For now. As far as any of us knew, the edict that all Trojan boys must be killed was still in force. Pyrrhus had killed Andromache’s son: we had no reason to trust him. I didn’t know whether he’d have the stomach to kill a newborn baby, now, when the heat of battle had passed, but I certainly didn’t intend to find out.
“Let’s get him swaddled,” I said.
A Trojan baby was bound in swaddling bands for the first few weeks of its life, and strapped tightly to its mother’s chest. Nothing much was visible except for its face and hands—and even these were hidden in the folds of its mother’s shawl. Could we get away with hiding the baby’s sex? I thought we could, as long as the girls remembered to call the baby “it” or—better still—“she.”
Speaking with complete authority, Helle said: “They’ll remember.” Did I detect the faintest trace of “or else”? We-ell, what if I did? I’d wanted her to be a leader—and a leader she was turning out to be.
So that’s what we decided. I fetched a sheet and a pair of scissors from my hut and together Andromache, Helle and myself set about making swaddling bands. Once the baby had been wrapped, all three of us spoke to the girls. They nodded and murmured assent; nobody seemed to need convincing—many of them would have seen sights in Troy that nobody their age—or any age—should ever have to see.
From that moment on, Maire’s baby became a girl. The following day, I mentioned the birth casually in passing to Alcimus, who showed absolutely no interest. At dinner, one or two of the men commented on the singing. I said: “Yes, we were celebrating. Maire had a baby girl!” Once again, no interest. A slave giving birth to a slave is nobody’s idea of news.
Except in the women’s hut. There, it changed the atmosphere completely. The girls had a new focus; Maire basked in being the centre of attention. After dark, when they gathered round the fire, the baby passed from one pair of arms to the next, like a good-luck charm. Maire looked on, smiling, though I noticed she was always relieved to get him back. Something fierce in that love. Mine, she seemed to be saying. Not yours. Mine.
Would I feel like that when my time came? Oh, I’m sure many women would tell me: “Don’t be silly—of course you will!” “They bring the love with them.” I wish I had a gold coin for every time I’ve heard somebody say that.
It’s not true—and I know it’s not true. The love doesn’t always come, not if the baby’s the result of a forced union—and especially not if it’s a male child who resembles his father. I’ve seen many such boys grow up, well cared for, well fed—or as well as their mothers can afford—but hardly ever touched, not cuddled, not loved. And believe me, they don’t thrive. So, every time I looked at Maire with her baby, I wondered how it would be for me. Oh, I laughed when the Myrmidons patted my stomach and talked about Achilles’s son, but I too thought it was a boy.
The exception to this welter of baby worship was Andromache. Her detachment surprised me, a little—I’d expected her to adore the baby, but instead, she rarely looked at him. One evening, when we had a few minutes alone, I asked her why. She said: “After Hector died, Hecuba went a little bit mad. She used to call the baby ‘Hector’—and not just once or twice, she did it all the time. Oh, she always corrected herself, but then a minute or two later, she’d do it again. I think she was genuinely confused. And then one day I came into the nursery and I found her trying to shove her little wizened tit into his mouth. I grabbed him off her and shouted: ‘GET OUT!’ Top of my voice—the whole palace must have heard. Imagine that, telling Hecuba to get out! But he was my baby—he was all I had left. So, that’s why I don’t want to…” She shook her head and I saw she was trying not to cry. “He’s her baby, not mine. I’ve had my go.”
As for me, I was astonished at how strongly I felt about that little boy. He was nothing to me, really—and yet I was fiercely determined to keep him alive. I thought he’d be safe while we were still in the camp. Maire rarely left the hut except to sit on the veranda, and none of the Greek fighters showed any interest in her child. The sea voyage would be more of a challenge, but he’d still be in swaddling bands and I thought the women would probably be kept in the hold. Anyway, I couldn’t worry about that now. I kept telling myself it was going to be all right. Given a reasonable amount of luck, I thought we could make it work.
28
Three or four days after the baby’s birth, I awoke to the sound of Alcimus moving around and got up at once to attend to him. As I set fresh bread and wine in front of him, he asked me how I was. We’d scarcely seen each other since Amina’s death, though that was mainly because he’d been so busy organizing the games. That’s what I liked to think anyway. Now, there were only two events left: boxing—a bloody sport guaranteed to produce serious casualties, but popular—and the grand finale of the games: the chariot race. That was to be held at the training grounds on the headland where much time and effort had gone into improving the track.
“Why don’t you come to see it?” he asked.
I was slightly taken aback—he’d never suggested anything like that before—but of course I said I would, I’d love to.
“Look out for me though, won’t you? I don’t want you standing around on your own. There’s been a lot of heavy betting—I think it could get a bit rough.”
“Who do you think’s going to win?” I had absolutely no interest in the chariot race, or any race, but we were talking again—that’s what mattered to me. I wanted him to feel I cared—and I did care—about him.
“Diomedes, I expect.” He was pulling a face: Diomedes won every chariot race. “Pyrrhus is in with a chance though.”
“Pyrrhus? Not Automedon?” Automedon had taken over as Achilles’s charioteer after Patroclus was killed, and he was generally regarded as the best rider in the compound.
“No, Pyrrhus. He’s far and away the best—and Automedon would be the first to tell you too.” He drained his cup. “Of course, he’s got next to no experience…but, I don’t know. He’s probably got the best team.”
I knew the team, everybody did—Ebony and Phoenix, the black stallion and the bay. I’d watched him drive them back from Troy, Priam’s bloodied corpse bumping along behind. Bastard, I thought, smiling, as I followed Alcimus to the door and waved him goodbye.
I would go to watch the race, I decided, and try to persuade Andromache to come with me. As Pyrrhus’s prize of honour, she ought to be there, ready to garland him if he won—and to mop his brow, or anything else that needed mopping, if he didn’t. Either way, there’d be really heavy drinking in the hall that night—and I’d have to be there, because Andromache hated it so much, walking up and down the tables rigid with distaste, a king’s daughter forced to play the part of a common serving woman. Poor Andromache, I thought—and then, rebelliously: Poor me. I’d had to do it.
Andromache was up and dressed. The girls were in the yard at the back, watching Maire bathe the baby. It was always rather touching to see how that little scrap of humanity with his dreamy, black-bubble eyes had the power to draw everybody in. I wished I could take them all to see the chariot race—the outing would have done them good: a brisk walk to the training grounds, something to distract them from their grief—but nobody had given them permission to leave the hut, whereas it was self-evidently right that Andromache should be there.