‘Where is he, the ravisher?’
Sisyphus turned. He saw the golden man, crouching beyond the oak. Eyes like suns burned into his own: there was an extraordinary and horrible rage in them. Then they softened into a strange amusement and the golden man lifted a secret finger to his lips. ‘Be silent, Sisyphus.’
‘Where, Sisyphus?’
‘Give me a spring, great Asopus, to enrich my land. Give me an eternal spring and I’ll tell you—’
Even as greedy Sisyphus spoke, there came a gentle rushing sound from near at hand. Water was sobbing and dancing out of the ground. It winked and twinkled as the lively bubbles jostled round the dry grass . . .
‘There,’ said Sisyphus, pointing to the oak, ‘your daughter’s ravisher is there.’ He approached the concealment and, with shaking hands, drew aside the thick tall grass.
Huge and still, there lay before him nothing but a stone. It was round – shaped vaguely like a giant’s face which stared up to the autumn sky from whence it took a mocking gleam of gold. A stone . . .
The river god had gone and nothing remained of the wild vision but the tattered wood, the scorched grass and a lingering smell of weeds and honey. But the spring still bubbled and Sisyphus, enmeshed in the web of eternity, turned slowly back towards his mansion while the round stone seemed to watch after him with a quietly vengeful air.
When he had departed, the stone dissolved back into the golden god. It was Zeus. He rose into the sky with a glare that eclipsed the sun. The gods on high Olympus shrank away before his fury. Hera alone looked on – and her smile was as menacing as the great god’s frown.
She saw her vast husband gather in his murderous artillery to vent his rage upon the ancient river god who had pursued him; she heard him whisper down the cleft of Tartarus, bidding dread Hades himself to take the wretched man who’d spied on his lust. ‘Take him, brother – now!’
Then she left him, and in her black and scarlet gown leaned across the sky and whispered dangerously to the sun, the moon and the impatient mounting sea.
NINETEEN
THE BATTLE WITH DEATH
The sky above Corinth and as far away as Ithaca was red as blood; but to Sisyphus it was no more than the gentle blush of evening. He was caught beyond escape in the divine net. His great mansion, pillared against the sky, seemed shrunk and humble, and in his mind he raised towers as high as the sun. Labourers in his fields seemed to him like tiny insects, scurrying after his countless herds; and even the heavy beasts were like flies on a green table that had suddenly become too small for mighty Sisyphus.
Such was the state to which this powerful man had been brought that he dipped his head as he passed under his own high portico, for his thoughts brushed the sky. The vision in the wood had blasted him and cracked his mould, letting in everywhere too loud a laughter and too bright a light.
He never heard the unearthly thunder of gigantic horses’ hooves, nor the roar of a dreadful chariot as it split the paved ground and hurled the huge engraved stones aside as if they’d been no more than autumn leaves. The screams and shrieks of his servants as they fled from the tottering house, and even the whimpering of Merope, moved him no more than the squeaking of mice. What was mortal terror to a man who’d spied on a secret of the gods?
Dreamily he stared into implacable eyes and wondered, almost idly, who was this huge dark personage standing before him who’d scattered his household and put out the lights?
Sisyphus smiled cunningly. It was Autolycus’s doing – some crazy illusion of that oily thief. But the man who’d talked with a river god was not to be taken in by shadows.
Then the enormous shadow whispered, ‘Sisyphus, you are finished now. Sisyphus, you are dead.’ Dull fires gleamed in the pits of its eyes; but they were fires without heat. Grim Hades held out his iron hands and Sisyphus saw the fatal manacle. It was a brazen serpent of terrible beauty. Misshapen Hephaestus had made it as a wedding gift; its jaws were set agape, and once they were shut there was no undoing them till the imprisoned flesh withered and the bone flaked into dust.
A chill crept over Sisyphus’s heart and the heat of his vision waned. Was he then but an ordinary man face to face with the most hated god in the universe? Was this his end and was he, after all he’d done and all he’d seen, to vanish from the world as if he’d never been?
‘Give me your hands.’
Then great Sisyphus, watcher of the gods, fell to his knees and began to howl and shriek for mercy. He beat the stone floor and begged for another month, another week, another day. He wept that it was for Merope’s sake, for his children’s sake . . . He sobbed to see the sun once more – to hear the birds and smell the autumn flowers that grew unheeded outside his bedchamber and now seemed the richest of all his possessions.
‘Give me your hands.’
‘Another hour, great god! Please – please – please!’
The Titan by marriage began to crawl backwards as the terrible god advanced. He scuttled like a frightened pig, squealing and grunting as it sees the slaughterer’s knife in the hand that has always carried food.
‘Five minutes!’
‘Sisyphus, my lord!’ moaned Merope. ‘There’s no escaping. Let me remember you with dignity—’
The doomed man howled with rage and bit her leg for daring to live on after he was gone. Then, of a sudden, Merope’s words seemed to take effect. Sisyphus grew calm. He knelt and stared almost wistfully at the brazen serpent that now cast its thin shadow across his wrists. He smiled – and Merope wept afresh. His little eyes blinked up trustingly at the huge god.
‘Such a little thing,’ he murmured, as might a child.
‘It will fit you, Sisyphus.’
‘Would it fit Autolycus? Would it catch so slippery a pair of wrists as his? Let me see it, great god – let me touch it. How beautiful it is! Ah! it is cold . . .’
Sisyphus, childlike Sisyphus, prattled on eagerly – and all the while his small wet eyes blinked up at the relentless god. But grim Hades, like all his eternal race, was of divine essence, unmixed with pity or any of the tangled dreams of the tragic creatures of Prometheus. His dealings were with the hopeless dead; the living and their fragile ways were strangers to him. Their movements were so small and brittle; their hands moved like darting dragonflies, here, there, everywhere . . .
‘Farewell, Merope, my love,’ chattered Sisyphus. ‘Farewell my children, farewell my home, my world, and – and – farewell death!’
Sisyphus’s voice rose to a shriek as the brazen serpent snapped its jaws. It was not for nothing that Sisyphus’s hands had spent their life in and out of other men’s pockets. They had gained, apart from wealth, some deftness and speed. Thus the brazen serpent, in all its thin cold strength, encircled now the mighty wrists of grim Hades himself!
The gods looked down and shuddered at the frantic ambition of the man who’d spied on the secret lust of Zeus and laid his hands on eternity. Their estate was threatened; shadows gathered in the universe. Huge beings began to move and, in passing, extinguished the betraying stars. They looked to Zeus, whose lust and fury had brought on the disaster; but the lord of the sky had eyes only for his enemy, the river god. Then they looked to the terrible queen of Heaven who beckoned to the sun, the moon and the sea . . .
Now began the strange triumph of Sisyphus of Corinth who had imprisoned the god of the dead.
He roared, he shouted, he danced, he flew out into his fields and laughed as his herds lowed and lumbered away amazed. He sent huge proclamations shrieking on the wings of the wind so that all might know that Sisyphus had conquered the lord of the dead.
Men rose from death-beds – old men, young men, worn-down grandmothers creaked out and blinked – and tottered back into the fierce quarrels of life. Dying kings reached out for sceptres already handed over, and eager sons whipped fingers back from near inheritances as if they’d been burned. Murderers fled from victims unkilled; and those who’d shrewdly made their last peace, found themselves nudged
sharply back to war.
War! But it was war without end as maimed remnants laid about them with stout right arms, chopped from the shoulder and brandished in the left. And everywhere mankind heaved and struggled under the monstrous burden of an immortality for which they’d not been fashioned.
And all the while, in the midst of this convulsion in nature, the mansion of Sisyphus in Corinth rocked and shuddered as the vast god within struggled against the brazen serpent. But Hephaestus’s work was eternal – and Hades could only pit the divine strength of his left hand against the equal strength of his right.
All had fled the house and scarcely dared look back at its bulk – now of an unnatural blackness and quaking like some gigantic beast against the sky. Sisyphus alone remained and jeered with ferocious glee at his dreadful prisoner. ‘Behold mighty Sisyphus!’ he howled triumphantly. ‘Saviour of the world! Now we’ll inherit it! Now we’re on a level with the gods!’
Suddenly the mansion cracked. The pillars clenched and the great roof fell thunderously in. For a moment the huge shape of Hades was seen, black as night under the noonday sky. Men in the fields many miles away saw him and flung themselves to the ground. The air was full of fire and the clash of armour, and the serpent round the grim god’s wrists snapped.
Ares, murderous child of Hera, had struck it with his spear.
The god of war had come to free the god of the dead.
Then Ares laughed and sent his brazen shout echoing across the crawling battlefields; he had restored the chief prize of war, which was death.
Sisyphus staggered wildly this way and that. But not for long. Hades took him – seized him by his knotted neck.
He shrieked violently and fought. Then he saw Merope watching in pity and dread.
‘Do not bury me! Do not hide me in the earth! I will be back – I will be back!’
But his raging spirit vanished in the thick clouds of disaster and his cries were overwhelmed by the thunder of the gigantic horses’ hooves.
She mourned him, sinister villain though he’d been; he was her husband and Merope had her pride. Servants washed his battered face, and set his shouting lips at rest.
Autolycus came to pay his respects; stared down cautiously at the dead man’s closed eyes – and offered to help the widow with the disposal of unwanted effects.
Then, on the morning of the third day, before Merope’s appalled gaze, Sisyphus came back. His dead eyes opened into crafty slits and his dead mouth stretched into a cunning smile.
He sat up. His hair was white, his skin was of a leaden grey; but he had come back.
He held a bandaged finger to his lips, chuckled and coughed to expel the dust of death that had settled in his throat. Not even the immortal gods could keep Sisyphus down. He chuckled again – and his little eyes flickered merrily behind the corpse film that partly dulled them. Great Persephone had let him go. He had explained to her, honourably and openly, that he hadn’t been buried. He had been taken without warning, without time to make his peace . . . He would rot neglected under the sky and be hideous in the golden corn, like a black corrupted poppy . . . Again he coughed, for some scraps of dust were in his lungs. So Demeter’s child had given him three days . . .
‘Three days?’ whispered Merope. ‘What can we do in three short days?’
Sisyphus looked at his wife in astonishment. ‘Do you take me for a fool? Do you think I mean to keep my word? When have I ever done such a thing before? He-he! The gods will have to look sharp indeed if they want to catch Sisyphus! Why, Autolycus! What d’you want?’ Sisyphus looked up. A figure was standing beside him and watching him with a curious sideways smile. Sisyphus tugged at his winding sheet which was tight about his chest. ‘Had you come thieving, Autolycus? Then think again, my friend. Sisyphus is back. He-he! Sisyphus has cheated death for a second time!’
The figure moved. It lifted a golden staff that fluttered white ribbons. It stepped lightly and its feet came close to Sisyphus’s eyes. They wore curious golden sandals ornamented with wings . . .
‘Autolycus—?’
‘It is not Autolycus, my friend.’
‘Then—?’
‘I am Hermes. Come, Sisyphus. You may cheat the god of the dead; but you cannot cheat the god of illusion. I am stronger than Hades, my friend.’
Immortal Hermes took Sisyphus by the hand in a grip there was no undoing and Sisyphus groaned and wept his farewell to the world for the last time.
His servants buried him in a hole by the wood where he’d seen the vision. Then they filled it in and proud Merope looked for the great round stone that Sisyphus had spoken of, but it had vanished; so she smoothed the earth that none should ever find the great criminal’s grave and dishonour it
‘Our friend is dead at last,’ wrote Autolycus to his daughter in rocky Ithaca. ‘He went with a great commotion – but he went in the end. Now he is at peace—’
In cold, bleak Tartarus, beyond the dreary Fields of Asphodel, there rises a black hill whose steep sides are channelled with wear. From here comes a tiny screaming as a figure, seeming no larger than a beetle, heaves and pushes a great round stone that glints with a mockery of gold. He is trying to push it to the top of the hill, but each time it reaches almost to the summit, its terrible weight overwhelms him and it thunders silently back into the valley in clouds of choking dust; then the tiny figure screams his despair and goes back to begin again. Neither hope nor dreams can sustain him; his labour is doomed and eternal. Though he knows he must fail, he cannot stop. He pushes and pushes to a summit that is not there, and the great round stone gleams mockingly like a sun that is anchored in the night. Will the dawn come this time? Nearly . . . nearly . . . ‘A-ah! Let me die!’ shrieks the ghost as the stone overwhelms him, as it always must.
Such is the peace of Sisyphus – who betrayed a secret of almighty Zeus.
‘But enough of Sisyphus,’ went on Autolycus to his daughter in distant Ithaca. ‘Merope has vanished from Corinth, and you’d scarce recognize their fine mansion now. It is going to wrack and ruin . . .’
By the same tall ship he sent also several choice goblets and a chest of crystal bowls to be laid up for his grandson Odysseus – as an heirloom, so to speak, from his departed father . . .
But the vessel bearing the gifts and the news was delayed by storms. Furious winds raged across the sea and the waves stood up like ragged mountain ranges, boiling with snow.
Patiently Anticleia waited, and watched the strange configurations of cloud that swirled in the sky.
TWENTY
THE SECOND FALL
The eye of the tempest was over Corinth. It glared down with livid anger and turned the wide landscape to a silvered lead. Something was amiss in nature; the heavens were awry. Men prayed frantically to be forgiven their secret sins and mothers hurried their children to the tops of houses, remembering tales of the ancient flood.
Whips of lightning lashed and struck again and again at the winding river Asopus – as if to scourge the god in his bed. Flaming rocks and white-hot stones flew like pelting stars and hissed into the trembling water. Vainly the river fled before the unnatural onslaught, dragging at its very source to escape. It foamed, it roared, it leaped its banks; and wherever the straining reeds parted the stony eyes of the god stared up in helpless agony as raging Zeus took aim to burn them out.
Savage beyond measure, the great god was hurling his vengeance down on his last nymph’s father – the interrupter of his necessary lust. It was this pent-up energy that now flowered into a spring to kill all summers. Through night and day the fire-storm fell, till the waters boiled and snarled. The reflections were all of flight and weird terror. Groups of villagers fled – flaring from every limb, then vanishing in thick red smoke; ravines and forests shivered into flaming fragments that danced across the mirrored eye of the extraordinary storm.
Here and there, between wild clouds, wandered the frightened sun, all pale and lustreless as if it had been unharnessed and abandoned; and dwellers
by the sea saw terrible Poseidon rise in a shaking mountain of dark water to overwhelm the sky.
A shadow fell across the back of avenging Zeus as he crouched over the ramparts of high Olympus; but he was fixed in his fury and did not feel it. Ceaselessly his huge arms made crooked lightnings over Corinth as he pelted the writhing river god with his fire, and brushed aside the congregating clouds whenever they hid Asopus’s agony. The river was burning down all its length – it was bleeding with fire like some dreadful running wound in the earth’s flesh. Beside such gigantic rage the gods themselves were but as masterless mice; and blazing Zeus paid no heed to the drifting abandoned sun, the mountain in the sea nor the empty husk of the moon.
A second shadow crossed his golden back, and the glittering, all-killing thunderbolt that lay at his side moved subtly out of reach . . . Then a third shadow came, a queer, intricate netting with a hundred nodding ends. It began to lift and lift till, for a moment, all the sky seemed to be made of hanging squares. And then – it struck!
There was a roar of thunder and all the corridors of the universe rattled and shook. Some part of the sky’s fabric cracked, and an uncanny ashy dust drifted down to the world below, settling on treetops and spotting the surface of the sea. Then there was a silence; the storm ceased, the tempest’s eye was quenched and the sky was suddenly emptied. All living things looked up aghast. The great god had fallen; Zeus had been overthrown. At last it had happened – even as it had happened to Cronus, near the world’s beginning.
He lay by the Olympian ramparts, enmeshed in a divine net. A hundred knots secured it, so tied that none could be undone without its nine and ninety neighbours. He was bound by the thongs of eternity, whose ends were all beginnings to deeper, tighter tangles that bit into his limbs. He lifted up his mighty head and stared at his triumphant enemies.
Poseidon looked down on him, snarling with the greed that had ever consumed him. Apollo looked down on him – proud Apollo whose sun-chariot had inflamed ambition to rule where he rode. Artemis looked down on him – cold, angry Artemis whose virginal eyes had watched his rapes and ravishings even in her sacred groves. Demeter looked down on him – wild bereaved Demeter whose child he’d given to Hades. Even Athene was among them – wise Athene, born from his own head. Her fathomless eyes condemned him for the cruelty in nature that made all creation suffer for his lusts.
The God Beneath the Sea Page 14
