The Arrows of Hercules

One – CUMAE

It was spring. A blustering boreal wind whistled clown from the flanks of the snow-crested Apennines, making the umbrella pines nod and the slender cypresses sway. It roared across the dark green Campanian plain, drying the brown mud of the fields around the villages and ruffling the sky-blue puddles left by the recent rain.

The wind rushed on over the Phlegraean Fields, a weird, legend-haunted region of sharp-ridged volcanic craters, of hot springs and sulfur-breathing lakes, of mysterious caverns which, men said, led to the underworld. It stirred the dense, dark thickets of ilex that crowded round the base of the citadel of Cumae. It flapped the woolens of those who clustered about the door to the Sibyl's chambers, on the seaward side of the Kill. It billowed the Campanian magnate's scarlet cloak, the Roman knight's chalk-whitened toga, the white cloaks of the bourgeois, and the brown cloaks of the soldiers and workers. It fluttered the threadbare shirts of the shivering slaves. It stirred the Tyrrhenian Sea at the foot of the hill until the water sparkled in the reborn sun like the swords of a distant battle. Overhead, the leaden pall of the last ten-day rolled away to southward, leaving a deep bright sky streaked with snowy plumes of cirrus.

On this morn of the tenth of Elaphebolion*(*Approximately March.), in the first year of the ninety-fifth Olympiad, when Laches was Archon of Athens, a runner pounded south on the coastal road, panting as he ran. As he sighted the acropolis of Cumae, he slowed and glanced back along the road by which he had come. No pursuers were in sight.

Above him, unaware, the crowd of seekers milled about, clutching their cloaks against the blast. The priests ushered out of the grotto a pair of swarthy, hook-nosed, long-robed Phoenicians, with rings in their ears and conical caps on their curly heads. As the Phoenicians went their way, murmuring in their own guttural tongue, men in the crowd began waving their arms, snapping their fingers, and calling out:

"Next!"

"It's my turn!"

"Take me next, O priest! I pay the god well!"

The clamor swelled until a priest beckoned the trio of Tarentines. One of these was a stooped, elderly man with a wreath on his scanty white hair. The other two were young, wearing hooded cloaks and high Thracian boots. One of the two was short and stout, with soft, rounded features. The other was tall, bony, knobby, and angular. Deep-set eyes looked out between his craggy, overhanging brows and wide cheekbones. A prominent nose, like a curved knife, divided his face, and the curly brown beard beginning to sprout from cheek and chin did not yet fully mask the sharp angles of his big jaw.

At the priest's gesture, the three started forward. The oldster moved slowly and painfully, with the short one bouncing on one side and the tall one shambling on the other. The Campanian magnate said loudly in Oscan:

"By the gods and spirits, I have waited long enough! After all, I am Gavius Trebatius!"

The priest smiled blandly. "All in good time, my lord."

"Surely a man in my position should precede these polluted foreigners!"

"My dear sir, you will hardly dispute precedence with the Archon of Taras!"

"Most reverend sir ..." The voices of the two dropped to an undertone as they continued their argument face to face, with gestures of angry impatience. The Tarentines paused uncertainly. At the elbow of the tall young Tarentine stood a big Celt in tunic and trews, checkered with a gaudy pattern of yellow, red, and green.

Grinning through his luxuriant bronze mustache, he murmured in accented Greek:

" 'Tis a good point that the holy father has, my lad. Did I not hear you say the old fellow was a king, now?"

"Not exactly. That's what the title means, but in our city the Archon has only priestly duties. Nothing political."

"You mean the poor man cannot have the head off anybody he thinks would look prettier without it?" The Celt clucked. "If that's your civilization—"

The red-cloaked Trebatius turned back into the crowd, scowling. The priest said in his oily voice: "You may come now, my friends."

"Wake up, Zopyros!" said the elderly Tarentine. "Are you doing figures in your head again?"

The tall youth grinned sheepishly. "I was working out how many oboloi a word the Sibyl's prophecy will cost our treasury."

"Abandoned scoffer! Come along."

The three paced sedately behind the priest, who led them to the tunnel hewn out of the rock of the hill. At the entrance, the other priest stood with his hand out. The Archon fumbled in his scrip and brought out a small, thin-leather sack, which he dropped with a clink into the upturned palm.

The first priest led them into the tunnel. At the threshold, Zopyros stumbled. The priest and the others frowned at the omen, but Zopyros quickly recovered and walked on as if nothing had happened.

This tunnel was sixteen feet high, several plethra*(*A plethron=100 feet.) in length, and of peculiar form. The lower third was roughly square in cross section, while for the upper two thirds the walls leaned inward, forming a trapezoid with a narrow strip of ceiling along the top. Light came through from a series of lateral galleries of the same six-sided form, cut through to the surface of the hill on the right. The stretches of light and dark tunnel made a series of concentric hexagonal patterns, which drew Zopyros' entranced gaze down towards the audience chamber at the far end.

Zopyros walked in a daze. It seemed that there must be some cosmic meaning to this piece of mountain-hewn geometry. Could he but grasp the pattern in its entirety ... The volume of a trapezoidal prism, he thought, would be—let's see—the length, times the height, times one half the sum of the width at the base and the top ...

Still pacing slowly, they reached the audience chamber. This was a large rectangular room, dark except where a shaft of sunlight slanted down through an overhead skylight and lit a patch of the rocky wall. Off to the left were more rock-hewn chambers, where the prophetess lived.

In the center of the chamber, an elderly woman—large, strongly built, and swathed in many cubits of black woolens—sat on a fantastically carved oaken throne. Stray strands of the woman's gray hair picked up the splash of sunlight on the wall. The air was heavy with incense.

Beside the throne stood yet another priest. The two priests murmured together in the dimness. Then the priest who had been standing beside the throne said:

"O Sibyl, the Archon of Taras seeks counsel for his city."

For a hundred heartbeats the woman sat silently, staring at the Tarentines. Then her keen gaze filmed over. Her eyelids drooped; her breath came heavily. She gasped, faster and faster, and burst into speech. She spoke in a loud, harsh voice. It sounded to Zopyros like some peculiar Oscan dialect, but the Sibyl spoke so fast that he could not be sure whether it was such a dialect or mere gibberish.

The woman ceased. The priest beside the throne said: "This is the word of the Sibyl:

The Sibyl also has a personal message for you," the priest concluded. "Wait."

They waited, while the wind whistled in the skylight and the galleries. The woman gasped, trembled, and again burst into speech. This time the priest said:

"For the Archon, she sees an Etruscan candle, burnt nearly to its end. For the short youth, she sees seven golden crowns. For the tall youth, she sees an immense bow. It is the bow of Hercules himself. Many men try to bend the bow but fail. Then this youth steps forward.

"With a mighty effort he strings the bow and fits one of Hercules' arrows to the string. He draws the bow to his breast—he lets fly— .and the arrow strikes the world and shatters it to bits, like a dish of pottery struck by a stone!"

'Zopyros gasped; the Tarentines exchanged appalled glances. "Oi!" exclaimed Zopyros. "I, a peaceful engineer, smash the world to fragments?" He turned to the priest. "Woe is me! Can the Sibyl explain?"

"The Sibyl never explains," said the priest. "It is not she who speaks, but the Far-Shooting One who speaks through her. The God of the Silver Bow allows us a glance through the misty veils of time and distance, but we ourselves must make what we can of these glimpses."

"This way, my sons," said the priest who had guided them in. As they walked down the corridor, the Archon said:

"I suppose the verse means that we must ally ourselves with Dionysios of Syracuse. The 'mule' refers to the story of the Partheniai, our bastard ancestors begotten by serfs on Spartan women while the Spartan men were away fighting. But this Wolf of the North—who Could that be? The Campanians? The Celtic tribes, which yearly swarm over the Alps in greater numbers?"

"It could be one of many northern powers," said the short youth. "Anyway, it's up to the Council to make sense of the verse. But how about those personal messages for us?"

"By our lady, it takes no seer to interpret the burnt-out candle!" said the Archon dryly. "She means I had better not make plans twenty years in advance. My creaky old bones tell me that, anyway. As for your seven golden crowns, Archytas my lad, she does but confirm what I have said, that anybody with a tongue loose at both ends, like yours, is wasted if he doesn't try politics. And Zopyros—well, world-smasher, what do you think?"

"I don't know what to think," said Zopyros. "The gods know I'm no—ah—'Hercules.' " (Zopyros winced, for it vexed him to hear these Italians mangle the name of the mighty Herakles.) "A Pythagorean should harm his fellow beings as little as possible ..."

They came to the end of the passage. As they stepped out the portal, the scarlet-cloaked Trebatius bustled past them. After the cave, the brightness was dazzling. Zopyros, squinting northward from the shelf of rock on which the inquirers were gathered, took in the curving shore line, the reedy swamps of Lake Licola, the dark green belt of pines along the sandspit that sundered lake from sea, and the blue dish of Lake Literna beyond. Ahead, to the west, lay the sparkling sea; to the left he could see the swampy Lake Acherusia with the mottled hills of Cape Misenum beyond. The Phlegraean Fields, the Campanian plain, and the distant Apennines were out of sight, behind the hill on which the acropolis stood.

The Celt flashed a friendly grin at Zopyros. "Did the wise woman tell you how you could turn the sea into gold, or marry the Great King's daughter, now?"

"Not quite, but she gave us much to think about."

"She gave good luck, I hope. I cannot wait to hear my own fortune. But himself in the red cloak has gone in, and by the time they get down to us common folk, I don't think I will be hearing her the day. Aral What's this?"

The rasp of sandals on the path from below and the sound of panting caused heads to turn. The runner stumbled up the last step to the place of assemblage and gasped:

"P-pirates! Etruscan pirates!"

There was an instant of blank silence, then a rising chorus of exclamations: "Ototoi, pirates!" "Oimoi! The gods protect us!" "Run for your lives!"

The crowd began to stir and break up, like a swarm of ants whose nest has been kicked apart. A few near the top of the path bolted down it, towards the clearing where stood the beasts of burden. The Tarentine Archon said:

"Pest! We can't have this. They'll all run back to Cumae, every man for himself, and we shall be caught at the tail of the procession and have our throats cut by the sea thieves. Stop them, lads!"

"I'll try," said Archytas. He pushed through the jabbering, gesticulating crowd to the head of the path, spread his arms to block those behind him, and shouted:

"Why are you running away? Are you men or mud-hearted cowards?"

"I'm a coward," said a Neapolitan in a blue embroidered cloak. "Out of my way, dog-face!"

The man laid a hand on his knife hilt. Zopyros, ranging himself beside Archytas, drew his own knife. Archytas shouted:

"If you're brave enough to threaten me, you're brave enough to fight the robbers!"

"But I'm not armed!" cried the Neapolitan, his voice going shrill.

"You have your dagger and cloak, haven't you? Perhaps they are Only a few. Here, you!" Archytas spoke to the youth who had brought the warning and who was now beginning to slide down the cliffside, past where Archytas stood. "How many are there?"

"I don't know. Perhaps thirty."

"Which way are they coming from?"

"Down the coast road from Lake Licola. Let go of my arm, Curse you!"

"We can do it!" shouted Archytas. "With these temple guards, we Drc as many as they! With danger, even danger's overcome!"

But the crowd still cried: "You're mad!" "Let us by!" "They are hardened fighters and we but peaceful folk!"

More men slid down the hillside to the right and left of the path. From below, Zopyros could hear the drum of hooves as the first of the mounted fugitives got his mule headed south "along the coastal road.

Now help came to the Tarentines from unexpected sources. The Roman knight, shouldering up to the head of the pathway, cried: "These young men are right, and the more shame to the rest of you! I have a sword in my gear below; who will stand with me?" He was an erect, tight-lipped man of early middle age, who bore himself with self-conscious dignity. Zopyros could barely understand his dialect, quite different from the local Oscan.

"Does your honor mean," said the Celt, "that this is not a private fight? Anybody can get in?"

"Quite so, quite so, man. Have you a weapon?"

"That I have, and I will show you how we make heads fly from their shoulders in the north country. To arms!" With a bloodcurdling shriek, the Celt bounded down the path. Others followed.

The crowd spread out on the hitching space and began rummaging in their gear for shields and weapons. They wrenched open bags, fumbled through their spare clothing, and shouted to their servants. Zopyros and Archytas threw off their cloaks, under which they wore chitons or Greek tunics—short-sleeved, knee-length, belted woolen shirts. They buckled on each other's bronze-studded leathern corselets, strapped on their smallswords, and took up the spears and shields they had brought from Taras. Somebody called:

"Who shall be our general?"

"I am a tribune of horse, who has commanded against the Veientes," said the Roman. "Does any man outrank me? Not so? Good. Now, where is the best place for an ambush?"

"The road passes under a steep bank, a few plethra to the north," said the trembling youth who had brought the message.

The Celt had doffed his tunic and strapped across his hairy chest a baldric, from which hung a long sword. A bronzen helmet with a little wheel on top now covered his long hair, and his left arm bore a big wooden shield with a bronzen boss. "Your honor," he said to the Roman, pointing at a chariot, "is that pretty thing yours?"

"Not so; it belongs to Trebatius, I believe."

"The fellow in the red cloak? I'm thinking, sir, that if I was to drive it full speed around a bend into the pirates, it would stir them up a bit."

"Trebatius would not like it."

"Ah, but he is in the cave with the wise woman, learning whether his next-born will be a boy, a girl, or a purple pig." The Celt pushed aside the slave guarding the chariot and began to unhitch the two white stallions, who shied and rolled their eyes at him. "Just give me the signal, Roman dear, and I will show you a charge like all the Persian king's chariots rolled into one."

"To the afterworld with Trebatius, then. Stand by," said the Roman, who had given his toga to his slave. He now stood in his tunic, which displayed the narrow purple stripe of the equestrian order. A heavy Samnite broadsword hung from his right side, and his arm bore a shield. "Are not the rest of you ready yet? In the name of the gods, hurry! ..."

The coastal road wound along the rocky shore, a few cubits above the waves. South along the road came thirty-four armed men at a fast walk, now and then breaking into a lope. They were a scarred, sun-tanned, fierce-looking lot, with here and there a missing eye or ear. They were dressed every which way, some in tar-stained stolen finery of brilliant hues, some in the short Etruscan shirts that left the genitalia exposed. Gold and silver flashed in the morning sun; jewels in rings, bracelets, and necklaces gleamed and winked against their dirty hides. All bore spears—some heavy thrusting pikes, some light casting javelins—and shields. Swords dangled from belts and baldrics. Half a dozen had helmets on their tangled hair; the rest were bareheaded or wore round seamen's caps. Only three wore cuirasses.

Crouching above the bank, Zopyros almost held his breath in the effort to keep from either talking or raising his head to peer at the foe. His heart pounded with excitement. The Roman knight had just threatened to break a spear shaft over the back of the next man who spoke.

The clangor of the pirates now came clearly, above the sigh of the wind and the splash of the waves. Swords clanked in scabbards; spears knocked against shields. There was the sound of many sandaled feet, of hard breathing, and of muttered curses and complaints in a harsh, grating, unknown tongue. Zopyros tried to estimate the number of the enemy by the volume of the sound.

Out of the corner of his eye, Zopyros saw the Roman wave his arm. At once there came the crack of a whip and the rattle of a chariot. Someone among the unseen pirates cried out. The hoof-beats grew louder. The Roman shouted:

"Stones!"

Zopyros sprang up, grasping a ten-pound stone in both hands. He raised the stone and hurled it down on the straggling mass of men below, while others to his right and left did the same. As Zopyros stooped for his second stone, Trebatius' gilded chariot, drawn by the whites at full gallop, hurtled around the bend on one wheel. The Celt screamed horribly, rolling his eyes and showing his teeth, a the chariot thundered towards the pirates.

"At them!" yelled the Roman. The four temple guards, moving heavily in their full panoply of polished bronze, began stumbling down the slope.

Zopyros threw his second stone, picked up his spear and shield, and bounded down the bank. Others, some with rolled-up cloaks in lieu of shields, charged on either side of him. All, as the Roman has commanded, shouted at the tops of their voices. Although a few o: those who had gathered at the Sibyl's cave had now slunk away, the attackers numbered over a score.

In the milling mass below him, Zopyros made out one man lying in the road. Just before he reached level ground, the chariot flashed by. The vehicle bounced into the air as the wheels struck another body.

Then Zopyros was in the mellay, jabbing wherever he saw an opening, catching a spear thrust and then a sword cut on his shield. He felt his point strike home. Then he saw a spearhead coming at his face and knew he could not bring his shield around in time. He stepped back, turned his foot on a loose stone, and fell sprawling, He rolled over to get his shield above him, groped for his spear and scrambled to his feet.

The pirates were no longer around him. The Roman cried: "After them! Do not let them get away! You!" he shouted at Zopyros Catching the young man by the shoulders, he spun him around and with a mighty push sent him staggering northward along the road.

Zopyros tripped over a body, recovered, and panted after a straggle of fighters, running north in pursuit of a little knot of pirates. Zopyros saw those in the lead overtake one man; saw the man go down under spear thrusts. The rest of the fugitives broke and scattered into the scrub like quail. The pursuers spread out after them but soon gave up the chase.

Zopyros, leaning on his spear and breathing in great sobbing gasps, caught an occasional flash of human hide among the ilexes. But the pirates, having thrown away their loose gear, ran faster for life than their pursuers ran for law and were soon out of sight.

Back at the battlefield, Zopyros found men bandaging wounds, while others snatched the jewelry from the corpses, hacking off fingers to get the rings. The Roman was coldly driving his sword into the body of a wounded pirate who still writhed and moaned. The Celt held his long sword and, by its hair, a severed head. Blood dripped slowly from blade and head.

"Is he not the fine trophy, now?" said the barbarian. " 'Tis sorry I am not to be going home to hang him in the hall. But you Greeks are funny about battle trophies. You will hang up an omadhaun's helmet but not the head that went inside it."

Zopyros was counting: "... seven, eight. Are those all we got?"

The Roman said: "Some fell or leaped into the sea when we charged them; I do not know whether they drowned or got ashore again."

"Is that man one of ours?" Zopyros indicated a well-dressed body among the corpses.

"It is. That is the man from Messana, the one with the young woman."

A Samnite spoke: "His name was Nestor, and I heard the girl Call him 'uncle'."

Zopyros stepped closer for a better view of the corpse. The gray-beard had several gashes, some of them deep body wounds. His tunic, Once white, was now mostly crimson.

"Still," said Zopyros, "we did well, considering that we had fewer in the battle line than they."

The Roman said: "I have seen it before. When one side breaks and runs, even the lightly wounded are struck down from behind as they run or speared as they lie on the ground. Therefore the losses of the losing side are many times those of the winners, even though the battle was close and hard-fought. When I fought at—"

The sound of horses cut off the Roman's sentence. A squadron of horsemen cantered around the bend, their horsehair plumes whipping in the breeze.

"Hercules! What's this?" said their officer. "I mean, are you the pirates or the people who fought against them?"

The Roman bared his teeth in a grimace of exasperation. "What do you think, my Campanian friend? Jupiter blast you, must I put on my toga to prove that I am Quintus Cornelius Arvina, of the Equestrian Order of Rome? Do I look like a pirate?"

"I'm sorry, sir," said the officer.

"Well, ride hard to the outlet of Lake Licola, and you may catch the remnant of the pirates before they board their ship."

The horsemen threaded their way through the fighters and corpses and took up their pursuit. As they galloped off, Zopyros turned to help Archytas bandage a scratch on his leg. All were in high spirits, chattering and laughing. Even the Roman cracked a thin smile. Landlord, peasant, and mechanic freely exchanged names and congratulations, differences of rank for the moment forgotten.

The Celt, pulling on his tunic, said to Zopyros: "It is Segovax son of Cotus that I am, young man, and the bonniest fighter that ever came out of Gaul. And who might you be?" He was almost as tall as Zopyros and much heavier, with merry blue eyes in a ruddy, weather-seamed face and hair, once bronzen, now streaked with gray. His cheeks and chin were shaven, but the hair on his long upper lip, uncut, hung down on either side of his mouth, then swept out and up like a buffalo's horns. Zopyros guessed his age at forty.

The Tarentine replied: "I'm Zopyros son of Megabyzos, and my friend here is Archytas son of Mnesagoras. Taras sent the Archon to consult the Sibyl, and we were chosen by lot to go with him, to run errands and protect him from evildoers. What brings you to our sunny southland?"

"I'm after having a bit of trouble at home, and I thought the wise woman could tell me where to find a good job as a hired soldier. I did it before in these lands, years ago, so I will not be finding it strange."

"Is that how you learned Greek?"

"It is that; and Oscan and Punic, too. The fairy that watched over my birth gave me the gift of tongues. Maybe you could—Valetudo preserve us, but look at all the people!"

A crowd had appeared on the road from Cumae. Among them were the servants who had watched the beasts of burden at the foot of the path to the Sibyl's cave, the priests of the Sibyl, the women and old men among the pilgrims, and a swarm of peasants and townsmen who, hearing of the victory, had come out to celebrate. Among them was the red-cloaked landowner, Trebatius, crying:

"This is an outrage! My beautiful chariot, all hacked and spattered with mud and blood! Who told you you might make free with my property, you stinking barbarian?"

The Celt looked up. "Is your honor addressing me, now?" he said softly, his hand stealing to his hilt. "Because if it is a fight you want to make of it—"

"Shut up and let me handle this," barked the Roman. "You, my good Trebatius, cower in the Sibyl's cave while the rest of us fight, and then you have the insolence to complain because somebody put your car to good use in your absence?"

"How was I to know what was going on?" said Trebatius. "When I came out from my hearing, everybody had gone. But this temple-robbing lout—"

"He is a better man than you." Others in the crowd took up the cry: "To the crows with Trebatius!" "Trebatius is a coward!" "Trebatius hides in a cave while the heroes are fighting!" "Let's give Trebatius a ducking!"

"You wouldn't dare!" screamed Trebatius, leaping into his chariot and turning the horses. "Out of my way, scum!" He lashed his horses furiously and rode at reckless speed through the scattering crowd.

The young woman from Messana was sobbing over the bloody body of her uncle. An elderly man with a wreath on his head stepped forward.

"Hail!" he said. "I am Aulas Gellius Mutilus, president of Cumae. This splendid victory has saved the shrine from the most unholy and tragic pollution. By the Heavenly Twins, how did you ever do it? You are not a trained army, but a mixed crowd of men of many nations, speaking different tongues, brought together by chance at the shrine. Yet you defeated a gang of well-armed, hard-fighting robbers, more numerous than yourselves."

Cornelius Arvina shrugged. "The Tarentines here dissuaded them from running away, and I told them what to do. After all, I am a Roman knight."

"You make it sound miraculously simple, best one. As chief magistrate of Cumae, I invite all our saviors—all those who took part in the battle—to a banquet this evening at the town hall. It is a small return, but the best we can do."

"I thank you," said the Roman gravely. "Meanwhile, did anyone think to bring us some wine? Fighting is a thirsty trade ... Ah, that is better!"

Zopyros noted with surprise that the sun was halfway down the western sky. At least two or three hours had passed since their audience with the Sibyl. The young woman still wept. Three men stood around her: two slaves, and a burly bodyguard who had fought against the pirates. Bashfully, Zopyros said:

"Young lady, can I do anything for you? I understand this man was your uncle."

She raised a tear-stained face. "I thank you, stranger. I don't know what to do. How shall I ever get Uncle Nestor's body home?"

"You don't want it buried here?"

"By the two goddesses, no! That would be terrible. His spirit would never be happy anywhere but in the family plot at Messana, and he would haunt us forever. But now ..."

"Well, the first step is to take it back to Cumae. How did you get here?"

"I rode an ass; the others walked."

"I'll lend you my mule, because it's a long walk for a little girl."

The girl looked doubtful. "I don't know ..."

"You have nothing to fear. I am Zopyros of Taras, a humble follower of the divine Pythagoras, and this is Archon Bryson of our city. Assure the young lady she can trust us, O Archon."

"My dear young lady," began the Archon. "I don't know your name ..."

"Korinna daughter of Xanthos. If these young men are with you, Archon, I'm sure they are honorable."

The Cumaeans stripped the bodies of the pirates and piled the naked corpses in a heap. Others cut brush to burn the bodies. As the three Tarentines, together with Korinna and her servitors, started south along the coastal road, a crackling orange fire, a pillar of dark smoke, and a smell of burnt meat arose from the pyre.

Plodding back to Cumae, Zopyros walked beside Korinna's ass. Ahead, the bodyguard led Zopyros' mule, on whose back the corpse joggled and swayed.

"I don't know how I shall ever get back to Messana," said Korinna in worried tones. "It is hard, very hard, for a woman to travel alone. Uncle Nestor arranged everything."

"What about the three with you?"

"Sophron"—she nodded towards the bodyguard—"seems a good fellow. I don't think he'd try to dishonor me; but the big Cyprian ox is too stupid to manage anything. As for the slaves, you know what they're like. You saw how all three stood helplessly by until you told them what to do."

"How did you come from Messana?"

"In Captain Strabon's ship. He plans to sail for home tomorrow."

"We came overland, by way of Venusia and Aquilonia."

"How was the journey?"

"Smooth enough, save for a close escape from robbers near Malienta, and a snowstorm on Mount Tifata. Of course these Italian roads, so called, are mere goat tracks. I wonder how you, a young girl, came to make this voyage with your uncle?"

"I, not my uncle, was the inquirer."

"Oh?" Zopyros raised his bushy eyebrows.

"I ... I wanted to find out how to get my child back. You needn't look startled. I am a respectable twice-widowed woman, once by death and once by divorce."

"By Mother Earth, you don't look old enough to have been married even once!"

"Nonsense! That's your sly Tarentine gallantry. I'm nearly twenty —practically* an old woman."

"Then my eyesight must be failing. Where is the child?"

"After my first husband died, I returned to my father's house and asked Father to find me a more interesting husband. Poor Aristeas had been sweet but terribly dull, you know."

"Many men are, I fear," said Zopyros. He added with a malicious little smile: "You found his successor quickly enough, didn't you? Hid he prove more fascinating?"

"I once thought so. But love is like looking in a mirror; when yon turn around, everything is on the opposite side."

Korinna fell silent. Zopyros, striding beside her, felt awkward and ineffectual. Thinking that, if he could get her to talk, it might lift some of the sadness from her small pale face, he groped for words:

"Who—what was he like, your second husband?"

"Elazar was a Phoenician building contractor and a childless widower. Father dealt with him while building a market in town. I saw them together once, standing in our courtyard, studying the plans. Elazar fascinated me—a big, strong man with a touch of gray in his beard, widely traveled and worldly wise—so different from Aristeas. Of course, Father didn't want me to marry a foreigner; but to please me he agreed."

"I take it that Elazar proved less fascinating when you came to know him better?"

"Oh, Elazar is quite a man in his way; and being a Phoenician's wife has its advantages. Did you know they give their women much more freedom and responsibility than we Hellenes do?"

"I know them well; I lived three years in Tyre. What happened then?"

"Elazar took me back to Motya, his home town, where he had a contract to rebuild part of the city wall."

"That's at the western tip of Sicily, isn't it?"

"Yes, on an island in a bay."

"Do they expect an attack by the Hellenes, then?" asked Zopyros.

"Not right now. But the warehouses of any Phoenician city bulge with goods gathered by their traders from all over the world, from the plains of Scythia to the Pillars of Herakles. Any warlord would love to loot such a place, and the Phoenicians know it. The Motyans are rich. We lived well. I could have learnt to put up with Elazar's gruff ways if we had not had a son."

"A son? Most families look upon a son as a blessing."

She lowered her voice, as if oppressed by the memory. "Elazar is a pious man in his way, and little by little I learnt what he had in mind. In times of peril to their city, leading Punic families give up their first-born to be burnt alive in the statue of Baal Hammon. If danger ever came to Motya, that's what Elazar meant to do with my beautiful baby."

"By Zeus the Savior! I saw that custom practiced once in Tyre. It's even cruder than the Italian custom of arming slaves or prisoners and making them fight to the death. What did you do?"

"At first I was so terrified that I couldn't think. Then I planned to run away with the child. Needing a confederate, I bribed the nurse. That was a mistake. Then I bribed a ship's captain to take us on his next run to Messana. I planned to visit another Hellenic woman when Elazar was out and, from her home, slip down to the pier. The nurse was to meet mc there with the baby.

"I went to my friend's house and put on a white wig. Carrying a small bundle of my things, I went to the piers and boarded the ship. But the nurse never appeared. Instead, Elazar came storming down, looking for me. Luckily, nobody thought he was describing the white-haired old lady who had just gone aboard. I hid among the cargo, and Captain Philon—Artemis bless him—never gave me away. My friend later wrote that the nurse, having taken my bribe, went to Elazar and disclosed the plot to get an extra reward from him."

"Death take her! What happened next?"

"I suppose I could have gone back to Elazar and taken my punishment. But that wouldn't have saved little Ahiram; for Elazar would have seen to it that I never got another chance to touch the child. In the end I sailed away without the boy. Perhaps I was a coward ..."

"I think you're a heroine," said Zopyros. "And then?"

"Father was dreadfully upset, of course; but he got the Archon's Court to grant me a divorce. When he wrote Elazar, demanding his grandson, he got no answer. He sent my brother Glaukos to Motya to offer a ransom—besides giving up his claim to my dowry—but Elazar practically threw Glaukos out of the house. That's why I came here to ask the Sibyl's advice. Since Father isn't well enough to travel, Uncle Nestor brought me. Now Uncle Nestor's dead, and it's all my f-fault ..." She began to cry again.

"Now, now," said Zopyros, feeling inadequate. "The Fates snip out threads as they please, and your uncle died a hero's death."

She wiped her eye with her veil. " 'Full is the earth of ills, and full no less are the waters.' "

"Are you still going to interview the Sibyl?" he asked.

"I've already done so."

"How is that possible?"

"By the time Trebatius came out from his hearing, nearly everybody else had left the acropolis. So I asked the priest if I might have my turn, thinking the pirates would be too fearful of the gods to invade the sacred grotto."

"Clever girl! What advice did you get?"

"She said:

"That describes Motya, all right; but it sounds as if you needed the help of some Easterner—an Ionian, or perhaps even a Tyrian."

"Don't ask me to get mixed up with Phoenicians again! To me they're hateful as the gates of Hell."

"I have good friends in Tyre; but I can understand your feeling."

They moved quietly for a time. The sun sank lower towards the Tyrrhenian Sea, which blazed with golden coruscations like the flames in the belly of Baal Hammon. At length she said:

"I've done all the talking. Tell me about yourself."

"There's little to tell. I'm just a hard-working engineer, in business with my father in Taras."

"An engineer? You mean a machine maker?"

"Machine making is one of our tasks. We do much else, besides. We design fortifications, build aqueducts, and survey roads. When a man like Master Elazar finds a task too complicated for him, he sends for us to calculate him out of trouble."

"I don't believe we have any engineers in Messana."

"There aren't many in the West; it's a new trade in Great Hellas. It calls for a lot of travel, and it's a chancy business. Somebody— perhaps a private contractor; perhaps the president of a city—puzzles over a technical problem until he's nearly mad. Then he calls us in. We solve the problem, and the man who has hired us says: 'Why, that was easy! I could have done as much! And do you scoundrels really think I'll pay you a hundred drachmai for that?'

"The last time one of them talked like this, my father said: 'All right, I'll say no more about the fee, if you will make a little bet with me.'

" 'What's that?' said the builder, who was a notorious gambler.

"I'll wager I can tell a hard-boiled egg from a raw egg without opening it. Will you bet a hundred drachmai that I can't?'

"The builder took him on. We got a dozen eggs, boiled half of them, cooled them, and mixed them with the six raw eggs. My father easily picked out the hard-boiled ones."

"How?"

"You stand the egg on end and spin it. If it spins like a top, it's hard-boiled. If it flops over, it's not. One of my Tyrian friends taught me that trick."

"How funny! What were you doing in Tyre?"

"My father sent me there for my technical education. He apprenticed me to Abdadon, a colleague who specializes in shipyards and docks. The Phoenicians are far ahead of us Hellenes in engineering."

"Really? I thought Hellenes led the world in everything."

"So they like to think; but some foreigners know a thing or two. The Phoenicians encourage invention by deifying their great inventors."

"What did you say your father's name was?"

"Megabyzos son of Zopyros."

"Those sound like Persian names."

"They are." Defensively, Zopyros said: "I'm only one quarter Persian. My grandfather Zopyros was a Persian nobleman who fell out with the Great King and fled to Athens, where he married a Hellene. When my* father grew up, he moved to Taras, because he heard it would be easier to become a citizen there. You know how exclusive thee Athenians are. If you're not of pure Athenian descent, it's easier lo steal a gryphon's egg than to gain Athenian franchise."

"Did the Tarentines grant him citizenship?"

"Oh, yes; we are now solid citizens despite our mixed blood. Without family or city, a man is nobody—Mistress Korinna, why are you staring at me like that?"

"Why ... you must be the man from the lands of morn, of whom the Sibyl spoke! You're part Persian, and you have lived in Tyre."

"Dear Herakles! Don't expect me to rescue your boy from his father!"

"You have been chosen by the gods for this task!"

"My dear Korinna, I have my duties to my city and my family, and Pythagoras placed duty and responsibility before all. Besides, the Archon would never let me go galloping off on such a chase."

"You won't help me, then?" Her lip trembled.

"I should be delighted to, but ... You have friends and kinsmen in Messana far better placed than I to cope with Elazar. I've never even been to Sicily."

"But they don't fit the Sibyl's pronouncement; you do!"

Zopyros squirmed in an agony of indecision. He liked this small, dark, pretty girl immensely. He had seldom had an opportunity to talk at length to a girl of his own class outside his immediate family. As Zopyros plodded on, frowning at the road before him, Korinna said:

"You might at least escort me back to Messana. Otherwise I don't know how I shall ever get home safely. Then, you could catch an eastbound ship and be back in Taras before your comrades."

"I'll ask the Archon ..."

When Zopyros and his fellow Tarentines, bathed and oiled, appeared in front of the town hall of Cumae, a low red sun was staining the white stucco of this edifice rosy pink. The town hall was a boxlike building of stuccoed mud brick. A pair of Doric columns, of stucco-covered local limestone, relieved the plainness of the building and testified to the precarious lodgment of Greek culture on the barbarous Italian coast.

"O Zopyros!" It was Korinna, who stepped out of the shadows where she had stood with Sophron the bodyguard and her two slaves.

"Rejoice!" said Zopyros. "Dear old Bryson says I may take you to Messana. But not a step further; he made me swear by the holy tetractys to return thence at once to Taras."

"We may never get to Messana!" she said. "A terrible thing has happened."

"Zeus! Don't tell me Captain What's-his-name has sailed off without you!"

"No, but it's just as bad. He absolutely won't take a corpse on board; he babbles about ghosts and sea daemons and bad luck."

"Furies take him! We can't delay. If we get a warm spell, your uncle won't... Well, I'll try to find another ship."

"Where?"

"I don't know." Zopyros waved an arm. "I'll inquire at the banquet. If there is none here, perhaps there's one at Neapolis. I'll manage something. Now get a good night's sleep."

Inside the town hall, oil lamps shed a soft yellow glow on the banquet tables. The president and a few men of the highest rank were already reclining on dining couches at the far end of the room. The other diners sat on benches at long tables. Zopyros tried to count the assemblage but gave up; too many people were moving about.

"Welcome!" said Gellius Mutilus. "I am sorry we cannot accommodate you all in proper style, but our little basilica is not large enough for so many couches. I hope you will drink enough of our best Falernian so that you shall not notice the difference."

Zopyros found himself between Segovax the Celt and the Neapolitan with whom he had had words before the battle.

"Rejoice, Master Zopyros!" said the latter. "You and your friends did what I thought impossible; namely: made me a hero in spite of myself. It proves that the gods do indeed intervene in human affairs; for, without divine help, you, I, and our fellow heroes should all be weltering in our gore. By Herakles' balls, I wouldn't have bet a moldy olive against a golden Persian stater that a raggle-taggle crew like ours had a chance against a gang of professional murderers!"

Zopyros said: "My friend Archytas, here, has a mysterious knack nf talking people into doing what he wants them to do. Some god lakes possession of his tongue."

"Anyway I, like a sensible man, prepared to go elsewhere. Only, ns things turned out, common sense was not sensible after all. Your health, sir!"

"Thank you, Master Ingomedon," said Zopyros. "Tell me: how can I catch a ship from here—or from Baiae or Neapolis, for that matter—bound for Messana? A ship, moreover, whose captain is not superstitious."

"Taking the old Messanian home, eh? Let me see. Strabon is leaving tomorrow, I believe."

"He won't carry the cargo in question."

"Well then—hmm—do you see that fellow over there, with the earrings and the necklace of glass gimcracks?"

"The lean one who twiddles his fingers and drums on the table?"

"Yes. He's a Phoenician captain who put in a few days ago. He was at the Sibyl's grotto ahead of us this morning. I don't know his name or his home port, but you could ask him. What he's doing here, I can't imagine, since he is neither a hero of the battle nor a Cumaean citizen. Maybe the president owes him money, or maybe they have some shady deal. Some say all Phoenicians are thieves, although I have no prejudice against foreigners. Why, some of my best friends—"

"I'm part Persian myself," said Zopyros with emphasis.

"Think nothing of it." Ingomedon hastily swallowed a mouthful of diced octopus and resumed in a lowered voice. "Actually, purity of blood is a sore subject in Cumae. You see, the Cumaeans are of bastard origin, just like you Tar—excuse me, but you know what I mean. Not two generations ago, when Cumae was still Greek Kymê, an army of Samnites seized the town, slaughtered the men, and grabbed the women. Some of those old brigands are still alive. The Samnites settled down with their new women and begat as fine a crop of little half-breeds as you ever saw. Since most of the women were Hellenes, however, the children grew up to speak more Greek than Oscan. They still do, albeit with that weird Italianate accent you hear. But they carry Oscan names, since the man has the final say in that."

Zopyros asked: "Is there a Pythagorean Society around here?"

"You mean a gang of philosophical fanatics, plotting to seize power and make everybody stop eating beans?"

"No, nothing like that! The Pythagoreans haven't touched politics for years, save in Rhegion. Nowadays they are simply men interested in mathematics and the other sciences—seekers after the hidden truths of the universe."

Ingomedon laughed. "Not around here! We Neapolitans think of three things only: our purses, our bellies, and our pricks. Excuse me; my food is getting cold."

Zopyros asked his other neighbor: "How goes it with you, O Segovax? Have you seen the Sibyl?"

"That I did, young sir. The wise woman told me: 'Seek thou the place where the island rules the shore.' Now where would that be?"

Zopyros frowned. "I hear the Dionysios makes his headquarters on the island of Ortygia. Thence he rules the Syracusans on the mainland of Sicily and a lot of other peoples besides."

The Celt nodded sagely. "I am after thinking about him. I once soldiered for the fellow they had before him, Hermokrates, and a grand man he was. What did the lady druid tell you?"

"She told me I should someday smash the world."

Segovax's blue eyes widened. "You don't say, now! I hope I'll be somewhere else when that happens. You look like a nice lad, not one who goes around breaking up worlds, and them so pretty and all."

"She also," said Archytas from the other side of Segovax, "told us to beware of the Wolf of the North, whoever that might be."

"Hold your tongue, you polluted rattlepate!" said Archon Brvson from further down the table. "Such sacred matters should not be blabbed from Karia to Carthage."

"Ah, well," said the Celt, "wine makes the tongue wag easier, like grease in the hub of a chariot wheel. But you will not be talking of Sibyls and prophecies now, I'm thinking."

The buzz of conversation died as a dancing girl sprang into the cleared space in the midst of the tables. Clad in a thin shift of purple Koan silk, she went into gyrations to the tune of a double flute with a nose piece, blown by another girl in the corner.

When the girl had finished her dance, the men whooped and applauded. The girl curtseyed and ran off. Soon she was back, juggling knives and balls. The applause was louder.

The third time, the girl placed on the floor several candlesticks bearing lighted Etruscan candles. Then she cast off her shift and, naked, turned cartwheels and did handstands amid the candles, which cast golden highlights on her well-oiled skin.

"Isn't he the sour-face, though!" said the Celt in a loud whisper.

"Who?" said Zopyros.

"The Roman, that Cornelius Arvina."

Segovax nodded towards the couches on the dais at the end of the hall. The Roman knight, wearing a look of chill disapproval, was sitting up on the side of his couch, with his feet dangling, pretending to adjust his toga so that the stripe on his tunic showed. The Celt continued:

"The lassie is after having the hair of her crotch shaved off. Is that the way they do in your city, now?"

"Some Italians do it," said Zopyros. "It's an Etruscan custom. Some of the rich young Tarentines do it, too—you know, those beautiful youths who spend their days striking statuesque poses in the gymnasium. But not us working folk; before I'd let anybody near my family jewels with a razor—"

"We have the hairs pulled out in Neapolis," said Ingomedon.

"Ouch!" said Segovax. "The things folks will do to be in style—"

"Zeus, Apollon, and Demeter!" cried Ingomedon. "Look at that!" The Neapolitan burst into a loud guffaw, in which the entire company joined until the town hall shook with a thunder of mirth.

For the dancing girl, with a final flip, turned a somersault and came clown on the lap of the Roman knight, with her arm around his neck and her face buried in his beard. Expressions of stark horror, dismay, and rage chased each other over the Roman's stern visage. For an instant it looked as if he would rise and stalk out. But, with the naked girl clinging to him like a limpet, this would have involved a scuffle, even more unseemly and undignified than his present position. Seeing that all the rest thought it a good joke, the Roman tried to smile but managed only a ghastly grimace.

The girl leaped down from her perch and made her bows to thunderous applause. When she had snatched up her shift and run out, Gellius Mutilus, the president, rose and said:

"To finish the evening, we shall auction off that little spinning top, for the night, to the highest bidder. Her kindly owner asks me to tell you two things: First, he promises that she may keep half the money the auction brings, for her very own self; and second, she need not take any man who displeases her. What am I bid, gentlemen? Do you care to open the bidding, good Cornelius Arvina?"

"I do not!" snapped the Roman, adjusting his toga.

Pointing, Ingomedon said to Zopyros: "There's your Wolf of the North."

"You mean Rome?"

The Neapolitan wagged his head affirmatively.

"I can't believe that!" exclaimed Zopyros. "Rome is a small, distant, backward, unimportant state, without sea power. How could Rome ever threaten Taras? Other peoples are far more menacing— the Lucanians, the Etruscans, or the Celts. Why, your fair Neapolis might be a greater threat than little old Rome!"

Ingomedon said: "I have been to Rome, man, and know whereof I speak. The Romans are a conservative people—exceedingly dull, in fact. They wouldn't even laugh at a comedy of Aristophanes. With them, custom is king. But they have discipline. We don't."

"Do you mean 'we Neapolitans' or 'we Hellenes'?"

"I know the Neapolitans best, naturally; but the remark applies to others as well. The Spartans have discipline, but cursed few other Hellenes. I have no discipline whatever. Hellas is full of pillow knights—lions in the bedroom, rabbits on the battlefield."

"They tell me the Spartans have been corrupted by success since they overcame the Athenians."

"That may be, but the Romans have a more complex organization than the Spartans ever thought of. Moreover, when the Romans conquer a neighboring people, they admit them—after a waiting period—to full citizenship. Thus their power grows."

"Hellenic cities are much more exclusive," said Zopyros. "Our local gods are jealous gods, who hate having strangers attend their rites."

"Exactly. So, when a Hellenic city gains an empire, as the Athenians did, it looks upon the other peoples of the empire as subjects to be exploited. Naturally, the subjects hate their masters and seize the first opportunity to break away. I don't know by what trick of theology the Romans get around the obstacle of common worship; but they do." The Neapolitan yawned. "By the Dog of Egypt, here I am, trying to play the oracle when I can't even foresee my own affairs a day in advance! The bidding for the girl has already risen beyond the reach of my purse, so I'm going. But remember what I have told you. If you live long enough, you'll see what Rome can do."

A stout, bald landowner won the dancing girl. As the party broke up, Zopyros marked the lean, intense-looking Phoenician sea captain and pushed his way towards him through the crush.

As the sun rose the next morning, Zopyros called at the inn where Korinna occupied one of the two private rooms.

"It's all arranged," he told her. "We sail this morning on the Muttumalein, of Captain Ethbaal."

"Another Phoenician!"

"I can't help that. He's the only one besides Strabon who is leaving within a ten-day. Let's gather our gear and be off!"