Warriors in Bronze (51 page)

I swallowed an arid lump that blocked my throat. 'You weave fantasies, you bitch! How could Helen's travail be concealed? Her nursemaids, household servants, midwife—'

'One midwife, and Aithra, delivered her, my lord. They tied a cloth round Helen's mouth to stifle her shrieks.'

I writhed on the bed, beat fists on thighs. 'How can I believe this ? If they took such pains to keep the birth secret why is it that only you should know?'

'The midwife was my mother. She told me that very day, and swore me to silence.'

I gripped Maira by the hair, tugged her flat on the bed. Lean­ing close I glared into her eyes. 'So. A brittle vow, it seems. And this clucking midwife still roams free to tattle far and wide.'

Maira breathed in shallow gasps. 'You are hurting me, my lord. No. Her tongue is stilled for ever. My mother died an agonized death after drinking from a bowl of milk that Aithra gave her. Which is why to you alone I have broken my oath.'

'You have told no one else?'

'Never a soul, my lord.'

I lay back and knuckled my eyes. Sweat started from my pores and runnelled chest and belly. Questions whirled through my brain like flotsam borne on a torrent. I could not doubt the story's truth: Maira risked her life in the telling. Always she had hated Clytemnaistra and was certain she, through Aithra, contrived the midwife's murder.

What induced Clytemnaistra - passionless, cold and calcu­lating - to pretend the child was hers: a masquerade fraught with danger and disgrace? Love for Helen, perhaps, a selfless, devoted deed to hide her sister's shame. Difficult to credit; I had found no whit of tenderness in Clytemnaistra's character. Perhaps malevolence drove her to foist the bastard on me and gloat secretly on my cuckolded ignorance. Did the woman hate me so intensely? Why? She could surely know nothing of her husband Broteas' killing. Could she ? No - impossible.

Suffocated by nightmare thoughts I clambered from the bed and paced the floor. The window framed a pallid sheen that painted grey the chequered tiles I trod. Tables, chairs and coffers crouched in the shadows like beasts of prey. Maira watched me mutely, dark eyes wide and fearful.

Fury choked my breath. I stopped in my stride, stared sight­lessly into the gloom. Go now to Clytemnaistra, throw the accusation in her teeth! Seize the brat by the heels and spatter its brains on the wall!

I clenched my fists and won control, forced myself to examine the problem coolly.

High policies were involved. Were Helen's rape exposed, should anyone be told she had borne a child by Theseus the disgrace would blast in fragments her marriage to Menelaus, shatter his hope of one day ruling Sparta and mine of seeing the kingdoms joined in brotherly alliance. More. Should the infamous scandal be blazoned abroad Clytemnaistra must also be shamed; then I could do no less than put her away. How­ever valid the reasons Tyndareus would be angered; the revela­tion would smash our friendship, finish the Spartan alliance, end my hopes of breaking Theban power and bring to crisis point the scarcity of corn. Within a year of winning the crown I'd be ruling a starving realm.A hint of the truth would destroy the ends I had swindled and murdered to gain.

It must never come out. How many people shared my know­ledge ? Helen, Clytemnaistra, Aithra - none, for her own secur­ity, would betray so dangerous a secret.

One remained.

I looked at the bed. Maira lay unmoving, her naked body a still bronze statue carved on the bedsheet's white. Scourged by blazing hatred and yearning for revenge she had blabbed the tale to me. Could she be depended on to curb her tongue in future ?

While the sweat dried harsh on my skin I considered the question coldly; and decided not.

I went to the bedside and knelt beside her. Maira lifted her arms and stroked my face and whispered words of love. I grappled her throat in both my hands, thumbs on windpipe, pressed with all my strength. She gurgled, flailed her limbs and writhed, her fingers clawed my chest. I held her fast, the soft brown neck like a flower-stalk in my grip, lifted her head and forced it back, and heard the backbone snap.

I lowered the limp form, wiped palms on a rumpled coverlet, stumbled to the window.

Above the palace rooftops dawn's rose-red fingers brushed Saminthos' peaks, the mountain leaned like purple ramparts against a honey-pale sky. I sucked great draughts of cool clean air, and stretched out arms to a wakening world, a world that sprouted dangers and adversities. Like phantoms fleeing at cockcrow a vision of the burdens capered before my eyes: Thebes, the Goatmen, Troy, the Corinthian shore - obstacles towering higher than Saminthos' distant pinnacles. To cleanse the honour of my House I must hunt down and exterminate Aegisthus, that misbegotten child Thyestes spawned upon his daughter.

And somehow I must pluck from my nest the cuckoo fledgling Iphigeneia.

Much remained to be done.

A rising sun drenched gold the mountain crests. Nothing was unattainable. Nothing lay beyond my grasp, beyond the reach of Agamemnon, king of men

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