Alexander (Vol. 3) (Alexander Trilogy) (34 page)

‘What is this password?’

‘It’s an old Macedonian rhyme, sung by children. Perhaps you know it, it goes like this: ‘The silly old soldier’s off to the war . . .’

The killer evidently took some pleasure in the irony as he nodded and completed the verse:

‘Hefalls to the floor!’

‘Exactly,’ confirmed Eumolpus, without displaying any emotion whatsoever.

He continued, ‘There is no remuneration for this mission, but you will receive a talent of silver from my own pocket.’

‘There’s no need,’ replied the man.

‘It will be useful. Use a dagger and strike at his chest. Macedonia’s greatest soldier must not die from a wound inflicted in his back.’

Demetrius nodded, ‘Is there anything else?’

You must take him by surprise. If he realizes what is happening, you’re lost. Don’t be lulled into a false sense of security because he’s seventy years of age. A lion is still a lion, even when long in the tooth.’

‘I’ll be careful.’

‘Go now, then. There is no time to lose. Your guides await you in the stables with the dromedaries. The money is already in Ecbatana at the temple of Eshmun of the Chaldaeans, just outside the southern gate. You must leave immediately afterwards, never to return.’

The man left by a side door that was pointed out to him, went down the stairs to the stables and set off immediately in the direction of the setting sun. From the heights of a tower Alexander stood pale and motionless, watching the killer until he disappeared from sight over the undulating profile of the desert.

It took Demetrius six days and five nights to reach Zadracarta, sleeping only for a few hours each night and eating and drinking while still astride his animals. Together with the guides he changed mounts when possible so as to maintain a constant speed – it was incredible just how far they could travel in a short space of time with this system. They reached Ecbatana around sunset of the thirteenth day and Demetrius went immediately to the entrance of the Governor’s Palace.

‘Who are you? What is your business?’ asked the sentry.

Demetrius showed him the document with the royal seal. ‘The King’s messenger with a most urgent mission – to deliver a verbal communication to General Parmenion.’

‘Do you have a password?’

‘Of course.’

Wait then,’ replied the sentry. He entered the guard house and spoke with his commander who came out almost immediately and spoke directly to Demetrius, ‘Follow me.’

They entered a huge colonnaded courtyard at the centre of which was a well from which servants were drawing water for guests and for animals, and they crossed it from one side to the other. On the western side of the portico, in shadow now, they took a stairway leading to the upper floor. Then they turned into a corridor guarded by a couple of
pezhetairoi
and walked down to an unguarded door at the bottom of it. The officer knocked and waited. Shortly afterwards there came the sound of footsteps and a voice that asked, ‘Who is it?’

‘Guards,’ replied the officer. ‘A courier has arrived from the King, he has an urgent message, a verbal one, and he says he has a password.’

The door opened and there appeared a man of about fifty years of age, almost bald, bearing a slate under his left arm and a stylus in his right hand. He introduced himself, ‘I am his correspondence secretary. Follow me, the General will see you immediately. He has just finished replying to a series of letters and was preparing to wash before supper. I hope you bring him good news. He still suffers greatly for the loss of Nicanor and he is increasingly anxious about the King and his last surviving son, poor man.’ As he spoke he peered at the killer’s stony face, trying somehow to guess the nature of the news he was about to give his General and in truth he could see no sign at all of it being good.

They stopped before another door and the secretary said, ‘Wait here – there is a formality to be dealt with before being admitted into the General’s presence.’

Demetrius was afraid he might be searched and gripped the hilt of his dagger under his cloak. Some moments passed in silence until, finally, the secretary reappeared with a tray on which there was a slice of bread, a bowl of salt and a cup of wine.

‘General Parmenion wants all those who enter his quarters to enjoy his hospitality. He says it brings good luck,’ he added, a half smile on his lips. ‘Please, help yourself

The killer let go of his dagger and stretched out his hand towards the tray. He took the bread, dipped it in the salt and ate. Then he washed it down with some wine.

‘Thank the General for me,’ he said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

The secretary nodded, placed the tray on a table, then led Demetrius to the door that led into Parmenion’s study and asked him to wait just a few moments more. He heard their voices through the door that was slightly ajar. Then the secretary came out and nodded to indicate that Parmenion was ready. Demetrius entered and closed the door behind him.

Parmenion was sitting at his desk and behind him was a shelf full of rolls of papyrus, each one bearing a small card with a label, while to one side was an easel with a map representing the provinces of the Persian empire east of the Halys river. As soon as he saw the messenger enter, Parmenion stood up to greet him. He wore only his military
chiton
which covered his legs to his knees and his Macedonian boots came halfway up his calves. He was of extraordinarily robust constitution and his iron and leather armour that hung now on a stand before the left-hand wall must have weighed, together with his shield, almost one talent. He was unarmed. His sword, with an antique blade, hung from its bandolier on the same stand.

He pointed to a chair. ‘Sit down, soldier.’

‘I am not tired,’ replied the killer.

‘No? It looks to me as though you’ve been to hell and back,’ replied Parmenion. ‘You look terrible. Come on, sit down.’

Demetrius obeyed, so as not to raise suspicion and decided he would wait for the General to move nearer, but as he sat the hilt of his dagger stuck out from his cloak, sufficiently for it to be noticed. Parmenion moved back instinctively towards his armour and weapons, ‘Who are you?’ he asked as he reached out for his sword. ‘You said you had a password.’

Demetrius stood up, ‘The silly old soldier’s off to the war . . .’ he said as he put his hand to the hilt of the dagger once more. At those words Parmenion let go of his sword and moved towards him with an expression of pained stupor on his face, ‘The King . . .’ he mumbled, ‘. . . but how can this be?’

The killer swiftly drove the dagger into Parmenion’s heart and watched as he fell without a sound, a large pool of blood spreading out over the floor. He watched him die and saw neither hatred nor rebellion in his eyes as the life ebbed from them. Only tears. And it seemed to him that the general’s lips whispered something with his last breath . . . perhaps . . . perhaps that password.

He left by another door on the wall to the right and disappeared into the corridors of the great palace. Shortly afterwards the peace and tranquillity of sunset was torn asunder by a long cry of horror.

*

Thirteen days later Alexander heard that Parmenion had been assassinated, and even though he himself had given the orders, the news was a cruel blow, as though he had somehow hoped that some god might have dictated a different fate. He closed himself away in his tent and in his anguish for days, without seeing anyone, without food or water. Leptine went to him more than once, but each time she came out in tears and then sat down on the ground outside the tent, crying through sun and rain as she waited for the King to let her in. Every now and then his friends would come to the tent to see if there was any sign of life and all they could hear was his hoarse, monotonous voice as it repeated again and again an old Macedonian children’s rhyme, and they left shaking their heads.

Eumenes finished the fourth book of his
Journal
with this paragraph:

T
HE DAY FINALLY
came when Alexander returned to the palace alone and on foot, unshaven, his hair matted and dirty. He had lost much weight and there was a hazy, ambiguous look in his eyes. Stateira welcomed him into her arms and sought to ease his pain as each night she sat at his feet, singing and playing her own accompaniment on the Babylonian harp.

Summer was already coming to an end when the King ordered the army to assemble and fixed a date for their departure. The officers leading the march spoke with the guides; those in charge of the supplies prepared the carts and the pack animals; the commanders of the various battalions lined up all their divisions and led them on training marches lasting days at a time, all this to get them used to the trials and hardships that awaited them through the gorges of the Paropamisus range. This resumption of military activity caused much excitement throughout the camp; the soldiers could barely wait to leave this terrible place that had brought such harrowing events and they all wanted nothing more than to put behind them the days of idleness and blood they had lived along the banks of this lifeless lake, there in the shadow of the crumbling walls of Artacoana, which now bore the name Alexandria of Aria.

Princess Stateira discovered she was pregnant and this news seemed to provide some relief for the King and even brought him some happiness. His friends were pleased as well, thinking that before long there would be a new, smaller Alexander among them. The march northwards was too arduous for a woman in this delicate condition and Alexander asked her to turn back and settle for the duration of her confinement in one of his palaces. Stateira obeyed and set off towards Zadracarta, with the intention of joining up with her mother at Ecbatana or Susa.

The trumpets sounded the signal for the departure one clear autumn morning and the King took up position at the head of his army, dressed in his splendid armour astride Bucephalas, just as things had been back in the days of his most glorious feats. Riding by his side were Hephaestion, Perdiccas, Ptolemy, Seleucus, Leonnatus, Lysimachus and Craterus – all decked in metal and with their helmet crests waving in the sun.

For days they travelled up the valley down which flowed the river of a thousand tributaries, passing through village after village and nothing happened. The Persian nobles who were following them with their own troops spoke to the people who lived in these places and explained that the shining young man astride the gigantic black horse was the new King of Kings and occasionally someone would appear shaking a branch of willow in salute. The night sky was increasingly clear and the twinkling up there seemed to grow wildly, almost as though the very stars were being born by the thousands in the great curved vault, like flowers in a spring field. Callisthenes explained that the air, at this height, was much clearer because there were no fumes and vapours to thicken it and this was why the stars were so much easier to see, but many soldiers felt that the sky was changing with the changes they were seeing in the land around them and in any case nothing could surprise them any longer in those remote lands.

They set up camp every evening at sunset along the riverbank, and when they lit their fires, the great multitude of soldiers – together with their entourage of women, merchants, servants, bearers, shepherds and herdsmen with their livestock – looked like an entire city on the move.

One day, the valley of the river of the thousand tributaries widened out into a vast plain, surrounded for the most part by a grand series of ridges of extremely high mountains all capped with snow and shining in the sun, standing out wonderfully against the sky.

‘The Paropamisus!’ shouted Eumenes, much moved at the sight of such natural beauty.

Callisthenes, however, was less impressed: ‘I have exchanged a series of messages with my uncle Aristotle of late and in his opinion the mountains in this area must be the last extensions of the chain of the Caucasians, the highest chain in the world.’

‘And we’re supposed to march up there?’ Leonnatus asked, pointing to the passes up near the peaks, suspended between heaven and earth.

‘Exactly,’ replied Ptolemy. ‘There’s no doubt now that Bessus is on the other side, with an army of Bactrians, Sogdians and Scythians; Alexander is determined to take him on, whatever the cost.’

Leonnatus brought his hand up to his forehead to shield his eyes and looked once more at the imposing mountain chain, blinding up there with its shroud of ice and snow, then he shook his head and moved on.

Callisthenes’ geographical theory was endorsed by the King and over the following days he identified in the wide fertile valley an ideal place to found a new city, to have a part of the great entourage that moved with his army settled there. He called it Alexandria of the Caucasus and garrisoned it with thousands of people, together with some two hundred mercenaries who opted to stay rather than face the vertiginous climb up through the mountains.