What I liked is the thing with the dogs in Book 16, Madeline said. What she was referring to was this: At the beginning of Book 14, when Odysseus (who, following Athena’s transformation of him, is to all appearances nothing more than a wizened old beggar) approaches Eumaeus’ hut, he is nearly killed by the swineherd’s snarling guard dogs, escaping only because he sinks down to the ground and drops his beggar’s staff until he’s rescued by Eumaeus, who tells him that he’s lucky to be alive. “One moment more and these dogs would have torn you to pieces!” But when Telemachus makes his way to
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