Dido (6 page)

‘No, they're both dead. My father used to have a small shop in the city, and died only five years ago, but I never knew my mother. She didn't live very long after I was born.'

‘That must be a sadness for you. Have you always written poems? Sung songs? My sister was especially impressed with your playing of the lyre. She plays a little herself, you know.'

Iopas nodded and blushed. ‘I find it easier to write and sing than to talk. I can be someone different from my real self then. And bringing music out of those instruments . . . it makes me feel' – he paused and smiled at Anna – ‘powerful.'

‘That must be wonderful indeed, but is being your true self so difficult?'

Iopas took some time to answer. ‘No, not difficult, but the person I really am isn't . . . well, he isn't the heroic, brave, confident and eloquent person I'd like to be, so it's just as well I'm allowed to pretend as often as I like to be another sort of person altogether.'

‘Well,' said Anna, ‘you're still very young and might
well become all those things – heroic, brave, confident and so forth – when you're a little older, don't you think?'

I'm flirting with him, she thought. But Dido isn't here to chide me and Iopas is so pleasant and he likes me. I know he does. If matters progress, there will be time enough then to speak to my sister. Anna knew that Dido was ceaselessly conscious of station and rank and dignity; and she'd made quite certain from the very beginning of their time in Carthage that everyone knew that she was in control; that her word was law. That she was to be obeyed. Anna was almost sure that this applied to her as much as to anyone else and wondered sometimes about how her sister saw the world. Dido was clear that she ranked higher than most men, but they, of course, found this attitude strange and uncomfortable. Once, she'd even asked Dido about it, and she, who went through her life seemingly with no doubts about anything, had answered: ‘It's my kingdom, Anna. I've been given this land. Fairly. It's mine. And I intend to make the city great. A force in the world. Everyone will wonder at it. And at me.'

Dido had wasted no time. She'd had the local chieftains in the palm of her hand. They were all besotted with her and some of them must have thought she would make them a good wife. They'd talked to their own builders and farmers and carpenters and engineers, and soon a whole army of workers was labouring to create this city that had
sprung up on the shores of the ocean. Also, Anna reflected, Iarbas helped us. This man, a chieftain from the neighbouring territory, had been eager from the first to assist the young woman who'd suddenly found herself so powerful. He, like some of the others, had hoped Dido would be grateful and marry him, but there had never been any sign of her doing so, and Anna wondered how dangerous that was. He was the most persistent of the suitors. When they first came to Carthage, Dido pleaded promises made to Sychaeus. Iarbas was not repulsive to look at, even though he was no great beauty: a big ox of a man with twinkling blue eyes and a hearty laugh. He was friendly for the moment, but he could just as easily turn from a friend into an enemy, and that would be difficult. How would Carthage survive if it was surrounded on all sides by its enemies, by people who wanted nothing more than to take Dido's kingdom for themselves, by force if necessary?

And when we first came here, we were refugees ourselves and on the run, Anna thought. Poor Sychaeus! To this day she wished that she had paid proper attention to what she had seen only moments before his death, but there hadn't been time. It had all happened too quickly.

She'd been sewing, as she often did during the long afternoons, in the gardens of Sychaeus' palace in Tyre. The cedar tree that grew in the palace garden sheltered her from the worst heat of the sun. Her head was bent over her work, and suddenly she became
aware that a shadow deeper than the shade of the tree had fallen over the fabric in her hands. She turned at once and jumped to her feet when she saw that a man was standing behind her.

‘Who are you? How did you get past the guards at the gate?'

She felt suddenly icy cold and thought: I'm frightened. That's why I can't feel the heat of the sun any more. The man was tall – taller than anyone she'd seen before – and he wore a grey cloak even though this was the height of summer. He had a pale face, half hidden by the hood of his garment. When he spoke, his words came to her ears as though he were standing a long way away, and yet she could have put out a hand and touched him.

‘I am Hades, the God of the Underworld. Of Death. I have come to warn you.'

‘Warn me? Warn me of what?' Anna trembled, terrified.

‘You will see. I must go to the appointed place.'

She watched the grey figure striding away and stood rooted to the spot, unable to move for what seemed like an eternity. When she recovered, when she found the strength to move again, she ran into the palace and found her sister, Dido, lying on the ground near the butchered body of her husband, weeping uncontrollably, the hem of her garment stained with the blood that pooled round Sychaeus' lifeless corpse. Their own brother had killed him. Of Hades there was no sign, and yet the day was no longer warm and sunny. A
shadow had fallen over everything and Anna could tell that the God was still somewhere near them, hidden, waiting.

She shivered as she sat beside Iopas. To this day it hurt her to remember how brutally Sychaeus had been murdered. Dido didn't even have time to mourn him properly, because their murdering brother would have killed them too if they'd stayed. We had to flee, she thought, but thanks to Dido's cleverness we didn't go empty-handed. She'd always sworn to Anna that the hiding place for Sychaeus' treasure was revealed to her in a dream, but Anna thought it was much more likely that her sister had known where the gold was hidden even during her husband's lifetime. She shivered when she recalled how terrified and desperate she'd been when they arrived on this beautiful shore. Dido, Anna thought, had never seemed frightened, but then she'd always been the brave one; I'm the one who jumped at every shadow.

But Anna was also good at putting painful memories to one side. She turned to Iopas and said: ‘Isn't it beautiful here? Hasn't my sister shown herself to be the best of queens?' Gardeners had only just finished planting palm trees in large white pottery tubs, decorated with dark blue snakes and dragons. Dido had ensured that the courtyards were almost the first things to be completed, once the living quarters and kitchens were ready. ‘She loves flowers and trees and everything growing,' Anna explained, ‘and these courtyards are like small gardens, aren't they?'

‘Tamed gardens,' Iopas said. ‘Not wildernesses.'

Anna looked at him and smiled. ‘Who would want to create a wilderness?'

Iopas opened his mouth, perhaps to persuade her of how beautiful a desert could be, but at that moment a messenger raced into the courtyard, panting and sweating as though he'd run for a long time.

‘Queen Dido. I have to speak to her. The harbour master has seen some ships making for our shores.'

Anna stood up. ‘Follow me,' she said, and began to walk swiftly along the corridors leading to the great hall, which was where Dido was generally to be found at this time of day, poring over maps and plans of buildings going up in the city, or talking to her advisers – and sure enough, when she entered the room, she could see her sister sitting at a table with scrolls of parchment piled up around her. Various men Anna didn't recognize were standing about, waiting to hear what the queen was going to say.

‘Dido,' she cried. ‘A messenger is here. From the harbour master.'

‘Madam . . .' The young man was now so out of breath that it took him a little while to collect himself. During those moments Dido sat very still and stared at him without saying a word.

‘Madam, there are ships approaching the harbour. We've seen three but there may be others. We cannot see what kind of ship clearly yet, but the harbour master needs your instructions.'

Dido stood up. ‘I think we should go down to the
harbour and see who these strangers are,' she said, gathering her robes about her and waving a hand to dismiss everyone else in the room. Anna watched as they gathered up the papers that had been spread out over the table and melted away almost before Dido had swept from the room. Anna followed her sister, almost running to keep up with her.

Outside the palace, the sun was striking the bright, clean stones of the new buildings and making them glitter. It was hot. Not unbearably so, but still Anna put on her headscarf to keep off the worst of the glare. Dido walked bareheaded, even though her skin was pale and burned easily. She could do this because a servant (whose duty it was to sit waiting, all day sometimes, in case the queen took it into her head to walk about the city) kept pace beside her, carrying a kind of awning on a stick which he held over her head so that she remained always in the shade. This arrangement also means that my sister can show off her hair, Anna reflected. Today, it was intricately braided and entwined with silver threads and hung down almost to her waist. Dido intended as many of Carthage's citizens as possible to see it – and they would, because somehow word had spread, even though this was a private excursion and not an official procession, and people were streaming down from houses on the hills, from shops, marketplaces and the temples built to the Gods, from inns and taverns near the harbour, all eager to see who had set their sails for land and was making for their shore.

‘Queen Dido,' said the harbour master, a sleek, plump, middle-aged man, who had the manner of a host welcoming guests to a private party. ‘What an honour to see you here! Come and sit in my quarters, madam, and stay out of this fierce sun.'

‘I carry, as you see, my own shade with me,' Dido answered him, adding, perhaps conscious that this sounded ungracious: ‘But thank you for your kindness and hospitality. Are we any clearer who's aboard these ships?'

‘No, madam. It's hard to tell, but soon they'll be close enough for us to observe them properly.'

In the event, no one could believe what they were seeing from the harbour master's window when the three ships weighed anchor in the bay. They looked like vessels from a nightmare, their sails torn and ragged, the paint worn from their sides, and their figureheads broken and disfigured. Everyone was shouting and talking at once and some of what they said floated up like ribbons of words to where Anna and Dido were standing: ‘Look – someone's coming ashore in a boat . . . haven't seen a bath in some weeks . . . Are they pirates? . . . No, the pirates've chased them here, looks like. How many? Can't tell . . . One of them's got a bandage round his arm . . . bleeding . . . Here they are . . . taking them to the harbour master . . . friends or enemies?'

Anna watched some sailors (sent, no doubt, by the harbour master himself) standing by as the small boat came close to the jetty; they jumped down into it and
grabbed hold of the three occupants. She couldn't hear what they were saying to one another, but the strangers were led up very quickly – bundled up, you could almost say – to where she and Dido were standing. The harbour master huffed and puffed as he approached them.

‘Now then, now then . . .' he said. ‘What do we have here? Who are you and where do you come from?'

Of the three men who stood before them, one was clearly the leader. Another was an elderly, grizzled sailor and the third was very young. No more than a boy really, with reddish hair and a wide smile, full of energy and seemingly quite undaunted by his adventures on the ocean.

‘We're grateful for your kindness,' said the leader. ‘We've come a very long way and we've been travelling for many moons. We're Trojans who fled the city as it burned. You've heard tell of the war?'

Dido stepped forward then. Anna stared at the man and tried not to appear too astonished. His voice . . . Who in the realm of men had ever had a speaking voice like this? Perhaps he was Apollo in disguise. Didn't the Gods sometimes visit mortals without revealing their true identity? That was what the stories said, and this voice was beautiful. It was deep and true, and every word came to Anna's ears like a note of music made by a golden instrument. Although he was dirty, ragged and unkempt after a long sea voyage, he towered over the harbour master and it was hard not to admire his muscled, sun-browned arms. His hair
and eyes were dark, and his nose as well-formed as that on a statue.

‘You are welcome,' Dido said. ‘I am Dido, Queen of Carthage.'

‘An honour, madam,' he answered, and bowed very low. ‘I am Aeneas, son of Anchises, of the city of Troy. This is my ship's captain, and that young scoundrel is Maron, who helps me with the care of my little son, Ascanius.'

She said, ‘How many are you, on those ships?'

‘There are thirty of us, madam. I've recently buried my poor father on the island of Sicily, but my son is thankfully still with me. I'm grateful to you for your kindness.'

‘It's my pleasure. Go to your men and tell them they are welcome. We will return to our palace and prepare for your arrival. I am sorry to hear of your father's death. Harbour master, help Aeneas and his men to disembark in good order. We'll deal with the ships later. They seem to be in need of some repairs.'

‘Pirates from the islands.' Aeneas smiled for the first time. ‘They didn't kill us, but the fight was fierce and our poor ships suffered greatly.'

Dido returned his smile. ‘We'll wait to greet you at the palace in due course. Baths and clothes will be prepared for everyone.'

Anna recalled how they'd left the harbour master's quarters then. Dido walked swiftly back up the hill, dismissing the awning-carrier with a wave of her hand.
‘Anna,' she said, over her shoulder, ‘may I leave this to you?'

‘Of course. I'll be happy to organize everything.'