The Gate to Women's Country (5 page)

C
ORRIG FOUND
S
TAVIA IN THE KITCHEN, LOOKING
ill and middle aged, her eyes puffy from lack of sleep, the text of
Iphigenia at Ilium
open on the table before her.

“I heard you moving around during the night,” he said as he stroked her hair. “You look dreadful, dear one.”

“I thank you,” she said laconically.

“Well, let's say then that you look less lovely than usual.” He filled a pan with water and grain and set it upon the stove.

“I couldn't sleep. I kept thinking about Dawid. Wondering what's going to happen to him.”

“That's normal. It will take a while to accept the fact that he's gone.” He poured hot tea into the empty cup before her, glancing down at the text. “That's hardly the most cheerful reading in the world.”

“I know,” she said. “I'm doing it mostly for distraction. I knew it by heart once, all the parts. I've seen it every summer, but I haven't actually thought about it in years. Morgot's done
Iphigenia
as long as I can remember. I have to learn it all over again if I'm going to do the part in this year's production.”

“You're not doing it until summer. Spring isn't even really here yet.” His dark brows rose, making perfect arcs over his tilted eyes and long, straight nose, deep furrows curling up from below his chin to bracket his wide, mobile mouth. He licked his lower lip, head cocked, examining her as he chopped up dried apples to add them to the grain.

“I thought it might be easier if I just read it over a
dozen or so times,” she said listlessly. “Then it might all come back to me without my trying very hard.”

“You'd have been better off getting another hour's sleep.”

“I couldn't sleep. Besides, it should cheer me up. The play's a comedy.”

“Comedy!”

“Well it is, Corrig. The audience laughs.”

He made a face at her, trying to make her smile. “There are some things about Women's Country I still find difficult to understand. How old were you when you first did that play?”

“Oh, about ten or eleven, I suppose. We did it every year in school, taking different parts, building sets, making costumes.”

“So you've been doing it for at least twenty-seven years. I should think you'd pick something else to do for a while, but Joshua says you Councilwomen never get tired of it.”

“It isn't that we don't get tired of it. It's that the play is part of the… part of the reminders. You know that!” She ran her fingers through her hair, fingering the roughness of scar tissue at the top of her head, wincing at a little tenderness there which had never gone away. “When's Joshua coming back?”

“Soon, I hope,” he said. “There's more to do around here than I can keep up with. Tell you what. If you're determined to review this play now, I'll read the lines to you and you see if you can remember Iphigenia's part.”

“She doesn't come in until about page six….”

“Then while I'm reading the first six pages, you'll have time to drink another cup of tea and have some breakfast.” He took the text from her, leaned his chair back on two legs, and began to read in his furry, deep voice, beginning with the “notes.”

Stavia, too tired to complain at hearing all the unnecessary detail, merely listened, letting his voice wash over her.

“Iphigenia at Ilium,”
read Corrig. “Note to students: The play is based upon a millennia-old preconvulsion story concerning a conflict between two garrisons, the
Greeks
and the
Trojans
, brought about when a Trojan warrior abducted a Greek woman named
Helen.
The
Greek
garrison pursued the couple to the city of
Troy
(also called Il
ium)
and laid siege to the city. This siege lasted for ten years, largely because of mismanagement among the Greek forces, but in the end the Greeks succeeded in conquering the Trojans and in destroying the city. The action of the play takes place after this destruction, outside the broken walls of Troy. Appendix A at the end of your drama book lists the names and attributes of some of the Greek and Trojan warriors such as Agamemnon, Menelaus, Odysseus, Hector, etc., who are referred to in the drama. Appendix B contains an outline of the original book upon which this play is based. Appendix C gives the history of the play together with comments on its significance to Women's Country.”

“Did you ever read the Appendices?” Corrig asked, flipping rapidly to the back of the book.

“I think I had to read them once for school. I really don't remember.”

“Persons of the Drama,”
read Corrig.

Trojans

H
ECUBA
: Widow of King Priam of Troy and mother of Hector.

A
NDROMACHE:
Widow of Hector.

The infant, A
STYANAX:
Hector's son.

The Ghost of P
OLYXENA:
Hecuba's daughter.

C
ASSANDRA:
Hecuba's daughter.

Greeks

T
ALTHYBIUS:
A messenger.

The Ghost of I
PHIGENIA
: Agamemnon's daughter.

The Ghost of A
CHILLES
: A Greek warrior.

H
ELEN
, seen upon the battlements.

Several soldiers and serving women.

Scene: At the foot of the broken walls of Troy. To the right the stones of the wall have tumbled into a rough stairway which permits ascent to the top of the battlements. On the left a few warriors, who were detailed to stand guard on the women, are playing dice. Huddled together are Hecuba and Andromache, with their serving women asleep around them. In Andromache's lap is her infant son, Astyanax, whom she is comforting.

A
NDROMACHE
There, baby, there. Take the nipple. Suck. Oh see, Mother Hecuba, he's too tired to suck. Poor baby. All the smoke and noise….

H
ECUBA
And howling. We've all been doing that. It's the crying's kept him awake, daughter. Well, I'm through crying. I cried for Hector, my son, and I cried for King Priam, my husband, and I cried for the city of Troy, and then I cried for me, and that's enough of it.

A
NDROMACHE
I'm dry of weeping, too.
(She looks up at the walls above her where a group of people have paused to gawk)
Bitch!

H
ECUBA
(Looking up)
You mean Helen.

A
NDROMACHE
Well, she's not down here in the dirt with us, is she? She's not trying to find food for a baby or worrying whose slave she's going to be.

H
ECUBA
That one is no man's slave. Still, Menelaus vows he'll kill her.

A
NDROMACHE
He'll not kill her. Kill the source of so much glory? Kill the topic often thousand poets' songs? She'll go back to being wife and honored queen, shown off like a prize cow. She'll sit in a carved chair with a silver sewing box and spin purple wool when all of us are dead.
(Looks up at Helen laughing on the battlement)
May her womb be closed forever. May she never bear another child. May she have boils in her….

H
ECUBA
Shhh, shhh. Your curses may bear fruit, and if they do you'll bring Erinyes down upon yourself. All those who curse their kin bring down the three avengers on themselves….

“Stop for footnote,” said Corrig, flipping to the back of the book. “What are Erinyes? I can never remember.”

“Furies,” Stavia replied, taking another sip of tea.

“Ah yes. ‘Anger, Vengeance, and Jealousy, who return from the underworld to earth to punish certain acts, particularly the murder of relatives, et cetera.' Was Helen a relative? Were the Greeks?”

“She was sort of married to one of their countrymen. I don't know, Corrig. I think in school they said it means all women are kin, sort of.”

“Hmm,” he mused. “Well. Back to text….”

A
NDROMACHE
I wasn't cursing kin. I cursed at her and at those Greeks who brought my Hector down. They are no kin of mine.

H
ECUBA
She's a woman, Andromache. A sister of ours. Perhaps she even thinks herself a Trojan. Long years she's walked the torchlit halls of Troy.

A
NDROMACHE
One day was too long.

H
ECUBA
Even one hour's too long, Andromache, but do not risk what little we have left on her behalf.

A
NDROMACHE
What little's that?

H
ECUBA YOU
are my son's loved wife, and you're alive. Your baby Astyanax
is
alive. And even I'm alive, though that may be sparse comfort for us both.

A
NDROMACHE
Your daughters, Polyxema and Cassandra, are alive. Such as they are.

H
ECUBA
That's true, so let's not tempt the Furies down for the sake of mere cursing.
(She takes the baby from Andromache)
Oh, baby, baby. Little Astyanax. He's trying so hard to fall asleep.

A
NDROMACHE
Speak of reasons for cursing. Here comes Talthybius.

(Talthybius enters left)

H
ECUBA
(Fumbling in her skirt)
Do you come like the raven, messenger, to croak dishonor in my aged ears?

T
ALTHYBIUS
I bring such messages as I am sent with.

H
ECUBA
They do not ever send you with good tidings, do they, Talthybius?

T
ALTHYBIUS
Priam's wife, if they had good to say, they'd come themselves with joy salving their lips.

A
NDROMACHE
But you they send with vomit in your mouth and Hector's blood still warm upon your tongue.

H
ECUBA
Shh, shh, daughter. The messenger brings only what he's given. What are you given now, Talthybius?

T
ALTHYBIUS
Some word about your children, Priam's Queen.
(He casts about for some acceptable part of the message)
Cassandra. I bring word of Cassandra.