Antigone's Wake Read online

  Polycrates, who still believed that nothing very wrong could happen to him, laughed out loud. “Yes, you make a fine joke, my friend, though I think you go too far in doing it in front of my servants.”

  The tyrant’s blindness sounded to Oroetes ears like the most impudent of insults. He therefore subjected Polycrates to such tortures as only Persian minds could devise. He was tied, lashed, and blinded. His bones were broken with stones. He was hung upside down, nailed to a hunk of wood, and finally garrotted. As a crowning insult, his body was punctured in a thousand places. All this was done in full view of the nobles who accompanied him to Asia, as a warning to any that might harbor similar ambitions. It was not missed by the Ionians that Chryse’s visions had all come to pass: when Polycrates was hung upside down he was washed by rain from Zeus; when his dead body was disfigured, his blood did not run from the wounds but oozed out, still and shining on his skin like thousands of tiny rubies.

  But the most chilling sight of all, said the witnesses, was the look in the victim’s eyes when they were breaking his bones. For it had finally dawned on him that this was not a joke, but a cruel reality from which he had thought himself immune.

  In this way did Olympus withdraw its favor from Polycrates, who built like a god, outshone all the other Greeks, and was the first mortal man to dream of mastering the sea.

  Oroetes did not long survive his victim. By the time King Darius came to the throne in Susa, the satrap’s long record of arrogant acts had made him notorious. Darius sent secret orders for Oroetes to be killed by his own guards. The orders were fulfilled with prejudice, and the body destroyed so no trace was left to be honored by his family. Polycrates’ bones, meanwhile, were dug up and surrendered to the Ionians, as a benevolent gesture to the new satrapy of Samos.

  Bereaved, Chryse willingly took upon herself the curse of loneliness with which her father had threatened her. She refused all proposals of marriage, and when her family plotted to turn her over to Polycrates’ brother, she fled to the mountains with her father’s remains, never to be seen again. For years after, goatherds told of hearing the mournful cries of a girl, audible when the wind blew down from the high pastures.

  *

  With the arrival of winter the Athenians were more or less trapped on the island. The storms that increasingly rose up from the sea made them reluctant to launch their vessels. Rations were tightened as they saw fewer supply ships from home. Everyone, from humblest slinger to general, stalked the beaches half-mad, thinking of the plenty he was missing because of the intransigence of the Ionians. Many of the less-experienced shieldmen had never missed so many city festivals in a row. Competitions were held to distract them, but athletic rivalries only increased dissension in the ranks. Anyone walking the camp would have heard Pericles cursed under many a breath; toasts were made to his death, even as it was understood by all that only he could lead them out of the impasse.

  The only bright spot in the dismal season was the example of noble Dexion, still facing the prospect of his son’s death a month after receiving Callinus’ threat. The poet went about his usual business as the first three-day deadline approached — inspecting the siege works, distributing supplies, mediating disputes. His face was immobile. He slept outside his tent, sitting up, his face turned toward the Samian walls. At dawn on the third day he stood alone in no man’s land, a tempting target for the Ionian archers as he waited for the execution party to mount the walls. He had a note delivered to Callinus, expressing neither hope nor anger, demanding only that his son’s body be delivered to him when the deed was done.

  Callinus replied that a boy so young should not suffer so quickly for the foolishness of his elders. He set a new deadline of one week. When this was endured by Sophocles with equal courage, he set another of two weeks, his demand accompanied this time by the severed tip of Iophon’s left index finger.

  This, at last, drove Sophocles to Pericles’ tent. The Olympian was prepared for him, intending to deny any negotiation — until he was surprised to see the poet fall to his knees.

  “My friend, we have known each other for a long time,” began Sophocles. “In the days of Cimon, they said I had thrown in my lot with the aristocrats’ camp — but we both know that wasn’t true. I produced the Agamemnon, and they said I lampooned your character, until they saw The Bow of Odysseus, and even the dullards could understand my respect for you. I saw then the quality of man you were, and what you could do for the city if you had the opportunity to lead. That time did come, and I’ve never had an occasion to regret my judgment — until now.

  “I beg you to release me from this ordeal. If you will not deal with Callinus, at least let me go and exchange places with my son. My death would at least be in accord with the responsibility I took when I accepted the generalship. But Iophon’s time has not yet come for taking risks. The future of my family is at stake. His mother lies ill, and I fear she won’t survive such a blow. Will you sentence her to death, as well as our unborn child, just to satisfy your hatred of the Ionians? Must the future be sacrificed for the necessity of the moment?

  “We both know what your answer must be, what Athens’ answer has always been. Our city chooses the future. If you do otherwise, you are not the Pericles I thought you were, and you make me fear the fate of everything we hold dear.”

  Pericles looked down at him with an expression of cool compassion, seeming as much to revile the poet’s desperation as he pitied his plight. When he spoke, his voice was in the opposite of his public mode — quiet, plain, without flattery or exhortation.

  “I am hurt, dear friend, if you truly believe that I act out of something as unreasoning as hatred. Come now … have I ever been that kind of man? If you so badly misunderstand me, what hope do I have that anyone else is with me?”

  Stepping forward, he extended a hand to pull Dexion to his feet. Then he kissed his friend on the cheek, put his arm around him, and began to declaim in his typical rostrum style — albeit from two feet away. “You are wrong to so despise my motives! For of course our enemies are free to say what they want, to sow discord among the people, and therefore to maintain this illusory freedom of which they are so proud. Wiser men than they know the truth: only one thing will keep the Greeks free of empires like that of Darius, and that is an empire of the Greeks. And what is more, the only city to lead such an empire is Athens. Sparta can scarcely spare the men to control her own territory. Corinth — she is rich, but a whore, unable to summon the resolve for such a task. Thebes? Is there any doubt she would turn Mede again, if the choice faced her? Is there any other city as despised as she?

  “And so it falls upon us — and I tell you it is not a responsibility to be welcomed. What did you think it would take, Dexion, to keep the Greeks safe? What can we fail to sacrifice, to keep an empire? Now that we have it, we dare not let it go, for that would be more costly than if we never tried. That is why the Samians must be punished — not because we hate them, or act out of spite. It is nothing other than a rational calculation.”

  “Is that all we mortals are to you, then — figures in a calculation? Is that why you oblige me to bury a son?”

  “That can’t be helped now. What I can promise you, though, is that we will make the Ionians bury more of theirs.”

  “And have your calculations included the fact that the city will fall soon? You forget that I can hear them, and that no one is better at judging the mood of crowds. Callinus is desperate because he can barely control the democrats in the city. The children are suffering. I can hear their mothers crying over them in the night. If you truly profess to hate wasting Athenian lives, why leave my son to die when the conclusion is foregone?”

  Pericles let him go, retreating several feet until turning to confront him again. “I respect your knowledge of these things, Dexion. You may well be right. But under the circumstances, your word is simply not enough. I’m sorry.”

  They looked at each other.

  “May I take my son’s place?”
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br />   “You are a far more valuable hostage than Iophon. It would be a poor trade for Athens.”

  “A poor trade for Athens … ” Sophocles repeated. Then, dropping all pretence of respect, he tore off his scarlet cloak and hurled it to the ground. Pericles watched this with a weary air, as if reminded of mortal frailties he had succeeded in transcending.

  Sophocles was about to leave when the Olympian seized his arm.

  “Yes, you may hate me if you want, but never disrespect our city. It is my reasoning that vexes us both. And who knows? Maybe one day I will also lose a son to war. Look forward to that day, Dexion, if the thought consoles you.”

  The thought did nothing for him. Returning to his tent, he sat and looked at his writing tablet, but the prospect of picking it up sickened him.

  There was a noise outside.

  “Bulos?” he called.

  Silence.

  “Bulos, I don’t want to see your face right now. Go fetch water.”

  He heard the noise again — the scrape of a spear point against the stony ground. Dexion shot to his feet, ripped open the flap: two shieldmen were standing there in full panoply. He recognized them as guards from Pericles retinue. As he glared at them, they stared back with a softness that was almost solicitous.

  He left his tent and strode north, to where Eupalinus’ tunnel had been discovered. His minders seemed to allow themselves to be left behind. But when he reached the site, he heard the metallic clap of greaves, and the hollow ring of a bronze butt-spike sheathed in earth. He turned, and found Pericles’ men posted behind him again.

  And so the Olympian was taking no chances that Dexion would flee into the tunnel to exchange himself. After all, that would be a poor trade for Athens.

  *

  Waiting yet again for the appointed time was a torment that made Sophocles despise his very life. Each day that stretched before him, interceding itself between the present and the advent of his relief, became an adversary. If he could, he would have mowed all the dismal hours down with his sword. But Time’s phalanx had no back rank. When hours became enemies, they massed on an endless plain, maddening in their resolve to exist, all demanding a small piece of his soul as he endured each one.

  Of the progress of the siege he no longer cared. If anyone had asked, he would have reported that the miserable sounds from the city were dying away. The decline was subtle, but unmistakable, suggesting a steady, pitiless attrition. The children went silent as they starved, and after they were gone the mothers grieved with the last of their strength. Though it was winter it was a very good season for the flies.

  It was obvious to him that the stubbornness of Callinus and his party was growing less and less relevant as time wore on. But whether it was out of fear or awe at his sacrifice, or just because Pericles ordered it, no one asked his opinion.

  And so he was left in his tent to brood over his memories of his life with Iophon. He remembered, for instance, that the boy had been only four when he took him walking for the first time in the garden of the Academy. The place had been recently decorated with plane trees at Cimon’s expense. What had been a somewhat unsavory zone at the edge of town was now a park, offering relief from the heat of Colonus in high summer, bathers brought their sons on festival days, letting them scamper free through the plantings, giving them their first taste of games in the gymnasia.

  Young Iophon only seemed to want to run, though. He took to his tiny heels at every turn, his father trailing behind as he shouted warnings about criminals and jackals. As the boy ran, he would simply repeat his father’s words without slowing down, declaring in that small voice (and the poet smiled as he recalled this) that the woods were not safe, that scorpions dwelled under rocks, that the red berries were not for eating but the mint leaves were all right.

  Iophon turned back to him once, pointing at a distant conical mass in the northeast of the city. “That is Wolf Hill,” said Dexion, who was ever handy with such answers. “It was created after Athena made the Acropolis. She had material left over and was carrying it away when jealous Poseidon sent a crow to startle her. The mountain marks the place where she dropped the rock.”

  But the boy was already off to the next distraction — an anthill that he found every bit as impressive as Athena’s handiwork. Sophocles himself became engrossed in a scroll of verses by the soldier-poet Archilochus. The work was good, with so much to savor, that when he looked up it was too late for him to prevent Iophon from inserting his little hand into a snake hole.

  He was bitten in an instant. From his screams, and the look of the wound, it was impossible to tell if the strike would kill him. Sophocles carried the writhing boy the five miles back to Colonus, fearing his negligence had cost the life of his only son. He didn’t know whether he should rush the boy to Nais or suck the venom out himself. He was on the verge of panic when he reached home, until his wife, with just a single look, told him that the bite was not poisonous. And with this good news, Sophocles collapsed with relief, believing that his own life had been saved, while Nais looked on with amusement and, somewhat more deeply, with vague worry that her husband’s self-recriminations were justified.

  From that day on, he avoided the Academy, and could never bring himself to pick up Archilochus again.

  The day appointed for Iophon’s execution was uncommonly warm for Klaphebolion. Though the time dragged by, he was seldom aware of the exact date — there hardly seemed a point. But when someone mentioned it was the ninth, he couldn’t help but realize that, far away at home, the City Dionysia had begun. It would be the first time in decades — since he was a cadet, in fact, stationed at the fortress at Rhamnous — that he would miss the entire festival. With no entry that year from Dexion, what an opportunity for Aristarchus, Thespis, and that skulking dog, Euripides! The flush of competitive jealousy felt like the return of an old friend too long gone, making him forget his misery for a moment.

  But then he glimpsed Ponstes, meaning to pass unnoticed, giving his stricken friend an awkward salute on the way to the latrines. No one, not even those he considered close, had treated him in normal fashion since news of Iophon’s capture had circulated. To have a sword hanging over his life — to know the day and time of his son’s demise — had a paradoxical effect, making Dexion something more than just another grieving mortal. He was blessed now — singled out by fate, which was another way of saying he was cursed. As they stood in his vicinity, the minders Pericles had sent fingered the strings of blue beads they kept in the caves of their shields.

  The Ionians made no announcement when the deed was done. There was no tableau staged on the walls of Polycrates, no grisly souvenirs sent to prove they’d kept their word. Instead, there was only a deliberate uncertainty, a cruel suspension between hope and despair. Yet what else could anyone expect in such a war? If there was any doubt before, it was dispelled. With the defeat of the Great King, the barbarians were not extinct, but only changed their faces. It was now the turn of the Greeks to lose their minds.

  All he had left of Iophon now was the severed fingertip Callinus had enclosed with his last warning. Sophocles kept the shriveling, rotting thing in a small wooden box meant for holding incense. As the flesh shrank, turning more black every day, the nail attached to it seemed to grow longer — a semblance of continued life he found perversely comforting. But the illusion wore off. The leathery skin soon cracked, then parted; a sliver of gray bone was laid bare. At last he could take no more, and built a small pyre in the sand outside his tent.

  It was meant to be a plain, family memorial; the simple farewell of a father passing his boy to the embrace of the gods. As he gathered kindling for the flames, he saw Bulos watching from a distance, and then Poristes. When the blaze was high enough, a crowd of shieldmen watched silently as he put the finger in the pyre. There was just time to say a few words — nothing more than to name the gods that would receive him — before the last free remains of Iophon ascended as smoke. He tried to keep it in sight as it lofted over
the camp, over the walls and the ships, thinning and rising as it merged with the wider gray of the winter sky. It was hardly visible at all when it was caught at last by the wind, speeding off to refuge in the west.

  *

  The siege dragged on another two weeks. All developments pointed in the Athenians’ favor. Despite the unsettled weather, a second squadron of Chian warships arrived, swelling the allies’ already lopsided advantage at sea. Artemon put aside his poetry to solve the problem of the shieldbreakers’ notorious inaccuracy. The mechanism’s vibration on discharge, he found, could be damped by mounting additional weight on the flexion arms, which he clad in bronze sleeves custom-made by the armorers. The result was not nearly as accurate as archery, but it was an improvement. Instead of having no idea where their shots would go, the firing crews could now venture a guess, or posit a range. Ionian lookouts on the walls were surprised to hear the massive bolts whistle past their ears, or send up splashes of sparks when they hit the masonry. Enemy bowmen could no longer line up with impunity to fire on Athenian scouts.

  “It may not be me, and it may not be anyone alive today, but someone will perfect the machine,” Artemon predicted. “And when he does, it will be the end of cities.”

  The suppression of enemy archery paid off when, for the first time, two Athenian scouts reached the foot of the wall in daylight. Their intention was to examine a small gate that looked somewhat more pregnable than the others. When they reached it, they were disappointed to find that the wear and tear they spied from a distance was nothing more than superficial scuffing. One of the scouts knocked on it to hear how heavy the planks sounded. Then he gave it a push — and was astounded to watch the gate swing open.

  What happened next became a story told around Athenian army camps for as long as the city fielded armies.

  The scouts, who had no armor and were armed with only short swords, poked their heads inside the Samian wall to have a look around. The door opened on a broad commercial street, with permanent storefronts and raised pavement for pedestrians. Under the circumstances, however, the stores were closed, and the street was empty except for a few Ionian shieldmen standing a post on the corner. The Samians looked in disbelief at the Athenians, who made obscene gestures in return. Then one of the guards put a horn to his lips and blew the alarm.