426 THE GREEK SAGAS: GREEK LOCAL LEGENDS
ORESTES: No longer be afraid that your mother's arrogance will ever dishonor
you again.
CHORUS: Be quiet, for I see Aegisthus approaching.
ELECTRA: Orestes and Pylades, get back.
ORESTES: Where do you see the man?
ELECTRA: He comes towards us from the outskirts of the city, with a smile
on his face.
CHORUS: Get back inside as fast as you can so that you may take care of the
situation well, as you have just done previously.
ORESTES: Rest assured, we will do it.
ELECTRA: Now hurry within.
ORESTES: I am gone.
ELECTRA: Let me take care of him out here.
CHORUS: It would be a good idea for him to hear from you a few gentle words
of assurance so that he may rush unsuspecting into his hidden ordeal with justice.
AEGISTHUS: Which one of you knows the whereabouts of the strangers from
Phocis, who they say have brought the news that Orestes has lost his life in the
wreckage of chariot? You, I ask you, yes you, the one always so insolent before,
for I believe that his death touches you especially and you especially know about
it and can answer.
ELECTRA (her responses to Aegisthus are laden with dramatic irony): I know
about it. How could I not know about it and remain uninformed about a calamity
touching those dearest to me?
AEGISTHUS: Then where might the strangers be? Tell me.
ELECTRA: Within. They have greeted a loving hostess.
AEGISTHUS: Did they bring the news that he was truly dead—for sure?
ELECTRA: Yes, and not by word alone, but they even offered proof.
AEGISTHUS: Is it possible for us to see this proof clearly?
ELECTRA: We certainly can and it is a very unenviable sight.
AEGISTHUS: You have said much to please me—how unusual!
ELECTRA: May you be pleased, if this happens to give you pleasure.
AEGISTHUS: I order that the doors be opened to display his corpse for all the
Mycenaeans and Argives to see, so that if any of them were once elated by vain
hopes in this man, now upon beholding him dead they may accept my bridle
and learn good sense without my having to chastise them with force.
ELECTRA: Certainly I have learned this lesson; in time I have come to my
senses and now acquiesce with those who are stronger.
AEGISTHUS (upon the revelation of the corpse): O Zeus, what I behold is a
portent that has befallen not without the ill will of the gods. If it entails a just
nemesis, I do not say. Remove the covering over the eyes completely so that my
relative may receive proper lamentation from me.
ORESTES: Lift the cloth yourself; it is yours to do not mine—to behold this
face and to speak words of affection.
AEGISTHUS: You give good advice and I will follow it. But you, call
Clytemnestra, if by any chance she is in the house.
ORESTES:AEGISTHUS: Ah, She is close to you; no need to look elsewhere. what do I look upon?