“Life’s never too short to keep track of anything,” Sostratos said.
Menedemos would have bet his cousin would come out with something like that. He retorted, “You’re the one who forgot Nikokreon’s dead, back there earlier today.”
Sostratos turned red. “Well, I shouldn’t have. What he did deserves remembering, whether you usually keep track of such things or not.”
“Now you’ve got me curious,” Menedemos said. “What did he do, my dear?”
“He’s the abandoned rogue who tortured Anaxarkhos of Abdera to death,” Sostratos answered. Menedemos must have looked blank, for Sostratos continued, “Anaxarkhos was a philosopher from the school of Demokritos.”
“Oh, I’ve heard of him,” Menedemos replied with some relief. “The fellow who says everything’s made up of tiny particles too small to cut up any more--atoms, right?” To his relief, Sostratos dipped his head. Menedemos said, “All right, Anaxarkhos followed him. What then?”
“He was a man who spoke his mind, Anaxarkhos was. Once when Alexander got hurt, Anaxarkhos pointed to the wound and said, ‘That is the blood of a man, not a god.’ But Alexander liked him, and didn’t take offense. Nikokreon was different.”
“You’re a tease, do you know that? If you were a hetaira, you’d have more customers than you knew what to do with, the way you promise and promise without actually giving very much.” Menedemos poked his cousin in the ribs.
“If I were a hetaira, all the men would run screaming, and I don’t mean on account of my beard,” Sostratos replied. “I know what my looks are.”
Menedemos had been a much-courted youth before his beard sprouted. No one had paid the least attention to his tall, gawky, horse-faced cousin. At the time and since, Sostratos had made a good game show of not caring. But, down deep, it must have rankled. Here, ten years later, Menedemos saw it coming out. He made a point of not overtly noticing. “Nikokreon was different, you say? How? What did this- Anaxagoras?-do?”
“Anaxarkhos,” Sostratos corrected. “ Anaxagoras was a philosopher, too, but a long time ago, in the days of Perikles.”
“All right, Anaxarkhos,” Menedemos said agreeably, glad he’d steered his cousin away from thinking about himself. “What did he do to get dear Nikokreon angry at him?”
“That I don’t know, not exactly, but it must have been something special, because Nikokreon thought up a special death for him,” Sostratos replied. “He threw him into a big stone mortar and had him pounded to death with iron hammers.”
“Pheu!” Menedemos said. “That’s a nasty way to go. Did the philosopher die well?”
“Anaxarkhos? I should say so,” Sostratos said. “He told the Salaminian, ‘Go ahead and pound my body, for you can’t pound my soul.’ That made Nikokreon so furious, he ordered Anaxarkhos’ tongue torn out, but Anaxarkhos bit it off before the torturer could get to him, and he spat it in Nikokreon’s face. And so you see, my dear, Nikokreon might have got off better than he deserved when Ptolemaios told him to slay himself. If I’d been the one giving the orders…”
“You sound as bloodthirsty as any of the Macedonians,” Menedemos said, eyeing Sostratos with unwonted wariness. “More often than not, you’re as gentle as any man I’ve ever known. Every once in a while, though…” He tossed his head.
“Someone who tries to kill knowledge, to kill wisdom, deserves whatever happens to him,” Sostratos said. “That polluted whoreson pirate who stole the gryphon’s skull, for instance. If I got my hands on him, I’d send for a torturer from Persia and another one from Carthage, and let them see who could do worse to him. I’d pay them both, and gladly.”
Menedemos started to laugh, but stopped before the sound escaped. When he looked at Sostratos, his cousin’s expression said he hadn’t been joking. That pirate was lucky he’d managed to get off the Aphrodite . And he’d stay lucky if he never complained in a tavern about the old bones he’d taken in lieu of other loot more worth having. If word of such grumbling ever got back to Sostratos, that pirate would have to look to his life.
When they returned to the merchant galley, Diokles proved to have done some scouting of his own. The oarmaster said, “They’ve got a fine kitharist from Corinth playing at one of the inns here. They say he’s the first kitharist to play in Salamis since Nikokreon flung the one named Stratonikos into the sea. Now that the king’s dead, they dare show their faces here again.”
“Oh, by Zeus!” Menedemos exclaimed. “Another one Nikokreon put to death?”
“Another one?” Diokles asked.
“But you have to remember, too, it wasn’t a king who killed Sokrates.”
“Democracy isn’t perfect, either-the gods know that’s so,” Sostratos said. “If we didn’t live in a democracy, we wouldn’t have to listen to Xanthos blather on and on whenever the Assembly meets, for instance.”
“You’re right,” Menedemos said. “One more reason to be glad we can get out of Rhodes half the year on trading runs.”
“Pity we can’t hear Stratonikos, though,” Sostratos said. “Who’s the kitharist who is in town, Diokles?”
“Areios, his name is,” the keleustes answered.
Menedemos nudged Sostratos. “What did old Stratonikos have to say about him, eh, best one?”
“He told him to go to the crows once,” Sostratos answered. “That’s all I know.”
“Sounds like Stratonikos told everybody to go to the crows,” Menedemos said. “That doesn’t make this Areios out to be anybody special. I wonder if we should bother seeing him.”
“What else is there to do in Salamis of nights?” Sostratos asked.
“Get drunk. Get laid.” Menedemos named the two obvious choices in any harbor town. They were, when he thought about it, the two obvious choices in towns that didn’t lie by the coast, too.
“We can drink and listen to Areios at the same time,” his cousin said. “And if you decide you want a woman or a boy, you can probably find one not far away.”
“He’s right, skipper,” Diokles said.
“Well, so he is,” Menedemos agreed. “He’s right a lot of the time.” He nudged Sostratos in the ribs. “If you’re so smart, why aren’t you rich?”
“Because I sail with you?” Sostratos asked innocently. Before Menedemos could get angry, his cousin went on, “A couple of hundred years ago, people asked Thales of Miletos that same question till he got sick of hearing it. He cornered the olive-oil market in those parts one year, and after that he was rich.”
“Good for him. I don’t suppose there’s any law that says philosophers can’t enjoy silver just like anybody else,” Menedemos said. “And I don’t suppose he got rich by trying to sell his oil to all the neighboring poleis that already had plenty of their own.”
Sostratos grimaced. “No, I don’t suppose so, either. We just have to do the best we can with it, that’s all.”
Together, Menedemos and Sostratos told him about Anaxarkhos. Then Menedemos asked, “What happened to Stratonikos?”
“Why, he spoke freer about Nikokreon’s family than he should have,” the keleustes answered. “That’s why the king drowned him.”
“This has a familiar ring, doesn’t it?” Sostratos said, and Menedemos dipped his head. Sostratos went on, “I believe it about Stratonikos, too. I saw him in Athens, years ago. Marvelous kitharist, but he would say the first thing that popped into his mind, and he didn’t care where he was or to whom he said it.”
“Tell me more,” Menedemos urged,
“He was the fellow who called Byzantion the armpit of Hellas,” Sostratos said, and Menedemos guffawed. His cousin added, “When he was coming out of Herakleia, he looked around carefully, this way and that. Somebody asked him why. ‘I’m ashamed oi being seen,’ he answered. ‘It’s like coming out of a brothel.’“
“Oh, dear,” Menedemos said, “No, I don’t think he’d have got on well with Nikokreon.”
“He didn’t get on well with anybody,” Sostratos said. “When he was playing
in Corinth, an old woman kept staring and staring at him. Finally, he asked her why. She said, ‘It’s a wonder your mother bore you for ten months when we can’t bear you for even a day’ But by Apollo, Menedemos, he played the kithara like no man since Orpheus.”
“He must have, or somebody would have drowned him sooner.” Menedemos turned to Diokles. “How did he fall foul of the king of Salamis?”
“I know he insulted Nikokreon’s two sons, but I don’t know how,” the oarmaster answered. “But once when the king’s wife-Axiothea, her name was-came in for supper, she happened to fart. And then later on she stepped on an almond while she was wearing a slipper from Sikyon- and Stratonikos sang out, ‘That’s not the same sound!”
“Oimoil” Menedemos exclaimed. “If he said that to anyone from my family, I’d probably pop him in the chops myself.”
“Ah, but would you kill him?” Sostratos asked, “That’s what’s wrong with what Nikokreon did-nobody could stop him if he set his mind on killing or torturing someone. That’s what’s wrong with kings generally, if you ask me.”
“I’m as good a democrat as you are, my dear,” Menedemos answered.
The answer was soft enough to keep Menedemos from going any further with his complaints. And he knew Sostratos didn’t want to have the oil aboard the Aphrodite , either, even if it had come from his brother-in-law’s groves. With a sigh, he turned to Diokles. “Whereabouts is this Areios playing?”
“It’s not far,” the oarmaster answered. “I was going to go over there myself, listen for a while, and see how overpriced the wine is. You gents coming? “
“Why not?” Menedemos said, and Sostratos dipped his head, too.
Diokles led them to the tavern where the kitharist was performing. When Menedemos saw where it was, he started to laugh. So did Sostratos, who said, “Call it Stratonikos’ revenge.” Nikokreon’s cenotaph stood only fifteen or twenty cubits away, with the statue of the late king of Salamis looking back toward the tavern.
“Play loud, Areios,” Menedemos said. “Let’s hope Nikokreon’s shade is listening,”
The place was crowded when Menedemos, his cousin, and the keleustes went inside. He heard the archaic Cypriot dialect, Macedonian, several less unusual varieties of Greek, and assorted retching gutturals from a table full of Phoenicians.
“By the dog of Egypt!” Menedemos exclaimed. “Isn’t that Ptolemaios?” He pointed to a blunt-featured, middle-aged man sitting at the best table in the place.
“It can’t be,” Sostratos answered. “He went back to Alexandria from Kos this past fall with his new baby.” He snapped his fingers. “This must be Menelaos, his brother. He commands here on Cyprus.”
“Mm, I suppose you’re right,” Menedemos said after a second glance. “Sure does look like him, though, doesn’t it?”
Perhaps sensing their eyes on him, Menelaos looked their way. He smiled and waved. Menedemos found himself waving back. Ptolemaios’ brother seemed friendlier than the lord of Egypt. “He has less on his shoulders than Ptolemaios does,” Sostratos said when Menedemos remarked on that.
Menedemos thought it over, then dipped his head, “I wouldn’t be surprised if you were right.”
Where Menelaos and his officers got the best seats in the house, a Rhodian merchant skipper and a couple of his officers had to take whatever they could get. Sostratos, of all people, was the one who spotted a table in the back of the tavern. All three Rhodians rushed to claim it. They got there just ahead of somebody who, by the gold rings on his fingers and his crimson-bordered himation, might have bought and sold them. The fellow gave them a sour stare before looking for somewhere else to sit.
Once his own fundament was on a stool, Menedemos discovered he could barely see the raised platform where Areios would perform. “He’s not a flute-girl at a symposion,” Sostratos said when he complained. “We came to listen to him, not to watch him dance or take his clothes off.”
“I know, but I would like to have some idea what he looks like,” Menedemos answered.
Before he could do any more grumbling, a serving woman came up and asked, “What are ye fain to drink, gentles?”
Menedemos hid a smile. He enjoyed listening to Cypriots talk; it was almost like hearing Homer and his contemporaries come to life. “What have you got?” he asked.
“We’ve wine from Khios and Kos and Lesbos and Thasos and Naxos and…” The woman went on to name almost every island in the Aegean and every part of the mainland adjacent to it. She finished, “And, of course, we’ve the local, and also wine of dates, in the which the Phoenicians take much pleasure.”
“A cup of the local will suit me fine,” Menedemos said.
“Same for me,” Diokles said.
The serving woman’s eyes called them both cheapskates. Menedemos didn’t care. A place like this was liable to pad its profits by claiming a cheap wine was really something more and charging three times as much for it as would have been right. With the local, at least he knew what he was getting.
“And what of you, most noble?” the woman asked when Sostratos didn’t answer right away.
“Let me have a cup of date wine, if you please,” Sostratos said. With a shrug, the serving woman went away.
“Why do you want to drink that horrid nasty stuff, young sir?” Diokles said.
“We’re going to Phoenicia. I might as well find out what the Phoenicians like, don’t you think?” Sostratos said. “If it is nasty, I won’t drink it again.”
After longer than she should have taken, the serving woman brought them their drinks. Menedemos tasted the local and made a face. He hadn’t expected much, and he hadn’t got it, either. Diokles drank without a word of complaint. Menedemos took another sip. He shrugged. It wasn’t that much worse than the wine the Aphrodite carried for the crew.
“What about yours, Sostratos?” he asked.
His cousin held out the cheap earthenware cup. “Have a taste yourself, if you care to.”
“Why not?” Menedemos said, though that was a question with an obvious answer. He sipped cautiously, then handed the cup back to Sostratos. “Too sweet for my taste, and thick as glue. The Phoenicians are welcome to it, as far as I’m concerned.”
“I wouldn’t drink it every day, either,” Sostratos said, “but I don’t think it’s as nasty as Diokles made it out to be. Better than drinking water, that’s certain.”
“I should hope so,” Menedemos said. “After all, what isn’t?”
“There’s that sour stuff the Egyptians and Thracians and Kelts brew from barley,” Sostratos said. “By all accounts, beer’s pretty bad. This tastes as though it wants to be wine, anyhow.” He drank some more, then thoughtfully smacked his lips. “Yes, it could be worse.”
“Thracians use butter instead of olive oil, so it’s plain they have no taste,” Menedemos said. Sostratos and Diokles both dipped their heads; for good measure, the oarmaster also made a disgusted face.
A fat, bejeweled man-Menedemos guessed he was the fellow who owned the tavern-came up onto the platform and spoke in throaty, Phoenician-accented Greek: “Hail, best ones! Hail also to the lovely ladies we have with us this evening.”
That made Menedemos look around. It also made Sostratos cough sharply. “You stop that,” Menedemos told him. “Hetairai aren’t wives.” Sostratos spread his hands, admitting as much. Menedemos did spot a couple of women; they wore veils, as if they were respectable, but they wouldn’t have come to a tavern if they had been. One sat with a big Macedonian a couple of tables away from Menelaos and his comrades. The other accompanied a man with the sleek look of a rich landowner.
Menedemos had missed some of what the tavernkeeper had to say. “-Here direct from appearances in Athens and Corinth and Alexandria,” the man went on, “My friends, I give you the famous… Areios!”
He clapped his hands, holding them above his head to signal everyone else to applaud, too. Menedemos clapped a few times. So did Diokles. Sostratos, Menedemos noted, sat quietly, waiting to
find out whether the kitharist would be worth hearing. Sometimes Sostratos was too sensible for his own good.
“Thank you very much!” Areios waved to the crowd as he came out onto the platform. Lean and spare, he spoke a polished Attic Greek. He’d probably been a striking youth. Even now, though the gray in his hair argued that he had to be close to fifty, he shaved his face to make himself look younger. By lamp- and torchlight, the illusion worked remarkably well. “I’m very pleased to be here,” he went on with a grin. “By the gods, I’m very pleased to be anywhere that isn’t apt to get sacked in the next hour.”
He got his laugh. Menelaos called, “That won’t happen in Cyprus. Cyprus belongs to my brother, and he’ll keep it!”
“As long as he keeps it till after I’ve sailed away, that’s fine with me,” Areios replied, and won a louder laugh.
“Another kitharist who thinks he can make fun of powerful men,” Menedemos said. “Doesn’t he remember what happened to Stratonikos here?” He paused. “Menelaos does seem a more cheerful sort than Nikokreon was-I will say that.”
“I wonder how he feels about being the second most important man in Ptolemaios’ realm,” Sostratos said. “Does he ever wonder what things would have been like if he’d been born before his brother?”
“Why ask me?” Menedemos said. “Why not go over there and ask him?”
For a bad moment, he thought Sostratos would get up and do just that. But his cousin was only shifting on the stool. Sostratos pointed to the kithara Areios cradled in his arms. “Have you ever seen a finer instrument?”
Menedemos had to crane his neck to see it at all, but answered, “I don’t believe I have.”
Large and heavy, the kithara was the instrument of choice of professional musicians. It had seven strings, and an enormous sound box that amplified the tones the kitharist struck from them. Areios’ kithara was of pale oak, and gleamed as if rubbed with beeswax. It had Inlays of ivory and of some dark wood, perhaps walnut, perhaps something more exotic-and more expensive. From supporting the instrument he played, Areios’ arms were as muscular as a pankratiast’s.
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