21
NARRATED BY
Battle orders had long been issued to the army, but Priam remained within his walls. Even the Trojan raiding parties ceased to plague us; my troops fretted from uncertainty and inaction. Having nothing to discuss, I called no council until Odysseus appeared.
‘Sire, would you call a council for noon today?’ he asked.
‘Why? There’s nothing to say.’
‘Don’t you want to know how to lure Priam out?’
‘What are you up to, Odysseus?’
Came a brilliant, laughing look. ‘Sire! How can you ask me to reveal my secrets now? As well might you ask for immortality!’
‘Very well, then. A council at noon.’
‘Another favour, sire?’
‘What?’ I asked warily. He was using that irresistible grin he saved to get what he wanted. I weakened; I could do nothing else when Odysseus smiled like that. One had to love him.
‘Not a general council. Only certain men.’
‘It’s your council, ask whom you like. Give me their names.’
‘Nestor, Idomeneus, Menelaos, Diomedes and Achilles.’
‘Not Kalchas?’
‘Least of all Kalchas.’
‘I wish I knew why you mislike the man so much, Odysseus. If he was a traitor we’d know it by now, surely. Yet you insist upon excluding him from every significant council. As the Gods bear the man witness, he’s had innumerable opportunities to give our secrets to the Trojans, but he never has.’
‘Some of our secrets, Agamemnon, he knows as little about as you do. I believe that he waits for the one secret worth his betraying where his heart belongs.’
I chewed my lip, huffed. ‘All right then, no Kalchas.’
‘Nor can you mention it to him. More than that, I want the doors and windows sealed with boards once we’re assembled, and guards posted outside so thickly they touch each other.’
‘Odysseus! Isn’t that going too far?’
He grinned wickedly. ‘I’d hate to make Kalchas look like a fool, sire, so we have to finish this business in the tenth year.’
The handful of men Odysseus had asked for came expecting a full council, and were curious when they understood they were all.
‘Why not Meriones?’ asked Idomeneus a little peevishly.
‘And why not Ajax?’ asked Achilles truculently.
I cleared my throat; they settled down. ‘Odysseus asked me to call you together,’ I said. ‘Just the five of you, him and I. The noises you can hear are guards boarding up this room. Which will tell you more emphatically than I could how secret our business is. I require your individual oaths on this: whatever is said here can’t be repeated outside these walls, even in sleep.’
One by one they knelt and took the oath.
When Odysseus began, his voice was soft; a trick of his. He would commence so quietly one had to strain to hear him, and as he outlined his ideas his voice would rise, until at the end it resonated among the rafters like beating drums.
‘Before I begin to talk about the real reason for this very small council,’ he said almost inaudibly, ‘it’s necessary to tell some of you what others among you already know. Namely, the actual function of that jail of mine in the hollow.’
I listened in growing anger and amazement as Odysseus told the rest of us what Nestor and Diomedes had always known. Why did it not occur to any of us to investigate activities in that hollow? Perhaps because, I admitted in the midst of my outrage, it had suited us not to enquire; Odysseus had removed some of our worst problems, which had never returned to plague us. Not, I learned now, due to weary prison sentences. They were his spies.
‘Well,’ I said at the end of it, tight lipped, ‘at least now we know how you can predict what Troy is going to do next so uncannily! But why the secrecy? I am King of Kings, Odysseus! I was entitled to know from the very beginning!’
‘Not,’ said Odysseus, ‘while you favoured Kalchas.’
‘I still favour Kalchas.’
‘But not the way you did, I suspect.’
‘Perhaps. Perhaps. Go on, Odysseus. What have your spies to do with this meeting?’
‘They haven’t been as idle as our army,’ he said. ‘You’ve all heard the rumours as to why Priam has made no move to come outside his walls. The commonest one is that his reinforcements haven’t come up to expectations – that he lacks our numbers. That isn’t true. At this moment he has seventy-five thousand men, a figure not including almost ten thousand chariots. When Penthesileia of the Amazons and Memnon of the Hittites arrive, he’ll outnumber us drastically. Added to which, he’s under the misapprehension that we’ll be lucky to field forty thousand men. You may take it all of this is accurate. I have people in the confidence of Priam and Hektor.’
He took a little turn about the room, sparsely populated and therefore free of obstacles. ‘Before I go any further, I must talk about the King of Troy. Priam is an old, old man, and prone to the doubts, vacillations, fears and prejudices of the very old. In short, he’s no Nestor. Never think he is. He rules Troy with a far more autocratic hand than any Greek king owns – he’s literally king of all he surveys. Not even his son and Heir would dare to tell him what to do. Agamemnon calls councils. Priam calls assemblies. Agamemnon listens to what we have to say and heeds us. Priam listens to himself and whoever echoes what he’s thinking.’
He stopped to face us. ‘This is the man we must outwit, this is the man we must bend to our will without his ever suspecting it. Hektor weeps as he walks the battlements, counting his own men and seeing us sitting on the Hellespont shore like fruit ripe for the plucking. Aineas chafes and burns. Antenor alone does nothing, because Priam is doing as Antenor wishes – Priam too does nothing.’
Another march around the chairs; every head followed him. ‘So why exactly is Priam unwilling to commit himself when he has more than a good chance of driving us out of the Troad right now? Does he truly wait for Memnon and Penthesileia?’
Nestor nodded. ‘Undoubtedly,’ he said. ‘That’s what a very old man ought to do.’
Odysseus drew a breath; his voice was swelling. ‘But we cannot allow him to wait! He must be lured from the city before he can afford to lose men by the countless thousands. My sources of information are much better than Priam’s, and I can tell you that both Penthesileia and Memnon will arrive before winter closes the passes from the interior. The Amazons are horsed, so they count as cavalry. With them, Troy will field over twenty thousand cavalry. In less than two moons she’ll be here, with Memnon hard on her heels.’
I swallowed. ‘Odysseus – I hadn’t realised – couldn’t you have told me earlier?’
‘My information is just now complete, Agamemnon.’
‘I see. Go on.’
‘Does Priam hold off purely from prudence, or is there more to it?’ Odysseus asked of no one. ‘The answer isn’t prudence. He’d give Hektor permission to come out at this moment were it not for Achilles and the Myrmidons. He fears Achilles and the Myrmidons more than the rest of our troops put together with all our other leaders. Part of his fear is rooted in certain oracles about Achilles – that he personally holds destruction for the flower of Troy. Part of it stems from the general feeling within the Trojan ranks that the Myrmidons are unbeatable – that Zeus conjured them up out of an army of ants to dower Peleus with the best soldiers in the world. Well, we all know what ordinary men are – superstitious and gullible. But both parts combined mean Priam wants a scapegoat to pit against Achilles and the Myrmidons.’
‘Penthesileia or Memnon?’ asked Achilles, face grim.
‘Penthesileia. There are mysteries surrounding her and her horse warriors and they bring women’s magic with them. You see, Priam can’t let Hektor face Achilles. Even if a Trojan victory was guaranteed by Apollo, Priam wouldn’t let Hektor face the man his oracles say holds destruction for the flower of Troy.’
There was no joy in Achilles’s face, but he said no word.
‘Achilles has rare gifts,’ Odysseus commented drily. ‘He can lead an army like Ares himself. And he leads the Myrmidons.’
Nestor sighed. ‘Too true!’
‘No need to despair yet, Nestor!’ Odysseus answered cheerily. ‘I still possess all my faculties.’
Diomedes – of course he was in on it already, whatever it was – sat grinning. Achilles watched me and I watched him, while Odysseus watched both of us. Then he brought the butt of the Staff down on the floor with a ring that made us jump, and when he spoke, his voice boomed like thunder.
‘There must be a quarrel!’
We gaped.
‘The Trojans aren’t strangers to the spy system,’ Odysseus went on in more normal tones. ‘In fact, Trojan spies in our camp have served me almost as well as my spies inside Troy. I know every single one of them, and feed them selected morsels to take back to Polydamas, who recruited them – an interesting man, this Polydamas, though not appreciated as he ought to be. For which we must thank the Gods who side with us. Needless to say, his spies take back only what I let them take back, such as the paltry number of soldiers we have. But for the past moons I’ve been encouraging them to send one certain snippet of gossip to Polydamas.’
‘Gossip?’ asked Achilles, frowning.
‘Yes, gossip. People love to believe gossip.’
‘What gossip?’ I asked.
‘That there is no love lost between you, Agamemnon, and you, Achilles.’
I think I stopped breathing for longer than I should, for I had to suck in air audibly. ‘No love lost between Achilles and me,’ I said slowly.
‘That’s correct,’ said Odysseus, looking pleased with himself. ‘Ordinary soldiers gossip about their betters, you know. And it’s common knowledge among them that there have been differences between the pair of you from time to time. Of late I’ve been fanning the rumour that feeling between you is deteriorating very rapidly.’
Achilles got to his feet, white-faced. ‘I don’t like this gossip, Ithakan!’ he said angrily.
‘I didn’t think you would, Achilles. But sit down, do!’ Odysseus looked pensive. ‘It happened at the end of autumn, when the spoils from Lyrnessos were divided at Andramyttios.’ He sighed. ‘How sad it is to watch great men topple over a woman!’
I clutched the arms of my chair to stay in it and looked at Achilles in mortified comradeship; his eyes were quite black.
‘Of course it’s inevitable that such a degree of ill feeling should come to a head,’ Odysseus continued chattily. ‘No one will be in the least surprised when the two of you quarrel.’
‘Over what?’ I demanded. ‘Over what?’
‘Patience, Agamemnon, patience! First I must dwell a little more fully on events at Andramyttios. A special prize was given to you as a mark of respect by the Second Army. The girl Chryse, whose father was high priest of Sminthian Apollo in Lyrnessos. He donned armour, picked up a sword, and was killed in the fighting. But now Kalchas is saying that the omens are very inauspicious if the girl isn’t returned to the custody of Apollo’s priests in Troy. Apparently we’re in danger of the God’s wrath if Chryse isn’t returned.’
‘That is true, Odysseus,’ I said, shrugging. ‘However, as I told Kalchas, I fail to see what more Apollo can do to us – he’s completely on the Trojan side. Chryse pleases me, so I have no intention of giving her up.’
Odysseus clicked his tongue. ‘Tch! I’ve noticed, however, that opposition annoys Kalchas, so I’m sure he’s going to renew his exhortations that the girl be sent to Troy. And to help him out, I think we’d better have an outbreak of plague in our camp. I have a herb which makes a man very ill for about eight days, after which he recovers completely. Very impressive! Once the plague breaks out, Kalchas is bound to increase his demands that you give up Chryse, sire. And, faced with the full force of the God’s anger in the form of disease, Agamemnon, you will acquiesce.’
‘Where is this going?’ asked Menelaos, exasperated.
‘You’ll see very shortly, I promise.’ Odysseus focused his attention upon me. ‘However, sire, you’re no petty princeling to have your legal prize so arbitrarily removed. You are the King of Kings. Therefore you will have to be compensated. You might argue that, as the Second Army gifted you with the girl, the Second Army must replace her. Now from the same spoils a second girl was allotted – rather highhandedly – to Achilles. Her name is Brise. All the Kings plus two hundred senior officers saw how much our King of Kings would have liked her for himself – more than he wanted Chryse, as a matter of fact. Gossip travels, Agamemnon. By now the whole army knows that you preferred Brise to Chryse. However, it’s also widely known that Achilles has developed a very deep regard for Brise, and would be loath to part with her. Patrokles, you see, goes round with a woefully long face.’
‘Odysseus, you’re treading a very thin line,’ I said before Achilles could speak.
He ignored me, swept on. ‘You and Achilles are going to quarrel over a woman, Agamemnon. I’ve always found that disputes over women are accepted without question by all and sundry – after all, let us admit that such disputes are extremely common, and have caused the deaths of many men. If one might presume, my dear Menelaos, one could include Helen in the catalogue.’
‘Do not presume!’ my brother growled.
Odysseus blinked. Oh, he was a reprobate! Once launched, no one could restrain him. ‘I myself,’ he said, thoroughly enjoying himself, ‘will undertake to set a few omens beneath our worthy priest Kalchas’s nose, and I myself will manufacture the plague. I promise you, the sickness will fool Podalieros and Machaon! Terror will stalk our camp within a day of the outbreak. When you’re informed of its seriousness, Agamemnon, you’ll go at once to Kalchas and ask him what has vexed which God. He’ll like that. But he’ll like your request for a public augury even more. In front of the army’s senior ranks he’ll demand that you send Chryse to Troy. Your position, sire, will be quite untenable. You’ll have to acquiesce. However, I’m sure no one will blame you if you take offence when Achilles laughs at you. During a public augury? Intolerable!’
By this we were beyond speech, though I doubt Odysseus would have paused had Zeus thrown a thunderbolt at his feet.
‘Naturally you’ll be furious, Agamemnon. You’ll turn on Achilles and demand that he give you Brise. Then you’ll appeal to the assembled officers – your prize has been removed from you, therefore Achilles must yield his prize to you. Achilles will refuse, but his position will be just as untenable as yours was when Kalchas asked for Chryse. He’ll have to give you Brise, and he’ll do so then and there. But, having handed her over, he’ll remind you that neither he nor his father swore the Oath of the Quartered Horse. In front of the assembly he’ll announce that he is withdrawing himself and the Myrmidons from the war.’ Odysseus roared with laughter, shook his fists at the ceiling. ‘I have a special nook reserved for a certain furtive Trojan I know. Within the day all Troy will be aware of the quarrel.’
We sat like men struck to stone by Medusa’s glare. What storms of emotion he had unleashed in the others I could only guess at; my own storms were hideous enough. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Achilles move, and swung my attention to him, agog to know his reaction. Odysseus could unearth more secret skeletons out of secret graves and rattle them than any other man I’ve ever known. But by the Mother, he was brilliant!
Achilles wasn’t angered, which amazed me. His eyes held nothing but admiration.
‘What kind of man are you, Odysseus, to dream up such strife? It’s a wicked scheme – staggering! However, you must admit that it’s hardly flattering to Agamemnon and me. It’s our two carcasses must bear the ridicule and contempt if we do as you want. And I tell you now that if I die for it, I will not give Brise up.’
Nestor coughed softly. ‘You won’t be giving anything up, Achilles. Both young women will be handed into my custody, and with me they’ll remain until things work out as Odysseus plans. I’ll lodge them secretly, no one will know whereabouts they are. Including Kalchas.’
Achilles was still unsure. ‘A fair offer, Nestor, and one I trust. But surely you can see why I mislike the scheme. What if we do succeed in duping Priam? Without the Myrmidons to hold the van intact we’ll suffer losses we just can’t afford. I’m not exaggerating. It’s our function in battle to hold the van intact. I can’t like a plan which endangers so many lives.’ His eyes brooded. ‘And what of Hektor? I’ve vowed to kill him, but what if he should die while I’m out of the battle? And how long am I expected to be out of the battle?’
Odysseus answered. ‘Yes, we’ll lose men we wouldn’t if the Myrmidons were there. But Greeks aren’t inferior warriors. I’ve no doubt we’ll do well enough. For the moment I won’t answer your big question – how long will you be out of the battle? I’d rather speak about getting Priam outside his walls first. I ask you: what if this war drags on for years more? What if our men grow old without seeing their homes again? Or what if Priam comes out when Penthesileia and Memnon arrive? Myrmidons or no, we’ll be hacked to pieces.’ He smiled. ‘As for Hektor, he’ll live to face you, Achilles. I know it in my bones.’
Nestor spoke. ‘Once the Trojans come out from behind their walls they’re committed,’ he said. ‘They can’t withdraw for good. If they suffer heavy casualties, Priam will receive information that our casualties are even heavier. Once we lure them out, the dam will break. They won’t rest until they’ve driven us from Troy, or until the last one of them is dead.’
Achilles stretched his arms wide, the great muscles moving under his skin. ‘I doubt if I have the strength of character to refrain from fighting while everyone else does, Odysseus. For ten whole years I’ve waited to be in at the kill. And there are other considerations too. What will the army say of a man who can desert them in their time of need because of a woman – and what will my own Myrmidons think of me?’
‘No one will speak of you kindly, Achilles, so much is sure,’ said Odysseus soberly. ‘To do what I ask will take a very special kind of courage, my friend. More courage than it would take to storm the Western Curtain tomorrow. Don’t mistake me, any of you! Achilles hasn’t coloured the thing a scrap darker than it is in reality. Many will revile you, Achilles. Many will revile you, Agamemnon. Some will curse. Some will spit.’
Smiling wryly, Achilles looked at me not unsympathetically. Odysseus had managed to draw us closer together than I had deemed possible after the events at Aulis. My daughter! My poor little daughter! I sat still and cold, tasting the unpalatable role I must fill. If Achilles would look an intemperate fool, what sort of fool would I look? Was fool the right word? Idiot, more like.
Then Achilles slapped his thigh sharply. ‘It’s a heavy thing you charge us with, Odysseus, but if Agamemnon can humble himself to take his share of the load, how can I refuse?’
‘What is your decision, sire?’ asked Idomeneus, his tone announcing that he would never consent to it.
I shook my head, propped my chin on my hand and thought, while the rest of them watched me. Achilles broke in on my reverie; speaking to Odysseus again.
‘Answer my big question, Odysseus. How long?’
‘It will take two or three days to draw the Trojans out.’
‘Which is no answer. How long must I remain out of things?’
‘First let us wait for the High King’s decision. Sire, what is it to be?’
I let my hand drop. ‘I’ll do it on one condition. That each of you in this room takes a solemn oath to see it through to the absolute end, no matter what the end might be. Odysseus is the only one who can guide us through this maze – such scheming was never meant for the High Kings of Mykenai. It is the lot of the Kings of the Out Islands. Do you all agree to swear?’
They agreed.
With no priest present, we swore on the heads of our male children, on their ability to procreate and on the extinguishing of our lines. Heavier than the quartered horse.
‘So, Odysseus,’ said Achilles, ‘finish it.’
‘Leave Kalchas to me. I’ll ensure he does what’s expected and never knows it was expected. He’ll believe in himself as completely as the poor shepherd lad plucked out of the crowd to play Dionysos at the Maenad revels. Achilles, once you’ve handed Brise over and spoken your piece, you’ll take your Myrmidon officers and return to your compound immediately. Handy that you insisted on building a stockade within our camp! Your isolation will be easily noted. You’ll forbid the Myrmidons to leave the stockade, nor can you leave it yourself. Henceforth you’ll be visited, but never visit. Everyone will assume that those who visit you go to plead with you. At all times and to every member of your inner circle of friends you must seem an extremely angry man – a man who is bitterly hurt and utterly disillusioned – a man who thinks himself grossly wronged – a man who would rather die than patch up his relations with Agamemnon. Even Patrokles must see you like this. Is that understood?’
Achilles nodded gravely; now that the matter was decided and the oath sworn, he seemed resigned. ‘Are you going to answer me yet?’ he asked then. ‘How long?’
‘Not until the very last moment,’ said Odysseus. ‘Hektor must be absolutely convinced that he can’t lose, and his father must feel the same way. Play out the rope, Achilles, play it out until they have to choke on it! The Myrmidons will return to action before you do yourself.’ He drew a breath. ‘No one can predict what will happen in battle, even I, but some things are fairly certain. For instance, that without you and the Myrmidons, we’ll be driven inside our own camp. That Hektor will break through our defence wall and get in among our ships. I can help events a little by using some of my spies among our troops. They can, for instance, start a panic leading to retreat. It’s up to you to decide exactly when the time is right to intervene, but don’t return to the battle yourself. Let Patrokles lead the Myrmidons out. That way, it will seem that you’re obdurate. They know the oracles, Achilles. They know that we can’t beat them if you don’t fight with us. So play out the rope! Don’t return to the field yourself until the very last moment.’
And after that there seemed no more to say. Idomeneus got up, rolling his eyes at me wildly; no one understood quite as well as he how hard it would be for Mykenai to let himself be so reviled. Nestor bestowed his bland smile on us – he knew it all long before this morning’s work, of course. So did Diomedes, grinning broadly at the prospect of other men’s acting the fool.
Only Menelaos spoke. ‘May I offer a little advice?’
‘Certainly!’ said Odysseus heartily. ‘Advise, do!’
‘Kalchas. Let him in on the secret. If he knows, then you halve your difficulties.’
Odysseus pounded his fist into the palm of his other hand. ‘No, no, no! The man is a Trojan! Put your trust in no man born to an enemy woman in an enemy country when you are fighting on his own soil and likely to win.’
‘You’re right, Odysseus,’ said Achilles.
I made no comment, but I wondered. For years I had championed Kalchas, but something inside me had turned this morning, quite what I didn’t know. He had been at the root of things which had done much harm. It had been he who had forced me to sacrifice my own daughter and thereby create the breach with Achilles. Well, if he was in truth not to be trusted, it would be evident on the day when I quarrelled with Achilles. For all its careful blankness his face would betray his inner pleasure – if indeed he felt any. After so many years, I knew him.
‘Agamemnon,’ came the plaintive voice of Menelaos from the door, ‘we’re boarded in! Would you kindly give the order to let us out?’