OEDIPUS. Had he but a small troop with him; or did he

travel like a great man with many followers?

JOCASTA. There were but five in all—one of them a

herald; and there was one carriage with Laius in it.

OEDIPUS. Alas! It is now clear indeed. Who was it brought

the news, lady?

JOCASTA. A servant—the one survivor.

OEDIPUS. Is he by chance in the house now?

JOCASTA. No; for when he found you reigning instead

of Laius he besought me, his hand clasped in mine,

to send him to the fields among the cattle that he

might be far from the sight of this town; and I sent

him. He was a worthy man for a slave and might

have asked a bigger thing.

OEDIPUS. I would have him return to us without delay.

JOCASTA. Oedipus, it is easy. But why do you ask this?

OEDIPUS. I fear that I have said too much, and therefore

I would question him.

JOCASTA. He shall come, but I too have a right to know

what lies so heavy upon your heart, my King.

OEDIPUS. Yes: and it shall not be kept from you now

that my fear has grown so heavy. Nobody is more

to me than you, nobody has the same right to learn

my good or evil luck. My father was Polybus of

Corinth, my mother the Dorian Merope, and I was

held the foremost man in all that town until a thing

happened—a thing to startle a man, though not to

make him angry as it made me. We were sitting at

the table, and a man who had drunk too much cried

out that I was not my father’s son—and I, though

angry, restrained my anger for that day; but the

next day went to my father and my mother and

questioned them. They were indignant at the taunt

and that comforted me—and yet the man’s words

rankled, for they had spread a rumour through the

town. Without consulting my father or my mother

I went to Delphi, but Phoebus told me nothing of

the thing for which I came, but much of other things

—things of sorrow and of terror: that I should live

in incest with my mother, and beget a brood that

men would shudder to took upon; that I should be

my father’s murderer. Hearing those words I fled

out of Corinth, and from that day have but known

where it lies when I have found its direction by the

stars. I sought where I might escape those infamous

things—the doom that was laid upon me. I came in

my flight to that very spot where you tell me this

king perished. Now, lady, I will tell you the truth.

When I had come close up to those three roads, I

came upon a herald, and a man like him you have

described seated in a carriage. The man who held