The Corn King and the Spring Queen. Naomi Mitchison

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СКАЧАТЬ Chief recover. It was when Harn Der spoke of the end of the road, how one day it might come through the marshes and out to a new land, a seaport perhaps; one of the others had taken this for a danger, opening a way to attack from the south, not the Red Riders, but ship-people—Greeks even. Then Tarrik had spoken, suddenly, bitterly and reasonably, to say that the Greeks were no danger that way—swords came from the north and the north-east; no one need be afraid of Hellas; they had been beaten too often now. The danger was that people should still think them great and wonderful, still do what they said, not through fear of war, but through fear of seeming barbarian. ‘Let us be what we are!’ said Tarrik, and seemed to cast out the Greek in himself. But no one cared for him to say that; they must not have their relations with the south disturbed, they must keep their markets, the flow out of corn and flax and furs and amber, and the flow in of oil and wine and rare, precious things, the pride of their rich men, the adornment of their beautiful women—and besides, something to look to, some dream, some standard. Harn Der thought of the Greek artist his son had spoken of, made up his mind that the man should be encouraged, and considered what to buy, a present perhaps for Yellow Bull to take back with him to the marshes and his young wife, who must be lonely so far from the city and everything that makes life pleasant for women.

      The Chief most likely saw that he had pleased no one again; he went back to laughter or silence. Disheartened, the Council began to break up. Then suddenly he said: ‘I must see where the secret is to hide. Yellow Bull, take me to the road.’ ‘I will, Chief!’ said Yellow Bull eagerly. But again Tarrik was laughing.

      They went out. A slave came in and mopped up the spilled oil, with a timorous eye on the Chief, who still sat in his chair, still laughing a little from time to time. It began to be near evening. With the room empty and windows unshuttered, there was always a little sound of waves, light in summer and loud in winter, coming up across the road from the harbour and the stony beach.

      Tarrik, whose name was also Charmantides, got up and went through the house to the women’s court, to find his aunt Eurydice, who was called Yersha by the Scythians. Her room looked partly over the sea and partly over the gardens, where there were lawns of scythed grass between great rose hedges, carved marble seats under apple trees, and narrow borders of bee-flowers and herbs round fountains and statues that came once from Hellas. But Yersha who was Eurydice sat at the other window, watching the sea. She had been copying manuscript; there was pen and ink beside her, and half a page of her slow, careful writing, and now she was quite still, beside her window. Along her walls there were chests of book rolls; above them their stories were repeated in fresco, black lines filled in softly with tints of flesh or dress—Achilles in Skyros, Iphigenia sacrificed, Phaedra and Hippolytos, Alkestis come back from the dead, horsemen with the thick, veiled beauty of a too much copied Parthenon, women with heavy eyelids and drooping hands and lapfuls of elaborate drapery, all framed in borders of crowded acanthus pattern that repeated itself again and again on the mouldings of doors and windows. The floor was of marble from Skyros, white streaked with brown and a curious green, the couches and table of citron wood and ivory, with worked silver feet. There were a few vases, light colours on a creamy ground, with palely florid borders and handles, and one or two marble groups, a swan or so, and the little winged, powerless Erotes, like mortal babies.

      She turned from her sea-gazing and smiled at him. ‘Charmantides,’ she said, ‘come and talk to me. Tell me why you did it.’

      ‘Did—which?’

      ‘Just now, at the Council: laughed, dear.’

      He stood beside her fingering her pen. Why had he laughed? It was gone now. Gone. He shook his head. ‘I am going to marry Erif Der,’ he said, and felt her breath and thought both check a moment before she answered.

      ‘I see. And that was why you were laughing? I am glad you are so happy.’

      He looked down at her, standing there by the table, making ink patterns on his finger-nails with her pen, and wondered what to answer. He did not think it was happiness that made him laugh, he was not the least sure what were his feelings for Erif Der, except that he wanted to get possession of her; he knew that she was somehow dangerous.

      His aunt knew that too. She went on: ‘Have you spoken to Harn Der?’

      ‘No,’ he said.

      ‘To Yellow Bull, then?’ He shook his head. ‘But surely you’ve seen someone besides the child herself?’

      ‘She’s not a child,’ said the Chief.

      ‘All the more reason, then, that she should not answer for herself. But—Charmantides —you know I have tried to be a mother to you, since your own mother died. I think you have loved me. Why did you not tell me about this before?’

      He began to elaborate the patterns on his fingers interestedly. ‘I didn’t know.’

      ‘Are you sure? Not at Plowing Eve?’

      He smiled: he liked thinking of Plowing Eve. Yes, she had been the best Spring Queen whom he had ever led through the needful dance—and afterwards, how the men had enjoyed themselves. … But he had not thought of marrying her then. ‘No,’ he said truthfully, ‘it was only now.’

      ‘Then, if it was only now, surely you see that this is not natural, not right? Surely you know, Charmantides, the things she can do. This is magic and done for some purpose of hers or her father’s!’

      ‘Very likely,’ said the Chief, ‘perhaps that was why I was laughing. But I am going to marry her all the same.’

      ‘Why?’ said Eurydice. ‘Oh why!’

      ‘Because I like to,’ he said, and looked out of the window. Cloud and sunshine swept over the sea; and below him on the beach was Erif Der, standing on a bollard, her fists clenched over her breasts, looking up at the Chief’s house. Abruptly Tarrik began to laugh again. ‘I am going to see Harn Der,’ he said, and went striding out, his white felt coat swinging stiffly as he went.

      As he walked along the streets of Marob, the men he passed saluted him with drawn knife at the forehead, and any girls who were armed did the same, but most of the women just lifted hand lightly to eyes, looking at him softly from under long lashes, hoping he would turn their way, the truth being that they and all the younger men liked Tarrik far better than old Harn Der and the Council, who would rule them for their good, but for no one’s pleasure. Still, it depended on little, it would come and go, and Tarrik could only be young once. He certainly enjoyed himself, and had broken very few hearts for long; most of his loves were married by now, and not at all angry with him, still looking softly even. There were several possible children, but none quite proved or at all acknowledged. At any rate Erif Der knew as much about it as anyone.

      Tarrik answered the salutes and glances more or less; but he was not thinking about them. Nor, for that matter, about what he was going to do now. He was making a charming plan for killing two birds with one stone; actually, that is to say, killing one of them, and as to the other, well, Yellow Bull was an extremely worthy young man—in spite of his having such a ridiculously red, scrubby face! A knot of girls at the street corner giggled to one another with speculations as to why the Chief was laughing out loud all by himself; but this time they were wrong. He stopped at a window and called up: ‘Oh, Epigethes!’ The Greek leaned out, his face changing to suspicion and some fear when he saw it was the Chief. ‘Will you come and ride with me?’ Tarrik shouted up. ‘Down south, to see Berris Der’s brother. In three weeks? We will talk about art, Epigethes.’ There was something about this that terrified Epigethes. ‘But I shall be busy, Chief,’ he said. ‘I have been given work to do by your nobles. I am an artist, I have no time for riding.’ ‘Ah yes,’ said Tarrik, ‘but I command you. Remember СКАЧАТЬ