For she had a very picky appetite. Her favorite meal was a kind of humpbacked whale that sang as it swam, and even sang on its way down her gullet, tickling her palate in a very pleasurable way. Among land animals she preferred a certain silvery ape. And these preferences made her bad temper worse. For the whales soon learned how much the Sphinx hated to be cold, and began to hide in the deepest gulches of the sea where the water was icy. By the time the Sphinx caught a whale, she would have to fly off to the desert and burrow under the sand and stay there until she thawed. So, finally, she gave up on the singing whales and began to hunt giant octopi and two-ton sea turtles—which filled her belly but gave her no pleasure.
As for the silvery ape, it was considered a delicacy also by lions and tigers and leopards and such, and its numbers were shrinking fast. So the Sphinx had to eat gorillas and baboons—who were nourishing but flavorless.
She found herself feeding, therefore, less heavily than she liked, and felt always half-starved. And her temper grew worse and worse.
2
An Unlikely Match
When Hecate announced that she meant to wed the lame little poet, Thallo, no one could understand why. But the assorted fiends and demons who staffed Hell had learned not to question the tigerishly beautiful Harpy queen no matter what she did. In the vast realm of the Land Beyond Death only Hades, its king, claimed authority over her, and he didn’t trust himself to approach her. The idea that his chief aide should wish to leave his employ threw him into such a fury that he kept his distance. He knew that if he came close he would assault her—and even he didn’t relish closing with that savage creature. For her great wings bore her more swiftly than an eagle, and her brass talons could rip an armored giant to shreds.
No one questioned her, therefore, when she quit Tartarus forever and flew off to Helicon to collect her unsuspecting man.
The rabble of poets who were wandering the slope of Parnassus, picking flowers and muttering bits of verse to themselves, scattered like quail when a huge, winged shadow fell upon them. Thallo alone did not flee, but sat on his rock, grinning, as Hecate alighted.
“A good day to you,” he said.
“A very good one,” she said. “My wedding day.”
“Oh, are you to be married?”
“Yes.”
“To whom?”
“To you, of course.”
“Me? Why me?”
“That’s either a modest answer or an extremely rude one. And I hope for your sake that it’s not rude.”
“Let’s put it this way,” he drawled. “We’ve had a few sprightly conversations, and I’m aware of a kind of excitement between us, but a man does expect to be courted, you know.”
“Everyone else is shocked by my choice,” she said. “So you may as well be too. While I make it a rule never to explain myself, I will say this: I have certain powers and have gained a certain measure of fame, but now I intend to devote myself entirely to you.”
“Thank you,” said Thallo. “You are the Arch Tormentress, are you not?”
“So I have been called,” she said modestly.
“And now you wish to focus these impressive talents upon me?”
“On you alone, sweetling.”
“Wish to quit public service and contrive a little private hell for me, is that it?”
“You have a way with words, gimpy one,” she murmured. “That’s how you won my heart.”
She unsheathed her brass claws and raked him tenderly. He shuddered with delight.
Her claws closed upon him; her wings beat the air; they arose. He dangled from her claws, laughing, still clutching the thick scroll on which was written the tale he had been working on for the past twenty years. He used it now to wave good-bye to his fellow poets, who were staring up in amazement.
3
The Ferryman
Thessaly is studded with mountains. For three months of the year they are clad in snow. But spring comes early there, and the melted snow cascades down to flood the rivers.
Of all these swift-flowing rivers the most perilous was Alpheus. Centuries before, an idle, mischievous river god by the same name fell in love with a nymph named Arethusa. He pursued her over the field and through the wood and was about to catch her when she gained the aid of Artemis, who changed her into a stream. Whereupon Alpheus changed himself into a river and sought to mingle his waters with the stream. But Artemis dammed him up and left him in thwarted flood. This curdled his disposition, which was not too good to begin with. He boiled with spiteful currents and tried to drown anyone crossing him. He also delighted in overflowing his banks, washing away towns and farms and drowning cattle.
Now, in the beginning of things man had not yet learned bridge building. The only way to cross a swift river was by boat, and this was dangerous also. To be a ferryman demanded great strength and courage. And the one who ferried folk across the treacherous Alpheus was the most experienced boatman in Thessaly, a gigantic grizzled old fellow named Abas. He had worked the river for more than fifty years, and seemed as powerful as ever. But he wasn’t quite. Suddenly one fair summer day the river went into spate. Abas was swept overboard and drowned.
His place was immediately taken, to everyone’s surprise, by his eighteen-year-old son, named Charon. Nobody objected, however, when the young man claimed his father’s post. For he was a hulking youth, much too big for anyone to challenge.
In order to carry more passengers, Charon decided to use a raft instead of a boat. He made it himself, felling a massive oak, trimming it, chopping it into logs, and binding them with vines. For an oar he used the trimmed trunk of a smaller tree. When he finished he had a huge, heavy, clumsy thing, more of a floating platform than a vessel. But he was so powerful that he sent it scudding across the river like a canoe.
The silent youth and his giant raft became very popular. After a month or so, more people were traveling with him than had ever crossed with his father.
One day, however, things were slow, and it was hours before a single passenger came to the dock. Charon eyed him closely, not liking what he saw—a big, burly fellow with a greasy beard. He wore a leather tunic and bore a heavy knobbed club. But he smiled at Charon and wished him good day.
Charon grunted, and said, “Get aboard.”
“I don’t want to cross,” said the man.
“What do you want then?”
“Just to talk to you.”
“Talk?”
“Is that so strange?”
“You’ll have to talk on board. There may be people on the far shore waiting to be picked up.”
The stranger stepped onto the raft. Charon dipped his oar and with a mighty thrust sent the clumsy craft scudding along.
“You handle this thing well,” said the stranger. “And I know. I’m a ferryman myself.”
Charon said nothing.
“In fact, I’m chief of the clan.”
“What clan?” Charon grunted.
“Ferrymen.”
“That’s no clan; it’s an occupation.”
“Well, this is what I want to talk to you about. All the other ferrymen have joined up. You’re the only one who isn’t a member.”
“And I don’t mean to be.”
“Why not?”
“Why yes?”
“We do each other a lot of good. Help each other.”
“How?”
“Fix fares.”
“How do you mean?”
“Well, before we got together, people paid us anything they felt like. A small coin, a sack of apples, a sausage. And those who had nothing gave nothing.”
“So …?”
“It’s no good. We had a meeting and decided to raise fares—and in such a way that our passengers couldn’t object; that’s the beauty part. What we do is simply stop the boat in the middle of the river and tell them to empty their pockets.”
“Suppose they don’t?”
“We reason with them for a minute or two, and if they’re still stu
bborn we hit them on the head with an oar and toss them overboard. Works like a charm. None of us had to drown more than one or two before people saw the light. Now, we’re doing very well.”
“If you’re doing so well, why are you bothering with me?”
“Because if even one ferryman does things in the old way it makes the rest of us look bad. In fact, we’ve noticed that people are going out of their way to cross over with you instead of using the river nearest them.”
“I’m not surprised,” said Charon.
“What it amounts to, brother, is that we’ll have to insist that you join up.”
“Insist how?”
“Well, if you don’t see reason and enroll yourself in the clan and start fleecing your riders like a good loyal member, then we’ll have to take drastic measures.”
“Drastic, eh?”
“I’m afraid so.”
“Want my answer now?”
“Yes.”
Charon stopped rowing. Unshipped his oar, raised it high and smashed it down on the man’s head. He caught the slumping body, whisked it into the air, and pitched it into the river—where it sank immediately. He dipped his oar, and with a powerful stroke drove the raft toward the other shore.
4
Menthe
For some months now Alpheus had been fast asleep under the river that bore his name. Then in the first week of spring he awoke, hungry and irritable—in a mood for drowning people. But there were no fishermen on the banks, no swimmers on the rocks, and he knew that he would have to wait until someone boarded the ferry.
But no one came to the old wooden dock. The raft was moored, and Charon lounged on it, braiding a rope. Alpheus squatted underwater, watching the shadows that slid across the surface. He glared at the shadow of the raft. He disliked everyone, but had formed a special distaste for the big, raw youth who plied his river so boldly.
“I’d drown him now,” thought Alpheus, “but I want to wait until he has some passengers.”
Upon that early spring day Charon was in a strange mood also. The wind blowing off the mountain was heavy with fragrance. Odor of clover and hot meadow grass mingled with the cool smell of mountain trees—cedar and pine. And the warm wind was striped with a colder air—a whiff of the last snow clinging to the crags. It was a maddening incense. Charon drew great draughts of it into the bellows of his chest. Then it seemed that fragrance became song as the birds welcomed the day; meadowlark and blackbird and the silver-noted throstle.
Charon felt himself boiling with restlessness, the kind that could not be drained off by terrific labors. Using his muscles was not enough upon this day; he wanted to use more of himself. But what more was there? The question burned in him. To cool himself off he jumped into the river, and was seized by a strong undertow—something he had not known since he had begun working as a ferryman. It was sucking him under.
Snorting, he broached like a dolphin, arching up out of the water. When he fell back he was again clutched by the undertow, which had grown stronger. He was delighted to be fighting something. The thews of his back and upper arms writhed like serpents under his bronze skin as he cleaved the water with powerful strokes. He drew himself onto the wharf.
“Bravo!” said a thin voice. “You’re a marvelous swimmer.”
“Marvelous!” piped another voice. “A pleasure to watch you.”
Charon brushed the water from his eyes and saw two little people, very ancient, either twins or husband and wife who had grown to look exactly like each other—except for the long white beard worn by the man.
Charon pointed to the raft and across the river.
“Yes,” said the wife. “We’d like to cross, please.”
“What’s the fare?” asked the man.
Charon shrugged.
The woman unpinned a brooch from her tunic, her only ornament; it was made of bronze, with a tiny blue stone. Charon shook his head and motioned her to pin it back on. She smiled and fished into a small sack she was carrying. She took out a loaf of bread.
“New baked,” she said. “And delicious, if I say so myself.”
The man nodded and smiled greedily to show how good he knew it to be.
Charon took the bread, broke off half a loaf, and stuffed it into his mouth. He tore the rest of it in two and gave a piece to each of the old couple. They had no teeth but their gums seemed very tough, and they mumbled the bread hungrily as Charon helped them onto the raft and began rowing toward the far shore.
Then, Alpheus struck.
He hunched his mighty shoulders, twisting the river currents into a single taut sinew of water that slid under the raft and flipped it over. Alpheus chortled and spun about, churning the river into a gigantic whirlpool. The old folk were sucked under. Charon was swimming toward them as fast as he could when he saw them disappear.
Without hesitation, he dived after them. He was in a whirling funnel of water. He felt himself being spun violently, his head knocking against his knees. The brutal force behind the water made it seem solid, not liquid. Battered as Charon was, he kept churning his way toward where he saw the old man and old woman sinking, hands clasped. The thought that they loved each other so much that they couldn’t bear to be parted, even in death, filled him with a rage of pity—which turned into strength and allowed him to cleave the water toward them.
He reached them, tucked them under one arm, and kicked his way to the surface.
Alpheus couldn’t believe he hadn’t drowned them. He seized the three of them in a gigantic watery hand and swept them toward a rock. They were going with such speed that Charon knew that they would be crushed to a pulp against the boulder. Trying to slow himself, he sank under, drawing a huge breath before he submerged, holding one arm above the surface so that the old folk could cling to it.
He curled his legs as he went, and as soon as he felt his feet touch the rock, he uncoiled, exerting all his strength in one last desperate leap. He shot out of the water.
Still clutching the man and woman, he curved in the air and landed on the shore.
Alpheus hurled water after them, a heavy sheet of it, curling like an ocean breaker, but Charon jumped away, bearing the old couple far enough inland to be safe from the boiling river.
But when he set them gently on the grass, they felt like a bundle of wet rags, and he feared that, despite all his efforts, Alpheus had succeeded in drowning them.
Out of the rags sprouted a form. Charon gasped. It was not the old woman rising, but taller than her, taller than a young woman, taller than a man. A nymph. A meadow nymph with a mane of glossy chestnut hair and leaf-green eyes. She smiled at him and he felt the heat rising in his huge body, squeezing his windpipe, pressing his eyeballs.
He looked her up and down. Her bare feet spurned the rags. Her long, bronzed body gleamed with wetness. She cast a fragrance of sunshine and crushed mint. She seemed to be swaying closer without moving. For the first time in his life he felt himself trembling.
“Who are you?” he muttered.
“I am Menthe.”
“And the old woman?”
“What about her?”
“Who was she? Where is she?”
“Nowhere now. She was just a disguise.”
“And the old man?”
“Nowhere too. Part of the costume, you know.”
“I don’t know. Tell me: Why all this bother? Who were you trying to fool?”
“Enemies.”
“Who would try to harm you?”
“Those who try to harm my mistress. I serve a goddess who is feuding with someone even mightier than herself. She was afraid he would learn about my mission and send his creatures to catch me before I could get where I was going. Therefore did I travel as that feeble old couple you were so kind to.”
“And this form I see before me now—is this another disguise?”
“No. It is me, myself, as I am.”
“An improvement,” grunted Charon. “So have you gotten to where you’re going?”
“But why?”
“My mistress needs your assistance.”
“Didn’t you say she was a goddess?”
“I did.”
“Which one?”
“Demeter. The Barley Mother. Lady of the Harvest. Mistress of Growing Things.”
“Why should such a one need the help of a mere ferryman?”
“I don’t know. But she says she does. It is not for me to question her.”
“But it’s for me if she wants me to do something for her.”
“Indeed, yes. But she will tell you herself. We must go to her.”
“Where is she?”
“Eleusis.”
“A long journey.”
She smiled at him. “We shall travel together.”
“I’m ready.”
5
The Barley Mother
They passed through an empty landscape. No one was working the fields. No one was visible about the occasional farm hut, save one chained dog howling miserably. Charon thought that the people must have flocked to the village upon this day for some celebration. But when they came to the village, it too was empty; not even a dog to be seen.
Then, as they passed through the village into the fields again, Charon heard a seething murmur that grew louder and louder as they walked. It sounded like the surf battering cliffs, but they were far from the sea.
And then he saw where the people had gone. They were thronging a huge plain; in the middle of this plain sat a low hill. The people did not stand. Men, women, and children were crouched upon the ground, some kneeling, as if in worship, or fear, or both.
Now Charon saw what had brought them there and was pressing them to the ground. On the hill towered something tall—so tall that at first he mistook it for a tree. But as he walked through the kneeling people and came closer to the hill, he saw that it was an enormous female figure clad in flowing robes. Upon her head was a braided crown of flowers. She was shaking her long white arms, now roaring at the crowd, now seeming to scold the skies.
Monsters of Greek Mythology, Volume Two Page 41