
Nothing shoddy anywhere, all first rate.
Take the color, now—may Pallas answer
Your heart’s prayer for the shoe of your dreams—
You won’t find such color at the dyer’s,
Nor yet such shine in an artist’s beeswax.
Cost three minas day before yesterday,
That pair did, from Kandas the wholesaler,
And a pair like them, I tell you the truth,
On my word, there is no point in tying,
I hope never to prosper in business
If he didn’t say he was giving me
These items as a personal favor,
So to speak, what with the price of leather
Going up everyday at the tanners.
A work of art’s what you’ll be buying,
Practically stealing it from my poor hands.
Night and day I wear out my bench working,
No time to eat, even, until sunset.
The din is worse than Mikion’s wild beasts.
Not to mention the thirteen slaves I need,
Lazy dogs, the lot of them, they are too.
Business falls off a bit, and all you hear
Out of them is Give me this, give me that.
Business is brisk, they roost around like hens
Keeping their between the legs good and warm.
(Realizing that his digression isn’t selling shoes.)
You can’t spend promises on anything,
As they say: cash on the barrel for these,
Or for as good a pair, we have lots more.
We’ll keep showing until you’re pleased.
Bring out all the cabinets here, Pistos.
What a pity if you don’t find a pair.
But you will. Look here. There is every style:
Sikonian and Ambrakidian,
Nossises, Khian, parrots and hemp soles,
Saffron mules and around the house slippers,
Ionian button tops and night walkers,
High ankles, crab claws, Argeian sandals,
Cockscombs, cadets, flat heels. Just tell me now.
Ladies, what’s your heart’s desire. Speak right out.
Women and dogs, as we all know, eat shoes.
METRO
How much are you asking for that first pair?
And don’t talk such a storm, you’ll drive us
Out of your shop with all this jabbering.
KERDON
(Unfazed, inured to nattering women.)
Price it yourself, dear madam, whatever
You think is just, or this pair, or this.
What’s fairer than that? How could I cheat you
If I let you set the value yourself?
If you know true work, make me an offer.
May a fox make its den in my grey hair,
My hair grey as ashes, if I don’t sell you
Fine shoes today and eat well tomorrow.
(Aside, to the audience, hamming his lines like a traditional villain, rubbing his greedy hands.)
Hermes the Fox and Peitho the Vixen!
I shall haul something in for supper
With this cast of the net, or know why not!
METRO
Why do you mutter and ramble on so
And not give the price with an honest tongue?
KERDON
Look high, look low, this pair is a
mina.
Ladies, if you were Pallas Athena
The price would be the same, not a cent less.
METRO
(Her patience gone, fire in her eye.)
I see now why your cabinets are full,
Kerdon. Works of art, indeed, that you keep
For yourself, clearly not for customers.
(Archly.)
The twentieth of Taureon, you know,
Is Hekatê’s daughter Artakenê’s
Wedding, for which new shoes will be needed.
They will all come here, I am sure they will,
So you’d better get a sack for a purse
For what they’ll spend, and you can dread thieves.
KERDON
(Unimpressed.)
For Hekatê as for Artakenê
The price is still a mina, be assured,
As it is for you, when you make your choice.
METRO
(With practiced sarcasm.)
Is it not your luck, Kerdon, to touch
Charming feet which love and desire have touched,
And you the scab off of a running sore?
(Looks around among her friends, pleased with herself, for having put this scum of a merchant in his place. Moves in on Kerdon for the kill.)
Now you can, you think, manipulate me,
But not my friend here. What will you charge her
For that pair? Think again before you speak.
KERDON
(Undaunted, brassy as ever.)
Five staters, by the gods, are offered me
Daily by Eveteris the psaltrist
For that pair, but I wouldn’t sell them to her
If she were to make the price four darics.
She flits around making fun of my wife
And she can go barefoot for all I care.
(Changing tactics while be has the upper hand.)
If you indeed want them, take these three pairs,
But for nothing less than seven darics.
I couldn’t dream of it. Seven darics.
(Leaps to fill the vacuum of their hesitation.)
How could I deny you, Metro, anything?
(Smiling foxily.)
You, Metro, whose voice lifts me to the gods,
A shoemaker, a very stone, you lift.
(Imagines he is quoting from poetical speeches be has heard at the theatre.)
For your tongue is not a tongue but a whisk
For delights. Like one of the gods is he,
Ah! who hears you talking day in day out!
(Squats, a shoe in his hand.)
Stick your tiny foot out now and let me
Slip this shoe on it.
(Throws up hands in wonderment.)
Fits to perfection!
What possible improvement could you want?
(Quotes again, finger beside nose.)
Beautiful things belong to the beautiful!
You would think that Athena made this shoe.
(Quickly, to another woman.)
You, if you please, your foot.