Adventure in Athens

by Caroline Lawrence

  He ignored me and took a big swig. Immediately he choked and had to be patted on the back by a laughing Alcibiades.

  I topped Dinu up a little, warning him in English, ‘Make that last all evening or Medusa will turn you to stone.’

  ‘Speech! Speech!’ cried Eyelashes. ‘I call for a speech from each of you in praise of Alcibiades, our guest of honour!’

  Each of the guests said something nice about the general. One praised his wealth, another his good looks and another his boldness.

  One young man with straight black hair produced a lyre from beneath his couch and sang what he called an ‘Ode to Alcibiades’.

  In between keeping their cups filled, I found a spare cup and filled it with well-watered wine for Crina, who sat in the shadows at the foot of a couch. Every so often I took a sip too.

  By the time each man had made a speech, they were pretty tipsy and the big krater of wine was almost empty, with nothing but dark red sludge at the bottom.

  Eyelashes came over and peered into the ancient punchbowl. ‘Fill their cups with the dregs,’ he said, ‘so we can play kottabos.’

  He opened the door and spoke to someone out in the courtyard. A few moments later a slave came in with a tall thin rod on a base and a little bronze bowl.

  I scooped up as much of the dregs as I could in my wine-pouring jug and as I went around the guests giving them each a dribble of blood-red gloop, the slave set up the rod in the middle of the krater. Then he balanced the small bronze bowl on top.

  I went over to Crina. ‘It’s for a game called kottabos!’ I told her. ‘I’ve seen it painted on ancient pots in the British Museum. Have you heard of it?’

  ‘No. Tell me.’

  ‘The aim is to knock the bowl off the stand. If you succeed, then the gods grant your wish.’ I tipped my head towards a diner with a little goatee beard. ‘That guy just prayed that his pregnant wife will give birth to a boy. Now watch. He’s going to throw.’ Goat Beard pushed himself higher on his left elbow, hooked his forefinger in one of the little handles of the kylix and flicked his wine dregs at the copper bowl.

  The dregs splattered harmlessly on the wall behind and everyone laughed.

  ‘May Philippos return my affections upon my return,’ cried the second diner, who looked like a rugby player. Everyone laughed again as he missed too.

  ‘May Alcibiades return my affections tonight,’ cried the youth with the lyre, and everybody laughed before he had even made his throw.

  All the other guests took it in turn to flick their last bit of muddy wine at the bowl, at the same time calling out a wish.

  Dinu was last. So far nobody had knocked the bowl from its stand. ‘It’s down to you,’ I heard Alcibiades tell him. ‘Otherwise it’s bad luck for us all.’

  The flickering yellow flame of an oil lamp made Dinu’s leafy garland glow and turned his blue eyes green, so that he looked like a leopard in the jungle.

  ‘Oh no!’ Crina was getting to her feet. ‘I know that look! He’s going to do something stupid!’

  But it was too late.

  Dinu had already hooked his forefinger around the handle of the cup. As he flicked his kylix forward, he cried out in excellent Greek: ‘May Alcibiades not take the expedition to Sicily!’

  45

  Slip of the Tongue

  I gasped. Dinu had done it. He had openly broken rule number three: As little interaction as possible.

  I braced myself for oblivion.

  Instead came the ominous clatter of bronze on packed earth.

  Not only had Dinu wished the worst thing possible, but the gods seemed to have heard his prayer.

  His glob of purple wine dregs had knocked the bowl off its perch.

  It had fallen onto its rim and now wobbled in a circle on the floor, making a ringing sound as it came to rest.

  The note of the ancient singing bowl died away, leaving the room in deathly silence.

  Because Dinu was reclining in front of Alcibiades with his back to him, he didn’t see the expression that flitted across his idol’s face.

  But I did.

  It was fear.

  ‘Dinu!’ I hissed in English. ‘Don’t say another word!’

  The other diners gaped at Dinu.

  For a terrible moment I thought they might leap off their couches and attack him.

  Then the good-looking youth who had played the lyre sat up straight on his couch. ‘Did you hear what happened last month at Delphi?’ he said in a quiet voice. ‘Carrion crows attacked the gold statue of Athena.’

  Another guest, a man who blinked constantly, said, ‘When my wife drew water this morning, it was the colour of blood.’

  ‘You know we’re all willing to follow you to our graves,’ said an older man who looked just like Stavros the limo-driver, ‘but what if this is not the time to attack Sicily? What if the gods are sending us a warning?’

  ‘Yes!’ said the oldest guest of all, a man with two streaks of grey hair over his ears like a badger. ‘What if the gods are warning us against hubris? We have only ever fought to defend ourselves. Never have we been the unprovoked aggressor.’

  Alcibiades pinched the top of his nose and closed his eyes. ‘I, too, have been having second thoughts,’ he confessed. Then the violets in his garland trembled as he shook his head decisively. ‘But it’s too late. How can we stop the expedition now?’

  ‘What if the people of Athens knew about the bad omens?’ said Rugby Player. ‘Wouldn’t they vote to abandon the whole enterprise? Isn’t it our duty to tell them?’

  ‘What?’ said Badger Hair. ‘Shall we gossip like old ladies? Telling them this bad dream or that possible portent?’

  ‘We need to do something across the city,’ cried Eyelashes, our host. ‘And we need to do it tonight!’

  ‘Yes!’ agreed Stavros Lookalike. ‘If the citizens see some kind of ill-omened sign they can take another vote.’

  ‘A referendum!’ said Rugby Player. ‘In order to rectify the first vote.’

  ‘Oh no!’ I said to Crina. ‘I wonder if this is when they smash the herms!’

  I said it in English but in my utter stupidity I forgot that the word is the same in both languages.

  ‘Herms?’ cried Eyelashes, whose hearing must have been as sharp as a bat’s. ‘Do something to the herms, did you say?’

  ‘They guard our passage around the city,’ mused Lyre Guy, ‘but also in and out of it.’

  ‘And they stand for democracy,’ said Blinker. ‘What with their great variety of faces and their appeal to hoi polloi.’

  ‘What if the herms could help us send a warning?’ said a man with a pock-marked face.

  ‘We could take off their garlands?’ suggested Goat Beard.

  ‘Something more drastic is needed,’ said Rugby Player. ‘We should smash them!’

  ‘That’s it!’ cried Alcibiades. ‘We’ll smash the herms! Nicias is so superstitious that he’ll call off the expedition for sure.’

  ‘What?’ Badger Hair’s face was almost as white as the streaks in his hair. ‘Deface the gods who protect our journeys, including our path to the underworld? Never!’

  ‘I agree,’ said Lyre Guy. ‘That’s too much. It would be an unheard-of sacrilege – worse than profaning the Mysteries.’

  ‘And what if we are caught in the act?’ cried Blinker.

  ‘If we cover our faces, spread out and do it in the next hour, then we should be fine,’ said Alcibiades. ‘My years on the field have taught me to act decisively.’ In spite of his lisp he sounded full of authority.

  ‘My father is a stonemason,’ said Rugby Player. ‘He lives not far from here. He has hammers and chisels, and pieces of soft leather to muffle the noise.’

  ‘Won’t your father be ashamed of your cowardice?’ cried Badger Hair.

  ‘No!’ said Rugby Player. ‘He’s been begging me not to go on the expedition. In fact, he’ll probably join us!’

  He slid off his couch and hurried out of the andron.

&
nbsp; ‘What’s happening?’ Crina said in my ear.

  I told her.

  ‘Oh no, Alex!’ She gripped my arm. ‘You gave them the idea!’

  I felt dizzy. Had I just done what I’d begged Dinu not to? Had I broken rule number three of time travel?

  ‘Wait!’ I said. ‘I think it’s OK. I’m not actually changing anything. It’s historical fact that someone smashed the herms …’

  She frowned and shook her head. ‘But, Alex, you gave them the idea!’

  Angrily I shook off her arm. ‘If I hadn’t, then someone else would have. It was destined to happen.’

  Alcibiades stood up and began to use all his skills of rhetoric to persuade Badger Hair, Lyre Guy and the other reluctant guests to join them.

  He said it was for the good of Athens.

  He said thousands of lives might be saved if we waited.

  He said the gods would understand.

  I don’t remember everything else he said, only that by the end of his speech my heart was pounding with excitement.

  As this was going to happen anyway, we might as well have some fun.

  By the time Rugby Player and his dad arrived with a load of chisels and hammers and leather shammy cloths, almost everyone was up for the deed.

  ‘Let’s vote on it,’ cried Eyelashes. ‘Who’s for smashing the herms around the city?’

  Out of sixteen right hands, twelve went up.

  One of them was Dinu’s.

  And one of them was mine.

  46

  Herm Busters

  When I was about seven, still living in Fulham with my parents, I saw my friend Callum steal some sweets from the corner shop. He said he did it all the time and never got caught.

  I thought what Callum did was exciting.

  I thought it would be cool to do something naughty. Just like Callum.

  So I decided to break something.

  Early one Sunday morning, before my parents were up, I took an empty jar out to the street. I looked right and left, but nobody was around. Heart pounding, I threw the jar onto the street.

  It bounced.

  After two more goes, it finally shattered in a satisfying explosion of shards.

  Smashing the herms was a bit like that.

  It felt bad and good at the same time.

  Plus, there was a gang of us.

  We all crowded out through the double front doors into the moonlit street. Eyelashes stopped by the herm on the corner, a few paces from his porch.

  ‘We’ll start with our herm!’ he said. ‘It’s been here since before the Persians.’ He turned to Rugby Player’s dad, the stonemason. ‘Show me how.’

  ‘Place the shammy like this.’ Stonemason Dad laid a soft piece of leather over the herm’s face and handed a big hammer to Eyelashes. ‘Now hit the nose bump.’

  The soft clunk was barely audible, but when Stonemason Dad pulled the shammy away, the nose clattered to the ground. Part of the herm’s mouth had broken, too, and it gave him a lopsided smile.

  The god didn’t look upset at all. He looked amused.

  ‘Spread out, men!’ commanded Alcibiades in a low voice that made his lisp more pronounced. ‘Go in groups of two or three. Work quickly and quietly and then meet back here!’

  All the men wanted to go with Alcibiades but he said, ‘I’ll take Euphiletus and the two boys. Your sister had better wait here,’ he said to Dinu.

  I felt a bit bad for Crina but mainly happy for myself. Alcibiades wanted me on his team!

  Dinu had pulled his garland down a little so that it cast his face in shadow.

  I didn’t have a garland so I started to wrap my scarf around my head.

  Not like a girl though.

  Like a ninja.

  Suddenly Crina grabbed our wrists. ‘Alex! Dinu! You can’t do this!’

  Dinu shook her off.

  I tried to be gentler. ‘Yes, we can. In fact, we’ll be going against history if we don’t. Wait here, like Alcibiades said. We’ll be back before midnight.’

  ‘You and Dinu could get caught again!’ She tugged at my headscarf. ‘They could execute you!’

  ‘Not if I’m with Alcibiades!’ I rewrapped the scarf around my face.

  I had to run in order to catch up.

  Alcibiades, Eyelashes and Dinu had stopped by another herm. Eyelashes held the soft leather over the marble face and Alcibiades swung the hammer.

  Thunk! This time the herm lost its chin as well as its nose.

  ‘Why do boys always want to smash things?’ Crina had not done as she was told; she was still following us. ‘You’re like toddlers knocking down bricks.’

  ‘Smashing things feels good,’ I said. ‘It makes you feel powerful. And it’s better than killing real people.’

  Alcibiades cocked his head. ‘You try one, Dinu,’ he lisped.

  Dinu’s eyes gleamed with pleasure and I felt a pang of jealousy until Alcibiades looked at me and said, ‘Alexis! You help him!’

  I held the shammy and Dinu raised the mallet.

  His blow took the face right off.

  We all grinned. Then Dinu handed me the mallet. ‘You next, Alexis,’ he said.

  Alcibiades gave him a nod of approval.

  The mallet was heavy. I felt its power.

  ‘Where’s the next one?’ I asked.

  ‘I think there’s one just up ahead,’ said Eyelashes. The strong moonlight on his garland cast leafy shadows on his face.

  He turned down a narrow street of white-plastered houses with only a narrow footpath between piled-up dung and rubbish on either side. Thankfully the scarf around my head partly covered my nose and its faint perfume blocked out the worst of the stink.

  At the end of this street we turned a corner.

  I saw the back of a herm up ahead at a narrow crossroads.

  My heart was thudding with excitement and I ran towards it, letting the mallet swing.

  But when we reached the moonlit herm, I skidded to a stop and stared.

  This one didn’t look like Hermes, the messenger god.

  It was more like the wise father of satyrs: old Silenus with his bald head, bug eyes, snub nose and wide mouth.

  The herm looked just like Socrates.

  And that was when I finally came to my senses.

  47

  Smashing Socrates

  ‘Oh my God!’ I felt as if someone had emptied a bucket of ice water on my head. ‘What are we doing?’

  ‘What are you waiting for?’ cried Dinu. ‘Smash it!’

  ‘Yes!’ cried Eyelashes. ‘Bash it!’

  ‘Come on, Alexis!’ lisped Alcibiades. ‘Are you with me or against me?’

  I let the mallet fall to the street. ‘I can’t. What would Socrates say?’

  ‘Yes!’ hissed Crina. I turned to see her in the shadows, fist-punching the air.

  ‘Socrates doesn’t care about the gods of the city!’ said Alcibiades. ‘He says no true gods would behave as badly as the ones the poets sing of. He believes there must be a single god who is perfectly good and just.’

  ‘That’s why he wouldn’t do this,’ I said. ‘It’s wrong and you know it.’ Then on impulse I added, ‘Don’t let the black horse drive the chariot of your soul!’

  ‘You dare rebuke me?’ A single stride brought Alcibiades so close to me that I could smell the sweet wine on his breath and the musky scent of his sweat. I felt dizzy.

  Alcibiades gripped my shoulders. ‘Who are you? Who are you really?’

  If Socrates’ gaze had been like a fishing line, gently trying to tease up the truth from the depths of my mind, Alcibiades’ gaze was like a spear piercing my soul.

  ‘What do you mean?’ I stammered.

  ‘Nobody has ever seen you before.’ He was using the plural form. ‘You three just suddenly appeared in the Temple of the Maiden.’

  He took my hand and rubbed the palm hard with his calloused thumb.

  I yelped.

  ‘Look at this soft hand,’ he sneered. ‘You’ve
never worked a day in your lives.’

  He cocked his head and brought his face so close that his nose was almost touching mine.

  ‘At first I thought you were spies from Corinth. But your Greek is strange and the girl can barely speak it. Therefore not from Corinth. So once again I ask: who are you really?’

  My mind was like a hamster on a wheel, working furiously but getting nowhere.

  ‘We’re from a faraway land,’ I stammered. ‘The um … Tin Islands.’

  ‘And yet,’ he lisped, ‘no ship has arrived from such a place and nobody saw you travelling on the road.’ He nudged my sandalled foot with the toe of his soft boot. ‘Those are the feet of someone who is used to being carried in a litter. Of someone completely unused to walking. But there’s something more. It’s as if you are not of this world. You don’t move like us. You don’t even think like us. I think I know who you are, but …’

  He stood upright and shoved my chest so that I staggered back and almost fell.

  ‘Go on then, leave! Take the girl with you!’ He slung an arm around Dinu. ‘You won’t leave me, will you?’

  My best mate turned to Alcibiades. ‘No,’ he said in Greek. ‘I will not leave. I’ll stay with you until I die.’

  Dinu looked at me and Crina with shadowed eyes. ‘I can be a warrior here,’ he said in English. ‘I will get fame and fortune and kleos with Alcibiades. I will never have a life back home as awesome as I can have here.’

  Then he picked up the mallet I had discarded and smashed the face of Socrates.

  48

  Socrates at Home

  ‘Alex?’ said Crina half an hour later. ‘Do those pillars look pink to you?’

  We had risked our lives by walking through the night-time streets of Athens and out the southern gate in a desperate attempt to find the house of Socrates.

  We both agreed he was the only one who could talk sense into Alcibiades and Dinu.

  Crina had been distracted earlier in the day when the blacksmith’s wife had taken her to his house, so she didn’t remember the exact route. But she kept recognising landmarks, including the corpse of a dead man in an alley, now partially eaten by dogs.