She rapped sharply on the door and the guard opened it immediately and carried in a bucket of water. Soon a smith came and removed my fetters. The old vestal bade me take off my dirty clothes; then she washed me with her own hands, and anointed and braided my hair. When she had finished, the guard extended a basket from which she took a shirt of the finest wool and slipped it over me. But on my shoulders she placed a coarse brown mantle similar to her own. Finally she placed a wreath of oak leaves and acorns on my head.
“You are ready to leave,” she said. “But remember, everything must happen secretly and without the knowledge of the people. Go, therefore. Hasten, holy deer. The field brothers are waiting to escort you to the city border and they will protect you should someone recognize you. You see, for the first time during the republic the consul has revoked a sentence. But the people do not know that.”
Taking me by the hand she led me up from the damp cell and a guard opened the gate for us. As we stepped into the market place I saw that a heavy fog had covered the market place so that the field brothers who awaited us in their gray mantles and wreaths of wheatears seemed like ghosts in the mist.
The vestal said, “You can see for yourself-the gods have descended upon the city as mist to shield your departure.”
She thrust me forward and I did not turn to bid her farewell, for something told me that a woman such as she was expected no farewell or thanks. The holy mist deadened the sound of footsteps and cartwheels as the field brothers who surrounded me steadied my faltering steps, for I was still weak after my illness.
On the bridge the guards turned their backs to us and for the last time I crossed the Roman bridge, smelled the stench of cattle manure and heard the creak of the worn planks under my feet. But the fog was so thick that I could not distinguish the water of the Tiber, although I heard it splash gently against the pillars as though bidding me farewell.
At the northern boundary the brothers wrapped their mantles about them and sat in a circle around me on the fog-dampened ground. The wind began to blow and the mists to disperse as solemnly they broke a barley loaf and each, from the eldest to youngest, took a piece and ate. The eldest poured red wine into a clay vessel which passed from hand to hand. But they did not offer any to me.
A strengthening north wind tore the mist into shreds and swept the sky clean. As the sun began to shine they rose as one man, hung a leather knapsack on my back, and pushed me across the border into the land of the Etruscans. In my heart I knew that what they did was right. The north wind blew triumphantly in my face, the blood began to flow warmly in my veins, but I did not recognize the earth that my feet trod.
7.
The north was my fate and I wandered freer than ever before, for I had discarded my old life as I would a tattered garment. After my illness I felt as light and airy as though my feet had wings and did not even touch the earth’s dust. The sunshine was intoxicating, the green of the budding meadows soothed my eyes, and I smiled as I wandered. Spring wandered with me with twittering birds, swelling streams, gentle days.
I did not hurry but rested often in the homes of shepherds and the round huts of poor farmers. The water tasted fresh in my mouth. The bread was delectable. I regained my strength and felt my body was cleansed of life’s deadening poisons and the oppression of deeds, thoughts and tormenting reason. I was free, I was happy, I was blissfully alone as I wandered.
Then came the hills with shadows of clouds gliding over them. And at last, after weeks of wandering, I saw fertile fields, sloping vineyards, silver-gray olive groves and ancient fig trees. Atop its mountain rose a city with its grassy wall, archways and colorful buildings. But I did not turn toward it. Profound yearning compelled me instead to leave the road and climb through thickets straight to the peak of the next mountain. Birds startled into flight flew ahead of me to the mountain and a fox lying at the mouth of its den flashed ahead of me up the mountainside. A proud deer rose from a clump of bushes, lifted its antlers and also ran lightly before me. Stones under my feet rolled down the slope, my mantle was torn and my breath quickened from the effort, but as I struggled upward I felt the approach of holiness. Moment by moment it became stronger until I no longer was merely myself. I was one with earth and sky, air and mountain. I was more than myself.
I saw the entrances to the tombs, the holy pillars before them, the shelters of the stonecutters and painters. I saw the holy stairs but still I did not pause. I rose above the tombs to the highest peak of the mountain.
Suddenly a storm broke. The sky arched above me cloudlessly but the wind blew as it will blow when, in a new human body, I will ascend the steps of my tomb holding in my hand the stones of this life. Although my writing may disappear and my memory fail, I shall read the events of this life pebble by pebble and a storm will again blow from a clear sky over my mountaintop.
To the north I saw a lake. In the distance, surrounded by hazy mountains, it gleamed bluely and I knew it was my lake, my beautiful lake. I felt as though I could hear the rustle of reeds in my ears, smell the shores and taste the fresh water. As the storm roared I turned my glance westward over the tombs to where the goddess’s mountain rose in a bluish cone. This too I recognized. Only then did I let my glance wander down the steps lined with painted pillars and follow the holy road across the plain and up the slope on the other side of the fields. And there I recognized my city. This rolling land with its hazy, beautiful slopes was my land and my father’s land. In my feet and in my heart I had recognized it already upon crossing the border and as the shadows of clouds had leaped toward me from peak to peak.
Overcome with a glorious intoxication, I dropped to my knees and kissed the land that had given me birth. I kissed the earth, my mother, in gratitude for having finally found my home after my long wandering.
As I descended the slope, shapeless beings of light darted across the sky. I looked into the black darkness of the sacrificial well and stepped before the tombs. I did not hesitate but laid my hand on the round summit of a pillar decorated with graceful startled deer, and whispered brokenly, “My father, my father, your son has returned!”
I sank to the warm ground before my father’s tomb and an inexpressible feeling of peace and security swept over me. The sun set behind the graceful cone of the goddess’s mountain, coloring the hills and the painted images on the temple roofs beyond the valley. It grew dark and I slept.
In the middle of the night I awakened to the rumble of thunder. The wind roared, the clouds loosed warm rain, and thunderbolts flashed around me. Suddenly the earth beneath me trembled as lightning struck the peak before me and the smell of the cleft stone filled my nostrils. My limbs began to move as the ancient dance came upon me. In the warm rain I joyously raised my arms and danced the lightning dance as I once had danced the storm dance on the road to Delphi.
When I awakened, stiff with cold, the sun was shining brightly. I sat up to rub my limbs and saw that the stonecutters and painters had paused on their way to work and were staring at me with frightened eyes. When I moved they stepped back and the guard of the tombs raised his holy staff. Then along a winding path came the lightning priest dressed in his robe of authority and wearing a wreath on his head.
The guard hastened toward him, raising his voice, shouted, “Lo, when I arrived I found a brown-clad stranger before the royal tomb of Lars Porsenna. Upon my arrival a doe sprang to her feet and fled, but a flock of white doves swooped across the valley from the goddess’s mountain and surrounded the sleeper. Then the workers came and awakened him.”
The priest said, “I saw bright flashes of lightning in the middle of the night and came to see what had happened on the sacred mountain.” He stepped before me and looked at me sharply. Suddenly he covered his eyes with his left hand and raised his right arm in greeting as though I were a god.
“I recognize your face,” he said and began to tremble. “I recognize you by your statues and the paintings of you. Who are you and what do you want?”
“I have sought and found,” I said. “In my heart I knocked until the door was opened. I, Turms, have returned home. I am my father’s son.”
An old weather-beaten stonecutter flung down his tools, dropped to the ground and began to weep. “It is he, I recognize him! Our king has returned to us alive, as fair as he was in the best days of his manhood.”
He would have embraced my knees but I forbade it, protesting, “No, no, you are mistaken. I am not a king.”
Some of the workers ran to the city to spread the news of my arrival. The priest said, “I saw the thunderbolts. Your arrival has been discussed among the consecrated for nine years. Many feared that you would
