SHEPHERD WISDOM
Nikander had returned to his aula and sat there with face of stone. The
kinsmen had gone. He himself had sent the doom upon his sons. For him
Delphi was already in the dust. The Persians had no need to destroy her.
Suddenly a running step outside, and the door burst open. There in a
flood of morning light came Dryas like Hermes running with outstretched
arms. He fell at his father’s feet, embracing his waist, hiding his face
in his lap.
“Father! Father! Father!” he cried.
Nikander fell forward at the shock of joy, trembling and unable to speak.
Then he righted himself, heard as in a dream the boy in his arms talking
to him.
“Only some god saved me! I want to fight for you, Father—to fight at your
side.”
“You did not go with the spies? Not after all?” Nikander said dazedly.
“Yes, Father, but——”
Here Eëtíon, whom both had forgotten, stepped forward and touched Dryas’s
shoulder.
“They abducted him, Nikander,” he said clearly. “It was only by a ruse
that I saved him. Oh, if you could have seen the joy in the boy’s face
when I got him free.”
“I see the joy in his face now,” said Nikander. Nikander believed because
he so wanted to believe.
“Tell your father how I fooled them,” urged Eëtíon, and Dryas between
trembling and laughter told the story of Eëtíon’s red paint wound. But
before he had finished, Nikander rose, took Eëtíon’s hand, and drew him
to an embrace.
“Oh, you good youth!” he said, “I can never thank you, never fully thank
you. No kinsman shall be so dear as you.”
Now the only shadow on Nikander’s joy was his anxiety for Lycophron. Dear
gods, where might his son be now? Even if Delphi survived the onslaught
of the Persians this sorrow would remain. Nikander could never speak his
son Lycophron’s name.
A slave brought their breakfast, and as they ate the figs and bread and
milk they began to talk seriously of Delphi’s plans of escape. Many
citizens had already carried their household treasures up the mountain to
the Korykian cave. And the priests were now urging a further questioning
of the god if perchance even yet he might reveal to them some way to
save the Holy Place. Dryas entered into the plans with an interest and
fearlessness which caused his father to look at him ever and again. What
had happened to Dryas? What brave-minded god was thus changing his son?
Such was their conversation when a temple slave came running in at the
door past Medon, saying breathlessly:
“The Pythoness, your daughter, is nowhere in the Pythia House. Is she
here, Nikander?”
Nikander hid his eyes confusedly a moment.
“Yes,” he said, “yes, she is here; I had forgotten. I will bring her back
myself and explain. Tell that to Tuchè. Dryas, dear lad, go you and fetch
your sister.”
The slave added with embarrassment: “And, Master, I was to tell you that
Tuchè is very angry. They wish to begin the rites at once. Consultants
are waiting and the priests are there. Aristonikè is too ill to go upon
the tripod and they have no Pythia.”
“Oh, unkind gods,” breathed Nikander. His heart had ached every time his
daughter was set upon the terrible high seat of the god. Now how much
more would it ache knowing how she had deceived. She must not go there
again. Must never again give an oracle. She was no fit subject for the
ecstasy. He must find some chance to tell her this. Must command her to
resist the trance no matter what rites were practised. But oh, what a
terrible fate for the poor child. Back to the Pythia House. Of course she
must go back.
He started to meet her before she could come downstairs.
But here Dryas returned with amazed face, and Melantho with him, running
down into the forbidden aula because of her anxiety.
“How could you think Theria was in the house?” asked Dryas.
“She has not been here. She is nowhere here,” urged Melantho.
Again Nikander paused, confused. What had he said to the child? What
harsh words? He had not meant them. Of course he had not meant them. But
surely she had not gone forth from the house.
Melantho was bringing in old Medon who knew all who came and went.
“What is it? What?” asked the poor deaf man. “Yes, little mistress was
here, but she went away—back to the Pythia House. Yesterday evening
early. Very sad she looked, and staggered as she went.”
So at last they knew that Theria was abroad.
Nikander’s face hardened with bitter anxiety.
“Come, Dryas,” he said. “We must find her at once.”
Dryas turned to Eëtíon, “Dearest Eëtíon, you will help us?”
As for Eëtíon, through what a range of feeling had he been carried in
these moments? First, joy like an unbidden melody, because his beloved
was in the house; then strong joy because he might see her as she passed;
then horror at her disappearance. Why had she gone? What had Nikander
done to her to make her run away? What cruel thing had he said? But there
was no time even to be angry. Theria must be found and that quickly
before the Persians should arrive. Eëtíon looked at Nikander, begging for
a boon.
“If I might help to find her,” he ventured; “but let me go my own way
while you go another. We must search everywhere at once.”
Nikander read his unspoken fear. Women must not be abroad when the
Persians were in the country. There was not an instant to lose.
“Nikander, I am presumptuous to give advice,” said Eëtíon. “But send also
messengers to the port. I beg you do that.”
It seemed to Nikander that he was sending messengers to the four quarters
of the earth for his vanished children. He answered hurriedly:
“Dear Eëtíon, you are wise, I can hardly think out this thing.” He was
too occupied to notice Eëtíon’s emotion.
Dryas had meantime fetched a fresh chiton for his friend. “You cannot go
forth in that stained cloak,” he told him. “Dear Eëtíon, how excited you
are, how like a kinsman you care for us. We’ll find her in a half hour.
She ran away once before, you know. I know exactly where she’s run to.”
Eëtíon was so angry that he dared not answer Dryas. How little the
shallow fellow knew of his sister’s character and ways. Eëtíon was glad
when they all left the house.
How foolish they were, running hither and yon without thought. In
Eëtíon’s Argos were many shepherds and when a sheep was lost they did not
go forth in this wise, but first thought about the paths, and the simple
sheep reasoning, and then went and found.
This flight of Theria’s was of course connected with the message which
Eëtíon had himself given to her. She had not sent for her father, but,
true heart that she was, she had brought the news herself. But why had
she fled forth like this?
He took Medon into the street.
“Tell me, Medon, was Nikander angry with his daughter?”
“Oh, Master, how should I know?” But Eëtíon saw at once that Medon did
know and did not rest until he got the truth of him.
Then he went back into the house and called Baltè.
“Baltè,” he said, “take with you two men slaves and go up on Parnassos by
the far eastern path and look for your mistress.”
“But, Master, surely she would not go there. Wolves are there.”
“She would not stop for wolves,” Said Eëtíon sharply, and Baltè saw his
eyes fill with tears.
“If you reach to the Korykian cave, Baltè, and yet do not find her, then
come down by the hither path and I will meet you at the top of the Bad
Steps. Give me a flask of wine and my sword there.”
Then Eëtíon fairly ran out and through the lane up the slender path he
knew so well.
On the hard rocky earth he could find no trace of her. But still he
climbed on, his heart aching for the dear lonely child who had fled from
unkindness and injustice.
Oh, how could Nikander have let forth upon her gentle head the wrath that
should have gone to his sons? Where was his fatherly tenderness? How
could he in the first place have put her away in the Pythia House, that
cruelty, that fearfulness, tales of which were rife in the Precinct? How
could Nikander have placed her there to be a barren maid, she who was so
full of life, so fit to be the mother of children? As Eëtíon mounted his
anger mounted with him. He longed intensely to take her away from cruelty
and neglect and to give her henceforth only tenderness and the visionary
love that was his.
He climbed up the Kaka Skala, passed the wood in which Theria had hidden
over night, on up into the pathless heights beyond her, into despair of
finding her alive. A mountain bear padded past him and broke its way into
the thicket to hide. “Oh, Artemis, Protector of maidens; help the little
maid who is now in thy care alone!”
By some instinct, for Eëtíon could now no longer reason, he turned back.
He descended to the Kaka Skala, he entered the wood, and there on a
jagged branch found some torn yellow shreds of dress.
Then as in fever he ran hither and yon searching; found, now a broken
twig, now a footprint. He began to call, “Theria! Theria!” He lost time
here for he was so sure she would stay hiding in the wood. But at the
last some god led him out upon the upland where he caught a glimpse of
a fluttering yellow garment on the ground. He ran to it and at last saw
her, slender and prone, her hair lying in soft dark billows upon the rock
and hiding her face.
With a sob he knelt, lifted her in his arms and tenderly put back her
locks. Then he saw her death-whiteness and the terrible gash upon her
forehead where she had hit the rock in her fall. He was too wild at first
to help her, kissing her, calling her, feeling her cold hands, holding
his lips against hers to make sure if any breath was there.
But when she responded not at all Eëtíon grew more careful. He brought
out the wine but could not give it between the set lips.
Then he gathered her in his arms to carry her up to a spring which he
remembered in the heights. He was too frightened now to feel any emotion.
He only knew that he was carrying Theria away from Delphi, away from
the bitterness and mishandling. It was right that he should do so. She
belonged to him, to nobody else in all the world! Away in some colony
over seas they could be truly wedded and live the years. He even forgot
her Apolline priesthood and the sacrilege of loving such a one.
Meanwhile, perhaps she was dying in his arms.
In the upper slope among the firs he found his spring. He laid the dear
burden on the ground, bathed her white face, bathed the wound and poured
the wine into it. At last life, like a visible prayer, came back into her
face and the colour of life was there.
Then indeed did Eros, the tall youth, earliest of all the gods, send
power into Eëtíon’s heart, filling it with a strange uplifting
worship—that invisible power with which the son of Chaos holds the cosmos
together, Eros the mighty one.
Now Theria opened her eyes. They were like black lakes and lonely as the
stars.
“Theria, darling, darling Theria. No harm shall come to you now, Theria!”
But she looked straight into his face without a spark of recognition.
“It is I—Eëtíon,” he said, taking her face between his hands. “Kiss me,
my maiden!”
“Apollon,” she murmured. “Apollon.” She did not close her eyes again,
but kept them fixed upon Eëtíon’s face in a way that froze his spirit.
Eëtíon was not skilled in Apollo’s ways; he knew nothing of mantic power
by which men with their natural eyes see things unseen. He could only
recognize that Theria’s spirit was farther from his than the farthest
planet.
“Apollon,” she said again.
She was in that far serenity that knows not time nor change, the
indifference that comes of too great knowledge from the gods.
Of a certainty she was going to die, and that very soon.
Eëtíon sprang to his feet. Fool, fool, that he was to bring his darling
where she could get no help from leech or magic. If she died here it
would be he who had killed her. The fear of Apollo now came over him.
Apollo would blast them both if he took her away for his own. Again he
lifted Theria in his arms and carried her back toward the path where he
hoped Baltè might meet him.
Baltè did not appear at the head of the Kaka Skala, but presently came
Delphic citizens bearing their household treasures to hide in the hills.
These, seeing the dying maiden, helped him gladly.
“Did the Persians hurt her? Are they already come?” they asked, terrified.
“No,” said Eëtíon. “The maid was lost and fell upon a rock.”
They gave their litter on which they had carried their burdens and upon
this Eëtíon and a slave of the Delphians bore her down toward her old
bitter fate again, toward the priesthood and the torture. If she should
live at all, she would not live long in that Pythia House. Eëtíon’s heart
was dead within him as he made the slow descent.