A breeze was murmuring with cool breath from that direction as I approached. I saw a gushing spring tumbling over rocks to empty into a deep oval pool, where its ripples spread out to stony edges. All was green, black, and white—green plants, black pool, white spray. And then, movement: the flash of human flesh.
Lovers were hidden here! I almost laughed at my own shock. Was I still so innocent? If I moved, they would surely see me and freeze. Feeling benevolent, I did not wish to disturb them. I was content to wait to make my escape. I sat down and held my breath. My only concern was that the path to Hermione’s pets might branch off and I would not know which to choose. Oh, let these lovers be quick about it! I thought, then chastised myself for being so uncharitable. Their voices drifted over to me, amplified by the pool.
“I feared you would be cross,” the woman was saying. There followed a silence.
Then, “No, I am happy. Happy beyond my telling. The gods smile on me at last, if they grant me a son.” That voice—it was that of Menelaus!
“Or perhaps two. I think there may be two in my womb.” I did not know this voice—or did I?
“That is too much to hope for! I am content with one.” Oh, it was Menelaus! No mistake.
I saw a stirring across the pool; bushes moved and I glimpsed an arm, a back. I could not think. I backed away, hoping they would not see me. But the bushes had closed over them again.
I stumbled back onto the path, running now to catch up. Menelaus. Menelaus and some woman. Who? It must be a palace servant, a slave girl. That girl who lingered at the feast, who brought Menelaus the locking box for his sea-journey.
Instead of horror, or betrayal, or lamenting, How could he? Why?, my first feeling was a rush of relief. I was free. Menelaus and his slave girl had set me free. Had Aphrodite arranged that as well? How well the goddess knows everything about us!
I ran and ran and eventually caught up with Paris and Hermione. I stopped and caught my breath.
“How you run!” said Paris, looking at me. “Your tunic flying out behind you, white against the deep shade of the forest—you could be a wood nymph.”
“Mother was a runner,” said Hermione. “When she was young,” she added.
“And how long ago was that?” asked Paris, winking. “A long time?”
“Before my wedding, when I was fifteen, I raced—and won. But once I married . . .” I shrugged.
“You could still beat them all,” said Paris.
“I will never know,” I said. We continued on the path. Menelaus! I could not cast the image from my mind. Everything I knew, everything I assumed about him, had been turned into disarray.
Then, suddenly, I was angry with him. Why must he add this complication? Then, just as suddenly, I started to laugh, and Paris and Hermione turned around. I had been overtaken with wild love, longing, desire for a foreign prince, and I blamed Menelaus for making things difficult?
Had any other queens fallen into a mad passion for a stranger? I could not think of any; but then, I was not thinking well. Phaedra’s passion for her stepson Hippolytus—also brought about by cruel Aphrodite—was within her own family. I could think of no other examples of what might befall us. Poor Phaedra killed herself, and Hippolytus was killed by Poseidon. But I would not kill myself, nor would Paris commit suicide. Why should we?
“Hurry up!” Hermione was gesturing. “And stop that silly laughing, Mother! If you don’t stop, I won’t let you see them!”
“Yes, my dear.” I joined them on the path. “My daughter, you have ventured far from the palace.”
“I wanted a secret place,” she said. “And my uncles hunt throughout the forest, so I had to find a place where they would not come. A place where no game could be. It’s a stony place, a place only tortoises would like.”
“Yes, they do like stony places,” said Paris. “There are many of them around Troy.”
“Near the sacred mountain of Parnassus there are many large ones, and they are all sacred to Pan,” said Hermione solemnly. She seemed so wise and old. Oh, my child . . . but are you old and wise enough to survive what must come? I was thankful she was as clever and mature as she was, beyond her years. But even so . . .
“We must make an excursion there someday,” said Paris. “I myself am longing to see this famous Parnassus.” He added softly, “There are so many things I wish to see. I think I could live forever and not be content, as there would still be things unseen before me.”
“Here we are,” cried Hermione. We rounded a bend in the path and came to an improvised pen made of branches and logs. She leaned over the edge and her voice rose in happy excitement. “Oh, oh! You have been naughty!” She climbed over the fence and disappeared from our sight. But Paris and I sought each other, drinking in one another’s image. His face filled my eyes, my soul, my mind. I could not take my eyes from him. He was looking back at me, silent. Already we did not need words.
Hermione’s head popped up. “Here he is, my prize one!” She was clutching a large tortoise with a scarred shell. “His name is Warrior!”
I looked at the creature. When faced head-on he looked disgruntled. His beady black eyes, set far apart, stared straight ahead with Olympian disdain. It is all the same to me, what you do, his expression implied. I wondered fleetingly whether a god inhabited him. The gods are all like that, I thought. They look at us, but they are never moved.
“And why do you call him Warrior?” asked Paris. He seemed genuinely, infectiously, interested.
“He battles the others,” said Hermione. “They hit each other like rams, and try to turn each other over. He just keeps on and on; he hammers away and always wins.”
“Perhaps you should have named him Agamemnon, after your uncle,” I said.
“Or Achilles,” said Paris. “That youngster—oh, he cannot be any older than I—who has already got such a reputation for fighting.”
“How have you ever heard of Achilles?” Could he mean that aggressive child who had come with Patroclus and the other suitors?
“Oh, in Troy they are much preoccupied with noble deeds at arms,” he said. “It is a passion in Troy. And this Achilles has made a name for himself, even reaching across the sea.”
“For what, I cannot imagine,” I said. “He was a horrid child.”
“Horrid children make the best warriors,” he said. “That is why I shall never make a great one. I was not horrid enough.” He laughed, and all the joy of a summer noontide was in it. Was I in love with him, or with his glad grace, his bask in the sunlit side of life? There are such people, rare people who promise to open the portals of secret joy to us.
“Here are more,” she said. “Come and look!” We leaned over the side of the pen and saw a carpet of moving creatures. They were all different sizes—some as small as an oil lamp, others large as a discus. They all wore a pattern of yellow and black, but no two bore the same markings.
“Why do you like them so?” asked Paris. “I must confess, I never thought about them one way or another.” He climbed over the fence easily and bent down to stroke the head of a venerable-looking one.
“I don’t know,” Hermione said. “I found one in the garden and he was so . . . I don’t know, calming. I could sit and look at him for a long time. He seemed so . . . wise. Like nothing could ever bother him or upset him. I want to be like that!”
I longed to ask, What upsets you or bothers you? But Paris said, “We all wish to be like that.” Perhaps we must not examine too closely, look too hard, at another. Even at our own child.
“Even grown-ups?” asked Hermione.
“Yes. Especially grown-ups,” Paris assured her.
Hermione gathered leaves and flowers for the tortoises, putting them in a big heap. The creatures moved slowly over to them and began eating, their leathery jaws clamping down on the greenery. It was very hard not to laugh. Finally I said, “I am sorry, my dear, but I do find these animals amusing.”
Hermione stroked one’s back. “I’ll never let the
m use you for a lyre!” she promised it.
The way back was lazy; we strolled along. I kept thinking of Menelaus and the slave girl, wondering how long this had gone on. My anger and amusement had drained away, and only curiosity remained. Aphrodite must have led him into it, as she had me. Perhaps it was her delayed punishment of Father for her grudge against him. We would never know; we could only accept. We had no power to do otherwise.
As Hermione walked along, head held high, I said, “Good, Hermione, that is the way queens walk. Isn’t it, Paris?”
He cocked his head. “My mother doesn’t have so much spring in her step,” he said. “Of course, she’s older. Much older. She’s had nineteen children, sixteen who live.”
Just the thought of it was head-spinning. “Nineteen!” How did Paris feel about his mother and father, truly, knowing they had put him out to die? How could he overlook that, forgive it, forget it? I never could have. I had been hurt by Mother even hinting at renouncing her encounter with Zeus, which she may not even have meant.
“Of course, whether Hermione is a queen or not depends on whether she marries a king,” said Paris. “If she marries a . . . a tortoise-keeper . . .”—Hermione giggled at this—“then she’ll only be Queen of the Pen.”
“Oh, she’ll be queen,” I said. “In Sparta it is the woman who holds the title. Her husband becomes king through her.” As I made Menelaus king. Well, my slave girl, you need not think that your child will ever follow Menelaus onto the throne, as he has no power to pass it on, I thought.
“Interesting,” said Paris. “Unusual.”
On our way back into the palace, we passed the Hermione plane tree. It had grown tall enough to give good shade now; its leaves were just opening, and it would spread out in the summer sun. But would I be there to sit in that shade?
The palace looked the same, but suddenly I was a visitor, joining Paris, seeing all through his eyes. This colonnade . . . these stout gates . . . the way the shadows of the pillars stretched out across the courtyard . . . all known to me since my earliest days, now newly foreign.
Preparations for Menelaus’s journey to Crete were complete. Tonight marked the end of the ninth day since Paris’s and Aeneas’s arrival, and now no custom need hold Menelaus here.
Menelaus. The slave girl. I could not get the image of them from my mind, but it was an image bereft of any pain. Menelaus was not the faithful spouse I had supposed. Perhaps he, too, was tired of waiting for Aphrodite to anoint our union. I could not blame him.
The curtain was pushed aside and Menelaus stepped in. He was dirty and sweat-stained, and he quickly peeled off his tunic and kicked off his sandals, heading for the bathhouse.
I did not wish to talk to him, lest I betray what I knew, what I had seen. I merely nodded as he hurried through. As soon as he was gone, I summoned my own attendants and had myself dressed for the supper that I knew would be the last. Even so, I was surprisingly careless of my attire. Anything would do. The only thing I paid attention to was my jewelry. It seemed oddly important that I wear my favorites—my chunk-amber necklace, my gold cuff bracelets with the hunting scenes, my hanging drop earrings, delicately fashioned of gold filigree.
The sun vanished and deep blue twilight stole into all the chambers like a fog, until the yellow of oil lamps banished it. We gathered around a smaller table on one side of the megaron; the dark rest of the hall gaped like a cave around us. No singers this time, no dancers. Just the few of us—Father, Mother, my brothers, Menelaus, Paris, and Aeneas.
“What message will you take back to Troy?” Menelaus asked Paris.
Paris shrugged. “I received different ones from you and your brother,” he said. “But neither of you seem inclined to let us speak to Hesione, and my father will be unhappy about that.” He raised his heavy gold cup and studied it as if its decorations held something of great import.
“Is that truly why you came?” asked Menelaus.
“Why else should we have come?” Paris sounded surprised.
“My brother was of the opinion that you were spies,” Menelaus said.
Paris and Aeneas both laughed. “As if we would come in person for that!” they said, almost in unison. “As you must know, there are plenty of spies about, experienced ones, and we need not be so obvious.”
“Ah! But no spy would have an invitation to our private table here,” said Menelaus.
I wished he would hush. He sounded so heavy-handed, so obvious. For the first time I saw the familial resemblance between him and Agamemnon.
“There may be less revealing talk here than at a mess hall or a ship,” said Aeneas. “Royal tables are not known for divulging information.”
“I have admitted you to my palace,” Menelaus said. “I have let you see what no other spy would see.”
Oh, let him stop!
“You have dined with my wife, an honor sought by many,” he continued. “You have looked upon her famous face.”
“You make me sound like a prize sow,” I said. I was angry at him, angry at his clumsy threats and brags—and now he was dragging me into it. “Here!” I leaned over the table, looking directly into the face of Aeneas. I could not do so to Paris, as he was seated right beside me. “Look your fill!”
Aeneas coughed and drew back, embarrassed, as any polite person would.
“Helen!” said Mother.
I sat back down and glared at her.
Menelaus cleared his throat and raised his goblet. “I merely meant that I have taken you into the bosom of my family,” he said.
“Yes,” said Paris. He had spilled a bit of his wine on the table and was drawing patterns with it, like a child. “Yes.” Then I looked down at what he had done: written Paris loves Helen in the wine, bright against the table.
My heart stopped. What if someone saw? I moved my left hand up and smeared it, but I saw Mother looking. At the same time I was overwhelmed by his daring.
Then out of the corner of my eye I saw my wine cup—the special one, the one Menelaus had given me as a wedding gift—move as Paris slid it over to himself and took a slow sip, placing his lips exactly where mine had been. I was shocked into frozen stillness, holding myself rigid, searching the faces and eyes of the others for a response.
“We shall be returning to Troy forthwith,” said Aeneas quickly. He had seen. “Our ship is waiting at Gytheum.”
“Not near Mycenae?” asked Menelaus. “I thought you landed there.”
“We did,” said Paris. “But our men have brought the ship around the Peloponnese so it is close and we do not have to track back to Mycenae.”
“I leave from Gytheum myself,” said Menelaus. “In fact—it is time. Forgive me, but I must take my leave shortly.”
He had waited the exact nine days, and not an hour longer. I suddenly hated his preciseness.
He drank his last wine, spoke some farewell words, then indicated that we must all leave the table along with him.
I turned to speak a formal parting to Paris and saw his lips forming the silent words, The sacred snake. I closed my eyes to show I had received the message: I must meet him at the altar of the sacred household snake.
In the meantime I must tread stately steps and follow Menelaus to his chamber to wish him farewell. He strode off quickly, leaving me behind.
I followed, slowly. It was quiet now, so quiet, in the palace.
I entered his chambers, which were strangely darkened, although one or two lamps burned in the far corner. But I heard a low murmur of voices coming from the connecting chamber. I stole over to the door and listened. I dared not look in and betray my presence. I knew well enough what it was. Perhaps I merely wanted to confirm what I had seen earlier in the day, vindicate my own decision.
For a moment the voices stopped and that meant the people were kissing and caressing. No ordinary conversation stops in midsentence—only the murmurs of lovers.
Then they resumed. Oh, I hate to let you go . . . Take care upon the high seas, have you sacrificed t
o Poseidon? . . . No, it is you who must take care, you carry my son . . .
I peeked around the doorframe and saw them—Menelaus and that woman, that slave woman who had brought him the decorated locking box. And hers was the same voice I had heard near the waterfall.
I stepped into the room. I said nothing, but I let the curtain fall behind me, and its sound made them jump. Two startled faces turned toward me. Menelaus pushed the woman—did she have a name?—away.
“Helen!” he gasped. He looked horrified; she looked annoyed. “It is not what it seems,” he blurted out.
Still I said nothing.
“I swear, she means nothing to me—”
Poor, foolish Menelaus. What a cruel, stupid thing to say in front of her. For a moment I sided with her. But in truth, I still felt nothing.
The woman shrank back, whispering, “How could you?” and stole away, sobbing, running for the door at the far end of the chamber. Menelaus did not follow, or pay any attention.
Instead, he turned directly to me, holding out his arms. “Oh, my dearest Helen, please, please—this means nothing—I beg you, forgive me—oh, please . . .”
I stood there like one of the pillars in the courtyard. How could I go to his arms when I myself had transgressed already in a much greater way? I loved Paris, was mad for him, although we had barely touched. Menelaus had lain down with this woman, but his loyalty was uncompromised. Who was the greater adulterer? And if I embraced Menelaus and “forgave” him, what would he think later of my hypocrisy?
“Oh, Helen, please—oh, do not fix that stony look upon me—I will make it all up—I will sell her, send her away—I care not, nothing matters but you . . .”
Still I could not speak, but out of honesty, not calculation. It only served to spur him on to higher emotion.
“I esteem you above all things. Nothing—not even the gods, may they forgive me—means more to me. I will give you my life . . .” He continued holding out his arms.
I should have gone into them. But I could not, and call myself honest. And above all, I had to be honest to myself. “Menelaus, you must depart. The ships await. You must go.” I turned away. I could do nothing else.