Robert Sheckley - Agamemnon's Run

"Everyone thinks you had your daughter killed," Dionysus said.

"They're wrong! There's that version of the story that says I didn't. That's the one I'm going with. But that bitch Clytemnestra and her sleazy boyfriend Aegisthus won't buy it. They've got guards out all over the city with orders to kill me on sight."

"So what are you going to do?"

"I need a way out of this! Can you help me? Isn't there some way I can get out of this whole mess?"

"Maybe there is," Dionysus said. "But you'd have to ask Tiresias for specifics."

"Tiresias? He's dead, isn't he?"

"What does that matter? He was the supreme magician of the ancient world. He'd be glad to talk to you. He likes talking to live ones."

"But how do I get to the underworld?"

"You must kill someone, then intercept the Charon-function when it comes to carry off the shade, and accompany them across the Styx."

"I don't want to kill anyone. I've had enough of that."

"Then find someone on the point of death and it'll still work."

"But who?"

"What about Cassandra?"

"No, not Cassandra."

"She's doomed anyway."

"We think we've figured an out for her. Anyhow, I won't kill her."

"Suit yourself. Actually, anybody will do."

"I'm not going to just grab some person off the street and kill him!"

"Agamemnon, it's really not a time to be finicky. . . . What about a plague victim? One not quite dead, but on the way?"

"Where would I find a plague victim?"

"Follow a plague doctor."

"How will I know Charon when he comes? His appearance is always invisible to any but the dead."

Dionysus frowned for a moment, then his brow cleared. He reached inside his tunic and took out a purple stone on a chain.

"They gave me this in Egypt. It's an Egyptian psychopomp stone. Some kind of amethyst, I believe. Take it. There's a doctor over there! Good luck, Agamemnon! I really must go now."

And with a wave of his hand, Dionysus danced off after his maenads.

Agamemnon saw the person Dionysus had been referring to: a tall, middle-aged man in a long black cloak, carrying an ivory

cane, and wearing a conical felt cap on which was the symbol of Asclepius.

Agamemnon hurried over to him. "Are you a doctor?"

"I am. Strepsiades of Cos. But I can't stop and chat with you. I am on my way to a call."

"To a plague victim?"

"Yes, as it happens. A terminal case, I fear. The family waited too long to send for me. Still, I'll do what I can."

"I want to go with you!"

"Are you a doctor? Or a relative?"

"Neither. I am—a reporter!" Agamemnon said in a burst of inspiration.

"How can that be? You have no newspapers here in Mycenae. I've heard that Argive Press managed to run for a while, but the price of copper went through the ceiling, and Egypt stopped exporting papyrus . . ."

"It's a new venture!"

The doctor made no comment when Agamemnon fell into step beside him. Agammemnon could tell the man wasn't pleased. But there was nothing he could do about it. He might even have been furious; but Agamemnon wore a sword, and the doctor appeared to be unarmed.

After several blocks, Agamemnon saw they were going into one of the slum areas of the city. Great, he thought. What am I getting myself into?

They went down a narrow alley, to a small hut at the end of it. Strepsiades pushed open the door and they entered. Within, visible by the gray light from a narrow overhead window and a single flickering oil lamp on the floor, a man lay on a tattered blanket on the ground. He appeared to be very old, and very wasted. Strepsiades knelt to examine him, then shook his head and stood up again.

"How long does he have?" Agamemnon asked.

"Not long, poor fellow. He's approaching the final crisis. You can tell by the skin color. Sometimes these cases linger on for a few hours more, half a day, even a day. But no longer."

"Let me look at him," Agamemnon said and knelt down beside the sick man. The man's skin was bluish gray. His lips were parched and cracked. Thin lines of blood oozed from his nostrils and the corners of his eyes. The turgid blood was the only sign of life in the man.

Agamemnon was acutely aware that he had little time in which to make his escape from Mycenae. But the man was still alive. How long did he have to wait until he died? A minute? An hour? How long before Aegisthus' soldiers found him? He had to get it over with. He tried to make up his mind whether to smother or strangle the man.

He started to reach toward the man's throat. The man opened his eyes. With the man suddenly staring at him with bloodshot blue eyes, Agamemnon hesitated—

"King Agamemnon!" the sick man whispered. "Can it be you? I am Pyliades. I was a hoplite in the first rank of the Argolis Phalanx. I served under you in the Trojan War. What are you doing here, sir?"

Agamemnon heard himself say, "I heard of your plight, Pyliades, and came to wish you well."

"Very good of you, sire. But then, you always were a good man and a benevolent commander. I'm surprised you remember me. I was only a common soldier. My parents had to sell the farm in order to purchase my panoply, so I could march with the others and avenge Greece for the unfair abduction of our Helen."

"I remembered you, Pyliades, and came to say farewell. Our war is won. The might of Greece has prevailed. Of course, we had Achilles. But what good would Achilles have been if it weren't for men in the ranks like you?"

"I remember Prince Achilles well, and the burial fires we lit for him when he was killed. I hope to see him again, in Hades. They say—"

The sick man's meandering discourse was broken as the door to his room was suddenly slammed open. Two armed soldiers Pushed their way in. They hesitated, seeing the doctor in his long robe. Then they spotted Agamemnon.

The leading soldier, a burly red-bearded man, said, "Kill them all. Aegisthus wants no witnesses. I'll take care of Agamemnon myself."

The second soldier was the one who had spotted Agamemnon coming out of the palace window, and had run from him. He advanced now on the doctor, who raised his ivory cane to protect himself, saying, "There's no need for this. I am a neutral, a physician from Cos, here only to treat the sick and injured. Let me go, I'll never say a word about what's going on here."

The soldier glanced at the red-bearded man, evidently his officer, who muttered, "No witnesses!" Then he turned back to Agamemnon.

Agamemnon saw the doctor suddenly lift his staff and bring it down on the soldier's head. The rod broke. Growling, sword poised, the soldier advanced on the doctor.

Agamemnon could see no more, because the red-bearded man was coming at him. Agamemnon had his sword out, but without armor, he knew he stood little chance against an experienced hop-lite. He circled around the sick man on his blanket, and the red-bearded soldier pursued, cautiously but relentlessly.

Agamemnon heard a scream. The doctor had been wounded, but was still fighting, trying to stab his assailant with the stub of his ivory cane. Agamemnon continued circling, winding his cloak around his left arm, but he knew it was hopeless, utterly hopeless. . . .

And then, in an instant, everything changed.

Pyliades, with the last vestige of his strength, reached out and clutched the red-bearded soldier around the legs. The soldier staggered and cut viciously at the sick man. That moment offered Agamemnon's only chance, and he took it. With a hoarse cry he threw himself against the soldier, overbalancing him. The weight of the man's armor did the rest. He fell heavily over Pyliades' body, his sword caught in the sick man's chest, trapped between two ribs.

Agamemnon was on top of him. Releasing his own sword, Agamemnon pulled the knife from his belt and tried to stab the man in the face. The knife bounced off the metal nose guard, breaking at the tip. Agamemnon took better aim and pushed the knife through an opening in the helmet, past a missing cheek guard, into the man's cheek, up into his eye socket, and then, with a twist, into his brain.