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in his cheek tightens from time to time.
    Cassandra looks down through the dusk from the ramparts of Troy as the mule-drawn waggon sets off with the cart behind it. The great eagle stays close to the travellers, holding the waggon as tight in its gaze as a gull holds a boat soon to land its trawl.
    Zeus sends Hermes to guide them in the form of a Myrmidon. It is a warm dusk and mist rises high from Scamander’s banks. Priam and Idaeus have stopped to water the animals. When they see the Myrmidon shoulder through the mist towards them Priam’s hand moves towards his sword.
    â€˜The royal Priam. Away from Troy so late! Have you deserted her now you’ve lost Hector?’
    Priam flinches. The god goes on:
    â€˜You’ll know me for one of Achilles’ men. Don’t be afraid. I have a father your age. But what are you doing here with this old man? Do you want to get killed?’
    Priam is not afraid. When Hermes tells him that Hector’s body is as firm and as beautiful as if gods had embalmed it – and this in spite of Achilles’ daily ritual of insult – his heart soars. Hector’s piety has not gone unnoticed. He rummages for a moment beneath the waggon’s wicker cover and comes up with a heavy golden beaker.
    Hermes refuses the gift, pretending to think it a bribe.
    â€˜But I will guide you past the sentries and take you to the lord Achilles. These nights he never sleeps.’
    Hermes puts the sentries to sleep. Idaeus’ waggon with four mules drawing it, Priam’s chariot with Hermes riding it, move as peacefully across the Achaean trench as two farm carts entering town on market day.
    When they reach Achilles’ compound, fenced-off with a high palisade, his ship moored nearby, Hermes reveals himself to Priam. Only a god – or Achilles – could, single-handed, slip back the bolt that fastens the fence.
    *   *   * 
    A CHILLES SITS motionless, a table of untasted food in front of him. Priam sinks before him and embraces his knees.
    Imagine: the mighty Priam crouched before you like a child.
    Gently Achilles removes his hands from the old man’s clasp. For a moment it looks as if he will stroke the long white hair, it is so like the hair of his own father whom he has not seen these nine years since he set sail with Phoenix for Troy. Huge sobs break from Achilles as he thinks of Peleus, ageing at home in Phthia, uncomforted by his son. And Priam? He thinks of Hector – of what else has he thought these twelve days? – who was like no one else on earth and whom no one could match but this man.
    The two men hold each other and weep: for those they have lost, for those who will lose them, for all the men gone down in the slow years of this wasteful war.
    *   *   * 
    W HEN THE time for tears is past Achilles raises Priam to his feet and fetches him a fine, inlaid chair.
    â€˜You’re brave, to come here unguarded. My men are like wolves. I kept them out of the fight too long. Now they’ve tasted blood again.’
    â€˜It’s Hector’s body I’ve come for. There was no question of fear.’
    This irritates Achilles.
    â€˜Don’t give me that. It takes three young, strong men to knock back the bolt on my gate. I know you’ve been helped by a god. I’ve had my instructions too. It’s Zeus’ wish that I give you the body and that’s why you’ll get it.’
    He turns away; the muscle in his cheek at work again.
    He leaves Priam seated and takes two of his women (not Briseis – two others) to where he keeps Hector when he’s not dragging him in the dust. He glares at Hector accusingly, as if a pact had been broken, then snaps into command, telling the women to wash the body and be sure to rinse away every grain of dirt. He is emphatic about this – as if the dirt he’s dragged Hector through had actually clung, whereas Hector shines through it,