The Ancient Ocean Blues

by Jack Mitchell

  “I’ve pricked my hand! Come on, Marcus, shuffle over toward me and use your teeth.”

  “I can’t chew through iron,” I said sulkily.

  “No doubt! You have to get one of my hairpins in your teeth and drop it into my hand, all right? As I was saying, in The Twice-Told Tale the heroine manages to escape from the pirates by using her hairpin to undo the cuffs! But I suppose you skipped that part!”

  There was nothing for it but to do as she said. I leaned over, bit into the hairbun, and felt the sharp metal hairpin. I was also blasted by a wave of perfume, which she must have applied to her hair liberally before her planned reunion with Spurinna. Gasping, I managed to get my teeth on the head of the pin, and then drew it slowly out from the thick bun. I turned my head, careful not to drop the pin, and let it fall into her outstretched hand.

  “There, not bad, Marcus!” she enthused. “I’m sorry I spoke so severely. But you see how useful my novels are, after all?”

  As she turned to free Homer’s hands and the lock gave a soft click, I had to admit that she had a point. In two minutes we stood stripped of our chains, rubbing our ankles and wrists, buried in the belly of the giant Sword of Cilicia. We waited for night to fall and then softly opened the cell door.

  The Forgotten Isle

  aulla snuffed the bronze lamp inside our prison and grabbed it. We crept under the low door, leaving the heavy togas and Paulla’s veil behind. The corridor was deserted. Everything was dark except to our left, farther aft, where a candle, encased in a thick orange glass, hung from the deckhead. By its glow we could see a hatchway at the end, with a steep stairway plunging below. Men were moaning underneath us: the galley slaves, presumably, sleeping fitfully at their oars. Yet the sound seemed to come from the ship itself, not from the downward opening.

  Paulla motioned for us to descend. We had no choice: the thought of going back the way we had come, up onto the main deck, into the arms of the Pirate Admiral, was too terrifying.

  Slowly, letting our feet search out each step, easing our weight from leg to leg, we passed to the deck below. It was an oar deck, and dark but for the dim moonlight peeking in from the oar ports in the ship’s sides. The ceiling was no more than four feet high. I expected the snoring and stench of the rowers, the shuffle of chains, but instead we felt the stillness of hollow, empty space. The quinquereme was shorthanded, and the pirates had kept this uppermost bank of oars unmanned.

  “Ow, oh,” came a sudden moan, right at our feet, followed by a sigh and sniffle. By the faint moonlight we could just discern that a man was lying sprawled across our path.

  Paulla, in front, did not hesitate. She crouched at the figure’s head, lifted her hand, and knocked the man’s head with the bronze lamp. There was an exhalation of breath and another deep sigh.

  “Step carefully!” she whispered.

  “Was that in The Twice-Told Tale too?” I asked.

  “I’m improvising,” came the soft response.

  Gingerly, stooping beneath the low deckhead, we stepped across the drunken pirate. I actually trod on his fingertip and had to catch myself against the beam to pull the weight off my foot at the last moment, but the pirate’s breathing never altered.

  The noises of the ship echoed eerily down the long, empty deck. As we picked our way between the oars (which were drawn inboard), the slightest scuff of our sandals seemed ten times magnified, and more than once we all froze in terror, certain that the pirates must have heard us. In turn, we could hear the rumble of the Pirate Admiral’s curses as he plotted strategy with his companions. From farther forward came echoes of drunken revelry – the pirates had plundered Pompey’s supply depot on Samos and were eating and drinking it all up. Beneath all of that was a low rumble, the snoring of two hundred slaves. Somewhere among them, I knew, was our dear Captain, but there was no hope of finding him there without being discovered ourselves.

  At last we reached midships. There, an oar had been removed and the oar port was open. I put my head out the side and saw the Hesiod floating a short distance away. There were no lights aboard. The little galley was perhaps thirty feet farther forward. Willing ourselves to go on, we reached a point we supposed must be level with the Hesiod’s stern.

  “We’ll have to use one of the oars,” I said quietly. “Lower it. Crawl down.”

  Paulla nodded. Homer did not.

  “Sir, I must remind you that I can’t swim!” he whispered loudly.

  “What do you mean?” I asked. “Keep your voice down!”

  “I mean, sir, that I had to use the bladder when we were shipwrecked! I am unable to swim!”

  “What do you do at the baths?” I whispered back.

  “I luxuriate, sir! In the hot, shallow pool!”

  “Don’t worry, Homer,” said Paulla softly. “Marcus and I will pull you, all right? But don’t splash, they’ll hear it!” She pointed upward.

  Homer clearly thought it was lunacy, which did give me pause for thought, but how else could we reach the Hesiod? Gently, we lifted an oar – it took all three of us, straining, to ease it up – and let it slide down, inch by inch, to the water. Its blade gave a gentle plop and then floated up, the shaft wedged at an angle into the oar port.

  “I’ll go first,” whispered Paulla. She hitched up her dress and ducked through the narrow opening. Then, wrapping her ankles and elbows around the shaft, she began to descend.

  “All right?” I asked Homer. He shivered, but agreed. I followed after him as soon as I heard the soft gurgle of Paulla sinking into the water by the oar blade.

  By Hercules, Homer took that oar slowly. You would never have called him athletic, but he certainly was methodical. He crept down, ankles clenched, as if his life depended on it, which in fact it did. My muscles were burning and my joints were aching by the time I joined them in the cold water of the bay. Gripping Homer by the collar, Paulla and I dragged him the short distance between the two ships, paddling with our limbs beneath the surface and with barely a sound to indicate our passage.

  Overhead loomed the stern of the Hesiod, far lower than the giant quinquereme. Still, its slick sides offered no grip for climbing hands. Instead, we had to feel our way down the length of the port side, with the Hesiod to hide us from the quinquereme, up to the ram at the bow. The pirate boarding-party had drawn in the oars, but our Athenian rowers were long gone. As we listened for sounds of life on board the galley, we heard nothing. The ram furnished just the extra few feet we needed to grab hold of the rail. Together, Paulla and I hauled Homer up.

  Shivering now, we crouched on the boarding deck, covered by the ballista. The Hesiod was well and truly deserted. The pirates were badly undermanned, and a twenty-oar galley was evidently not worth guarding. But they had taken all the stores.

  “We’ll have to use the sail,” I told Paulla. “But just a sliver of it, mind. We have to keep it quiet, we can’t outrun anybody. Three feet at most. Loosen the halyards and I’ll cut the anchor.”

  By now, we were a competent crew. I headed for the stern and loosened the knot on the anchor cord. This seemed to take forever, but I had no knife to cut it free and we could never pull the anchor in without crashing it against the side.

  At last the knot was free. The rope slipped and the Hesiod began to drift slightly. “Anchor away!” I called softly.

  Homer and Paulla let the yard drop just a few feet. At once we began to move forward. There was a faint lapping of water at the bow.

  “Shorten it!” I called.

  We slowed to a steady glide. I took the steering oar. A light wind was blowing from the island, directly off the starboard beam, and this made our first progress rather slow. With one trireme still blocking the rear, we would have to curve around to the left, across the bow of the second trireme. Then we could run with the wind. I warned my crew to be ready to shorten sail again, and began the long, steady turn through the pirate fleet.

  A burst of merriment and song shook the night. It came from inside the second trireme.
Its crew was apparently more drunk than the crew of the quinquereme. I gave it as wide a berth as I could and then headed for the mouth of the bay.

  The Sword of Cilicia was now behind us, and the drunken trireme nearly past. We were still going at a snail’s pace. I had to alter course again to get past a small bireme, and still there was no sign that we were noticed. The night was thick enough, but surely someone must wonder about the little galley separating itself from the fleet?

  At last we passed the final pirate vessel. The wind grew stronger as we neared the mouth of the bay. Paulla and Homer let the sail down to halfway and the water hissed as we picked up speed. The lights of the galleys behind us were fading now, lost in the distant lights of Samos.

  My crew bounded up to the steering oar.

  “Marcus, well done!” cried Paulla, wrapping her arms around me. Then she grabbed Homer by the shirt and shook him with excitement. “We did it, you crazy Greek, we did it! The Hesiod is ours!”

  Homer was grinning with relief. “It is something, isn’t it, to have stolen the same galley twice?”

  “It is indeed,” I agreed. “Especially when that galley’s as fine a ship as this.”

  Once we had calmed down, we discussed a course. Homer pointed out that the pirates would certainly sail around the eastern end of Samos, between the island and the great headland of Mount Mycale, if they were making for Miletus; consequently, we should steer clear of that. Rather we might retrace our steps along the north coast of the island and from there swing south and east.

  “But what if we come too late?” argued Paulla. “We have to tell Pompey about the pirate attack!”

  “We do have a good head start,” I countered. “Half the pirates will have headaches tomorrow. They can’t reach Pompey until the day after, surely?”

  In the end we agreed on Homer’s course. None of us wished to have a pirate fleet on our trail, and we might still reach Miletus in time to warn Pompey. No one had the courage to mention the Captain, but we could all imagine him there, somewhere in the flagship. It was heartbreaking to see his cushions still lying scattered about the poop deck.

  Our main problem was navigation. None of us had sailed to Miletus before, and the pirates had stolen the Captain’s charts. We knew, from our outward voyage, that we would have to find the channel south between Corassia and Samos, but from there our only idea was to go vaguely south-east.

  Homer, of course, volunteered to navigate. He claimed to have memorized his versified astronomical treatise, and he knew the constellations as we headed west with a good backing breeze. We sighted Mount Kerketeus before dawn, its peak of white chalk glimmering faintly in the moonlight; this marked the western end of the island. We steered south about its feet. As the light grew, we could tell we had come too close to the archipelago of Corassia, and we veered south-east.

  Then the wind died. It had carried us west alongside Samos and nearly to the open sea, but by mid-morning we lay becalmed. The square-rigged sail drooped from the yardarms, try as we might to stiffen it. The sky was free of cloud in every direction, save for a little pile off the tip of Kerketeus, still visible to the north-west. Another galley might have rowed its way onward, but the Hesiod had no such choice.

  Noon came and the afternoon dragged on. I slept in the cabin, telling Paulla to wake me if we moved, but when I opened my eyes again at dinnertime, I found that nothing had changed, except that we were all powerfully hungry and had nothing to eat. Homer tried praying to various wind gods, but either he misremembered the poems they preferred or they were busy elsewhere, blowing against a different galley’s sail.

  “Look at it this way,” I told Paulla, who had not stopped pacing and looking at the eastern horizon. “The pirates sail by the same winds as we do, don’t they?”

  “They’re not sailing at all,” she replied. “They’re rowing.” And I had to stop her from wasting her strength at an oar herself.

  At last, at dusk, a wind swept down from Mount Kerketeus. The sky was still clear, but the high airs were flowing fast. Perhaps a storm was brewing. Regardless, we adjusted the angle of the sail and soon were speeding south-east through the lowering night.

  Here Homer’s constellations failed us. He claimed that he had not studied that part of the astronomical treatise that dealt with the south-east at that time of year, and he began mistaking one set of stars for another, muttering verses under his breath all the while.

  “Confound it,” he whispered to himself, “is it the red star sunk beneath the belt, or beside the belt? Which is the belt? The thrice-bejeweled belt or the one with four? More that way, sir!”

  “Starboard?” I asked.

  “Yes, indeed, starboard. Does that look like a thrice-bejeweled belt to you, sir? Or would you say it’s more wan beneath the weight of heaven?”

  So much for the science of astronomy, I thought, and gave up wondering where we were. I knew that if we kept sailing we must reach civilization eventually, but how long could we last without food?

  Paulla’s keen eyes saw it first.

  “Marcus,” she said, hurrying back to the steering oar. She looked extremely tired. “Do you see that light over there?” She pointed through the night.

  “Off the port side?” I asked nautically

  “Right, over there, just by the sail. Isn’t that light, or are my eyes playing tricks?”

  By Hercules, it was light indeed – a minute point of light that was not a star. It was some miles away to the north, as best I could reckon – certainly not the great city of Miletus, but it might save us. We veered round, as close to the wind as we could, and after half an hour we could tell it was actually a cluster of lights above the line of the horizon.

  “It must be an island,” I said, “but I can’t see any land. We should slow down.”

  Coming closer, we discovered that the land was all too near. We were entering a broad bay, half a mile across, which split into three smaller bays. The light was coming from the hillside at the back of the largest of these, in the middle.

  “Must be a village,” Paulla said, and went to wake Homer, who had given up navigating in favor of sleep. The two of them searched the hold for something heavy and found a sack of rusty iron. Tying this to a length of rope, they made a new anchor. Meanwhile, the galley crept past the mouth of the bay and drew toward the steep hillside. I brought us in as close as I thought safe.

  “Lower the sail!” I called.

  “Sail down!” returned Paulla, loosing the halyards.

  “Anchor away!” I called.

  Homer dropped the anchor over the side. It struck bottom rather quickly. I was relieved to find that he had first attached one end of the rope to the galley.

  We agreed that Homer, who dreaded another encounter with the sea, would stay and guard the galley while Paulla and I swam to shore and explored.

  We dove over the side with a splash. The bay was slimy and thick with seaweed, but we managed to get ashore in the dark. I had forgotten that Paulla was such a strong swimmer. At the end of the bay we found a short pier, but we could see no boats tied up alongside. The hillside rose steeply from the beach, and from where we stood we could no longer see the yellow light.

  “There must be a path,” remarked Paulla, and sure enough we found one at the end of the pier. It went up in short zigzags, just gentle enough for a donkey to climb. After we had reached the second turn, we heard a burst of merry song from the village above – and the sound of a drum.

  “Is it Greek?” I asked.

  “I can’t tell,” whispered Paulla. “We should be careful.”

  “Why, yes, it is one of our favorite songs,” said a man’s voice, in Greek, from close by.

  We spun around, but there was no one there.

  “I’m above you! Hello! Look up!” called the voice again. “It’s a steep path. Hold on, we shall come down to you!”

  A moment later, two men came jogging down the path and turned the corner above us. They were wearing sheepskin coats and w
ere clean shaven. On their heads they wore broad, flat-brimmed hats. Each of them had a dagger at his waist, but their hands were spread in welcome.

  “Strangers!” cried one of them, an older man with gray hair. “Welcome to our little island! It is long since anyone came across the wine-dark sea to us.” The men reached us and clasped my hand firmly in theirs. When they noticed that Paulla was a girl, they took off their hats and bowed. Then they presented us each with a gift of welcome – one pear each. These were round, glossy, and firm.

  “Thank you,” I replied self-consciously.

  “We heard the splashes in the bay,” said the younger man eagerly. “And we thought you were seeking refuge from the storm.”

  “Storm?” I asked.

  “There will be a storm tonight,” replied the older man. “And then it will be a night indeed. Now keep no ships upon the wine-dark sea…”

  “…but surely stick to land, as I decree,” finished the younger man. They both laughed. “Not bad, eh, stranger? Of course, one expects good advice from the poet.”

  “The poet?” I asked sharply.

  “Hesiod, sir, the prince of poets,” replied the old peasant gravely. “Very well put, wouldn’t you say?”

  A lunatic thought crossed my mind. “Kind sirs,” I began, “may I inquire as to the name of this island?”

  “This island, stranger? Why, have you no chart, or has it been so long that the world has forgotten us? You have reached the island of Tragias, my friend, famous for its pears. And rightly so, as you can… But where is she going?” he cried in alarm.

  Paulla had given me her pear, turned right round, and bolted down the path. The peasants looked at me in astonishment as she disappeared into the darkness.

  “Why,” exclaimed the young man, “surely that’s rather unfair. How can we have such a bad reputation, when no one ever comes here?”

  We stood in uncomfortable silence. A splash from below, magnified by the encircling hills, indicated that Paulla had jumped into the water again and was swimming back to the Hesiod. I munched my pear, which was indeed delicious. The peasants strained their ears. There came the sounds of a struggle aboard the ship. Homer was protesting. Then we heard a tremendous splash, followed by cries for help, and another, gentler splash as Paulla dived in after him.