The Wooden Walls of Thermopylae

by Nick Brown

  “What, Mandrocles, did you not consider I might be a man of taste who could appreciate things fashioned far from Attica?”

  Strange how something so trivial can transform mood; a simple exchange about a cup altered my perception of Xanthippus and, I think his of me. No, I can’t explain it any further, reader, but you know what I mean: something similar must have happened to you.

  I sipped the wine; the mix was delicate and honeyed. For a moment we sat in silence: me sipping wine and trying to regain a measure of what old Pythagoras used to call equilibrium; as for Xanthippus? Well, I think he was considering what the basis of his relationship with me was to be.

  He was a crueller, harsher man than his modernising son, the onion headed Pericles, but easier to understand and predict. We spent our lives alternating between being on opposing and then the same side but in spite of that I found it easy to get close to him in a way I never could with his, admittedly greater, son. Silence is, however, only temporary.

  “I’m sorry for the way you were brought here, Mandrocles, but not sorry that you are here. I have a use for you.”

  He must have seen the look in my eyes.

  “No, I give you my word; this time you’ll come to no harm.”

  I must have looked unconvinced.

  “Neither will I make you perform a task injurious to those you currently serve.”

  He clapped his hands and two slaves entered the room, one carrying another less fine cup.

  “But now we will have your hurts dressed before showing you your bed; drink from that cup, it will help you sleep.”

  They led me off; I was in a daze but knew I needed sleep. As we left the room he added,

  “Tomorrow I’ll tell you about the task: I think it’s one you will like.”

  Minutes later I was still trying to make sense of that as I fell into a pleasantly drug induced sleep.

  I don’t know what they’d put in the drink but it worked: when I woke next day, the morning was half gone. It worked another way too. My body still ached, I felt bereft and lost but I realised I didn’t want to die. I got up and wandered out of the small sleeping cell to try to get some bearings: I didn’t want to blunder into the women’s quarters and be expelled with a beating. I got no further than a few paces when a slave, obviously instructed to watch for me, escorted me to the andron.

  The house of Xanthippus was elegant, light and airy, very different from most. The statues were few but exquisite; the man had an unexpected discernment and love for the modern ideas of beauty. It was clear where Pericles, with his fondness for sculptors and artists, inherited his tastes. Curiously there was no sign of the faithful hound that Xanthippus presented as a legend in the later wars. Why do I make so much of this, reader?

  Because in those early days of the great changes consequent upon the rise of the Demos, leaders of men had to change ahead of the times. They had to begin to consider the opinions of those whom they previously instructed or employed. They had to grow a public face acceptable to the new force. In those early days few either tried or, if they did, succeeded. Themistocles was the best: you could almost believe he was born for the role but Xanthippus in a more subtle way wasn’t too far behind. He would of course deny this, but in his manufactured tale of the faithful hound you can see the true genius of the politician.

  Xanthippus was in the andron concluding business with the last on his list of clients.

  “Good to see you looking better than you did last night, Mandrocles.”

  He rose; this signified the meeting was at an end and his client, who looked like a wealthy peasant farmer in his best festival robes, gushed out a few rapid sentences of thanks and praise then backed out practising a strange bobbing and bowing movement.

  “You slept longer than I anticipated, the draught must have been strong. I have business to attend in the Agora but I have a task for you. Take this message to a house you will find at the end of a lane if you take the left fork at the crossroads of the hekaton just below the great ramp. Go and eat in the kitchens before you leave. Oh, and Mandrocles, I will require a full account of what you find in that house.”

  Like his client, I was dismissed.

  Finding a house for the first time in Athens isn’t easy. The city works on the basis that if you don’t know the householder well enough to know his house already then you have no business there. The city’s littered with hekatons, heroons and shrines and most of them look the same. It took me several false turns before I ended up in front of a house that more or less fitted the description I’d been given. They should give the streets numbers or even names; it would save a lot of time. All Athenian houses look poor from the street, everything is focussed on the inside, but it didn’t take long to figure out this one had genuinely hit hard times.

  The door opened after I’d hammered on it long enough to scuff my knuckles and then only by a couple of inches. A voice – I couldn’t see a face – said,

  “The master’s out.”

  “Open the door and I’ll come in and wait.”

  “We don’t open to any we don’t know.”

  “You’ll open for me. I come on the orders of Xanthippus, son of Ariphron Strategos of the –”

  The door started to close and would have done so but for a woman’s voice inside shouting: a voice I recognised.

  “Mandrocles, Mandrocles, is it you?”

  The door opened; fully this time, and I found myself face to face with Elpinice. I don’t know which of us was more surprised. Her, probably; I looked different last time she set eyes on me. Then I was inside and the ancient crone doorkeeper dispatched to her quarters. I won’t record those first minutes, it was kept close then and it’s kept close now.

  She escorted me to the andron, or what passed for an andron in that cramped dwelling. No other lady of noble birth in Athens would have done that. But then Lady Elpinice wasn’t like the others and we had history. I sat on a shabby chair, my ribs aching from the recent pressure.

  “Cimon won’t be back before dusk, he’s hunting beyond Lykabetos. Yaya will stay in her room and sleep so we are alone.”

  We had so much to say but didn’t know how to begin. I could feel myself shaking. Then she said,

  “I’m to be married.”

  Just that. I waited as if it was a joke that she’d soon admit and laugh. But she didn’t; she cried and I didn’t know what to say. Then it all spilled out.

  “Married to Callias, a rich man. Not a bad man like they insinuate to slur us further. Not a man who’s bought me to further slake his lusts now my brother’s enjoyed his fill, as the scandal sheets say.”

  It was said with such bitter sadness that despite my fury, I too wanted to weep. I’d heard the slanders about the illicit relationship. About the way that Cimon, grown feral on strong drink, and his promiscuous sister copulated not caring which of the servants saw them. Typical of the lies that spread in a free city where the Demos enjoys undue license. But a particularly cruel lie.

  She was intact, I know it.

  There were other lies spread as well. I’m sure you will have heard them, maybe even enjoyed them. Like the story of the painter Polygnotus: how he introduced the face of Elpinice into the portrait of the Trojan women he painted for the Peisianacteum in return for sexual favours. Only someone who didn’t know the man or the lady could believe such lies and only a liar cursed by the Gods would tell the story.

  Even her most twisted enemies admitted she was a strong woman but that afternoon she sat and wept for hours. But behind the tears was the strength. Strength and courage to equal any possessed by those who stood in the front line at Marathon.

  “Because of what we feel for each other even though neither of us dare speak it and so that you will understand, Mandrocles, I will tell you why this marriage has to be.”

  She dried her eyes, pushed back her long hair which had earlier come undone and fallen to her waist, and told me a tale of sacrifice and heroism. Told it like a Spartan would: few words, no
emotion.

  “My father’s enemies did more than just bring him down. They ruined the family, killed off any chance of greatness for Cimon while he was still a boy. A fine of fifty talents and the confiscation of the estates reduced us to this.”

  She indicated the small shabby room.

  “We have only one thing left to sell: me. I can bring no dowry so the marriage brings us shame. Callias is a shrewd investor but one prepared to gamble: he pays the debt and marries into an ancient and noble family. One that, freed of debt, may rise again. That’s all there is.”

  She paused a moment, considering her next words carefully.

  “Except perhaps that I think he might have been encouraged in this by someone playing an even deeper game.”

  “But how?”

  “No, no questions my love, that is what happened: there is no more to say.”

  I couldn’t resist one last try.

  “But married to such a man?”

  “Do you suppose an Athenian woman, particularly of my pedigree, has any choice? If father was alive I would have still been married off.”

  “Yes, but to someone of higher …”

  “Callias works hard, his money frees the family. This is my role in the struggle. There is no more to say.”

  She was right, there wasn’t. We sat in the uncomfortable room for a while in companionable silence until she said,

  “The house will be empty for some hours yet; we will move to a room of greater comfort and I’ll redress your hurts while you tell how these last months have treated you. No better than they have me, I suspect.”

  She stood, helped me up and walked me to a chamber deeper in the house near to where crone Yaya had gone.

  “We have never had time like this before, have we? Although I know it is something you always wanted. And be sure there will never be a time like this again.” She took my hand and led me through the ill-fitting door.

  Some time later I was roused by the barking of dogs. I must have slept; there was no sign of Elpinice. Perhaps it was all a dream. I heard voices outside, one that I recognised although the timbre was now much deeper. I left the chamber rapidly and hurried down the darkening corridor to the andron. Inside, spinning goat’s wool and wearing the most traditional peplos with shawl and veil, was a young Athenian matron. Elpinice. She gestured for me to sit. Down the corridor there was the sound of knocking at the door.

  A short while later we heard it open and the sound of voices moving towards us. Two men only, from the sound of it. Then the door frame was filled by a well-muscled youth of about the age I’d been when his father rescued me from the life of a farmer on Samos. He was streaked with sweat and dirt from the hunt; long shaggy hair framed his face which, despite the covering of wispy hair, was instantly recognisable. Cimon!

  I hadn’t managed to fully get up from the chair before he was on me, embracing me, re-breaking my bones. I can’t remember what either of us said; it doesn’t matter. But what I do remember is the lightening jolt at what I saw standing in the doorway when I lifted my head and looked beyond his shoulder.

  Pugnacious, bull necked and grinning: Themistocles.

  Chapter Eight

  My father used to teach me that the stars turn and spin; he picked this up from some cracked philosopher at the court of Polycrates. Well for a moment everything stopped, stars included.

  “Brother, Lord Themistocles, now you are returned I can abandon my obligation of guest host and return to a modest occupation more fitting to my station.”

  She said it straight-faced and it flummoxed all three of us; none of us believed it was a genuine expression of her thoughts but it was said with such icy rectitude that we couldn’t smirk either. She rose and left with her distaff, head bowed in an attitude of meek respect. Looking back now, I recognise it for the stroke of tactical genius it was. In one simple sentence she had thrown me and Themistocles into the same boat. I wished she’d been there when I’d spewed out my rage at Lyra.

  Themistocles understood and he wasn’t going to waste an opening.

  “You see Cimon and I have been companions in the hunt. Do you think your young master would have behaved so with a man he believed had brought down his father, the hero Miltiades?”

  So I was back in the fold: betrayed, bitter and bewildered, but back all the same. I said nothing, just stood with my head bowed, after all I had spent the afternoon with a highborn Athenian lady so the sooner the conversation moved on to other matters the better. Anyway I did not wish anything that would detract from Cimon’s high spirits. From what I’d heard they’d been in short supply recently. He clapped his hands and shouted for wine. It duly arrived; a draft of poor provenance. Cimon mixed and poured the libation then looked to Themistocles.

  He tasted and looked satisfied with the vintage and for a moment I saw clear as day Miltiades in Themistocles’s house before Marathon asking him if he always drank such piss. I think maybe Themistocles was thinking the same; he nodded to me over the rim of the cup before saying,

  “I’ve heard how you received the cup I’d saved for you, Mandrocles. Unlike the Spartans and the Great King, I think it an ill thing to spear the messenger.”

  He paused, holding my gaze a moment before concluding,

  “Particularly an innocent who feels nothing but affection for you.”

  I think he’d been going to say love but, of course, a flute girl doesn’t feel love.

  “She didn’t deserve it.”

  He’d played his cards skilfully as usual: all I felt now was remorse, all thoughts of anger and betrayal evaporated.

  “So think next time, boy, now drink. Cimon son of Miltiades, what shall the pledge be?”

  Cimon, with a political grasp I’d never suspected and without hesitating, replied,

  “First Aegina, then the Great King.”

  We drank and Themistocles breathed out, almost too quiet to hear,

  “If he still lives.”

  Strange, but back then – however parlous your own life – even the slightest mention of the Great Persian empire dried out your mouth with fear. Particularly coming from Themistocles, whose ability to predict their intentions must have come from the Gods themselves.

  So we drank and as I watched Cimon down his first cup in one I saw how experience and age had transformed him. He wasn’t a boy anymore and I would become his man like I’d been Miltiades’s. Now he’d order and I’d obey even were it to cost my life. Not that it stopped me noticing that he drank too quickly and enjoyed it too much. Then the thread of life changed stitch again.

  “The arrangement with Callias concerning your sister progresses well?”

  “Very well, to my surprise she accepts without complaint.”

  He spoke like the head of the family conducting the normal marriage business but I could see in his eyes traces of the boy who had relied on his sister as the one constant in his life. Themistocles was oblivious to any such niceties.

  “Good, I think considering what is soon to break over us we move quickly. I suggest to avoid further slanders Elpinice move for a time to my house. My wife will collect her before dark.”

  Cimon nodded; I felt a twist of anguish wring my guts. She’d been correct as always: she was finally lost to me. He asked,

  “And the wedding?”

  “Quick as possible: best for everyone. Once the settlement’s handed over you can establish a respectable household and move towards your ambitions.”

  Cimon nodded; I didn’t know he had any ambitions: last time I’d seen him he was still a boy.

  “For now though, best that you go to ground like a fox sensing the hunt.”

  From his face it was clear Cimon hadn’t followed this particular stream of logic and I hadn’t the faintest idea what Themistocles was talking about. He looked at us with the expression of an Athenian dealing with slow-witted yokels from the hills. Then he spelt it out.

  “Things are going to be quite lively over the next few days: maybe worse than lively.
Starting tomorrow, if you need to understand further then get to the Agora early in the morning, you’ll be safe and in good company; it’ll be packed with democrat patriots. After that there may be a few scores settled and a few cracked skulls so you take Master Cimon somewhere safe, Mandrocles.”

  I stared at him open mouthed.

  “Take him home with you.”

  “Home with me?”

  “To the Piraeus of course. It’s all seamen living there so where could the son of the hero of Marathon be safer?”

  I wanted to tell him about Aeschylus and Lyra but he forestalled me.

  “The poet won’t mind anyway, he’s not there; he’s gone away for a few days to attend to some business of mine, and you won’t see the girl again unless you’re prepared to crawl on your hands and knees to her. So you take Cimon home with you tonight, best to be out of the city and avoid the prologue of this particular play which is going to start after dark.”

  So that night we slept in the room above the bar overlooking the sea at Piraeus. There was no need to fear oversleeping: next morning, before Apollo’s chariot dragged the sun up out of the waters and into the sky, the whole of Piraeus was on the move. We dressed rapidly, snatched a cup of wine downstairs then joined the crowd moving towards the Agora.

  As is often the case on these occasions, in Athens there was a festival mood but I’d learnt enough to know it could very quickly turn ugly. A group of rowers carrying oar loops to signal their democratic credentials recognised Cimon and burst out cheering, which was carried out into the wider crowd by people who could have no idea what the cheer was for.

  So it seemed we walked in the middle of an army of friends. By the Ceramicus our numbers were swelled by what appeared to be the whole artisan population of the city, and the ill-kept narrow lanes slowed our progress to a crawl. Eventually we could smell the stench of the Eridanos, the foul drain that moves across the Agora, and knew we were close to the action. All the seating in the Orchestra was taken so we stood near the back and waited for things to start. We’d learnt by now that this meeting had been called by Themistocles and his supporters to inform the people of close and present danger.