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Then the beggar spoke . “ Let me try the bow , ” he said . “ I want to see if I am still strong . ” The suitors were angry . “ You are drunk , old man , ” said Antinous . But Penelope said , “ Let him try . He will not marry me , even if he strings it . ” “ Mother , go to your room , ” said Telemachus . “ I will decide about my father’s bow . ” Penelope was surprised , but she went upstairs . Athena sent her into a sweet sleep . Eumaeus carried the bow across the hall and put it into his master’s hands . Odysseus turned it round and looked at it carefully . Then , as easily as a musician puts a string on his instrument , he strung the great bow . He touched the string , and it sang like a swallow . The suitors went pale . Zeus sent a clap of thunder from the sky . Odysseus took an arrow and shot it from where he was sitting . It flew through the rings of all twelve axes . “ Telemachus , ” he said , “ your guest has not shamed you . I am still strong . ” Telemachus took his sword and spear and stood at his father’s side . Then Odysseus threw off his rags and jumped into the big doorway with the bow . “ The contest is over , ” he said . “ Now I will find another target . ” He shot at Antinous , and Antinous fell dead . The suitors jumped up . They looked round the walls for shields and spears , but Odysseus and his son had hidden them the night before . “ You dogs ! ” shouted Odysseus . “ You thought I would never come home from Troy . You ate my food and you wanted to marry my wife while I was still alive . You were not afraid of the gods , or of men . Now you will pay . ” Eurymachus offered to pay back everything they had taken . But Odysseus would not listen . There was a short and terrible fight . On one side were Odysseus , Telemachus and the two loyal servants . On the other side were more than a hundred suitors . Athena was with Odysseus . She sat high on a roof beam like a swallow , and the suitors ’ spears all missed . When it was over , none of the suitors was alive . Odysseus did not kill the singer Phemius or the servant Medon , because Telemachus asked him not to . They had only served the suitors because they had to . Then they made the hall clean again . XIV . The Secret of the Bed Old Euryclea ran upstairs to wake Penelope . “ Wake up , my dear child ! ” she cried . “ Odysseus is here ! He was the old beggar . He has come home , and the suitors are dead . ” “ You are mad , ” said Penelope . “ Why do you laugh at me ? Let me sleep . ” “ It’s true , ” said Euryclea . “ Telemachus knew it , but he kept the secret . And I saw the scar on his leg myself . ” Penelope went down to the hall . She sat by the fire , opposite Odysseus , and looked at him for a long time . She did not say a word . Sometimes she thought it was him , and sometimes she did not .
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