The Orpheus Descent

by Tom Harper

  Did you ever wonder why the world doesn’t look backwards at night, if we’re seeing it all by reflected light? It was the sort of question Adam often asked back in Oxford.

  He remembered Ren in the hotel mirror, and shivered. In a backwards world you couldn’t trust anything.

  The light he’d seen from the beach glowed through the trees ahead. Jonah tugged Ren’s T-shirt, but she shook her head and kept going. Jonah hung back. He thought he saw the outlines of a figure behind the light, a tall man standing stock still. Was he holding a gun?

  The trees ended and he saw clearly. The light was a sunken floodlight shining out of the ground; the figure a statue in front of a ten-foot wall. Even on his pedestal, he was barely taller than Jonah: a grotesque dwarf with a pug nose, bulbous cheeks, a cheeky grin and an erect penis that almost touched his chin. Two goat horns curled back out of his forehead, and he held a set of reed panpipes.

  In daylight, the statue might have been comic – endearing, even. The contrast between the erection, bursting with hope, and the sad ugly body was almost pathetic. But in the flare of the floodlight, the face became cocky and cruel. The phallus wasn’t desire, but a threat. And the dark wall behind him looked impassable.

  ‘Where now?’

  A warm breeze tickled the back of his neck. From somewhere nearby, Jonah thought he heard soft music rising and falling. The wall seemed to ripple. When he put out a hand, he felt branches and leaves yield to his touch. Not a wall, but a hedge.

  A few yards along, a more perfect blackness showed a gap.

  ‘Is this the way in?’

  The black mouth smiled at him. Beyond, he could feel the tangled darkness waiting to swallow him – the same way it had swallowed Lily, a black hole from which nothing ever came out. Was it possible to feel nothing? To be terrified of nothing?

  An owl hooted from the trees. He swayed and took a step back; something touched him; he almost screamed aloud. It was only Ren’s hand feeling for his in the darkness. Her slim fingers closed around his.

  ‘Whatever you see, don’t run off. Don’t let go.’

  She pulled him in.

  The moon didn’t penetrate the high hedges. They walked in darkness, their world defined by shifting limits they touched but never saw. Deprived of sight, Jonah’s other senses went into overdrive. He heard branches rustling; scratches, whispers and sighs; the thud of his footsteps on the earth like a heartbeat; snatches of the same mournful music he’d heard before. The sticky, private smell of the hedge filled his nose; his fingertips grew so sensitive he could feel every vein in the leaves he brushed. Soon he began to dread the touch. He imagined the foliage coming to life, wrapping itself around him, forcing itself down his throat until it choked him. He’d never suffered claustrophobia, but now he couldn’t escape the thought of the walls slowly pressing in, squeezing him between them.

  Suddenly, light flared around them. Another buried floodlight, exploding like a mine when they stepped over it. Rubbing his eyes, he looked around to see if they’d been caught.

  The only creature watching was a black stone animal, sitting on its plinth like a cat in the sun.

  ‘Guard dog?’

  ‘It’s a sphinx.’ In the floodlight’s glare, they could see they’d come to a fork in the path. One way led left, the other right. In front of them, the sphinx stared dead ahead and offered no clues.

  ‘Which way do we go?’

  ‘That’s the riddle.’

  ‘Do you know the answer?’

  She tugged him down the right-hand path. The light faded behind them, leaving him blinder than before.

  They stumbled on through the maze. Each time they came to a fork, light flared to reveal a choice and a statue. A goddess draped in diaphanous robes, bending her bow towards them; a terrifying Medusa with snakes writhing out of her hair; a solemn-faced boy with broken stone where his genitals should have been. Each time, Ren chose right.

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘“The Mansions of Night, the right-hand spring”,’ she quoted at him. ‘You always go right. Maroussis knows that.’

  It sounded too easy. And at the next fork, his fears came true. When the light came on, there was a black sphinx staring at them.

  ‘We’ve gone round in a circle.’ Despair flooded through him, washed on by a wave of terror that he’d be trapped in the maze forever. ‘You led us the wrong way.’ He pulled away, but Ren gripped his hand until her nails almost drew blood. Her strength surprised him.

  ‘It’s not the same statue,’ she said fiercely.

  ‘Are you sure?’ Jonah examined it, but saw nothing that identified it.

  ‘If you start to doubt yourself, you’ll never get out.’

  ‘What about the floodlights?’ Each time, the light hit him like a gunshot. ‘If we keep setting them off, someone’s going to see. They’ll know we’re in the maze.’

  She shrugged. ‘They know anyway.’

  ‘Then why don’t they stop us?’

  ‘That’s not their job.’

  They carried on. Now he could hear a scratching sound, all around, as if they’d wandered into a colony of crickets. The path twisted and turned, ever tighter, until he could hardly tell which way was forward. The noise got louder.

  And then they were out. He’d passed the exit before he knew it; the hedges vanished and spacious night opened around them. A wide lawn ran up to a low, square-built house silhouetted in its own light. Sprinklers spun glistening arcs of water across the grass, making the sound he’d thought was crickets.

  There was nowhere to hide. A wide stone basin, like a birdbath, cast the only shadow on the lawn.

  ‘How do we get to the house without being seen?’

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’ Still holding his hand, Ren led him across the open lawn. The wet grass yielded to their feet without a murmur. The sprinklers turned, soaking them with a fine spray. By the time they got to the other side, Jonah’s legs were wet through. He barely noticed.

  As they reached the edge of the house, the sprinklers suddenly shut off and sank back into the lawn. The night came alive with the patter and rustle of living things. Below the house, where the promontory fell away to a hidden beach, Jonah could hear waves brushing the shore.

  They crouched behind a row of bougainvillea that guarded the top of the slope. Above, Jonah glimpsed the arches of a whitewashed colonnade, and a set of French windows opening onto a balcony. Dim lights glowed inside. His chest tightened. Was Lily there?

  A shadow broke the line of the windows. Jonah froze. A man stood on the balcony puffing on a long cigar. At first, Jonah took him for another statue. Lit by the moon, in a grey three-piece suit, with a handkerchief tucked in the pocket and a grey silk tie, he could have been cut out from an Edwardian photograph.

  A red ember flared on the end of the cigar. The photograph turned to colour. A cloud of smoke blew out into the night. The man looked down, staring straight at where Jonah and Ren were hiding.

  The smell of tobacco mingled with the flowers and damp earth. Raising his voice just enough to carry, the man in the suit called down from the balcony.

  ‘I suppose you have come to see me?’

  Twenty-nine

  ‘And what’s more, I have to say, so far you’ve only understood a small fraction of the difficulty which this involves …’

  Plato, Parmenides

  Love draws you to Beauty. Beauty leads you to Truth. And Truth is immortal.

  For a moment, I felt as if I’d broken through the clouds and was standing on a mountaintop bathed in sunlight. The love in my heart fused with the longing in my soul and I thought I understood everything Diotima had told me. I was flying.

  ‘What did Agathon find when he went through the door?’

  Diotima lay back in my lap and gave me a strange, dissatisfied look. ‘I’ve told you as much as I can.’

  The sun went in. I landed with a bump. ‘But you haven’t told me anything. Just riddles and metaphors.’

 
‘Words are part of the wall we have to get through.’ She pointed to the circle she’d drawn in the earth. The damp ground had already begun to ooze shut, muddying the shape. ‘We call this a “circle”. But if we called it a “straight line”, it would still be the same thing. Language is a weak tool: it describes things, but it doesn’t get to the being of the thing.’

  ‘There you go again,’ I complained. ‘Walls, tools – more metaphors.’

  ‘Metaphors are the closest we can come. To put it into words brings it down to the level of language – and all that languages are is metaphors.’ She bit her lip, frustrated with me. ‘Didn’t you ever have an experience that seemed to go beyond words?’

  ‘Last night.’ Even thinking about it sent small tremors through me.

  ‘So describe it to me.’

  I blushed – but she wouldn’t let me off the hook. ‘Well, um, you undressed, and then I took off my tunic, and then I put my …’ I mumbled away into nothingness. ‘This is ridiculous.’

  ‘You see? Some things are too real to be put into language.’

  ‘But I need to understand.’

  She turned away and began walking into the trees, brushing past the papyrus fronds. I called after her, ‘Did Agathon find it in the book? The Krater?’

  A rustling in the reeds across the lake made me look back. Dion had returned with the boat. He gave Diotima a shy stare that stayed on her while I clambered in. He started to row away. Diotima stood on the shore and watched us go.

  ‘Wait,’ I called. I could feel something being pulled out of my heart as the space opened between us. ‘Aren’t you coming?’

  ‘I can’t come to Ortygia. There’s a lion in that cave who’d gobble me up if he got his hands on me.’

  She said it frivolously, like a little girl playing pretend. But the grimace on Dion’s face was real enough, and all too grown-up. I wondered again about his place in things. Where were his loyalties?

  My thoughts were a mess as we rowed across the lake: a tangle of frustrated questions and ignorance. Diotima’s mysteries had set me on fire; I had to know them, however much she wrapped them up in riddles and allusions.

  What was Agathon looking for?

  The same as you.

  But was it the secret Agathon discovered that killed him? Or was it the nymph he fell in love with?

  As we approached the landing, I saw a guard hurrying up the steps to the palace, presumably to report to the tyrant that I had come back as promised. Or perhaps to tell the boy to get back to the library. When I got there, I found him still staring at the same scene of Aeschylus I’d set him that morning.

  I gave him some Aesop – the fable of the Fox and the Grapes, nothing controversial – and told him to compose two columns on the moral. He scowled, which was something. I stared out of the window, at the crimson sky and the sea, and tried to put my thoughts in some sort of order.

  Was it the mystery I wanted, or Diotima? Did I think that by possessing one I could understand the other? The Voice of Desire screamed so loud I couldn’t tell what it was saying.

  Too many metaphors, the Voice of Reason complained. Wings, walls, nymphs, souls: every question I asked, Diotima obscured it in clouds of words.

  Socrates, baiting a sophist: ‘I don’t want this “if you like” or “that’s your opinion” sort of argument; I want to prove the real you and me.’

  Metaphors insinuate and suggest; they mislead the mind like a painter’s trick of perspective. You think they add meaning, but all they are is images. They create similarities where none exist. They’re illusions. Lies.

  From now on, I resolved, I’ll steer clear of metaphors and other figures of speech. They’re too dangerous for the situation I’m in.

  When the lesson was over, I found Dion on one of the terraces overlooking the harbour. His hair was oiled and combed, and he wore a vividly dyed robe. Lesser men would have looked pretentious in it – I’d have felt ridiculous – but Dion carried it off easily. I guessed Dionysius was hosting a dinner that night, though I hadn’t been invited. If the tyrant had really wanted to torture me, he’d have made me go.

  We greeted each other, and talked warily around a few general subjects – the weather, the theatre, common acquaintances. The impact of our first meeting had cooled to second thoughts: now, neither of us trusted ourselves. Or each other.

  Two bushy cypresses grew at either end of the terrace, filled with starlings. The screech of their chatter made it impossible to eavesdrop on us. And I had to believe that the golden youth I’d glimpsed, thirsty for virtue, was still there inside the shell.

  ‘Your brother bought a book from a man in Locris called Timaeus,’ I said.

  ‘He buys a lot of books.’

  ‘This is one he paid a hundred drachmas for. It’s called The Krater.’

  He shrugged.

  ‘Do you know where it is?’

  ‘Most of his books are in the library.’

  I turned and looked Dion in the eye. For all their confidence, there are still ways of asserting authority over eager young men. Socrates taught me that much.

  ‘Do you know the book I mean?’

  Suddenly, like athletes at the starter’s call, the starlings rose off the tree in a cloud. They flew out over the water, spiralling and twisting in the air like smoke.

  The soul is the impression we leave when we die – smoke lingering in the air when the fire’s burned out.

  No metaphors, I reminded myself sternly.

  Dion picked up a leaf and began pulling it apart.

  ‘The book was gibberish. The ravings of a madman. Dionysius was so furious he’d spent a hundred drachmas on it, he ordered it to be burned.’

  I gripped the balustrade and stared at the foamy water swirling below, hoping there was more. ‘And?’

  ‘I don’t like to see knowledge destroyed. I persuaded him to send it to the temple treasury instead.’

  ‘I need to see it.’

  ‘There’s no point. My brother was right: it’s nonsense.’

  Words are part of the wall we have to get through.

  ‘I’ll judge that for myself.’

  Dion straightened a fold in his robe. ‘Then you’ll have to ask Dionysius. No one except the chief priest enters the temple sanctuary without his permission.’

  Dion went in to dinner; I headed back to my room. In the colonnade by Dionysius’ ball court, I met Euphemus and another man coming the other way. The companion was short, fat and balding, sweating from trying to keep pace with Euphemus. He smiled as if I should remember him.

  ‘We were coming to find you,’ Euphemus said.

  ‘Our new Athenian,’ his companion added. ‘The scourge of tyrants.’

  The moment he spoke, I remembered who he was. The strange man who’d found me in the garden the day before, who’d thought I should have brought him letters. So much had happened since then I’d almost forgotten.

  ‘Did you get your letter from Athens?’ I asked.

  ‘That was a misunderstanding.’ He chuckled, then abruptly broke off. ‘Or perhaps not.’

  ‘Leon thought you were me,’ Euphemus explained.

  ‘An Athenian, a philosopher, the boy’s tutor – you can see why I was confused.’

  Another smile, eager to please. I didn’t care. Euphemus was the least of my worries now.

  Leon glanced over his shoulder and licked his lips. ‘I’m glad we found you. There’s a passage of Herodotus we’d like your opinion on.’

  He unrolled a book and fussed until he found the line he wanted. He pointed a fat finger to it, inviting me to read.

  ‘To yourself, if you don’t mind.’

  I leaned over. When night fell, Gyges took his knife and hid behind the door. Then, when the king had fallen asleep, Gyges entered his room and struck him dead.

  I looked up, surprised and confused. ‘What do you want to know?’

  ‘We’d just like your opinion.’

  I tried to think of something intelligent.
‘There’s a variant of this story I’ve heard,’ I said. ‘Gyges finds a magic ring which makes him invisible, which lets him sneak into the king’s palace.’

  ‘How quaint.’

  ‘It poses the ethical question: do we behave well because it’s the right thing to do, or just because we’re worried we’ll get caught?’

  I glanced at Euphemus, expecting him to launch into one of his monologues. But he stayed quiet. Instead, Leon exclaimed, ‘But that’s precisely what we wanted to talk to you about. Ethical questions.’

  ‘I’ll try.’

  ‘Now this passage here …’ He rolled the scroll on and pointed. I read, silently, It was a heavy blow to Croesus to learn that his son was dead, because the stranger whom he had sent as the child’s guardian had turned out to be the murderer.

  I was missing something. I checked with Euphemus again, but he wouldn’t meet my eye.

  ‘You keep on talking about a question.’ I looked from one to the other. ‘Well? What is it?’

  Leon fiddled with his thumbs. ‘Really, you’ve hit the nail on the head already. Is a good man willing to do the right thing? Even if he might get caught.’

  ‘I think you misunderstood. If he’s doing the right thing, he doesn’t have to worry about being caught.’

  ‘Well, that’s just it, isn’t it? Good and bad, right and wrong. Tricky.’ He nodded twice more. ‘That’s why we came to you.’

  ‘Socrates would have said that a man who knows what’s good could never do something bad.’

  ‘Take Thrasybulus,’ Euphemus said suddenly. ‘Would you say that what he did was right or wrong?’

  I stared, trying to make sense of the question. Athenian history was so far from my mind that it took me a moment to put the pieces together. Thrasybulus is the general who came out of exile to overthrow the Thirty Tyrants, fifteen years ago. He led the Democrats in the battle where my inglorious uncle Critias died.

  At first I thought Euphemus was simply mocking me again, trying to get a rise with an old argument. Then the penny dropped.

  I looked up and down the corridor. I lowered my voice. ‘Are you asking …?’