Free Homer’s Daughter by Robert Graves

with a cargo of Chalybean iron ingots, bound for the Temesan copper mines in south-west Italy. Her captain, a cousin of the Taphian king, called at the Palace,and when he had been entertained in a manner befitting his rank, my father, as usual, asked him whether he brought news of Laodamas.
    He brought none, but proved liberal with advice. “My lord King, it is clear that his absence is eating at your heart like a mouse at one of these splendid Elyman cheeses, and I can see only one course for you to take. First: despatch a responsible member of your household to Sandy Pylus, where, since it is the centre of the amber trade, your son will naturally have gone to buy his necklace. If the Pylians have no news, mourn him as drowned, return, and build him a cenotaph worthy of his fame. Afterwards send your peevish daughter-in-law back to her father’s house with the bride price; there let her marry again. Why keep her here in the Palace, my lord King, weeping and mourning without cease? A half-blind man could see that the Lady Ctimene depresses your spirits and those of your admirable servants.”
    â€œYes,” my father agreed, “and she is not even breeding me grandchildren.”
    â€œWell, then,” the Taphian continued briskly, “who can go to Sandy Pylus? Your son Clytoneus? Though young, he is keen-witted. Or, failing him, what of your capable brother-in-law, my lord Mentor?”
    â€œI trust nobody but myself,” replied my father, “to make the necessary enquiries. Yet how can I go?”
    â€œEvery king believes that his presence is indispensable; but a short holiday does him good, and his people little harm. Why not accompany us, when we sail home, in twenty days’ time at the most, from Temesa? I prefer, you see, to take the longer route back, avoiding the Strait of Messina, which isboth dangerous to navigate and a notorious haunt of pirates. We could land you at Sandy Pylus within the month. How would that be?”
    My father was goaded into taking a sudden resolution: he would leave the kingdom under the regency of my uncle Mentor and sail to Sandy Pylus. Despite my warnings, he still obstinately believed the first part of the Hyrian merchant’s story—which was, I admit, circumstantial enough—and concluded that Laodamas must have reached Thesprotia by way of Corcyra. But what happened then? Had he met with unexpected trouble? Had he been robbed of his wealth by King Pheidon? Perhaps even sold into slavery?
    â€œIf all other sources of information fail,” my father told the Taphian, “I shall visit Delphi and consult the Oracle of Apollo. Or, maybe, Zeus’s at Dodona would be the more reliable of the two.”
    Though reposing small faith in the prophetic gifts of the divine priestesses, he knew well that Delphi and Dodona were centres of information and gossip for all Greece, and that he would learn from the sacrificial butchers, or the intelligent corps of messengers, whatever was to be known of Laodamas’s whereabouts. He summoned my mother, my brother Clytoneus, my uncle Mentor, my grandfather Phytalus, and myself to a family council; but not Ctimene.
    â€œLet me tell the truth,” he confided to us. “The fact is that I cannot face the prospect of Ctimene’s prolonged anxiety and grief. She makes the very walls of the Palace weep and shudder in sympathy. Often I despair of her life; more often I grow enraged and am tempted to send her back to Bucinna, with the bride price which she brought—or its equivalent insacerdotal and commercial privileges. But this I will not do, for fear of antagonizing Laodamas when he returns—you must notice that I refuse to take your pessimistic view and say ‘
if
he returns’.”
    Fifteen days later, the Taphian put in again with his cargo of copper, to which my father now added a valuable consignment of linen, honey, and folding bedsteads, and stepped cheerfully aboard.