Jason and Medeia Read online

but in strength and spirit he was hardening up like a

  three-year-old bull.

  He feinted a little, seeing if his arms were supple after

  all that

  rowing, the long hot span in the calm. He was satisfied, or if not, he kept it hidden. The old man watched him,

  leering,

  eager to smash in his chest, draw blood. Then Amykos’

  steward,

  a man by the name of Lykoreus, brought rawhide gloves, thoroughly dried and toughened, and placed them

  between them, at their feet. “

  “ ‘We’ll cast no lots,’ old Amykos said. ‘I make you a

  present

  of whichever pair you like. Bind them on your hands,

  and when

  I’ve proved myself, tell all your friends—if you’ve still

  got a jaw—

  how clever I am at cutting hides and … staining them.’ ” With a quiet smile and no answer, Polydeukes took

  the pair

  at his feet. His brother Kastor and his old friend Talaos

  came

  and bound the gauntlets on. The old man’s friends

  did the same.

  “What can I say? It was absurd. They raised their

  heavy fists,

  and the gibbous old man came leering, all confidence,

  drooling in his beard,

  his eyes as wild as a wolf’s, and went up on his toes like

  someone

  felling an ox, and brought down his fist like a club.

  Polydeukes

  stepped to the right, effortlessly, and landed one

  lightning

  blow Just over the old king’s ear, smashing the bones inside. The crazy old man looked startled. In a minute

  he was dead,

  twitching and jerking in the wheat stubble. We stared.

  No match

  at all! We hadn’t even shouted yet—neither we nor they!

  ‘The Bebrykes gave a wail, an outraged howl at

  something

  wider than just Polydeukes. They snatched up their

  spears,

  their daggers and clubs, and rushed him as if to avenge

  themselves

  on the whole ridiculous universe. We leaped up, drawing our swords, running in to help. Kastor came down with

  his sword

  so hard that the head of the man he hit fell down on

  the shoulders,

  to the right and left. Polydeukes took a running jump at the huge man called Itymoneus, and kicked him in

  the wind

  and dropped him. The man died, jerking and trembling,

  in the dirt.

  Then another came at him. Polydeukes struck him with

  his right,

  above the left eyebrow, and tore the lid off, leaving the

  eyeball

  bare. A man struck Talaos in the side—a minor wound—

  and Talaos turned on him,

  sliced off his head like a blossom from a tender stem.

  Ankaios,

  using the bearskin to shield his left arm, swung left and

  right

  with his huge bronze axes, and the brothers Telamon

  and Peleus,

  Leodokos and I behind them, jabbed through backs and

  bellies,

  limbs and throats with our swords. They scattered like

  a swarm of bees

  when the keeper smokes them from the hive. The

  remnants of the fight fled inward,

  bleeding, spreading the news of their troubles. And

  that same hour

  they found they had new and even worse troubles. The

  surrounding tribes,

  as soon as they learned that the fierce old man was

  dead, gathered up

  and flooded in to attack them, no more afraid of them. They swarmed to the vineyards and villages like locusts,

  dragged off

  cattle and sheep; seized women and children, to make

  them slaves;

  then set fire to the barns. We stood and watched it all, almost forgetting to snatch a few sheep and cows

  ourselves.

  The ground was bloodslick, the sky full of smoke from

  the burning villages.

  We watched in shock. Who’d ever heard of such

  maniacs?

  We walked here and there among them, rolling them

  over on their backs

  to pick off buckles, swords with bejewelled hilts, new

  arrows,

  and, best, the beautifully figured bows that no one can

  fashion

  as the craftsmen among the Bebrykes could do, in their

  day.

  A splendid haul.

  “But Polydeukes sat staring seaward—

  black waves quiet as velvet, under a blood-red sky— brooding. He pounded his right fist into his flat left hand again and again. I touched his shoulder. ‘Stupid,’

  he hissed,

  never shifting his eyes from the sea. ‘God damned old

  clown!’

  ‘Ah well,’ I said. ‘And all that talk!’ he said. ‘—Free will, survival! I ought to have taken his big black teeth

  out one

  by one! I ought—’ ‘Ah well,’ I said. His eyes were as

  calm,

  as ominous green as the sky those days when the air

  went dead.

  ‘If Herakles were here,’ he said, ‘you know what I’d do?’ I shook my head. ‘I’d kill him,’ he said. ‘Or try.’ He

  grinned,

  but his eyes looked as crazy to me as the eyes of the

  man he’d killed.

  ‘He wouldn’t approve. You’re supposed to be his friend,’

  I said.

  ‘I’d smash in his brains for good. “Defend your head

  or die!”

  I’d tell him. And no mere joke. Because I am his friend.’ I let it pass. Boxers are all insane, I thought.

  Like everyone.

  “Late that night, when the Argonauts

  were all sitting in a crowd on the beach, gazing at the

  fire,

  Orpheus sang a song of the wonderful skill and power of Polydeukes’ fists. He sang of the age-old hunger of

  the heart

  for some cause fit to die for, some war certainly just, some woman certainly virtuous. He sang the unearthly,

  unthinkable joy

  of Zeus in his battle with the dragons. Then sang of Hylas, gentler than morning, gazing at his father’s

  killer

  with innocent love and awe. As he sang, the hero of his

  song,

  Polydeukes, rose, bright tears on his cheeks, and left

  our ring

  to walk alone in the woods, get back his calm, we

  thought.

  That was the last we saw of him.”

  10

  Then Jason told

  of Phineus: spoke like a man in a dream. The sea-kings

  listened,

  leaning on their fists. Not a man in the hall even

  coughed. They sat

  so still you’d have thought some god had cast his spell

  on them.

  Old Kreon stared into his wine, blood-red in its jewelled

  cup,

  and even when Jason’s tale scraped painful wounds—

  the fall

  of Thebes, the tragedy of Oidipus—the king showed

  nothing.

  His daughter Pyripta twisted the rings on her fingers

  and sighed.

  Surely the chief of the Argonauts must be aware, I

  thought,

  how queer the tale as he told it now must seem to them. The Asian, fat Koprophoros, smiled. He did not mask his pleasure at seeing the Argonaut show his quirky

  side.

  Athena leaned close to the left shoulder of Aison’s son, warning him, struggling to guide him, her b
eautiful

  gray eyes flashing;

  Hera leaned close to his right, her lithe form moving

  a little,

  weaving like a snake. The story was not what they’d

  hoped for at all,

  this version turbulent with unresolved doubts, key

  changes not

  familiar, chords that clashed, a version of well-known

  tales

  gone crooked, quisquous, trifling matters better off

  forgotten

  blown up out of proportion, and matters of the keenest

  interest

  dropped, passed over in silence as if from obsessive

  concern

  with moments that made no sense. That was no way

  to win

  a throne. Not even Paidoboron, indifferent to thrones, would wander off like that. Athena and Hera looked

  flustered,

  losing control. Sweet Aphrodite, fond, dim-witted, hovering over Pyripta, was close to tears—so filled with pity for the hero as he teased the story of his life

  for meaning,

  she dropped all thought of Medeia, for the moment, and

  charged the heart

  of the princess with tender affection, innocent

  compassion for the man.

  He said:

  “At dawn we stowed the ship with our booty, loosed the hawsers, hauled up sail, and pushed toward Phineus’

  land,

  riding the swirling Bosporos, driven by wind. The day was ordinary except for this: around mid-afternoon a wave came in out of nowhere, and even Tiphys,

  who knew

  the ways of seas and rivers like the back of his hand,

  was amazed,

  watching it come, a gray wall high as a mountain,

  sweeping

  clouds along. It hung, full of menace, directly above our sail, and we dived for hand-holds—all but Tiphys—

  and waited

  for the end, the shriek of the ship breaking up. We

  felt—nothing!

  no change, the great wave rolling on south, and behind

  it the river

  calm, as quiet as a pool. ‘What happened?’ I yelled

  at Tiphys.

  Our hearts were pounding like sledges. He said he had

  no idea.

  ‘Impossible!’ I said. ‘You know the sea like your own

  mind.

  A prodigy like that, there must be some good reason

  for it!’

  But Tiphys could tell us nothing. ‘Perhaps some god,’

  he said,

  pushing his long yellow hair back. ‘Maybe some joke.’

  He shrugged.

  Mad Idas grinned, showed all his twisted teeth, and

  farted.

  “The next morning we put in across from Bithynia; anchored offshore from the mansion of Phineus the

  seer. He had

  the greatest prophetic gift of anyone living, a man who knew not merely by flickers, an insight here and

  there,

  but knew by steady intuition—or so men said—as much as Apollo knew, who knew all Zeus’s mind. He won great wealth by it, but also unspeakable misery.

  “We’d heard, before we landed, nothing of that. We

  went up,

  eager to visit with the prophet whose reputation

  stretched

  farther than merchants travelled, to the ends of the

  earth. The old man

  felt our presence before we came. For days he’d felt us coming. He rose from his bed—none saw it but one

  aged raven—

  groped for his staff of olive wood, and, feeling his way by the sootblack wall, his old feet twisted and shrunken

  beneath him,

  he hunted his door. He trembled—age and weakness—

  and his head

  kept jerking, twisting to the side, then up, his horrible

  blind eyes

  searching. At the door he fell, siled over and tumbled,

  banging

  his bald, bruised head on the steps, and down he went

  like a corpse

  to the bottom, all without a whimper, because he’d

  known he’d fall.

  He lay awhile unconscious. He had no friend, no servant to care for him; not even a dog would live in the same

  house with Phineus.

  “After a while the seer came to

  and groped around in the dust for his staff, and at last

  found it

  and painfully climbed back up it and onto his feet,

  trembling,

  jerking his head, and then, moving slowly, inch by inch, labored toward his gate and the two stone steps that

  opened

  on the road. There too, as he’d known he would, he fell.

  And there

  we found him lying with his face in the dirt, his legs

  twisted up

  like a child’s knot. There were trickles of thin, pink

  blood in his beard

  where he’d broken his teeth. My cousin Akastos rushed

  up to him

  and meant to lean over him, listen to his heart, but then

  drew back

  with a look of disgust. And now we too were near

  enough to smell it:

  vultures’ vomit, the stink of death on a hot day, blunt as the kick of a mule. We stood well back from

  him,

  gagging, breathing through our mouths, just keeping our

  dinners down.

  And then—horrible!—the creature we’d taken to be

  dead for days,

  rotting on the road, moved his hand a little—a hand

  as pale,

  as darkly veined as the stomach of a butchered cow. It

  was caked,

  like all his revolting body, with dirt. Where the hand

  went back

  to the dark of his filthy robe, which had fallen over it, the wrist was like two gray sticks. Then Phineus

  turned his head,

  opened his milkwhite eyes as if to stare straight at us, and called out: ‘Argonauts, welcome! You’ve come to

  my rescue at last!’

  He moved his tongue around his mouth, then wiped his

  hand, spitting dust

  and blood. ‘From the Harpies, I mean,’ he said. Then

  widened his eyes

  and let out a croak, like a man who’s suddenly

  remembered something,

  a source of pain and rage. We stared in amazement.

  The old man’s

  body shrank up, then jerked out stiff, shrank up,

  jerked out,

  and we thought he was dying again. But then he lay

  limp, and tears

  made streaks on his stubbled cheeks. ‘O murderous

  gods,’ he said,

  and then for perhaps ten minutes Phineus sobbed and

  sometimes

  pounded the road with his fists. At the end of that

  time he clutched

  his belly, looked furious, and spoke. ‘I’d forgotten you

  wouldn’t know.

  I’d forgotten I’d have to go through with you now the

  whole insipid

  tale. Even though it’s a fact that you people will save

  me, because

  it’s fated—like everything: endlessly, drearily, stupidly,

  cruelly

  fated—I’m forced to go through dull motions, politely

  pleading,

  cajoling, explaining, telling you my tedious history; and I’m forced to listen to your boring responses,

  predictable even

  to a man not gifted with second sight.’ He pulled

  himself together

  and labored up onto his knees, groping with his staff,

  stifling

  the angry imprecations of his swollen heart. Then: ‘Believe me, I’d far rather die, and I would hav
e died

  long ago

  if the will of mortals were a match for the will of the

  gods. But alas!

  they’ve got us all by the bellies. They throw a crumb,

  a bone,

  keep us alive, howling with hunger, and keep us too

  weak

  to raise our daggers to our wrists, crawl down to the

  river … But enough.

  Let’s get on with it, play out our parts! If I may forestall your question, Jason, son of Aison—’ I cleared my

  throat.

  He stretched out his hands to stop me. ‘Don’t ask!’ he

  implored. ‘Don’t drag

  it on and on and on! The answer to your question is: I’m a victim of curses. Not only has a fury quenched

  my sight—

  an affliction bitter enough, God knows—and not only

  am I

  forced to drag through the years far past man’s usual

  span,

  aging, withering, no end in sight—but worse than that, Harpies plague me—eaglelike creatures with human

  heads.

  When my neighbors, or strangers from across the sea,

  come here to my house

  to ask of the future, or of hidden things, and leave

  me food

  as payment, no sooner is the food set out on my plate

  than down

  from the clouds—dark, swifter than lightningbolts—

  those Harpies swoop

  snatching the food from my fingers and lips with their

  chattering teeth.

  At times they leave me nothing, at times a gobbet or two to keep me alive and screaming. They imbrue with their

  sewage stench

  all they touch. I would rather die than consume the stuff those Harpies leave—so I rant to myself. But my belly

  roars,

  tyrannical; I submit. Yet this one curse will pass, if my name is Phineus. The Harpies will soon be driven

  away

  by two of your number, the lightswift sons of the

  Northern Wind.

  It has taken place already in the mind of Zeus.’

  “So he spoke.

  We stared in pity and disgust. Then Zetes and Kalais,

  sons

  of the wind, went closer, gagging from the stench but

  generous;

  and the noble Zetes reached for the foul, filth-shrivelled

  hand

  and said, ‘Poor soul! There’s surely no man on earth who

  bears

  more shame, more sorrow than you! Heaven knows,

  we’ll help if we can.

  But first, tell us—’ Before he could finish, the old man

  cringed.

  ‘I know, I know! What’s the cause? you’ll ask. Have I

  done some wrong?

  Have I rashly offended some god by, for instance,

  misusing my skill?

  If you help me and foil the justice of some great god,