So we reached the harbour, where a small crowd waited to cheer us on our way. I think they were glad to see the back of us, for we were foreigners, but they made little sign of it.
Argo bobbed up and down in a clear channel, ready for sailing as the Captain had said. Even Argus could find no fault with her; and I certainly could find no fault with the cargo of gold which Apsyrtus had had put aboard from the warehouse beside the wharf. The decks fore and aft, and even the aisle between the rowers’ benches, were heaped high with fleeces, each one as heavy as a child with the gold particles caught up in the greasy wool. In Colchis they lay such fleeces on the bed of the gold-bearing stream, not far from Ares, the place where I was supposed to plough the field with bronze bulls. The specks of gold, coming down in the water, catch in the fleeces, which are dragged out when they are saturated with the precious metal.
There was the price of a kingdom on board the Argo that morning. I was only too anxious to be away with it, before Apsyrtus changed his mind!
The tide helped us, too, and before long we stood off the city and set a course homewards again.
The meat and drink were good. Apsyrtus had kept his word. I felt almost sorry in my heart that I should have to come back to Colchis one day, with perhaps fifty ships like Argo, to get more of this gold. I should have to break my word to him, but only a fool could let such a chance go.
I asked the princes and the Spartans if they would come back with me in a year or two, and they smiled and said that nothing would please them more. We are a practical people, I think, and do not let words spoken in the stress of the moment weigh too heavily with us. I know that some folk have called us wily and crafty and even treacherous; but that is because they are dreamers, and cannot see the truth that stares them in the face. In this life, a man must make provision for himself and his family; that is sense. All else is nonsense and women’s stuff, the stuff of dreams and visions.
Now a strange thing happened and I do not know how best I can explain it. At the end of the first day out, when Colchis was a white blur in the farthest sunset, Atalanta came to me and said that the fleeces were stirring at the after-end of the ship and that she thought something was hidden under them.
I remember answering, ‘Maggots, my dear! They get into old fleeces. That is all!’
But she came back again and said that she had felt under the fleeces and that what her hand had touched had not been maggots, but something which would interest me much more.
I went quietly with her as the men rowed and put my own hand under the sheepskins. She was right; it was a woman.
Together we rolled back the top layers and soon we saw this woman. It was Medea, dirty and ragged, her hair a tangled mess, her face swollen with weeping, her lips bitten and bleeding.
She stared up at me with wide frightened eyes, as though begging me not to hurt her any further. Indeed, she had good reason to do so for I had my short sword out and was considering putting it into her as she lay. The only reason I did not do this without delay was that I did not want to ruin the skins and lose any gold by drenching the wool in blood.
So I just glared down at her, while Atalanta poked her in the side with her foot, rolling her about. There was no love lost between these two women ever, although they prayed to the same goddess and sometimes conducted rituals together.
I said, ‘Either I should throw you overboard as an offering to Poseidon—and because you tried to take away my pride; or I should turn about and hand you over to your husband, Apsyrtus. I gather that he wishes to speak a few words with you—before they tie you to the horses!’
Medea sat up on the skins and shook her head wearily. ‘No, Jason,’ she said. ‘Apsyrtus is not as simple as that. He wishes me dead, yes, but he put me here, under the fleeces.’
I almost fell backwards with surprise at these words.
‘Put you here?’ I said. ‘Why, his captain commanded me to hand you over if I saw you. Why should Apsyrtus put you here, on the ship of one of his friends?’
Medea wiped the tears from her eyes with the back of her dusty hand. The movement left streaks of grime across her face, so different from the gold with which I had first seen it coated.
‘How like a boy you are,’ she said, flatly. ‘Apsyrtus has no friends, and least of all you, a foraging Hellene. What have you done to help him, but roam about his city, drinking and plundering?’
I said, ‘But Apsyrtus has sent me homewards, with a cargo of gold, and friendly farewells. I do not believe you.’
Atalanta snorted and said, ‘Put the sword into her, Jason. She will betray you if you don’t. I can smell such things from far off. Don’t forget, I am a witch-woman, too.’
Beaten and bedraggled as she was, Medea looked up at Atalanta with scorn, and said slowly, ‘This woman is a fool. I would not have her as my scullery maid. Listen to me, Jason; my brother gave you a cargo of gold only to claim it back. He is as much a miser as my father. And he put me aboard this ship to give himself an excuse for pursuing you and getting back that gold. Do you not see, he will follow you in his swift galleys and run you down. He will find me aboard, where he carefully put me, and you will pay the penalty for breaking your oath to him, for not giving me up. He will accuse you of helping me to escape. Then he will kill you and all your crew. He will sink Argo, and no man will ever know what happened to your brave venture.’
I put my sword back and sat down upon the fleeces, suddenly weary.
‘Tell me,’ I said, ‘and see that your forked tongue speaks the truth. If Apsyrtus wishes to kill you and me, then why did he not do it in Colchis? Why let us get so far before he carries out such a plan? It is not reasonable. I would kill a man where he stood, not chase him half over the world to do it.’
Medea began to put a fishbone comb through her tangled hair and to wipe the grime from her face with spittle. It seemed that she was growing more pleased with herself every moment.
She said, ‘Apsyrtus did not kill us in Colchis because he wishes to be known as a just king now that he has taken the throne. Besides, there are many folk in Colchis who still follow me and call me goddess; just as there are many Corinthians who would like to have a Hellene such as you as their new king, and not a bastard Scythian. Finally, Apsyrtus fears that the secret of your killing might come out, at some time. So, he does not want hordes of Hellenes coming here for vengeance. He wants to show a clear reason for killing you and your crew, which will be acceptable to all reasonable kings; the sort of thing that they would do themselves. Now do you understand boy?’
I turned away, to think, and as I did so, I saw the first of the Colchian galleys pulling swiftly away from the harbour towards us, a sleek hound on the scent of its quarry.
I looked back and said, ‘I see, Medea. The galleys have convinced me. There is more truth in you than I gave you credit for.’
She placed her fine hand upon my thigh and I could not resist its warm touch. There was a magic in it always which bewitched me, even against my will.
Then I stood up and took the pace-hammer.
‘We must row hard, my brothers,’ I called, ‘if we are to live.’