The Persian Boy (42 page)

I was in his upper room with him when he read this letter, and threw it down. “Fit to do murder, robbery and worse. He has ruled this province like a wolf in winter; I’ve heard it everywhere. Any man who crossed him, put to death without trial. He’s looted even the royal sepulchers.” His brows came together; he was remembering Kyros. Perhaps indeed the Magi had kept silent because of someone they feared more than the King. “Well, I’ve witnesses enough already. Let him come; I shall like to see this Orxines … Bagoas, what’s the matter?”

“Nothing, Al’skander. I don’t know. I don’t know where I’ve heard that name.” It had been like some echo from a nightmare forgotten on waking.

“Was he cruel to you when you were with Darius? Let me know, if you remember anything.”

“No,” I said. “No one was cruel there.” Of my life before, I’d only told him that I had been bought by a jeweler who ill-used me. The rest, he would only have pitied; but I’d wished to bury it, to forget forever. Now I asked myself if this Orxines could have been some hated client; but his rank was too high; and the horror was even deeper. Perhaps I just dreamed it, I thought; I had bad dreams when I was a slave.

That night, Alexander said to me, “Did they build this bed for elephants? Stay and keep me company.” It was years since he’d slept in a Persian royal bedchamber. We fell asleep quite soon. Dreams flung me into a terror long forgotten. My own scream woke me. It was the dead of night. Alexander was holding me to him. “See, you’re with me, all’s well. Whatever did you dream of?”

I clung to him wildly, like the child I had just been. “My father. My father without his nose.” Suddenly I sat straight up in bed. “The name! I remember the name!”

“What name?” He looked up; he was always very serious about dreams.

“The name he told me, when they dragged him away to kill him. ‘Orxines,’ that was what he said. ‘Remember the name. Orxines.’ “

“Lie down, and be quiet a little. You know, I told you today Orxines was a villain. I expect that gave you the dream.”

“No. I remember how he said it. His voice was different, because his nose was gone.” I shivered. He covered me up and warmed me.

Presently he said, “It’s not such a common name, but there may be others. Would you know this man again?”

“There was one lord from Persepolis. If that was he, I’ll know him.”

“Listen. Be near when I give him audience. I’ll say to you, ‘Bagoas, have you written that letter?’ If it’s not the man, say no?, and go out. If it is, say yes, and stay; and I promise you, he shall know you before he dies. We owe it to your father’s spirit.”

“That was his last wish, that I’d avenge him.”

“You loved him. In that, at least, you were fortunate . . . Come, sleep. He knows you have heard him now, he will not trouble you.”

Next day the satrap came in state, as if confirmed in the rank already. He advanced to the throne, where Alexander sat in his Persian robes, and made the prostration gracefully. He had always had polished manners. His beard was grey now, and he’d grown a paunch. He made a tasteful speech about his seizure of the satrapy, all for the sake of good order and the King.

Alexander listened calmly, then beckoned me. “Bagoas, did you write that letter I spoke of?”

I answered, “Yes, lord King. You may be sure of it.”

So I was there to hear him charged with his many murders. Strange that I only remembered him as my father’s friend whom everyone trusted. He seemed the same man still, so amazed to hear such things about himself that I almost doubted them, till Alexander took him by surprise with something proven. Then his face grew horrible; I would not have known him.

He was tried soon after. The kin of his victims testified; many in rags, their fathers having been killed for their estates. Then came the guardians of the royal tombs of Persepolis, those who had not resisted; the rest were dead. Darius the Great had given him the most loot, but he’d done well with Xerxes, and had robbed my own dead master of his modest grave-goods; he seemed surprised at Alexander’s minding that. Of stripping Kyros’ bones he could not be convicted, since there were no witnesses; but it made no difference.

Alexander said at the end, “You chose yourself to be shepherd of your people. If you had been a good one, you would have left here with honor. You have been a beast of prey, and you shall die like one. Take him away… Bagoas, speak to him if you wish.”

As they were leading him off, I touched his arm. Even then, he had contempt to spare for a eunuch. I said, “Do you remember Artembares son of Araxis, your friend and host, whom you betrayed when King Arses died? I am his son.”

I’d doubted it would mean much to him, after all the rest. But he had enough pride of birth to feel it. He flung off my hand; if he could, he would have stamped me underfoot. “Do I owe all this to you, then? I should have thought to buy your favor. Well, old times come round again. A eunuch rules.”

Alexander said, “A eunuch shall hang you, since he is the better man. Bagoas, I leave it in your charge. See it done tomorrow.”

I had nothing, really, to do; the captain whose usual work it was saw to it all, and only turned to me for the order to hoist him up. He kicked and writhed, on the high gallows against the wide sky of Pasargadai. I was ashamed to find it distasteful and take so little pleasure in it; it was disloyal to my father, and ungrateful to Alexander. I prayed in my heart, “Dear Father, forgive me that I am not a warrior, and have embraced my destiny. Accept this man through whom you died, and who robbed you of your son’s sons. Give me your blessing.” He must have given it; for he never again returned to me in dreams.

Ptolemy has only put in his book that Orxines was hanged “by certain persons, under Alexander’s orders.” I expect he thinks it showed some loss of dignity, to have brought me forward. Never mind. He does not know of the night, while I was still a boy, when my lord drew the story out of me. He was very true to his promises, as Ptolemy himself has written.

He gave the satrapy to Peukestas, who had saved his life in the Mallian city. After Orxines, no one blamed him for not appointing a Persian; but he did the nearest thing. Peukestas had come to love the land; he understood us, and liked our way of living, even our clothes, which he was well made to wear; he had often practiced his Persian on me. He ruled the province well, as much loved as Orxines had been hated.

We rode on to Persepolis. ?Alexander would have been there all this while, if there’d been a palace for him. Far off from the Royal Road we saw on the broad terrace the blackened ruins. He pitched his tent in open country outside; and I slipped away, to see what was left of the splendors Boubakes had wept for.

Already sand was drifted deep on the royal stairway, where the cavalcade of the lords had ridden. The sculpted warriors on the frieze marched up towards the roofless throne room, where only the sun held court between columns carved like flowers. Charred beams littered the harem; in its walled garden, a few tangled roses grew in a bed of cinders. I went back, and said nothing of where I’d been. A long time had gone by, since that feast of young men with torches.

At night he said, “Well, Bagoas, but for me we’d be better lodged tonight.”

“Don’t mourn for it now, Al’skander. You will build something better, and hold the feast as Kyros did.”

He smiled. But he was brooding about Kyros’ tomb; he was a great one for omens. Now these bones of grandeur, black and ragged against an angry sunset, revived his grief.

“Remember,” I said to him, “how once you told me the blaze was godlike, an upward waterfall? How the tables were set with flame?” And I was going to add, “No fire without ash, Al’skander.” But a shadow brushed me, and I closed my mouth on it.

We marched on towards Susa, where we were to meet Hephaistion’s army. It grew cold in the passes, but the air was sweet and the great spaces stirred my heart. Alexander was happy too; he had some new plan, which he was not telling me yet. I felt him spark with it, and awaited his good time.

But one evening he came in looking troubled, and said, “Kalanos is sick.”

“Kalanos? He’s never ill. He was even well in the desert.”

“I sent for him this evening; I felt like a talk with him. He sent back asking me to go to him.”

“He sent for you?” I must admit, it shocked me.

“As a friend. I went, of course. He was sitting as he always does at his meditations, only propped against a tree. He usually gets up when I come, though he knows he needn’t. But he asked me to sit down by him, because his legs had failed.”

“I’ve not seen him since Persepolis. How did he march today?”

“Someone lent him a donkey. Bagoas, he looks his age. When first he came to me, I’d no notion how old he was, or I’d never have taken him from his home. A man of seventy can’t change all his bodily habits without harm. He’d lived for years in peace, every day the same.”

“He came for love of you. He says your fates were joined in some other life. He says …” I paused, having run on too fast. He looked up, saying, “Come, Bagoas.” At last I answered, “He says you’re a fallen god.”

He was sitting naked for the bath, on the edge of his bed, with his hands on his sandal. Since first he was my lover, he’d never let me undo his shoes, unless he was wounded or dead tired, when any friend would do it. Now he sat still, his brows creased in thought. In the end he only said, as he took off his sandal, “I tried to get him to bed, but he said he must finish his meditation. I should have ordered it. But I left him there.” I understood that; it was what he’d have wished himself. “I don’t like his look. He’s too old to force his strength. Tomorrow I’ll send a doctor.”

The doctor came back to report that Kalanos had a swelling in his entrails, and should travel in the sick-wagon. He refused, saying it would disturb his meditation, and that the foolish beast his body, if it would not obey, at least should not command him. Alexander gave him a soft-stepping horse to ride, and after each day’s march went to see how he was; which was always thinner and weaker. Others went too; General Lysimachos for one was very fond of him; but sometimes Alexander would stay alone. One evening he came back so distressed that all his friends remarked it. It was not till we were alone together that he said, “He is resolved to die.”

“Al’skander, I think he is in pain, though he does not say so.”

“Pain! He wants to ?die by burning.”

I exclaimed in horror. It would have shocked me in the execution place at Susa. Besides, it was a pollution of holy fire.

“I felt the same. He says in his own country women do it, rather than outlive their husbands.”

“So say the men! I saw it done to a child of ten, and she wished to live. They drowned her screams with music.”

“Some do consent. He says he will not outlive his life.”

“Could he get well?”

“The doctor won’t answer for him. And he won’t accept a regimen … I didn’t refuse him flat; he might have done it himself at once, as best he could. With every day’s delay, there’s just a chance he might take a better turn. I don’t think so now; I think I can see the death-marks. But one thing I’m resolved on; when he goes, he goes like a king. If it’s true we live many lives, he was that before.” He paced about a little, then said, “I will be there, as his friend. But I cannot watch it.”

So we reached Susa. Nothing was stranger to me than that. The Palace was just the same; even some old eunuchs, who had not marched with Darius, were still bustling about. When they learned who I was, they thought I must have been very clever.

Strangest of all was to stand again in the lamp-shadows of the golden vine, and see that head on the pillow. Even the inlaid casket was on the bed-table. I found him looking at me. He held my eyes, and stretched out his hand.

Afterwards he said, “Was it better?” He couldn’t even wait to be told, supposing he’d needed telling. In some things, he was like a child.

The fountain court with its birds had been looked after. Alexander said it was just the place for Kalanos. He lay in the little room there; and each time I came to see him, he would ask me to open a cage. I hadn’t the heart to tell him they were foreign birds, and might have trouble to make a living. It was his last pleasure, to watch them fly.

Hephaistion’s army, with the elephants, had arrived before us. Alexander told his friends what Kalanos wanted, and ordered Ptolemy to prepare a royal pyre.

It was like a king’s divan, decked with banners and garlands; underneath, it was filled with pitch and terebinth and tinder, and whatever would give the quickest and fiercest flame, mixed with Arabian incense.

In the square before the Palace, where all great ceremonies had been held since Darius the Great, the Companions stood drawn up, with the heralds and the trumpeters. On the fourth side were the elephants, newly painted, with sequinned draperies and gilded tusks. King Poros could have asked no more.

Alexander had chosen the cortege; the handsomest Persians and Macedonians on the tallest horses, in all their arms; then the offering-bearers, with grave-goods enough for a royal tomb, cloths sewn with gems and pearls, gold cups, vases of sweet oil and bowls of incense. They were to be laid on the pyre and burned with Kalanos. Alexander came in Darius’ chariot, draped in white for mourning. His face looked drawn and set. I think he had devised all this magnificence, not just to honor Kalanos but to make it a little bearable.

Last of all came the living dead. Four big Macedonians carried his litter shoulder-high. The splendid Nisaian charger he had been meant to ride on, but was too weak to mount, was led beside him, to be sacrificed by the pyre.

He wore a thick wreath of flowers on his neck and breast, as the Indians do on their wedding day. As he came near, we heard that he was singing.

He still sang to his god, as they laid him on the bier. Then, at this funeral of the living, his friends came up to take their leave.

All kinds of people came; generals and troopers, Indians, musicians, servants. The offering-bearers began to pile their gifts on the pyre. He smiled, and said to Alexander, “How like your kindness, to give me remembrances for my friends.”