The King was drunk. He'd danced with all the courtesans without asking his wives' permission, he'd sung as loudly as he liked, he'd crashed a table and gone back to singing. He lay back on his pillows and demanded entertainment. A young poet was brought in.

Outside the castle crouched silently on the plain. Beyond it stood the mountains and in between the labyrinth, the King's pleasure maze. It was a bit run down; the King's enthusiasm had waned. It was, he told himself, an illusion of his youth, the kind of trickery which creates a maze of images where every idea leads to another and another to another. It was a disorder of the mind, he decided. He was into straight arrangements now.

The poet was nervous. He knew what the King wanted, but he had other things in mind. He'd heard of the ruler's kindness but in fact had only experienced his cruelty: the men of his village had been slaughtered. He was a child and had escaped. He could recite the old epics but instead preferred to begin with folk songs from his region, as he interpreted him.

The King sat through two songs before interjecting, "As you wish," which was the signal to have the poet tossed out. The King knew Commentary when he heard it. Enough of that. I do as I like. No one knows if the poet was sent to the gallows or simply shown the palace gates. In any case, he was never heard from again.

During the King's revelry, which continued until at least 3 a.m., a humble-looking artisan slipped into the castle, under the pretext of fixing a leaky pipe. After he was checked for weapons of the obvious sort no one paid any attention to him. He'd brought his tools along. The night was very clear. It was spring, there were scents riding on the air - acacia and fig flowers. The worker went to work and rearranged the labyrinth; for good measure, he carried a few of the pictures out in his big canvas bag, and brought them back to the mountains, where they were bartered with neighboring tribes so the villagers could buy arms.