Black Poodle and Other Tales — 06 - The Return of Agamemnon, part 1

[Illustration: It] It was ten years since Agamemnon, the mighty Argive monarch, had left his kingdom (somewhat suddenly, and after a stormy interview with the Queen, as those said who had the best opportunities of knowing), with the avowed intention of going to assist at the siege of Troy.

He had never written once since, but so many reports of his personal daring and his terrible wounds had reached the palace that Clytemnestra would often observe, with a touch of annoyance, that, if not actually dead by that time, he must be nearly as full of holes as a fishing-net.

So that she was scarcely surprised when they broke the intelligence to her one day that he really had gone at last, having fallen, fighting desperately, against the most fearful odds, upon the Trojan plain; and when, a little later, she formally announced to her faithful subjects her betrothal to AEgisthus, her youngest and favourite courtier, _they_ were not surprised in their turn.

They told one another, with ribald facetiousness, that they had rather expected something of the kind.

They were celebrating their Queen's betrothal day with the wildest enthusiasm, for they were a simple affectionate people, and foresaw an impetus to local trade.

It had been but a dull time for Argos during those weary ten years, and the city had become well-nigh deserted, as, one by one, all her bravest and her best had left her, to seek, as they poetically put it, 'a soldier's tomb.'

Several married men, in whom no such patriotic enthusiasm had ever been previously suspected, found out that their country required their services, left their wives and their little ones, and started for the field of battle.

There were many pushing Argive tradesmen, too, who abandoned their business and sought--not ostentatiously, but with the self-effacement of true heroism--the seat of war upon which their sovereign had been sitting so long; while the real extent of their devotion was seldom appreciated until long after their departure, when it was generally discovered that, in their eagerness, they had left their affairs in the greatest confusion.

And very soon almost the only young men left were mild, unwarlike youths, who were respectable and wore spectacles, while the rest of the male population was composed of equal parts of prattling infants and doddering octogenarians.

This was a melancholy state of things--but then the absent ones wrote such capital letters home, containing such graphic descriptions of camp life and the fiercer excitements of night attacks and forlorn hopes, that the recipients ought to have been amply consoled.

They were not; they only remarked that it seemed rather odd that the writers should so persistently forget to give their addresses, and that it was a singular circumstance that while each letter purported to come direct from the Grecian lines, every envelope somehow bore a different postmark.

And often would the older married women (and their mothers too) wish with infinite pathos that they could only just get the missing ones home and talk to them a little--that was all!

But all anxiety was forgotten in the celebration of the betrothal, for the Argives were determined to do the thing really well.

So in the principal streets they had erected triumphal arches, typifying the chief local manufactures, which were (as it is scarcely necessary to inform the scholar) soda-water and cane-bottomed chairs; and from these arches chairs and bottles were constantly dropping, like a gentle dew, upon the happy crowd which passed beneath.

All the public fountains spouted a cheap dinner sherry like water--'_very_ like water,' said some disaffected persons; householders were graciously invited to exhibit flags and illuminations at their own expense, and in the market-place a fowl was being roasted whole for the populace.

All was gaiety, therefore, at sunset, when the citizens assembled in groups about the square in front of the palace, prepared to cheer the royal pair with enthusiasm when they deigned to show themselves upon the balcony.

The well-meaning old gentlemen who formed the Chorus (for in those days every house of any position in society maintained a chorus, and even shabby-genteel families kept a semi-chorus in buttons) were twittering in a corner, prepared to come forth by-and-by with the ill-timed allusions, melancholy and depressing forebodings, and unnecessary advice, which were all that was expected of them, and the Mayor and Corporation were fussing about distractedly with a brass band and the inevitable address.

All at once there was a stir in the crowd, and the eyes of everyone were strained towards a tall and swaying scaffold on the royal house-top, where a small black figure, outlined sharply against the saffron sky, could be seen gesticulating wildly?

'Look at the watchman!'

they whispered excitedly; 'what _can_ be the matter with him?'

Now before Agamemnon left he had had fires laid upon all the mountain tops in a straight line between Argos and Troy, arranging to light the pile at the Troy end of the chain when it should become necessary to let them know at home that they might expect him back shortly.

The watchman had been put up on a scaffold to look out for the beacon, and had been there for years day and night, without being once allowed to quit his post--even on his birthday.

It was expected that Clytemnestra would have let him come down for good when she was informed of Agamemnon's death on such excellent authority, but she would not hear of such a thing.

She knew people would think it very foolish and sentimental of her, she said, but to take the watchman down would seem so like giving up all hope!

So she kept him up, a proof of her conjugal devotion which touched everyone--except perhaps the watchman himself.

Clytemnestra and AEgisthus, who had happened to come out while all this excitement was at its height, found themselves absolutely ignored.

'Not a single cap off--not one solitary hurray,' cried the Queen with majestic anger.

'_What_ have you been doing to make yourself so unpopular with my loyal Argives?'

she demanded suspiciously.

'I don't think it's anything to do with _me_, really,' protested AEgisthus, feebly.

'They're only looking the other way just now, and--can't you see why?'

he added suddenly, '_they've lit the beacon on the top of Arachnaeus_!'

Clytemnestra looked, and started violently, as on the mountain-top in question a red tongue of flame shot up through the gathering dusk: 'What does it mean?'

she whispered, clutching him convulsively by the arm.

'Well,' said AEgisthus, 'it looks to me, do you know, rather as if your late lamented husband has changed his mind about dying, and is on his way to your arms.'

'Then he is not dead!'

exclaimed Clytemnestra.

'He is coming home.

I

shall look upon that face, hear that voice, press that hand once again!

How excessively annoying!'

'Confounded nuisance!'

he agreed heartily, but his irritation sounded slightly overdone, somehow.

'Well, it's all over with the betrothal after this; don't you think it would be as well to get all the arches, and fireworks, and things out of the way?

We shan't want them _now_, you know.'

'Why not?'

said the Queen; 'they will all do for him; _he_ won't know.

Ye gods!'

she cried, stretching out her arms with a tragic groan.

'Must _I_, too, do for him?'

'Any way,' said AEgisthus, with an attempted ease, 'you won't want _me_ any longer, and so, if you will kindly excuse me, I--I think I'll retire to some quiet spot whither I can drag myself with my broken heart and bleed to death, like a wounded deer, don't you know!'

'You can do all that just as well here,' she replied.

'I wish you to stay.

Who knows what may happen?'

--she added, with a sinister smile, 'We may be happy yet!'

Clytemnestra's sinister smiles always made AEgisthus feel exactly as if something was disagreeing with him--so he stayed.

By this time the populace had also realised the turn affairs had taken, but they very sensibly determined that it was their plain duty to persevere with the merriment.

They were, as has been mentioned before, a simple and affectionate people, and fond of their king; so, as his return would be even more beneficial to trade than the betrothal, they rejoiced on, and there was nothing in the least strained or hollow in their revelry.

And presently there was a fresh stir in the crowd, and then a rumbling of wheels as the covered chariot from the station rolled, amidst faint cheering, up to the palace gates, and was saluted by the one aged sentinel who stood on guard.

'It _is_ Agamemnon,' gasped the Queen; 'he has come already--he must not find me unprepared.

I will go within.'

She had just time to retire hastily, followed by AEgisthus, before a short stout man in faded regimentals and a cocked hat with a moulting plume descended from the vehicle.

The Chorus, finding it left to them to do the honours, advanced in a row, singing the ode of welcome, which they had had in rehearsal ever since the first year of the war.

'O King,' they chanted in their cracked old trebles, 'offspring of Atreus, and sacker of Troy!'

'Will you kindly count the boxes?'

interrupted the monarch, who hated sentiment; 'there should be four--a tin cocked-hat box, two camel-hair trunks, and a carpet bag.'

But a Greek chorus was not easily suppressed, and they broke out again all together, 'Nay, but with bursting hearts would we bid thee thrice hail!'

'Once is ample, thank you,' said the King, with regal politeness; 'and I should be really distressed if any of you were to burst on my account.

Has anybody such a thing as half a drachma about him?'

He heard no more of the ode, and the Mayor thought it advisable to roll up his address and take his Corporation home.

Agamemnon had succeeded in borrowing the drachma, and had just turned his back to pay the driver as Clytemnestra glided down the broad steps to the court-yard, and, striking an attitude, addressed nobody in particular in tones of rapturous joy.

'O happy day!'

she cried very loudly, 'on which my hero husband returns to me after a long absence, quite unexpectedly.

Henceforth shall his helmet rust upon the hat-stand, and his spear repose innocuous amongst the umbrellas, and his breastplate shall he replace by a chest-protector; for a shield he shall have a sunshade, and instead of his sword he shall carry a spud.

But now let me, as an exceptionally faithful wife, greet him before ye all with----Agamemnon, _will_ you have the goodness to tell me who that young person is in the chariot?'

was her abrupt and somewhat lame conclusion.

'Oh, there you are, eh?'

said Agamemnon, turning round and presenting a forefinger.

'How de do, my love; how de do?'

('I shan't give you another obol!'

he said to the driver, who seemed still unsatisfied.

) 'So, you're quite well, eh?'

he resumed to his wife; 'plenty to say for yourself as usual.

Gad, I feel as if I hadn't been away a week--till I look at you....

Well, we can't expect to be always young, can we?

So you want to know my little friend here?

Allow me to present her to you.

One moment.'

And bustling up to the chariot, he assisted from it a maiden with a pale face, great, wild, roving eyes, and hair of tawny gold, and led her back to his wife.

'The Princess Cassandra of Troy--my wife, Queen Clytemnestra.

They tell me this young lady can prophesy very prettily, my dear,' he remarked.

Clytemnestra bowed coldly, and said she was sure it would be vastly amusing.

Did the Princess intend giving any public entertainments?

'She is our visitor,' Agamemnon put in warningly; while Cassandra smiled satirically, and said nothing at all.

Clytemnestra hoped she might be able to induce her to stay longer, a week was such a _very_ short time.

'She has kindly consented to stay on a little longer, my love,' said Agamemnon--'all her life,' in fact.'

The Queen was charmed to hear it; it was so very nice and kind of her, particularly as strangers were apt to find the neighbourhood an unhealthy one.

And as AEgisthus joined them just then, she presented him to the King, with the remark that he had been the most faithful and devoted of courtiers during the whole period of the King's absence; to which Agamemnon replied, with the slightest of scowls, that he was delighted to make the acquaintance of Mr. AEgisthus; and after that no one seemed to know exactly what to say for a minute or two.

At last AEgisthus hazarded a supposition that the royal warrior had found it warm over at Troy.

'It varied, sir,' said the monarch, uncomfortably; 'the climate varied.

I used to get very warm fighting sometimes.'

AEgisthus agreed that a battle must be hot work, and Clytemnestra suddenly exclaimed that her husband was wearing the very same dear shabby old uniform he had on when he went away.

'The very same,' said Agamemnon, smiling.

'I wore it all through the campaign.

Your true warrior is no dandy!'

'We were given to understand you were wounded,' remarked AEgisthus.

'Oh,' said the King, 'yes; I was considerably wounded--all over the chest and arms.

But what cared I?'

'Exactly,' said AEgisthus; 'and, curiously enough, the weapons don't seem to have pierced your coat at all.

I observe there are no patches.'

'No,' the King replied; 'so you noticed that, eh?

Well, the reason of that is that those fellows out there have a peculiar sort of way of cutting and slashing, so as to----' And he explained this by some elaborate illustrations with his sheathed sword, until AEgisthus said that he thought he understood how it was done.

But Clytemnestra suddenly, with a kitten-like girlishness that sat but ill upon her, pounced playfully upon the weapon.

'I want to see it drawn,' she cried; 'I want to look upon the keen flashing blade which has penetrated the inmost recesses of so many of our country's foes.

Oh, it won't come out,' she added, as she attempted to pull it out of the scabbard; '_do_ make it come out!'

The King tried, but the blade stuck half way, and what was visible of it seemed thickly coated with rust; but Agamemnon said it was gore, and his orderly must have forgotten to clean his accoutrements after the fall of Troy.

He added that it was the effect of the sea air.

'Troy really has fallen then?'

asked AEgisthus.

'I suppose you stayed to see the thing out?'

'I did, sir,' answered the monarch proudly; 'I sacked the most fashionable quarters myself.

I expect my booty will be forwarded--shortly.

Didn't you _know_ Troy was taken?'

he asked suspiciously.

'Couldn't you see the beacon I lighted just before I started?'

The courtier murmured that it was wonderful to find so long and tedious a journey accomplished in such capital time.

'What do you mean by that?

How do you know how long it took?'

demanded Agamemnon.

'Don't you see?'

said Clytemnestra.

'Why, you say you had the fire lighted at Ida when you started; then, of course, they would see it directly over at Lemnos, and light theirs; and then at Athos, and then----' 'You are not a time-table, my love,' interrupted the monarch, coldly.

'I won't trouble you for all these details.

Come to the point.'

'The point is,' she explained sweetly, 'that we have only just seen the beacon flame arrive here at Arachnaeus, after leaping from height to height across lake and plain; so that you, my dearest, must have made the distance with almost equal celerity!'

'I came _with_ the beacon,' said Agamemnon, coughing; 'perhaps that disposes of the difficulty?'