Arcadian Nights

by John Spurling

  Minos looked at him steadily and nodded.

  ‘How strange fate is! If your people had not murdered my son I might never have met a man I would so gladly make my son-in-law.’

  ‘I will take the word for the deed.’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘I will think of Ariadne as my reward if I overcome the Minotaur.’

  ‘But even if you do, I cannot give her to you.’

  ‘I understand that. Even great kings are not free to do exactly as they wish, but everyone may try, as in a labyrinth, to find some way out.’

  Minos laughed and put his hand on Theseus’ shoulder as he sent him out to the soldiers in the corridor who were to conduct him to the labyrinth.

  ‘You deserve your reward.’

  The labyrinth was on the opposite side of the palace from the arena where the festivities were held. The ground fell away steeply there towards the River Kairatos, allowing Daidalos to construct high walls without impeding any of the views from the palace. Unless one went up on to the palace roof, as Pasiphaë habitually did, one would scarcely be aware of the labyrinth’s existence. She was there today, of course, eager to see her terrible son destroy the upstart prince from Athens whom she both fancied sexually and disapproved of as a too attractive and so far too successful enemy. She had been one of those watching the wrestling match who sided entirely with Tauros and resented his humiliating defeat. She insisted that both Ariadne and Phaedra should accompany her on to the roof, wanting them to see the cocky conqueror brought low. This was not at all where Ariadne had planned to be and she was forced to disobey her father’s instructions by swearing her sister to secrecy and revealing that she meant to help Theseus escape. Phaedra promised to distract her mother while Ariadne went down to unbolt the door to the labyrinth, once Theseus, as she hoped against hope, had overpowered the monster.

  The heavy bronze door was opened by the soldiers and Theseus walked through into a dark lateral corridor. He waited to hear that the bolts outside had been shot before removing his robe, sticking Ariadne’s golden pin firmly into the ground and tying the loose end of one of his balls of thread to it. As he did so, a bull roared somewhere in the distance. Minotauros, as his relations called him, had heard the door bolted and was looking forward to his lunch. Unwinding the tethered ball of thread with one hand and holding the second ball in his armpit, Theseus set off down the corridor to his right, feeling his way along the wall with his free hand, making no sound with his bare feet. He did not want to be surprised by the creature in a dark, narrow corridor, where Minotauros would have the advantage of his strength and of being long accustomed to the layout as well as the lack of light, but to find his way to one of the larger, lighter spaces, preferably that in the middle, which Daidalos had told him was the largest and fully open to the sky. Theseus had got quite far into the labyrinth, turning left and right alternately, when he heard Minotauros roar again, this time from somewhere behind him. He had probably reached the door and been disappointed not to find his victim cowering there.

  Some of the corridors Theseus turned into were blind alleys. On these occasions he rewound the thread as he retraced his steps, not wishing either to waste thread or to come that way again. His eyes were well accustomed to the darkness now, but the part of the labyrinth he had reached was often roofless, so that some light reached even the darker passages. He heard Minotauros roar again, louder and closer, and after some time, as he thought he must be nearing the centre of the labyrinth, a faint scuffling sound several passages away, as if the monster in his haste to find his victim was brushing against the walls. Theseus had several times recently come across bones discarded on the floor and soon the passages were littered with them. He must, he thought, be approaching the centre. The scuffling was now much closer, and as he returned from a blind alley into the passage he had just left, Theseus realised that Minotauros had turned into the same passage. Theseus quickly went back into the blind alley and pressed himself against the wall, breathing as quietly as he could and hoping that his pursuer didn’t have a sharp sense of smell. Minotauros passed without noticing him and went on down the corridor. Theseus followed him, pursuer now rather than pursued, catching glimpses of his quarry from time to time in the places where it was lighter, but always staying well back.

  Just as he was in sight of an open, rectangular space, Theseus’ thread ran out. He quickly knotted its end to the loose end of the second ball and continued warily towards the open space. There was no sign of Minotauros and Theseus hung back in case his enemy was lying in wait in one of the three passages leading off the space. But then he heard him roaring some way ahead and the faint answering cries of a woman. He was probably complaining to his mother on the palace roof that he was hungry and the cow or goat or human sent in for him had not materialised. Theseus, paying out his thread, carefully stepping round the bones on the floor, turned and turned again – he had long since lost any sense of orientation – towards the sound.

  Beginning to feel tired now from the constant tension of concentrating and a little unnerved by the evidence of all his predecessors’ fate, he wished he had accepted Ariadne’s offer of a weapon. She had wanted to give him a knife to tie to his upper arm where it would be concealed by the sleeve of the robe, but he had refused. Why? He had some scruple about an unfair fight, perhaps not wanting to assassinate Minos’ stepson as his son Androgeos had been assassinated on the road out of Athens. This scruple now seemed ridiculous. What was fair about being introduced into this labyrinth to feed a ravenous monster, what was fair about fourteen young Athenians every year being submitted to the same horrible treatment? Minos’ kingdom must be among the most advanced and civilised in the world, but this aspect of it was wholly primitive and if Minos himself, as he had hinted, did not approve of it, why didn’t he stop it? He, Theseus, owed nothing in the way of fairness to any of these people, except Ariadne, and by not accepting the knife he had put her future in jeopardy as well as his own.

  The bull’s roaring had ceased and Theseus, not knowing now whether Minotauros was still in front of him or might not, following a different route, have got behind him again, proceeded with great caution, constantly glancing back and looking round every corner before he turned it. It was as well he did, since he suddenly saw, at the end of the passage he was about to enter, a huge shape blocking the daylight beyond. Minotauros, he realised, was almost as broad and high as the passage itself. No wonder he made a noise brushing the walls and disturbing the bones on the floor when he was in a hurry! Theseus drew his head back and retreated, looking for a side passage to hide in. Given the monster’s size, it would be disastrous to meet him anywhere but in the open centre of the labyrinth. But there was no side passage and the scuffling and rattle of bones were growing louder. He was coming.

  Theseus went quickly back to the corner and got down on the floor on his hands and knees across the passage in the darkest place. Now he could hear the bull’s breath, a snorting and sniffing amplified by the enclosing walls. But as Minotauros turned the corner, peering no doubt down the length of the corridor and not at the ground, his shins met the kneeling Theseus and he fell headlong over him with a fearful roar of shock and anger. Theseus was up in a moment and running down the passage towards the daylight. As he emerged into a large, square, open space – surely the centre he had been looking for – with the sun overhead, Minotauros was already on his feet and racing after him. Theseus ran to the far corner of the square, hearing as he did so an excited cry from Pasiphaë on the palace roof far above:

  ‘You’ve got him, my beauty!’

  Minotauros, as he came out into the sunlight, turned his great white bull’s head upwards and waved one of his human arms in acknowledgement, then, seeing Theseus, roared in triumph, put down his head and charged across the square, kicking aside the bones which were scattered all around. Up above, Pasiphaë accompanied his deep roaring with shrill screams of delight and encouragement. Theseus waited until the last moment and dived aside
. Minotauros ran, horns first, into the wall and as he recoiled and shook his head, less with pain than surprise, Theseus struck the back of his head with a long leg bone he had found on the ground nearby. Again Minotauros shook his head, but more as if a fly had settled there than as if he had been dealt a blow which might have killed an ordinary man. Then, turning more swiftly than Theseus expected and lashing out with one arm, he knocked his adversary sideways and sent the bone flying out of his hands. Pasiphaë on the roof of the palace could be heard screaming with joy as Minotauros stood over Theseus and bent forward to thrust his horns into him. Theseus, unable to get to his feet in time, seized the monster’s left ankle and tugged it towards him. Minotauros staggered but kept his balance and one of his horns gouged a long wound in Theseus’ calf. Theseus, meanwhile, had regained his feet and, hardly yet noticing any pain in his leg, leapt on to Minotauros’ back, crossing his legs round Minotauros’ belly at the same time as getting his arms round his neck. Minotauros roared and tried to shake off his incubus, then backed towards the wall to scrape him off, but Theseus, squeezing the human diaphragm with his legs and the bull’s throat with his arms, hung on and could hear Minotauros gagging.

  Now, in a desperate effort to free himself, Minotauros ran into the nearest passage, where, unbalanced by the weight on his back and the terrible pressure on his throat and diaphragm, he stumbled over a human skull and fell forwards on to his knees. Theseus quickly unclasped his legs and, moving forward to sit astride the monster’s shoulders, exerted all his remaining strength on the windpipe. Minotauros was already too weak to rise and at last his feeble struggles ceased and he collapsed and lay flat on the floor of the passage. But Theseus did not release his grip on the windpipe until he was sure no breath remained. Then at last he stood up, rolled the huge body over and made sure the heart had stopped beating. For a moment he thought of going out into the open square and raising his arms in triumph for the benefit of Pasiphaë, whose cries of malicious pleasure at what she believed would soon be Minotauros’ victory had stopped when he entered the passage out of her sight. But no, he decided, it was better no one should know the outcome of the fight until he had time to reach the door of the labyrinth, which Ariadne had promised to unbolt as soon as she heard Theseus tap on it three times.

  The only problem now was that he had dropped his ball of thread as he emerged from the passage on the far side of the square, and if he were not to show himself in the open he must follow the passage he was in and find his way back to the original passage, where he could pick up the ball and, winding it up as he went, retrace all the twists and turns he had taken through the labyrinth. He didn’t think that would be too difficult.

  But it was. The passage he was in turned away from the direction of the passage where his ball of thread lay and Theseus, taking further turns which he thought should lead him back, lost all sense of direction. He must, he thought, since he didn’t pick up his thread in any of these passages, be in the eastern part of the labyrinth, on the far side of the central square from the way he had come in. He cursed Daidalos for the ingenuity of his design and himself for not using some of the discarded bones to mark the ends of passages he had already traversed. The absence of bones now suggested that he was far away from the centre where Minotauros had evidently spent most of his time. From time to time he passed through roofless corridors, but the walls were too high and the corridors too narrow for him to be able to see the sun, which must now be beyond its zenith, and reorientate himself. He did not despair, certain that at some point he must either come back to the centre or to a passage where he had passed with his thread, but he was deadly tired and his gashed calf throbbed with pain.

  In the meantime Ariadne had slipped away from her mother and sister on the palace roof. They had seen Minotauros leave the central square and enter the passage with Theseus on his back and Pasiphaë at least seemed to assume that her son would soon drag his victim out into the open again and begin to devour him. Ariadne feared she might be right, but when neither of them emerged, she began to hope for a better outcome. Her hopes rose higher as time passed and there was no sound or sign of either Minotauros or Theseus. Phaedra took over the task of trying to calm the increasingly querulous Pasiphaë.

  Ariadne went first to Minos’ study to report what she had seen. Her father thought that since neither had emerged, Theseus was likely to have been the victor, though he conceded that both might be dead or even still struggling or pursuing one another through the labyrinth.

  ‘And what if Theseus is dead?’ she asked.

  ‘Then all our plans are likewise dead,’ said Minos. ‘You will not go to Athens, having no husband to go with. The seven Athenian girls must remain in the palace and the six youths in prison. If Minotauros is also dead, perhaps they will escape death, but we will either sell them as slaves or keep them here in our own service. Meanwhile, you must be ready to open the door in case Theseus has indeed conquered, but if he has not come out by nightfall you had better return to me and I will cancel the secret arrangements I have made for releasing the prisoners and conveying them to the harbour.’

  So Ariadne went to the door of the labyrinth and waited between hope and despair. If Theseus had won, why had his thread not brought him quickly back to the door? But if Theseus had lost, why was her mother on the palace roof constantly calling out for her son? They must, she decided, both be dead or fatally injured, and for her that was as bad an outcome as if Theseus had lost. Hours passed and the sun began to set. Ariadne prayed to Aphrodite, goddess of love, begging her to be kind to two lovers and promising to sacrifice to her as soon as their ship reached land. Aphrodite heard, no doubt, but knowing these lovers’ future knew also that her kindness could only store up heartbreak for Ariadne.

  Night came down and Ariadne, stiff and sorrowful, was about to leave her post and go to her father when she heard, very faintly, a tap on the door, then another, then a third. Joyfully, her blood racing, her eyes pouring tears, she drew back the bolts and pushed the heavy door open. There he was, Theseus! She took him in her arms, but they nearly fell together. He could scarcely stand. For the last many hours he had been limping on his inflamed leg, sometimes crawling, sometimes supporting himself on the walls, through Daidalos’ fiendish invention, and by the time he at last found his thread he was almost too exhausted and feverish to go any further. Taking time only to support him to the top of the steps that led up from the labyrinth and help him to a dark angle of the palace building where no one could see him, Ariadne ran to her father, afraid that he might already have cancelled all the arrangements for their escape. She found him on the point of doing so, but hearing of Theseus’ wound he told Ariadne to fetch medicines, salves and bandages before leading the Athenian girls out of the palace to the rendezvous near the prison. He himself would fetch Theseus.

  Half sitting, half lying in his dark corner and seeing not Ariadne but a man standing over him, Theseus thought some soldier must have come to arrest him and struggled to his feet so as to fight him off. But the man, an old man, unarmed, retreated a few steps and said quietly:

  ‘Not quite the shades yet, Theseus, though dark enough. I have come to help you. You’ve killed my ugly stepson, I suppose, and you shall have your reward, but you must be careful what you say afterwards. Put the blame on Ariadne, or give her the credit, but never let it be known that Minos had any hand in your escape!’

  Theseus, limping painfully with his arm round the king’s shoulders to a place where Ariadne was waiting with balm and dressings for his wound, beside two covered carts containing the seven girls and six youths from Athens, could hardly believe this was not a dream. Perhaps he had dreamed the labyrinth and the encounter with the Minotaur, perhaps he would wake up to find it was still the night before his ordeal and all was still to be gone through. Only half-conscious as he was lifted into the cart, he thought he heard Minos say:

  ‘The gods go with you, Theseus, as they clearly have been with you. I believe Poseidon meant to for
give me my long-ago mistake and sent you for the purpose. May he give you calm seas and fair winds for Athens!’

  He did not hear Minos take tender leave of his daughter, nor see him walk quietly away in the darkness towards the palace, where he was greeted by the violent grief of his wife who had been brought off the roof by Phaedra but was now convinced that her son was dead. But where was Phaedra to comfort her? Minos had the palace searched, but she was not to be found. He guessed then that she had gone with the Athenian girls and would already be on-board the ship and sailing out of the harbour. For a moment or two he considered ordering his own ships to overtake it and bring her back, but how could he do so without bringing back Ariadne, Theseus and the Athenians too? No, he must wait until morning before sending his fleet in pursuit or all his plans for Ariadne’s future and the future of relations with Athens would go awry.

  So Theseus had gone off with both his daughters. He smiled, was almost inclined to laugh. The gods were so tricky. They gave with one hand what they took away with another. A white bull which you failed to sacrifice led to a bull-headed stepson, whose long-awaited removal gave you a husband for your daughter, but lost you another daughter. And what on earth would the foolish Phaedra do now, an unmarried girl in a foreign city? And what could he do to placate the desolated Pasiphaë? It was no laughing matter.

  6. THE ISLAND

  The Athenian ship headed due north through the night and was well clear of Crete by dawn. Theseus himself was still feverish, watched over by Ariadne. She did not reveal to the master of the ship that her father had not only authorised but assisted their escape, so that the sailors as well as the former prisoners were constantly expecting pursuit and, since there was little wind to fill the black sails, rowed with special vigour. The seven Athenian girls even took turns with the youths, but could not quite understand in the darkness why there seemed to be eight of them. Only when it grew light did they see that their extra companion was Minos’ daughter Phaedra and, fearing that she was a spy and would somehow bring about their recapture, wanted to throw her overboard. The sailors and youths, however, protected her and Phaedra explained that she had known of the plans for the escape and had helped her sister, so that she would herself have been punished once the escape became public.