The Corn King and the Spring Queen

by Naomi Mitchison

  ‘Yes,’ said Erif. Oh, anything not to have to talk just now!

  ‘I never minded if the others did or didn’t,’ he said. ‘I expect they did. I always got what I wanted and no one was any the worse. It helped the Corn. In five months it will be Plowing Eve again. I wish I knew what happened at Harvest; I cannot remember it better than a dream, and yet I was not even drunk. At Plowing Eve my head will stay clear, though. Will you help me, Erif?’

  She answered ‘No,’ but with her face on the floor, so muffled that he did not hear or heed.

  ‘Ever since I was a man, I have known that I was truly Corn King,’ he said. ‘It is a queer thing to have power. But you have power too. So has Berris, but differently. The Greeks used to have power, but it is lost now. Yellow Bull thinks he has power. So does the Council. I am seeing without a cloud now; Erif, why is that?’

  But before she could make up an answer, something had happened to drive it out of both their heads. The Captain of the Chief’s Guard came running in. ‘Chief!’ he shouted, ‘there’s a big ship blowing in north of the harbour—her mast’s gone and she’s nearly on to the shingle!’ They both jumped and ran, Tarrik giving orders as he went. At the door he turned and shouted to her: ‘Erif, stay here!’ But that was the last thing Erif Der was going to do.

  The night was quite different now. A yellowish full moon had risen out of the sea and torn through the clouds to the north-east; even when their jagged edges streamed across it, the puzzling, diffused light went on. Over the hissing and grinding of the waves came other noises; men’s voices at top pitch, and sometimes on the back of the gale heart-tearing sounds of timber breaking up, the screech and crash of the strained wood, and sharp improbable sounds there was no time to guess at; and crackling of the bonfires they had lighted high up the beach, and neighing of the sea and fire-maddened horses, and women crying to one another behind; and again and always, the sea. There was no chance of launching a boat, but the men were wading out with ropes tied round their belts, legs braced against the surf; things were passed from man to man, inshore and up to the bonfires, to be helped back to life if they had breath in them at all. Erif sent a dozen women off to the Chief’s house for wine and warm clothes; she could do that, anyhow! Tarrik was nowhere to be seen, and for a time she was so hard at work among the half-drowned sailors that she did not think of him; he would be somewhere. They seemed to be half Scythian and half Greek, perishing with cold and wet and four days of storm and desperate struggle against it before the sides began to strain and gape hopelessly, and at last the mast snapped and killed three of them. They had a hold full of corn from Olbia, the last of the season; and they had left it too long. They gulped down hot wine and huddled themselves in the dry clothes, calling each other by name as man after man was passed up, and asking where they were, thankful to have come on a town and friends and food and rest after that terrible four days, and the storm ending too late to save them.

  Tarrik was down in the sea, stripped to the waist and covered with oil for warmth; he was head of one line, as far out as he could keep his footing on the battered shingle. The light from the bonfires on the shore lay out on the surface beyond him as far as the third or fourth wave, so that he got some warning of anything coming in and had a moment to brace himself and take it. Sometimes a man clinging to a plank or swimming weakly in the trough of a wave, sometimes a cask or chest or bit of a mast, once a horrible, heavy strip of torn sail that tangled round his legs and pulled him over into the surf. Further out, between him and the moon, he could see the black, jagged outline of the wrecked ship, heaving and pitching as she broke up.

  For more than an hour, though it scarcely seemed five minutes, he had been extremely efficient and enjoying every moment; he was shouting at the top of his voice and using every inch of his strength and skill; his side stung vividly where a splintered plank had grazed the skin; his eyes were used to seeing quickly in the half-lit dark, his arms and shoulders to heaving weights; he had beaten the sea! But now no living thing had come in for nearly ten minutes; he began to feel the cold at last. One more look out to the wreck before he turned. And there was a man moving on the black against the sky. He yelled out, though he knew it was no use against this wind. But the man had disappeared. For a minute or two he held himself hard against the battling waves, peering out ahead, then at last saw the black smudge on a tearing water crest that meant something coming in. He moved to the right, shouting back to the man behind to be ready, leaning against the weight and struggle of the sea. Then over the top of one great blinding wave the swimmer came at him head foremost, and both were rolled over and over and into the next on the line, one of the guards; he stood firm and held Tarrik, who heaved himself up, choking and cursing, one arm round the man from the ship. ‘Are you the last?’ shouted Tarrik, as soon as he got his breath. The man gasped yes, clinging to Tarrik’s bare, slippery shoulder. He was small and light, soaked and streaming like a bunch of seaweed; an open cut on his temple was bleeding steadily, smearing his face with pale blood. Between them, Tarrik and the guard helped him in through the fierce shove and suck of the shallow water, and up to the bonfires. And so Sphaeros the Stoic came to Marob.

  Erif Der had clothes and hot wine and food for them all; she saw to the graze on Tarrik’s side, and odd cuts on his arms and hand; furtively, she kissed his cold back as she helped him on with a shirt. Yellow Bull came up, wetter and wilder looking than one would have thought possible; he had been head of another line of rescuers. ‘That was fine, Chief!’ he shouted, and then suddenly caught sight of Erif and remembered and checked and buried his face in a huge cup of wine. But Tarrik was far too excited and happy to notice the change in Yellow Bull, or even see that, for the moment at least, every one was round him again, talking and cheering, forgetting that he had ever been unlucky.

  But Yellow Bull drew his sister aside out of the glare of the fires. ‘What have you been doing?’ he asked. ‘Wasn’t this your time?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘I suppose so. I forgot. It was so exciting. I’m sorry, Yellow Bull.’

  ‘Father will be angry.’

  ‘I know. But—you can tell him there’s going to be another chance, quite soon, at the bullfighting.’

  ‘He’s going to try that, is he?’

  ‘Yes. So you see, then—It will all work out. Yellow Bull, let tonight alone.’

  In the meantime Tarrik was giving out the rescued sailors to the chief men in his town, to keep for the moment, anyhow. Time enough tomorrow to see what should be done with them. Nearly all had been saved, not much hurt, including the captain, who kept on talking to anyone who would listen about his insurance. When they had been allotted, all the other things, barrels, rafts, bedding, and whatnot that had been washed up, were heaped at one side and left under guard. Tarrik found the little man he had saved last sitting quietly by the fire, trying to tie up his own cut head; he was managing it very neatly, but his hands were shaking still. ‘What in hell were you doing to stay so long?’ asked Tarrik suddenly.

  The man looked up. ‘I knocked my head; they thought I was dead and left me. It wouldn’t have mattered.’

  ‘No,’ said Tarrik, amused.

  ‘But you see, when I found I was alive after all, the impulse was too strong for me. Besides I am still hoping to finish my journey.’

  ‘Where were you going?’ Tarrik asked, in Greek this time.

  ‘To Sparta, to King Kleomenes. I am his tutor.’

  ‘What do you teach him?’

  ‘Philosophy.’

  ‘You had better teach me; I am a king too.’

  ‘I do not know if you would be a good pupil; if you are, I should be glad to teach you. But Kleomenes needs me.’

  ‘I have been to Greece, but never to Sparta; they say it is a rich place, where a few have all the power, and most are poor and unhappy.’

  ‘It is like that now; but States may become better. Who are you, King, and what is your country?’

  ‘I am Tarrik of Mar
ob; but my name is Charmantides as well.’

  ‘You are partly Hellene, then?’

  Tarrik hesitated a moment, looking the philosopher up and down. ‘I do not choose to think myself Hellene,’ he said. ‘I am a barbarian.’

  The little man laughed pleasantly and openly, half shutting his eyes. ‘Good!’ he said. ‘Now we have something real. I do not think Hellenes are good and barbarians bad, Tarrik of Marob. I think we are all citizens of one world. I think, too, that you have seen the worst sort of Hellene. Isn’t that true?’

  ‘Perhaps. They were not citizens of my world, anyhow. What is your name?’

  ‘I am called Sphaeros of Borysthenes. You see, I am not quite a Hellene either.’

  ‘You will come to my house,’ said Tarrik. ‘The blood is getting through that bandage. Does it hurt?’

  ‘Not much. It is of no consequence, anyway.’

  ‘Perhaps not to you. But I want you to teach me, I want you alive!’ He called: ‘Erif! Look: will you make the blood not come?’

  Erif Der laid her fingers over the red patch on the bandage, then after a moment took them away sharply, and spoke low to Tarrik: ‘Who is it?’

  ‘Sphaeros: a Hellene: a teacher of kings. Make him well for me, Erif!’

  She frowned and began muttering words and making little movements. Tarrik looked on anxiously, wondering what was the matter. Sphaeros sat quite still, feeling a little weak, only just sometimes lifting a hand to wipe away a trickle of blood from his neck. ‘I can’t,’ said Erif Der suddenly, ‘I can’t! It doesn’t work on him!’ She jumped up and called to the women for a bowl of water, needle and thread, quick. Then she undid the bandage. ‘This is the other way,’ she said to Tarrik, and took his sharp little hunting-knife and cut the hair all round the wound, and then sewed the edges of it together, with her lips pressed up firmly, and eyes fixed on what she was doing. Sphaeros twisted his hands between his knees and shut his eyes, but said nothing, only gave a little gasp when it was all over. Tarrik gave him a cup of wine; the bleeding had stopped; Erif Der turned away and made one of the women pour water over her hands till they were clean.

  The next day the Council met; they had to decide what to do with the ship’s crew and the few passengers, a merchant with his clerk and two servants, and Sphaeros. The natural thing was to take them as a gift from the sea, and, after due thanks, enslave them or hold them to ransom. Three generations ago this would have been a certainty; but these were degenerate days. The Council discussed other possibilities. The Chief was being curiously reasonable, hearing both sides and then giving his own opinion, in a way that made Harn Der and his eldest son rather anxious. However, they comforted themselves with the thought of the bullfighting later on. Erif Der might have her own ways, but they could trust her to be loyal to her family.

  In the end it was settled that such of the crew as had any money should have a sum fixed to be handed over in spring, whenever a ship came to take them away; the others would have to work for their living, and there would be correspondingly larger sums for the captain and passengers to pay. ‘But as to the Greek, Sphaeros,’ said the Chief, ‘I will pay his now; he is my guest.’ Any cargo, wood, baggage or provisions washed up from the wreck were to be distributed.

  When the Council was ended, Tarrik found that his aunt had asked Sphaeros up to her room and was talking to him. Sphaeros sat on the edge of a chair, looking displeased and faintly uncomfortable; he had already refused offers of money, clothes, books, and exclusive friendship as between Hellenes in a barbarian country, from Eurydice, always with politeness, but still firmly. ‘I am honoured,’ he said, ‘but, as you must see, I cannot commit myself yet.’ He was a little curious to know more about Erif Der but was too discreet to ask. He had always liked Scythians, rather romantically, perhaps, but then he was more than usually sane and clear-headed over other things. He liked the hardness, the violent living of these riders and fighters, the carelessness of pain. The contrast in his mind was between them and the rich Greek—the kind of life that he saw reflected in this room of Eurydice’s—rather than the Wise Greek. The Wise Greek was so very rare, thought Sphaeros: one thought one had found him, but how often one was disappointed. And it seemed to him that this strong, questioning, bare-breasted Tarrik was a Romantic Scythian. But so far he could not quite fit in Eurydice. At any rate, it gave him no pleasure to eat caviare and white bread from golden dishes on an ivory table, and hear rather second-rate poetry read aloud. He did not really mind in the least that his clothes were slightly torn, and discoloured and shrunk with sea water; in fact, he had not noticed. His sandals were borrowed and on the large side, but he did not even know who was the lender, so he could not possibly fret about returning them.

  Tarrik leant against the wall, with his thumbs hooked into his belt. ‘You’re going to stay with me all this winter,’ he said, ‘and teach me.’

  ‘But I must go to King Kleomenes as soon as I can,’ said Sphaeros. ‘There will be small ships sailing from harbour to harbour still; I can work my way south.’

  It suddenly occurred to the Chief that he really had someone to deal with this time. ‘You won’t go till I let you,’ he said. ‘I have the power here, my philosopher.’

  ‘Yes, King of Marob,’ said Sphaeros, ‘but you cannot make me teach.’

  ‘I can kill you the moment I choose—and I will if you don’t do what I want.’

  ‘Yes, and how well I shall teach then!’

  But Eurydice came between them, distressed at this scene between her Charmantides and a real Hellene philosopher. ‘This is all nonsense, of course! Charmantides, you mustn’t be rough. This delightful Sphaeros is my guest.’ And she smiled at him, feeling that there was something to be said for being a respectable age—though not, of course, old!—at the moment.

  But Sphaeros did not respond properly; he had a hand on Tarrik’s arm, and was looking up at him earnestly. ‘King!’ he said, ‘I will tell you why Kleomenes of Sparta needs me, and then you will let me go to him. I do not think you are truly the sort of king who kills people without reason.’

  Tarrik, unused to this particular form of flattery, blushed and said: ‘Well, we shall see. Tell me, anyhow.’

  ‘It’s a long story, it begins before you were born, King.’

  ‘At supper, then. Oh, I shall get Berris!’

  At first Berris refused to come to supper, with all sorts of excuses; but in the end, of course, there he was, with his eyes fixed on the Hellene. They sat round, more or less Greek fashion, Eurydice in a high-backed chair, waited on by her own maids; Tarrik half lying, half sitting, always very restless, on a big throne with red cushions; Erif Der beside him with her proper crown, five spikes of silver, lightly engraved with stags and lions that had star sapphires for eyes, and a heavy patterned dress that fell over her feet. Sphaeros was on Tarrik’s other side, head propped in hands, lying along a couch of cedar lattice, with small cushions, and Berris beyond him on another couch, but sitting half up, clasping his knees, eating by fits and starts. They had a long and large supper, with quantities of meat, stewed and boiled and roasted, and fish, and raisin pies, some good wine and much bad, wheaten cakes and run honey and cream.

  Eurydice only spoke when she had something to say which appeared to her to be really noble—or witty—or revealing a heart which yearned for Hellas; this made her conversation rather fitful. Tarrik kept on thinking, quite rightly, that she was at her best when alone with him. He talked rather little, because he was hungry and at the same time happier than he had been for months. Sphaeros was naturally rather silent, and tonight he was tired too, but knew he must tell his story well enough to convince the Chief. So, during supper, Erif and Berris Der talked at one another most of the time, across the others, sparring like two pretty game-cocks. They talked Greek out of politeness, and hers was bad, but fluent and very funny, whether on purpose or not. They ended by throwing bread balls at one another and Eurydice disapproved; but Tarrik joined in, and then Sphaeros, not out o
f any sense of compliment to his barbarian hosts, but in all pleasantness and seriousness. Only then in the middle of it, Tarrik suddenly took up a half-loaf and threw it at his cup-bearer and shouted to them to clear the food and bring more wine. He pledged them all in a skull cup, one of the chiefs of the Red Riders that he had shot himself as a boy ten years before. ‘And now the story,’ said Erif.

  Sphaeros sat up on his couch, so as to be able to face them all, and shifted his head bandage where the edge was catching his ear. ‘The beginning of the story is away back,’ he said, ‘in the time when the Spartans did something that no one else had ever done with their eyes open—or ever will, I think. They turned their backs on the beauty that was ripening in Hellas, in their own hearts too. They said: “We will not build temples, nor make statues or paintings or music, we will have no poets here. We will make life hard and bitter so that only the strongest can bear it, and these shall be our citizens.”’

  He stopped for a moment, just long enough for Berris to ask ‘Why?’ The others were all quiet.

  ‘Why?’ said Sphaeros, half to himself. ‘Because Sparta is a hot green valley, a garden where flowers blossom too much and die; they had to climb out of it, to live on the peaks in the cold winds. They made themselves the strangest State in the world; strong and free and caring not at all for death, no man for himself but all for the others, for Sparta. By casting out the beauty we know, they made a beauty of their own.’

  Tarrik began to fidget and frown. ‘Sparta is not like that. I have been to Hellas—I know for myself: no traveller’s tales, my Sphaeros. I tell you, if there was any luxury, anything rare and precious and sought after, they had it in Sparta.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Sphaeros, ‘but that came afterwards. It seems that no man and no State can live on the heights for ever. Sparta became too powerful, and the doom of the conqueror fell on her: gold and silver flowed down into hollow Lacedaemon and rotted the very roots of their greatness. These things, rather than the riches of the spirit, came to be what they cared for in Sparta; men strove for them only. In that moment the Good Life left them and was gone. Now gold follows after gold, and with it land and power, houses and cattle and slaves; more and more of the lands and riches came into the hands of a few men; and those of the citizens who dropped behind in the gold race must needs take to trade or farming to get their bread, and so they lost the good Life, and had no more leisure for the Training, the Eating-together, and all those matters without which no one can have citizenship of Sparta. A time came when all the riches in the State belonged to scarcely more than a hundred families, and of these many were unbelievably rich, though some had mortgaged their land and were deep in debt, and had nothing but the appearance of riches. The rest of the people worked for them, and were humble and slavish through debt and anxiety and poverty, and there was no happiness.’