The Oracles of Troy (The Adventures of Odysseus)

Eperitus looked expectantly at Odysseus, whom he felt must surely speak out against the recklessness of an immediate attack. As for himself, he agreed with Diomedes’s call for a more thoughtful approach: the fulfilment of the oracles did not mean the walls would come tumbling down, but that a marker had been passed and the gods would somehow or other present the Greeks with an opportunity for victory. Repeatedly beating their heads against the walls of Troy, in his opinion, could only lead to one conclusion – a broken skull.

‘If Neoptolemus and Menelaus want to attack Troy, I cannot go with them,’ Odysseus declared. Eperitus and Diomedes exchanged satisfied glances, while others grumbled their dissatisfaction. But Odysseus had not yet finished and raised his hands for silence. ‘I am wounded and tired and I need to rest, but I won’t discourage any man who believes the time to end the war has come. It seems to me the gods have finally tipped the scales in our favour and Priam’s city is ripe for the taking. So if the King of Men decides to send the whole army into battle, then I will not speak against him. I will even keep my Ithacans here to guard the ships, denying them and myself the glory of victory.’

The assembly exploded with a sudden call to arms, a call that Agamemnon was ready to embrace and encourage.

‘So be it. Muster your armies on the plain. Summon every man capable of bearing arms. Troy falls today!’

Eperitus watched the kings exit the tent, all of them eager to be in the forefront of the coming battle. Even Diomedes went with them, leaving Eperitus suddenly doubtful of his own conviction that the attack would fail. He wondered whether, after being in the thick of the fighting for ten years, he and the rest of the Ithacans were about to miss the final defeat of their enemies. Then he shook his head, as if to rid himself of the ridiculous notion, and turned to the king.

‘Why didn’t you speak up, Odysseus? You know this is madness – do they really think another assault on the walls is going to make any difference?’

Odysseus hooked his large hand around Eperitus’s elbow and pulled him through the crowded tent to one of the exits. Men were fighting each other to be the first out and back to their armies, so drunk were they with the thought that the gods were about to give them victory. Eperitus watched them in disgust, as if he stood alone on an island of reason while the rest of the Greeks crashed about him in a storm of insanity. He followed Odysseus through the crush and soon felt the soft sand giving way beneath his sandals, hearing once more the liberating sound of the waves rolling against the shore and the cry of the seagulls hovering overhead.

‘Odysseus, why don’t you call them to their senses?’ he implored, casting a glance over his shoulder at the running figures spreading through the camp like a fire. ‘Climb up on the prow of one of these galleys and shout out. Tell them this is folly. Do you want the blood of hundreds of men on your hands?’

At this, Odysseus stopped and turned to face his captain.

‘Eperitus, I know as well as you do that these men are going to certain defeat. And maybe I could stop them if I tried – maybe. But I have a plan to conquer Troy now, a plan given to me by the gods, and if that plan is to succeed then the Greeks must taste defeat one last time. I’ll explain everything in my hut, but first we have to find Omeros.’

Chapter Thirty-three

HOPE OUT OF DEFEAT

Penelope rarely felt happier than when she was visiting the pig farm at the southern end of Ithaca. The sight of the fat swine trotting through the mud in the wide pens, their tiny eyes half hidden by their flapping ears, always brought a smile to her face. Even better was to be free from the confines of the small palace and out in the open air, where the sky seemed to go on forever and she could gaze south-east towards the horizon – the direction Odysseus would return by when the war in Troy eventually ended. But as she leaned against the wooden timbers that kept the noisy beasts from wandering off, she felt ever more sharply the absence of her son.

She looked down at Argus, sitting faithfully at her side with his ears pricked up and his tail wagging. He was looking expectantly towards the road that came down from the north, passing through fields of gnarled and windswept olive trees.

‘What is it, boy?’

The boarhound gave a bark and stood on all fours. Penelope followed his gaze and saw a horseman approaching along the road, leaving a trail of dust behind him.

‘Looks like Mentor, my lady,’ said Eumaeus, the swineherd, who was standing among his pigs and throwing out handfuls of wild nuts and berries from a leather satchel at his hip.