Fire From Heaven (19 page)

He had better take off his cloak; while he spared a hand for the pin, he talked on to keep the horse in mind of him. ‘Remember who we are. Alexander and Boukephalas.’

The cloak fell behind him; he slid his arm over the horse’s back. It must be near fourteen hands, a tall horse for Greece; he was used to thirteen. This one was as tall as Philotas’ horse about which he talked so much. The black eye rolled round at him. ‘Easy, easy, now. I’ll tell you when.’

With the reins looped in his left hand he grasped the arch of the mane; with his right, its base between the shoulders. He could feel the horse gather itself together. He ran a few steps with it to gain momentum, then leaped, threw his right leg over; he was up.

The horse felt the light weight on its back, compact of certainty; the mercy of invincible hands, the forbearance of immovable will; a nature it knew and shared, transfigured to divinity. Men had not mastered it; but it would go with the god.

The crowd was silent at first. They were men who knew horses, and had more sense than to startle this one. In a breathing hush they waited for it to get its head, taking for granted the boy would be run away with, eager to applaud if he could only stick on and ride it to a standstill. But he had it in hand; it was waiting his sign to go. There was a hum of wonder; then, when they saw him lean forward and kick his heel with a shout, when boy and horse went racing down towards the water-meadows, the roar began. They vanished into the distance; only the rising clouds of wildfowl showed where they had gone.

They came back at last with the sun behind them, their shadow thrown clear before. Like the feet of a carved pharaoh treading his beaten enemies, the drumming hooves trampled the shadow triumphantly into the ground.

At the horse-field they slowed to a walk. The horse blew and shook its bridle. Alexander sat easy, in the pose which Xenophon commends: the legs straight down, gripping with the thigh, relaxed below the knee. He rode towards the stand; but a man stood waiting down in front of it. It was his father.

He swung off cavalry style, across the neck with his back to the horse; considered the best way in war, if the horse allowed it. The horse was remembering things learned before the tyranny. Philip put out both arms; Alexander came down into them. ‘Look out we don’t jerk his mouth, Father,’ he said. ‘It’s sore.’

Philip pounded him on the back. He was weeping. Even his blind eye wept real tears. ‘My son!’ he said choking. There was wet in his harsh beard. ‘Well done, my son, my son.’

Alexander returned his kiss. It seemed to him that this was a moment nothing could undo. ‘Thank you, Father. Thank you for my horse. I shall call him Oxhead.’

The horse gave a sudden start. Philonikos was coming up, beaming and full of compliments. Alexander looked round, and motioned with his head. Philonikos withdrew. The buyer was never wrong.

A surging crowd had gathered. ‘Will you tell them to keep off, Father? He won’t stand people yet. I’ll have to rub him down myself, or he’ll catch a chill.’

He saw to the horse, keeping the ?best of the grooms beside him for it to know him another time. The crowd was still in the horse-field. All was quiet in the stable-yard when he came out, flushed from the ride and the work, tousled, smelling of horse. Only one loiterer was about; the tall boy Hephaistion, whose eyes had wished him victory. He smiled an acknowledgement. The boy smiled back, hesitated, and came nearer. There was a pause.

‘ Would you like to see him?’

‘Yes, AlexanderÉIt was just as if he knew you. I felt it, like an omen. What is he called?’

‘I’m calling him Oxhead.’ They were speaking Greek.

‘That’s better than Thunder. He hated that.’

‘You live near here, don’t you?’

‘Yes. I can show you. You can see from over here. Not that first hill there, the second, the one behind it.’

‘You’ve been here before. I remember you. You helped me fix a sling once, no, it was a quiver. And your father hauled you off.’

‘I didn’t know who you were.’

‘You showed me the hills before; I remembered then. And you were born in Lion Month, the same year as me.’

‘Yes.’

‘You’re half a head taller. But your father’s tall, isn’t he?’

‘Yes he is, and my uncles too.’

‘Xenophon says you can tell a tall horse when it’s foaled, by the length of leg. When we’re men you’ll still be taller.’

Hephaistion looked into the confident and candid eyes. He recalled his father saying that the King’s young son might have more chance to make his growth, if that stone-faced tutor would not overwork and underfeed him. He should have been protected, some friend should have been there. ‘You’ll still be the one who can ride Boukephalas.’

‘Come and look at him. Not too near just yet; I shall have to be here at first every time they groom him, I can see that.’

He found he had fallen into Macedonian. They looked at each other and smiled.

They had been talking some time, before he remembered he had meant to go straight up from the stable, just as he was, and bring the news to his mother. For the first time in his life, he had forgotten all about her.

Ê

A few days after, he made a sacrifice to Herakles.

The hero had been generous. He deserved something richer than a goat or a ram.

Olympias agreed. If her son thought nothing too good for Herakles, she thought nothing too good for her son. She had been writing letters to all her friends, and her kindred in Epiros, relating that Philip had tried again and again to mount the horse, and had been thrown with indignity before all the people; how it was as savage as a lion, but her son had tamed it. She opened her new bale of stuffs from Athens, inviting him to choose stuff for a new festal chiton. He chose plain, fine white wool, and, when she said it was too mean for so great a day, answered that it was proper for a man.

He brought his offering in a gold cup to the hero-shrine in the garden. His father and mother were present; it was a court occasion.

Having made the proper invocation to the hero, with his praises and his epithets, he thanked him for his gifts to mankind, and finished, ‘As you have been to me, so remain; be favourable to me in what I shall henceforth undertake, according to my prayers.’

He tilted the cup. A translucent stream of incense, like grains of amber, shone in the sunlight, and fell on the glowing wood. A cloud of sweet blue smoke rose to heaven.

All the company, but one, pronounced Amen. Leonidas, who had come to watch because he thought it his duty, compressed his lips. He was leaving soon; another was taking up his charge. Though the boy had not yet been told, his good spirits were offensive. The Arabian gum was still showering from the chalice; the cost might run into scores of drachmas. This after his constant training in austerity, his warnings against excess!

Among the cheerful pieties, his voice said tartly, ‘Be less wasteful of such precious things, Alexander, till you are master of the lands they grow in.’

Alexander turned from the altar, with the emptied cup in his hand. He looked at Leonidas with an alert kind ?of surprise, followed by grave attention. At length he said, ‘Yes. I will remember.’

As he came down the steps from the shrine, his eyes met the waiting eyes of Hephaistion, who understood the nature of omens. There was no need for them to speak of it after.

‘I know now who it will be. Father’s had a letter, he sent for me this morning. I hope this man will be bearable. If not, we must make a plan.’

‘You can count on me,’ said Hephaistion, ‘even if you want to drown him. You’ve put up with more than enough. Is he a real philosopher?’

They were sitting in the trough between two of the Palace gables; a private spot, since only Alexander had climbed there till he showed Hephaistion the route.

‘Oh, yes, from the Academy. He was taught by Plato. You’ll come to the lessons? Father says you can.’

‘I’d only hold you back.’

‘Sophists teach by disputation, he wants my friends. We can think later who else to have. It won’t just be logic-chopping, he’ll have to teach things I can use, Father told him that. He wrote back that a man’s education should be suited to his station and his duties. That doesn’t tell us much.’

‘At least this one can’t beat you. He’s an Athenian?’

‘No, a Stagirite. He’s the son of Nikomachos, who was my grandfather Amyntas’ doctor. My father’s too I suppose, when he was a child. You know how Amyntas lived, like a wolf in hunting-country, throwing out his enemies or trying to get back himself. Nikomachos must have been loyal, I don’t know how good a doctor he was. Amyntas died in bed; that’s very rare in our family.’

‘ So this son - what’s he called -?’

‘Aristotle.’

‘He knows the country, that’s something. Is he very old?’

‘About forty. Not old for a philosopher. They live for ever. Isokrates, who wants Father to lead the Greeks, is ninety-odd, and he applied for the job! Plato lived to over eighty. Father says Aristotle had hoped to be head of the School, but Plato had chosen a nephew of his. That’s why Aristotle left Athens.’

‘So then he asked to come here?’

‘No, he left when we were nine. I know the year, because of the Chalkidian war. And he couldn’t go home to Stagira, Father had just burned it and enslaved the people. What is it pulling my hair?’

‘It’s a stick from the tree we came up.’ Hephaistion, who was not very neat-handed, unwound with anxious care the walnut-twig from its shining tangle, which smelt of some expensive wash used on it by Olympias, and of summer grass. This done, he slid his arm down to Alexander’s waist. He had done it the first time almost by accident; though not rebuffed, he had waited two days before daring to try again. Now he watched his chance whenever they were alone; it had become a thing he thought about. He could not tell what Alexander thought, if he thought at all. He accepted it contentedly, and talked, with ever more ease and freedom, about other things.

‘The Stagirites,’ he said, ‘were confederates of Olynthos; he made examples of those who wouldn’t treat with him. Did your father tell you about the war?’

‘What?É Oh yes. Yes, he did.’

‘Listen, this is important. Aristotle went off to Assos, as Hermeias’ guest-friend; they’d met at the Academy. He’s tyrannos there. You know where Assos is; it’s opposite Mytilene, it controls the straits. So, as soon as I thought, I saw why Father chose this man. This is only between us two.’

He looked deeply into Hephaistion’s eyes, as always before a confidence. As always, Hephaistion felt as if his midriff were melting. As always, it was some moments before he could follow what he was being told.

‘É who were in other cities and escaped the siege, have been begging Father to have Stagira restored and the citizens enfranchised. That’s what this Aristotle wants. What Father wants is an alliance with Hermeias. It’s a piece of horse-trading. Leonidas came for politics, too. Old Phoinix is the only one who came for me.’

Hephaistion tightened his arm. His feelings were confused; he wanted to grasp till Alexander’s very bones were somehow engulfed wit?hin himself, but knew this to be wicked and mad; he would kill anyone who harmed a hair of his head.

‘They don’t know I’ve seen this. I just say “Yes, Father,” I’ve not even told my mother. I want to make my own mind up when I’ve seen the man, and do what I think good without anyone knowing why. This is only between us two. My mother is entirely against philosophy.’

Hephaistion was thinking how fragile his rib-cage seemed, how terrible were the warring desires to cherish and to crush it. He continued silent.

‘She says it makes men reason away the gods. She ought to know I would never deny the gods, whatever anyone told me. I know the gods exist, as surely as I know that you doÉ. I can’t breathe.’

Hephaistion, who could have said the same, let go quickly. Presently he managed to reply, ‘Perhaps the Queen will dismiss him.’

‘Oh, no, I don’t want that. That would only make trouble. I’ve been thinking, too, he may be the kind of man who’ll answer questions. Ever since I knew a philosopher was coming, I’ve been writing them down, things nobody here can tell me. Thirty-five already, I counted yesterday.’

He had not withdrawn, but, backed to the sloping gable-roof, sat propped lightly against Hephaistion, trustful and warm. This, thought Hephaistion, was the true perfection of happiness; it ought to be; it must be. He said restlessly, ‘I should like to kill Leonidas, do you know that?’

‘Oh, I thought that once. But now, I think he was sent by Herakles. A man doing one good against his will, that shows the hand of a god. He wanted to keep me down, but he taught me to put up with hardship. I never need a fur cloak, I never eat after I’m full, or lie in bed in the morning. It would have come harder to start learning now, as I’d have had to do, without him. You can’t ask your men to put up with things you can’t bear yourself. And they’ll all want to see if I’m softer than my father.’

His ribs and their muscle-layer had knit together; his side felt like armour. ‘I wear better clothes, that’s all. I like to do that.’

‘You’ll never wear this chiton again, I’m telling you. Look what you did in the tree, I can get my whole hand Inside itÉ. Alexander. You won’t ever go to war without me?’

Alexander sat up staring; Hephaistion was jolted into taking his hand away. ‘Without you? What do you mean, how could you even think of it? You’re my dearest friend.’

Hephaistion had known for many ages that if a god should offer him one gift in all his lifetime, he would choose this. Joy hit him like a lightning-bolt. ‘Do you mean it?’ he said. ‘Do you really mean it?’

‘Mean it?’ said Alexander, in a voice of astonished outrage. ‘Did you doubt I meant it? Do you think I tell everyone the things I’ve told to you? Mean it - what a thing to say!’

Only a month ago, Hephaistion thought, I should have been too scared to answer. ‘Don’t fight me. One always doubts great good fortune.’

Alexander’s eyes relented. Raising his right hand, he said, ‘I swear by Herakles.’ He leaned and gave Hephaistion a practised kiss; that of a child who is affectionate by nature, and fond of grownup attention. Hephaistion had hardly time to feel the shock of delight before the light touch had gone. By the time he had nerved himself to return the kiss, Alexander’s attention had been withdrawn. He seemed to be gazing at heaven.

‘Look,’ he said pointing. ‘You see that Victory statue, on the top gable of all? I know how to get up there.’

From the terrace, the Victory looked as small as a child’s clay doll. When the dizzy climb had brought them to its base, it turned out to be five feet tall. Its hand held a gilded laurel wreath, extended over the void.

Hephaistion, who had questioned nothing all the way because he had not dared think, clasped in his left arm, at Alexander’s bidding, the bronze waist of the goddess. ‘Now hold my wrist,’ Alexander said.

Thus counterpoised, he leaned out, off balance, into empty space, and broke two leaves from the wreath. One came easily; the second he had to worry at. Hephaistion? felt clammy sweat in his palms; the dread that it would make his grip slide off turned his belly to ice, and crept in his hair. Through this terror he was aware of the wrist he held. It had looked delicate, against his own big frame; it was hard, sinewy, the fist clenched on itself in a remote and solitary act of will. After a short eternity, Alexander was ready to be pulled back. He climbed down with the leaves in his teeth; when they were back on the roof, he gave one to Hephaistion, saying, ‘Now do you know we shall go to war together?’

The leaf sat in Hephaistion’s hand, about the size of a real one. Like a real one it was trembling; quickly he shut his fingers on it. He felt now the full horror of the climb, the tiny mosaic of great flagstones far below, his loneliness at the climax. He had gone up in a fierce resolve to face, if it killed him, whatever ordeal Alexander should set to test him. Only now, with the gilt-bronze edges biting his palm, he saw that the test had not been for him. He was the witness. He had been taken up there to hold in his hand the life of Alexander, who had been asked if he meant what he had said. It was his pledge of friendship.

As they climbed down through the tall walnut-tree, Hephaistion called to mind the tale of Semele, beloved of Zeus. He had come in a human shape, but that was not enough for her; she had demanded the embrace of his divine epiphany. It had been too much, she had burned to ashes. He would need to prepare himself for the touch of fire.

Ê

It was some weeks before the philosopher arrived; but his presence came before him.

Hephaistion had underrated him. He not only knew the country, but the court, and his knowledge was up-to-date; he had family guest-ties at Pella, and many travelled friends. The King, well aware of this, had written offering to provide, if it seemed of use, a precinct where the Prince and his friends could study undisturbed.

The philosopher read, approvingly, between the lines. The boy was to be taken from his mother’s claws; in return, the father too would let well alone. It was more than he had dared hope; he wrote back promptly, suggesting the Prince and his fellow-students be lodged at some distance from the court’s distractions, and adding, as an afterthought, a recommendation of pure upland air. There were no sizeable hills within miles of Pella.

On the footslopes of Mount Bermion, west of the Pella plain, was a good house which had gone downhill in the wars. Philip bought it, and put it in order. It was more than twenty miles out; it would do very well. He added a wing and a gymnasium; and, since the philosopher had asked for somewhere to walk about, had a garden cleared; nothing formal, a pretty editing of nature, what the Persians called a ‘paradise’. It was said that the legendary pleasance of King Midas had been thereabouts. Everything flourished there.

These orders given, he sent for his son; his wife would hear of them from her spies within the hour, and somehow twist their meaning to the boy.

In the talk which followed, much more was exchanged than was said in words. This was the self-evident training of a royal heir. Alexander saw his father took it as a matter of course. Had all the rebuffs, ambiguous double-edged words, been more than sparring in the endless war with his mother? Had all the words really been said? Once he had believed she would never lie to him; but he had known for some time that this was vanity.

‘In the next few days,’ said Philip, I’d like to know which friends of your own you want to spend your time with. Think it over.’

‘Thank you, Father.’ He remembered the hours of tortuous stifling talk in the women’s rooms, the reading of gossip and rumour, the counter-intrigues, the broodings and guessings over a word or look; cries, tears, declarations before the gods of outrage; smells of incense and magic herbs and burning meat; the whispered confidences that kept him awake at night, so that next day he was slower in the race or missed his aim.

‘Those you go about with now?,’ his father was saying, ‘if their fathers agree, will all be quite acceptable. Ptolemy, I suppose?’

‘Yes, Ptolemy of course. And Hephaistion. I asked you about him before.’

‘I remember. Hephaistion by all means.’ He was at pains to sound easy; he had no wish to disturb a state of things which had taken a load off his mind. The erotic patterns of Thebes were engraved on it; a youth and a man, to whom the youth looked for example. Things being as it began to seem they were, there was no one he wished to see in this place of power. Even Ptolemy, brotherly and a man for women, had been throwing too long a shadow. What with the boy’s startling beauty, and his taste for grownup friends, he had been an anxiety for some time. It was of a piece with his oddness, suddenly to throw himself into the arms of a boy his own age almost to a day. They had been inseparable now for weeks; Alexander, it was true, was giving nothing away, but the other could be read like an open book. However; here there was no doubt at all who looked for example to whom. An affair, then, not to be interfered with.

There was trouble enough outside the kingdom. The Illyrians had had to be thrown back last year on the west border; it had cost him, as well as much grief, trouble and scandal, a sword-slash on the knee from which he was still limping.

In Thessaly, all was well; he had put down a dozen local tyrannies, made peace in a score of blood-feuds, and everyone, except a tyrant or two, was grateful. But he had failed with Athens. Even after the Pythian Games when, because he was presiding, they had refused to send competitors, he had still not given them up. His agents all said that the people could be reasoned with, if the orators would let them be. Their first concern was that the public dole should not be cut; no policy was ever passed if it threatened that, not even for home defence. Philokrates had been indicted for treason, and got away just ahead of a death-sentence, to enjoy a generous pension; Philip rested his best hopes now on men never for sale, who yet favoured the alliance because they thought it best. They had seen for themselves that, his first aim being the conquest of Asian Greece, the last thing he wanted was a costly war with Athens in which, win or lose, he must stand as Hellas’ enemy, for no better reward than to secure his back.

He had sent therefore this spring another embassy, offering to revise the peace treaty, if reasonable amendments were put up. An Athenian envoy had been sent back, an old friend of Demosthenes, a certain Helgesippos known to his fellow-citizens as Tufty, from his effeminate topknot of long curls tied in a ribbon. At Pella it became clear why he had been chosen; to unacceptable terms he added, on his own account, uncompromising rudeness. No risk had been taken of Philip winning him over; he was the man who had arranged Athens’ alliance with the Phokians, his mere presence was an affront. He came and went; and Philip, who had not yet enforced the Phokians’ yearly fine to the plundered temple, gave them notice to start paying up.