Helen of Troy (91 page)

“You call me coward?” she said. “You dare to call me coward?”

“A coward of the worst sort,” I said.

She raised her arm, struck me. I struck back, sending her reeling into the water. I saw her arms flailing for the instant before the waters rescued her, whisked her away into the deep.

The waters roiled a moment, then calmed. I watched the churning and turmoil as she disappeared. Our journey had been in vain. She had flung mercy away.

We had wasted treasured time in coming here. The nighttime jouncing in the chariot, the stumbling ascent of the mountain, the rush to find Oenone—all wasted! Better to have stood by Paris, sponging his brow, keeping watch beside him. Better to have sent for every physician within a day’s ride, better to try Gelanor and his wild ideas. Better anything than this!

LXV

I
cursed myself for having been led on this fruitless journey. Our way down the flanks of the mountain was swift because we could see. Our stomachs were crying out for food, the guards accompanying us were grumbling, but even so we were able to make good time. Soon we were on the flat ground and heading for Troy. The walls, bathed in the glow of the afternoon sun, beckoned us toward them.

From a distance Troy looked as she always had: gleaming and invincible. Her citadel, crowning the heights, was just barely visible. I could see our palace, and Hector’s, and Priam’s, and the temple of Athena. What I could not see was what was happening inside them. From the outside they were lovely as ever; their vulnerability would not be apparent, not until they shimmered in flames and fell.

The southern gate was open. Another lull in fighting was allowing Trojans to leave the city, fanning out into the woods to gather herbs and fire-wood, pasture horses, and replenish supplies.

I rushed inside the gates, eager to be with my love, and learned his state from the guards soon enough: he was just clinging to life.

I clutched Andromache’s shoulder. “I cannot bear it, I cannot withstand it,” I cried.

“Yes, you can,” she said. “If the gods will it so—Oh, the hatred of them!—then you must.”

“As you have?”

“Yes. As I have.”

I began to run up the steep road to the citadel, beyond the fallen houses in the lower city, one part of me seeing that they were deserted, that their owners had fled, but all I saw, truly, was Paris. Paris. Paris. With my own will, I would make him live. It was impossible that he would die. That he could die. It could not be.

Andromache and I had held hands all the way up to the citadel, but then we drew apart as we stood between her palace and mine. I faced her, she who had lost everything in her life, I who still stood on the brink. “Come inside with me,” I urged her.

She brought her hand up to her mouth. “Forgive me, Helen, I cannot.” She bit down on her fist. “I cannot witness it again.”

“I understand.” And I did.

“Go now,” she said. “It may yet all be right.”

Slowly I mounted the steps. As I approached the chamber, the musky smell of sick-masking incense enveloped me. Then the unmistakable sounds of helpless people scurrying.

I stood in the doorway and saw the shutters were drawn; I marched across the room to fling them open. Yes, I would open the shutters, Paris would sit up and thank me, turning his face to the sun. So I bestowed restorative power upon the shutters; it was a token of my desperation. The sickroom attendants winced at the stab of light. It showed the incense smoke curling grayish blue in the air. Still I had not dared to look at Paris. Now I could wait no longer. From where I stood, behind him at the window, I could see his rigid arms extended on either side of the bed, like poles. They were so stiff they could not bend at the elbow, and they were horribly swollen, to the size of gourds. His hands were black and so distended I could not see the separate fingers.

With a cry, I dropped to my knees beside him and looked upon his face at last. What I saw was no longer Paris, but a purplish bruised visage that had once been a face. Even his hair was no longer his: the bright gold was muddy, hanging in clumps like rotted weeds. His eyes were swallowed up in the puff of their sockets, his skin was purple deepening to black. Even his lips, cracked and open, were black, with red fissures running through them.

“Helen . . .” His voice, so faint I had to lean over to hear it, was still his. “She said no?”

“She did, may her body dissolve into slime,” I said. “But we do not need her. I am here now; I was foolish to seek help from another. I can—”

What could I do? Call on my father Zeus?
Was
he my father?

“—call for help far above what she could do. Oh, my dearest, I should have done that straightaway!”

He tried to move his arm, to touch my hand. But it would not obey him; it remained as stiff and unresponsive as a stick.

“Wait,” I said. I bent over to kiss his forehead. Instead of being hot, it was as cold as Oenone’s pool. It sent waves of fear through me. I rushed from the chamber. I could not supplicate Zeus here.

I sought the privacy of an inner room—difficult to find, with all the soldiers and refugees crammed into our palace. No large space remained. At length I found an empty chamber, but it was one used to store provisions, not a lovely and airy room such as Zeus in his majesty deserved.

I had snatched up two of the censers with their incense, and now I set them with shaking hands on the floor. I stretched myself out before them, feeling the cold stone under my cheek, under my chest, my legs.

Zeus, son of Chronos, if you are indeed my father, take pity on me. I lie here
before you utterly abject, begging for the life of my husband, Paris. You can save
him. You can restore him to health. You, mightiest of the gods, can make or undo
anything you desire. Oh, grant me this wish!

I felt nothing, no response. Did that mean . . . there was no Zeus? That he was not my father? That I had not addressed him properly?

I know not the proper words to use, but see into my heart! See my true submission.
If it is possible . . . let me die instead of him. Yes, transfer this affliction
onto me! You allowed Alcestis to take the place of her husband. Allow me!

Still silence. Did he not hear, or was it just that he willed himself to reject my plea, as if he had not heard?

Let me die instead of Paris!
I rose to my knees, addressed him out loud. “Let me take Paris’s place in the chamber of death,” I said. “Let me exchange my life for his.”

Silence. I fell back to my knees and blew on the censers, frantic to coax more smoke out of them, as if that would command the attention of Zeus.

“Please, Father,” I said. “Hear my supplication.”

Then I heard—did I hear it as a sound, or only words whispered in the secret inner recess of myself?—his voice.
My child, I hear you, but it cannot be. I cannot reverse fate, a man’s destiny. We gods cannot interfere with that. We
could, but at the same time we cannot, as it would destroy the order of things.
Your Paris is slated to die, and die he must. I am grieved, my child, but I cannot
stop it, no more than I could stop the death of my son Sarpedon on the field before
Troy. I wept for him, as you shall weep for Paris.

“You called me child,” I said.

You are my child. The only mortal woman I acknowledge as my daughter. And you shall not die.

“Without Paris, I do not wish to live,” I told him.

You have no choice. You will live, because your blood decrees it. We will welcome
you amongst us when the time comes.

“I shall make a poor goddess,” I said, “grieving always for my lost Paris.”

Many of us grieve, but I shall share a truth with you: still it is good to be
a god.

The voice ceased. I had failed. Zeus had rejected my plea, as had Oenone. That was all I cared about. I rushed from the chamber—more wasted time!—and ran to Paris.

I clasped his head in my hands. I could feel the sweat on his brow, but I touched him gently, lest I cause him pain. His swollen eyelids opened and he looked at me.

“What did—what happened?” he murmured.

“I was promised that you shall recover. Yes, from this moment on, new strength will flood into your limbs and the poison will recede.” I hated lying, but I could not speak the hideous truth. I stroked his arm, with its skin stretched so tight that if I scratched it with my nails it might burst. “All this shall recede,” I said. “Your arm will be yours again.”

He smiled—or rather, his lips attempted to move. “He listened to you.”

“Yes. He will spare us. For I would not live without you, and so the Hydra’s poison would fell me as well.” As it felt like it was already doing.

“Helen.” He gave a great sigh. I saw how his whole body had darkened in the short time I had been away from his side. No, not so soon! “You were ever faithful. I did not deserve you.”

“None of that, now!” I told him. “No such foolishness. I was yours from the beginning. I am only thankful your ship came when it did. I do not think I could have waited a moment longer.”

“Hold my hand,” he said.

I took it—the swollen remnant of what had been Paris.
O the gods! Aphrodite, could you not bend yourself to attend on us now?
“Yes, my dearest. I shall never release it, until you stand strong again and leave your bed.”

“It is so dark in here,” he said, agitated. “Dark, dark! And a tunnel is sucking my feet away, making me slide down it.”

“No, my love, you are lying here wrapped in finest linens.” Linens that were sweat-soaked. “You are safe.”

Then he was gone. No last words, no farewells, nothing left for me. He was whisked away down that tunnel he had spoken of—not in fear, but in wonder.

Paris was dead, and I a widow. But that meant nothing—although it was soon to—beside the enormity that Paris had ceased to be.

I closed his eyes, gently touching his eyelids. How many times had I stroked them, kissed them? Oh, I could not bear to think upon it.

I turned to the chamber attendants and managed to say, “Prince Paris is dead. His spirit has departed. Prepare him.”

I could remain no longer in our chamber. I stumbled out.

I sought the privacy of the little chamber where my attendants slept. There was no one there. I fell down on the pallet. Tears would not come. Nothing came but a great desolation. Paris was gone. The world had ended for me.

I had spoken true to Zeus. I had no wish to live. Life ceased for me with the last breath of Paris. And he had had no words for me, only nonsense about dark tunnels. It was meaningful to him, but not to me.

He had not known those would be his last words. Perhaps we never know. While we are robust and in the prime of life, we imagine our deathbeds, the wisdom we mean to impart, and the precious words, like jewels on a necklace, that we intend to bequeath to those around us. But it is rarely to be. We perish quickly on the battlefield, or in an accident, or in a lingering illness that will not announce its schedule for our destruction. And so our words perish with us, and those left behind are condemned to clutch at memories, at what they imagine we wished to say.

I could feel sorrow, but not the finality of it. It was too great to be comprehended. I forced myself up from the pallet and ran blindly to Andromache, my one other companion who had faced this.

She was waiting for me in her chamber. She had made a forced attempt to weave, but her shuttle lay idle beside her on a stool. As I stumbled in, she rose and extended her arms. I fell into them, feeling her embrace.

“Paris has joined Hector,” I said.

“They are embracing, even as we, those left behind, are also embracing. If we had eyes to see, we might behold them,” she said. She stroked my hair. “With sorrow I welcome you as my sister.”

The funeral of Paris: a high mountain of wood, Paris lying respectfully draped on his bier to cover the horror of what the poison had wrought upon him, official mourners weeping and keening through the streets of Troy. By the side of the funeral pyre his mother and father stood, as wooden as the fagots under their son. The remaining brothers formed a flank around them. All of Troy, so it seemed, had deserted the city and now stood on the southern plain where the funeral was to take place.