The Ten Thousand

by Michael Curtis Ford

  We stared at him in eager silence.

  "I said, does that mean being the strongest, you piss-ants!?"

  "Yes!" we called, though with some hesitation. The instructor stood in the shadows, seeming to glare at us with disgust, until he pointed to one of the larger ephebes standing in the front row. I had unconsciously flexed my knees in an attempt to make myself appear shorter in case he should look in my direction. The chosen boy walked uncertainly into the firelight.

  The instructor nodded to the smallest of the several hoplites who had been standing motionless to the side. The soldier whipped off his helmet and stepped forward, slowly and stolidly, until he stood directly before the boy and crouched in a wrestling stance. The boy smiled faintly and he too crouched, as if eager to demonstrate his skills against his much shorter opponent. At the instructor's clap the hoplite shot forward and in a move that was barely visible to us in the semidarkness, he tripped the ephebe onto his belly in the dirt. The boy's arm stretched straight out behind him with the soldier's foot planted squarely on the shoulder joint. The man paused for a second before leaning back slightly against the arm, eliciting a loud "pop" as the joint pulled out of its socket, and the boy screamed. An audible shudder ran through the crowd and we all took a half step back in horror, as the hoplite roughly assisted the sobbing boy to his feet, his arm hanging limply, and gestured for him to step back into his place in the darkness.

  The instructor stepped forward again.

  "You were wrong!" he growled. "There will always be an opponent stronger than you. Even great Hector fell to one who was stronger. He who relies on strength alone endangers himself and his polis. Does that mean, therefore, being the most skilled with a weapon?"

  Silence.

  "Sons of whores. I said, does that mean being the most skilled with…"

  "No!" a hundred voices shouted.

  "Need I demonstrate?" he asked in an evil tone as he drew a sword and began scanning the faces of the ephebes peering fearfully at him from the darkness.

  "No!" we shouted again, in rising panic.

  "You learn your lessons quickly," he said dryly. "Tell me then, does it mean having the fastest reflexes?"

  "No!" came the automatic response.

  He chuckled hollowly. "I believe I will demonstrate this one," he said.

  The crowd of boys shrank back away from him as he began peering at their faces. Unaccountably, his gaze rested directly on me. "You," he said, "the big one. Let us test your speed."

  I stepped forward warily, memories of the training bouts with Antinous still fresh in my mind though they had occurred over six years before. The instructor looked me over, with what seemed almost an expression of disappointment behind the shadows of his visor.

  "A squire," he said in disdain, noting my lack of a chlamys. Hawking his throat he spat an enormous, glistening gob on the ground at my feet. "Blindfold me, squire." He took off his helmet and breastplate and stood before me, massive, his bare chest and shoulders dark in the torchlight under a layer of curly hair. I hastened to obey, using a black linen cloth one of the other hoplites handed me. I then stepped back, and the man faced the boys, though unable to see any of them from behind the fabric.

  "Now, squire, attack me, from any direction, however you see fit."

  At this, the other hoplites began clanging their spears rhythmically, in unison, against their shields, setting up a racket that would obscure any sound that my feet might make as I circled around him seeking the optimal angle of attack. The beat was taken up immediately by the ephebes, who clapped their hands and stomped their feet in the same rhythm. As I looked around, however, I saw only fear on the faces of those around me. I stood motionless for a moment, gazing at the instructor and summoning my courage, listening to the rhythm of the beating hands and clanking spears. I then began moving slowly around him in concentric circles, drawing ever nearer, fixing my eyes steadily on him, wary of any trickery. The man stood erect and immobile, not a muscle twitching, his jaw thrust forward in utter concentration.

  As I moved closer I made several feints toward his body, once almost touching him, to test his senses, experimenting as to whether he was able to see my moves from under the blindfold. All these maneuvers were met with a rising volume of din from the ephebes, who in their excitement increased the speed of their stomping, losing the sense of the steady beat until the noise was no longer a distinct thumping but rather a prolonged roar. Again and again I dove in, stopping just before committing to a full-fledged attack, while the man stood as if frozen.

  Suddenly, sensing that his concentration must have flagged, I leaped forward, plunging my fist with all my strength directly into his exposed belly. Scarcely had my knuckles met the hair on his skin, however, than he whirled, catlike, stepping to the side and throwing me into an off-balance stumble, augmented by an iron fist clubbing down across the back of my neck. I slammed jaw-first onto the flagstones, half senseless, and heard vaguely, as if from a distance, the sound of metal sliding on leather as he drew his sword and pressed the tip against the middle of my back almost before I had even hit the pavement. I opened my eyes and peered through the semidarkness into the crowd of now silent ephebes. I could make out Xenophon's face staring straight at me, his eyes wide in surprise and terror.

  "You were wrong again, shitworms," the instructor said in a low, menacing voice. "It does indeed mean having the fastest reflexes."

  We endured two years of training in hoplite weaponry, archery, javelin-throwing and maneuvering of the catapult, I performing the same drills as Xenophon, as well as serving as his foil and weapons bearer. For two years we were roused from bed before sunrise to submit to conditioning exercises that surpassed anything Antinous had put us through, and to suffer the relentless reflex drills designed to make our defensive responses unthinking and automatic. We dined in the common mess with the officers and men and practiced parade drills before the entire city. In those two years we became men. Upon successful completion of the regimen, Xenophon was awarded a fine shield and spear and formally inducted into the Athenian army. Through Gryllus' manipulations, however, young Xenophon would not serve as a mere foot soldier. His father, now retired from the military but maintaining a heavy presence in the city's political life, fitted him out with a fine horse and all the cavalry equipment needed by a young nobleman. He presented him with a commission as squad leader, the same position in which Gryllus himself had started his illustrious career many years before.

  In this role, Xenophon cut a fine figure. He had grown to a man of medium height, but quite muscular, his broad chest tapering to a slender waist and well-defined thighs. Gryllus even had to order a special cuirass made for him, to be more comfortable around his collar and shoulders. His glossy black hair was cut short and left curly, military style, and unlike many heavily bearded officers, he kept a clean jaw. His eyes were still as round and limpid as they had been when he was a boy, but since his recovery from the chest wound years earlier, they had lost their sweetness and innocence, and instead glinted with a hardness that belied the boyishness of the rest of his face. When introduced for the first time to his men or to other officers, his features often gave the initial impression of a young man promoted too quickly to a level beyond his experience. This view was corrected as soon as he issued his first orders in a deep and commanding voice, and fixed his eyes on their recipient with an expression that brooked no dissent.

  I regularly attended morning gymnasium with Xenophon and cared for his animal, reporting to Gryllus on his son's whereabouts and traveling with him as his squire to his postings at Athens' dwindling garrisons. He was a model officer, possessing not an ounce of frivolity, the ideal of his father's virtue. Yet during his infrequent leaves he would disappear for days on end, spurning both his fellow officers in the barracks and the comforts of Gryllus' house, where his father vainly awaited his arrival, eager to trade camp stories and discuss military tactics. Only I know the hours he spent in drab civilian clothes, quietly accompa
nying Socrates as he made his rounds throughout the city, and how Xenophon would discreetly scratch cryptic notes of the philosopher's words on a small travel tablet and transcribe them at night. Only I know the days he spent with a bitter, discredited old general named Thucydides, who was busy writing a history of the war, and who occasionally used Xenophon as an aide to check his calculations and organize his notes. Only I know these things because Xenophon told them to me, and swore me to secrecy. Gryllus considered Socrates a frivolous charlatan, and Thucydides a revisionist madman, and though he would have raged at Xenophon for frequenting the former, he would have disinherited him for assisting the latter.

  The city's military situation progressively worsened, and over the next few years Xenophon found himself increasingly occupied in defensive activities more befitting a besieged provincial garrison than the center of the Hellenic world. He was in Athens the night the vessel Paralus arrived, bearing shocked sailors carrying the terrifying news of the Spartan admiral Lysander's sacking of Athens' colonies. He remained in the besieged city that year, riding the walls in its defense against the gathering land and sea forces of the Spartan alliance. He heard the tragic moaning of the people, both for those lost and for their own fate; and he watched as the city's fortresslike Long Walls were destroyed to the rhythmic wailing of the reedy auloi, played unceasingly by weeping young girls whom Lysander had ordered to accompany the city's dismantling.

  Thus the war's dismal end, and in the shadowy, shifting political alliances that emerged to rule Athens immediately afterwards, Xenophon's star began to wane. His wound at Phyle was the least of his worries, for he soon recovered full strength in the injured leg. When the Thirty Tyrants were overthrown by the democrats, Xenophon, who never outwardly supported any regime but merely followed the orders of his father and his superiors, found himself in actual disgrace, if not in outright danger of his life. The cavalry were disbanded and Xenophon's wages rescinded. There were even calls in the assembly for former cavalry troops to return all payments that had been made to them over the past two years. Gryllus fiercely stifled this motion and others, in a determined rearguard action to protect Xenophon's, and his own, declining reputations. Athens' new leaders eventually came to their senses and reconstituted the cavalry corps for the city's defense-but prohibited former officers, Xenophon included, from joining, on account of their past association with the Thirty. Xenophon's political viability was in jeopardy, and his very patriotism had been called into question.

  It was around this time, when his morale was at its lowest and he had confided in me his fears that he would soon be forced into exile or imprisonment if the regime did not stabilize, that a fortuitous event occurred, one of those few occasions that make one lift one's eyes to the heavens in wonder at the impeccable dramatic timing of the gods. A letter arrived, borne by a runner from the port whence it had just been taken off a tramp grain ship from Ephesus. Xenophon unrolled it suspiciously, for little news he had received of late was in his favor, and was startled to find that it had been written by Proxenus, from whom he had heard nothing since his return to Boeotia twelve years before.

  Proxenus, who had been elected to the rank of general in the Theban army and had inflicted considerable damage on the Athenians in the war, had now found a position in Sardis, commanding a Greek mercenary brigade in the employ of the Persian prince Cyrus. Cyrus had generously bankrolled Sparta during the war, and was now raising an army to dispatch some troublesome neighboring tribes in Asia Minor. Proxenus was seeking able-bodied recruits for the campaign.

  "Xenophon," he wrote, "past political affiliations are of no consequence. Previous history is ignored. The war between Sparta and Athens is a thing of the past. Cyrus' only requirements are a stout heart, strong arms and a willingness to fight." Did Xenophon know of anyone who might fit those qualifications?

  His eyes clouded over in thought as he considered the proposal and his own current prospects in Athens. Holding the letter in his hand, he slowly turned away and began walking absent-mindedly to his father's study, as if to seek his advice. I caught my breath, then quickly strode over and placed my hand heavily on his shoulder. He stopped and looked at me in puzzlement.

  "Xenophon," I said. "Wait, before you talk to your father; think about this. Proxenus is your cousin, but he is also a Boeotian, an ally of Sparta, and therefore in Gryllus' eyes no friend of yours. He is a mercenary now, an irregular, employed by Sparta's biggest backer, a Persian no less. Is this really something you wish to present to your father?"

  He fixed his eyes on mine for a moment, and then again glanced down at the letter. I could see the paper trembling in his hand, and I recalled the agony he had felt when Proxenus left. "Perhaps it would be better to speak first to Socrates," he muttered to me under his breath.

  I wondered aloud at this, too, despite what I knew of his deep admiration for the old philosopher. "Xenophon, you're going to ask advice from a man your father can't abide, about a project that would kill him if he knew you were even considering it."

  He flared for an instant. "Always protecting him, aren't you, Theo? Why don't you look to my side for once? Gryllus is my father, and for better or worse, I am his son. But his war is not my war." He looked away, seething, and I waited for a moment while he struggled to gain control of his emotions. Finally, he took a deep breath and pointed sadly to the long-unused saddle blanket neatly folded in the corner of the room, and to his army-issue shield, both gathering dust. "What would you have me do, Theo? What would you have me do?"

  CHAPTER SIX

  SOCRATES MEANDERED THROUGH the stalls of the thronging agora, poking his head into the shops of the vendors he knew, gently handling pieces of fruit or sandals or ceramic lamps and commenting favorably on their quality. He nodded and smiled at everyone, even those who, he knew, disdained his lack of regard for worldly goods, or found his thinking on these matters dangerous. He was accompanied in his apparently aimless wandering by a small knot of young men, most of them from the best families, by the look of their clothing. Noticing our presence, however, which had been rare of late, Socrates brushed past the others and practically skipped up to us. He was surprisingly agile for his age and the extent of his belly, which had not grown any smaller over the years. The man had hardly changed since we had first met him, unless his eyes could be said to have even a merrier twinkle than before. After a polite greeting Xenophon, who after five years in the military had little patience for chatter, broached the subject of Proxenus' letter with Socrates. The old man frowned unhappily.

  "Xenophon, you have many reasons to stay," Socrates said after a moment of thought. "Regimes come and go. The Thirty were in power for only two years, and now the democrats rule. They too will pass soon enough, or at least the indiscretions of those who served under them will soon be effaced from memory. But even admitting this-or perhaps that your true problem is that you are bored and have a desire for adventure and for wealth-is Cyrus' banner really the one under which you should march? Your service under the Thirty will be forgotten six months from now. But joining with Cyrus, who financed the Spartans to destroy our city-that is a different matter, and the adventure you gain may be very dearly won."

  Xenophon stood stiffly, a soldier's posture, facing his mentor. His eyes were directed toward Socrates, but were focused on the middle distance, like one whose mind has already been set. Socrates noticed this too, and paused, searching his face. He sighed.

  "Xenophon," he said gently. "One thing more: You are not yet married, and you're not likely to find a suitable wife among Cyrus' camp followers. Your father will be expecting a grandson soon. You have a family here, friends, a fortune, a future ahead of you and an Athens that will soon be reconciled with itself again." Socrates smiled sadly. "I know that Proxenus is your blood relation and your friend, and there are ties between you that I can never loosen. But please, consider your position carefully. Talk to your father, or if you feel that his opinion is a foregone conclusion, at least take the trouble to
sacrifice to the gods, and ask the oracle at Delphi for guidance in making your decision."

  We walked back to the house in silence. That afternoon we rode, still in silence, to the old family estate at Erchia, which he had not visited in years. The weather was cold, windy and rainy, and as soon as we arrived Xenophon strode through the dusty hallways to his old room, closing the door behind him. For two days I scarcely saw him as he remained shut inside, reading the books he had brought with him, writing letters, working assiduously on his notes. I cannot say this was unusual-ever since losing his commission he had been in a state of depression, sleeping late, neglecting to shave, writing volumes of work that no one ever saw and which he destroyed by fire in a brazier in his room or carefully filed away in a locked chest. This time, however, I was concerned, because there was a finality about his actions, a determination in his expression, like that of someone set on completing a task, and because I knew of the decision that was hanging over his head like a leaden weight, one that would affect me every bit as much as him.

  On the morning of the third day he burst into my room, bathed and well-rested and with blood-stanching cobwebs still dangling parasitically from his jaw as the result of his hurried shaving. The transformation in him was so dramatic that I was momentarily startled, though at the same time delighted to see him having returned to himself. Xenophon was not in the mood for idle chatter, however.

  "Pack up, Theo," he announced. "We leave in an hour."