by Peter Green
‘Is the figure of the Goddess to portray any known person?’ he inquired maliciously; ‘your wife, for example?’
‘How intelligent of you,’ said Alcibiades. In the fading light Agatharchus could not be sure if the General had winked as he uttered the words.
Alcibiades turned to go. He said, over his shoulder: ‘You may leave the choice of a model to me.’
As Agatharchus made his way down from the Acropolis and turned into the Potters’ Quarter, he began to wonder how he was to explain the business to his many impatient clients. Then his mind drifted away from such tiresome matters to the experiments he had been making. Surely they could be turned to good account? Stage scenery, for example . . . He was still pondering over this as darkness fell.
• • • • •
Myrrhina was a pouting, professionally plump beauty of about twenty: her manner was a curious blend of convention and arch suggestiveness. Till Alcibiades had acquired her she had been a public courtesan. Her tastes in clothes, wine, and music were all excruciating. Alcibiades’ friends had spent a good deal of time speculating as to why, with the whole of Athens to pick from, he had chosen such a creature for a mistress. She was, indeed, the last of a long line; but she had survived for considerably longer than her predecessors.
The answer was very simple: she was sexually indefatigable. She hardly existed when she was not in bed; like a master cook, she spent most of her waking hours in a state of vague abstraction, thinking out new variations of pleasure to make herself ever more desirable. Alcibiades found this, and her lack of complication, refreshing. He had rented her a small house well away from the residential quarter, near the City wall by the Sacred Gate, where he paid her regular visits. This arrangement suited them both admirably. Now, however, he was suggesting something rather more startling.
‘I don’t mind posing for you,’ she said. She lounged on a daycouch, resplendent in a new robe striped in green and white, heavily scented, a box of sweets at her elbow. A pet monkey which Alcibiades had bought for her from a sailor in the docks hopped chattering in the corner, dragging at its chain. ‘Not even if it has to be naked,’ she added, in the voice which turned even the most innocent remark into an indecent innuendo. ‘But in your own house . . . I don’t like it at all. It’s not proper,’ she complained, somewhat incongruously. ‘And there’s your wife—’
‘I said I only wanted you to pose,’ said Alcibiades.
‘I know, darling. But you know very well what’ll happen, don’t you?’ She popped a sweet into her mouth. ‘And if your wife finds out, that’ll mean trouble. I don’t like trouble. Things are perfectly all right as they are. Why do you have to spoil it all?’
Why indeed, thought Alcibiades. The idea had seemed an admirable one when he had first conceived it. Now it was only his pride that made him persist with it; that, and an obscure urge to humiliate Hipparete, to destroy her unwavering resignation, to hurt her visibly, by whatever crude and violent means he could find. ‘I’ve made up my mind,’ he said briefly, his jaw set. ‘If you don’t like the idea . . .’
Myrrhina knew better than to argue with Alcibiades in this mood. ‘All right,’ she said, sighing. Her large breasts rose and fell. Then she stared at him dreamily, and murmured, with the naïve wonder of a child, ‘You’re a very cruel man sometimes, aren’t you?’
• • • • •
Agatharchus put down his brushes, yawned, stretched, and said: ‘That’s all I have time for today.’
The Goddess of Nemea extracted herself from Alcibiades’ arms. ‘About time too,’ she said. ‘I don’t know what might have happened if you’d gone on any longer . . .’ She stood there, plump and naked, displaying her opulent charms to Agatharchus’ appreciative gaze before slipping back into her clothes.
‘The same time tomorrow?’ asked Agatharchus. Alcibiades nodded. The painter picked up his gear and departed, not altogether unwillingly. The girl was a beauty, there could be no doubt of that. But there was something that repelled him in Alcibiades thus openly flaunting her in his own house. All the same . . . The possibilities of the situation struck him, and he laughed to himself.
As soon as he had gone, Alcibiades and Myrrhina, without exchanging a word, went over to the couch in the corner of the room. It was here, half an hour later, that Hipparete found them.
She showed no sign of anger; she did not even raise her voice. She waited while Myrrhina dressed again and left the house, tear-stained and trembling. Only then did she speak her mind to her husband; and on this occasion Alcibiades had no words with which to answer her.
• • • • •
Myrrhina was a philosophical girl. When the first shock of the ugly scene wore off, she dabbed at her eyes and began to think about ways and means. She had never assumed that her liaison with Alcibiades would be permanent; all she had to consider now was how best to look after her own future. Things might have been worse. On the credit side she had a new wardrobe, a house—though presumably that wouldn’t last for much longer—some music lessons, and the cachet of having been the mistress of the most notorious man in Athens. She had no intention of going back to the life from which Alcibiades had rescued her.
She ran over the possibilities in her mind. The answer, when it came, was surprisingly simple. She changed her dress, spent a good deal of time in repairing the ravages to her face, used up the last of her new scent, and set off in search of Agatharchus.
• • • • •
‘I’m not in the least interested in your private life,’ said Axiochus; ‘but you’ve been incredibly stupid. You may think your reputation is unimportant. That’s one of the mistakes you’ve made all along. Your position isn’t so certain that you can afford to fly in the face of convention with an open scandal. Especially one of this kind. Supposing she succeeds in divorcing you?’
‘She won’t,’ said Alcibiades. He had regained some of his composure; but his face was still flushed and angry. Shame, injured vanity, and vexation were all blended in his expression. Axiochus went on: ‘Don’t forget that we need money at the moment, and we need it badly. I know something about the state of your finances. The fine show you put on to satisfy the public for your various excesses is almost entirely drawn from your wife’s property. Again, I make no personal comment. But if she obtains her divorce, you’ll lose the lot. If that happens, I don’t envy you your position. Or that of any of us. Why can’t you learn to control yourself? Any period of inaction seems to drive you to a kind of lunacy. I can understand it in a way. But to antagonise the one person whose support you need most . . .’ He shook his head. ‘I don’t suppose I shall ever understand you,’ he said.
‘Have you any suggestions to make?’
‘I’ve been consulting a friend of mine who’s a lawyer. Your wife will have to lodge her petition in public, before a magistrate. The point of this is to give the husband the opportunity of reclaiming her in person—by force, if necessary. An old law, but it’s still in force. Frankly, I’m sorry for her. But it’s your one chance.’
He paused, and then added: ‘I don’t know what the general feeling about this business is likely to be. I’ve communicated with all our friends. They’re willing to come with you and support you. I strongly advise you to take advantage of their offer.’
‘A curious use to put a political club to,’ said Alcibiades. ‘Very well. I’ll do as you wish.’
‘I don’t think you have any choice in the matter,’ said his uncle grimly. ‘By the way, where is she now? Not in the house still, I presume?’
‘No,’ said Alcibiades. ‘She’s gone to her brother.’
Axiochus looked at his nephew with astonishment that almost bordered on respect. It occurred to him that it must have taken a great deal to drive Hipparete to take refuge with such a creature as he knew Callias to be.
‘When you have the leisure,’ he observed, ‘you must tell me the whole story. I confess it intrigues me considerably.’
• • • • •
Old Megaera paused in the middle of weighing up her fish to tell her the news.
‘You missed a rare sight,’ she said, wiping the glittering scales from her fingers on to her apron.
The baker’s wife grunted as she unpacked the hot loaves. Megaera went on: ‘Ever seen a General’s wife asking for a public divorce?’
‘Alcibiades, I suppose,’ said the baker’s wife. ‘Nothing odd about that. It was only a question of time.’
‘There was a huge crowd there to watch. You know the girl—small white-faced thing. Always looks frightened.’
‘Well she might with a husband like that. Yes, I know her. She’s got spirit, though.’
‘She was frightened all right this morning. Trembling so much she could hardly answer the magistrate, poor thing. And then, when we thought it was all over, the magistrate called out—you know the way they do it—“If anyone knows of a lawful reason why this woman should not be separated from her husband,” and all the rest of it, with their names, and their fathers’ names, and the Gods alone know what else, why then up speaks the General himself, as bold as you like. “Yes, I do. I know the law,” he says, and with that he picks her, up in his arms as if she’d been a baby, and marches away with her through the crowd. He had all his friends behind him, wearing swords too. But no one took any notice of them. It’d have been the same if he’d done it alone. There wasn’t a man of them dared look him in the face, let alone lift a finger to him.’
‘Did she struggle at all? asked the baker’s wife, interested in spite of herself.
‘At first. But it wasn’t any use. He’s strong all right, I’ll give him that. Then she just went limp. I thought she’d fainted. But her eyes were still open.’
The baker’s wife shook her head and returned to her stall.
• • • • •
Alcibiades strode in at the door of his house, ignoring the startled comments of the bystanders in the street, and threw his wife down on a couch as if she had been a sack of logs. Despite Hipparete’s light weight, he was sweating from his exertions. Now he strode to and fro, his hands clenched, looking at her. She lay where she had fallen, her face white, her hair spread out in wild confusion on the scarlet cushions. Yet her great dark eyes were fixed on her husband’s furious face, and she made no attempt to escape.
This immobility merely exasperated him more. Suddenly he yelled for his steward, in a strangled, barely recognisable voice. When the steward appeared at the door, hesitating to come in, his face shocked and nervous, Alcibiades merely said: ‘Get me a whip.’ The steward stood motionless, not knowing what to do. Alcibiades took a single step towards him. The steward took one look at his suffused eyes and twitching mouth, and fled. When he came back with a riding-lash in his hand, neither his master nor his mistress had moved. Alcibiades snatched it from him, and thrust him out at the door so violently that he fell in a heap in the passage. Then Alcibiades shut the door, and locked it. Now, for the first time, he spoke.
‘You are my wife,’ he said between his teeth. ‘You have put me to public shame by what you have done.’ He advanced towards her, his whole body shaking.
‘You are my husband,’ said Hipparete. Her voice was low but steady. ‘Is the shame I have undergone any the less? You should be coming to me for forgiveness, not in anger.’
‘I am the master in this house,’ said Alcibiades. ‘Am I to be answerable to my own wife? You are my goods, my possessions. You are as absolutely mine as the roof that covers you.’ With one violent movement he stripped the robe from her shoulders, leaving her half-naked.
She did not move as the lash curled round her ribs, leaving a clean red weal across the white flesh. She only knew that whatever happened she must not cry out. She felt the bruises on her wrists where he had held her, and the sharp blinding pain that was beyond any pain she had known. Through a mist of uncontrollable tears she saw his face as he struck once more. And in the midst of her agony she realised, with the force of a revelation, that he wanted her as he had never wanted her before. She gave a great gasp of mingled pain, and shame, and desire.
What happened next she was not sure. He must have thrown away the whip; for an instant he stood close to her, so close that she felt the heaving of his breast, and smelt the fierce maleness of him that she had once dreaded. He stared into her eyes as if she were a stranger. In a soft caressing voice she had never heard him use before he said: ‘I never thought to see a woman who would not flinch before me.’ And then, as if the words were forced out of him by a power greater than himself: ‘Forgive me. I have done you great wrong.’ Hardly knowing what she did, she clasped him to her violently, forgetting her pain, and all the agony of mind she had suffered. His hard scarred body relaxed, softened. For the first time since their marriage she knew herself truly his wife.
It seemed hours later that he looked at her with wonder in his eyes and said: ‘I never knew I had married such a woman.’
With infinite compassion she gave him back look for look, gentle now to his utter defencelessness, and murmured: ‘You never thought of me as a woman at all.’
He remained silent, his head bowed. Hipparete said: ‘How could you? You had never known a woman who was not—’ she faltered for an instant, then went on—‘who was not like her. I had seen nothing, experienced nothing. How could I be a wife to you? I expected tenderness, and found a passion I could not comprehend, that brought fear instead of love.’ She broke off here, and gathered her strength. There was one more thing that had to be said. ‘I could fight many things. But not a ghost.’
In a voice that was hardly above a whisper he said: ‘You knew?’
‘I was never sure. I know now. And knowing, I can try to understand.’
The minutes flowed past in silence. Hipparete said at last: ‘It was my duty to try and understand you. We have both been foolish . . .’ She gave a tiny laugh. ‘I know that you will have many women yet. That is . . . unimportant. If I truly possess you, if I have your trust. If I know in my heart that you look on me as your wife . . .’
‘I swear this,’ said Alcibiades: ‘I shall not dishonour your house again.’ It seemed as if he would say more; but he changed his mind. It was only now that Hipparete became once more aware of her bruised and aching body. Slowly they rose to their feet and looked at one another. Then, uncertainly at first, Hipparete began to smile.
Chapter 23
In Athens that winter two men watched every move made in the Peloponnese with growing concern. Nicias, still hoping to be re-elected, still patiently building up his supporters against what he referred to as Alcibiades’ warmongering, was praying desperately that an open rupture with Sparta might be avoided till he had a chance to return to power. The longer the situation remained doubtful the better his chances were. Alcibiades had been swept into office on the crest of a brilliant political coup; but the people were impatient for results, and so far the young General seemed to have been resting on his laurels. Paradoxically, the harder he worked to persuade the Assembly to put their fleet and army at the disposal of Argos and her allies, and appoint himself to the supreme command to crush Sparta once and for all, the more they hesitated. Nicias had spread dissension only too cleverly.
It was during this winter that the natural division between young and old, adventurous and conservative, became irrevocably established; and if the blame lay anywhere, it was at Nicias’ door. When the spring elections came round, something happened that neither he nor Alcibiades could have foreseen, which symbolised very prettily the state of chronic indecision to which the Athenian people had been brought. They were both elected to the Generalship.
• • • • •
Alcibiade
s’ private reputation, like a well-poised counterbalance, had improved as his public one worsened: he drank less spent less on his horses, was mixed up in fewer scandalous parties. Almost one would have said that he was becoming domesticated. The young men who formed the core of his political supporters became openly alarmed, and nothing but the knowledge of his implacable feud with Nicias preserved their loyalty. Hipparete knew only too well how tenuous her control of him was; how little she ever could, or would ever wish to, divert him from his main purpose. She had peace and contentment in her own house; and with that she was well satisfied.
All through that year Nicias and Alcibiades tugged this way and that at the Assembly like two dogs at one bone. Determined to take some kind of action, Alcibiades begged a few troops and archers and spent most of June attempting to provide Athens with much-needed ports on the Corinthian Gulf. He had some success at Patrae, but returned to Athens after taking a beating at the Isthmus.
This passed off without comment; but his next move caused rather more alarm among the peace party. Action of some sort he was determined to have; if Athens would not mobilise on his advice, she might if confronted with an international situation. His Argive friends were only too willing to co-operate with him; and late in the summer they picked a transparently contrived quarrel with Epidaurus. The move was not entirely pointless from a practical point of view; if they secured Epidaurus, it would provide a convenient foothold in the Peloponnese for the Athenian fleet.
There were marchings and counter-marchings. Sparta put her whole army into the field and moved to the frontier, but did not cross it. Alcibiades, hoping to detach Corinth from her Spartan allegiance, called a conference of all non-Spartan Peloponnesian States at Mantinea. The Corinthians and some envoys sent by Nicias between them ruined his hopes: the Corinthians pointed out with acidity that to call a peace conference when Argos and Epidaurus were still actually fighting was absurd, and the proceedings broke up in disorder. The Argives, by now in a highly confused state of mind, recalled their army; whereupon Agis, who had held his Spartans in readiness for just such an event, crossed the Argive border. Alcibiades, hoping that the chance he had been waiting for had at last come, took a thousand heavy-armed troops—all he, could extract from a suspicious Assembly—and sailed across the Saronic Gulf to confront them. But autumn was coming on; and the Spartans promptly disbanded their forces and went home.