“Didn’t you say something like this before?” asked Menelaus. “You repeat yourself and you wander from the subject. I thought you wanted to give an account of the house since I left it?”

“That’s just what I’m doing, Menelaus,” said the old gate-keeper, “and if I go at it in a roundabout way, it’s only to be tactful. I’m trying to say respectfully and harmlessly that there are some dangerous new ideas abroad in your household, and I want to find out whether you know about them and dislike them, or whether you share them. I’m terribly afraid you share them, and if you do, I suppose I ought to leave you, old as I am, for I’m too old to change. The reason I suspect you’ve picked up some of these new ideas is—well, when the ship was sighted we learned that you weren’t to be lonely; Helen was coming back with you. That was a new idea, Menelaus. But we got used to it, and we rehearsed what we thought would be respectful manners toward the repentant captive brought home in disgrace. But she doesn’t seem aware of any disgrace, and she isn’t repentant. She doesn’t behave—neither do you, in fact—as though she were a—”

“Look here, Eteoneus,” said Menelaus, “I’ve taken all I’m going to from you. You pretend to have household business on your mind, and then you pretend to have damaging news of Orestes, which turns out to be more to your discredit than his, but what you really want is to discuss my wife’s reputation. I’m home now, and I’ll run the house myself. You get out and watch the gate … Here, wait a moment! If the madness comes on you again to talk about Helen, do it where no word of yours will reach me. You wonder why I didn’t kill her. Well, she was too beautiful. You don’t resemble her in the slightest. Be careful!”

“The gods be praised, Menelaus,” said the gate-keeper, “you talk now like your old self! May I go on with what I was about to say?”

“Finish up with Orestes, and get out,” said Menelaus.