Читать книгу The Private Life of Helen of Troy - John Erskine - Страница 3

Table of Contents

I

The point of the story is that Paris gave the prize to Aphrodite, not because she bribed him, but because she was beautiful. After all, it was a contest in beauty, though Athena and Hera started a discussion about wisdom and power. It was they who tried to bribe him. They had their merits and they had arguments, but Aphrodite was the thing itself.

Her remark, that he would some day marry Helen, interested him as a divine experiment in prophecy. It might happen or it might not. Very likely the goddess did not mean it as he thought; a wise man, even though he believed the oracle, would always wait and see.

Meanwhile he did wonder what Helen looked like. He needed travel. He might as well visit Sparta as any other place. Cassandra told him not to, but she always did. Œnone warned him, but she was his wife.

When he came to the house of Menelaus, the gatekeeper let him in, and since he was a stranger they wouldn't ask his name nor his errand till he had had food and rest. Menelaus put off a journey he had thought of, and practised the sacrament of hospitality. But when he found out who it was, he told Paris to make himself free in the house, and after polite excuses went down to Crete, as he had planned.

So they all intended well. But Paris saw Helen, face to face.

II

When the war ended in Troy, with the fall of the city, Menelaus went looking for Helen, with a sword in his hand. He was undecided whether to thrust the blade through her alluring bosom, or to cut her swan-like throat. He hadn't seen her for some time. She was waiting, as though they had appointed the hour. With a simple gesture she bared her heart for his vengeance, and looked at him. He looked at her. The sword embarrassed him. "Helen," he said, "it's time we went home." They tell the story another way, too. Menelaus was not alone, they say, when he came on Helen in that inner room; Agamemnon was there, and others, to witness the final justice of the long war. Several who had never seen Helen, crowded in for a first and last look at the beauty for which they had fought. When Menelaus saw Helen standing there, he was conscious of his escort. Anger and strength oozed out of him, but those sympathetic friends were at hand, to see a husband do his duty. He raised the sword--slowly--not slowly enough. Then he heard Agamemnon's voice.

"Your wrath might as well stop here, Menelaus; you've got your wife back--why kill her? Priam's city is taken, Paris is dead, you have your revenge. To kill Helen would confuse those who ask what caused the war. Sparta had no share in the guilt; it was Paris entirely, he came as a guest and violated your hospitality."

Menelaus understood why his brother was called the king of men. But later in the evening he was heard to say he would have killed Helen if Agamemnon hadn't interfered.

He had to take her to the ships for the night, with the other prisoners, but he couldn't make up his mind in what order they should set out. Not side by side, of course. He in front, perhaps. That idea he gave up before they reached the street. The emphasis on the procession seemed misplaced. He sent her on ahead to take unprotected whatever insults the curious army might care to hurl at her. But the men gazed in silence, or almost so. They didn't notice him. He heard one say she looked like Aphrodite, caught naked in the arms of Ares, when Hephaistos, her ridiculous husband, threw a net over the lovers and called the other gods to see her shame. A second man said he felt like the other gods on that occasion, who expressed a willingness to change places any time with Ares, net and all.

III

Some other men, that night when Troy was sacked, having less cause for violence than Menelaus, showed less restraint. Ajax found Cassandra in Athena's temple, where she served as priestess--a girl lovely enough for Apollo to desire, but of no such beauty as protected Helen. There, as it were in the very presence of the goddess, he violated her, and went on to other business in the riot. Afterwards when Athena's anger was clear enough, he admitted he had injured the woman, but asserted that he had not desecrated the temple, for Odysseus had already stolen away the sacred image, and the room, therefore, if a shrine at all, was an abandoned one. But the distinction was not likely to commend itself to the deity, and Agamemnon announced at once that the fleet would delay its homeward sailing until prolonged and thorough sacrifices had been offered, due rituals of introspection and repentance, lest the goddess should wash their sins away in cold water. Agamemnon was tender in the matter from the moment the prizes were distributed. Cassandra fell to him.

All day he stood by the priest while the flames were fed on the altars, in the midst of the respectful army, and Menelaus stood beside him--the two kings without a rival, now that Achilles was gone. At dusk they let the offerings burn down and smoulder, the soldiers kindled supper-fires, and the priest said the omens so far were good.

"The sacrifices are well begun," said Agamemnon.

"For me," said Menelaus, "they are ended. It wasn't our own sins that brought us to Troy, but as you said last evening, the sins of others. Whatever errors we have fallen into since we arrived, we've had reason to regret as they occurred. If anything was overlooked, through pride or ignorance, this day of sacrifice must have made up for it, and something more. I sail for Sparta tomorrow."

"When I think of sailing," said Agamemnon, "I remember Aulis. Our setting out from that harbour cost the life of my child, offered to appease the gods. You did not object to excessive sacrifices then. It was all for you, my brother. My quarrel with Achilles I atoned for long ago, since I was in the wrong. But since at other times I may have been wrong when I thought I was right, I must now satisfy even the unsuspected angers of Zeus and Athena before this host of mine can face wind and wave and what lies between us and our homes."

"What you really fear," said Menelaus, "is your wife."

"Your wife is with you," said Agamemnon, "and your daughter is safe in Sparta, no doubt looking after your affairs. We've all been looking after them. Now I must care for my people. What I really fear is the vengeance of Athena on every one of them, on you and me, on the meanest that row in the ships, for the theft of her image and the outrage to her priestess."

"Odysseus stole the image," said Menelaus, "but only because the city couldn't be taken while the image was there. For that and for some other measures in which he proved helpful, he should perhaps offer many sacrifices. As to what happened to Cassandra, I look upon it as justice, though rather crude. Paris was her brother. The fault of Ajax was haste. She might have been his in the partition of prizes, to take home and treat as he chose, beyond the criticism of the gods and secure from the wrath of mankind, for he has no wife waiting for him."

"My wife," said Agamemnon, "has caused no scandal in the family as yet. In some respects she differs from her sister. How many men have captured Helen, or been captured by her? Theseus, before your time, and you of course, and Paris, and Deiphobus--and wasn't there something between Achilles and her? Did Hector admire her, or was it only she that thought of him? Our special philosophies, brother, are evolved that we may live peaceably with our own past. You are in no position, I can see, to condemn the work of Ajax. Cherish your philosophy; you will need it."

"As I was saying," said Menelaus, "I sail for home to-morrow. I'm sorry we part in this mood of dispute. If staying here would do you any good, out of gratitude I'd stay. But the will of the gods is common sense, I think--or essentially so; and if your whim for prolonged sacrifices had really to do with religion, I should argue that the gods who enabled us to burn up Troy, never intended us to live here."

"You go to your fate," said Agamemnon. "I shall not see you again."

"Another mistake on your part, I prefer to think," said Menelaus, "and calling, I hope, for no ceremonial repentance."

Helen was sitting in the tent, motionless by the flickering lamp. The scented flame and smoke of the tripod went up before her face, and made him think of goddesses and altar-fires. Why was she there? Had she been there all day? Out at the sacrifices he had imagined her humbled among the other captives, feeling at last the edge of retribution. She might have stood up when he came in.

"To-morrow we sail for Sparta."

"So soon?"

"Is it too soon? You prefer Troy?"

"Not now," said Helen, "and you remember I never had much preference for places. But so many ships and men to get ready in a day! You were longer in starting when you came--with more reason for haste, I should have thought. Why, there must be sacrifices, there are gods to think of, the wide dark ocean, the ghosts of so many dead to quiet before we go."

"The dead are at peace and the gods are satisfied," said Menelaus; "we've given the whole day to sacrificing. The ocean remains wide and dark. Agamemnon will continue the sacrifices for that and for some other things prayer cannot change. We have had words about it and parted. He and the host will stay a while longer, I go home to-morrow with my men and my captives."

With her, he meant. He didn't know how to say it. Not "with my wife and my captives." He hadn't the courage to say "you and my other captives."

"Menelaus," she said, "of course I shall share the journey with you, however unwisely you undertake it. But you are wrong, and your brother is right. Those who are conscious of wrong-doing need time for regret and for remorse, and those of us who are conscious of no wrong-doing, we most of all should offer sacrifices against our pride. You have your old common sense, Menelaus, an immediate kind of wit, but you still lack vision. If you had more vision you would be more conventional."

"If I hear you," said Menelaus, "you are advising me not to depart from established rules of conduct?"

"That is my advice," said Helen.

"I am overtired and my brain refuses to work," said Menelaus. "Will you return to--whatever place you have just come from, or shall I leave this tent to you? We start early in the morning."

IV

The wind was against them, and the men were at the oars. Menelaus sat near the helmsman, and Helen before him, her face bare to the wind. The rowers looked up at her, not as in anger at one who had brought on them war and labour, but curiously at first, then with understanding and awe, as though there were a blessing in the boat. Menelaus watched the change in their gaze, and wondered why he had come to Troy--and remembered why.

Helen shifted her position, for the first time in hours, and looked in his eyes. The oarsmen looked up at him, too; they forgot to row.

"Menelaus," she said, "you should have offered sacrifices. There is something very strange about this boat."

"On the contrary," he replied, "the boat is perhaps the only thing here that is beyond criticism. The wind is unfavourable, but the men row well, except when you distract them."

"In Troy at this moment, or somewhere along the shore," she said, "Agamemnon offers up prayers which I dare say will be effective; he will doubtless reach home. Our own prospect seems to me uncertain. You know my point of view--I have no love for adventure unless I know where I'm going."

"We are going to Sparta," he said.

"I fear we are not," said Helen.

"We will hold to the course," said her husband, "and unless the stars are disarranged in this much troubled world, we shall arrive in Sparta in a week. That will be excellent time, don't you think?" he asked the helmsman.

"It took us longer to reach Troy on the way out," said the helmsman.

"When I went to Troy," said Helen, "it took only three days, but that was an exceptional voyage."

Thereafter the rowers bent to the oars and the helmsman read the sun and the stars. At first Helen would look at Menelaus from time to time, serene enough, but as though she could say something if it were worth while to do so. After many days she only sat motionless, gazing far ahead across the sea, and the oarsmen kept their patient eyes on her, as though she and they were faithful to something Menelaus could not understand. He passed the time feeling lonely, and wondering whether the water and the food would hold out.

"Ah, there is Sparta at last," he said.

"I doubt it," said Helen.

As a matter of fact it was Egypt. Helen walked ashore on the narrow bridge the sailors held for her, as though one always landed in Egypt. The wind died completely. The weary men set up the king's tent and shelters for themselves, and went to sleep. Menelaus could not remember that he had given orders for disembarking, but he wasn't sure and didn't like to ask.

"This famous land is more interesting than I had thought," said Helen some weeks later. "In my afternoon walks I have met several of the natives, and they seem to have reached here an average of culture somewhat above our best in Sparta, don't you think?"

"Helen, you exasperate me," said Menelaus. "I'm not here to tour the country nor to compare civilisations."

"Of course you aren't, nor I either," said Helen, "and when you are ready to sail you have only to tell me. Meanwhile, Polydamna, the wife of that substantial man who sold you the food for our next voyage, is teaching me her skill in herbs and medicines--a good skill to have in any house, and here they all seem to have it. Unless you offer sacrifices in the next few days, I shall learn much of what she knows."

"I will make no more sacrifices," said Menelaus. "The wind will rise of itself."

"Then I shall learn it all before we go," said Helen.

After a fortnight or thereabouts, she saw him one day coming from the house of Thonis, Polydamna's husband, with a small lamb under his cloak. While he called the men to a quiet spot and sacrificed the animal, she kept herself discreetly in the tent. Menelaus found her there.

"Be prepared to sail to-morrow," he said, "in case a wind should rise."

She was ready, and the wind rose, but it turned out to be only a frail breeze, young and short-lived. As they reached the island of Pharos it died altogether.

"Oh, well," said Menelaus, "there's a good harbour here and a spring of fresh water. We'll put in till the wind freshens, and fill the casks."

Helen walked ashore on the narrow bridge the men held for her, as though one always landed in Pharos. After twenty days the food gave out, and the men crawled along the stony shore, trying for fish with a little cord and bare hooks. All those days Helen walked, composed and gracious, in the smoothest paths she could find among the rocks, or sat near the brow of one modest cliff, watching the purple waters and the gulls and the far sky-line. Menelaus avoided his men and wandered alone, at the other end of the island from Helen. But she was not surprised, so far as he could see, when he strolled up at last to her position on the cliff.

"I'm thinking of going back to Egypt," he began. "These men need better food than they can find here, and we could row to Canopus in a day."

"If you are asking my advice," said Helen, "I can only follow your own best judgment. As you say, we seem to need food."

"At times, Helen, you irritate me," said Menelaus; "any fool would know we must go back to Egypt. I wasn't asking your advice. In fact, I ought to have gone back long ago."

He was prepared to tell her why he hadn't gone back before, but she annoyed him by not asking. He turned and saw three of his men, wan and hungry, and the helmsman with them, waiting, as it seemed, to say something unpleasant.

"Menelaus," began the helmsman, "we have followed you so long that you must know we are faithful, but we've come to ask you now if you've lost your wits. Do you enjoy suffering yourself, or do you like to see us suffer? You keep us on this island to starve, while there is food in Egypt, within one day at the oars, if we had our strength. A few hours longer here, and we shall be too feeble to launch the boat. Waiting for a wind, you say. But if it came now, there's not food enough to keep us till Sparta; we can't fish as we sail."

"I forgive your bad manners because of your hunger," said Menelaus, "but as it usually happens in such cases, your advice comes late and is therefore superfluous. I had already decided to return to Egypt for supplies, and we shall start at once. Get the boat ready. . . . Did I make myself clear? Launch the boat. . . . Oh, you have something more to say?"

"Yes, Menelaus," replied the helmsman. "When we reach Egypt we shall make proper sacrifices to the gods, that we may return home in safety. We would have sacrificed at Troy, with our fellows, but you commanded us to come away. Now that we have suffered your punishment with you, we will obey you no longer in this matter, but only the gods. Clearly it is the fate of none of us to see our friends again unless we offer hecatombs to the deathless who keep the heavens and the paths of the sea. No doubt we should have perished before this had there not been with us our lady yonder, your wife, to soften the anger of the gods--herself immortal in our eyes, reverent and careful toward those above who give life or withhold it."

"It might be well," said Menelaus, "to offer further sacrifices at this time. I had considered that also, but there is nothing here of any value to sacrifice. In Egypt, as you suggest, we can secure rich offerings, and I had already resolved to do so at the earliest convenient moment. You may now launch the boat--unless, of course, there is something further?"

They hastened down to their fellows, and Menelaus turned toward Helen.

"I hope you won't keep us waiting. This talk has somewhat delayed my plans."

Thonis gave them food to store in the boat, and cattle for the sacrifice, with bowls of dark wine. In the sight of them all Menelaus drew the pitiless knife with certain flourishes of irritation across the throats of the victims, and they fell gasping to the ground. Then he turned the wine from the bowls into cups, and poured it forth, and prayed in an incisive voice to the gods.

"O Zeus, most glorious, most great, O Athena, wise and terrible, O all ye immortal beings! Now do your works in the light, that men may look on justice. Punish the guilty and reward the good. Who among us have sinned against you let them starve on the sea rocks or drown in the waters. But those who with pure hearts have done your will, bring us soon to our own people!"

And the wind blew them all safe and sound to Sparta.

V

"Menelaus," said Eteoneus, the old gate-keeper, "I've hoped for a few minutes of your time ever since you came home. You've been absent a long while, and I dare say you'll want a report of the household."

"Nothing wrong, is there?" said Menelaus.

"Orestes has been here."

"Oh--my brother's son," said Menelaus.

"Yes," said Eteoneus, "and I might add, your wife's sister's son."

"What do you mean by that?" said Menelaus.

"I mean," said Eteoneus, "I had some doubt whether I ought to let him in."

"It seems to me," said Menelaus, "you imply something rude about my wife's relatives."

"To tell you the truth," said Eteoneus, "I had no idea, until you returned, that you still counted your wife among your relatives."

"You forget yourself," said Menelaus.

"No, Menelaus," said Eteoneus, "it's an awkward subject, but we'll have to face it. I have to, at any rate; I'm partly responsible. When Paris came, I let him in. What happened afterwards we all know--at least, we know the events, but some of us are at a loss to interpret them. You entertained Paris, of course, without question as to what he came for, and he stole your wife. Naturally you went off for your revenge, and I may say that none of us who stayed at home expected to see Helen again, certainly not restored to your esteem. If you would explain the new situation to us--give us at least a hint as to what our attitude should be toward her, it would relieve what is at present an embarrassment to your domestics."

"You were about to speak of Orestes," said Menelaus.

"I was," said Eteoneus. "When you went away, you told me to look after the house with peculiar vigilance, since your strongest men were with you, and your daughter Hermione remained here, with considerable treasure still in the vaults. Then Orestes appeared. Perhaps I should have asked him in, like any other stranger, and found out his errand afterward, but in your absence I couldn't take the risk. I kept him out until he would say who he was. He may tell you of his displeasure."

"If there's one thing I dislike," said Menelaus, "it's a family quarrel. I hope you didn't come to words?"

"I fear we did," said Eteoneus. "He wanted to know what had come over this house, that all virtue, even the most elementary, had deserted it. He suggested, as I recall, that the stench of our manners must sicken the gods. He went into some detail which I shan't repeat; in outline, he noticed that having begun with a comparatively excusable slip, such as the infidelity of your wife, we had sunk at once to a point where we were no longer hospitable. I assured him that with us, as with other civilized people, nothing was more sacred than the rights of a guest, but that recently we had become interested in the rights of the host, also, and that since these had been ignored once in this house, we were a little nervous about good-looking and anonymous young men; in these times we felt that unusual caution on our part should not be misinterpreted."

"I see nothing in that speech to insult him," said Menelaus.

"Well," replied the gate-keeper, "that isn't all I said. When he made that remark about your wife, I felt that loyalty to the house compelled me to say something. I inquired after his mother's health."

"That's sometimes done," said Menelaus, "even among the polite."

"I mean," said the gate-keeper, "I asked him whether it wasn't more delicate to leave your husband's roof before you betrayed him, than to be false by his own fireside while he happened to be absent. Orestes got the point--that's why he was angry."

"If Orestes understood you," said Menelaus, "it's more than I do."

"I suppose you haven't heard," said Eteoneus, "but all Sparta knows the scandal. Your sister-in-law Clytemnestra--your double sister-in-law, I might say, your wife's sister and your brother's wife--has been living with Ægisthus ever since Agamemnon went to Troy. It's hardly worth while for him to come back."

"There! I never liked her!" exclaimed Menelaus. "I'm shocked but not surprised, except for the man. Ægisthus will regret his daring. My brother will come back. He may not be wanted, but he will return all the more surely for that. He has had considerable practice recently in dealing with men who steal other people's wives."

"What Sparta is curious about," said the gate-keeper, "is whether he has had enough practice in dealing with Clytemnestra. She's a formidable woman, even in her innocent moments, and she's making no secret of her present way of life. She thinks she is justified by something Agamemnon did. Of course she doesn't doubt, any more than you do, that he'll return. It's thought she has a welcome waiting."

"This is terrible!" groaned Menelaus. "But after all it may be only gossip. Women so beautiful as those sisters pay for their gift in the malicious rumour of envy. Really, Eteoneus, I don't wonder that Orestes was angry."

"I don't wonder myself," said Eteoneus, "but angry or not, he denied nothing. How could he? These rumours that spread about beautiful women are often malicious or envious, as you say, but they're rarely exaggerated."

"That's digression we needn't discuss," said Menelaus. "So Orestes went home? Frankly, Eteoneus, I should like to hear his side of this story."

"You may, easily enough," said the gate-keeper, "for he's been here at regular intervals, and unless his habits change he's due in a day or so."

"I thought you didn't let him in?"

"I didn't, but he never asked permission again--he just came in. I ought to add that he came always to see Hermione, and she arranged it somehow, I never knew just how. She doesn't like me much more than he does."

"I can't believe anything scandalous of my daughter," said Menelaus, "and you made a grave error in introducing the idea. I have an impulse to question your judgment as to these other reports. Of course I've been away a long time and she's now quite grown up, but her character seems to me essentially unchanged. I've always thought her propriety itself."

"So do I, so do I," said Eteoneus, "and when it comes to the conventions, Orestes is rather strait-laced. It often happens that way, I've noticed--the children go in for correct behaviour. Especially when they are not so good-looking."

"My daughter is said to resemble me," said Menelaus, "and I believe she and I understand each other. But if you agree that their meetings were entirely proper, what on earth are you talking about? Why didn't you let him in, in the first place? They were intended for each other, before our family life was upset; now that we've returned, I dare say they'll be married shortly, if they wish to be."

"Menelaus," said Eteoneus, "it's a difficult thing to explain to one who hasn't followed my profession. I'm a family gate-keeper, and the sense of responsibility makes me alert to what I let in. When I opened the gate to Paris, I had a presentiment that love was entering, and instinct told me that the entrance of a great passion would disturb your home. You did not feel the danger. Now Orestes, I'm quite sure, brings with him some new ideas. If you realised what it would mean to your house, to let in new ideas, you'd be on your guard."

"Eteoneus," said Menelaus, "I've heard a good deal of oratory since I left home, and though I'm no critic in such matters, I've become sensitive to possible innuendo in the spoken word. Much of what you have said sounds to me like diplomatic insult."

"I may have overstepped my intention," said the gate-keeper, "but I did want to rouse you to a problem which only you can solve. We are all loyal to you but we don't know where we stand. It used to be that a wife who deserted her husband and children was in disgrace, if possible was punished. You thought that way when you sailed for Troy. We at home here have prepared all these years to cheer your lonely grief as well as we might, if ever you came back to your--"

"Didn't you say something like this before?" asked Menelaus. "You repeat yourself and you wander from the subject. I thought you wanted to give an account of the house since I left it?"

"That's just what I'm doing, Menelaus," said the old gate-keeper, "and if I go at it in a roundabout way, it's only to be tactful. I'm trying to say respectfully and harmlessly that there are some dangerous new ideas abroad in your household, and I want to find out whether you know about them and dislike them, or whether you share them. I'm terribly afraid you share them, and if you do, I suppose I ought to leave you, old as I am, for I'm too old to change. The reason I suspect you've picked up some of these new ideas is--well, when the ship was sighted we learned that you weren't to be lonely; Helen was coming back with you. That was a new idea, Menelaus. But we got used to it, and we rehearsed what we thought would be respectful manners toward the repentant captive brought home in disgrace. But she doesn't seem aware of any disgrace, and she isn't repentant. She doesn't behave--neither do you, in fact--as though she were a--"

"Look here, Eteoneus," said Menelaus, "I've taken all I'm going to from you. You pretend to have household business on your mind, and then you pretend to have damaging news of Orestes, which turns out to be more to your discredit than his, but what you really want is to discuss my wife's reputation. I'm home now, and I'll run the house myself. You get out and watch the gate. . . . Here, wait a moment! If the madness comes on you again to talk about Helen, do it where no word of yours will reach me. You wonder why I didn't kill her. Well, she was too beautiful. You don't resemble her in the slightest. Be careful!"

"The gods be praised, Menelaus," said the gate-keeper, "you talk now like your old self! May I go on with what I was about to say?"

"Finish up with Orestes, and get out," said Menelaus.

"I'll have to go back to pick up the thread," said Eteoneus. "Oh, yes. We talked it over, of course, with the men on the ship, and they answered as though we were demented; even to them who have lived through Troy and its miseries, Helen seems altogether admirable. We try to get a clue from you, but though you are at times, if I may judge, somewhat embarrassed, and though you are irritable now that I have ventured to raise the question, you too seem to accept Helen as the unshaken authority and inspiration of your home. And here's where Orestes comes in. I used to believe Hermione looked at things in the old fashion. She was rather pathetic, I thought, circulating stories about her absent mother, stories which if we were deceived by them would make Helen out quite innocent, rather a victim than--well, we'll leave it there. I admired the daughter's loyalty, though it took a fantastic form, and I was sure, of course, she didn't believe her own tales. But now Orestes has put ideas into her head which once would have troubled you. I had a talk with her one day about him--told her what was said about Clytemnestra and Ægisthus, and warned her against compromising herself with that branch of the family. If you'll believe it, she actually defended Clytemnestra. I imagine she had the argument from Orestes. Though her aunt wasn't doing right, she said, Agamemnon hadn't done right, either; he asked her to send their youngest daughter, pretending he had arranged a marriage with Achilles, and when the delighted mother got her ready, and safe to Aulis, he killed the child as a sacrifice to the winds, so that the fleet might sail. After that, Hermione asked, what loyalty did Clytemnestra owe to Agamemnon? And I couldn't think of the reply I wanted. I did say that Clytemnestra's conduct wasn't sanctioned by religion, but sacrifice was. She laughed at me. There you are, Menelaus! I call that dangerous. If you hadn't changed, you'd thank me for putting you on your guard."

"Now that you've got to the point at last," said Menelaus, "I don't mind telling you I have indeed changed. I'm not afraid of new ideas as I once was, and as you still are. We've been away a long time, we've seen many countries and other people, and we must have broadened. Before I went I wasn't interested, for example, in Egypt, but it's a remarkable country, and the people know a lot more than we do. And we've been through the war, you should remember. Nothing can be quite the same again. When your emotions have been stretched in unusual directions for a protracted period, you discover that your ideas have changed, and not necessarily for the worse. Those who go to war seem to have more new ideas than they who stay at home. I won't say I like these ideas of Orestes, but they don't scare me. Before I went to Troy, if you had told me that Achilles would give back Hector's body to be buried by his relatives, and would stop the war for twelve days so that the funeral would not be interrupted, I shouldn't have believed you, but that's what he did. When Helen went off with Paris, I followed to kill them both. Now here she is home with me again. You can't get over it. It's the one new idea you've had in twenty years--your surprise that my wife is at home and not in the tomb. I'm rather surprised myself, but not so much as you are. I can't explain it--I can only say, with you, our ideas change."

"The parallel between Hector's corpse and your wife eludes me," said the gate-keeper, "but I gather, Menelaus, that you think a great deal of good has come out of the war--not for the Trojans, I take it, not for Hector, not for Patroclus nor for Achilles, but for you. The logic of your position, I suppose, is that your wife did you a good turn when she ran away with another man."

"I don't know that my gate ever needed watching so much as it does at this moment," said Menelaus. "Did you happen to favour my wife with any of your conversation just before she left for Troy? I've often wondered what drove her away; Paris was never the only reason enough."

VI

"How good of you, Helen, to return my call so promptly," said Charitas. "I was distressed that you weren't at home. Just as soon as I heard of your unexpected return, I went over to your house. It seemed the least a girlhood friend could do. There's so much I want to hear. The other side of the garden is shaded--we'll go there."

"You've changed the garden, Charitas, I shouldn't have known it," said Helen. "It was lovely before, but you've improved it since I saw it last."

"Time does wonders," said Charitas. "Helen, your servant can wait outside with the sunshade--you won't need it."

"She may stay with me," said Helen. "Adraste and I get on well together. Come here, Adraste, I want my friend to see you--a friend of my girlhood."

"Oh, Helen, how beautiful she is! What an amazing person you are, to keep a beautiful girl like that in the house."

"I have no prejudice against beauty," said Helen--"why shouldn't I have Adraste with me?"

"Well, perhaps your husband isn't susceptible, and you haven't a son to worry about. My boy, Damastor--you remember him? Oh, of course you don't; he was about to be born when you left for Egypt. Damastor is handsome as Apollo, and he loves everything beautiful. It's terrible. I've tried to bring him up well. He's an artist, I'm afraid--my father had a second cousin who was. I've tried to keep his mind occupied, and there are not many occasions in Sparta. There's Hermione, of course, and I'd be ever so pleased if he took a fancy to her. I've interested him in gardening--most of this is his work. But I don't think it will hold him long."

"You're afraid," said Helen, "that if he saw a beautiful girl he'd fall in love with her?"

"Well, you know what I mean," said Charitas.

"No, I don't," said Helen.

"I want him to be a credit to his bringing up, and fall in love at the right time with the right girl," said Charitas. "You and I know that beauty often leads to entanglements with the inexperienced."

"It often leads to love, I believe," said Helen, "and in the presence of great beauty all men seem to be inexperienced. There isn't enough of it, I suppose, to get used to. You wish your boy to be respectable--fall in love with a plain woman? Or entirely conventional--marry one he doesn't love at all?"

"How cynical it has made you--I mean, you didn't talk this way before you went away."

"Before I went away," said Helen, "we never mentioned the subject, your son not yet being born, but I dare say I should have talked the same way then. I hope so. It isn't cynical--it's merely honest. You know as well as I that it's quite proper to marry someone you respect but don't love. Society never will ostracise you for it. And you know it's getting into the realm of romance when you really lose your heart to your mate, even though he or she isn't beautiful. That's more than respectable--it's admirable. Something like that, I understand, you dream of for your boy."

"That doesn't quite cover my point of view," said Charitas.

"No, it doesn't quite cover mine, either," said Helen. "I ought to add that those two formulas, love without beauty and marriage without love, though they are respectable and conventional, are also very dangerous. Rare as beauty is, you can't always prevent it from coming your way, and if you see it you must love it."

"I don't know that you must," said Charitas; "some of us have previous obligations."

"If you've never given yourself to beauty," said Helen, "there are no previous obligations."

"Then you wouldn't try to stop a boy from falling in love with the first beautiful girl he sees?"

"I'd try to prevent him from falling in love with any other," said Helen, "and when the beautiful girl arrives, it's his duty to love her. He probably will, anyway, whether or not he has contracted obligations with the respectable and plain, and I'd rather have him free and sincere. The way you are going at it, Charitas, you will make your boy ashamed to love beauty, and he'll pursue it in some treacherous, cowardly fashion. Your ambition to keep him respectable may prevent him from being moral."

"Do you talk this way to Hermione?" said Charitas.

"I've had little opportunity to talk to her on any subject," said Helen, "but I should say the same thing to her. I hope she will love the most wonderful man she knows, and I'd like her to fall in love at sight, but in any case she probably will love as fate wills, and there's no use interfering. The ones that take advice are heart-free."

"Would you mind Adraste's waiting at the other end of the garden?" said Charitas. "There are one or two things I'd like to whisper to you."

"Adraste will wait at the end of the garden," said Helen. "But now she's gone, I must say, Charitas, I see no point in whispering. If it's unmentionable, don't let's say it."

"Helen, it's all very well for you to be frank, but perhaps you do harm to others. You oughtn't to say such things before the girl--and with reference to my son; you'll put ideas into her head."

"Dear Charitas, what possible ideas of ours are new to the young, who listen to nature? I mentioned your son only because you did, and I wished him a happy fate. You, it seems to me, gave him a bad character; you expressed distrust of him, and before the girl. She hasn't lost her heart to your description. You really ought to send him over to our house some day soon, to prove he's more of a man than you've tried to make him. I'm curious to see the boy."

"He's been there several times recently, to see Hermione," said Charitas. "I couldn't say it before your servant, but I'd be quite satisfied if he cares for Hermione. No one could breathe a word against her."

"They probably could, in some circumstances," said Helen, "unless human nature is falling off. But I agree that she doesn't deserve it. Does she happen to be interested in Damastor? Her father always wanted her to marry her cousin Orestes."

"She never mentioned Orestes to me," said Charitas, "nor my son either, I must say. She wouldn't to his mother. She's been here quite often recently. Come to think of it, she's talked chiefly about--"

"Go on," said Helen, "about what?"

"Why, about you. She explained it all, and I must say she took a weight off my mind."

"You evidently expect me to understand you," said Helen, "but I'm quite mystified. What did she explain? What was on your mind?"

"Oh, Helen, I really didn't mean to bring the subject up--not so soon. But now I might as well go on. She explained about you and Paris, and I was so thankful to know that you were the innocent party."

"Innocent of what? Are we speaking of crimes? A gratifying idea! Perhaps Hermione will explain it to her mother when I get home."

"Well, not crimes, if you prefer," said Charitas, "but I understood--we all did--that you ran away to Troy with Paris--that he was your lover, and you--you loved him. I confess I believed it, Helen--your husband made the same natural mistake. And since Paris was a prince, we thought he really was a gentleman. The moment Hermione explained his low character, and told me of the miraculous rescue heaven provided for you, I knew at once that you had been an unwilling victim, first and last. We're all so glad that Menelaus could see it too, and forgive you."

"Menelaus!" said Helen. "Well, to come back to Paris. Why does Hermione think his character was low?"

"He stole the furniture," said Charitas.

"What?" cried Helen.

"So I learned from Hermione," said Charitas, "and he forced you to go with him. Hermione expressed it very delicately, as a young girl should, but I got the impression that you resisted him all the way to Egypt, and there you were rescued. Really, Helen, it must have been a thrilling adventure."

"Charitas," said Helen, "I'm deeply interested in my daughter's version of my story. When did she tell you all this?"

"Most of it before you came home, some of it since. The other day she looked in to say that since your return she had been able to confirm several details about Egypt."

"What about Egypt?" said Helen. "You mentioned the country when I came in this afternoon, and I didn't understand to what you referred."

"Oh, Hermione gave me the names of the man and his wife with whom you stayed--Thon--Thonis? Is that it? and--Oh, yes, Polydamna."

"I stayed in Egypt with Thonis and Polydamna, did I?" said Helen.

"Didn't you?" said Charitas. "Hermione says you did."

"You'd better tell me all she said," replied Helen, "and then I'll correct anything that's wrong."

"It seems silly to be telling you, Helen--I'd rather have you tell me what happened. But you know, we thought you just ran away with Paris, until Hermione explained that he took you against your will, and robbed Menelaus of some things of value, and altogether showed himself for what he was. Then the wind blew you to Egypt instead of Troy--I'm sure it was the gods protecting you--and there you appealed for help, and Thonis would have killed Paris if he hadn't been in a sense a guest, entitled to sanctuary. But he made him go on to Troy alone, and you and the stolen things remained with Thonis and Polydamna until your husband came for you and brought you home. That's true, isn't it?"

"Is it Hermione's idea," said Helen, "that there was no war with Troy?"

"Dear me, no--I mean yes," said Charitas, "the war was a deplorable but natural blunder, she says. Your husband and his friends went to Troy and demanded you back, and the Trojans said you weren't there. Of course our men wouldn't believe them. The Trojans said you were waiting for Menelaus to call for you in Egypt. That sounded terribly facetious, especially as they didn't deny that Paris had reached home. So there was nothing for it but to fight. Naturally, if you had been there, as Hermione says, the Trojans would have been glad to give you up."

"She says so, does she?" said Helen.

"Yes--to save the city; it stands to reason. But they could only defend themselves, once they were attacked, and when the city fell and the truth came out, it was too late. So much time lost! And nothing for Menelaus to do, after all, but go back to Egypt and bring you home. If I know your husband, Helen, he was irritated."

"He was," said Helen; "the voyage from Egypt was anything but agreeable. What else did Hermione say?"

"That's all, I think--"

"Charitas, have you told these stories to any of our friends?"

"To every one I could, Helen; I knew it would make them happy to have your reputation cleared--we're very fond of you."

"I see I shall be busy for some time," said Helen, "correcting all this nonsense. I may as well begin with you now, Charitas. You really didn't believe Hermione?"

"Certainly I did! It was entirely plausible, and for your sake I wanted to believe it. I shouldn't have been much of a friend if I hadn't done my best."

"You thought it plausible," said Helen, "that Hermione should know the circumstances of my leaving home, when she was only a child at the time? For my sake you wished to believe I waited twenty years in Egypt because I couldn't come home without Menelaus' escort? Well, let me correct your error. Menelaus and I were blown down to Egypt on our way back. I never stayed with Thonis and Polydamna, though they are the people who sold us food and supplies. Paris and I made a very direct voyage to Troy; at least I enjoyed it and it didn't seem long. I loved him dearly. He never would have taken me away if I hadn't wanted to go. And he didn't steal the furniture. Some pieces did disappear, I understand, in the confusion, but they must be here somewhere in Sparta; Paris took nothing to Troy, and Thonis certainly gave nothing back to Menelaus on our voyage home."

"Oh, Helen, don't tell me that; I've hoped for the best!" said Charitas. "I can't believe it as I look at you. You look so--you won't mind the word?--so innocent! And for you to contradict the creditable story yourself, and insist on being--on being what we thought at first! I can't make you out at all. And I can't understand now why you came home with Menelaus."

"Or why he came home with me," said Helen. "That is the queer part of it. All the relatives and friends are puzzled. I'm not going to suggest any explanation of his conduct. But he did want me to come back; he intended to kill me, but he changed his mind. If you want to go deeper than that into his motives, Charitas, ask him yourself sometime when he is over here. But I can give you at once my own explanation of myself. Thank you, dear Charitas, for saying I look innocent. I am innocent. That is, of everything except love. From what you said this afternoon, perhaps you think love is a crime. Let's compromise, and say it's a great misfortune--a misfortune one wouldn't have missed. There's every reason why we should be frank about our misfortunes, about our faults, too, for that matter, and certainly about the misery our faults and our misfortunes bring on others. Now if I allowed you to believe that shabby story about Egypt, I should be shirking the blame for all the trouble at Troy. I was there, and I was the cause of it all; to deny it would be to deny myself--to exist only in falsehood."

"For goodness' sake, Helen," said Charitas, "I'll go mad with your reasoning. You want the world to know you caused the trouble at Troy, and you want us to think you're as innocent as you look. What's your idea of innocence?"

"Charitas, I'm not easily provoked," said Helen, "but I've a mind at this moment to learn what is your idea of respectability. Here we are sitting in your garden, in broad daylight; your servants and perhaps the neighbours can see what disreputable company you keep. Shall I go now, or not until you've heard the rest of my story?"

"Don't be sensitive, Helen--finish the story. Of course I want to hear it. I hope for light."

"You won't get it from me," said Helen; "our experience hasn't been of the same order, and our ideas probably won't be. But here is my account of my innocence. I am used to having men fall in love with me, but I never wanted them to, and I never flirted with a man in my life. I simply existed; that was enough. And I never wished to love. To marry--yes; I was glad to marry Menelaus, but I had some of your prudent conviction that marriage is easier to arrange and carry through than love is. Against my will I fell in love with Paris. It just happened to me, and I don't consider myself responsible. But I could be sincere--that at least was in my choice, whatever else was fate. Since love had befallen me, I saw it through to the end. Charitas, sincerity was the one virtue I salvaged out of the madness, and I kept a little intelligence, too--I had enough wit to know that the end would be bad. I was deserting my child; what would happen to her character, growing up alone, and with such an example? When we reached Troy, the Trojans, I was sure, would repudiate Paris and me, else there would be war. But as it turned out, the Trojans did nothing of the sort. They welcomed me. When the war was going the wrong way for them, they said more than once that it was worth it, just to have me with them. Charitas, a woman who does a wrong she feels she cannot help, yet expects to suffer for it, and is ready to pay the penalty as though it were altogether her fault--such a woman, in my opinion, is moral far above the average. By your own standards, I think--certainly by mine--the Trojans lost their sense of moral consequences. Hermione's story would save their reputations, but it does less than justice to mine. I am proud of my willingness to pay for what others suffered from my misfortune. Without that moral clarity, I could have no peace of mind. And I think Menelaus, like the Trojans, showed that he was ethically confused. From the beginning of the siege, I thought our people would win, and that Menelaus would kill me. But instead he brought me home, as you see. Even the gods, it might be said, were delinquent, not to annihilate me--but perhaps I'm to suffer exquisitely now through my neglected daughter, who has grown up to have a respectable and dishonest imagination. Had I been here, I should have taught her to love the truth."

"Well, with the facts this way, Helen," said Charitas, "I can't understand Menelaus any more than I can you. I'd have sworn he'd be insane for revenge. He was always such a devoted husband."

"He was," said Helen, "he came for me with a knife or a sword or something. I hardly noticed; it made no difference to me. I expected it, and made no attempt to escape. I even made it easy for him, drew my robe away from my heart--so."

"Oh, it was then he decided not to kill you? Poor man! . . . Helen, you're impossible!"

"Why impossible, Charitas? Obvious and innocent, I think," said Helen. "Far more moral, I claim, than the world in which I have tried to lead a good life. If you had had my experience, and had grown used as I have to the odd turns things take, you'd either say that our ideas of justice have no basis in experience, or else that our misfortunes are the work of powers above us, who use us for their own purposes. Love, for instance. You'd better lift up your hands to it. It's terrible as well as beautiful. It isn't what you think it is, Charitas--it isn't just a word for a feeling we have."

"I haven't gone into the subject so deeply as you have," said Charitas. "No doubt you've talked this over many a time with Paris. You haven't said much about Paris."

"I loved him," said Helen, "and he is dead. What would you like me to say about him?"

"You don't mind my asking, do you?" said Charitas. "I wondered how he fitted into your philosophy. You loved him enough to run away with him, but now that he is dead you seem rather tranquil about it. Helen, it does make you seem hard-hearted; you ought to appear sad, anyway."

"If I tell you the truth, you'll not understand me," said Helen, "but the truth is, it wasn't Paris I loved; I loved something he made me think of. At first I thought I loved him--afterwards I loved, and always shall, what I thought was Paris. First I loved him, then I was sorry for him."

"That's what I have against romance," said Charitas, "the disillusion afterwards."

"Ah, you've heard of it?" asked Helen.

"Yes," said Charitas, "and in your case the disillusion must have made you feel it was an unusually bad mistake. That's why I can't see much in your philosophy of innocence, Helen."

"If that illusion was a bad mistake, Charitas, then most marriages are a fatal error. Please understand why I was sorry for Paris; I felt that he too was lost in a madness, lost for something not me, for something I made him dream of, something he would never find--lost as I was lost. But it happens in marriage too, if you begin with love. Many a good husband is a lost man. When it comes to that, Charitas, how about the wives? Isn't it my turn to ask how your own heart has weathered the years?"

"I don't think I could speak of anything so intimate, Helen, not even to you. Besides, I've nothing to tell. My husband and I have been entirely faithful to each other."

"But might not be," said Helen, "if there were a beautiful serving-girl in the house. As for yourself, Charitas, do you mean you are still in the heyday of amorous illusion, or do you feel virtuous because you have always managed to care for other men a little less, even, than you have cared for your husband?"

"Don't talk that way, Helen; it hurts. I confess I'm old-fashioned. I like the old ways of men and women."

"Adraste likes them, too," said Helen. "She seems to have met a friend at the end of your garden. He's been talking with her most confidentially, not to say affectionately, for the last fifteen minutes."

"Kind gods!" cried Charitas, "that's my boy Damastor! There, I told you, Helen, I told you!"

VII

Hermione was Helen's child, but Menelaus was her father. She had his dark hair, his black eyes, and his kind of regal bearing. She had the manner of knowing who she was. Helen was queenly by birth, Hermione by inheritance. She was not beautiful herself, but she called beauty to mind, and she had an admirable character. The world, she thought, might be set straight by intelligence and resolution. She was disposed to do her part. She stood before Helen now, tall and slender, much at ease, wondering why her mother had sent for her.

"Hermione, I find certain scandalous rumours circulating about me here in Sparta. Perhaps you can explain them."

"Which do you refer to, mother?"

"So you have heard of them. I must know their source, if possible, in order to stop them. Scandal is always annoying, and usually it is unnecessary."

"At times, mother, it is inevitable."

"Never," said Helen. "I've met people who thought so, but I don't share their view. In any case, the question hardly concerns us. I wish to get at the bottom of these stories in which I figure rather discreditably. When did they first come to your attention?"

"I'd rather forget than talk about them, mother."

"We'll dispose of them first and forget them afterwards," said Helen. "Since there are several of these stories, which did you hear of first, and when?"

"There's the legend," said Hermione, "that you deserted your husband and ran away with Paris to Troy. I first heard of it immediately after you went."

"But that's not scandal," said Helen, "that's the truth."

"If that's not scandal, I don't know what it is."

"I see you don't," said her mother. "In scandal there's always some falsehood, something malicious and defamatory. Scandal, to my mind, is such a story as I heard yesterday afternoon from Charitas. She says I never was at Troy at all. Paris carried me off, against my will, and some valuable furniture, too. The winds blew us to Egypt--you know the absurd tale? Well, that's what I call scandal. What should I be doing in Egypt? And should I have gone off with Paris if he had been a thief?"

"The furniture was missing," said Hermione, "and you must admit, mother, Paris was the natural one to blame, since he--well, he did--what he did."

"What did he do?" asked Helen. "You were an infant at the time; I'd like to hear your account of the episode. Perhaps you supplied the malicious part of the scandal. Paris didn't steal me, as you were about to say, I was quite willing. But if he had stolen me, I'd prefer to think he would have had no margin of interest left for the furniture."

Hermione said nothing.

"Well?" said Helen.

"Mother, this is a terrible subject--I'd rather avoid it," said Hermione. "It isn't a subject for a girl to be talking to her mother about."

"What isn't?" said Helen.

"The character of the man who--who seduced you," said Hermione.

"Nobody seduced me, and I have not desired your opinion of Paris. You were a year old when he saw you last. What I want to know is something you may be able to tell me--how did these scandals begin?"

"If you insist on our coming to an understanding," said Hermione, "I think you oughtn't to turn the discussion from its natural path. I didn't want to say anything, but if we talk of it at all, it is a question of Paris. Of course, when he left I had no opinion of him, but I have one now. I don't think highly of him. He's dead--and all that, but his conduct has seemed to me, still seems, shocking."

"My impression is that he couldn't help it," said Helen. "You'll admit I was in a better position to understand him. But that's not the point. How did such a story begin? Do you know?"

"Since you are determined to find out," said Hermione, "I made up all the stories myself."

"That's what I gathered from Charitas," said Helen. "I'm glad you have the frankness to own it. Oh, Hermione, how could you tell those lies? You needn't answer; it's the result of my leaving you--you had no bringing up."

"You hurt me," cried Hermione, "you hurt me with the hard things you say and the cool way you say them! I try to be dutiful, I call you mother, but we don't belong to each other. If you were human you'd know why I did what I could to save your name, to keep even a wild chance it might be a mistake, to support at least a little good opinion for you to return to--if you came back. Don't look at me so--you've no right to! If I had a daughter telling me such truth as I'm telling you, I'd feel shame--I couldn't be so shining and serene!"

Helen continued radiant and serene. "Respectability based on falsehood," she said. "That's what your love for me suggested. I've seen it tried before, Hermione, you're very like your father. Like my sister, too, I'm sorry to see. By the way, have you seen Orestes in my absence?"

"From time to time," said Hermione--"that is, not very often."

"What if you had?" asked Helen. "It wouldn't be a crime, would it?"

Hermione said nothing.

"You needn't blush," said Helen, "it's not your daughter speaks to you as yet; it's only your mother, who embarrasses you with her liking for sincerity. As a matter of fact, I've no doubt you've seen your cousin frequently."

Hermione said nothing.

"There's nothing to be ashamed of, if you have," her mother went on; "we once planned that you should marry him, and I dare say he likes you. I raised the question merely to examine your character a bit further. You lacked courage about me, but I could excuse that--you're young, and mine is an unusual case. But you ought to have enough courage to tell the truth about your own blameless life. You thought my reputation would be improved by those extraordinary tales; will you tell me what your reputation can gain by lack of frankness?"

"Orestes has been here often, I suppose," said Hermione, "but it doesn't seem often. Perhaps that's because I'm in love with him, as he is with me. I should have told you before, but I thought you didn't care for him."

"I don't care for him," said Helen, "but then I don't intend to marry him. Do you? You see the dilemma you've placed yourself in. If you wished to marry him, yet gave him up because I disapproved, I'd know you valued my opinion--and I'd know you weren't altogether in love. But if you are to marry him anyway, and defer to my opinion only by concealing your intentions, then I'm not flattered, and I foresee no happiness in your marriage. In marriage, if anywhere, you need the courage of your convictions, at least at the beginning."

"You hurt me so," cried Hermione, "I'm tempted to speak plainly enough to satisfy even you! I don't know whether it's the courage of my convictions, or just that I'm angry, but I don't admire your kind of courage, nor the kind of man you ran away with, nor your ideas about scandal! I still have some impulse--I don't know why I have it--to spare you the things you don't like but which can't be helped. I'm not so old as you, but I don't feel very young. I've grown up watching what you call your unusual career, and I realise without the slightest shame that I'm more old-fashioned than you are; I like the respectability you seem to dread, I want a lover I can settle down with and be true to, I'm going to have an orderly home. I'm sorry I tried to save your reputation for you, since you prefer it the other way, but no great harm was done--none of your friends really believed me. What I did was out of duty, I have no reason to love you, I owe you gratitude for nothing. You never made me happy, you never made anyone happy, not even those who loved you--not my father nor Paris, nor any of them. Paris must have seen--he was a fool to take you."

Hermione was a bit amazed, and on the whole gratified, at her own indignation and spirit. She felt it was a big moment. Helen, too, strange to say, seemed pleased.

"Now you are telling the truth," she said. "Thank heaven you are beginning, though it's at the bottom, where we so often begin--with unpleasant things about others. But I'd rather hear this than those silly fabrications of yours. Correct at every point; you have no reason to love me, and none to be grateful. As for Paris, I've often wondered why he loved me. For the same reason, I suspect, that your father didn't kill me, that night in Troy. I told Paris precisely what you have said--that I had made no one happy. I also told him that no man had made me happy--that what promised to be immortal ecstasy would prove but a moment, brief and elusive, that our passion would bring misery after it, that for him it would probably bring death. With his eyes open, and I can't say he was a fool, he chose our love. Or perhaps there was no choice. But surely your father knew the worst when he came to find me, sword in hand and murder in his heart. He had every right to kill me, and I thought he would. Or perhaps I didn't think so."

Hermione was put out that her mother wasn't angry. It seemed her turn to speak, but she couldn't get her wits together; she felt unexpectedly exhausted. She had been standing for some time; now she sat down on the couch beside her mother.

"Your facts are correct," Helen went on, "but some aspects of them you are too young to understand. I ought to have made you happy--one's child ought to be happy. But not one's lover; I deny any obligation there. If we only knew beforehand, and accepted the implications, that happiness is the last thing to ask of love! A divine realisation of life, yes, an awakening to the world outside and to the soul within--but not happiness. Hermione, I wish I could teach you now that a man or a woman loved is simply the occasion of a dream. The stronger the love, as we say, the clearer and more lifelike seems the vision. To make your lover altogether happy would be a contradiction of terms; if he's really your lover he will see in you far more than you are, but if you prove less than he sees, he will be unhappy."

"Don't you think you're a peculiar case?" said Hermione. "To you love may be this uncertain kind of trouble, but to other people, as far as I've observed them about here, it's a fairly normal, reliable happiness. At least they don't talk as you do, they look comfortable, and they congratulate the young who have agreed to marry."

"My dear child," said Helen, "I am a peculiar case--everyone is who has known love. But there's some general wisdom about the matter which I'd share with you if I could. It's useless to try. You'll have to learn for yourself when you fall in love."

"I am in love," said Hermione--"with Orestes."

"Yes, child, in love--but not deeply. I dare say he has never disappointed you, as yet."

"Never!"

"The early stage," said Helen. "We have to build up the illusion before we can be disappointed."

"I've a new light on scandal," said Hermione, "and I'll do my best to grasp your idea of love. May I ask you a personal question? I suppose this theory ought to apply to you as well as to the men who loved you. Has love for you, too, always been a mistake?"

"Never a mistake," said Helen, "always an illusion."

"So when you ran off with Paris, it wasn't really Paris you loved--as you found out later?"

"You might say that--it wasn't the real Paris."

"But you'll admit you hadn't the excuse you give me, of inexperience," said Hermione. "You had already loved my father, and I suppose had found out that he, too, wasn't what you wanted. You shouldn't have been deceived a second time."

"I married your father," said Helen; "I never said I loved him. But not to shock you and not to misrepresent myself, let me say I've always been fond of Menelaus, and he's an impeccable husband. Yet your argument would miss the point, even if I had been passionate over him. I should then have to confess the same disillusion in my love for Menelaus as in my love for Paris, but perhaps I preferred my illusion for Paris. It's the illusion you fall in love with. And no matter how often it occurs, no matter how wise you are as to what the end will be, one more illusion is welcome--for only while it lasts do we catch a vision of our best selves. In that sense, as I understand it, love is a disease, and incurable."

"Well, then," said Hermione, "when once a person has occasioned in you this divine vision of yourself, you might keep the happiness if you never saw the person again?"

"That's a profound insight," said Helen, "but to be so wise would be inhuman."

"One other question, mother--does father think as you do?"

"I doubt it, but you never can tell," said Helen. "Your father hasn't spoken to me at any length about his ideas of love--not for a long time."

"I'm sure he wouldn't agree with you," said Hermione, "and neither do I. Your praise of truth gives me courage to say I don't think all the people I know, except you, are wrong, nor that what seems their happiness is an illusion. For myself I want the kind of happiness I believe they really have. I shall never understand how you, so beautiful and so clever, with a husband you had chosen yourself from so many splendid suitors, could throw yourself away on that person from Asia. I've tried to imagine just what was your state of mind when you ran off with him, but I can't."

"No, in that direction," said Helen, "you failed rather notably. I come back to the scandal you spread. You told Charitas I went away because I couldn't help myself--Paris took me by force."

"It seemed the kindest version."

"Oh--was there a choice of versions? What have I escaped--which were the others?"

"Oh, what's the use, mother?" said Hermione. "I've owned up about the stories, and since you don't like them, I'm sorry. You only make me angry by the way you examine me. I tried to do right, but you make me feel cheap."

"If you were trying to do right, you have no cause to feel cheap," said Helen. "But I suspect you were uncomfortable even at the time; I credit you with too much intelligence to think you knew what you were talking about."

"I knew what I was about--I was telling a lie, for your sake, and also for the sake of the rest of us. I could have told more than one lie; I tried to choose the best. The first I thought of wouldn't do--I had it out of old-fashioned poetry--that situation you get so often where the gods deceive the lover by a spell, and he doesn't know who it is he takes in his arms, but afterward his eyes are cleared and he knows he's been tricked. I was so desperate at first, I thought of saying Aphrodite enchanted you, so you thought it was Menelaus, but it turned out to be Paris. Don't smile--I didn't waste much time on that threadbare poetry. Then I could have said you went with Paris willingly, but that was so obviously disreputable, and I couldn't explain it away. Besides, it was just what people were thinking. I saw it must be Paris taking you by force."

"Very strange, considering what I was telling you only a moment ago about love," said Helen, "but that first idea isn't threadbare poetry, and if you had told it I should never have called it scandal, for it's the truth. Paris couldn't have stolen me against my will. In a sense I went of my own accord. But in the deepest sense the story would have been true--it was the spell."

"Now really, mother, that's too much--not that--not at this late date!"

"Truth, Hermione, profound truth! You always think it's Menelaus you're embracing, and it turns out to be Paris."

"I give you my word, mother, never in my life have I heard a remark more cynical!"

"On the contrary," said Helen, "it's one of the most optimistic remarks you will ever hear, especially coming from me. You don't understand yet, and many who ought to know seem reluctant to tell, but in love there's always a natural enchantment of passion to draw us on, and when the enchantment dies as it must, there remains behind it either a disillusion, or a beautiful reality, a friendship, a comradeship, a harmony. This wonder behind the passing spell I've never yet found, but I have always sought it, and I persist in believing it may be there."

"If we all lived on your plan," said Hermione, "I don't see what would become of people. We haven't the right to lead our own lives--"

"If we don't lead our own life," said Helen, "we are in danger of trying to lead someone else's."

"I mean, we're not alone in the world," said Hermione. "You can talk me down, but I wonder you don't realise how queer your sense of proportion looks. You take me to task because I spread a story about you--false, I'll admit, but in the circumstances remarkably generous and favourable. Yet you have been preaching ideas here, with your quiet voice and those innocent eyes of yours, ideas which would make us all wicked if we followed them. Telling a little falsehood for a kind purpose doesn't seem to me so bad as destroying homes and bringing on war and taking men to their death."

"It wouldn't seem so bad," said Helen, "unless you asked what started the destroying of homes, the war and death. You might find that the remote cause was a little falsehood for a kind purpose. If we all lived on my plan, you said. I have no plan, except to be as sincere as possible. We certainly are not alone in the world, and the first condition of living satisfactorily with the others, I think, is to be entirely truthful with them. How can anything be kind that is partly a lie? And you don't see what would become of people! Well, what's becoming of them now? Ever since I returned I've noticed how the kind ways of our fathers, the manners wise men agreed on for each other's happiness, can be turned to very mean uses. Charitas came over to see me at once. What could be kinder than to welcome an old friend home? Had she any honest business in my house if she didn't come as a friend? I've returned the call, and I know her through and through. She told me the legends you tried to circulate; of course she hoped they weren't true. She hoped for the worst. What she wanted when she rushed over here was the first bloom of the gossip, news of my most intimate experiences, to discuss my wickedness more specifically with the neighbours. And then, poor woman, she's never had any adventures herself. I disappointed her. She got no news, and made it clear that I am an entirely moral woman."

"Mother! How could you?" said Hermione.

"I won't go into the argument now," said Helen--"I'm growing tired of myself as a theme for conversation, and it's you I wanted to talk about. But I might leave this suggestion with you--that of all those who went to Troy on my account, I'm the only one who returned with an unimpaired sense of morality. If this talk has opened your eyes in the least degree, you may watch the people around you, and watch yourself, and you'll see what I mean. We have the right to lead our own lives--you've the right even to marry Orestes, though I still hope you won't. But that right implies another--to suffer the consequences. If I'd been home to train you properly, I shouldn't be telling you now that for intelligent people the time for repentance is in advance. Do your best, and if it's a mistake, hide nothing and be glad to suffer for it. That's morality. I don't observe much of it in this neighbourhood."

"It's only fair to remember," said Hermione, "that Charitas has been a good friend to me in your absence. She'd be astonished if she knew what you think of her."

"She knows now, and she is astonished," said Helen. "I consider her a dangerous woman. Mark my words, she'll do a lot of harm. What sort of boy is that son of hers?"

"Damastor? Oh, he's all right," said Hermione. "He hasn't his mother's steadiness of character, but he's harmless. He's devoted to Charitas."

"What do you mean by harmless?" asked Helen.

"Oh, he's well-behaved, sheltered and quiet, a bit young even for his years."

"You must admire his type," said Helen.

"What, Damastor?" cried Hermione.

"His mother says he's devoted to you."

"To me? I scarcely know him! Oh, I've seen him at his mother's, but not often. He's shown no signs of devotion, thank heaven! I've thought of him as a mere child."

"Then he hasn't been calling on you lately?"

"Never--who told you that?"

"Charitas. She says he told her. I thought myself it wasn't so. They're a very respectable family. No more than the normal amount of lying, I dare say. You might do worse."