37

The Dead Man’s Stare

His face and outstretched hands appear to me whenever I close my eyes. He tries to speak to me, I know, yet I cannot catch his words. I will write instead, though I had to beat Cyklos’ slave before he would bring the lamp; I will write until I fall asleep on this stool, my back propped by the wall.

The queen and the boy they call a king came in her chariot. The driver was a slave, short but muscular; a most cunning man, I think, about horses. He wanted to know how much I had driven. When I told him I could not be sure, he winked at me and thumped my shoulder with his fist.

Queen Gorgo spoke with me. There cannot be two such women in the world! She asked whether I recalled our meeting in the temple of Orthia. When I explained that I sometimes forget, she told me gently, “But you must remember our meeting at my house, yesterday.”

“Of course,” I told her. “No man could ever forget a queen so lovely and so gracious.” It was a lie, and I blushed for it even as the words left my lips. As quickly as I could, I turned the talk to her horses, which are all grays, very beautiful and finely bred.

“I think they’re probably the best in Hellas,” she told me. “We’ve raced them against my nephew’s before, and they’ve always won easily; but now he says that his can’t lose as long as you drive for him. Are you going to cast a spell on my horses? Or on your own?”

I told her I knew nothing of such things.

She nodded slowly, and her eyes were sad. “You remind me of Leonidas; you’re a plain fighting man. You’ve something of his energy, too, I suspect. It’s a good thing for Rope that there are such men as you, but not for your wives and mothers.”

While I spoke with Gorgo, Polos had been scrutinizing her team. He told me how eager they were to run, and how confident of victory. Of the one I was to drive he said, “They know they aren’t going to win. They only want to finish the race and go back to the pasture.”

I asked, “How can they know they won’t win? Did they tell you that?”

Polos shrugged, and appeared every bit as downcast as if he were one of the horses himself. “They only say that the man who drives always makes them gallop too fast, so that they’re winded before the race is over.”

I dropped to one knee, bringing our eyes to a level. “Tell them I won’t ask them to do their best until the last stretch of the last lap. Nor will I shout until then. When I shout, the race will be practically over. Then they must show their heels, and afterward they’ll be walked back to their pasture. Can you do that?”

“I think so. I hope they’ll understand and remember.”

We raced three times around the field, which was large, as I have said. The finish—and the start—was the great oak under which we had rested. Gorgo stood there to judge the race; she held up fingers to give us the count of laps, although that was not really needed. When her driver saw that I did not force my horses to their utmost, he took a comfortable lead and held it. I permitted him to do it, even though Prince Pausanias shouted for me to drive faster at the end of the first lap, and also at the second.

Perhaps I should not write it, but it was a great joy then to drive as I did—very fast and yet without any straining for more speed—through the clear, warm morning. No dust rose from the soft grass, and the tall trees and low walls of piled stones seemed to spin past us in a sparkling dance.

I do not know whether Polos can actually speak with horses; such things seem impossible to me. But as we swung through the third turn at the far end, I felt all four steady themselves for the final dash. We gained a bit on Gorgo’s chariot then.

Half the lap passed … two-thirds. “Now!” I roared it with every shred of wind my lungs would hold and cracked my whip like lightning over the heads of the team. They bounded forward like four stags.

When we had brought both our teams to a halt, Queen Gorgo’s driver spat all the ugly words he could lay tongue to into my face—some of them words I have never learned. Until Pasicrates stepped between us, he pretended that he was about to strike me with his whip. Prince Pausanias paid less heed to him even than I, grinning at Gorgo, who much to my surprise smiled at him in return. As for pretty Io and little Polos, they fairly capered with delight; and even Themistocles and Simonides were wreathed in smiles.

Then Gorgo’s driver threw himself at her feet, talking very fast and pointing to her team. I could not understand all that was said, but I knew that he was begging her to propose a second race. It is never good, as I explained to Io, to make a horse run twice in the same day, though it must often be done in war. Indeed, it is best to give a horse several days in which to rest after a hard run.

But the prince readily agreed to hold a second race before the first meal. Their drivers walked both teams until they no longer sweated, examined their feet, and at last permitted them to drink a little. I asked Polos whether our horses understood that they would have to run again. When he nodded, I asked him to explain to them, if he could, that it was not my doing, that when I had promised them they would be returned to pasture after the race, I thought it true.

Polos positively glowed with pleasure, saying, “They don’t mind. They want to race again.”

I would not have held them back if I could, but I did not urge them forward. Of their own will they thundered around the meadow, keeping pace with Queen Gorgo’s until the final turn. Then, as her chariot drew well ahead of mine, it threw a wheel. Her driver fell, and was dragged half the length of the course by the grays. For a moment it seemed we would trample him, but my team answered, swinging right. He was stunned, however, and when I saw Pasicrates cut the reins from his wrist, I thought him dead; but before we left, he stood and walked.

We ate the first meal here. The food was not good, but Io says the food at the barracks is worse. We eat there at times, she says. She wants me to ask the queen to let us dine with her, though I have told her Cyklos would surely be offended, and rightly. Io asked Aglaus where the black man was, but he could only tell us that he had gone out alone shortly after we went to speak with the prince.

As I left with Hippoxleas to go to the practice, I happened to pass the room where the black man sleeps with his wife; and I overheard him addressing her, his voice that in which an officer gives his orders in battle. We had not gone far when both came running after us. Gasping, the black man’s wife asked whether I could wear my sword when I was made a resident of Rope; and when Hippoxleas declared that all weapons were absolutely forbidden, she drew me aside almost rudely, while the black man prevented Hippoxleas from going with us.

“There’ll be trouble tonight,” the black man’s wife told me breathlessly. “He wants me to wedge the table against the door, and not open until I hear his voice. He’s going to the ceremony—he’ll bring your sword with his, wrapped in his cloak. He’ll throw it to you if you need it.”

I told her to take Io and Polos into the room with her, but she said, “Aglaus can protect them better than I could, and he’d kill me if he found Aglaus with me.”

I will say nothing of the practice; it was easy enough, and I cannot recall anything that need be noted here except, perhaps, that Queen Gorgo directed it.

After the second meal we assembled, as before, to await the rising of the moon. We stood in silence, as we had been taught at the practice; and on the rare occasions when anyone dared to speak, he was hushed at once by several young Rope Makers. The slave standing next to me in the darkness (a wiry little rogue from what I could see of him) nudged me once or twice as though to assure himself, as well as me, that this was no dream. I had overheard these slaves talking among themselves at the practice and knew they were those who had fought best in the war, chosen by their fellows.

The full moon rose at last, hailed by the deep tones of the Men’s Chorus. There can never have been another so beautiful as that silver shield upon the arm of the goddess!

Hardly had the men’s voices fallen silent than we heard the bellowing of the bulls. Trotting they came, one black and one pied, each with two strong men to hold the shining chain through its nostrils. Priestesses cast fresh logs on the fire, and when its flames shot twice the height of a tall man, King Leotychides dispatched both bulls, which knelt in reverence to the goddess as they died. Together, Queen Gorgo and Tisamenus (the prince’s mantis) examined them, she announcing each finding in her strong, clear voice.

Afterward each of the judges spoke, praising Themistocles. It was while he was replying, loudly cheered by all of us, that I happened to bump slightly against the young Rope Maker who was to sponsor the wiry slave. It was far from violent, and indeed I doubt that he gave any heed to it; but my arm told me that he had a dagger beneath his cloak. I thought then that he had been warned as I had, and had felt it wise to bring a weapon, though he risked the displeasure of the gods.

Themistocles was crowned by Leotychides and Pleistarchos, and our voices echoed to the heavens. Surely there is no point in listing here all the gifts he received, for there were very many; but I will say that the prince gave him the finest of all, a chariot of silver, set with precious stones and drawn by the horses I drove twice to victory. That was the final gift, and I saw how widely his eyes opened when he received it. There is a certain look that a man wears when he finds he has risen to a height he never dreamed of, and Themistocles of Thought wore it then.

As for me, my face must have made my amazement plain, for Hippoxleas whispered, “Is anything wrong?”

I shook my head, and did not tell him that I recalled that chariot, having seen it elsewhere.

Aglaus touched my arm, and when I turned to stare at him, pointed out the black man among the spectators, with Polos and Io before him. The moon was higher now, and the sacred fire lit the whole scene; I could see the cloth-wrapped bundle the black man held, which he had been too prudent to bring close to the young Rope Makers.

We bathed in the cool waters of the Eurotas, as we had also at the practice, but this time we did not resume our old clothing; our guides consecrated us with a perfumed unguent and clothed us anew in white.

When this was done—and it did not take long—we formed our double column. There was considerable confusion, though we had practiced it again and again. I wanted to bawl orders as though upon the drill field, and I saw the same wish on the faces of Hippoxleas and a dozen others; still we kept silent, and it may be that the column shaped itself more smoothly because of it.

No doubt the march around the city should have tired us. I cannot speak for the rest, but I was not conscious of the least fatigue. The clear voices of the women, the graceful and ever-changing figures of the dancers, and the solemn scenes at temple after temple buoyed all our spirits, I think. In the flickering torchlight the carven faces of the gods smiled upon us. Lustily our voices answered those of the women as we praised each god in turn.

Sooner than I would have believed possible, our procession was over. Another temple, I thought, and it did not surprise me to find that it was upon the banks of the Eurotas, for the last two we had visited had stood there also. But it was the temple of Orthia, to which we had returned; and there I presented to an ancient image of the goddess the silver figurine Hippoxleas had carried for me, and cast away my guttering torch. Those who had not already made offerings now presented similar figures, though theirs were of lead. Mine depicted the goddess winged; wearing a tall headdress, she stood before her sacred tree. Those of the slaves that I saw were of beasts of the chase or small soldiers bearing bows or slings.

Prince Pausanius himself placed the crown of blossoms on my head, just as I had been promised he would. He seemed even more cordial than he had been in the morning, embracing me and twice instructing Hippoxleas to see that nothing evil befell me during the feast to come; each time Hippoxleas assured him that nothing would. It seemed strange to me that a man such as I, larger and (I believe) stronger than is common, should be cosseted like an infant. I could not but observe how brilliant the eyes of Queen Gorgo appeared; but such was my fatuity, and such the excitement of the moment, that it was not until the wreath was upon my head that I realized they were bright with tears.

When the feast began, Io, the black man, Polos, and Aglaus joined us. There was meat and wine in plenty, fruits and honey, honeyed breads and cakes—everything that anyone could wish for. We ate and drank our fill, and the black man collected figs and grapes, and a skin of good wine to take back to Bittusilma. By that time the scarlet moon rode low in the west. Half or more of the feasters had gone to their homes already, or so it seemed to me. I had forgotten the black man’s warning, and so perhaps had he, though the bundle that held our swords lay at his feet. Not far off a hundred hounds or more coursed deer; their baying haunted the night whenever the noises of our feasting slackened.

There came a scream of anguish and despair—I hope I never hear such a sound again—and with it a running man, his chaplet of blossoms half-fallen from his head. He had one of the knives the priestesses had used, and though I could not be sure in the darkness, it appeared to me that he was drenched with blood. At once Hippoxleas rose as though to stop him, received the curved blade in his belly, and snatched away my crown of flowers. All this took place so quickly that I was still staring openmouthed when Hippoxleas lay dead at my feet.

A dozen daggers struck down the man who had killed him; the crowd surged about us, and I lost sight of the black man and the rest.

For what seemed to me whole days, I searched everywhere for them. I never found them, and when I felt that a new day should already have filled the sky, exhausted and more than half drunk, I decided to return to this house. I stumbled a score of times, but fell just once, when I tripped upon the legs of the expiring slave.

He, too, had worn a crown of blossoms; it lay in the dust not an arm’s length from where he had fallen. Though his mouth ran with his blood, he struggled to make his speech clear to me, to forgive me, warn me, or tell me I know not what—or perhaps merely to beg my help; all the gods know how gladly I gave it. It was then that I recognized him, for in trying to stanch his blood, I had drawn him out of the shadows and into the moonlight. He was the slave who had driven Queen Gorgo’s gray horses, and though I did him no harm, he will not let me sleep.

Since returning, I have learned that the one-armed man and some other Rope Makers had forced the black man, the children, and Aglaus to leave the feast, threatening the black man with the laws of Rope when he would not.

I am in a place besieged.