‘No one ever suspected anything. . except for Ulysses.’
‘All was born in deceit and in deceit it is destined to end. But you can turn the evil you have done into good. Ulysses can help you, far away as he is. Use his mind. Carry out what he has imagined,’ said the voice. ‘No more than this can I tell you.’
The ray of light dimmed until it nearly disappeared and the hiss of the wind issued ever stronger from the top of the cavern.
The Old Man of the Sea seemed to have dozed off on his stone throne. His limbs hung limply, his mouth fell half open. The king of Sparta turned back, traversing the tunnel and the great chamber until he found himself once again in the open. The wind had become very strong and his men struggled to secure the ship’s lines to the ground so that the sea would not steal it away.
Menelaus watched them through the swirling sands that obscured the light of day, and he hardly recognized them, as if they were foreigners pushed there from distant lands by the force of the sea and the wind.
Only the next day were they able to return to their island in the delta. The queen saw the ship coming to shore, and yet he tarried. After a long wait, she walked to the beach and found her king sitting in silence, watching the waves. She asked him what the response of the Old Man of the Sea had been and Menelaus, without turning, said: ‘His response was quite auspicious, for me and for you, my queen. The old man said:
Menelaus, it is not your destiny to die in the bluegrass land of Argos,
but in the Elysian fields where the gods will send you,
there where life is lovely for mortal men.
No snow, nor chill, nor rain there,
but always the gentle breeze of Zephyr blowing
sonorous from the Ocean, soothing and refreshing.
For the gods hold you, as Helen’s lord, a son of Zeus.
‘One day sorrow and wounds and death will end, my queen. We shall live in a happy place, far from all others, for ever.’
He fell still again, watching the foam of the waves that died at his feet, and then said: ‘We must return.’
6
Myrsilus thought that his last day had come when he saw armed Trojans in such a far-off land. But the Chnan had no fear and he approached the new arrivals, mingling among them, watching and listening to try to understand why they were there.
It was evident that the village chieftain and the man who seemed to be the chief of the Trojans did not understand each other, but that they had become accustomed to communicating using gestures, and even the Chnan could understand these gestures well.
‘I think,’ he told Myrsilus later, ‘that the foreigners want to remain here. They are prepared to exchange bronze for wheat, milk and meat for the winter, and seeds for the spring. They want to settle down in this land.’
‘When Diomedes finds out he will march here with his men and wipe them all out! I am certain he wants no Trojans in the land in which he will found his new kingdom.’
‘Then don’t tell him,’ answered the Chnan. ‘We cannot wage war in these swamps, in this bitter cold, and those wretches mean no harm. They’re just trying to survive the winter. When the seasons change they will sow wheat and, if they manage to harvest it, a new people will be born, in a new land, under a new sky. Let the seeds take root, warrior. This land is big enough to nourish many peoples.’
‘Perhaps you are right, Chnan. There’s only one thing I do not understand; why it is deserted. If we were in the land of the Achaeans, there would be at least six or seven villages in the land that stretches from here to the sea. Here we’ve found nothing but these four huts in an entire day’s journey. And no more, as far as the eye can see.’
‘You’re right. Perhaps the land is inhospitable, perhaps it is infested with wild beasts. Perhaps the people who lived here were driven away by famine or killed off by a plague. Man persists in living everywhere, even if the earth doesn’t want him. Do you know that there are men who inhabit the great sands, where not a blade of grass grows? And men that live in lands covered with ice? But the earth, sooner or later, frees itself of men like a dog scratches off fleas. Perhaps it is best that we rest now. Tomorrow morning we will have to start off for the ships before dawn, or your king will set off looking for us and get all of us into a fine mess.’
‘What about our comrades out there on the plain? They have no shelter; they’ll die of cold when the frost sets in.’
‘I’ll go tell them to come here with us. There’s plenty of room.’
‘No,’ said Myrsilus. ‘Someone must remain outside the village in case something happens.’
‘I understand,’ said the Chnan. ‘I’ll go. .’ He took a pile of pelts from one of the corners and stole away, disappearing into the darkness. He returned not long after. The Trojan camp was lit up by a few scattered fires. The village was just barely illuminated by the ash-covered embers that still burned in the centre of the main clearing.
As he groped around for the entrance to the hut, he felt a heavy hand fall on his shoulder. He spun around and saw that it was one of the women who had looked with longing at the goods he had set out. No one had offered to exchange pelts or food for an amber-beaded clasp for her. But she knew she had something even more precious that perhaps the foreign merchant would appreciate: herself. Tall and buxom, her blonde hair fell loose on her shoulders and a leather cord decorated with bits of bone adorned her white neck.
She smiled at him and the Chnan smiled back. Small and dark he was, and with his short, curly hair he seemed like little more than a boy next to her. She slipped a hand under his tunic to feel for a trinket that she liked, taking his right hand at the same time and placing it on her breast. The Chnan was flooded by a heat he had not felt since he had left his land; he felt like a boy reaching out to gather ripe clusters of grapes from the vine. He put his other hand under her gown and he realized she wore nothing underneath; it was like caressing the soft down of a newborn lamb. He kissed her avidly, and it felt like sucking a honeycomb at high noon in the fragrant mountains of Lebanon.
She left him leaning against the wall of the hut, exhausted, walking away with the supple, solemn roll of a mare and the Chnan realized that he had made the best deal of his entire life. Even if she had carried away all the wealth he had laced under his tunic, what he had had in exchange was worth as much as a herd of horses, as a load of cedar wood, as a caravan of mules laden with all the copper in Sinai.
He entered the hut and by the dim light of a wick stuck in tallow took stock of what was left to him. Oh virtuous woman! The girl had taken nothing but a clasp with three beads of coloured glass, one yellow, one red and one white, streaked blue. In the dark her fingers had recognized what her eyes had desired by the light of sunset.
‘Did you see them?’ asked Myrsilus’s voice in the dark.
‘I did not see much but I felt the earth shake. .’ answered the Chnan as if talking in his sleep.
Two hard, woody hands threw him against the wall. ‘I asked you if you’d seen our comrades,’ repeated Myrsilus, and his voice was a low growl.
The Chnan regained his wits: ‘I did see them and they were dying of cold. Now they’re fine. Better than before, without a doubt. Calm down, warrior, let us get some sleep as well.’
Myrsilus was placated and lay down once again on his mat, pulling up a cover made of sheepskins sewn together. The warmth was soothing, and sleep descended rapidly on his eyelids, but he was soon saddened by anguished dreams. He realized that he had left his homeland for a cold, muddy place where the sky and the ground were always sodden, as if it had just rained or were about to rain. Even his king was changing; he was shedding his splendour with each passing day. The days of Ilium were distant, as if centuries had passed since they had left the shores of the Hellespont.