Would you believe it? He had hardly spoken before a distant roll of thunder sounded from a blue and cloudless sky; and at the noise one of our Sicel slaves looked up from the heavy quern in which she was grinding a mixture of wheat and barley, and gave him his lucky word. I should explain that, being weak in the chest, this woman was the last of a team of six to complete the stint set her just before dawn; the others had already crept back to their straw pallets for a nap. All our maids must do an occasional spell at the quern; it is good exercise. As my father tells us: "A slave who does not eliminate the gross humours of his system, by daily sweats, is a sullen slave and soon will be a sick one." But, as the priests of Apollo say: "All things in measure," and the unusual consumption of bread, since my suitors had begun to plague us, made work at the quern ten times longer and more tedious than before.
The lucky words were these: "Father Zeus, for whom do you thunder assent like that? From a clear sky, too! Has some distressed nobleman prayed and found you in a good humour? Then, please, listen to a poor Sicel slave and fulfil her wish at the same time! Pitiful Zeus, let today see the end of impudent banquetry at the Palace! The quern is grinding away my life and breaking my back. May those greedy suitors never again eat the flour that falls from it!"
Aethon's heart leapt in his breast, and he prayed aloud to Apollo: "Archer Apollo, whose servitor I am, favour me on the festival of your vengeance!" For, this being the anniversary of the God's victory over the Python, we had chosen it to be the day of our vengeance also.
Meanwhile, Clytoneus had taken his spear from the spear stand and gone off to attend Apollo's public sacrifice, Argus following at his heels. Eurycleia kept the maids busily whitewashing, and when they had completed one wall, sent them to draw water, put purple covers on the settles, lay the tables with goblets, two-handled cups and trenchers, and strew freshly cut branches of juniper on the pavement. Before long Eumaeus drove in three splendid hogs and, meeting Philoetius, who had brought a heifer and some fat goats ferried across from Hiera, greeted him with: "Honest friend, the Queen wishes to see you."
When Philoetius returned, he found Melantheus insulting Aethon again. "Are you still about, troublemaker?" Melantheus stormed. "Didn't you collect enough food yesterday, that you must beg for more? Where do you stow it all away? Don't tell me you have eaten that entire haggis in a single night as well as those scraps! Now, look here, fellow! Any more of your mischief and you and I must come to blows. I fancy that I can hit a trifle harder than Irus."
But Philoetius interposed. "This man is under the Queen's protection," he said, "having cheered her with news of Prince Laodamas. If it proves to be true, our troubles will soon be over. The King and he will send those damned rogues packing, and give you your deserts, you traitor!"
Then he approached Aethon and pressed his hand, saying: "My name is Philoetius, at your service."
Melantheus slunk out of the court. Philoetius was not a man with whom he cared to quarrel.
About an hour later Clytoneus entered the Palace, followed by the suitors, who threw their cloaks down on the settles and lost no time in sacrificing the beasts provided by Eumaeus and Philoetius. Being hungry, they set their servants to cook the livers, kidneys, brains and suchlike in a huge mixed grill, resting them on the marrow bones, and called for wine and a great deal of bread. Two big black cauldrons also bubbled at the hearth fire, containing pigs' trotters, the heifer's heels and tongue, sheeps' heads, and lengths of tripe, to which barley, beans and vegetables had been added. The rest of the meat was roasted on spits of pomegranate wood and five-pronged toasting forks. Eumaeus, Melantheus and Philoetius acted as waiters, because the other servants were still working in the stables and the garden; it was not nearly dinnertime yet.
Clytoneus called to Aethon: "Beggar, come and sit at this table with me!" The table had been set on the threshold, just outside the front door, where the red stone dogs stood guard, and he filled a golden wine cup for Aethon, saying in a loud voice: "Cypriot, you may rely on me to protect you from any abuse or assault, though these uninvited guests often forget that they are banqueting in a palace, not a country tavern, and behave accordingly. My lords, are you listening?" He beckoned to Eumaeus, who thereupon helped Aethon, before anyone else, to a steaming bowl of stew.
A contemptuous murmur arose, which Antinous, who had arrived fairly drunk, interrupted. "Well," he said, "I suppose that we must put up with Prince Clytoneus's bragging a little longer; for I do not think that the Fates have measured him out a very extensive life."
Ctesippus guffawed. Then he shouted: "Comrades, our licenced beggar has already been served with food enough to satiate a smithy full of blacksmiths, and since Prince Clytoneus has shown courtesy to so distinguished a foreigner, I do not propose to be behindhand in following his example. Here is my contribution, and if he finds it too tough even for his ostrichlike stomach to digest, let him pass it on to Gorgo the goose woman or some other humble and deserving person."
Melantheus had brought him a dish of broth, and Ctesippus, picking up one of the heifer's heels—but, because it was very hot, using one of our best purple covers as a glove—hurled it at Aethon. With one of those mirthless grins that you see on the bronze figures of horned men imported from Sardinia, Aethon moved his head aside; and the missile struck the wall instead.
Clytoneus, grasping his spear, burst out: "It is fortunate for you that the heel missed my guest, Ctesippus! If he had not ducked in time, I should have spitted you like a sucking pig. My patience has a certain breaking point and if you stretch it any further, will snap. No doubt, you have decided to kill me; but beware, for I will take one or two of you with me to Hades first. My lord Agelaus, as the noblest born Trojan present, next to myself, you must help me to keep order here. When the Council chose you to act as Regent for the King, did they authorize you to see his son publicly insulted?"
Agelaus answered, grinning: "Ctesippus is in merry mood. Pay no attention to his practical jokes, which reflect a lively and generous nature. You must remember, kinsman, that we have absented ourselves from the town festivities in honour of Apollo—after witnessing the introductory prayers and sacrifices—at your personal invitation. You promised that today the Princess Nausicaa will clearly name the man whom she intends to marry, as she has been urged to do for a couple of years at least. Once she does so, this series of banquets will end, and there need be no recurrence of unpleasant scenes, which I deplore no less profoundly than yourself, but for which I hold you largely responsible."
Only one of my suitors, the Sican Theoclymenus, had noticed that no arms were hanging in the cloisters; nor did the whitewashing of the single wall deceive him. He cast a keen glance of enquiry at Clytoneus, who raised the butt of his spear a handsbreadth from the ground in warning, and pointed to the side door.
Theoclymenus rose shivering from his stool. "My eyes are darkened," he said. "The court is full of ghosts, and I hear a sound of mourning in the air. Forgive me, comrades, if I leave you and invoke the God Apollo in the market place." He crossed the court at a run.
Everyone stared. But Antinous hiccuped: "Upon my word, that was the neatest excuse I ever heard! To cover his confusion when he had been taken short at table and disgraced himself…" A yell of laughter drowned the rest of his disgusting speech.
I paced up and down my bedroom for a while. Dolius the gardener had stumbled on Ctimene's dead body hidden by long grass in a corner of the orchard, by the melon patch. I ordered him to say nothing to anyone and leave her where she lay—explaining that we could not attend to the funeral rites until I had announced my choice of a husband. I may say at once that we never discovered who killed Ctimene, or why. Her throat was cut from ear to ear and someone had evidently dragged her to this place of concealment. My own view is that, suspecting Melantho of a love affair with Eurymachus, she had joined the party of maids, none of whom realized, in the half-dark, who she was. She then followed Melantho, and either cut her own throat when these suspicions proved to be well founded; or perhaps Eurymachus (who never stuck at murder) cut it for her. It does not matter. The curse of the amber necklace had drawn Ctimene down to join my brother Laodamas in loveless Hades.
The news animated me with a calm rage. I went into the empty throne chamber and sat unobserved on a chair immediately behind the front door, from which I could hear everything. When, by the sound of drunken laughter—at my orders Philoetius and Eumaeus were assisting Pontonous to keep the cups and goblets filled to the brim—it was at last clear that the time had come for action, I slipped out again and called Eurycleia.
"Eurycleia," I said, "the key of the storeroom, please!"
She accompanied me, and I remember that when, having undone the thong attached to the knob, she unlocked the door and pulled it open, the hinges gave a great vengeful groan, as loud as a sacred bull who sees trespassers venturing across his paddock. I read this as a good sign. On days of critical importance one watches for every possible indication of the Gods' will; but must be careful not to be deceived by the ambiguity in which they love to cloak their designs.
I took up the fourteen well-stocked Sicel quivers that Clytoneus had secreted here, found a box of brass and iron quoits used for our palace game of ringing the peg, and then with trembling hands reached for the nail where hung a tall, curved, glittering gold case engraved with ancient pictures. My dear friend Procne had fortunately come to stay at the Palace, now that her father had sailed for Elba. She and Eurycleia between them managed to lift the long heavy box of quoits, while I carried the golden case and the armful of quivers. "Come," I said, and we filed through the silent throne chamber and into the thronged banqueting court, very slowly, not looking about us. I came to a halt beside the main pillar that supported the cloister roof, and to my surprise remained perfectly self-possessed.
The suitors, startled and pleased to see me wearing my bridal robe and a garland of fresh flowers, beat on the tables with their knife handles and raised a lusty cheer; which I acknowledged with a slight nod before setting down my load and addressing them. "My lords, the Prince Clytoneus decided to make no choice of husband for me that might prove disagreeable to the King, and prudently left the decision to myself. Finding this an invidious task, I appealed to the Goddess Athene, who appeared to me in a dream last night and spoke as follows: 'Child, choose the man with the steadiest hand and the keenest eye of all who sit at table in your inner court; and since tomorrow is the feast of Apollo the Archer, remember the bow of Philoctetes!' What could be plainer? Homer describes how Isander and Hippolochus contended for the kingdom of Lycia in an archery match; and though the prize here is a smaller one, more than one hundred noblemen dispute it bitterly—passionate rivals for my love."
I let these words cut like a razor.
"Not only would it be tedious," I went on, "for so many rivals to contend with the same bow, but I fear quarrels of precedence. Therefore, to limit the entries, I have designed a simple trial of manual skill. My brother Clytoneus will set up twelve pegs in a row, one behind the other, across the court: and no suitor may cast more than one quoit. Whichever three men ring the most distant pegs are permitted to take part in the archery match, which will consist of shooting arrows through axe-heads. The bow I shall lend them is an heirloom; this bow of Philoctetes, the most famous hero-relic in all Sicily. It belonged to Hercules himself, who bequeathed it to Philoctetes as he climbed upon his pyre on Mount Oeta. With this very weapon Philoctetes shot Paris first in the hand, and then in the right eye, thus virtually ending the Trojan War."
My speech provoked a deal of confusion, because they had expected me to choose one or other of the suitors whom my father had approved. Now, if the company as a whole accepted my means of deciding the issue, for which I claimed divine sanction, they too would have to stand by the result and change their plans. And the young men whose bride gifts had not been particularly handsome, thinking that here was a chance to improve their position, clamoured a full-throated assent. Clytoneus at once took a mattock and dug a long trench in the stamped earth of the court; then he fixed the pegs at three paces' interval along the trench, in accurate alignment, pressing the soil tightly around them with his shoe. Afterwards he drew a mark from behind which all competitors must cast their quoits. "You may begin, my lords," he said, as he strode back to his seat.
Antinous, drunk though he was, thought of a clever objection. Reminding us that Apollo had once accidentally killed the boy Hyacinth with a quoit, he suggested that it would be courting death to institute a public quoit game on Apollo's own feast day. "One of us would be bound to meet Hyacinth's fate. But I cannot agree that the archery match would be tedious; and, as for precedence, we can compete in a circle, beginning from this wine jar and continuing sunwise, as the wine is served. There seems to be a sufficiency of arrows. Let the mark be a quoit suspended from the door yonder—the one that leads into the court of sacrifice." This meant that he and his friends would have the first shots and, to judge from the previous day's funeral games, the contest would degenerate into a farce.
Clytoneus, however, allowed him to have his way, despite my bitter protests. He took the golden case from my hands and, unfastening the clasps, pulled the bow reverently out. I had never, as it happened, seen it before—a terrible-looking weapon, standing as high as a man, and consisting of what must have been the largest pair of Cretan wild-goat's horns ever grown, fastened together with hammered bronze. Aethon had already examined it when he visited the storeroom, and provided a cord of twisted flax, four times stouter than an ordinary bowstring, with a loop at either end, and of exactly the right length.
The horns of a living goat have a certain suppleness, but in the course of years they harden somewhat, and after centuries set almost as hard as a stag's antlers.
Leodes came first. Being a junior priest of Zeus, he had presided at all the recent sacrifices, which gave him the place of honour next to the immense jar from which the wine circulated. He accepted the unstrung bow and an arrow while Eumaeus proceeded to nail up the quoit. Then Clytoneus shouted: "Hey, there, Philoetius, bar that door from the outside; someone might enter unexpectedly and get hurt." Philoetius went round by the passage and did so.
Posted on the threshold, Leodes addressed himself to the bow, which he struggled to string, using both hands and knees; but succeeded only in ricking his back. "Friends," he groaned, "I am defeated by this adamantine weapon, and lay odds of ten to one in wine or beef that nobody else can master it. The pull is enough to break the strongest heart. Princess Nausicaa has played another trick on us."
He leant the bow against the door, propped the arrow beside it and sat down again heavily. Antinous reproached him. "What nonsense! If Philoctetes could string it, his descendants can surely do the same? I never hold with the superstition that the men of old were stronger and more courageous than ourselves. The bow is a trifle stiff, that is all; it needs warming and greasing. Just because you were born on a moonless night—blame your mother—and are consequently slack-twisted, without strength in your wrists or shoulders, and take no exercise except backgammon and cottabus… Very well, I propose to take up your wager: two bullocks and two wine jars against twenty that I accomplish the task! Melantheus, put a panful of hog's lard to warm at the fire; when we have greased the bow, length by length, you will see how it recovers its spring. Age freezes, lard thaws."
Melantheus obeyed, after which two or three members of Antinous's party took turns in trying to string the bow, but without the least success. I should mention here that archery is not an Elyman accomplishment; most of my suitors had never handled a war bow in their lives. Meanwhile, at a prearranged signal, Eumaeus and Philoetius went out unobtrusively by the side door. Eumaeus ran to the main gateway, where his son was waiting with an expectant group of loyal grooms and gardeners. "When you hear the sound of fighting in the hall," he said, "attack the suitors' servants and drive them from the court of sacrifice. Make a dash and clatter as though you were an army, and yell threats in the King's name." Philoetius hurried to tell Eurycleia: "Lock the maids in their quarters, and keep them there." Eumaeus then came back through the same door, which Philoetius made fast outside with a bar and a yard or two of Byblus cable, before regaining the hall by way of the throne chamber.
Eurymachus now snatched the bow from Noemon's hands, but though he turned it slowly round in the heat of the fire, and fairly smothered it with lard, succeeded no better than the others. "Hades curse the thing!" he cried. "Leodes was right. It will break any heart or back."
Antinous laughed. "When I come to consider the question," he drawled, "to string the bow on Apollo's feast day is even more of a mistake than to cast quoits. Hercules used this bow for numerous extraordinary feats during his Labours, but Apollo and he, being rival archers, were always at loggerheads. Indeed, their hostility once degenerated into an open brawl, when Hercules had pulled the tripod from under Apollo's priestess Herophile and carried it off to found an oracle of his own. Father Zeus was obliged to part them with a thunderbolt. I believe that Apollo himself has stiffened the bow—perhaps vexed at our abandonment of his public festivities. So let us adjourn the trial until tomorrow had propitiate the God by sacrificing certain fat goats which Philoetius has driven in for us. Tomorrow will not be a day of such peculiar sanctity, and may the best man win."
Antinous was applauded for this pious and ingenious suggestion. I suppose that he had planned to take away the bow, which was now lying on a sheepskin by the fire at some distance from the front door, and replace it next morning with a large but more manageable one.
"Apollo, Apollo, favour us!" he cried. All the wine cups and goblets were hastily filled again to the brim, and each man poured a libation to the God before draining his vessel to the lees.
At this point Aethon bent down and, clasping Clytoneus's knees, said: "A boon, my Prince! When I return home to Cyprus (may it be soon!) my friends and kinsmen will ask me: 'What have you done? What have you seen?' And after recounting my adventures in Egypt and Palestine and Libya, I hope to add: 'Then I made a voyage to Drepanum, where is stored the famous bow of Philoctetes the Phocian, which settled the Trojan War. The King's son took this wonder from its curved golden case, engraved with the Labours of Hercules, and allowed me to handle it myself.' Let me, I beg, make good this hope, although to string it will doubtless prove beyond my power, since I am not of Phocian blood, like many of your gallant friends."
This was the cue for a pretended tiff between Clytoneus and myself. When he granted Aethon's boon, I was to round on him and say: "What, let a beggarman profane that holy relic with his foul fingers? Are you picking a quarrel? Replace the bow in its case at once and lock it up in the storeroom."
Clytoneus was to shout: "I have every right to entrust this bow to whomever I please, and I resent your interference. Go to your quarters now, attend to your own work and see that the maids attend to theirs. Your task is done for today, and I am master here. Eumaeus, bring me that bow!"
We must have spoken our parts convincingly enough, because a shout of laughter arose, which increased to a roar when Eumaeus hesitantly picked up the bow and brought it across the court to Clytoneus. Clytoneus handed it to Aethon with a look of pretended defiance.
I stamped my foot and flounced out, slamming the door behind me as if in a rage.
"Someone is going to have his face scratched tonight," Ctesippus taunted, "just to show who is mistress in this Palace."
Aethon held the bow lovingly in his hands, weighing it and turning it over as though admiring its ancient workmanship. He was addressing a secret prayer to Apollo and Hercules, begging them to compose their dispute and together guide his arrows. The suitors nudged each other and grinned: "He is an expert on bows, by the look of it—collects them, no doubt, the old vagabond. Or perhaps he thinks of setting up a bow factory." Aethon said gently: "My lords, what a marvellous bow this is, unstrung! But how much more marvellous when strung!" He took the flaxen cord and with a sudden commanding gesture grasped the horn and bent it slowly and effortlessly until the loop engaged in the notch; he might have been a musician fixing a new gut to his lyre, for all the trouble it gave him. Then he sat back, twanged the string with his thumb, making it twitter like a swallow, reached for the arrow and, almost without taking aim, sent it screaming across the court at the quoit nailed against the door. It struck the exact centre of the target and the arrow tip pierced the thick oaken plank.
Then, turning to Clytoneus with an easy laugh, he said: "Prince, I stand on your sister's promise. I strung the bow, I hit the bull's eye, I am therefore her husband. Do you acknowledge my claim?"
"I acknowledge it publicly."
"That is well. Now I have another mark to hit. A certain man present treacherously killed my fellow clansman, the noble Mentor. I am come to avenge him: blood for blood. Antinous, prepare to meet black death."
Antinous was raising a two-handled cup to his lips, when the arrow passed clean through his Adam's apple and cut through the nape of his neck. He collapsed with a spasmodic thrashing of arms and legs, upset the table and spilt the bread and meat on the floor. Blood spouted from his mouth and nose all over the good food.
A shout of dismay echoed along the cloisters, but Aethon had fitted a second arrow to the bow and sat prepared to shoot anyone who opposed him. Eurymachus gazed wildly around the cloister walls and suddenly noticed that the weapons and shields were no longer there. He quickly made up his mind, and sang out: "Friends, this Cypriot is a master archer who will kill at least four or five of us before we can arrest him. And he was within his rights to shoot Antinous, in requital of blood; we cannot deny it. Moreover, if the Princess agrees to marry this stranger, let us not stand in her way but disperse to our homes; for the Goddess Athene herself has ordained the contest."
Mixed cries of assent and protest were heard. Then Clytoneus spoke: "My lords, listen to me. Antinous has died because he killed my uncle Mentor, whom the King appointed Regent in his absence. There are still two other plain murderers among you. First, Eurymachus, who stabbed my brother Laodamas—which was the beginning of all these troubles—and drowned his body in the sea, as his ghost complained to the Queen. Next, Ctesippus, guilty of the murder for which my brother Halius was wrongfully banished—the barbarous disembowelling of a fisherman. Though each of these criminals were to surrender his whole inheritance, it would not be sufficient requital of the wrong he has done our house. My lords, bind them without delay, haul them before the Council, and you will thereby free yourselves from the charge of blood guiltiness which overhangs every person in these cloisters. Come Agelaus, come Leodes, come Amphinomus—I address you as the three most pacific of those who have condoned the rebellion against my father—what do you say?"
When they made no reply, Eurymachus shouted again: "Very well then, friends! He refuses our offer and accuses us of rebellion, which if proved would be a capital offence. So let us kill him at all costs and have done with it! Out swords; use tables for shields!"
He leaped at Aethon, sword in hand, but an arrow struck him on the right nipple and down he went, knocking over the table and a couple of stools in his fall.
"And now for Ctesippus," yelled Clytoneus. "With his death, we can make an end of killing."
It was too late. Amphinomus, as Eurymachus's cousin-german, could not refrain from vengeance. Keeping close to the wall, he rushed at Aethon, who was looking around for Ctesippus and had exposed his back. Clytoneus, however, saw him coming and hurled his spear. Amphinomus fell transfixed but Clytoneus, left weaponless, dared not run forward to retrieve the spear, for fear of being slashed with a sword. He cupped his hand and muttered in Aethon's ear: "Keep them off while I fetch spears, shields and helmets." He darted through the front door, dragging Eumaeus with him. Philoetius followed; he pushed his way through the tables where the fuddled suitors were all at loggerheads, some calling on the others to make a concerted rush on Aethon, some recommending surrender.
Aethon yelled above the din: "Any more for Tartarus? Any more for the Styx? Walk up, walk up, my lords! Here is a fool's chance for eternal extinction. But let those who love life keep twenty paces from the bow of Philoctetes. And avoid that side door!"
A general retreat across the court ensued, and the decision might well have been for surrender, had not Eumaeus's son, roused to action by the uproar, attacked the suitors' servants in the court of sacrifice and bawled: "Good news! The King's ship is sighted. Soon he will land and take vengeance."
Noemon, driven mad by jealousy when he saw Aethon string the bow and heard him acknowledged as my husband, rallied his comrades. "We are lost," he exclaimed. "The King will make no distinction between guilty and innocent but hang us all as rebels. Quick: we must overpower this single archer even if some of us fall to his shafts. We can then threaten to burn the Palace unless the King consents to pardon us. Seize your tables, and when I say 'One, two, three!' charge!"
Noemon had not counted as far as two before an arrow flew in at his open mouth and silenced him for ever. Then Clytoneus and Eumaeus, hurrying back with spears and shields, took up their positions on either side of Aethon; while Philoetius, fully armed, ran to defend the side door.
Clytoneus made a gallant effort to avoid the odium of a massacre. "This is your last opportunity to surrender, my lords," he cried. "If you let it slip, here are fourteen quiverfuls of arrows, feathered with curses of my brother Halius, to shoot you like dogs. Step towards me, one by one, with your hands above your heads and submit to be bound. We promise every man his liberty except Ctesippus."
"Never," shouted Ctesippus. But Leodes lifted his delicate hands and said: "Friends, the battle is unequal and while Ctesippus lives we are harbouring a murderer. I urge you to surrender; for once we are dead, there is an end of love, honour and the joys of this world."
Agelaus had been consulting with Melantheus, who volunteered to fetch the arms that were so desperately needed. He entered the Tower, jumped from a first-storey window which gave on the street, and ran to the kitchen entrance. Bursting in, he worked his way along a series of passages, making for the storeroom; from which his daughter and her foolish companions helped him to drag out armfuls of spears, javelins and shields. They hurried these to the Tower, where Agelaus pulled them up through the window for distribution among his clansmen. Soon with a shout of "No surrender!" twelve armed Trojans formed a line of battle, shield to shield.
Clytoneus beat his breast "I left the storeroom key in the lock," he cried. "Melantheus must have gone all the way round. Quick, Eumaeus, prevent him from fetching more! You too, Philoetius! Aethon and I can hold the doorway until your return."
Philoetius and Eumaeus rushed indoors and caught Melantheus paying a second visit to the storeroom. They sprang on him, felled him, pinioned his arms and legs with a length of cable and, throwing the free end across a beam, hauled him high up. Then, after belaying him to a pillar, they locked the door, pocketed the key and regained the court, leaving Melantheus dangling impotently.
Aethon grew anxious. He had counted on inflicting such heavy losses on the enemy that they must surrender. But now Agelaus was shouting: "Cypriot, lay aside your bow. If you surrender to us, I swear to spare your life and send you back to your island with golden gifts. If you fight on you are doomed."
A strange thing happened. A swallow came flying into the cloisters, circled around Aethon, and perched twittering on the lintel above his head. Aethon, who is occasionally gifted with the power to understand the language of birds, recognized the ghost of Mentor, promising him victory in Athene's name.
The enemy advanced across the court and Aethon rapidly shot three of them in the feet, so that they shrieked for pain and let fall their weapons. Nevertheless, the mass of Phocaean swordsmen sheltering behind the wall of Trojan shields swept forward, and a ragged volley of spears flew at the defenders of the door. All missed their mark, whereas Aethon's arrows, and a return volley of spears carefully aimed, accounted for three of the enemy, including Demoptolemus. Yet the charge was not broken; on they came. Philoetius had the good fortune to kill Ctesippus with a spear-thrust in the belly. "Payment for the heifer's heel," he bawled.
In desperate fighting Aethon dealt Agelaus a blow of his naked fist which shattered his temple; and Clytoneus transfixed Leiocritus. The enemy wavered. Aethon raised a Cretan shout of triumph and they turned to flee. Leodes, who had behaved more correctly than most of my suitors, tried to surrender by clasping Aethon's knees. "Too late," said Aethon, striking off his head with the sword that Agelaus had dropped.
Had Procne not been beside me, I should scarcely have been able to bear the suspense; in emergencies no girl equals Procne. I swore to have her chosen as Athene's new priestess. All this while we were craning our heads out of my window. The cloister roof prevented us from seeing Aethon and Clytoneus, and we could not even be sure that they were still alive and unwounded. But when our champions went charging across the open court in full view, Procne and I gave thanks to Athene for the completeness of our victory. We watched them ruthlessly despatch the suitors, using swords now, drawn from the scabbards of the dead.
"No quarter!" cried Aethon. Suddenly my heart chilled, because among the twenty or thirty wretched, fuddled, helpless men I distinguished Phemius the minstrel, his lyre slung over his shoulder, distraught with fear and battering at the side door. He evidently wanted to escape and take sanctuary at the Great Altar. But finding no egress he cast his eyes wildly about him; and saw me.
"Save me, Princess," he shrieked. "The murder of a Son of Homer on Apollo's own feast day would curse this house until the seventh generation."
He was right. I screamed at Clytoneus and Aethon to protect Phemius; Clytoneus shook his head wilfully, Aethon did not even look my way. Scrambling out of the window, I slid down the cloister roof and dropped on all fours to the court below. The corpse of Noemon broke my fall. Picking myself up, I sprang in front of Phemius, and spread my arms wide. Aethon came bounding towards us, drunk with blood lust. "Aethon, beware!" This time my scream dispelled his trance. He flung away sword and shield, fell at my feet, and worshipped me as though I were a goddess; while the other three methodically continued their horrid task of hunting down fugitives and cutting the throats of the wounded.
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