Years before the Trojan war King Tyndareus decided it was time to marry off his daughter Helen and, as she was the same age, her cousin Penelope. Penelope was fair but Helen, who was actually the daughter of Zeus, though no mortal but her mother knew it, had beauty that broke men's wills. Upon hearing of Helen's impending introduction to society, the flower of Achaea's bachelorhood descended on Tyndareus's palace to court his favor and (since he was an indulgent father) his daughter's. Odysseus, young and ambitious, came all the stormy way from Ithaca to win her but when he arrived and saw the throng of suitors surrounding the girls he knew that for all his skill in war and presence of mind, his kingdom was small and poor, and more eligible princes abounded. Pensive, he haunted the periphery of the hall where Helen suffered gentlemen to wait on her and racked his mind for a stratagem. He was distracted by the braying laughter of Menelaus, a thick-headed bully whose ill-breeding was evident in the offhand contempt with which he treated Penelope, who hovered near him, her eyes fixed on his face, filling his wine cup and laughing at jokes intended for Helen.
``I must have Helen or die," Odysseus thought, ``though she does not seem like the sort of thing that can be had. More like a raptor, bright-eyed, poised over the world, inaccessible, rarely descending, swiftly striking. It would be worth my life to get her." Just then Mentor, Odysseus's father's man who had come with him from Ithaca, appeared as though from out of a mist and pulled him aside. Eyes shining, Mentor said he had noticed that though every man was smitten with Helen and could scarcely tear his eyes from her face, no two of them described her the same way. This effect was so pronounced that they might have been describing different women altogether. For Agamemnon she was wide-hipped, cow-eyed, faithful and slow. For Themistocles she was a wild thing of volatile moods and for Idomenos a giddy, vapid admirer of his seamanship, and so on.22.1 Not only that but when she was not immediately before them her suitors were hard pressed to remember anything about her at all--he had found that when Helen was out of sight her suitors could not even recall the color of her hair, although they accepted any suggestion given to them. Menelaus the Spartan was the only one who was not smitten with her--he seemed to desire her because she was considered desirable and only the best wife was consistent with his dignity. Odysseus, skeptical, tried to remember her face and failed. A plan formed and in his preoccupation he did not notice when Mentor vanished in a rushing of wings.22.2
That night Odysseus climbed up the wall of the palace garden through thick perfumed air and into Penelope's bedroom. She regarded him morosely, dull eyed and indifferent at the prospect of ravishment. Odysseus sat beside her on her bed, put an arm around her shoulders and asked in a conspirational whisper how would she would like to have Menelaus for a husband. Penelope replied with the clarity of depression that she would like it above all things but that no one could compete with Helen. Odysseus said, ``I will get you what you want, and as for Helen she will get a husband who is a much better man than Menelaus."
The next morning Tyndareus's valet brought him a note that had been found in the banquet hall. It was from Helen, informing him that she had fallen in love with Menelaus, prince of Sparta, and had asked him to carry her away that night, this being the only sure way of getting the husband she wanted. In a post-script she conveyed her kindest regards to the other suitors. As the young men grumbled over this effrontery the rumor spread that Penelope, the plain one, had also eloped, going off with an obscure island-lord. Tyndareus sat fuming until he realized that both his wards were in advantageous marriages with respectable grooms, that he had not paid a shaved copper in dowry and no one could say a word against him.
On Ithaca, Odysseus's bride was his delight and for her part she did not seem to mind him, though she would never let him see her undressed. In Sparta, Menelaus was happy because he had what everyone else wanted. For the first few months of their marriage his wife adored him, but soon even she found him odious. He reciprocated her dislike and, still loathe to let anyone else so much as see her, kept her sequestered in his palace.
When the glib and handsome Prince Paris visited the Spartan court, Penelope, who was permitted out of the women's quarters for state occasions, was easily seduced and absconded with him not so much for love as in the hope of any other kind of a life.
In due course Agamemnon and Menelaus came to Ithaca and demanded that Odysseus muster his forces to sail with them to recapture Helen. Odysseus longed to explain the joke and tell them to forget about their war and go home somewhat the wiser, but he saw their grim faces and their warships in the harbor and knew that he would not long survive that revelation, so he went home and kissed Helen goodbye, waiting to see if she would kiss him in return (he had lived with her for years by then but had not yet made up his mind whether she liked him, nor had he learned to read her face) and then got his arms to go to the war that he hoped would end by summer's reaping.