The Bull from the Sea (17 page)

There was a pause. They did not look at one another; I saw to it that they did not dare. But their thoughts spun between them like cobwebs in a breeze.

“You came by ship,” I said. “Is it fit for me to sail in?” Indeed, they said, it was well prepared. “The Lady Hippolyta is coming with me. She was a royal priestess in her land, and will be treated as befits her. You have leave to go.”

They laid fist on breast, and started backing out. In the doorway they took root, blinking; and the lesser ones edged behind the greater. The chief of them, who had found us in the wood, seemed to have words stuck in his throat like a fishbone. I waited, tapping my fingers on my belt. At last it came. “By your favor, my lord. The ship for the Cretan tribute is at Piraeus, waiting to sail. Have you any commands? Some message?”

He had not the face to hold my eye. I was getting angry.

“You have got already,” I said, “my message for the runner. There is nothing in Crete that will not wait.”

A
LL PEOPLES HAVE THEIR
time-marks. In Athens they will say, “It was while we still paid Minos tribute,” or, “In the year of the bull.” But sometimes in my presence they check and pause, and count by the feasts of Athene or the Isthmian Games. They do not say, “In the time of the Amazon,” though all Athens says it. Do they think I shall forget?

It was ripe autumn, the turning of the grapes, when I brought her home. We would stand on the Palace roof, while I showed her the villages and great estates; then she would point to some peak of Parnes or Hymettos, and say, “Let us go
there!”
I took her, whenever I could. She was not used to sitting indoors, and would get into mischief, meaning no harm; running up to me in the council chamber with two couple of great wolfhounds, which knocked the old men over and trod in the clerks’ wet clay; getting some rich baron’s daughter to strip and wrestle with her, so that the mother, finding them at it, screamed and swooned; clambering in the beams of the Great Hall to get her hawk; and so on. I once overheard my chief steward call her a young savage. But he was so frightened when he saw me, that I was content and did no more to him. I was too happy to be cruel.

They had made the Queen’s rooms fine again; but she only used them to dress and bathe. It was in mine she liked to be, even when I was not there. Our arms hung up together on one wall, our spears stood in one corner. Even the deerhound I gave her, a tall bitch from Sparta, mated with Aktis as soon as it was grown.

Against her coming they had laid out a treasure of jewels and clothes, embroidered bodices and gold-hung flounces. She walked up to them softly, like a deer smelling a trap, wrinkled her brows, drew back, and looked at me. I laughed, and gave her the jewels to play with—she loved clear bright things—and let go the clothes to the Palace women. Hers I had made by my own craftsman, in her own style, but richer. The kidskin was Sidonian dyed, the laces were plaited gold tagged with agate or crystal, the buttons lapis, or Hyperborean amber. For her caps, I got the one thing fine enough to put against her hair: the silk that comes a year’s journey before it reaches Babylon, woven with flying serpents and unknown flowers.

As I had promised, I gave her arms: a shield with her leopard crest, a cheek-flap helm plated with silver and plumed with sheet-gold ribbons that glittered when she moved. I had brought her a Scythian bow from the Hellespont; and she used to come with me to the smithy to watch the making of her sword. It was the best one made in my time in Athens. The center rib had a line of ships let into blue enamel, in memory of our meeting; the pommel was made of a green stone from the silk country, like clouded water, carved with magic signs; the golden handgrip of the hilt was beaten into lilies. I taught her myself to use it. She used to say it handled like a living limb. Often at evening I would see her lay it across her knee, and run her fingers over the work to feel its fineness. Her hands lie on it still.

The Cretan ship had sailed, with no message from me. Sometimes I was sorry, as one would be for forgetting a child’s name day. But Phaedra was leaving childhood, and it would be crueller still, I thought, to let her think I would soon be coming. “There is time enough,” I would say to myself; though for what, I did not know.

As the people saw it, there was one more woman in my house, a captive of my spear, who had caught my fancy above the rest. Kings marry notwithstanding, and get an heir. Only I knew, and she who never thought to question it, that I could never watch another woman walk in front of her.

The Palace girls guessed, however, finding me so changed, who had never before kept to one alone. I had brought them all gifts from Kolchis, and gave them leave, if they were lonely, to go with my guests of honor. Those with growing children of mine, for whom they still hoped favor, took it well; but I saw some looks that I did not like. A great house must have women, who are as much its wealth as corn and cattle; there must be proper service; besides, they are the signs of victory. But I told Hippolyta, if she had any trouble, to bring it straight to me.

She said nothing, so I thought no harm, till one evening I came in as she dressed, and she said to me, “Theseus, must I undo my hair?”

“What need?” I said, smiling and catching her eye across the maid; I used to undo it in bed. She answered, “This gift of yours will need it.”

She lifted it in her hands: a heavy golden diadem, crusted with gold flowers, with a shower of gold chains on either side to mingle with the hair. She was going to put it on, when I jumped forward and caught her wrist, and called out, “Stop!”

She put it down jingling, and looked at me surprised. I said, “I did not send this. Let me see it.” I put out my hand; but it drew back as if from a snake. There was no doubt what it was. Someone had brought out the crown of the witch Medea. She had worn it when I had seen her first, sitting by my father in the Hall.

Hippolyta, too, sat there at my right hand; perhaps in the very chair. She would have worn this for my sake before all the barons, if I had not come in time. It broke my night’s sleep; I would reach over to feel if she was breathing. In the morning, I sifted the matter out.

The treasurer owned to me, since there was no help for it, who had coaxed him for a peep inside the strongroom. He was no worse than a doting fool, and had served my father, so I only took his office from him. Then I sent for the woman.

While I walked up and down, Hippolyta came in. I heard her behind me, but would not turn. I was angry with her for keeping her mouth shut. Any woman can tell when another hates her; she might have been poisoned, instead of this. The truth was, of course, that she had felt herself a victor; it was beneath her to trample on the fallen. I heard her breathe hard behind me, and a clink of bronze. Trying to harden my heart, and keep a rebuking back to her, I could not help a quick look over my shoulder. She was dressed for battle down to her shield.

Our eyes met. She was as angry as I.

“They say you have sent for her here.” I nodded. “Her, without me?”

“What is this?” I asked. “Have you not seen enough of her? If you had done as I said, it would have been better every way.”

“Ah! You own it! And what did you mean to do, then, fighting my quarrel? Tell me that.”

“Fighting? You forget, I am the King. I shall do judgment. Go now; we will talk afterwards.”

She came up in two strides, and looked at me eye to eye. “You meant to kill her!” she said.

“It is a quick death, off the Rock,” I said, “and better than she has earned. Now go as I asked, and let me deal.”

“You
would have killed her!” Her eyes flashed, and narrowed like a lynx’s. Even when we were hand to hand at Maiden Crag, I had not seen her like this. “What am I? A peasant wife, one of your bath-girls? It was the same when I killed my leopard! Oh, yes, I remember; I had to shout or you would have had that too. And you swore not to dishonor me!”

“Dishonor you? Not to stand by and see you wronged, is that dishonor? I warned you against letting things come to this. You would not heed; and who is the better for your pride?”

“I am, if you are not! Did you think I would come creeping to you like a slave-girl, telling tales? Have I never been taught honor, or the law of arms? I know what calls for a challenge, as well as you do. Yes, and if you had been any other, I would have had your blood too, for this.”

I nearly laughed; but some voice said danger. If she lost her head and defied me, she was too proud to draw back; and who could tell the end of it? But, I thought, if I give in first will she not despise me? We stood at stretch, fizzing like cats upon a wall. I don’t know what would have come next, if we had not heard outside the Guard bringing the woman. That brought back my wits.

“Very well,” I said. “I give her to you. But remember, after, it was you who asked.”

I went and sat apart, in the window. But the woman, when they brought her in, ran straight past Hippolyta, fell down clasping my knees, and wailed excuses. She blamed it all on the treasurer, who had loved her, poor fool.

“Get up,” I said. “I have nothing to do here. The Lady Hippolyta can right her wrongs without help from me. Attend to her; there she is.”

I looked across. She was sickened already by this grovelling; she could not meet my eye. But she stood her ground, showed the weapons (ax, spear and javelin, as I remember) and offered her enemy first choice.

There was no answer, but a squeal of fear. When it sank to sobbing, Hippolyta said quietly, “I have never fought with a knife. I will take one against your spear. Will you fight now?”

Yelling as she ran, the girl came back to me, and fell upon the ground clawing her hair, begging me not to have her butchered by the Amazon, who had bewitched me for sure, else what could I see in such a freak of nature? Then before I could think to stop her (one does not think of such things) out came the bile such women hide from men till hate or fear makes them careless. I got six months’ siltings, thrown in one drench; thrice-chewed, spat-out backbitings of the closet and the bath. I gasped in the stream, then stood up, letting her fall. She lay on the floor between us, looking from face to face, gulping and moaning. She found she had meddled with something outside her ken, and did not like it. “What now?” I said, speaking across her. “She is yours.”

We exchanged silent glances. We could not talk with the woman there. At last Hippolyta said in a low voice, “I have never yet killed a suppliant. If she is mine, send her away.”

I had her taken out, still grizzling to whoever had ears to hear. When we were alone together, I said, “I would have spared you that, with your leave or without it, if I had known.”

She turned slowly. I wondered, if she struck me, what I would do. But she said, “I am ashamed,” and covered her face.

“You?” I said. “Of what? The shame is mine. With that I made do, before you came.” Then we were reconciled, and more in love than ever, if that could be. As for the girl, keeping my word I sold her to some Sidonian trader at Piraeus.

That was enough for me. I made a clean sweep of every girl I had doubts of. Since still she would tell no tales, no one was punished; I gave them to my barons, or with dowries to marry decent craftsmen. That left a quiet house, but short service. Though lack of company was better than what she had had, the dose of poison had left a sickness on her spirit. I could not bear to see her dimmed.

And then one day she said to me, “I have been talking to Amyntor.”

She spoke as simply as a boy. She had still much innocence. After what had happened, I was pleased to see it. I smiled and said, “You could do worse. He was my best lad in the Bull Court.”

“He tells me his wife was there too, and better than he. I should like to see her. But he says he must have your leave.”

“He has it,” I said, thinking how times had changed, when men wanted to bring their wives under my roof. It was clear he had planned for this. When I sent for him he almost owned it. “She has settled down, sir, since she had the boy. I think she is happy most of the day, and perfection is for the gods. She knows that I understand; but no one forgets the Bull Court.”

“No wonder. Nor will I forget that back-spring she used to do, off her finger-ends. She went like a song.”

“There was a song,” said Amyntor. We hummed the air.

“She would have grown too tall,” I said. “We were just in time, there.”

“I once found her crying over that. But not since the child.”

“She can bring him; would she be willing to come?”

“Willing? She has been on at me, sir, board and bed. But you’ve surely seen, since your Lady came, every bull-dancer that is left would die for her.”

So Chryse came from Eleusis. She had grown a tall full-breasted Hellene beauty; all but she herself, I suppose, had forgotten the fearless golden child of the Cretan songs. She loved Amyntor. Yet princes had staked on her a chariot-team or a country villa; young nobles had risked their necks and bribed the guard, to send her as the custom was their verses of hopeless love; she had heard ten thousand voices shout for her as she grasped the horns. Something she must have missed among the house-bred women with their talk of nurses and children, scandal and clothes and men.

She and Hippolyta were friends at the first glance, neither having a mean thought to hide. I would find them in the evening telling tales of Crete or Pontos, or laughing while the little boy played at bull-leaping with a footstool. Peace and order came to the women’s quarters, which had stood in some need of it; and people began to say that the Amazon, for all her strangeness, had made King Theseus steady.

But the barons, as I knew, thought more than they said when they saw her sitting by me in the hall. They knew it meant I would not marry yet, feared it would lay up strife for the day when I did, and wanted the bond with Crete tied firmly. Nor had they forgotten Medea, who had been, besides a sorceress, a priestess of the Mother, scheming to bring back the old religion and end the rule of men. Now here was another priestess of a Goddess; one who knew magic, as they had heard. It did not move them, or quiet their fears, that she wanted nothing but to be free in the woods and mountains, or else with me.