Glory and the Lightning (35 page)

“Most true,” said Xanthippus, and frowned, leaning his elbow on the table and placing his bearded chin within his palm. “Yet, there are some politicians who say that if we had priest-kings and could command obedience of men and docile behavior, we would enter an immortal land of joy and fulfillment.”

“In that event,” said Zeno, “it would be the politicians who would rule and not their priest-kings. Priests are obsequious before the power of others, and are obedient to it.”

The sly slaves were listening, and so even the brave and powerful soldier, Xanthippus, who despised the priests, said with haste, “Who has access to the gods but the priests?” He winked covertly at Zeno whose face became as quiet as marble, not with fear but with disgust at the world.

The overseer of the hall came and Xanthippus commanded the presence of his son, Pericles.

The young Pericles entered the portico with his attendant slave, an elderly man with a beard. Zeno looked at the child who was twelve years old, Pericles, son of Xanthippus, of the deme Cholargus of the tribe Acamantis, and Xanthippus looked at his son with smiling pride and said, “His mother, as you may know, Zeno of Elea, is the grandchild of Clisthenes, who drove out the sons of Pisistratas, and thus put an end to the Tyrants and attempted to return to the laws and principles of Solon. But that, as we know, was an impractical dream. My wife said to her slaves, being near her time of delivery of my son, that she was brought to bed of a lion.” Xanthippus put his dexterous tongue into his cheek and winked at Zeno.

The sun in the portico was blinding and vivid even at this hour and the shadows were pointed and dark blue and very sharp and the sky was a resonant color as if formed of turquoise flame. Pericles stood in the reflected brilliance quietly and with containment, almost as if indifferent to the scrutiny of a stranger, and as if his thoughts were fixed on some distance. He was tall for one so young and slender but muscular. He seemed much older than his years. He was clad in the short green tunic of preadolescence with the Greek key as its border on the bottom and about the sleeves, and his legs were slight but firm and his feet, in their sandals, long and narrow. His body and stillness had that elegance and grace much admired by the Athenians, and his skin was as fair as milk. His face showed the thinness but strength of his patrician bones, so subtly formed that they appeared to lie close to the flesh and to dominate it. His nose was slightly aquiline and his pink mouth was full and faintly sensual but finely carved and controlled. His eyes were of so pale a blue between pale lashes that it was almost as if they had no hue but were the eyes of a statue. His hair was the color of bright flax and curled at his nape and about his cheeks, and his white neck was long and thin and upright and flexible.

All this made for a certain exquisite and masculine beauty except for his brow, which, though the color and rigidity of marble, rose to an unusual height as did the crown of his head, and gave an elongation out of proportion to the face, thus diminishing and dwarfing it. Such a grotesque height would have attracted the attention of the priests and authorities as being abnormal, and Pericles, had he been born of less illustrious parents, would have been allowed to die entombed in a large vase. For the authorities did not permit deviations in body or distortions of countenance or other grotesqueries to survive.

Zeno, in deference to the boy—for were not children susceptible to adult stares?—did not direct the full power of his eyes on Pericles, but fixed them at a point near the child’s cheek.

“Greetings, Pericles, son of Xanthippus,” said Zeno in his high kind voice.

The boy responded, “Greetings, Zeno of Elea.” Zeno was surprised at the depth of Pericles’ voice, for it was not the piping of children.

“I have told my son of you, Zeno,” said Xanthippus, “and that I am attempting to persuade you to be his tutor.”

For the first time Pericles looked fully at Zeno, and again Zeno was surprised, for it was not the wary and suspicious stare of a young boy but the calculation and weighing of a man, fearless yet cautious.

Zeno, gazing at the youth, knew with all his intuition that he had no need to question Pericles to discover his intelligence. Those pale eyes were implicit with cold inner fire and intellect, with judiciousness and latent power, and glowed with that radiance which can come but from an unusually intelligent mind. Pericles had brought his attention to Zeno from a far place where his thoughts were engaged, yet when he had done so it was with a certain piercing and cogent vigor which was totally aware and focused, and not diffused or vague.

Truly, thought Zeno, a most remarkable child—if one can call him a child—and one with potential terribleness.

Zeno had never said this to another prospective student, but he said it now: “Do you accept me as your tutor, Pericles, son of Xanthippus?”

At this the youth smiled urbanely, and flashed a glance at his father. “I do,” he said, and Zeno, laughing a little inwardly at himself, thought: I have been given an accolade!

“He reads and writes adequately,” said the subtle Xanthippus, who had understood the exchange and was gratified. He fingered his black and pointed beard and struck an attitude in his chair. “Then, it is settled,” he said. “You will not find my son stupid, Zeno of Elea, but possessed of a mind of curiosity and eagerness to be enlightened and guided.”

I doubt if he can ever be guided, except by a woman and then only on occasion, thought the wry Zeno.

“His mother has been educated by tutors in her father’s house,” said Xanthippus, “her father being deluded that women possess intellects.” He smiled. He held out his hand negligently to his son, and Pericles went to him and took that hand and leaned against his father’s shoulder.

Zeno could not restrain himself and he said, “Pericles, it is not in your nature to accept anyone immediately. Why have you accepted me?”

“I have read some of your writings,” said the youth.

Zeno raised his eyebrows. “And what did you think of them, my child?”

“They are lucid,” said Pericles. He smiled at Zeno and it was as if he were a man, cognizant and a little amused.

Zeno became grave. “That is a compliment,” he said. “If the young can understand a sage then he has succeeded in being intelligible.”

He saw that Pericles was regarding him with that disturbing convergence of his which permitted no intruding thought at the moment.

Xanthippus dismissed his son with a kiss on his lips, and Pericles bowed formally to Zeno and took his departure with his slave. He did not run, flailing his limbs aimlessly, as did other children. He walked with the firmness and quiet of a man. Zeno said to Xanthippus, “Your son is not a child. He is a man, and I am honored to teach him.” His eyes ached from the light and from his thoughts.

“Perhaps it is true that my wife was brought to bed by a lion,” said Xanthippus, and laughed. “A white lion with a golden mane. Does not my son resemble such?”

Zeno did not answer frivolously as Xanthippus expected. He considered, and then he said, “Yes.” He clasped his hands between his knees and gazed at the stones of the portico and absently took a sip of wine. Xanthippus looked at him dubiously, then he shrugged. He struck his hands for the overseer and when the slave entered the portico Xanthippus said, “Summon the Lady Agariste from the gynaikeion (women’s quarters) to attend her husband immediately.”

As Zeno was a man as well as a guest Agariste entered the portico attended by two female slaves with the customary short hair and simple long tunics and bare arms and feet. But Agariste wore a peplos of saffron linen with a golden girdle intricately wrought, and she was so tall that she had no need of the high-heeled shoes worn by other rich Athenian ladies. Her shoulder pins glittered with jewels and there were many jeweled rings on her long, white and very slender hands and bracelets on her narrow arms. She had a noble figure if one too thin for the taste of many men, and her bosom swelled under the folds of the peplos in a delightful fashion and it was evident that she had no necessary recourse to the strophion to elevate it. Her hair was naturally fair and of a fine gilt sheen, and so abundant and so full of tendrils and waves that she wore no false wigs or supplements to increase its bounty. It was bound with golden ribbons. Zeno saw that it was from his mother that Pericles had inherited the strong refinement of facial structure, the milky complexion, the carved mouth and aquiline nose and the almost colorless blue of the large eyes. But Agariste was haughty and cold whereas her young son was grave and stately. It was evident that she possessed enormous esteem for her person and her intelligence, for her glance was august and her manner suggested that she found even her husband—the notable soldier of much fame, and the politician of no mean ability—not entirely her equal. As for Zeno, whom she had desired to see, and with whose writings she was familiar, she saw before her a small man of no distinguished appearance and with crudely cropped hair and a childlike figure, and she was disappointed and in some curious way offended. Seeing this Zeno thought: Had she expected an Achilles, or Apollo or at least a Hercules, out of a Homeric poem?

“Zeno of Elea, the Lady Agariste, the mistress of my house,” said Xanthippus, who admired, respected but heartily disliked his wife. He loved her in his way for her gifts of character and her beauty and her family history; however, he frequently discovered her tedious for she had no humor at all but only arrogance.

She bowed slightly and coldly to Zeno and he saw the grace of her long body under the carefully arranged folds of the peplos. Xanthippus did not invite her to be seated and she could not sit without her husband’s invitation. She glanced swiftly at an empty chair of ebony inlaid with pearl and when Xanthippus said nothing a slight flush ran over her transparent face and the pale eyes had, for a moment, the glitter of bare metal.

Studying her with a slight smile and in a little silence, Xanthippus finally said, “You wished to speak with Zeno of Elea, Lady, as you requested?” He leaned back in his chair, then negligently lifted a citron to his mouth and sucked at its juices.

Mortification heightened her color. She did not look at Zeno but addressed her husband: “Lord, you consider him an adequate tutor for our son?”

Zeno began to pity her. He said, “Lady Agariste, I find Pericles most exemplary, and I feel destiny in him. Therefore, I have consented to teach him.”

Agariste, her humiliation growing, yet heard Zeno’s voice and, more to her liking, his words. She turned her face to him though she kept her eyes averted. She had a voice as chill as snow and as colorful. She said, “Zeno of Elea, you repeat what I have heard in my dreams and have seen in my visions. I do not feel that you are exaggerating or flattering, but speak only the truth.”

“It is true, Lady,” said Zeno, and he began to feel annoyed that Xanthippus appeared to be absorbed in choosing a certain nut from a bowl of them, stirring them about noisily with a long lean finger as if looking for a favorite. So Zeno rose in a most courteous gesture to Agariste.

Xanthippus evidently found the nut he was seeking, and he cracked its thin shell between his strong white teeth and his eyes of that dark staring blue flickered with mirth.

“You are pleased, Agariste?” he asked, as if addressing a superior favorite among his slave women. He shifted seductively in his chair.

Agariste, whose flushed face had suddenly whitened both with wrath and shame, inclined her head and Zeno had to admire her composure and dignity for all she was a woman of no pleasant ways.

“Good. Then you may retire,” said her husband and waved his hand graciously.

He knew that she had intended to question Zeno sharply, and to impress on him the honor he had been offered, and that she had intended to cow him while she, too, studied his theories and his words. She had hoped to engage his mind and make him admire her attributes. Throwing up her noble head she turned and, accompanied by her maidens, left the presence of the men, her peplos as quiet as yellow stone. Xanthippus watched her leave and affected to study her figure and her movements as men study the gifts of the hetairai and are about to choose among them. Zeno did not find this risible.

Xanthippus saw this and he smiled. “The Lady Agariste is a female of many talents and not only beauty,” he said. He paused. “Her conversation is chiselled out of granite.”

Zeno could not help smiling. “I will return at dawn tomorrow to begin the instruction of my student,” he said, and took his leave.

He believed the oracles at Delphi to be fraudulent and ridiculous and the imposture of priests hungry for lavish offerings from the superstitious and the gullible. In an unguarded moment or two he had quickly investigated the hollow caves. Still, an oracle had predicted the defeat of Xerxes and his barbarians when the very thought had been preposterous and even priests had fled their temples. Another had predicted the future fame and glory of Greece, and Zeno, not often mystical, believed that implicitly.

Twelve years ago they had announced the birth of a great hero who would bring down the imperial lightning from Olympus and from the hands of Zeus upon this small city of only forty thousand souls, the majority of whom were slaves, and would write the name of Athens in immortal marble for the blinkless stare of the centuries.

CHAPTER 3

“It has been asked from the beginning,” said Zeno to his pupil, and with a courteous glance at Agariste who sat nearby, listening keenly and severely, “‘What is man?’ The first brute in the skins of animals asked that when he suddenly contemplated himself in quiet pools in the primeval forests. ‘Who am I?’ he asked. ‘I mate and live and breed and eat and defecate and die as do the animals which I hunt. Yet, I discern a difference. What is that difference which makes me a man?’ He was less moral than the beasts of the jungles and the plains and the mountains. (He knew he was weak before the power of their teeth and their claws and their strength, and he was less agile.) He discerned that the beasts had their own code of morality, discipline and behavior, which could not be violated except at the cost of death or destruction. “Was he less than the beasts after all? In all the capacities of their bestial nature they were superb, decisive, confident. He, himself, was not. We know that man possesses few instincts, and that he chooses by his own will, to a large extent, what he will think and what his future shall be. That is the crucial difference between man and the other beasts. The Choice. Does that ability make him an outlaw in the very natural world in which he was conceived, or does his disobedience to the law make him superior to them? He is not at peace with himself.