The Mask of Apollo

by Mary Renault

  He called for cooled wine, and conferred a moment with the young Aristoteles, a dapper youth with thin legs and small, keen eyes. Presently he came back to sit with me against the shady wall of the house, under the vine trellis. Sweet herbs stood in pots around. “I can leave it all to him,” he said. “He never forgets anything. One of our most gifted men, but not at home with first principles. How, how, how—he will probe into that forever; he can’t see that for Plato the use of how is to find the why. Why, Niko, is man? And why does man ask why? When we know that, we have all truth in our fingers. Without, a lifetime of how leads where? Maybe to designing a catapult like old Dionysios’, which can lob a stone two stades from the walls, and kill a man—a mystery of God which we can bring ourselves to destroy because we have never defined it … But why run on? What can I do for you, Niko?”

  I told him I had heard he was sailing with Plato, and had just come to say goodbye. “You have no notion,” he said, tilting his head back against the wall with a sigh, “what has gone on since last we talked—and before that, for I kept things back; you were defining my own thoughts to me faster than I could bear … Oh, yes, of course you’re wondering how Plato was induced to go. The only wonder is that he held out so long. He’s had barely a day of peace—do you know, Dionysios has written, over the last few months, to every friend of consequence he has in Athens, urging them to push him on, saying, as a rule, that when in Syracuse he proposed reforms which can only be carried out under his direction. He should know what that’s worth; but you can suppose how he’s felt, with half Athens saying he has power to reform the tyranny, but prefers his ease at home, or is afraid to test his theories. Besides all that, Dionysios has been pressing the Tarentines, and has written to Archytas hinting that the treaty may be denounced if he doesn’t get Plato there. Archytas is trusted like the father of the city; how can he risk the people’s safety for one friend’s, when it must seem to him the friend might even do good by going? Of course the Archon’s Kyrenian guests have written too, praising their host’s progress in philosophy, and his devotion to Plato’s doctrines—which means without doubt that he’s been expounding half-baked versions which Plato would die to hear.” He paused for breath, while his servant set up the wine table.

  “Poor Plato,” I said. “Like a poet when some barnstormer butchers his best lines.”

  When the man had gone, he said, “All Dion’s friends have written, too. And there are more of them than all the rest put together.”

  I said nothing. He broke off a sprig of basil, and turned it in his hand, peering into the little flowers.

  “Dion is my guest-friend of long standing. In any case one owes him justice. He has a son growing up in the Archon’s house. There is his wife …” He was some time silent before saying, “There is another threat Dion does not know of. Plato promised not to tell; those were the only terms on which he could hope to avert it.” Next moment he was distressed at having said even so much, and made me promise to be secret.

  I asked when they were sailing. With good weather, he said, in two days’ time. “God knows, Niko, when we shall get home, if ever. Before my wife I laugh at it; poor girl, she’s pregnant, and hardly more than a child herself. I feel cruel to go, but it would be worse forsaking Plato. I wonder how long before you and I sit here again.” He looked round the garden, his eye dwelling here and there. “Will you be playing in Syracuse? It would be good to see you.”

  When the ship sailed, I went to see it off, since half Athens was doing the same. It was like a scene in the theater.

  Plato and Dion behaved perfectly; no doubt their goodbyes were already said. They exchanged a ceremonial kiss, like two kings in tragedy. I saw Axiothea and her friend shedding open tears, and the eyes of the Academy men were not much drier. They might have been watching Sokrates drink the hemlock. But Dion kept his countenance. His noble bearing so much impressed the audience, I kept expecting applause.

  Months passed. It drew near autumn, and no news of Plato’s return. I saw Axiothea seldom, both of us having a good deal to fill our time. Thettalos had been doing short tours, coming home between, and it was natural when I had the right offers for me to do the same. These were brief, happy fasts, on which I worked well.

  When sailing weather was clearly ending, I went out of my way to ask Axiothea where Plato was. In Syracuse, she said; Dionysios had persuaded him to winter there, and complete the settlement of Dion’s property.

  “Again?” I said. “No, that’s too much!” Little Lasthenia, sharp as a brown bird, added, “I hope he’ll get proper thanks for it.”

  Axiothea looked at us sadly. She had always worshipped Dion; but if she felt a loss, she still had the Cause. It looked simpler to her than to me; she had never been in Sicily.

  Winter passed; spring came. At the Dionysia, Philemon, a most distinguished artist, bargained with Miron to release Thettalos for the contest. Their play was Herakles in Lydia; Thettalos did Omphale and Iolaos, changing masks with great virtuosity, and most striking in the former role. I could see the pleasure he got from working under an up-to-date protagonist, though old Miron’s discipline had done him good. I myself was doing Theseus in the Underworld, and would gladly have had him for Pirithoos and Persephone; but one can’t have a bird without a broken eggshell. It was one of Theodoros’ prize years; we came back from his party tired and happy, not reminding ourselves that roads and seas were opening, and we would soon be parting again.

  Presently, after our seeing a good deal of each other in early summer, Miron got an offer to go to Macedon, and then on north to Byzantion. Knowing from the past that I should find it harder when alone to make any plans, I shook myself like a dog and began to stir about.

  Only four days later, when they had barely begun rehearsing, Thettalos came home at noon. He had resigned from Miron’s company.

  “Not another day. I knew I couldn’t last out rehearsals, so I played fair by the old monster and gave him time to replace me. Oh, no, Niko, I have to come up for air. O Agamemnon lord of men, boom, boom, ototoi, ototoi, right hand up, left hand out. I feel like some image shut up in a temple strongroom, with the dust settling thicker every day.”

  “By the dog!” I cried. “I could clip you over the head. You stupid boy, why didn’t you tell me you didn’t mean to go north? Now I have signed up to go to Sicily.”

  “Sicily?” He looked up with his mouth full; he was devouring barley cake and raisins and cheese like a schoolboy back from the wrestling class.

  “Yes—signed, sealed and witnessed. I shall be two months away, or more.”

  “Have you got a second?”

  “What time have I had? If you had only—”

  “Dearest of men! I always longed to see Syracuse.”

  I started, then subdued my heart, as one covers a cage to stop a bird from singing. “Don’t tempt me, my dear. You know as well as I do that you’ll never rest, now, till you’re creating your own play. It can’t be long—two years, or three; meantime you’re too sensible not to take direction, but will resent whoever you have to take it from. Don’t let me be the one.”

  “Truly, Niko, I swear, it will be Elysium to work for you. I’ve been living like someone flat on a frieze. I shall talk my mind out, seeing it’s you; that I can’t help; but I’ll never cross you. All Miron taught me was to know how good you are.”

  “It would never do,” I said, trying to sound resolute.

  “Fate intends it. Look how I left him, the very day.”

  “You’ve picked up his superstition, if nothing else.”

  He came and sank down beside my chair. He had filled out his boyish hollows; his stride, like a young lion’s, had both weight and grace. He was born to play heroes, though not in Miron’s style. He flung his arm across my knees, and went into Patroklos’ speech from The Myrmidons, putting in all the grace notes. False to the sacred honor of our bed, O most unthankful for those many kisses … Please, Niko, take me to Sicily!”

  “Well,” I sai
d, “now, if you grumble, you’ve put yourself in the wrong beforehand. I was holding out for that.”

  He called me a monster and embraced me. Within the month we sailed.

  Since it would be easy to find third and extra men in Sicily, we sailed alone. Good weather, and showing him the sights, made it a pleasure trip. At Tarentum, I did not omit paying Archytas my respects, in case he had letters for Plato. He thanked me, and said he had just sent a messenger. Though courteous, he was not talkative, and seemed to me an unhappy man. He had sent a leading Pythagorean in Dionysios’ trireme, to help persuade Plato; if he had had a hard choice between his people and his friend, and was concerned for the outcome, he had my sympathy, but there was no reason why he should confide in me. He told me Plato and Speusippos were both reported in good health, and in favor with Dionysios. He forgot to ask how Dion was.

  The Syracusan consul had of course announced our arrival; but I was amazed to find, when we made port, how many people turned out. Thettalos exclaimed that I must have made the hit of a generation last time I came. But I soon learned the secret. When I had pushed his silver talent back at Philistos, I had supposed it would go straight into his treasury. As I now found out, he had done precisely as I asked. He had commissioned a life-sized bronze of the god, with a gold vine-crown, riding a gilded leopard. Of course, his own name was on the plinth as well as mine; he had the right, as choregos. I don’t know if he did it for that, or because with all his vices he was too pious to rob a god. At all events, there it stood, in the sanctuary by the theater; the citizens now supposed I was the richest actor in Greece.

  Our informant was Menekrates, who met the ship, sumptuously dressed and looking just what he was, a successful actor-manager who played all the big Sicilian cities, visiting Italy once a year. Last time he stayed with me in Athens, I had seen he was doing well; he must have been rising ever since. He carried us off, not to the lodging in the lower town, but to a great new house above the theater, with a fountain court paved in black and white mosaics, and a carved marble balcony facing the sea. Two pretty gold-skinned children came running out to meet him, from which I guessed, before I saw her, that he had married one of those blond wives so much prized in Sicily.

  I had never been there so late in summer; the streets were griddle-hot and dusty, the hills parched brown; but his courtyard, piped from a spring above, was fresh and green, and his thick walls were cool. We supped lying on cushions of Persian stuff, with two men and a boy to wait. Nothing was too good for us. It was his way of saying I had turned his luck, that day at Leontini.

  We talked theater at first. A big drama festival was coming on the feast of Arethusa, the local river-goddess. I had been met on the dock with a message from the tragic poet Chairemon, on a visit here from Athens, asking me to see him before I made any plans. In Sicily it’s catch-as-catch-can for artists; no draw like ours at home.

  It was not till the slaves had cleared and left us with the wine that I mentioned Plato. I had noticed our host had grown more careful in his talk. He had more to lose.

  “Plato?” he said. “I’ve enough to keep me busy without running after sophists, especially when they’re as meddlesome as that old man. If we get through to the festival without a riot here, and looting in the streets, we can thank the gods rather than him. I’m thinking of sending Glyke and the children into the country.”

  Startled by all this, I said it was inconceivable that a man like Plato would be conspiring against his host. “No doubt,” he answered. “But with the advice he gives, he’ll hardly need to. What the Archon’s just done—and everyone blames Plato for it—is to put his veterans on half-pay. Don’t go near Ortygia. I tell you, there’ll be trouble.”

  I could believe him. Old Dionysios had had an excellent name with soldiers of fortune everywhere, if with no one else, because he rewarded long service. The country round was full of paid-off men settled on land he had given them, often enough at the citizens’ expense. They made a useful reserve, and encouraged recruiting. Menekrates said, “He was one to skin a flayed ox, as the saying is. But everyone knew where the money went; on power. Every few years, when the Carthaginians came, we had the good of that whether he cared or not. But the young one, who’s pretty near as greedy, spends on his pleasures. While he’s idling, we get twenty extortioners where we had one before. Believe me, he can’t afford to stint his garrison. Let’s say no more; it’s hearsay only, and least known’s best. But Plato must know too much, or too little, to give such counsel.”

  “If he ever gave it. I’d lay a year’s takings against. We heard all this last time, put about by Philistos. It was just a tale.”

  Thettalos, who had maintained a modest quiet but could not forbear supporting me, said all Athens knew that Plato had come out about his friend Dion’s property, and to try for his recall.

  “Recall?” said Menekrates, staring. “If Dion wants to come home, he’ll have to recall himself, not wait to be invited. Then, who knows … But that’s dangerous talk. We’ve traveled; we’ve seen in other cities what comes of that.” He walked over to the doorway, to make sure the slaves had gone to bed. Coming back, he said, “As for the property, God reward all true friends, but in Plato’s case I don’t know who else will. Dion’s land was all sold up this spring. There was some talk of putting it in trust for his son, young Hipparinos; but where’s the odds? It would go the same way as if Dionysios spent it.”

  I remembered Dion’s words at Tarentum. “How old is the boy?”

  “I suppose about fourteen. He’s a favorite with his uncle the Archon, who’s fond of saying he won’t grow up a spoilsport like his dad. He comes to all the parties. I was at one myself not long ago, after a Madness of Herakles that took well. Plato was there too. A handsome lad, they say, not unlike Dion when he was that age. But the Academy won’t see him; his education’s well in hand. The liveliest of the girls was sent over to his supper couch, but I couldn’t see he had much to learn. His hand was down her dress all through the first course, and up it all through the second. Old Plato did try, at the start, to get a word with him, but the boy laughed in his face. Even his uncle had to remind him he was speaking to a guest, though he couldn’t keep from smiling.”

  Thettalos gave me one of his looks when Menekrates’ back was turned. He had speaking eyes; sometimes one could see it even through a mask.

  “Where is Plato staying?” I asked. “His nephew is a friend of mine, and I’d like to see him.”

  “Plato himself has that house in the palace garden he had before; it’s the Archon’s chief guesthouse. But I don’t think the nephew’s staying there. Maybe he wasn’t asked very heartily. I heard he was with religious folk, Pythagoreans. I’ll inquire tomorrow. Thettalos, dear boy, your cup—you’re drinking nothing. I’ll show you our theater, while Niko’s hunting sophists. The acoustics are first-class, but you need to know them.”

  Next morning I went to the house where Speusippos and Plato had stayed before. For fear of missing him, I was there before sunup; when the slave reported him still in bed, I said I would wait till he woke. This was not long; while I sat on the rim of the courtyard fountain, two smiths came in with a great new bolt for the outer door. They said, as they clattered, that they were sorry to rouse the master, but they were pushed with orders like this. One must blame the times.

  The din soon woke Speusippos, who looked out to see what it was. A pretty tousled girl, clutching her dress, appeared behind him; he had not counted on early rising today. Having urged her to go home quickly and not loiter in the streets, he turned and saw me. “Niko!” he said, and laughed shortly as he caught my eye. “I heard you were in Syracuse. Have you been waiting long?”

  I said I was sorry his night had been cut short so rudely. “No,” he said, “it’s as well I woke. I must see Plato in Ortygia; it’s better to go early, while the streets are quiet. They seem to be expecting trouble. Come in while I finish dressing.”

  His host greeted us going in, a silver-haired old
man shrunk with age, but upright and with a skin like a baby’s. In Speusippos’ room, with the tumbled bed still warm with the scent of the girl, he said, “I don’t think he saw her leave. Not that I’ve ever deceived him; he knows I follow the philosophy rather than the regimen, which, let us admit, has picked up much superstition since the founder’s time. He’d say, I suppose, that I’ve set myself back two or three rebirths with last night’s work. ‘The body is the tomb of the soul.’ Well, I was on edge, which my soul was taking no good from; besides which, I’ve learned from her more than she ever set out to teach, as I’ll tell you sometime. I must go; will you walk along with me?”

  As we headed for Ortygia, I remembered Menekrates warning me not to go near the place. But I was ashamed to be less bold than a philosopher, not to speak of forsaking a friend. So far, only one thing was to be noticed about the streets—that they were empty.

  I asked how Plato was, and if his mission had prospered. He made the gesture of a man so weary of his troubles that he can hardly bear to talk of them. “Plato’s as well,” he said, “as he’s likely to be after wasting a year for nothing, or worse than that. I suppose you’ve heard. All Dion’s property has been sold up, a hundred talents’ worth or more; and Dionysios has ceased even to pretend that he’ll get a drachma.”

  I exclaimed suitably. There seemed nothing to say.

  “You think Plato should have foreseen it. Of course he did. But with all these protestations, appeals and guarantees, he couldn’t be certain. Short of that, he didn’t think he should hold back.”

  “When my bad day comes, God send me such a friend.”

  “He’s always been the same. At Sokrates’ trial, neither his kin nor his friends could keep him from getting up to testify. When the court laughed him down because of his youth, which I daresay saved his life, he fell so sick with grief, they doubted he’d outlive Sokrates. May he keep his luck. I tell you, I begin to wonder.”