Odyssey 6.295 · Book 6, lines 295–297
Wait, and time your entrance
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ἔνθα καθεζόμενος μεῖναι χρόνον, εἰς ὅ κεν ἡμεῖς ἄστυδε ἔλθωμεν καὶ ἱκώμεθα δώματα πατρός. αὐτὰρ ἐπὴν ἡμέας ἔλπῃ ποτὶ δώματʼ ἀφῖχθαι,
There sit down and wait a while, until we come to the town and reach my father's house. But when you reckon that we have arrived at the palace,
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The setting
Nausicaa lays out the timing. Odysseus is to sit in Athena's grove and let her and her maids drive on ahead into town; only after enough time has passed for them to reach the palace should he set out.
A note on this passage
The plan is all about timing. Odysseus must let the girl reach home first, then follow alone once he judges she has arrived. The gap is deliberate: no one must see them enter together. What began as her fear of gossip becomes a concrete piece of stage-management.
The delicacy is worth noting. Nausicaa arranges his separate, later approach not to abandon him but to protect them both — and she trusts him to keep the interval on his own judgment. It is a small act of collaboration between two careful people, the shipwrecked man and the king's daughter, each managing appearances for the other's sake.
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