The Song of Troy

‘King Odysseus hadn’t forgotten you, then.’

‘No, sire, of course he hadn’t. He simply waited for the right moment to strike. They flogged me and cast me in chains and left me here at your mercy. Boreas began to blow, they could sail at last. Pallas Athene and Apollo were placated.’

I got up, stretched my legs, sat down again. ‘But what of this wooden horse, Sinon? Why is it here? Is it Pallas Athene’s?’

‘Yes, sire. She demanded that her Palladion be replaced by a wooden horse. We built it ourselves.’

‘Why,’ asked Kapys suspiciously, ‘didn’t the Goddess simply demand that you return her Palladion?’

Sinon looked surprised. ‘The Palladion had been polluted.’

‘Go on,’ I ordered.

‘Talthybios prophesied that the moment the wooden horse rested inside the city of Troy, it would never fall. All its former prosperity would return. So Odysseus suggested that we build the horse too big to fit through your gates. That way, he said, we could obey Pallas Athene, yet make sure the prophecy couldn’t be fulfilled. The wooden horse would have to remain outside on the plain.’ He groaned, moved his shoulders, tried to sit more comfortably. ‘Ai! Ai! They shredded me!’

‘We’ll bring you in and tend you very soon, Sinon,’ I soothed, ‘but first we must hear the whole tale.’

‘Yes, sire, I understand. Though I don’t know what you can do. Odysseus is brilliant. The horse is too big.’

‘We’ll see about that,’ I said grimly. ‘End it.’

‘It’s already ended, sire. They sailed, I was left here.’

‘They sailed for Greece?’

‘Yes, sire. In this wind, an easy business.’

‘Then why,’ asked Lakoon, still very sceptical, ‘were wheels put on the beast?’

Sinon blinked, astonished. ‘Why, to get it out of our camp!’

Impossible to doubt the man! His suffering was too real. So were those whip weals, his extreme emaciation. And his tale fitted together without flaw.

Deiphobos looked up at the mighty bulk of the horse, and sighed. ‘Oh, what a pity, Father! If we could get it inside –’ He paused. ‘Sinon,’ he said then, ‘what happened to the Palladion? Polluted?’

‘When it was brought into our camp – Odysseus stole it –’

‘Typical!’ said Deiphobos, interrupting.

‘She was displayed on her own altar,’ Sinon went on, ‘and the army was assembled to see her. But when the priests made the offerings to her, she was three times enveloped in flames. After the fire died down for the third time she began to sweat blood – big drops of it oozed out of her wooden skin and rolled down her face, down her arms, from the corners of her eyes as if she wept. The ground shook, and out of the clear sky a fireball fell into the trees beyond Skamander – you must have seen it. We beat our breasts, we prayed – even the High King himself. Afterwards we discovered that the Goddess had promised her sister Aphrodite a favour – that if the wooden horse was placed inside Troy, then Troy would marshal the forces of the world and conquer Greece.’

‘Hah!’ snorted Kapys. ‘Too, too convenient! This brilliant Odysseus thinks of making the horse too big, then sails away! Why should they go to so much trouble only to sail away? Why should they care what size the horse was? They sailed home!’

‘Because,’ said Sinon in a voice which indicated that he was rapidly coming to the end of his patience, ‘next spring they’re coming back!’

‘Unless,’ I said, rising from my stool, ‘the horse can be brought inside our walls.’

‘It can’t,’ said Sinon, sagging against the side of the car and closing his eyes. ‘It’s too big.’

‘It can!’ I cried. ‘Captain! Bring ropes, chains, mules, oxen and slaves. It’s early morning. If we start now, we can get the beast inside before darkness falls.’

‘No, no, no!’ Lakoon yelled, face a mask of terror. ‘Sire, no! Let me at least petition Apollo first, please!’

‘Go and do what you feel you must, Lakoon,’ I said, turning away. ‘In the meantime, we’ll start fulfilling the prophecy.’

‘No!’ shouted my son Kapys.

But everyone else roared on a whoop, ‘Yes!’

It took most of the day. We attached ropes reinforced with chains to the front and sides of the massive log platform, then harnessed mules, oxen and slaves; with almost infinite slowness the wooden horse moved down the road. Painful, frustrating, exasperating work. No Greek – no man! – could have counted on our stubborn persistence in the face of such a task. At every bend the thing had to be backed to and fro a dozen times to keep it on the cobbles and off the sward, for the wheels were only bolted to the table; there were no axles in the world strong enough to take such a mountain of weight.

By noon we had drawn it to the Skaian Gate, where, sure enough, we could see for ourselves that the head was five cubits taller than the arched roadway above the vast wooden door.

‘Thymoites,’ I said to my most enthusiastic son, ‘tell the garrison to bring picks and hammers. Break down the arch.’

It took a long time. The stones laid down by Poseidon Builder of Walls didn’t yield readily to the blows of mortal men, but they crumbled fraction by fraction until a large gap existed above the open door of the Skaian Gate. Those harnessed to the creature drew on the roped chains; the mighty head went forward again. As the jaws crept closer and closer I held my breath, then screamed a warning: too late. The head stuck. We prised it loose, demolished a little more, and tried again. But it would not pass through. Four times in all that noble head jammed before the space was wide enough. Then the gigantic thing rolled groaning and ponderous into the Skaian Square. Hah, Odysseus! Foiled!

To be sure, I decided that the horse must be towed up the steep hill and brought inside Troy’s wellsprings, the Citadel. Which took twice as many beasts of burden and what seemed aeons of time, though the cityfolk put their shoulders to it too. The Citadel gate had no arch over it; the horse just squeezed through.

We brought it to rest for good in the verdant courtyard sacred to Zeus. The flagstones cracked and split under its huge weight and the wheels sank into the ground amid fragmented paving, but the replacement for the Palladion stayed upright. No force on earth could move it now. We had shown Pallas Athene that we were worthy of her love and respect. Then and there I vowed publicly that the horse would be kept in perfect condition, and that an altar would be erected at its base. Troy was safe. King Agamemnon would not return in the spring with a new army. And we, when we had recovered, would marshal the forces of the world to conquer Greece.

Came Kassandra’s crazed laughter; she ran from the colo

‘Father, get it out! Get it out of the city! Leave it where it was! It is a creature of death!’

Lakoon was there, nodding grim confirmation. ‘Sire, the omens are not good. I’ve offered Apollo a hind and three doves, but he has rejected them all. This thing spells doom for our city.’

‘I have seen it. Father speaks the truth,’ said the elder of his two sons, pale and shivering.

Thymoites sprang forward to defend me; my own temper was rising, and the voices around grew afraid.

‘Come with me, sire,’ said Lakoon urgently. ‘Come to the great altar and see for yourself! The horse is accursed! Chop it up, burn it, get rid of it!’

Hustling his two sons before him, Lakoon ran to Zeus’s altar, far outdistancing my old legs. Suddenly, attaining the marble dais, he screamed. So did his sons, leaping and shrieking. By the time one of the guards reached him, he was down in a huddled heap and moaning, his arms plucking at his writhing sons. Then the guard skipped backwards very quickly and turned a horrified face towards us.