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Chapters (39)
  1. Cover
  2. The Private Life of Helen of Troy
  3. Contents
  4. NOTE
  5. PART I
  6. I
  7. II
  8. III
  9. IV
  10. V
  11. VI
  12. VII
  13. PART II
  14. I
  15. II
  16. III
  17. IV
  18. V
  19. VI
  20. PART III
  21. I
  22. II
  23. III
  24. IV
  25. V
  26. PART IV
  27. I
  28. II
  29. III
  30. IV
  31. V
  32. PART V
  33. I
  34. II
  35. III
  36. IV
  37. V
  38. VI
  39. VII

“If you saw their love begin, on your own premises and right under your eyes,” said Eteoneus, “you must have known about it all along, and you ought to share the responsibility with your boy for anything he’s done. This house is all it should be—now. I’m too old-fashioned to like what happened some time back, but I’ll stand by the house, in all the essentials. The young people fall in love now-a-days, just as they used to do, and some of the old people have forgotten what it’s about. If you take that boy away now, I’ll say you’re the meanest woman I’ve met in a long life, and I’ve met all kinds!”

“This time you’ve gone too far,” said Charitas. “When my husband hears how you’ve spoken to me, he will have a word with Menelaus.”

“He will if I let him in,” said Eteoneus, “or he can learn from his son how to come in the back way, through the servants’ quarters!”

PART IV

PART IV

death and birth

I

I

“Charitas sent her husband to complain of the way you spoke to her, Eteoneus,” said Menelaus. “I’m sorry to say it’s not the only criticism of you that has come to my attention in the last few days. At this crisis, when you know how heavily burdened I am already, it does seem as though you might refrain from questionable ventures in deportment. I said I wanted to speak with you, but now that you are here, I don’t know what to say. You’ve been my servant for many years. You were the one person in the household I used to count on for absolute propriety. But in recent months your tongue has been getting you into trouble. You yourself reported some high words with Orestes, and I had to object to your disposition to discuss my wife. Now our best neighbour comes in and it’s his wife you’ve discussed. What has happened, Eteoneus? And what ought I to do with you?”

“Nothing has happened to me, Menelaus,” said the gate-keeper; “nothing but old age. I believe age has not essentially altered my character, but if you think it has, perhaps you ought to retire me. In the days when my conduct gave satisfaction, only the common run of travellers stood outside your door, and only normal events happened inside of it. Now, as you’ll admit, we have strange visitors, and we receive strange messages, and what goes on inside this house is new, or ought to be new, to my experience. I doubt if my speech has become less guarded; I should probably have made the same comments forty years ago, if the same events had happened then.”