I didn’t have one either. What I did have was a knot of fear in the pit of my stomach that twisted and tightened as I threaded my way through the crowd. Entering the hut, I found Alcimus and Automedon facing each other across the table. I put bread and olives in front of them and began to pour the wine, but Alcimus waved me away, so I went and sat on the bed. Neither of them said anything; though I got the impression they had been talking before I came into the room. A few moments later, a great hammering on the door began. Thinking there must be some crisis in the women’s hut—Amina was still very much in the forefront of my mind—I ran to answer it, but Alcimus got there first and pushed me out of the way. Pyrrhus bulged into the room—there’s no other way of describing it—and, once inside, seemed to go on expanding till he was taking up every available inch of space.
“I can’t let it go!” he said, as he sat down.
I knew in my bones—in my water, as the old wives say—what “it” was, and yet I listened avidly, needing to have my worst fears confirmed. Last night—but it might have been the previous night, or even the night before that—somebody had tried to bury Priam. Made quite a good job of it, actually—the grave, though shallow, was enough to keep seagulls and marauding crows away. A shovel had been found abandoned nearby, together with a jug of wine and a few scraps of stale bread. The jug was still half full, so it seemed likely the funeral rites had been interrupted, perhaps by somebody leading horses along the path between the pastures and the yard. Who could have done it?—that was the question.
Who would have dared?
“Nobody in this compound,” Pyrrhus said. In fact, he refused to believe any Greek fighter would have done it.
Automedon tried to point out that some people had strong religious objections to leaving the dead unburied, to denying them their rite of passage into the other world. “Everybody deserves a proper burial,” he said.
“What, enemy fighters?”
“Ye-es.”
“My father didn’t bury Hector.” Evidently, he felt any reference to Achilles was enough to settle an argument. “No, it’s a Trojan—got to be.”
Alcimus pointed out patiently that there were only two Trojans in the camp. Calchus, a priest and a seer, highly respected—even if he did wear makeup and traipse about in a skirt. Could they rule him out? Well, yes, they could—almost. Why would he suddenly risk his life to bury Priam? Surely any loyalty he might once have felt to Priam was long gone; he’d worked for Agamemnon for at least the past ten years.
Alcimus was looking doubtful. “Yes, but he’s not in favour at the moment, is he? Hasn’t been for a while.”
“Can’t be him,” Automedon said. “No integrity.”
“No balls,” said Pyrrhus.
Alcimus looked from one to the other. “Well, then—that leaves Helenus.”
“Not him either,” Pyrrhus said. “He betrayed his father.”
“Under torture,” Automedon said.
“What’s that got to do with it?”
“None of us knows what we’d do under torture.”
“Huh,” Pyrrhus said, obviously thinking he did know.
“Mightn’t that be precisely why he would do it?” Alcimus asked. “A way of making good?”
They considered it.
“Ye-es,” Pyrrhus said. “I can see that.”
“Right, then,” Automedon said. “Let’s bring him in. Though if he’s any sense, he’ll have buggered off.”
“Where to?” Alcimus said. “He’s nowhere to go.”
“He could live off the land, hunt. For that matter, there’s plenty to eat in Priam’s gardens.”
“You might do that,” Alcimus said. “I doubt if Helenus would. And anyway, he can barely walk.”
This was true. I’d seen him hobbling around the camp, with blood-stained rags knotted round his ankles. Odysseus must have beaten the soles of his feet to pulp.
“Are we agreed, then?” Alcimus went on. “We bring Helenus in and— Well, what about Calchas? We can’t just drag him in—he’s a priest.”
“Invite him to dinner?” Automedon said.
Pyrrhus groaned. “For god’s sake…”
“But you agree we need a different approach?”
“Yes. Yes! Just don’t sit him next to me.”
Pyrrhus was already on his feet, obviously eager to get on with it. The others followed him to the door, both of them offering to find Helenus, but Pyrrhus insisted he had to go himself. In the end, all three of them set off together. I listened to their voices fading into the distance, and then it was quiet again, except for the buffeting of the wind.
I stared blindly at the bread and olives lying on the table, my brain scrabbling for a way of denying what I knew. I was remembering that moment by the fire when I’d glanced across at Amina and she’d lowered her eyes and pretended to adjust the strings of the lyre. I’d told myself it meant nothing; perhaps she just didn’t like me, but that was only one instance in a pattern of avoidance. And then later, she’d been missing from the circle of girls who’d gathered round Helle. At least, I was almost certain she’d been missing; I still wasn’t entirely sure. A large part of me just didn’t believe she could be involved. The women’s hut was guarded. Yes, but she could have climbed over the fence at the back. So, I paced up and down, wondering what to do, aware all the time of a mounting anger at the conversation I’d just heard. Only two Trojans in the camp? There were hundreds of Trojans in the camp; but they were women and women are invisible. An advantage, perhaps? If Amina had buried Priam, her best chance of getting away with it was that nobody would believe a girl capable of doing it. I needed to talk to her. No matter how many times I churned these thoughts round—and I did, for upwards of an hour—I always returned to that. I needed to talk to her—and away from the hut, away from the other girls. Whatever happened to Amina, the others mustn’t be implicated.
Next morning, early, I fetched four wicker baskets from the yard and went along to the women’s hut. The girls were still sitting on their pallet beds, even Helle, who was usually up early and practising dance routines in the yard. As I came in, Amina looked up and then quickly away. I tried to guess whether any of them knew about the burial; on the whole, I was inclined to think not. Amina wouldn’t have tried to involve anybody else; she’d have been too proud of the fact that she’d acted alone. Yes, but she must have been gone hours…Some of them at least would have noticed that, and might have known what she was doing—or guessed. If she’d done it. They might all, including Amina, be oblivious to anything going on outside the confines of the hut.
Before speaking to Amina, I went along the passage to Andromache’s room. I was worried about her. She was so white and thin and miserable, it occurred to me she might be one of those (rare) people who simply give up eating, who make up their minds to die. One of my mother’s maids starved herself to death. I could see her quite clearly; she had a mole on her upper lip. I hadn’t thought about that woman in years and I wondered why she came back to me so vividly now.
Andromache was in bed, apparently asleep.
“Andromache?” At the sound of her name, her eyelids fluttered. “Andromache? Wake up.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Somebody tried to bury Priam.”
Her eyes were wide open now. “Helenus?”
“Perhaps. Actually, I think it might have been one of the girls.”
“Who? Which one?”
She did sound genuinely incredulous. Whatever had happened, it must have been without her knowledge. “Amina.”