Jason and Medeia

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Jason and Medeia Page 10

by John Gardner


  time of thaw—

  so I left it there. Pelias was giving a great banquet for his father Poseidon and the other gods—or all but

  Hera—

  when I came where he sat, his lords and ladies all

  crowded around him,

  dressed to the nines, like a flock of exotic birds—long

  capes

  more brilliant than precious stones, deep blue, sharp

  yellow, scarlet—

  eating and laughing, plump as the mountainous clusters

  of grapes

  the slaves bore in. I bowed to him, dressed in the

  panther-cape

  already famous for midnight strikes, unexpected attacks from rooftops, pits of dungeons. I bowed, most

  dignified—

  except, of course, for that one bare foot. He looked not

  exactly

  gratified that I’d made it. He looked, in fact, like a man who’s gotten an arrow in his back. Pelias threw out his

  hands,

  tiny chins trembling, and said, ‘J-J-J-Jason!’ And said no more. He’d fainted. It was three full days before I

  could see him.

  “Well, no reason to stretch it out. I sat by his bed, summed up my winnings, and waited to hear what he

  thought it all worth.

  I heard, instead, about the golden fleece. I had the

  m-makings

  of a king, he said. He continually squeezed his hands

  together,

  winking. I thought he’d gone crazy. ‘J-J-J-Jason, b-boy, you’ve got the m-makings of a king.’ He was gray and

  flabby, like a man

  who’s been sitting in a dimly lit room for a full

  half-century.

  His legs and arms were spindles, the rest of him loose,

  like a pudding,

  his large head wide and flat, wrinkled like an embryo’s. In his splendid bedclothes—azure and green and as full

  of light

  as wine falling in a stream in front of a candle flame-he looked like a slightly frightened treetoad, blinking

  its eyes,

  cautiously peeking out from a spray of peacock feathers. You would not have thought him a child of Poseidon

  the Earth-trembler,

  but demigod he was, nonetheless, and dangerous.

  “I waited, laboring to figure him out. I dropped the

  idea

  of craziness. He was sly, vulpine. The way he made his eyes glint when he mentioned the fleece, and wrung

  his hands

  and made me bend to his pillow, to let him poke at me, conspirators in a cunning scheme—I knew the old man was sane enough. He was pulling something. Yet this

  was the plan:

  Bring him the golden fleece, and he’d split the kingdom

  with me,

  half and half. I could see at a glance what he wanted,

  all right,

  though I wasn’t quite sure of the reason—not then.

  But half the kingdom!

  I looked down, hiding my interest, adding it up. I saids “You seem to forget the difficulties,’ and watched him

  closely.

  ‘No d-d-d-difficulties!’ he said, and splashed out his

  arms,

  then wiped his mouth. “None for a muh-muh-man like

  you!

  ‘I waited. He grinned like a monkey. Then after a while

  he sighed,

  allowed that it might be a long way, allowed that there

  might

  be ‘snakes’ (he glanced at me) ‘snakes and suh-suh-so

  on.’ He sighed.

  ‘And if I … refuse your offer?’ He sighed again, looked

  grieved.

  “You’re young, J-Jason. P-popular.’ He looked out the

  window.

  And I understood. ‘You think I’ll reclaim my father’s

  throne

  despite all the horrors of civil war. But if, by

  mischance—’

  ‘J-Jason!’ he exclaimed. His eyes were wide with shock.

  I laughed.

  He snatched my hand, and, sickly as he looked, his grip

  was fierce.

  He wept. ‘J-Jason, I wish you w-well,’ he said. And

  he did—

  as Zeus wished Kronos well when he had all his bulk

  in chains,

  or as Herakles wished for nothing but peace to the

  slaughtered snake

  or the shredded, mammocked tree when he tore off the

  apples of gold.

  ‘Suppose you had the suh-certain word of an oracle,’

  he said,

  ‘that a suh-certain man was going to k-k-k-kill you.

  What would

  you do?’ I nodded. ‘I’d send him to fetch the golden

  fleece,’

  I said. Old Pelias squeezed my hand. ‘Go and f-fetch it.’ And so I agreed. Pelias had known I’d agree, of course. What Pelias couldn’t know was that I’d beat those odds. It meant two things—the perfect ship and the perfect

  crew.

  I could get them. That very day I checked with the

  augurers,

  playing it safe. No signs were ever better; and though I had, like any man of sense, my doubts about how much a squinting, cracked old priest—with

  reasons of his own,

  could be, for seeing what he did—how much such a

  man could know

  by watching a few stray birds, still, I was excited.

  I was

  a most devout young man, in those days. Goodness

  in the gods

  was a rockfirm fact of experience, I thought. And so

  I told

  the king that as soon as I’d gotten my ship and crew

  together

  I’d sail.

  “It was Argus who built the ship—old Argus, under Athena’s eye. He built it of trees from her sacred groves, beech and ironwood, towering pines and great dark

  oaks

  that sang in the wind like men, a vast, unearthly

  choir—

  and Athena showed him herself which trees to cut.

  When the beam

  of the keel went in, old Argus smiled, his long gray hair tied back with a thong, and the beam said, ‘Good! Nice

  work, old man!’

  When he notched the planks and lowered them onto the

  chucks, the planks

  said, ‘Good! Nice fit!’ He carved the masts and shaped

  them with figures

  facing in all the four directions, and after he’d dropped

  them,

  slid them with a hollow thump to the central beam,

  they said,

  That’s fine! We’re snug as rocks!’ Then he built the

  booms and wove

  the sails. The black ship sang, and Argus had finished it.

  “I gathered the crew.

  “I can’t deny it: there never was

  in all this world or on any world a mightier crew than the Argonauts. Sweet gods, beside the most feeble

  of the lot,

  I seemed, myself, a mildly intelligent hedgehog!

  I gathered

  Akhaians from far and near—all men of genius, sons of gods—

  “And the first, the finest of them all, was Orpheus.

  He was borne by Kalliope herself to her Thracian lover

  Oiagros,

  high on the slopes of Pimplea. Even as a child, with his

  music

  he enchanted the towering, frozen rocks and the violent

  streams,

  and to this day there are quernal forests on the coasts

  of Thrace

  that Orpheus, playing his lyre, lured down from Pieria, rank on rank of them, coming to his music like soldiers

  on the march.

  The next I chose was Polyphemon, son of Eilatos,

  out of

  Larissa. He was, in
his younger days, a hero in the

  ranks

  of the incredible Lapithai who warred with the centaurs

  once.

  His limbs by now were heavy with age, but he still had

  the same

  fierce heart.

  ‘The next was Asterios, son of an endless line

  of travellers, explorers, river merchants, a man who

  could trade up

  wools and linens to priceless gems. And Iphiklos was

  next,

  my mother’s brother, who came for the sake of our

  kinship. Then

  Admetos, king of Pherai, rich in sheep. Then the sons of Hermes, out of Alope, land of cornfields; with them Aithalides their kinsman. Then, from wealthy Gyrton, Koronos came, the son of Kaineos—strong as a boulder, though he wasn’t the man his father was. In Gyrton

  they say

  the old man singlehanded beat the centaurs back, and after the centaurs rallied and overcame him, even then they couldn’t kill him. With massive pines they

  drove him

  down in the earth like a nail. He was still alive.

  “Then Mopsos,

  powerful man whom Apollo had trained to excel all

  others

  in the art of augury from birds. He knew when he

  came, he said,

  that he’d meet his end in the Libyan desert.

  Then Telamon

  and Peleus, sons of Aiakos, fathers in turn of sons as awesome as they were themselves—the heroes Aias

  and Akhilles,

  now chief terrors of Troy.

  “And after the two great brothers,

  from Attica came Butes, son of Teleon, and Phalerus, famous for their deadly spears. (Theseus, finest of the Attic line, was out of business. He’d gone with Peirithoös into the Underworld, and was kept

  there, chained,

  a prisoner deep in the earth.)

  ‘Then out of the Thespian town

  of Siphai, Tiphys came. He was a mariner who could sense the coming of a swell across the open

  sea

  and knew by the sun and stars when storms were

  brewing, six

  weeks off. Athena herself had sent him to join us—she who’d supervised the building of our ship.

  “Then Phlias

  came, Dionysos’ son, who lived by the springs of

  Asopos—

  child of the black-robed god who was my father’s father. Phlias was a dancer, a tiger in battle. He never learned

  speech.

  “From Argos came Talaos and Areion, and powerful

  Leodokos.

  “Then came Herakles. He’d heard a rumor of the

  expedition

  when he’d just arrived from Arcadia. It was the famous

  time

  when he carried on his back—alive and thrashing—

  the monstrous boar

  that fed in the thickets of Lampeia. As soon as Herakles

  heard it,

  he threw down the boar, tied up its feet, and left it

  squealing—

  loud as a hurricane—blocking the gates of the great

  market

  at Mykenai. His squire, Hylas, that beautiful boy whom Herakles loved like a son—or like a god—came

  with him,

  serving as keeper of the bow. He was like a breeze,

  like rain.

  You see them sometimes, boys like Hylas, and you

  pause, as if

  snatched out of Time, stunned for an instant. It’s as

  if you’ve come

  suddenly, turning a familiar corner, to a world more

  calm,

  more innocent than ours, and there at the door of it, a deity, childlike, all-forgiving; you find yourself thrilled to what’s best in yourself, a spring not yet

  corrupt,

  and as religion wells in your chest—a strange humility—something else sweeps in, a curious sorrow, deep, mysterious despair. Such gentleness, such trust, such beauty of eyes and limbs … It was as if I knew

  even then,

  the instant I saw him, that something terrible awaited

  him,

  patient as a wolf, and knew that after the beautiful boy was gone, strange things would happen to us—

  smoke-black darkness,

  murderous winds, waves that ground at our ship like

  monstrous

  teeth … Impossible to say what I mean. He was like

  a sign

  of the best possible in nature, and his very goodness

  made him …

  “But enough. Let me think who else there was.

  “There was Idmon the seer.

  Of all the heroes of Argos, Idmon was the last to come. Like Mopsos, he knew by his own birdlore that for him

  the trip

  meant death; yet the poor devil came, for his reputation’s

  sake.

  A coward’s coward, I used to call him. He was terrified at the very idea that he ever might fly in terror.

  “From Sparta

  Aitolian Leda sent us the mighty Polydeukes, king of all boxers, and Kastor, master of the racing

  horse.

  She’d borne them as twins in Tyndareos’ palace, and

  loved them so well

  she swallowed her fear like bitter wine and allowed

  them to go

  as they wished. No wonder Zeus had loved her, a girl

  like that,

  and planted in Leda’s womb the most beautiful woman

  on earth!

  “From Arene the sons of Aphareos came, Lynkeus

  and Idas.

  They were both brave men and as powerful as bulls—

  yet I hesitated

  before I’d take them on board. Idas was crazy. He talked pure gibberish at times, and foamed at the mouth.

  When sane,

  he was quarrelsome, insolent, a chip on his shoulder

  as big as a tree.

  But Lynkeus wouldn’t have joined without him; and

  Lynkeus had

  the finest eyesight in the world. As easily as you and I see distant eagles, Lynkeus could see things

  underground.

  Yet Idas’ vision was keener still, I learned in the end. His beads were of human bone, and his cheek bore

  lion scars,

  and scorning, shaming, mocking was all he loved; yet

  he was not

  mad, exactly. Like leopards they watched the world,

  those brothers,

  though Idas fooled you. The man had the eyes of a

  sleeping dragon.

  “From Arcadia, Kepheus and Amphidamas came, two

  sons of Aleos,

  and their older brother Lykourgos sent us his

  twelve-foot boy

  Ankaios. He had to stay home, himself, to care for

  his aging

  father—a testy, sly old devil, as we saw for ourselves. The old man didn’t approve of allowing a boy so young to sail with us, whatever his size, and when argument

  failed

  to sway Ankaios’ father, old Aleos chewed his gums and schemed. Ankaios arrived at the ship in a bearskin,

  waving

  a two-edged axe in his right hand. His grandfather’d

  hidden

  his equipment in a corner of the bam, still hoping to

  the very last

  he’d keep his baby home.

  “Augeias also came,

  whose father was the sun; and Asterios and Amphion, from Pelles’ city on the cliffs. And Euphemos followed

  them,

  the fastest runner in the world—the boy Europa,

  daughter

  of Tityos, bore to Poseidon. He was a man who could run on the rolling waters of the sea so fast his invisible feet weren’t wet by it. —But Zetes and Kalais were faster

  in the sky,

  the two sons of the North Wind, whom Oreithyia bore to Boreas in the wint
ry borderland of Thrace. He’d

  brought her

  from Attica. She was whirling in the dance on the banks

  of the Ilissos

  when he snatched her from earth and carried her away

  to Sarpedon’s Rock,

  near the flowing waters of Erginos, where he wrapped

  her up

  in a dark cloud and raped her. It was an astounding

  thing

  to watch those sons of hers soar up into the sky,

  the sea-blue

  eagles’ road! The wings on each side of their ankles

  whirred

  and spangles of gold burst through like sparks from

  the dusky feathers,

  and they shot away. Their black locks whipped on their

  shoulders and backs,

  but their faces were steady as arrowheads in flight.

  “The last

  we took with us was Argus, gentle old craftsman, sly as Daidalos—but older, richer in ancient lore— a man who remembered secrets most of the gods

  had long

  forgotten. He was no fighter. In time of war he’d sit bent over, with his lips drawn tight, his blue eyes

  violent,

  alarmed, as though he’d pierced the forms of the ships

  we’d burned,

  the white bodies of the dead—had pierced the shapes

  of our destruction,

  and saw, beyond them, nothing. And yet he forgave

  our work,

  when breezes had cleaned the air of the stink and smoke,

  and we’d laid

  the dead away. Old Argus didn’t much care for us, destroyers of filigreed halls and high-prowed ships,

  wasters

  of goldsmiths’ work, despoilers of cities, the works of

  mind.

  There were times when that gentle scorn of his—a

  sneer, almost—

  inclined us to smash his head for him. But we couldn’t,

  of course.

  We needed him—needed his art, if not that calcifying smile. And Argus came, whatever his distaste, to guard his masterpiece—to guard, perhaps, whatever work he could. And because he was curious. Not death itself would have given the old man pause if he thought he

  could learn from it.

  For all his nobility of mind he was a man consumed by need to know, need to reduce the universe to facts.

  “Such was my crew, or anyway the best of it;

  all men of genius, sons of the immortal gods.

  “The Argo

  was ready, equipped with all that goes into a well-found

  ship

  when pressing business carries people to sea. We made our way to the shore where the ship lay grumbling,

  muttering to herself

  to be gone. A crowd of excited townsfolk gathered

  around us,

  tall men, some of them, some of them fine to see; but set by the best of them all, the Argo’s crew stood out

 

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