Sappho (13 page)

Mysilos of Leanex, Tyrant of Lesbos, flanked by soldiers, visited his barber in the deserted agora. His counselors did not consider it safe because of contagion, but there was no one about. The stalls set up on the long finger of land that separated the two harbors presented a desolate scene. The white stone bridges were swept clean of people. The melon sellers were gone, gone the dice players. Neither Mycenaean artifacts nor old Lydian coins were displayed. There were no red clay pots with geometric black designs readied for export. Sponges fished from the sea, once hoisted on long poles, had disappeared. None tended to the mending of sails or the forging of iron. Nor did women dip their wool in heated vats for dyeing, nor sculptors work the winged gryphon with his lion's body and spiral of curls.

The tailor shop was shut down. The barber alone remained open by command of Mysilos. The Tyrant posted bodyguards to either side and sat, somewhat overflowing the chair. Mysilos gave directions as to the styling of his hair and beard. He was particular about the cut, the curling, and especially the pomade.

The barber nodded obsequiously as he was given these detailed instructions, although he attended the Tyrant routinely and knew exactly what unguents, lotions, and oils to use. As he laid these articles beside the curling iron and scissors, an arrow out of nowhere hit the Tyrant in the jaw under his ear. It cut his tongue in two. Mysilos clutched the chair and hung forward, blood splattering the swept earth under him. Something gelatinous oozed from his eye as from the center of an egg.

The barber hopped helplessly about, calling on the gods to witness. “I am an unfortunate, an innocent, a bystander!”

Soldiers dashed to the body that had toppled out of the chair. They ran in and around the deserted stalls, returning once more to inspect the body. Since the murderer could not be found, it seemed best to convey the corpse to its residence.

When news of the murder was brought to Pittakos, he went to the people. In the main square he talked to those willing to assemble, and asked them what he should do. It was suggested the Oracle at Delphi should be consulted. Pittakos dispatched a priestess on this mission.

Also put forward by members of the nobility was the suggestion that the raging of the gods against Mitylene could be due to the banishment for a year of two sons and a daughter of ancient Lesbian lineage. Pittakos agreed to their release. It was the first act of clemency by the new Tyrant of Lesbos.

*   *   *

In high Pyrrha, Alkaios was jubilant at the news, and composed a ditty for the occasion:

Now is the time to

get drunk,

the time to

make love,

now that Mysilos is dead

Laughingly he turned to his friends. But brother and sister looked thoughtfully at each other. Mysilos's death had lost importance. A year ago they had been angry and involved. Now it was their new freedom that concerned them. Certainly it was not without danger. Suppose on their return the plague did not abate? Suppose it grew worse? They sent up fervent prayers.

By the time the trio reached Mitylene, the fever no longer blew its hot breath, the last of the dead had been burned, and a fresh wind came from the sea.

The city was grateful to Pittakos, who offered public hekatombs to the gods and, in preparation for the coming of his old enemy Alkaios, strengthened the laws against drinking. A proclamation lettered in wood and hung in the main square announced that this edict would be strictly enforced. Alkaios laughed. “Well, well, a personal greeting, you might say.”

They were given warm welcome by their families, who, except for Sappho's aunt Tyro and a few retainers, had remained miraculously untouched. With Sappho's house in mourning for Tyro, and indeed the entire city mourning, no public show of their private rejoicing was made.

Pittakos vowed he would hunt down the murderers of Mysilos and bring them to justice. He was convinced it was a conspiracy. For one thing, Lydian gold was being passed in the public houses and in the street of women.

He proclaimed: “The guilty must be found and dealt with if the gods are not to bring back the foul death that sucks life from the body.”

The populace shuddered, but Sappho paid little attention. She was happy to be home, to find her mother as before, Eurygyos matured, and Larichos grown into a young lad of great beauty. She cried with her mother over her aunt Tyro and listened gravely as Kleis lamented how thin she and Khar had become.

Actually both were hardened from the coarse, spare diets and plain life they had led in Pyrrha. The simplest things now seemed to Sappho luxury beyond measure—her baths, her handmaidens, the oiling of her skin, the massaging of her supple limbs, the dainties served at table, and the wardrobe of coan dresses she had almost forgotten.

Small, informal gatherings took place nightly and friends begged for her latest songs. One they found hard to make out; it was a song in praise of gold:

Gold is the child of Zeus,

neither moth nor worm devours it

and it overpowers the strongest

of mortal minds

For gold is unspotted

“What does it mean?” the guests asked uneasily, thinking of the Lydian gold.

“It means what it says.” Surrounded in Pyrrha by rough materials and utensils of the peasantry, Sappho thought often of gold and wove its gleam into a song, for it meant the things she was used to, the many rich objects familiar to her touch.

Attaching no importance to the song of gold, she played and sang another devised since her return. It was of crickets:

And the clear song from

beneath her wings does rise

when she shouts down

the perpendicular blaze

of outstretched sunshine of noon

That night Niobe stopped her before she could enter her quarters. “Lady”—her voice broke—“I know not how to tell you. Someone has been in your chambers, and what they searched for I do not know. Your jewels were left untouched.”

Sappho hurried to look and saw at once that her woman's chest was in disarray. “And my jewels are all here?” she asked Niobe.

“Yes, Lady. And a quantity of gold besides.”

“Gold, you say? A thief who gives rather than takes,” she said musingly.

Niobe blamed herself; she had crept into the great hall to hear her mistress sing. Sappho assured her she was not at fault and sent her to fetch her bed. Almost immediately there was a scratching at her door; Niobe had returned without slaves or a bed. “Pardon, Lady. Your brother, the lord Kharaxos, is here and would speak with you.”

Sappho motioned her to let him in.

Before saying a word, Khar took her hand in his.

“Sister,” he spoke in a rapid undertone, “we have been denounced. Alkaios is waiting. We flee to Egypt. It seems while Pittakos rules, there is to be no truce.”

Her heart, like a netted fish, floundered before resuming its beat. “Why denounced, and by whom?”

“For the murder of Mysilos. Pittakos declares it to have been paid for with Lydian gold. Tonight you sang a song in praise of this metal, so our apartments were searched. And caches of gold were discovered, hidden by Pittakos's agents. It will be said, while sitting above suspicion in high Pyrrha, we ordered and paid for the Tyrant's death.”

“All this because of my song?”

“Come, Sappho, get your things together.”

“But it is so mad an idea…” She could hardly orient herself to this fresh disaster.

“There is a ship waiting.”

“Ah, there are troubles in our house.” She took several turnings in the room before facing him. “You are right to go, and Alkaios. But I will stay. I will face my accuser.”

“None live long who strive with gods.”

“Since when is Pittakos a god? May Zeus destroy his might, not ours. Hurry brother,” she urged Kharaxos. “For you it is the ordained time.”

“And for you, sister? Think carefully.”

“My mind is firm, Khar.”

They clasped arms as comrades. They had shared much, and now Khar was being torn from her. In such a way she had parted from her father. Hastily, to nullify the unlucky thought, she said, “May Poseidon of the blue hair watch over your craft and bring you safe into Egypt.”

“I will send a token, my ring.”

She kissed him on the cheek, and the next moment was alone. What thymos drives Pittakos to wrong my house in this manner? she asked herself. The song of gold had been innocent, and she was innocent. She was also young and inexperienced enough to believe that would save her.

*   *   *

The populace was roused. They demanded that Sappho the poet be questioned, for her brother and Alkaios had taken ship by night and quantities of gold were believed to have gone with them.

Sappho was composed when they sent for her. She now looked on Pittakos with Alkaios's eyes. Yes, he had a slight potbelly, and his feet were certainly unsightly, in fact, splayed, just as Alkaios sang. They surveyed each other. It was a long hard look on both sides.

“Sappho, Sappho, daughter of a mighty sire, it grieves me that no sooner are you returned than new controversy swirls around you.”

She drew her perfumed mantle close.

“Your brother Kharaxos and your confederate Alkaios have fled to Amasis in Egypt.”

“They have gone to trade. Since when is that a sin for a merchant family?”

“I have heard the song Alkaios made when he learned of the murder of the good Mysilos. Do you know it?”

“If you mean Mysilos the Tyrant, I know it well. We were sitting on a rock in Pyrrha when he composed it. It possesses a nice cadence, don't you think?”

Red anger crept up the man's neck, but he mastered it and seemed to speak casually. “There was another song sung in Mitylene last evening. I am told its theme was of gold.”

“A worthy theme.”

“You must think so, for you, Sappho, were the singer.”

“What you say is true.”

“Why did you sing that particular song?”

“Who can say? The Muses put it into my mind.”

“More likely it was Hermes, the mischief-maker, who is enough like you to be your twin.”

Sappho said simply, “At the close of the year when we place our sins on a scapegoat for sacrifice, I will not require the rite of purification for any crime. Can you say the same?” She studied him with a look that appeared to be candid but in fact rendered judgment.

He had to remind himself that it was she who was here for judging. “The gold was seen,” he told her.

“Naturally it was seen. By those who placed it in our rooms.”

There was a pause as Pittakos strove for a judicious tone. “If only you had not put aside the womanly role that is rightfully yours. Surely you do not think it gives me pleasure to send you once again into exile? For I am of the same race as yourself.”

Sappho's lips twisted. “Hardly,” she said.

“There is grave suspicion that you are implicated in the murder of our beloved Tyrant. You must leave Lesbos.”

“Yet my heart is like that of a child.”

He regarded her from beneath heavy brows. “You should have gone with your brother.”

“Why? To please a Tyrant who perverts justice?”

“Pyrrha taught you nothing.”

“It would have pleased you had I fled, as when a lion attacks a sheepfold, the sheep panic and smother themselves in piles.”

“You are banished from Lesbos.”

“You are a small man for all your size, Pittakos, blown about by small winds. I will go, since I must. But I will go as befits the poet of Lesbos, with my servants, my eunuch, and my female slaves. You will look mean-spirited before the world if you deny me these decencies.”

“It is seemly. You are no longer a child. I grant your request.”

“It is not a request. I stated to you what is my due. I request nothing—not a pardon, because I am innocent, not forgiveness of sins I had no part in—nor do I apply to you to stay in Lesbos. But I tell you this: brother will not be dear to brother as in the old days.”

“Are you threatening me?” Pittakos bellowed, half rising.

“I make no threats, just a prophecy. My eyes cannot always see—but my art sees, my songs see. Farewell, Pittakos.”

He got up from his high-backed chair. But Sappho was not yet done.

“As for the one who placed Lydian gold to be found in my room, may terrors grip hold of him. May he become the slave of strangers! For he is the murderer.”

Involuntarily Pittakos's hands clenched.

Until this moment Sappho had concealed her suspicions. But there could no longer be doubt. It was Pittakos himself.

*   *   *

The servants had slaughtered, the sacrifice been made. Sappho studied the entrails as they fell. Much could be foretold in this manner, not only by the shapes but by the color of the offal as well and what parts lay next to one another.

After conferring with Kleis, Sappho decided to journey to Corinth and be the guest of Arion, the poet whose birthplace was Lesbos. He came from the same small village of Methymna as her mother did, and Kleis knew his family well.

“No less a man than the Tyrant Periander is his patron. You will be received by Arion for your sake and for mine. And for my part, I will not feel I am casting a daughter upon the sea like flotsam, to end up the gods know where.”

Sappho was still studying the entrails. “Earth-encircling Lord Poseidon, grant a fair passage for Sappho! And you, Nereids, children of Doris the Ocean nymph, who dwell at the bottom of Sea, Amatheis of the lovely locks, dark-eyed Halia, Galatea, sisters all, I pray you keep your realm calm. And Clymene, shapely offspring of Ocean, intercede with the tides. Let them be peaceable for this daughter of Lesbos, unfairly sent from family, home, and friends.”

This brought fresh tears from her mother. “Perhaps it would be better if you went to Athens; at least it is a city of the Hellenes.”