Heroes (formerly Talisman of Troy) (29 page)

‘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 astonished 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?”

‘She did not answer. She would not answer, no matter how much I implored her. Perhaps she thought an uncertain truth would do me more harm than not knowing. She closed her eyes and seemed to be sleeping, and I did not want to tire her further with my insistent questions. She never awoke again, and several days later, we placed her on a litter and buried her with rites worthy of a family member.’

‘So you still don’t know who that woman is,’ said the prince. There was an ambiguous expression in his eyes, as though he understood what had passed through King Menelaus’s mind as he buried the queen’s nurse with honours that long ago winter’s day.

‘Who was truly responsible for the war?’ he asked then.

‘We were,’ said the king with a firm voice. He sat opposite his nephew and held his head in his hands. ‘The Atreides were the repositories of a terrible secret that dated back to the time when Euristheus reigned in Mycenae. We knew that the day would come when we would be invaded by the descendants of Hercules who had been driven away many years before by King Euristheus, and we knew that these invaders would destroy the land of the Achaeans. We were responsible for averting this impending threat, for preventing the destruction of our cities, the devastation of our fields, the massacre and enslavement of children and women.’

The prince shook his head: ‘And to ensure that this would not happen, you unleashed a war that lasted years, instead of saving your strength, instead of readying the armies and the fleets? I don’t understand . . . I just can’t understand.’

The king drew a long breath, as the outer courtyard rang with the footsteps of the guards who had arrived to relieve their comrades on the first shift. Then he said: ‘What we needed, to ensure that this would not happen, was the talisman of the Trojans. The talisman would make us invincible; only with the talisman in our possession would we be able to gather the strength necessary to withstand the onslaught, but we needed to have it before our time was up. No army can challenge fate. The question was, how to win it from the hands of the Trojans? Well, one day your father told me that he was planning to go to Ithaca to consult Ulysses. The little king of the western islands was already famous then for his cunning, and both Agamemnon and I had good relations with him. His wife Penelope, as you know, is the cousin of your mother and your aunt Helen.

‘Ulysses was against the war, and he opposed our plan for a great expedition against Troy. He did not believe in the honesty of our intentions; he imagined it was a desire for power and conquest that animated us. That was the only way we could explain the answer he gave us. “If it is only that statue of stone that you want,” he said, “much less than a war is needed.” Nothing is more powerful in this world than a woman’s appeal over a man, he claimed. His plan was simple: invite one of the Trojan princes to Sparta and then convince Helen to seduce him and flee with him. Once inside the city she would be able to give us all the information we needed.’