HECUBA Shh, shh, daughter. The messenger brings only what he’s given. What are you given now, Talthybius?
TALTHYBIUS Some word about your children, Priam’s Queen. (He casts about for some acceptable part of the message) Cassandra. I bring word of Cassandra.
HECUBA (Nodding) She went quite mad, you know. She ran throughout the palace, up and down, dancing with Hymen’s torches in her hands, whirling until she’d set fire to her hair. We threw wet blankets on her, holding her until the flame was out. Her nuptials shall light a funeral pyre, or so she says. What else is there to know about Cassandra?
TALTHYBIUS Agamemnon will take her home with him. She pleases him.
ANDROMACHE One can account so little for some things. He’s pleased with her? Then he is likely pleased to taunt the Gods and court his own destruction. What will he do with her?
TALTHYBIUS He will bed her, I think, madam.
ANDROMACHE Hell bed the virgin priestess of Athena! When he is done, then will he curse at Zeus and piss upon the image of Apollo? Or is he turned by madness that he seeks a mate most like himself…?
HECUBA Shh, shh, daughter. Do not curse the Greeks who seem well able to proscribe themselves. So, Talthybius. Agamemnon will take Cassandra. What of Polyxena?
TALTHYBIUS (After an uncomfortable pause) She was assigned by lot, as were you all.
HECUBA Where? To whom? What Greek takes Polyxena?
TALTHYBIUS She has been assigned to serve the tomb of Achilles.
HECUBA Slave to a graven tomb! How dreadful for her. She loves the lively arts, Talthybius. Dancing. Eating. To think that she must serve Achilles’ tomb.
TALTHYBIUS Count her as happy, Queen. Her fate frees her from troubles that still follow you….
HECUBA What troubles have I? So, I’ll be a slave. When thousands lie unburied on the field, when blood runs down to feed the summer trees, does slavery count for much?
TALTHYBIUS YOU will be slave to Odysseus.
HECUBA His ownership will be as short as my subservience, Talthybius. I am an old woman. See. My hair is white.
TALTHYBIUS (Leaning down to look at her closely) You have years yet.
HECUBA (She fumbles in her skirt again, then removes her hands and clenches them in front of her, staring at them. There is a pause) My daughter Cassandra says not.
TALTHYBIUS NO one believes Cassandra. As for Andromache….
ANDROMACHE I’LL be a slave. I know it already. I say with my husband’s mother that my slavery will be brief.
TALTHYBIUS But you are young yet.
ANDROMACHE SO I am.
HECUBA Enough, Talthybius. You have told us enough for one visit. Croak somewhere else for a time.
TALTHYBIUS Queen, I cannot.
ANDROMACHE Oh? Do you bear some vomit yet?
HECUBA Shh, shh.
TALTHYBIUS Your son, Andromache….
ANDROMACHE DO not tell me of any wickedness which would wrest a suckling from his mother’s arms. Don’t tell me he’ll be taken from my care to grow to manhood in some other house.
TALTHYBIUS I will not tell you that.
ANDROMACHE He’ll go with me? You would not leave him here?
TALTHYBIUS (Sadly) Here, yes. On his father’s soil. In his father’s place.
ANDROMACHE Whose words are these?
TALTHYBIUS Odysseus spoke before the Achaeans, extolling Hector’s glory. He said that they could ill afford to rear a hero’s son lest he rise up when he is grown and venge him for his father’s death.
ANDROMACHE They will leave him here? With some shepherd, some potter, some lowly family?
TALTHYBIUS Here among these stones. Thrown to his death from Troy’s new-riven walls. So they have said.
ANDROMACHE (Screams and clings to her child. Talthybius summons the guards who help him wrest the child from her. He then ascends the stair of tumbled stone, she crying after him) I call doom upon you, Talthybius, and those who sent you here. I call doom upon their ships and on their men. I call the Furies down. Oh do not, do not. Give him to me. He is only a little child. My milk is still warm on his lips. Gods, Talthybius, they’ll curse you—don’t. (She screams and weeps)
HECUBA (Holding her) Andromache. Love. Daughter. Sweet girl. Oh why didn’t I, when I had the chance— oh why didn’t I? Oh here, hold on to me. How can they do this to a baby…?
(There is a cry from the top of the wall, a high, piercing sound, like a bird. They look up. Talthybius has thrown the child from the walls. The guards are all looking down. The ghostly figure of Iphigenia wanders near them….)
“I think this is my entrance coming up,” said Stavia, filling grain bowls for them. “Aren’t you tired of reading, Corrig?”
“I love the sound of my own voice. Now, get ready, you’re almost on.” He went on reading.
HECUBA Who’s that? Who walks on these walls among the warriors?
“The cry comes again,” quoted Stavia from memory, “and the ghost of Iphigenia is seen. In her arms, she carries the ghost of the child, as she descends the stair.”
ANDROMACHE DO warriors have no pity that they do these things? What stomachs them? Are men made up of iron? What do they use for hearts? Do they not see we are the same as they, our children like their children, and our flesh like that of women whom they left behind?
IPHIGENIA (Crying like a seabird) What difference would it make? They do the same to their own.
ANDROMACHE Who calls? Is that my child?
IPHIGENIA (Holding out the baby) Your child? Or some other’s child? Two children dead. One virgin girl, one suckling boy. See, here we are, wandering together. (She dances)
HECUBA (Frightened) Who are you?
IPHIGENIA Agamemnon’s daughter, come from Hades’ realm to seek revenge on him who killed her.
HECUBA Daughter of Agamemnon? The man who says he’ll take Cassandra?
IPHIGENIA Ah well, we know the truth of that, old woman. He will not take her far nor keep her long. And you need not curse him. I’ve cursed him quite enough without your curses.
ANDROMACHE Is that my child?
IPHIGENIA If I am my father’s child, this is your child. No, this
