Andromache Part 14

Nay, name them not, child, name not those Holy Ones.

ALCIMEDON.

We love not his name in this house, stranger. Have you no other tale?

HERMIONE.

[_Controlling her excitement._] Nay, what hurt is his name? It is only some boy's tale.

ORESTES.

He took on him a great feud, greater than he knew. For his father called from the dead for vengeance on the woman who had murdered him. And the G.o.ds called, too, and put voices always about him calling for blood. And then they betrayed him!

MOLOSSUS.

Did his father betray him, too?

ORESTES.

Nay, it may be that the voice was not his father's, after all. But the G.o.ds----

PRIEST.

See that your tongue offend not, stranger!

ORESTES.

So be it. Well, in the end he recked not of the G.o.ds. He cared not how sore they hated him, and cared not if he lived or died.

MOLOSSUS.

And what did he do?

ORESTES.

This is the last story I heard of him, from a Chalcidian man who had been in Sicily.

HERMIONE.

Had he gone so far away?

ORESTES.

Beyond the end of Sicily to a kingdom of the Iberians. For he vowed that he would be like Paris, and win the most beautiful of all women for his wife; for, you must know, the G.o.ds had marred all the world for him, and made it all as ashes in his mouth, except beauty. For beauty is immortal, like themselves; and they cannot hurt it. So he sought and questioned where that woman might be; and men said she was queen of a land among the Iberians.

HERMIONE.

[_Half divining his meaning._] Had he seen her himself?

ORESTES.

Ay, long ago, they said.

HERMIONE.

And did he too deem her so fair?

ORESTES.

[_Looking full at her._] More beautiful than the flowers and the sunlight, so that in dreams her eyes haunted him.

MOLOSSUS.

Well, and what did he do?

ORESTES.

He took his s.h.i.+p, with a hundred men well armed, and hid them in a bay of Iberia. And he went up alone to the king's castle and saw the woman.

For he was not sure if she was really so beautiful, and wanted to see her again very close. So he stayed in the king's house and made a plot to bear her away.

MOLOSSUS.

But what happened?

ORESTES.

I said it was but a boy's story. The Chalcidian knew not what had happened. Some said he won the queen to his s.h.i.+p, and fled away, wandering; and some said she told the king of his plotting, and they slew him there in the banquet hall. [_A slight pause._] So perchance even Orestes has found his peace; or, perchance he is still an outcast man, with a new feud following him.

MOLOSSUS.

But I wish I knew.

ORESTES.

Oh, 'tis a foolish story, without an ending.

HERMIONE.

[_Breaking out from her suspense; recklessly._] And a poor fool, your Orestes, whatever befell!

ORESTES.

How so? What if he won the woman?

HERMIONE.

He only fled on the seas with her, an exiled man, with no comfort. Could he not get him a kingdom?

ORESTES.