Read Online Argos by Ralph Hardy - Free Book Online Page B

are, we are notyet doomed to Hades until our day is appointed. Come, let us feast on this stag that the gods have provided for us, for we are worn out by hunger.” And together they made a great fire and ate late into the night beside their ship. When the rosy dawn came again, my master roused his men and said, “Dear friends, now that we have eaten and slept, I tell you I do not know what course to take. When I climbed the highest point on the island, I saw nothing but the vast sea all in a circle around us.”
    Hearing this, his men groaned and pulled their hair with this sad news, but then my master said, “Wait, there is more. In the center of this island I saw smoke rising from a hall. Perhaps the inhabitants can tell us what direction to aim our prow.”
    â€œWhat if it’s another Cyclops?” asked one man, and they all cried out in fear at that memory.
    â€œWe can never know until we find out for ourselves,” my master replied. “Come, we will draw lots and divide ourselves. Half will explore the source of the smoke and half will remain here.”
    And when they had done that, and they were divided in half, brave Eurylochos was chosen to lead his group of two and twenty men to the center of the island, and the mountainsparrow followed them. When the men reached the great hall, they heard the spinning of a giant loom and the enchanting voice of the golden-locked Circe. Then Polites, one of the leaders of the men, said, “Friends, someone is singing sweetly inside, and I think there is no monster within. Come, let us call on her and see if she is a goddess or a mortal.”
    And when they called out to her, Circe opened the doors, revealing herself to them, and invited them into her hall. But Eurylochos, suspecting treachery, waited outside.
    Once inside, Circe seated the men on chairs and benches and gave them a potion of wine and drugs, along with pale honey and barley and cheese. Such was the power of the drugs that the men forgot their own country and stared only in wonder at her while she drew forth a wand and touched them each on the shoulder, turning them into pigs. Then she herded them into pens and set them about eating acorns and small ears of corn, but they cried, too, for though they were pigs, their minds remained as before.
    This did Eurylochos see with amazement, and then he stealthily crept back along the trail toward the black ship, to tell my master what had happened to his companions. But when he arrived, so great was his grief and despair that he could not speak, but only cry out in lamentations for manyhours. Finally he managed to tell his tale, but my master did not console him. Instead Odysseus slung his great bow across his shoulder and sheathed his great sword.
    â€œGuide me back there,” he commanded, but stout Eurylochos fell to his knees and begged him not to go.
    â€œGreat Odysseus, do not take me there against my will,” he pleaded. “Leave me here, for I know you will not return nor bring back our companions. Rather let us make haste with those who are left so that we may avoid the day of evil.”
    â€œThen stay, Eurylochos, if you will not guide me. For I am compelled to find my men and return with them.”
    And Odysseus left then for the glen, climbing high over a mountain to reach the valley where he hoped he would find his companions. Along the way he met a young man carrying a golden staff. This was Hermes himself, who had taken the form of the young man, and he took my master by the hand and asked, “Where are you going, grieving one, alone through these hills? Do you know your men have been captured by Circe and turned into the shape of pigs? Do you come meaning to set them free?”
    â€œI do come for my men, though I knew not they were captured by Circe, golden youth,” answered my master. “Nor did I know she had changed them to swine.”
    How like my master to never reveal everything he