memory
nagging his mind — so it seemed to me — refused to
come,
and the slave, his eyes level with Jason’s, as though he
were
no slave, but a fellow king, would give no help. At last Jason dismissed it, and left. But in front of his house
(it was morning,
birdsongs filling the brightening sky), he paused and
frowned
again, studying the cobblestones under his feet, and
again
the memory, connection, resemblance, whatever it was,
would not
come clear.
The dark house rising above the vine-hung, crumbling outer walls, the huge old trees, seemed still asleep, hushed in the yellowing light as an ancient sepulchre. The feeble lamp still burned at the door. The old male
slave,
a Negro stooped and gentle, with steadily averted eyes, lifted the hooks at the door to let him in, and took his scarlet cloak. Jason walked on to the central room which opened onto the garden. His gaze hit the fleece
at once—
or he heard it, felt it with the back of his neck before
he saw it—
and it seemed to me that the words of the seer had
returned to him
like a shock: You may see more than you wish of that
golden fleece.
He crossed to it quickly and kneeled to touch it, then
drew back his hand,
snatched it away like a man burned. And then, more
gently,
thinking something I couldn’t guess, he touched it again. Did the fleece have for him, I wondered, the meaning
it had for Medeia?—
love sign, proof that despite the shifting, deceiving mists of their lives together, he knew her worth — understood
her childlike
needs as well as he understood, I knew from his tale, his own? He raised it in his hands and went over to
stand with it
by the fireplace. There was no fire, but the wood was
piled
in its bin; the lamp stood waiting. With a jolt, I
understood.
He meant to destroy the thing, outflank his destiny. The same instant, I felt Medeia’s presence with us. She stood at the door, in white. In panic, I searched
her face
to see if she too understood. But I couldn’t tell. No sign. She watched him fold the cloth and lay it on the carved
bench.
They went up. I found myself shaking. Who remembers
the elegant speeches
he makes to his wife, the speeches she laughingly
mocks herself,
but clings to more than she thinks? If I were Jason and
saw
the fleece, and remembered the words of the blind old
seer of Apollo,
I too, blindly — like a mad fool, from the point of view of the old, all-seeing gods … I checked myself. They
were phantoms,
dead centuries ago if they ever lived. It was all absurd. I remembered: The wise are attached neither
to good
nor to evil. The wise are attached to nothing. I laughed.
Christ send me
wisdom!
Still trembling, I went to the door, then out to the
garden
to walk, examine the plants and read the grave-markers. I could hear the city waking — the clatter of carts on
stones,
the cry of donkeys and roosters, the brattle of dogs
barking.
I sat for a long time in the cool, wet grass, and as the day warmed, and the children’s voices came down
from the house—
soft, lazy as the butterflies near my shoes— I fell asleep.
7
Kreon beamed — propped up, plump, on scarlet pillows— wedged in, hemmed on all sides by slaves, some feeding
him,
some manicuring his nails, some waving fans, great gleaming plumes. His cheeks and bare dome
dazzled,
newly oiled and perfumed, as bright as the coverture of indigo, gold, and green. The pillars of the royal bed were carved with a thousand liquid shapes: fat serpent
coils,
eagles, chariots, fish-tailed centaurs, lions, maidens … Writhing, twisting, piled on top of one another, the
forms
climbed up into the shadows beyond where the sunlight
burst
like something alive — a lion from the golden age — past
spacious
balconies, red drapes.
“He was magnificent!”
the king said. The slave in black, standing at his
shoulder,
smiled, remote. “Poor Koprophoros!” the king exclaimed, and laughed till the tears ran down. The slave by the
bed laughed with him.
“And poor Paidoboron,” he said, and looked more sober
for an instant;
but then, unable to help himself, he laughed again. You’d have sworn he was ten years younger today, his
cares all ended.
His laughter jiggled the bed and made him breathless.
The dog
at the door rolled back his eyes to be certain that all was
well,
his head still flat on his paws. When the fit of laughter
passed,
the old king patted his stomach and grew philosophical. “Well, it’s not over yet, of course.” Ipnolebes nodded, folded his hands on his beard. King Kreon lowered his
eyebrows,
closed one eye, and pushed out his lower lip. “Make no mistake,” he said, “that man knows whom he’s speaking
to—
This for the princess, that for the king; this for the
Keltai,
this for the Ethiopians.’ ” He closed his left eye tighter still, till the right one gleamed like a jewel.
“And what
does he offer for Kreon and Ipnolebes?” Abruptly, the
bed
became too little span for him. He threw off the cover— slaves leaped back — reached pink feet to the floor and
began
to pace. They dressed him as he walked (somewhat
frailly, eating an apple).
This, certainly, whatever else: the trick of survival may not lie, necessarily, in heroic strength or even heroic nobility, heroic virtue— consider Herakles and Hylas, for instance. The world’s
complex.
There’s the more serious side of what’s wrong with
Koprophoros.
Graceful, charming, ingenious as he is (we can hardly
deny
he’s that), his faith’s in himself, essentially. The
strength of his muscles,
the force of his intellect. We know from experience,
you and I,
where that can lead. Oidipus tapping his way through
the world
with a stick, more lonely and terrible, more filled with
gloom
than Paidoboron himself. Or worse: Jokasta hanging
from a beam.
Or Antigone.” He paused and leaned on the balustrade
that overlooked
the city, the sea beyond, the visitors’ ships. “Antigone,” he said again, face fallen, wrecked. He raised the apple to his mouth and discovered he’d eaten it down to the
pits. He was silent.
He stared morosely seaward. Ipnolebes stood head
bowed,
as though he knew all too well what molested his
master’s thought.
The king asked, testy, his eyes evasive, “Tell me,
Ipnolebes,
what do the people say now about that time?” The slave stiffened, disguising his feelings, then quickly relaxed
once more,
grinning, casually picking at his arm. But if there was
cunning
in what he said, or if some god had entered his spirit, no one there could have known it. “My lord, what can they say?” he said at last. “No one was