Odysseus: The Return

by Valerio Massimo Manfredi

  Their footsteps faded into the distance and my heart laughed in my chest. I savoured the taste of revenge.

  The flesh-eating monster wept and wept, all night long, but I thought of my comrades buried in his stinking bowels and I could not rest. I still wanted to hurt him any way I could, more than I already had. But I repressed the seething rage in my heart because my work wasn’t over. For a long time he slumbered, seeming nearly dead, but then he would wave his arms and legs around wildly hoping to snare us in case we’d moved close to get a better look. But I made sure that the men stayed as far away as possible and let no one approach him.

  Dawn finally showed her face and a ray of light poured through the ceiling to illuminate the cavern. The cyclops stumbled slowly to his feet, groaning, so that his bulk completely blocked out the light streaming in from above. His dark shadow covered us all. The sheep and goats had begun to bleat more and more loudly, because they were hungry and thirsty. They were used to going out to graze when the sun rose.

  Moved to compassion for his flock, the monstrous shepherd groped around until he found the boulder that sealed the entrance to the cave and he moved it. Light flooded into our prison, the tomb of all our hopes. It was I who had opened the cavern door, my mind that commanded the arms of the colossus.

  As the sheep began to move out, the cyclops lowered his hands to make sure that we were not trying to slip out among them. He patted each animal, recognizing it by its fleece.

  I had assembled my men and told them the plan I’d devised for their escape. We took the ropes made of palm fibres that were lying about the cave and with the help of Trasimachus I trussed the sheep together three at a time and then slung a man under the belly of each middle one. I bound Trasimachus as well, and then watched them all slip out from between the giant’s legs as he let his flock through.

  I was last to leave, hidden under the belly of the big ram, clutching his wool. I realized that this was the fulfilment of the prophecy my mother had made when I’d returned from my first hunting party with grandfather Autolykos; I felt sure I could follow my companions out. But this was instantly cast into doubt when the cyclops recognized the ram and began stroking him gently: ‘How is it that you are last to leave, dear old friend? You would always run out first to lead the sheep to pasture and today you are the last. Are you sad for your master, who can no longer see the light of the sun?’ His hands lingered on the deep fleece and more than once his immense fingers brushed my own. My heart trembled thinking of the fate that would befall me if he caught me. I would not even have the time to grasp my sword and slay myself; he would make sure that I suffered all the agony that a man can suffer at the hands of the most cruel of torturers. This time my anguish was even more acute than when, from a crack in the hollow belly of the horse built by Epeius, I spied the fiery torch held by Laocoon, priest of Troy.

  But he allowed the ram to pass and I finally let myself drop to the ground. I got up and hastened to join my companions who were waiting for me. We ran down the path that led back to our ship. When we reached the seashore we embraced one another in tears. For me they were like brothers or sons for whose lives I had long feared. The joy in my heart was great because I had not failed them; I had snatched them from an atrocious death. I’d returned them to the light of the sky, the scents of the earth, the colours of the sea. The last to embrace me was Trasimachus, the man who had eaten the red flowers.

  ‘You’ve given me back my life, wanax Odysseus. And now, my king, take us home!’ he said. I grasped him tightly and could not hold back my tears. One after another we all boarded the ship, myself last, and we cast off the moorings. My crew were bent hard over the oars, so anxious were they to leave that accursed land. At the prow, I was keeping a watchful eye on our course when I spotted the cyclops at the top of a cliff, leaning on a tree trunk the way a shepherd leans on a staff when guiding his sheep. My shipmates had seen him as well and were rowing with all their might to distance the ship as quickly as possible from the shore.

  But I could not hold back, at the sight of the monster who had held us in his thrall. I yelled: ‘Cyclops!’

  My voice echoed like thunder on the sea.

  He heard me and wheeled around to try to understand where my voice was coming from. My comrades implored me to keep silent, in vain.

  ‘Cyclops!’ I shouted again. ‘You disrespected the sacred laws that protect guests by devouring my comrades and you’ve paid the price for your savagery. If someone one day asks you who blinded you, tell him that it was Odysseus, son of Laertes, king of Ithaca, destroyer of cities. It is I who took the light from you!’

  My words infuriated him. With brute force, he ripped off the peak of the mountain he stood on and hurled it into the sea. The huge rock fell just in front of our prow, raising a huge wave that pushed us back towards land. The men were terrified that the threat we had just escaped would engulf us again. They set to their oars with renewed vigour, but Polyphemus flung out another and even heavier boulder which just missed the ship, landing in the wake of our stern. The billow it created pushed us out on the open sea and towards the island.

  I could hear the giant’s voice in the distance. He was imploring his implacable father, Poseidon, to avenge him, but his words could not touch me, not yet, so great was my joy at that moment for having freed my friends and delivered them from a horrible death, and so deep was my grief at seeing the still oars and empty benches on my ship. The taste of the vengeance I had just inflicted was strong and bitter. Not even the blue god who the giant claimed as his father could heal him.

  I let out the triple cry of the kings of Ithaca, shrill as the scream of an eagle.

  4

  THE ECHO OF POLYPHEMUS’ ranting rang in my ears for the whole stretch of sea that separated us from the low island and stuck in my heart like a freezing blade.

  When we went ashore on the island, we learned that our comrades had been struck by foreboding when we failed to return. Eurylochus had readied a strong combat unit with archers and heavily armed warriors to set off for the mainland in search of us. But the great exultation that greeted us soon faded when it became clear that a number of the men who had set out with me were no longer with us. In so many years of war the bonds between the men had become very deep. They’d always protected one another on the battlefield and every fallen comrade represented a wound in their hearts that wouldn’t be healed. It was like they were all members of the same family.

  The men had not whiled away their time in our absence – they’d hunted, and captured a good number of wild goats. They were divided up, and we included the sheep we’d managed to carry off from the cyclops’ flock. In all, the crew of each ship were allotted ten animals, with eleven for me, out of respect.

  The cyclops’ curse still sounded in my heart. I dragged a fat sheep to the seashore, skinned it and burned the thighs and the best parts in sacrifice to Zeus, in the hopes that this might ward off the ill omen that chased me over the waters as I escaped from that cursed, lawless land peopled by creatures without respect for gods or men. I thought of Calchas, of what he’d said to me that day long ago under the wild fig tree of Troy. I wished he were present, so he could tell me whether the god was pleased with my offering, or disdained it. I could not tell on my own. I sacrificed the animal for nothing, I know that now, but then I still nourished hope.

  When I returned to our camp, the men had butchered other sheep and goats, opened jars of wine and lit fires to roast the meat. We ate and drank until sunset on the sand still warm from the rays of the sun. Everyone was quiet. Those who had encountered the cyclops wanted to forget and the comrades who had stayed on the island sensed that something awful had taken place but didn’t have the courage to ask. Little by little, as time passed, as I breathed in the scents of land and sea, watched the stars glittering in a clear sky, listened to the bleating of the kids tagging along after their mothers as they wandered the fields, I could almost forget what had happened. I even had a brief, fleeting sensati
on that nothing had happened, nothing at all. That I’d dreamed it all up. Perhaps I could even believe that; I’d understood by then that things were true if we believed them. My thoughts went back to my adolescence . . .

  ‘Atta, when I was at grandfather’s house, I saw the goddess Athena.’

  ‘Sleep, my son.’

  What would King Laertes my father have said to me at that moment had he been present? If I told him: ‘Atta, a giant with a single eye in the middle of his forehead, as tall as a pine tree on Mount Neritus, devoured six of my comrades’?

  ‘Sleep, my son.’

  Yes, sleep, heart of mine, sleep if you can.

  ‘What happened to the men who are missing?’

  The voice was Eurylochus’.

  ‘Ask the others. I’m tired. Too tired, understand? Tomorrow we’ll leave here – we have a long voyage ahead of us. We have to get home, and do you know why? Because even on this side of the wall of fog we crossed – When had that happened? – the sun rises in front of us and sets behind us. When we reach Ithaca and we enter the great port, when we have mourned our dead and embraced our loved ones, all of this will vanish. For always, like a nightmare at the rising of the sun.’

  Eurylochus said no more and walked away. I stretched out on the sand and covered myself with my cloak. Distant in the night, on the mainland, I heard a groaning like that of a dying animal. A long suffocated wail. A shrill wind whistled back from the sea.

  AT DAWN, we loaded the ships with everything that the land could offer us, especially reserves of fresh water. We drew up along the shore facing the mainland. We called out the names of our fallen companions ten times each, and then each crew of men boarded their own ship, went straight to the rowing benches and took up the oars.

  We sailed into the open sea and my ship once again led the others. A brisk, hot land breeze pushed us north and west. There was no way to fight it. We sailed for days and nights as the wind shifted eastward and gained in intensity. Elpenor was at the helm of my ship and Eurylochus was checking the tautness of the rigging and the direction of the sail. A great sadness gripped my heart because I knew that we were getting further and further away from our homeland and because I mourned for the comrades I had lost. If only I had left them in the land of the flower-eaters! They would still be basking in the rays of the sun. Instead they wandered in the gloom of Hades, lamenting their lives lost. I thought I had been acting for their best interests, but the gods and fate decided differently from what I intended.

  It was a little after midday when Eurylochus approached me: ‘Why won’t you tell me what happened to the men who didn’t return with you from the mainland?’

  I had been hoping that he would not ask again, that he would understand that the memory of what had happened was too bitter for me to recount. I had to answer him this time, and I told him the whole story. If he didn’t hear it from me, he would have heard it from the others.

  ‘You have nothing else to say to me?’ he asked again when I had finished.

  I knew what he meant. ‘If you already know, why are you asking me?’

  ‘Because I want to hear it from your lips and I want to know what awaits us.’

  The wind was getting stronger and bellying the sail, the mast was groaning under the stiff gusts. All of the beams were creaking. The men dipped their oars into the sea only when they thought it would lessen the strain of the helmsman.

  ‘The monster shouted out a curse. He invoked Poseidon, asking him to prevent my return.’

  Eurylochus looked down to hide a scowl. I didn’t have the heart to tell him the worst. But what I told him then had the ring of truth. ‘He cursed my name,’ I said, ‘but as you know, my friend, my name . . . my name is No One!’

  Eurylochus smiled and so did I. This meant that my comrades had not repeated quite everything. On the third evening of our voyage, the wind started to drop off and to shift slowly westward. The setting sun was, in fact, directly in front of me, and the foaming sea was dark as wine. The light that flooded the ship made it look as if it were made of copper.

  Eurylochus approached me again. ‘What is that?’ he asked.

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘Down there, look at that line of white foam. The waves, they seem to be dashing against something.’

  ‘An island?’

  ‘That’s what it looks like. Or a peninsula, perhaps. What shall we do?’

  ‘Go ashore,’ I said. ‘It’s always best to have as much fresh water on board as we can, and the men can eat fresh food, although we’re not running out of what we have. We’re strong. We can defend ourselves in the face of danger, and the mass of land doesn’t look that big. Give orders.’

  Eurylochus didn’t wait to be told twice. He ordered Elpenor to veer slightly north towards the line of foam, which could now be seen much more distinctly. The men put their backs into the oars to help the manoeuvre. The foam was turning pinker as we watched, and the wind getting weaker until it had died down almost completely. We struck the sails and rowed towards the shore in a semicircular formation.

  As we approached, an astonishing vision appeared before our eyes. The sea was covered with floating stones, so close to one another that they seemed to be an extension of the land. Behind them we could see tall walls made of bronze or copper and, beyond that, a column of smoke slowly rising towards the sky. A deep, loud rumble sounded like it was coming from the bowels of the earth. An island, floating on the sea.

  We looked at one another, wondering what to do. Recent memories made me wary of braving danger in an unknown land, but this place was clearly inhabited, and we could not avoid meeting the local chief or lord, whoever that might be.

  I ordered the ships to remain at the mouth of the port and had a boat take me to the shore. I spoke with Eurylochus before leaving: ‘You remain here with the rest of the fleet. I’ll just take a few men. Don’t approach land until you hear from me. If by dusk tomorrow you hear nothing, turn your prows to the sea and continue on your own to Ithaca. You will assume command.’

  We embraced because we didn’t know whether we’d ever see each other again, and I went ashore with the men I’d chosen. We walked towards the wall, which was reflecting the last rays of the sun. There were no other ships in the port, no houses along the path leading to the wall, no flocks at pasture. We were armed under our cloaks and I told my men to be ready for anything.

  We finally arrived at the city gates. The doors were carved with figures of fantastic, unfamiliar animals. At the centre was an eight-pointed star, with four long points and four shorter ones alternating. From inside came the sound of flutes and cymbals, as if a celebration were under way, with singing and dancing. The air was completely still. Not a puff of wind, not the slightest breeze. I found it very odd to be on an island without feeling the wind’s breath. I remembered my youth on Ithaca well: every afternoon, whether it was winter or summer, the wind would pick up and swiftly cross the channel between my island and Same, ruffling the forest leaves with a thin breeze that soon became blustery, and could turn very cold in the wintertime.

  I knocked with the pommel of my sword and waited. Just a few moments passed before the tall doors began to turn on their hinges and opened wide. We entered cautiously, hands firmly on the swords we held under our cloaks, and proceeded towards a deserted courtyard, following the sounds of merrymaking, which seemed to be coming from inside the palace. There were no guards, no warriors, nor were there any weapons hanging from the walls. They were decorated, instead, with ornamental objects: masks of unknown creatures and of men and women with unfamiliar features. Fanciful figures, symbols perhaps, cast in gold and silver surrounded them. The men walked behind me, murmuring low-voiced at the wondrous things on view. The light of the day was quickly fading but another light in front of us filtered from under a solid bronze door adorned with friezes of gold, silver and red copper, polished to a high sheen.

  That door also fell open before we could make a move, letting us i
n to a big hall with tables prepared for a feast. At the head, on a silver throne, sat a strong-limbed man, not yet old despite the thick head of smooth white hair that shone like silver framing his face. All around him, reclining on couches covered with linen and purple fabrics, were young men and women, drinking wine from magnificently crafted glittering cups.

  ‘Welcome, foreigners!’ he said to us. ‘Come forward. Here you will be treated well.’

  My heart leapt in my chest. What a difference from the atrocious welcome of the savage cyclops! Well, he’d got what he deserved, in the end, and although his curse dogged me I was not sorry that I had blinded him and condemned him to a lifetime of darkness.

  Servants immediately added places at the table close to the throne for all of us, and when we had satiated our hunger and thirst for good wine, our host asked us to speak up: ‘Who are you, my guests? Where do you come from? What has brought you here? Not many men have ventured this far.’

  I spoke, as I always did, and as always I did not tell the whole truth: ‘We are Achaians. We were returning from the war after having destroyed the walls of mighty Troy, but a strong gale dragged us far off course. For nine days and nine nights the storm tossed us on the sea. Then the wind let up and the waves carried us to your island. May the gods give you health and prosperity in exchange for your hospitality.’

  ‘Are those your ships that wait at the entrance to the port?’

  ‘They are. We did not want you to imagine that you had pirates at your gates.’

  ‘You did well. I have no weapons, as you can see, but I can count on much greater forces, and that’s why anyone who dares to come here with hostile intentions pays a high price. But send one of your men, now, to tell the others to join us. Here they will find water and food; they will have nothing to worry about. The news of the fall of Troy has reached our ears. Tell me about it, I pray you, for my curiosity is boundless, and my sons and daughters will be glad to hear your story as well.’