mother. My whole being seemed suddenly to have broadened and brightness shone within me. The girl approached me, felt my knees and shoulders and rubbed her body against my loins. My strength seemed to ebb away and my armpits perspired so that beads of sweat ran down my sides. But Hierofila boxed the girl’s ears and pushed her away.
“You recognize your mother,” she said. “Why don’t you greet your. father?”
I shook my head in bewilderment. “I have never known my father or my origin.”
Hierofila began to speak in a godlike voice. “My son, you will know yourself when you lay your hand on the round summit of your father’s tombstone. I see your lake, I see your mountain, I see your city. Seek and you will find. Knock and it will be opened unto you. And when you return from the sealed gate remember me.”
Suddenly she exclaimed, “Look behind you!”
I did so but saw nothing, although the flames which blazed brightly in the draft illumined every corner of the cave. I shook my head.
In apparent amazement Hierofila placed her palm on my forehead and urged, “Look again. Do you not see the goddess? Taller and fairer than mortals, she is looking at you and extending her arms. A mural crown is on her head. She is the moon goddess and also the goddess of the fountain. She is the goddess of foam and deer, cypress and myrtle.”
I looked again but saw no goddess with a mural crown. Instead, another form began to take shape before my eyes-a stiff form, bent forward like a vessel’s prow, grew from the stone wall of the cave. It was tightly robed in white and its face was sheathed in bandages. Silent, motionless, the shape leaned forward stiffly. Its position was expectant and indicative.
Hierofila took her hand from my forehead and asked tremblingly, “What do you see?”
“He is motionless,” I said. “His face is wrapped in linen bands and he is indicating the north.”
At that moment the roar in my ears became supernal, whiteness dazzled my eyes and I fell unconscious to the ground. When I awakened I seemed to be flying through space with the starry sky above and the earth below, the roar still echoing in my ears. Only when I opened my eyes did I realize that I was lying on the stone floor of the cave while Hierofila knelt beside me chafing my hands and the girl was wiping my forehead and temples with a cloth dipped in wine.
Hierofila said in her quavering old woman’s voice, “Your arrival has been predicted and you have been recognized. But don’t tie your heart to the earth. Search only for yourself that you may acknowledge yourself, you immortal.”
I ate bread and drank wine with her as she told me about her visions. Then when I finally stepped out of the cave a ray of sunlight struck a tiny pebble on the ground before me. It was a dull white transparent pebble with an oval shape and as I placed it among the other stones of my life in the pouch around my neck for the first time I comprehended that the picking up of the pebble signified the end of one era in my life and the beginning of another.
Making my way from the cave in a daze, I rejoined my comrades and together we returned to the city where Demadotos interpreted the oracle’s prophecy in his own way. He allowed us to sail from Cumae, but first he removed the emblems from our vessels and carefully put them in his treasure vault without sending them to Gelon. Nor did we care about the emblems; nothing made any difference so long as we could leave that unfriendly city.
6.
In the harbor of Tarquinia we handed our leaking vessels over to the guards. When we went on shore, however, the people did not greet us but turned their backs and covered their heads. The alleys emptied before us. Such sorrow did we bring to the land of the Etruscans. And so we parted silently from one another in the harbor.
I myself accompanied the ten or so Tarquinian survivors to the city, where Lars Arnth received us with deep concern but without a word of reproach. He merely listened to our story and gave us gifts. When the others had left he asked me to remain.
“It is useless for even the bravest man to struggle against Fate, which not even the gods control. I mean the gods whose number and holy names we know and to whom we sacrifice. The veiled gods, whom we don’t know, are above everything, perhaps even above Fate.”
“Blame me, abuse me, strike me,” I begged. “I would feel better.”
Lars Arnth smiled his sadly beautiful smile and said, “You are not to blame, Turms. You were merely the messenger. But I am in a difficult position. The leaders of our four hundred families are divided, with those who are friendly toward the Greeks censuring me bitterly for having needlessly antagonized them. Imported goods have become more expensive and the Attic vases that we are accustomed to placing in our rulers’ tombs are obtainable only at usurious prices. Who could have foretold the Greeks’ success against the Persian king? But I believe they are only using our expedition to Sicily as a pretext to destroy our trade.”
He laid his hands on my shoulders and continued: “Far too many of our people already admire Greek culture and adopt the spirit of skepticism and derision that everywhere accompanies the Greeks. Only the inland cities are still sacred, for our seaports are unholy and poisoned. Don’t remain in Tarquinia, Turms, for soon you may be stoned as a stranger who interfered in Etruscan affairs.”
I opened my robe and showed him the barely healed wound in my side and the blisters in my palms. “At least I have risked my life for the Etruscan cause,” I said bitterly. “It is not my fault that I was lucky and returned alive.”
Lars Arnth looked uncomfortable, avoided my eyes and said, “To me you are not a stranger, Turms. I know better and recognize you just as my father immediately recognized you. But for political reasons I must avoid trouble. Not even for your own sake would I wish an unknowing people to stone you.”
He banished me from his city with assurances of friendship although as a wealthy man he did not realize that I had been impoverished. I had long since used the gold chain that Xenodotos had given me, for in Cumae we survivors had shared everything. I had to sell my notched sword and dented shield in Tarquinia and as the wintery winds blew down from the mountains I wandered on foot to Rome by way of Caere, for I was too thin and feverish to work my passage on a cargo vessel.
When I finally stood at the top of Janiculum and looked down on the yellow river, the bridge, the wall and the temples beyond, I saw that the destruction had extended as far as Rome. But in the midst of the wasteland I found my own summer house unharmed, and Misme ran toward me on brown legs, her eyes shining with happiness.
“We have lived through alarming times,” she explained. “We didn’t even have time to flee to Rome as you suggested. But the men of Veii thrust holy stakes in our yard and thereafter no one disturbed us or even stole our cattle. We have had a good harvest and hidden it. Now we will become wealthy, for the price of grain has risen in Rome. Surely, now that we have taken such good care of everything, you will buy me a new garment and shoes for my feet.”
I realized that my house had been spared through the thoughtfulness of Lars Arnth. But in meaning well he did me only harm, for as soon as I stepped on the bridge to Rome I was arrested, turned over to a lictor, and placed in a dungeon in the Mamertine prison. On cold nights the water on the floor of the cell froze, rotting straw was my bed, and I had to fight with the rats for the food which I myself had to supply. My fever increased, I had hallucinations, and when I rarely regained my senses I thought I was dying.
Because of my illness I could not be tried and condemned. In truth, the officials considered me an insignificant person and my arrest was merely a political move to provide the people with a scapegoat in the unsuccessful war. Little attention was paid me and the consuls were unconcerned about my fate.
But I did not die. My fever diminished and one morning I awakened with a clear head but so weak that I could hardly raise a hand. When the guard saw that I had recovered he permitted Misme to see me. Day after day she had walked the long distance to the city and back again after waiting in vain at the prison gate. But the food that she had brought me saved my life, for the guard said that I had eaten and drunk during my lucid moments although I did not remember it.
Upon seeing me Misme burst into tears, sank onto the dirty straw and fed me with her own hands, forcing
