Helen of Troy

by Margaret George

  He made sure we all had gold cups to drink from—each of them shallow, decorated with circles and swirls, and smooth and glorious yellow, a bright, happy yellow, as only gold can be. Since there were over thirty of us in the megaron, this advertised his wealth, as he thought, discreetly.

  His guests were Palamedes of Nauplia, Diomedes of Argos, Poliporthis of Tiryns, and Thersites of Corinth, as well as a number of others I did not recognize, as they had never visited us in Sparta. Agamemnon strode amongst them bluffly, slapping their shoulders, throwing his head back and roaring like one of his lions at the gateway.

  Menelaus stood about, looking lost. He did not relish such gatherings, being a quiet and private person. I kept myself by his side. Taking his hand, I intertwined my fingers in his. I felt a wearisome need to protect him.

  There were few other women present; women were not usually admitted to such gatherings. Clytemnestra and I were the exception: Clytemnestra as the host of Mycenae, and I because Menelaus would not be parted from me, and I was sister to Clytemnestra.

  “Ah, my friends!” Agamemnon bellowed. “Welcome, welcome! I am touched that you would come all the way here in the dangerous travel time of winter.” He looked about. “Drink, eat! I slew a late-season boar and it has hung and cured to perfection, so I share it with you!”

  More boasting about himself, I thought.

  “It is roasting even now!” He stood, swaying slightly in his thick boots, his fur-clad shoulders making him look like a formidable bear.

  Clytemnestra came over to us, trailing her long robes. “That man has no sense of time,” she muttered. “It will be hours before it is ready. I told him to start it earlier—”

  I leaned over and kissed her cheek. “No matter, dear sister. We are happy just to see you. We did not come for the boar. Indeed, we are not sure why we have come—aside from an opportunity for Hermione to see her cousins again. Perhaps that is the most important, and lasting, thing that will come of this.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Agamemnon wants to assess the support he can count on.”

  “For what?” Menelaus asked. “Everything is quiet. We are at peace.”

  “Agamemnon does not like peace,” she said.

  “But surely he does not mean to provoke war? And with whom?” Menelaus was upset by the sudden news.

  “He has entangled himself with the cause of Hesione,” she said. “Which is foolish,” she hastened to add. “Although the Trojan king claims otherwise, Hesione seems perfectly content to live in Salamis with Telamon. It has been almost forty years since she was taken from Troy.”

  “Troy,” muttered Menelaus. “A place better left alone. All that happened in another generation, and although some may call me coward for it, I say the happenings of the day should be confined to that day and time, and not spill out and contaminate another.”

  Clytemnestra raised her eyebrows. “How radical!” she said. “But sensible,” she allowed.

  Agamemnon walked up and down the megaron, his rough features illuminated by torches stuck in wall sockets. In some lights he was handsome; in others he looked like a satyr. Perhaps it was the beard and the deep-set eyes.

  “The boar is coming, I say, it is coming!” he said, holding up his arms. “But friends, while we wait, I must exhort you to think upon the wrongs done to us by the insults of the Trojans. That aged princess of theirs, Hesione, sister to their king Priam, was awarded to Telamon of Salamis years ago. But they never cease agitating for her return! They even threaten to send out a party to rescue her. They say she was taken against her will, by Heracles. I say, nonsense! She shows no desire to return to Troy.”

  The loud voice of Thersites broke through the crowd. “Has anyone asked her?”

  “I assume her husband Telamon has! Or her son, the matchless archer Teucer!” Agamemnon yelled. He threw back a cup of wine.

  “Could she speak freely before them?” Thersites persisted.

  “Surely after forty years—” Menelaus began.

  “Women cannot always say what they wish.” To my surprise, the voice was mine. I had not meant to speak out. But it was true.

  “What do you mean?” My brother-in-law rounded on me. All eyes were fastened on me.

  “I mean that a married woman, who has regard for her family, for her husband and child, cannot always frame the true feelings in her heart in words—for they may be contradictory.” I took a breath. “The love for one family does not smother the love for the first one.” I had been fortunate—I had both my first family and my chosen, second one about me. But that did not always happen.

  “She has forgotten Troy!” Agamemnon pronounced. “She has proved it by her actions.”

  “Conflicted loyalties can cause great pain—and lead to silence,” I said. I saw his brows contract. I did not relish his attention, but how could I remain quiet? His misconceptions might lead to bloodshed, for clearly he had convened these warriors in hopes of rousing and using them.

  “If the Trojans persist in making these accusations, we’ll answer them with warships and with bronze!” he cried. He looked around to see who would echo his cry. There were a few halfhearted cheers.

  “Troy is arrogant,” said Thersites. “It lurks beside the Hellespont and hinders our trade farther in, all the way to the Black Sea. I’d be just as happy if it vanished.”

  “It isn’t about to vanish,” said Agamemnon. “It will persist, as a spear in our sides, until we make it vanish.”

  “Troy has many allies surrounding it,” said Diomedes. “They would come to its aid.”

  “Stop!” said Menelaus. “You talk as if a war is a given. There is no reason, no purpose, for a war with Troy. It is cheaper, to be frank, to pay whatever bribes and tolls they require than to muster an army. This is the way of trade—barter, taxes. They were given their position near the Hellespont by the gods, just as we were given ours on the Aegean. We must respect that.”

  There was a low groan in the room, although Menelaus spoke intelligently. Intelligent objections were not what they wanted—not in the flickering torchlight and the half shadows and half-truths floating about in the wintry chamber.

  “So you just want to sit in your great hall in Sparta, warming yourself by the fire, and die with no glorious deeds to be recited when the funeral pyre is lit?” Diomedes asked.

  I felt Menelaus stiffen beside me. He had to answer. “I believe . . . I believe . . .”—he searched for words—“that whether there are glorious deeds to be sung at a man’s funeral depends upon what tasks the gods set before him to test his character. We accept the cup the gods give us. We must. Peace is also a gift.”

  “Bah!” cried Diomedes. “I can fill this cup with whatever potion I desire!” He lifted his golden cup high.

  “But the cup itself was given you by another.” Again, it was my voice speaking. I could not bear his cockiness. “Perhaps you are not as free as you would wish.”

  He glared at me, and then at Menelaus, as if to say, Curb your wife!

  “Leave quivering old Priam alone,” a voice sounded from the back of the hall. Perhaps the mood was turning; perhaps Menelaus’s sensible advice was seeping into men’s minds.

  “Priam! He’s an old fool. A decadent potentate from the east. He has fifty or so sons—all lodging in his palace at Troy,” Agamemnon said.

  “Is that a reason to attack him?” asked Menelaus. “Let him have his fifty sons!’ ”

  He hid it well, but I heard the pain in his voice. Fifty sons—oh, let me have one. Only one! All men wanted sons. Menelaus ached for one.

  “It’s not seemly,” muttered Agamemnon, also sonless.

  “I heard he just added another,” Palamedes said. “A grown one.”

  “Oh, one of those slave offsprings?” Poliporthis laughed. “A king’s halls are full of them.”

  “This one is different,” Palamedes persisted. “This one, a legitimate son, was cast away because of a bad omen, and has returned to claim his inheritance. And he cuts a
pretty figure, they say, with prowess in contests of all sorts, as well as a stunning face. They call him Paris, ‘pack,’ because he was tucked into a pack when he was being taken out to the mountain as a newborn to die.”

  “Oh, how affecting!” Thersites bowed, sneering. “What a lovely story!”

  “So old Priam sits happy on the lookout of windy Troy, knowing he is safe!” Agamemnon all but spat. “What matter whether he have forty-nine sons or fifty, whether one is pretty or not?”

  “What matter to you, Agamemnon?” a strong voice spoke out. “You speak non—you speak without thinking.”

  No one told Agamemnon he spoke nonsense—no one except Clytemnestra. And then not in public. Agamemnon glared, searching the room for the man who had spoken. “It matters to me because Priam is the brother of Hesione. It is he who keeps reminding the world that she was taken from Troy—by Greeks. He hates us!” Agamemnon lowered his chin, as he always did when he was crossed, looking like a truculent bull.

  “That’s your imagination,” said Menelaus. “I have heard he is an even-tempered and sensible man, not given to hatred.”

  “Well, if he’s sensible, then he should fear us!” Agamemnon motioned and two men emerged from the shadows—an older one with a shiny face and a gloating expression, and a younger one with much hair and dark slashes for eyebrows. I had seen them before—where?

  The older one was carrying an armful of protective clothing and armor, and the younger one bristled with weapons—spears, swords, arrows, and shields. Perched on his head was an impressive helmet made up of rows of boars’ tusks.

  “Lynceus, show them what you’ve brought!”

  Obligingly, the man spread out his linen breastplate, his bronze greaves and helmet, and one huge winding spiral of metal to cover a fighter from shoulder to thigh. It would also require superhuman strength to move and fight in it.

  “This outfits the warrior,” he said proudly.

  “I have a storeroom full of these,” said Agamemnon. “I am prepared for any challenge.”

  “It seems you may issue the challenge yourself,” said Diomedes. “Once you have such weapons, do they not raise their own cry to be used?”

  “Better that than to be needed and be lacking,” said Agamemnon. “Now, Cercyon, show the rest of it.”

  The young man quickly obeyed, kneeling down and displaying the weaponry at his feet. “Ah, but the best course is to have such superior weapons that the enemy never has a chance to strike.”

  He motioned to a group of swords and daggers at his feet. “Long swords are too awkward. A shorter sword is better. Stronger. It won’t suddenly crack and leave you unprotected. And it’s meant for thrust-and-cut rather than just the old-fashioned puncturing. Of course, a dagger is the best for close fighting.” He brandished one, relishing its heft. “But the disadvantage is that you must be close.” He laughed.

  “The ideal would be a weapon that could kill from afar. In fact, if you look at swords, you can see that each improvement is an attempt to kill at a greater and greater distance from the body of the attacker.” Suddenly Gelanor was standing beside the young man. “What you want is a long sword that also slashes. That would be a warrior’s dream.”

  Why was he here? Had Agamemnon taken him from Menelaus’s service?

  The thought of his no longer being in Sparta was intolerable. We would demand his return. How had Agamemnon recruited him?

  “Your boar-tusk helmet.” Gelanor pointed at it. “Very pretty. But we have better things now.”

  Cercyon looked crushed. He pulled it off and squeezed it.

  “You need something more rigid to protect your head better,” said Gelanor. He stood over the display of arrows and their bows. “Arrows need to fly farther,” he said.

  “Arrows are a coward’s way of fighting!” said Diomedes of Argos.

  “Oh? How bullheaded! No, my friends, arrows are but the next step in the long and unfinished story of war weapons. They allow you to kill from far afield. If you do not perfect them, someone else will.”

  “What is the farthest an arrow can shoot and kill?” someone asked.

  “With these bows and arrows, seventy paces. But with mine, you can hit a target three hundred paces away.”

  “Impossible.” Agamemnon stood beside him. “I have great faith in Gelanor, but this is impossible.”

  “The problem lies in your bows,” said Gelanor. “The arrow can go only as far as the tension in the bowstring. If you could stretch the string farther back, to your ear, or even farther, your arrows will astound you.”

  “We don’t have such bows, nor bowstrings,” said Lynceus.

  “Not yet. Let us build them. It can be done. And fairly easily, I think.”

  “So you don’t actually have these bows?”

  “No, but I am confident they can be made. Using hair with the sinews, to increase the spring—”

  “Bah!” Lynceus grabbed the bow that Cercyon had put on the floor. “This is good enough for me!”

  But Cercyon tellingly pulled Gelanor aside to question him.

  “I’ll embrace any method that kills more Trojans!” said Agamemnon. “Just show me how to get them!”

  After the men stopped swarming around the weapons, they were removed and a bard was summoned into the hall. I was able to go to Gelanor’s side and whisper, “Have you deserted us?”

  He looked at me, his peculiar half-smile in his eyes, not his mouth. “Never, my lady. I stand always ready to deflect your enemies.”

  Because no enemies had reared their heads since the poison episode, I had seen little of him. “You must not stay in Mycenae,” I suddenly said. “I order you to return to Sparta with us.”

  Now his mouth smiled. “I obey.” He laughed. “Agamemnon’s pay is bad. And he clearly does not mean to pursue any of my ideas. They will cost too much, and the man is stingy.”

  The bard stood in the hall, waiting for the company to grow quiet. He clutched his lyre and shut his eyes. Outside, the wind was gathering itself and I could hear it tearing around the corners of the building. Someone threw more wood on the fire, but all the same the cold was creeping in, stealing between the stones.

  “Sing of the voyage of the Argonauts,” someone said. “Jason and the Golden Fleece.”

  “We’re heard that a hundred times,” said Cercyon. “No, do Heracles and the Hydra!”

  A groan rippled around the room. “No! Boring!”

  “Do Perseus! He founded Mycenae, so they say.”

  “Perseus and the Medusa!”

  “No!” Agamemnon shouted. “Sing of Priam and his quest for his sister Hesione.”

  The bard looked sadly at him. “I know not such a song, sir.”

  “Then compose it! Do you not have the Muse at your call?”

  The bard looked uncomfortable. “Sir, it is a story without an ending. Such is not suitable for an epic song.”

  “Then let us write it, by all the gods!” cried Agamemnon. “Then you can sing it well enough!”

  * * *

  The fire was dying down, and no one threw more wood onto it. Outside, the wind was ferocious, and guests were eager to get to their beds, to pull a warm fleece over themselves, wrap their arms around their shoulders, and hope for sleep.

  Menelaus and I were assigned to the best of the guest chambers, the ones we had occupied on our wedding visit. When we stepped out of the megaron, we were slapped by a wind so strong and cold it felt like a garment of ice, with a hint of sleet. We shivered and huddled together as we made our way across the passage leading to our chamber.

  To be here again, after all that had passed in the intervening years . . . But in truth, I cared not; I was so sleepy I could barely see anything.

  Menelaus was groaning, as always, to indicate how tired he was. He took off his fur, removing it from his shoulders, but they seemed no less burdened.

  He stooped. I had never noticed it before, but he was bent over—unlike that eager young warrior Cercyon, who had stood
as straight as a quivering new sword. Menelaus was older, of course, although no war had sapped him—only time.

  His stooping was dear to me. His weakness drew me. I stood beside him, compassion for him brought on not from his strength but from his human burdens.

  Dear Menelaus. I did care for him.

  We embraced; we lay down together. I felt him near me, my dear friend, my lord. But what followed was the same as always. Aphrodite had failed me again; she had withheld her gifts. There remained the gifts of love, respect, devotion, that the other gods had showered upon us. Lying in Menelaus’s strong arms, I thought wistfully that I must content myself with them. I was fortunate to have been granted even these. And had not Menelaus been my ally since the beginning? That was our start, and that would be our finish.

  XX

  Seeing Sparta come into view, spread out along the banks of the Eurotas, my spirits rose as they always did. My city was fair, open, set in its groves of trees—it was everything the cold, guarded Mycenae was not. Both palaces were set high, but ours was a golden beacon over the plain.

  Hermione was happy to be back home, where she could roam in the open corridors. All that was missing for her were cousins for playmates; there were the children of the attendants and slaves about, of course, but no one of her own blood. She confided in me that this time Cousin Iphigenia did not seem so interested in playing, that she had accumulated a collection of ivory combs and bronze mirrors and perfumed oil, and spent much time in arranging them.

  “Well, she is near the age when she might have to marry,” I said. “I suppose she is only making ready for it, in her own mind.”

  “And Elektra is too little, she’s a pest, and no fun. She’s just annoying; all she does is ask questions.”

  I laughed. “That is what being three means,” I said. “So did you.”

  She shook her head furiously, making all her curls dance. “No, no, I didn’t!”

  “There’s no shame in it,” I assured her. “Better to ask too many questions than too few.”