Ivan Yefremov - Thais of Athens

The “Daughter of a Snake” had recovered from the hardships of life with her restless sea-goer and looked as pretty as ever in her pink Babylonian dress. Thais invited her to visit Lysippus, but Hesiona preferred to spend the morning hours, while the sculptors were busy with their models, at home playing with Leontiscus.

Now there was one more childless female admirer of her son, and that was most displeasing to the Athenian. Nearchus did not want children, believing he could not provide enough reliability for them; a sailor’s fate was much too uncertain. To Hesiona’s question of what he thought of her, Nearchus smiled slightly and told her that she was sufficiently intelligent, beautiful and rich to take care of herself in the case of his demise. Hesiona tried to explain to the Cretan that, aside from being provided for, she needed many other things from him which she did not want from anyone else in the world. The fleet leader told the Theban that she was quite free, but that he would be glad if she waited for his return because, much to his surprise, he had never found a woman better than her.

“Did you look?” Hesiona asked.

“We all like to take chances,” he said with a shrug.

Gradually, the Theban realized that her intended was as obsessed with the dreams of the hidden Ocean as was his childhood friend, Alexander. Alexander never felt at peace without Nearchus. He always tried to find something for Nearchus to do that was near him, calling himself the chief navigator of his army. As a result, Hesiona was left alone in a big house for so long that she considered divorcing her famous husband. He seemed to have dissolved in the unreachable distance.

The “Daughter of a Snake” asked how Thais managed to bear Ptolemy’s even longer absences. Her friend replied that she didn’t need Ptolemy as much as Hesiona needed Nearchus.

“I am presently impatient for his return,” Thais said, “because of his son. Leontiscus must be separated from this house before you and your like spoil him irrevocably.”

“You shall miss him,” Hesiona exclaimed.

“No more and no less than any Helenian mother. I’ll bear myself a girl to brighten things up. She will be with me for eighteen years and by then I shall be finished with my wanderings and ready to take care of the house.”

“Ptolemy’s house?”

“Unlikely. The older he and I get, the younger will his lovers be. It will be difficult for me to tolerate dazzling youth near me when I have nothing left with which to compete against her, except for my good name and position. When all that is left are the name and position, one’s old life is over and it is time to begin another one.”

“What other one?”

“How am I to know? Ask me about it in fifteen years.”

Hesiona laughed and agreed, having no idea that fate had prepared amazing but different paths for them both. They would soon separate forever.

The friends rode their old horses and bought another horse for Eris, a spotless Parthenian stallion as black as night. Eris had become a respectable rider and could manage a strong horse. In the evening they rode into the mountains, up the slopes overgrown with wormwood and thyme, passing rare outcroppings of dense dark stone which had been smoothed by the wind. Letting the horses graze, the three women chose a large, flat boulder which had absorbed sunlight all day and spread out on it, feeling the welcoming warmth on their skin. A cool wind flowing through the rocky valley carried the scent of gum from the woods above, mixed with the fresh and sharp smell of the grasses. An enormous snow-covered peak obstructed the sun from the west, and the gentle warmth from the rock was quite pleasing. Sometimes the first faint stars appeared in the twilight sky, and brias, the desert owl, called out several times before the riders returned to the city.

Each of them behaved differently during these silent mountain vigils. Eris sat hugging her knees and resting her chin on them, observing the jagged mountain range and the shimmering, pearly mist of the distant plain. Hesiona pulled herself to the edge of a drop overhanging the valley and lay on her stomach, observing the play of water in a creek at the bottom of the crevasse. She watched for mountain goats and for chipmunks who popped out of their burrows and whistled to their neighbors. Thais settled on her back with her arms spread and watched the sky with its few slow clouds and mighty gryphs. Observation of the sky hypnotized her.

Hesiona quietly watched Thais, whom she considered to be the best of women, and was astonished by the constant change of expressions on her face, though her body remained completely still. As she gazed at the sky, Thais suddenly smiled, then transformed into a picture of deep sadness, or even dared the fates with an expression of menacing stubbornness. It was all done with a barely perceptible movement of her lips, eyelids, eyebrows and the nostrils of her nose, which was as straight as if it had been smoothed along a carver’s ruler, with a Cretan dip at the bridge that softened the heavy, classic Helenian profile. Watching Thais reminded Hesiona of the mysterious art of the Egyptians, who managed to communicate a change in mood even though their statues were made of hard polished stone.

Once, when Thais appeared more sad and thoughtful than usual, the Theban asked, “Do you still love him?”

“Who?” Thais asked, not turning her head.

“Alexander. Was he not your greatest love?”

Thais sighed deeply. “Lysippus once told me that a skilled sculptor can use the same outlines to create flesh as mighty and heavy as a rock, and can imbue his creation with incredible power of inner flame and desire. In the same image … almost.”

“I did not quite understand you. I became a bit savage among swamps and sailors,” Hesiona said with a smile.

The Athenian turned serious. “If a man wishes to follow gods, his love must be as free as theirs. Not like an irresistible force that crushes and tears us apart. Strangely, the more it possesses its victims, the weaker they are before it. The more enslaved they are by their feelings, the more poets glorify these pitiful people who are ready to commit any humiliation and lowly deed. They would lie, kill, steal, break a vow … Why is that? Is that the wish of the light-bearing. silver-footed Aphrodite?”

“I understand. You have no hope, have you?”

“I have long since known that. Now you know too. Then why must I weep under the star that cannot be taken from the sky? It follows its predestined path. And you follow yours.”

They visited symposiums, adopted enthusiastically by the Persians, who followed the artists’ example. Only Eris flatly refused to go. She was disgusted by the sight of people who ate and drank too much.

Thais also admitted to Hesiona her aversion toward gluttons. She had been sensitive toward any expression of crudeness ever since she was a child, and presently lost all tolerance for it. Loud laughter, shallow jokes, uncontrolled eating and drinking, hungry glances that used to glide over her without bothering her, now irritated her. The Athenian decided this attitude meant she was growing old. Spirited discussions heated with wine, poetic improvisations and love dances felt more and more like nonsense. She could hardly believe that she and the golden-haired Spartan used to be called the queens of symposiums.

“It is not old age, my beautiful friend,” Lysippus said in response to the Athenian’s question He pinched her lightly on her smooth cheek. “Call it wisdom. Or call it maturity, if the first term seems too formal. Each year you will move further away from the games of your youth. The circle of your interests will become broader and your expectations of yourself and others will go deeper. You must be more demanding of yourself first, then toward others, or else you shall turn into a haughty aristocrat with an impoverished heart and mind. And you will die. Not physically, of course. With your health, you may live a long time. But you will die spiritually and walk around as your own outer shell, which would truly be a corpse. You are likely unaware of how many such living corpses trample the face of Gaea. They are deprived of conscience, honor, dignity and kindness. These are all things that form the basis of a man’s soul and are awakened, strengthened and upheld by artists, philosophers and poets. But these people get in the way of the living while looking exactly like them. Except they are insatiable in the most basic and simplest of desires: food, drink, women, the power over others. And they seek to satisfy themselves by all means. Have you heard of the Hecate’s companions?”