Complete Works of George Moore, page 595
As I had not distinguished myself at rehearsal that morning my ambition amused my comrades, and the legend grew that when I came into my inheritance I would spend it all in buying parts to which my small merit as an actor did not entitle me. The story might have lived and died quickly, like many another harmless joke, if it had not reached the ears of the manager, with the exact sum of money he was to receive for every leading part confided to me. It was not the manager’s fault; I acquit him of all blame. He had to defend himself, and the only way to prove these stories false was by giving the parts that should have come to me to others, and feeling that I was unjustly treated I was about to leave the theatre, when my father died on the verge of bankruptcy, having spent all the money he had made upon women from Corinth, building houses, and living riotously. When my ruin was no longer hearsay but a fact that could not be gainsaid, certain of my comrades regretted the scandal that had been set going about me and would have shown me some kindness in the future to make amends if I had remained in the theatre; but when a man hath been discredited, whether he be in the right or in the wrong, it is well for him to leave those who have plotted against him. The parts of messengers would still have been given to me, no doubt, but the pay of a messenger is a poor one. I was living in a small room on a loaf of bread a day and half-a-bottle of sour wine, and was weary of it. Yet it was not for the comforts of life that I left the theatre, but because in my poverty I had read Homer deeply and had discovered much that needed interpretation, and the only way for me to interpret Homer was to become a rhapsodist. I had a good voice, and inveigled by the desire to express the truth about Helen, I paid for a passage in a ship bound for Cnidus and went to bed convinced that at noon I should be in the middle of the Ægean. But at noon, or after noon, I was asleep on the beach at Aulis. How was that? Otanes asked. At midnight a God spoke in my ear, saying: To Aulis! To Aulis! A voice spoke in thine ear, Kebren! Yes, close by; when I put out my hand there was nothing, yet the voice was so plain that I should know it if I were to hear it again. And before sleeping thou hadst no thought that a God might come to thy bedside, no feeling that something was about to happen? No, sir, none. Which is strange, said Otanes, for yesterday, as I have told thee, I was full of forebodings, certain that another uneventful day would not go over. How can that be explained? By the fact that thou, too, wert in the mind of the God, Kebren replied. It may be as thou sayest, Kebren. And they spoke of Gods and oracles for a long time.
My good wife would have enjoyed our talk if she were here to listen to it. Never weary of embroidering stories of Gods and mortals was she, and she would have made a design for a tapestry out of what thou hast told me. All I have told thee, sir, is but the truth; and Kebren waited for Otanes to continue. But Otanes was thinking of his wife and her embroideries, and of a phrase that he had heard her say: To complete the design of the Gods we have to put a stitch here and there. He had answered: — In saying as much, Theano, mayhap thou’rt not far from the truth, the Gods being free from human mortality. Immortal they are not, for their natures change or modify, and immortality they need not claim, for behind the Gods there is ineluctable Fate. It is hard, Kebren, to accept ourselves and all we see and hear as blind chance, for there seems to be a design; yet when we seek the design we lose it. And the riddle, said Kebren, is not less when we look up to the stars and say: They are the dwellings of the immortal Gods, who descend occasionally to Mount Olympus to look after the affairs of men. Thereat we touch the two extremes of human thought, replied Otanes, and he began to speak of the wisdom of Mesopotamia and the star watchers of Babylon, Kebren giving as much attention as he could, afraid to interrupt lest he should harden Otanes’s heart against him. At last the strain became too great for him to bear, and he asked: Does Biote incline to blind chance, or to the Gods in the stars and the Fate behind the Gods? Women are not interested in the past or in the future, Otanes answered; they live in the present time, and maybe they are right. But here is Timotheus.
A message, sir, from the lady Biote. A chill gotten in the courtyard last night will prevent her from being present at the reading this evening. My thought was to return to Athens this afternoon, Kebren struggled to say to Otanes, and said it somehow. Thou hast left the theatre for a long itinerary, Otanes answered, reading and interpreting Homer to all and sundry. Thine itinerary was planned to begin at Cnidus, but why Cnidus rather than Mitylene or Rhodes, or Aulis, whither the God directed thee? And when Homer hath been read to us thou’lt be better able to read him to others. There are twenty-four books of the Iliad, and easily thou canst read a book to us in an evening. But I will not press thee for an answer at once; think of it until to-morrow. The generosity of thine offer, sir, takes me aback. I had not expected so much. A day longer in which to rest I had hoped for, no more. At the end of the month, Otanes continued, a fee will be given to thee for thy reading, as much and more than thou wouldst have earned in the theatre, and one of my ships will take thee to the city that seems most favourable to thee. Now I must leave thee, for I am a little anxious about Biote. Thou’lt find in my library the earliest manuscripts of the Homeric period, and in them perchance a clue to the ancient worship of Helen as a Goddess.
Otanes turned to go, and Kebren hurried forward to open the door for him, afraid as soon as he had opened it that he had betrayed his secret wish to be left alone to consider and appreciate the good fortune that had fallen upon him from the skies — yes, from the skies, so miraculous did it seem that a man should pass from penury to affluence in the space of an hour. The word affluence gave him pause. At the end of the month, when the Iliad was read, he would step on board one of Otanes’s ships with a heavy purse of money, and the ship would take him to whatever city seemed to him most favourable. And for an hour, or for a few minutes (it is hard to measure the duration of a dream), he lectured on the banks of the Eurotas at eventide. The shadow of the mountain lay steeped in the quiet water; the crowd listened.... But why the Eurotas? for the Spartans were not great readers of Homer, though indeed they had supplied the story of the burning of Troy and the rape of Helen ages ago. Why do I waste time thinking of Sparta and the Eurotas? he asked himself, and quietly as an otter slides into the water he returned to the dream that lay ahead of him: the month he was to spend in this beautiful house, attended by slaves. An hour ago I was in imagination walking back to Athens, my weary limbs unable to bear the hardship of the way, afraid to spend half-a-drachma on a bottle of sour wine — as if it would have mattered whether I spent it or not! I might have gone to the manager of the theatre and told him what had happened to me, and asked him to lend me the price of a passage — but why think of all these things? I would think of nothing but the present moment, of this wonderful house that the God led me to by the hand, as a parent leads a child.
A finer house it was certainly than any he had seen in Athens or heard of. In Athens everybody’s money went into public buildings and nobody cared where he lived so long as public life was beautiful and chaste. But this Boeotian had put his money into his own house, in which he had lived with his beloved wife, and in which he now lived with his beloved daughter, Biote! And Kebren was about to think of her when his eyes were captured by the sight of the spouting River-God in the middle of the courtyard, with two attendant nymphs holding their hands in the spray, and from them his eyes wandered to the dolphins and sea-horses with curling tails wallowing in a mosaic of blue and brown and white stones, united with red streamers from different parts of their bodies, giving a sense of life and movement. He asked himself whence Otanes had got the idea for this house in Aulis, and Egypt, Carthage, Syracuse, were explored, and then his thoughts turning northward, he remembered Dioscurias, whither the Persians sent caravans laden with ivories and dyed stuffs. Wherever he goes a great trader gathers ideas, and if he be a collector he collects everything. A wise God indeed it was that brought me to this house! And his thoughts sobering a little, he bethought himself of the manuscripts, and thinking that he would do well to spend the morning in examining them, he strayed from the courtyard into the hall, where he stood lost in admiration of the hammer beams carved into figure-heads by a craftsman, till steps awoke him from his reverie.
The master, Timotheus, spoke to me of his library, but he was perplexed at the moment by memories of business at his counting-house and went away without taking me to it. The master remembered his forgetfulness at the last moment, sir, and gave orders that I should take thee to the library. A man that is truly worthy of his possessions! Kebren muttered to himself, and when Timotheus had opened the chests, saying: — Here are his treasures, he drew over a stool and began his examination. All the works of Æschylus, Pindar, Chionides, Anacreon of Teos, are here, he said, and many other lesser-known but not unworthy writers. He brought his stool to another chest, where he found copies of the Iliad and the Odyssey, and it was not until he opened a third chest that he forgot everything except the manuscripts it contained. A cursive examination of these showed them to be of great antiquity. The poems written by the bards at the time of Homer, he said, rejected from the canon for one reason or another. I have often wished to read them, and if I should find proof in this chest that Helen was deposed unjustly, like Chronos, horizons will be thrown back.... His thoughts passed beyond his control, and when he awoke he could remember nothing. I might have been dead! he muttered, picking up another manuscript, and he continued to read till the light began to fail and Otanes returned from his counting-house. Reading in my library, Kebren, and diligently, I can see from the pile of manuscripts that have been already examined. Reading for mere pleasure of the words? or in search of some hint that will throw a light on Zeus’s intention in seeking out Leda in the river — to gratify a brutal lust or to punish Athene for some fault committed on Parnassus? Thou hast said it, Kebren replied, overjoyed, and rising to his feet and setting his back against the tallest of the oaken chests, he stood as if addressing an audience. Speaking to one, but having many in his mind, he approached by gentle stages to an avowal of his belief that Helen had a claim upon the affections of the Athenian people equal to or nearly equal to Athene’s. And without challenging the supremacy of her who gave the olive to Greece, he said, it seems to me that Greece will be a gainer, not by the substitution of one Goddess for another but by the resurrection of a Goddess from an unmerited oblivion, or at least a partial forgetfulness.
So that is thy creed! Otanes muttered. Art surprised? Kebren asked, abashed by the intonation rather than by the words. Not surprised, Kebren. Every young man should think religion out for himself, else he will have none. I, like another, strove in my youth to reconcile the Gods and their sway. And as if urged by some secret need to confess himself, Otanes continued: I have not abandoned my dreams; the pressure of circumstance hath merely forced them underground. To rise up again, like a river, Kebren replied, and the proof of the ancient worship of Helen I shall find in these poems. His face became suddenly overcast. The very poem in which the poet speaks plainly of Helen’s divinity may be lost, he said, burnt in Troy, perchance. Even so, the God that led me hither had thy library in his mind, for how long we may not proffer a guess — before it existed in thine, Otanes. I like to listen to thee, Kebren, for listening to thee brings back my youth. And they talked on, returning every now and then to the baffling, unanswerable question whether all is blind chance — Or stitches, Otanes interjected, in some great design that the Fates are weaving behind the Gods. We shall never get farther; the Fates were the beginning and will be the end of all, however we may think and puzzle. And then, like one who would escape from the Gods and their doings for a while, he asked Kebren if he did not find the verses of the elder poets rougher than the verses declaimed in the theatre at Athens. Certainly rougher, Kebren answered; verse is smoother now than it was. A gainer or a loser by the change? And Kebren, hesitating to declare a preference, replied: As Biote is not able to leave her room and would be hurt were I to spend the evening reading Homer to thee, I will read instead a play of Æschylus. Willingly indeed will I hear thee read the masterpiece, Otanes answered, but not now. In a few minutes Timotheus will announce the evening meal. Wherefore they talked on till the doors were thrown open, and during the meal it was debated whether Kebren should read the Supplices or Prometheus Bound, the choice falling to the Supplices. For the sake of the Chorus, Kebren said, as they rose from table. We will keep Prometheus Bound, the finer play in many ways, until to-morrow. But Biote will be here, Kebren, and dialogue is not easily understood except by players. The best parts of the Iliad are in dialogue, sir.
And so it fell out that part of the Supplices was read that evening and talked over, Kebren commenting upon his reading and challenging the interpretations of other actors till the wicks began to smoulder in the oil and Otanes’s thoughts turned to the business that awaited him in the morning at the counting-house. A very pleasant evening it hath been, he said, and to-morrow evening will be pleasanter, for Biote will be with us. Kebren had forgotten her, and as he laid his head upon the pillow forebodings began to gather in his mind, but before an ugly thought appeared sleep intervened, and in the morning he hurried to meet Otanes, hearing already the many pleasant things his host would certainly have to say to him about his reading. But before Otanes opened his lips to speak, his face warned Kebren that his humour had changed. To ask him bluntly what had happened Kebren did not dare, and the meal continued in silence till Otanes said: Biote hath an attack of marsh fever, slight or serious Aglaia, her nurse, will not say. We shall have to wait three or four days to learn if her lungs be attacked. Her lungs attacked! Kebren exclaimed. Thou’rt a stranger in Boeotia, Kebren, and hast no knowledge of the marshes round Lake Kopais. Whenever a west wind blows fever flies are carried hither. Many suffer and a few die, but the lake remains undrained, which is a pity, for the draining of it would give thousands of acres of the sweetest grass in Greece to many herds of kine. A tribe that was here before we were, drained part of the lake and was enriched by it, and the legend of the wealth of their city, Orchomenos, awakened hopes that the ruined canals might be rediscovered; but we had the Persians to contend with — He walked up and down the hall and along and across it without speaking, and Kebren wondered of what he was thinking. I ought to have sent her to Euboea, to Mnasalcas, Otanes said at last, stopping before Kebren; and thinking that a remark was expected from him Kebren asked who was Mnasalcas. A sheep-farmer, Otanes answered, and from his talk, which quickly became incoherent, Kebren learned that Acamas, Mnasalcas’s father, and Otanes were comrades in boyhood and had laid nets for wild-fowl in the Lelantus, and for that and other reasons they had traded together in many seas. His words stumble on, Kebren said to himself, but his mind is away. Timotheus came to say that Otanes’s head clerk desired to speak with him, and Kebren was glad when Otanes hurried past, leaving him to make the acquaintance of Timotheus.
The master bumped past me as if I were a person of no consequence, and it is true I am of none. I am a slave like my father before me, and my child after me, if I had one. But I do not complain; indeed, I would hardly change my lot. All the same, Timotheus, it is not like Otanes to bump past thee? He would not have done so, sir, if he were not in the midst of a great grief. Thou art right, Timotheus. And the contentedness of Timotheus with his lot opening Kebren’s eyes to the slave, he noticed that he was almost a dwarf, but without deformity, standing on the smallest feet he had ever seen on a man. He cannot have fetched much in the market, he thought, and later he admired the slave’s thick brown hair running over his head in curls. Timotheus spoke in a thin, obsequious voice, breaking every now and then into a little giggle. No Greek is he, Kebren said to himself, but no worse for that — a pleasant little fellow. And feeling drawn to the slave, he took him into his confidence, saying: The master was telling me about Mnasalcas and his sheep-farm. Timotheus responded at once to the invitation to gossip, and Kebren heard from him that Mnasalcas’s flocks comprised hundreds of sheep, and that he and Otanes divided great sinus of money between them for the growing and the exportation of the wool. His stead stands on the upper reaches of the Lelantus, and one day — but I am called away; thou must excuse me, honoured sir. Thine ears are quick, Timotheus; I heard nothing. Timotheus smiled at the compliment. My hearing is as good as it ever was, he cried back, and Kebren turned again to his reading, but wearying he laid down the manuscript to ponder, his thoughts returning to Timotheus, whom he now looked forward to meeting at the midday meal. But Timotheus did not serve it, and the slave who replaced him being without liveliness of mind or wit, Kebren opened his manuscript again and read till Timotheus came to ask him at what hour he would like the lamps to be lighted. He answered.: Not yet, and continued reading. At last he said: A call came for thee, Timotheus, when thou wert about to tell me a story. To tell thee a story, sir? Yes, about the upper reaches of the Lelantus; and Kebren waited for the slave to recover his memory.
