“I was worried about these Rhodians, too, but they treated me as well as if I were one of Ptolemaios' men,” Euxenides said, and Sostratos couldn't fault him for that. He went on, “They really did act as neutrals should, and I expect you'll show them every kindness here.” That expect held the snap of command, and told Sostratos which of Antigonos' officers owned the higher rank.
“Just as you say,” Aristarkhos answered, still sounding unhappy about it. “For now, though, come with me, why don't you? We'll send a messenger to Antigonos first thing in the morning. He’ll be pleased to know you got away.”
Euxenides picked up the leather sack that held his worldly goods. “Thank you for my passage,” he said, waving first to Sostratos and then to Menedemos as he went up the gangplank to stand on the quay beside Aristarkhos.
“Thank you for your help on Telos,” Menedemos replied. Thank you for your help here, Sostratos thought. Maybe jealousy had made him misjudge Euxenides. They could have made their own steering oar on the island, even if it wouldn't have been so perfect as the one the officer had turned out. But for Euxenides' acquaintance with Aristarkhos here in Knidos, though, things might have gone hard for them.
Aristarkhos asked, “What cargo are you carrying, Rhodians?”
“Perfume and purple dye,” Menedemos answered.
“Papyrus and ink,” Sostratos added. His cousin shot him a warning look. He realized he might have done better to keep quiet about the papyrus. It came from Egypt, Ptolemaios' stronghold. Reminding Antigonos' captain about it might cause trouble.
Aristarkhos only grunted. “Where are you bound?” he asked.
“Athens,” Sostratos and Menedemos said together. Sostratos wondered if that admission were wise. For the past eight years, Demetrios of Phaleron had ruled Athens as Kassandros' puppet, and Kassandros was no friend to Antigonos, either.
But Aristarkhos merely grunted again, remarking, “With that cargo, you would be.” He leaned forward, trying to see better as twilight thickened. “Will you stop at Kos on the way?”
Anther dangerous question. Lying might be safer, but also might be more dangerous. Sostratos decided to tell the truth, as calmly and reasonably as he could: “Of course we will, O best one. We are traders, and we are neutral. They make silk on Kos, and you can't get it anywhere else in the world. We'll buy some to take with us, and we'll sell crimson dye there,”
“When I left Rhodes bound for Miletos, they warned me ahead of time they planned to put in at Kos,” Euxenides said. “This was before we knew Ptolemaios' whole war fleet was heading that way.”
“All right, fair enough,” Aristarkhos said. His suspicions finally seemed to have dissolved. “Will you want to spend a day in the market square here before you go on?”
Sostratos and Menedemos looked at each other. Sostratos could think of nothing he wanted less. What he wanted was to get to Athens as fast as he could. But what he wanted and what was expedient were liable to be two different things. “Thank you,” he said. “That's very kind.”
He'd made the right choice. He saw that at once, by the way Aristarkhos relaxed. The officer turned to Euxenides, saying, “Come on, let's get you back to the barracks before it's too dark for us to see where we're going.” They walked down the quay together.
“Just what I want—a day in Knidos' market square,” Menedemos said. “It would take a special miracle from Zeus to make enough to pay the whole crew an extra day's wages.” He reached up and set a hand on Sostratos' shoulder. “And I'm sure you're even happier about the layover than I am.”
“Oh, of course.” Sostratos' sounded even glummer than his cousin had. But then he brightened. “You never can tell what we might find, though. Who would have thought we'd come across the gryphon's skull in Kaunos?”
“Yes, who would?” Menedemos' tone suggested he would have been just as well pleased never to have set eyes on it. He sighed. “We couldn't even hope to find the Rhodian proxenos' house without a torchbearer now. Do you feel like going to an inn, or will the poop deck do for the night?”
“The poop deck is fine, as far as I'm concerned,” Sostratos said. “Nothing but bugs and noise and thieves at an inn.”
“Not quite nothing,” his cousin observed.
“We've got wine here, and I'm not so mad for girls that I've got to have one the instant I come into a port,” Sostratos replied.
“Well, I don't have to have one, either,” Menedemos said in tones of affronted dignity. Sostratos smiled to himself. That gibe had gone home. Menedemos stripped off his chiton, crumpled it up, and set it on the deck to serve for a pillow. He wrapped himself in his himation and lay down. Sostratos did the same.
There was room on the deck for Diokles, too. But the keleustes perched on a rower's bench and leaned against the Aphrodite’s side planking, as he usually did when spending a night aboard ship. He'd got into the habit years earlier, when he still pulled an oar, and he'd never been able to get out of it.
Sostratos peered up into the night sky. Aphrodite's wandering star, brightest of them all, blazed in the west, following the sun down toward the horizon. That of Zeus, less brilliant but able to travel all around the heavenly sphere, shone low in the east. Distant music from the double flute and voices raised in song argued that more than a few people preferred revelry and wenching to this almost Lakedaimonian simplicity. To the crows with them, he thought, and fell asleep.
Menedemos was anything but enthusiastic about spending a day in Knidos' agora hawking the Aphrodite's goods. “Not your fault,” he said to Sostratos as they set up their little display of dye and perfume and papyrus and ink. “You couldn't afford to make that Aristarkhos angry at us. But even so ...”
“Even so,” Sostratos agreed mournfully. “I want to go on to Athens.”
He sounded like a small boy who wanted a sweet and was about to throw a tantrum because his pedagogue wouldn't buy one for him. Menedemos chuckled. If there were thinking-brothels like the thinking-shop Aristophanes had given Sokrates in his Clouds, nothing would have kept Sostratos aboard the Aphrodite the night before. He'd practically boasted about not caring whether he got laid, but he would have been gone like a dart from a catapult if he'd seen a chance to argue about the whichness of what.
“We'll go through the motions,” Menedemos said. “Then we can prowl the market square for a while, and then we'll head back to the ship.”
“Fair enough.” But Sostratos heaved a sigh. “We could be most of the way to Kos by now.” He exaggerated, but not by a great deal; the island lay less than half a day's journey north and west of Knidos.
Local merchants started crying the virtues of their olives and onions and drinking cups and wool cloth. And, not too far away, a couple of bearded Phoenicians in ankle-length linen robes and brim-less caps called out, “Balsam! Fine balsam! The finest incense and medicine the gods ever made!”
Hearing that, Sostratos perked up. “We ought to see what sort of bargain we can strike with them, A mina of balsam goes for two minai of silver.”
“You're right,” Menedemos said. “We'll have time to dicker, I expect. It won't move fast in a little town like this.”
But they'd hardly begun singing the praises of their own goods before a man with the careful, forward-leaning walk of the shortsighted came up to them and said, “You'd be the Rhodians who got in last night?”
“That's right, best one,” Menedemos answered. “What can we do for you?”
“Papyrus,” the fellow answered. That surprised Menedemos. The man went on, “Aristarkhos said you had papyrus.”
That surprised Menedemos even more. This fellow looked about as much like a soldier as a black Ethiopian looked like a fair-haired Kelt. “That's right,” Menedemos repeated cautiously. “Who are you?”
“I'm Diodoros son of Diophantos,” the nearsighted man said, leaning closer to Menedemos for a better look at him. Then he explained himself: “I'm Antigonos' paymaster hereabouts.”
“Ah.” Menedemos dipped his he
ad. That made Diodoros a customer, all right. “Yes, best one, we do have papyrus. Quite a bit of it, as a matter of fact.”
“Gods be praised!” Diodoros exclaimed. “My dear fellow, do you have any idea how difficult it is to keep proper records when your commander is at war with Egypt? I've been writing on leather; on boards; even on potsherds, the way they did in the old days when they decided whom to ostracize.” He spoke Attic Greek; Athens was the home of ostracism.
“We can probably help you,” Menedemos said. Diodoros might be the paymaster, but he was too excited to make much of a bargainer. Menedemos asked Sostratos, “How much papyrus have we got left? I know you sold some in Kaunos.”
“Oh, dear!” Diodoros sounded horrified at the thought of any of the stuff slipping through his fingers.
“We still have seventy-one rolls left,” Sostratos answered; Menederaos had been sure he'd have the number at his fingertips. His cousin added, “We have some excellent ink, too.” He pointed to one of the little round pots that held it.
Diodoros dipped his head. “Ink is all very well, but I can make my own at a pinch. I wish I could make my own papyrus. How much do you want per roll?”
How hard can I bit him? Menedemos wondered. It was a nice calculation. True, Diodoros was a paymaster, and knew how much things cost. But he'd also made it plain he badly needed what Menedemos had for sale. Still, if Menedemos asked too high a price, Antigonos' officer was liable to set soldiers on him and simply take what he wanted. Yes, a nice calculation indeed.
Menedemos made it between one breath and the next. “Six drakhmai,” he replied. “You said it yourself, sir: there's a war on. Once I sell what we've got, who knows when I'll see more?”
“You're a Rhodian, Dealing with Egypt, that gives you an advantage,” Diodoros said. He could remember business, at least to some degree. Sostratos chose that moment to take a roll of papyrus out of a sack and examine the smooth, creamy writing surface. Without saying a word, he smiled and put it back, Diodoros' eyes followed it as if it were a beautiful hetaira closing a door behind her. He sighed. “Necessity is the master of us all. I'll give you four drakhmai a roll for fifty rolls.”
Even that was above the going rate. The dicker that followed didn't last long. They settled on five drakhmai, two oboloi per roll. After some thought, Diodoros decided to buy sixty rolls, not fifty, Menedemos felt like jumping for joy. As the paymaster went off to get the silver and a sailor hurried back to the ship for the requisite rolls of papyrus, he turned to Sostratos and said, “We made a profit here! Who would have believed it?”
“They were wild for papyrus in Syracuse last year, too, after the Carthaginian siege cut them off from it,” Sostratos answered. “If you're going to keep records, you really can't do without it. More people are reading and writing these days, too. It's a good thing for us to carry.”
“I can't tell you you're wrong,” Menedemos said. “And Diodoros was right—we do have the inside track on bringing it out of Egypt. A round ship hauling grain could carry plenty for us to resell without even noticing the burden.”
His cousin dipped his head. “True enough. And now, shall we see what those barbarians want for their balsam?”
“Certainly,” Menedemos said. He and Sostratos walked over to the Phoenicians, one of whom was tall—almost as tall as Sostratos— and thin, the other short and even thinner. Menedemos bowed. “Hail.” He named himself and his cousin.
“Hail,” the shorter Phoenician replied. As he bowed, he touched his forehead, lips, and heart in turn. “I am Abibaalos son of Gisgon. Here with me, you see my brother, Abimilkios.” He spoke good if guttural Greek, and even gave the foreign names endings a Hellene might have used. “How may we serve you, my masters?”
No free Hellene would have called another man master. As far as Menedemos was concerned, the Phoenicians carried flowery politeness too far. He said, “You have balsam, do you?”
“Ah, balsam! Indeed we do.” Abibaalos bowed again. “We have the finest fragrant balsam from the garden of Engedi, clear and yellow as fine honey from Hymettos”—he really did know Hellenes well, to come up with that comparison—”burning with a sweet smoke, and also useful in medicines of all kinds, for epilepsy, for pain, as an antidote against deadly poisons, to warm the stomach and the liver, to heal inflamed eyes, to keep wounds from going bad, and to cure pleurisy and make a man's prong rise. It is effective, if the gods will.”
That was a longer catalogue of virtues than Menedemos had bargained for, almost longer than the Catalogue of Ships in the Iliad. He said, “We might be interested in some, if the price is right.”
Abimilkios spoke for the first time, in a hollow, rumbling bass: “The price is two of silver for one of balsam, by weight.” His Greek was less fluent than his brother's, but he sounded more determined. And that was indeed the going rate for balsam.
“We are traders, too,” Menedemos said.
Abibaalos and Abimilkios both smiled. Menedemos had seen that smile on Phoenicians before; it said Hellenes couldn't be traders, or at least not good ones. He leaned forward, responding to the silent challenge. He'd won some dickers from the men of the east. If he'd lost some, too, he chose not to dwell on those. Abibaalos said, “We heard you calling out your wares. You have perfume and dye and papyrus and ink, Is it not so?”
“Only a little papyrus now,” Sostratos answered. “We just sold most of it to an officer here.”
“You would have got a good price for it, too, with Ptolemaios and Antigonos at war,” Abibaalos remarked. He was no fool. He went on, “Crimson dye I can lay my hands on straight from the source. Perfume, now . . . These are the roses of Rhodes?”
Menedemos dipped his head. “Just so, best one. Even more fragrant than balsam.”
“But less rare,” Abimilkios put in,
“More people want perfume than balsam,” Sostratos said.
“More people can afford it,” Abibaalos replied. “In what size jars is the perfume?”
“Each one holds two kyathoi,” Menedemos answered. The jars weren't very big.
“The standard size,” Abibaalos said, nodding as barbarians often did. “One of those jars for each drakhma's weight of balsam, then.”
“Outrageous!” Menedemos cried, though he wasn't particularly outraged. “We ought to get three drakhmai by weight, at least.” After half an hour of insults and howls, he and his adversary settled on two drakhmai and one obolos' weight of balsam per jar of perfume.
“For a Hellene, you are not a bad bargainer,” Abibaalos remarked as they clasped hands.
“From a Phoenician, that is high praise,” Menedemos said. He and Abibaalos both smiled the same sort of smile, which meant they both thought they'd won the dicker.
4
Sostratos enjoyed watching Kos rise up out of the sea as the Aphrodite drew near; it was one of the most beautiful islands of all. It was famous for fruit of all kinds, and especially for its wines. A good many mulberry orchards, now springtime-bright with new leaves, grew within easy walking distance of the city of Kos. A little farther inland, on higher ground, stood the marble majesty of the Asklepeion.
As the akatos sailed past the healing god's shrine—easily visible from the south—Menedemos remarked, “All sorts of offerings in there from people the god cured.”
“And I know just which one in particular you're thinking of, too,” Sostratos said.
“Do you?” Menedemos sounded particularly innocent, which convinced Sostratos he was right.
“I certainly do,” he said: “the Aphrodite rising from the sea that Apelles painted.”
His cousin grinned, unabashed. “A painting of a beautiful girl—a beautiful goddess—with no clothes on is a lot more interesting than all those terracottas of knees or feet that people cured of sore joints or bunions give the god.”
“It does make you wonder what Apelles was cured of, though,” Sostratos said. “The clap, maybe?”
“Scoffer,” Menedemos said. “His portrait of An
tigonos is in the Asklepeion, too.”
“So it is,” Sostratos agreed. “Now if the whole Hellenic world could just be cured of not only old One-Eye but all the marching generals.”
Menedemos laughed and clapped his hands. “Now there's a wish, my dear. Too much to hope for, though, I'm afraid.” Sostratos dipped his head in agreement; he thought it was too much to hope for, too. And one thing a love for history had taught him was that poleis didn't need competing marshals to give them excuses to fight among themselves. The wars nowadays, however, were on a larger scale. Thoukydides, who'd reckoned the Peloponnesian War the greatest the Hellenes had ever waged, would have been horrified and amazed at the sheer scale of the fighting among Alexander's successors.
Several of Ptolemaios' fives patrolled the waters outside the harbor of the city of Kos. Sostratos would have been astonished had Ptolemaios not had ships ready to fight on the sea at all times. Kos looked northeast, toward Halikarnassos on the mainland only a little more than a hundred stadia—two or three hours' journey—away. Antigonos surely kept a fleet of his own there, and as surely had ships on patrol in front of his own harbor. Neither general would risk a surprise from the other.
One of those prowling galleys spotted the Aphrodite and came centipede-walking across the sea toward her, three banks of big oars rising and falling in the smooth unison that bespoke a well beaten-in crew. The five was fully decked, her oar-box also encased in timber to protect the rowers from missiles. She mounted a catapult near the bow. Its crew stood by to send darts farther than any archer could. Armored marines, the plumes on their helmets waving in the breeze, strode here and there across the planking.
The Gryphon's Skull Page 11