John Gardner - Jason and Medeia

man,

Akastos who’d stood at the door of Hades, listened to

the Sirens,

braved the power of Aietes and the dangerous Kelts?

The old man

hinted that after his death Akastos should follow him as my fellow king. It was not in the deal; I refused.

Akastos

was furious — not at me. And now he seldom came to the palace, bitterly ashamed. He remained with

Iphinoe, at home,

or travelled with friends, supporting their courtships

or wars.

“At times Pelias would drop his peevishness, put on, instead, a pretense of cowering love. He’d sit with his head to

one side,

lambishly timid, and he’d ogle like a girl, admiring me. ‘Noble Jason,’ he’d call me, with lips obscenely wet, and he’d stroke my fingers like an elderly homosexual, his head drawn back, as if fearing an angry slap. His

desire

to please, in such moods, was boundless. He couldn’t

find honors enough

to heap on me. He gave me gifts — his ebony bed (my father’s, in fact), jewels, the sword of Atlantis—

but with each

gift given, his need — his terror of fate — was greater

than before.

In the end he gave me the golden fleece itself as proof that all he owned was mine, I need not murder him. He was mad, of course. I had no intention of murdering

him.

And still he cringed and crawled, all bootlicking love.

That too

I tolerated, biding my time.

“Not all on Argos shared or understood my patience. On the main street, on the day of the festival of Oreithyia — our chariot

blocked

by the milling, costumed crowd — a humpbacked

beggarwoman

in fetid rags, a shawl hiding all but her hawkbill nose and piercing eyes — a coarse mad creature who sang

old songs

in a voice like the carrion crow’s and stretched out

hands like sticks

for alms — leaped up at sight of me, raging, ‘Alas for

Argos,

kingless these many years! Thank God I’m sick with

age

and need not watch much longer this shameful travesty! We had here a king to be proud of once, a man as

noble beside these pretenders

as Zeus beside two billygoats!

That king and his queen had a son, you think? He

produced what seemed one—

an arrogant, cowardly merchantry-swapper with no

more devotion

than a viper. The father’s throne was stolen — boldly,

blatantly—

his blood cried out of the earth, cried out of the beams

and stones

of the palace for revenge. The son raised never a finger.

And the mother,

poor Alkimede, my mistress once, was driven from her

home

to lodgings fit for a swineherd. There she lived with

her boy,

as long as he’d stay. It was none too long. For all her

pleas,

for all the great sobs welling from her heart, he must

leave her helpless,

friendless in a world where once she’d stood as high as any in Akhaia.? shameless! Shame on shame he heaped on her: not on his own but in foul collusion with the very usurper who seized that throne, he must

sail to the shores

of barbarians, and must bear off with him on his mad

expedition

the finest of Akhaia’s lords! Few enough would return,

he knew.

O that he too had been drowned in the river with

innocent Hylas,

or fallen like Idmon to a maddened boar, or withered

in Libya!

She might have had then some comfort in death,

though little before,

wrapped in a winding-sheet wound by strangers,

tumbled to her tomb

like a penniless old farm woman. And Jason returned, joyful with his barbarous bride, and shamelessly joined

the usurper,

smiling on half of his father’s blood-soaked throne. See

how

he preaches justice and reason, preaches fidelity, trades on his great past deeds to avoid all present risks. “Do not rave,” he raves; “no shame can trouble our city. Prophesy wealth and wine! The past is obliterated! Tell us no more about crimes in the tents of our

ancestors!

Justice and reason, like tamed lions, have settled in

Iolkos.”

Where is his justice and reason? Where is his loudly

bugled

fidelity? The throne was stolen; stolen it remains. What of fidelity to fathers and mothers? What of

fidelity

to the dead in their winecupped graves?’

“So the old shrew raged, shaking. Medeia, standing beside me, glared with eyes like ice. Softly, she said, ‘Who is this creature

you allow to berate you in the streets?’ I touched her

hand to calm her.

“A woman who loved my mother,’ I said. Medeia was

silent.

It was not till another day she asked, ‘Is this accusation just, that Pelias stole your father’s throne?’ I thought, Everything is true in its time and place. But answered

only:

‘I was young; my father was unsure of me. There were

vague rumors …

It was all a long, long time ago.’ But after that when I spoke in the assembly or debated plans with my

fellow king,

and Pelias had qualms, found reasons for doubt,

objected, found cause

for delay, she would watch him with tigress eyes.

“Pelias, as his mind dimmed with the passing years, grew

increasingly a burden.

It’s a difficult thing to explain. He interfered with me

less.

He grew deaf as a post and nearly blind, his mind so

enfeebled

that in the end he relinquished all but a shadow of his

former power.

The trouble was, he seemed to imagine that both of us had abandoned the nuisance of government.

Old-womanish, dim,

he’d call me to his bedroom and beg from me stories of

the Argonauts,

or he’d tell me, as if we were shepherds with all

afternoon to pass,

tedious tales of his childhood. It proved no use to send his daughters instead, willing as they were—

good-hearted, sheltered

princesses with the brains of nits. It had to be me— myself or Akastos, and Akastos rarely came. I would

stoop,

absurd in my royal robes, by the old man’s bed, and

listen,

or pretend to listen, brooding in secret on Argos’ affairs. The drapes would be drawn, a whim of his daughters,

as though he were

some apple they hoped to preserve through the winter

in a cool dark bin.

He would stutter like a fond old grandmother, on and

on. At times

he’d recall with a start the prophecy, and he’d hastily

offer

his cringing act, lading on flattery, protesting his

life-long

love. His fingers, clinging to mine, gripped me like a

monkey’s.

His daughters would listen, drooping like flowers from

slender stalks,

and whenever they spoke it was tearfully, with a kind of

idiot

gratitude for the affection I showed their belovèd father. At last he’d sleep; I’d be free to leave the place.

“I’d go to the wing of the palace I kept with Medeia and the

children; I’d pass

in silence among our slaves, and my heart was sullen

with suspicion.

Surely, I thought, they must mock me. Jason in his

kingly robes,

shouldered like a bull, gray eyes rolling as he sits, polite

as a cranky old shepherd’s serving boy, by the bed of

Pelias,

hanging on stammered-out words. O shameless coward

indeed!

I would stand alone at the balustrade of marble, glare

out

at the sea, Orion hanging low, contemptuous.

I was not a coward, I knew well enough,

and it ought not to matter what others supposed.

I governed well — no man denied it. If I wasted time on a fusty, repulsive old man, I had excellent reasons

for it.

I was no Herakles pummelling the seasons with passionate, mindless fists. Oh, I could admire the