Upon our arrival the girl began to run restlessly to and fro and thrust her face to each of ours in turn. Then she burst into wild laughter and began to shout, scream and leap like a madwoman until Hierofila commanded her to be silent in an oddly hollow and metallic voice which I would not have expected to issue from the lips of an old woman. Then Demadotos’ emissary bowed his head before her and began to explain our mission.
But Hierofila ordered him also to be silent. “Why are you chattering? I know of these men and foresaw their arrival in Cumae when the ravens disappeared from the mountain and flew in flocks over the sea from whence these men came. Nor will I permit the spirits of the dead with their swollen tongues and gaping eyes to force their way into my dwelling with these men. Go your way and take the deceased with you.”
She began to pant and to make forbidding gestures. After consulting among ourselves the two Etruscans left, summoning the spirits of the deceased.
The sibyl grew calm. “Now there is room to breathe again. But whence came that brightness that surrounds me and the roar of an invisible storm?”
The girl, who had been busy in a corner of the cave, stepped forth. She touched Hierofila’s hand and placed on my head a wreath of dry bay leaves.
Hierofila began to titter. Staring at me with blind eyes she said, “You favorite of the gods, I see the blue of the moon at your temples but the sun shines from your face. I myself would tie a wreath of myrtle and willow for you, but content yourself with bay since we have nothing else.”
Demadotos’ emissary thought that she was raving and impatiently began to explain our mission once more. But again Hierofila interrupted him. “What do two vessels mean when a thousand vessels will clash on the sea near Cumae? Let Demadotos permit these men to go in peace and release their vessels. Emblems, not ships, determine wars.”
Her voice swelled as though she were shouting through a metal trumpet. “Demadotos does not need ships but emblems. The god has spoken.” When she had regained her breath she said more calmly, “Go your way, you stupid man, and leave me alone with the messenger of the gods.”
Demadotos’ adviser entered the prophecy in a wax tablet and tried to draw me out of the cave with him, but the girl fell upon him, scratching his face with her long nails. Then she wound her arms around my neck. She was not clean, but such a powerful smell of bay leaves and strong herbs exuded from her skin and clothes that she did not seem repulsive. I said that I would remain in the cave for a moment since that was apparently intended, and Demadotos’ emissary left alone, holding the corner of his mantle to his mouth. Then only did Hierofila descend from her pedestal and open a wooden shutter in the wall, letting in fresh air that immediately swept away the poisonous vapors. Through a cleft in the mountain I saw the sky and the blue of the sea.
The sibyl stepped before me, felt me with her hands, touched my cheeks and hair with her fingertips, and said with feeling, “Son of your father, I recognize you. Why do you not kiss your mother?”
I stooped, touched the floor of the cave and kissed my palm to indicate that I acknowledged the earth as my mother. My whole being seemed suddenly to have broadened and brightness shone within me. The girl approached me, felt my knees and shoulders and rubbed her body against my loins. My strength seemed to ebb away and my armpits perspired so that beads of sweat ran down my sides. But Hierofila boxed the girl’s ears and pushed her away.
“You recognize your mother,” she said. “Why don’t you greet your. father?”
I shook my head in bewilderment. “I have never known my father or my origin.”
Hierofila began to speak in a godlike voice. “My son, you will know yourself when you lay your hand on the round summit of your father’s tombstone. I see your lake, I see your mountain, I see your city. Seek and you will find. Knock and it will be opened unto you. And when you return from the sealed gate remember me.”
Suddenly she exclaimed, “Look behind you!”
I did so but saw nothing, although the flames which blazed brightly in the draft illumined every corner of the cave. I shook my head.
In apparent amazement Hierofila placed her palm on my forehead and urged, “Look again. Do you not see the goddess? Taller and fairer than mortals, she is looking at you and extending her arms. A mural crown is on her head. She is the moon goddess and also the goddess of the fountain. She is the goddess of foam and deer, cypress and myrtle.”
I looked again but saw no goddess with a mural crown. Instead, another form began to take shape before my eyes-a stiff form, bent forward like a vessel’s prow, grew from the stone wall of the cave. It was tightly robed in white and its face was sheathed in bandages. Silent, motionless, the shape leaned forward stiffly. Its position was expectant and indicative.
Hierofila took her hand from my forehead and asked tremblingly, “What do you see?”
“He is motionless,” I said. “His face is wrapped in linen bands and he is indicating the north.”
At that moment the roar in my ears became supernal, whiteness dazzled my eyes and I fell unconscious to the ground. When I awakened I seemed to be flying through space with the starry sky above and the earth below, the roar still echoing in my ears. Only when I opened my eyes did I realize that I was lying on the stone floor of the cave while Hierofila knelt beside me chafing my hands and the girl was wiping my forehead and temples with a cloth dipped in wine.
Hierofila said in her quavering old woman’s voice, “Your arrival has been predicted and you have been recognized. But don’t tie your heart to the earth. Search only for yourself that you may acknowledge yourself, you immortal.”
I ate bread and drank wine with her as she told me about her visions. Then when I finally stepped out of the cave a ray of sunlight struck a tiny pebble on the ground before me. It was a dull white transparent pebble with an oval shape and as I placed it among the other stones of my life in the pouch around my neck for the first time I comprehended that the picking up of the pebble signified the end of one era in my life and the beginning of another.
Making my way from the cave in a daze, I rejoined my comrades and together we returned to the city where Demadotos interpreted the oracle’s prophecy in his own way. He allowed us to sail from Cumae, but first he removed the emblems from our vessels and carefully put them in his treasure vault without sending them to Gelon. Nor did we care about the emblems; nothing made any difference so long as we could leave that unfriendly city.
6.
In the harbor of Tarquinia we handed our leaking vessels over to the guards. When we went on shore, however, the people did not greet us but turned their backs and covered their heads. The alleys emptied before us. Such sorrow did we bring to the land of the Etruscans. And so we parted silently from one another in the harbor.
I myself accompanied the ten or so Tarquinian survivors to the city, where Lars Arnth received us with deep concern but without a word of reproach. He merely listened to our story and gave us gifts. When the others had left he asked me to remain.
“It is useless for even the bravest man to struggle against Fate, which not even the gods control. I mean the gods whose number and holy names we know and to whom we sacrifice. The veiled gods, whom we don’t know, are above everything, perhaps even above Fate.”
“Blame me, abuse me, strike me,” I begged. “I would feel better.”
Lars Arnth smiled his sadly beautiful smile and said, “You are not to blame, Turms. You were merely the messenger. But I am in a difficult position. The leaders of our four hundred families are divided, with those who are friendly toward the Greeks censuring me bitterly for having needlessly antagonized them. Imported goods have become more expensive and the Attic vases that we are accustomed to placing in our rulers’ tombs are obtainable only at usurious prices. Who could have foretold the Greeks’ success against the Persian king? But I believe they are only using our expedition to Sicily as a pretext to destroy our trade.”