Electra

by Henry Treece

  After I had drunk deeply and often at the howl, I said to her, ‘What must I do now, mother? I am like a ship without a steersman,

  I do not know which way to turn in the storm that has suddenly blown over me. I am like old Jason.’

  Clytemnestra stroked my head and smiled, as though she was secretly pleased that I still must ask her advice. She said, ‘You must stay in High Town for a while, under guard. If you go out, the common people will hurt you, that much is certain. Wait till their temper has died down, and, if there is still anything to nurse, then nurse Aegisthus. Let it be known that you care for him. after all; let it be thought that you do penance for this day’s mistake. Then, as soon as it is safe, be away to Delphi by night, along the narrow roads, and ask the god what is best for you. I can advise no more than that. Perhaps he will tell you where Orestes and Hermione are, at the same time. Then you can bring them back and we may restore some of the old order in this city. Have no fear about going, I shall not die yet awhile. This much I know; that I shall live to see my son again. It was told me in a dream last night.’

  I bowed before her and went to see if the citizens had carried Aegisthus back into the palace.

  29

  He lay in the dark for weeks, shrinking like a wine-skin that is too porous and lets the liquid flow away gradually. His own skin lay about him white and wrinkled. His bed now smelled of his wound.

  The doctors put a paste into the hole, of curdled milk, honey, bull’s blood and horn-shavings. They said that what caused it would cure it. Tyndareus always stood there, glowering at me, his hand on his dirk, angry that I should even be allowed into the king’s room.

  At first I was not permitted to go near him; but after a while they were glad to have someone to change the dirty wrappings, and they let me do it, though it made me retch every time, until at last the hole began to skin over.

  He was a long while before he would talk to anyone, much less to me, but one day, when we were alone, he stared at me thoughtfully and said in his hoarse voice, ‘Very well, Electra; you have had your way, and you see what has come of it. Now are you content?’

  I bowed my head and said, ‘You will have me killed, father, is that it?’

  Aegisthus seemed to like me calling him father; it was a good touch, I thought secretly, because he almost smiled, then answered, ‘No, daughter. I shall not have you killed, because what you did, you did in ignorance. Besides, there has been blood enough spilled between our families, and it is time for that to stop. Unless we hold together, we shall all perish. I hear that wild men, savages from the north, are moving down all the while towards Mycenae. They call themselves Dorian, and their one desire is to sweep us all away— Cretan, Mycenaeans, Laconians—as though we had never been. When I am well again, I shall try to bargain with them until I can be sure of the New Army once more. Then, perhaps, we will see whether we can drive these incomers back to the sea, and start the world afresh.’

  He began to groan soon after this, and I had to leave him in his doctor’s hands, for I did not wish it to be thought that I had poisoned him.

  I told the queen what he had said. She smiled her withered smile and said, ‘All my lifetime there have been rumours of Dorian coming down to sack Mycenae. When I was a little child, no older than the girl Helen, my dreams were full of Dorian. I used to think they had four eyes, beaks like eagles, and great claws on their hands and feet! But they have not come yet—and I sometimes wonder if they are anything but the dark visions of poets, who try to keep men in order by telling them frightening things.’

  Later I told Aegisthus something of what my mother had said. He smiled painfully then answered, ‘So the queen says they are a dream? Well, you shall see one of them, then you will know. Of course, he is only an envoy from their king, not a great lord himself, but he will at least prove that Dorian exist.’

  He knocked on the gong that stood beside his bed, near the tripod that burned continually, and two soldiers came in with a man between them.

  ‘Here is a Dorian,’ said Aegisthus, pointing.

  The servants drew back a window curtain so that I should see the visitor more clearly. He stood no higher than my shoulder, but he was enormous in his girth, and made more frightening by the bundle of sheepskin that he wore as a tunic. His hair was as white as flax and hung in plaits on either side of his broad head, bound round with wire. His pale blue eyes stared out of his red, scarred face; his fringe of beard was so thick that it looked like the brush the grooms use to polish horses’ hides. His hands were so big and red, with their nails black and broken, that I shuddered to think of them touching any part of me.

  He was bow-legged from much riding, and he bore a broad sword, wrapped in a calfskin scabbard, that reached almost to his ankles.

  Over his shoulders he wore a cloak made up of patchwork, of cloths of all sorts, but so threadbare and torn that no beggar in Mycenae would have been seen out in it.

  When he took his hand from his face, I saw that he had a little length of ivory pushed through his nose, and sticking out on each side. It gave him a savage look, wherever he turned.

  A heavy musty smell followed him., as though, like the lynx, he had his own especial odour, as though he was different from other men.

  I wondered what manner of language such a beast would use— would he bark like a dog, mew like a cat, or bellow like a bull?

  Instead, he spoke to me, smiling grimly, in a tongue that I understood almost without effort. It was like our own tongue, save that some of the words were twisted round, as though he spoke with a pebble in his mouth. He said, ‘Greetings, goddess. Now I have seen all the treasure of Mycenae! What they say of you, up in the hills of Othys, is no lie; you are the most comely of the Hellene women. That is what they say, and what you are.’

  He held out his hand to me and, shrinking, I took it. It was as hard and cold as stone. He pinched my fingers together, as though he meant to crush them, but I do not think he even knew that he was hurting me. He was used to holding things like that, rolling them in his great hands, letting his fingers think for him, letting them discover what it was they grasped.

  I did not cry out. I decided that I must keep still and smile, whatever he did to me, to show him that I was truly the goddess and no ordinary woman. Even when he put his big hand on my breast I stood still. He did not pinch any more, but bowed his head and took his fierce hand away, like a leopard withdrawing its paw after touching a dead deer.

  Then he turned to Aegisthus and said, ‘This woman would be right for my master, the king. You swear on oath that she is from the loins of Agamemnon?’

  Aegisthus nodded as solemnly as his pain would let him and said, ‘She is of the blood of Atreus and is out of the body of Clytemnestra. The court scribes shall write down her pedigree before the day is over, if your king wishes it.’

  The Dorian walked round me and touched me here and there, like a farmer at a market. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘my master would want such a pedigree, in case he needed to sell her again. Our people drive hard bargains, and they must always know what it is they are buying.’

  As he spoke, I began to see the manner of revenge Aegisthus was working out for me; but I stood quite still, listening to my inner voice that told me all would be well, if I could wait.

  Then Aegisthus said, ‘And what is more, no man has had her. She would come fresh to your master, ready for his breaking-in, like an untamed horse.’

  The Dorian threw back his shaggy head and laughed harshly. ‘Zeus,’ he said, ‘do you think we set any store by such things? Among my people not a woman goes untrained after she is ten years old. When such folk as we are on the move, we do not delay. We take it as it comes, and no one thinks the worse of a girl who has learned her work. I ask you, King of Mycenae, do you demand that each cup you drink from shall come to your lips unused by any before you? Well, it is the same with wives, and every other thing. See, this sword I wear has been through a hundred hands. It is a good sword; it will strike off a pig
’s head at one blow. Now, should I not be a fool if I refused this sword because others had used it?’

  He bent over Aegisthus and put a great hand on the king’s bony chest. ‘Look you, man,’ he said, laughing, ‘if I have the taking of this goddess back to my king, I shall not be slow, nor will all my fellow-riders. It would be waste not to; and my master will expect it to have been done. So speak no more to me of these pretty ways of your people. There is no place for them in the hard life we Dorian lead.’

  The man left soon afterwards, to go back to his skin tent outside the city walls. When he had gone, I said to Aegisthus, ‘So, that is the sort of peace you will make with the incomers? You will use me as your bargaining coin.’

  He lay back on his pillow, with his hands under his head, and said softly, ‘It is nothing. You make too much of these slight affairs. Suppose you go to their king, it will not be all loss to you. You will be a queen, and will rise in greatness as your husband rises. I am offering you a new life and a new fame, Electra. Besides, suppose you do not like the Dorian king when you meet him—well, it would be a small thing for you to come to some arrangement. They are a simple folk, and you are a clever girl. Let us say that you might give him the sort of drink that would keep him quiet thereafter, and so find yourself another husband, if the worst came to the worst.’

  I did not know what to do when he said these things. I think that if I had had a knife, I might have risked all and have used it on Aegisthus as he lay smiling up at me from his bed. But his guards always searched me for weapons when I went to visit him, so I was harmless. All I could do then was to weep, though it shamed me to sink so low.

  After a short while he reached out his hand and patted me on the side. ‘There,’ he said, ‘I know what is in your mind. You are thinking that a rough Dorian husband would not be so sweet a lover as Hermione. But you must not let such fancies keep you from your greatness. You will find, among the Dorian women, others of the same taste as yourself, others who know a way of passing the time while their lords are away burning and stealing. After all, my dear, what you have discovered with your cousin is no magic; it is not yours alone. Consider the Amazons, who have known how to live without men since the world began. No, girl, your secret is shared by thousands, and has been since Hera first quarrelled with Zeus!’

  I left his room and went back to my mother, for I could stand no more of his wicked talk. From his mouth, even the sweetest love seemed to turn sour and bitter. His words laid dirt on everything, and I could not tolerate it.

  I told Clytemnestra what had been said, and she answered thus:’ We have come to the breaking-point again, daughter. We have come to a place in the weaving where we cannot see what the god means by his pattern. Aegisthus is more powerful now, flat on his back with the hole in him, than he ever was running about on two legs. That is often the way of life; it is the unexpected that happens. I thought all would be well once we had buried Agamemnon and set the great stone over him. Then, I thought, we could work together and wear Aegisthus down, as water does a stone. But it is not as easy as I thought. You see, I have lost my own children, and have gained only one of his. And in gaining his child, I have lost my strength and am an old woman. Now, unless we can do something quickly, I shall lose you; and shortly, the fool Aegisthus will lose Mycenae to the Dorian—for, mark my words, those beasts will come here whether you marry their king or not. They are not like us Achaeans—they do not abide by the bargains they make. You cannot bargain with a lion or a snake, and Dorian are like lions or snakes. They are not men, as we know men, my dear.’

  I sat down and wept. I said,’ In my lifetime, short as it has been, the world has changed, mother. Our family has fallen apart; Hellas has fallen apart; and soon even this great palace may crumble and be grown over by the weed, so that later men may never find it.’

  Clytemnestra answered,’ These things are always happening, my child. See, King Priam of Troy must have thought that his city would last until the world ended in a clap of thunder—yet our own men dragged down its walls. Men who once drilled here, outside our house, with their chariots and their javelins. It is the law of the gods that things must change, just as the seasons change, just as the trees change, as the seas and the skies change.’

  When this did not stop my weeping, she said, ‘Consider, daughter, that Priam’s Troy, great as it seemed, was only one of many Troys. There had been others before it; others which lay under Priam’s Troy, and on which his city was built. Perhaps other Troys will one day grow upon the city your father dragged down, who knows? And perhaps there will be another Mycenae when we are gone. Another Hellas, another Electra, another Clytemnestra…. Others again and again, who will carry on the story that the god wishes to tell himself, just as the weaving-women work and work away to make a piece of cloth that will tell all that there is to know, for ever and ever. All things are timeless, daughter. It is only we who weep; the god does not weep, because he knows, to the end of time, that life must go on and on, and the same stories be told and told again. To him, Cretan, Hellenes, Minyans, Egyptians, Dorian, Libyans, Hittites, are all small grains of sand in a long shore that reaches out of sight. Now do you see why you should not weep today?’

  I rose and dried my eyes and nodded. ‘I see, mother. You are wiser even than I thought. Now, tell this small grain of sand what she must do.’

  The queen half-rose upon her elbow and, with a great effort, since her talking had tired her, said, ‘This very night, take two horses, one for you and one for Rarus; and go, cloaked, to Delphi. There, ask the pythoness what is best for us all. That is the only counsel I can give you, Electra.’

  I knelt and kissed her burning hand. ‘I will do as you say, mother,’ I answered. ‘Now that you have spoken to me, I feel stronger in my purpose once again.’

  She nodded and settled back to sleep. ‘Have no fear, daughter,’ she whispered. ‘I shall be here, and Mycenae shall still be standing, when you return, though your journey will be a long one.’

  30

  Delphi was not, then, as you know it now, doctor. Not tumble-down shacks and grass-grown streets, but tall white columns along the gullies in the rocks, and doves fluttering above the many shrines. An expensive place to stay in, with rich Egyptian and Assyrian Night-seers putting the prices up everywhere.

  Old veterans who had fought at Troy lay about the streets showing their stumps of limbs and begging for offerings in their rusted helmets, claiming to have been the first through the great gates in that wooden horse they all boasted of, and which, if the truth were told, was only another of the poets’ lies.

  Three years and the pythoness wouldn’t say a word. A drunken old woman, once a licensed girl at the Mother Shrine down the street from the grotto of Apollo, but now so worn that only the beggar veterans went to her.

  ‘No, lady, I cannot hear anything coming up about your brother.’

  Another month. ‘No, dear, the god is asleep today. He won’t say a word about Aegisthus.’

  The next year. ‘Oh, but you’ve asked about Hermione so often, the god is weary of your questions. Look, I can tell you where there is one, a black-skinned girl from Colchis. Now if I say the word, she will… oh, you Mycenaeans, always in a hurry…

  All wastes, is used up, the substance withers.

  ‘Rarus, the landlord threatens to kick us out tomorrow if the rent is not paid, and we have pawned everything that would raise the price of our lodging. What shall we do?’

  ‘Lady, who am I to advise you? I will see if I can find out in the tavern room. Yes, I will be careful, I know what these Egyptians are.’

  Then that evening; ‘Lady, the landlord says it can be done easily. In your goddess-dress, at the Shrine of Via, where the cypress avenue ends, they need a new one there. All comers, I am afraid. But the money’s good. The Shrine takes half and you have the other half to pay him off with.’

  ‘Look, Rarus, it is not that I have any feelings about all comers. This thing means nothing to me in itself;
but I will not sell it for the Shrine and for him. What I do is for love, for the sweet song of it all. Hermione would be able to understand what I mean. Oh, god, where is she? That crafty old pythoness will not speak a word. She always wants more and more for her fee, and never tells anything. Our room is littered with the shards she has scribbled on, and not one gives an answer I can understand.’

  After a long silence, with the sheep bleating up from the street, white lambs being driven in at night for the pilgrims to buy as offerings at dawn: ‘Lady, there is another way, though I hesitate to speak of it.’

  ‘Dear boy, dear, dear boy, tell me. You know that I regard you as my brother; my brother who knows me through and through, and from whom I keep no secrets. Tell me, I beg you.’

  ‘Then, lady, there is a place where the four roads meet, at the entrance to Delphi, where the travellers lay down their loads before they start the last trudge into the town. There is a little old stone, an ancient altar. It struck me yesterday, as I was looking round, that anyone who set up shop there would catch the traffic before it got into the town and spent at the stalls and market-place. The simple folk would jump at it, half-starved from the deserts and mountains they must cross getting here.’

  ‘But, Rarus, my dear, I don’t know if I dare. It is one thing at the festivals, when all are blind with wine; but in the broad daylight, in public, among crowds, that would be shameful, surely? I could not bring myself to it, and they would want their money back. Oh, Rarus, to have been here three years, and still to be so silly! Tell me, brother, what must I do?’