by Tom Pollack
Then Athens’s foremost politician brightened, clapping Cain on the shoulder.
“If your prophecy comes true, my friend, Greece shall finally have its freedom from foreign domination!”
Cain smiled and bid his host good night.
***
“I have an idea, Cleon,” said Cain to the dapper young entrepreneur who employed him at the shipyard near Cain’s old haunts in the harbor of Athens.
“You’re good for one every day,” Cleon complimented him. “But not all of them are necessarily practical, Agathon. Spell it out for me.”
Their voices were nearly drowned by the grating handsaws that sliced through lengths of pine all over the yard, scattering clouds of sawdust that fluttered in the mild, harborside breeze. Nine months after Cain had alerted Themistocles to the potential of Laurium, revenues from silver were pouring into naval construction. Themistocles, ever persuasive, had used Athens’s ongoing conflict with her nearby rival, the city-state of Aegina, as a pretext to sway the assembly. He had said nothing about the Persian threat, on the assumption that local rivalries would galvanize his compatriots far more than remote threats from abroad.
“I want us to build a special flagship for the fleet,” Cain urged his boss. “I am sure we can get Themistocles to fund it.”
“And how will this warship be different?”
“For one thing, it will have a crew of two hundred ten—seventy rowers on each deck—meaning an increase of forty oarsmen. So it will be slightly larger than the standard warship, without compromising speed or maneuverability. It will also have a triple rudder. There will still be a single pilot, but he will control three steering devices, rather than two, for more precise course changes that can be executed more quickly.”
Cleon cleared his throat speculatively and stroked his beard.
“But the ship’s most important innovation will be its weaponry,” Cain continued. “It will have far more than the usual bronze-coated ramming spike at the bow. I have developed some new designs.”
He held out several scrolls for Cleon’s inspection. The shipbuilder was well acquainted with Cain’s inventive streak. For some months now, he had briefed Cleon on his innovative designs for weapons that could be fitted to large ships.
“What’s this?” Cleon pointed to the first drawing.
“A catapult to launch flaming balls of tar,” Cain replied. “But now look at this,” he gestured to a second, far more elaborate sketch.
“It looks like a threshing machine,” said Cleon.
“That is not far from the truth,” Cain smiled. “I call it a war reaper. Attached to a ship, it can be operated by soldiers on deck to repel enemy troops trying to board, or to reach beyond an enemy ship’s rail in order to attack all the oarsmen on the middle and upper decks.”
Cleon stared at the drawing, a design for death if he ever saw one. “And what name would you suggest for this vessel?”
Cain hesitated. “I haven’t given that much thought. But how about Phobos?”
“Every warship in the fleet bears a feminine name. You know that, Agathon. Phobos, the word for ‘fear,’ is masculine.”
Cain shrugged. “But this ship will be feared.”
Cleon paused and considered the potential selling price of such an awesome battleship. “You find the money, and we’ll build her!”
***
By the late summer of 480 BC, the shipyards of Athens had turned out a hundred new warships, enlarging the total Greek fleet to nearly four hundred. Crews from Athens alone totaling more than seventeen thousand men had been assembled, ranging in a broad spectrum from aristocratic landowners to middle-class artisans to poor peasants. The Athenians’ ardent belief in democratic government was mirrored in the diversity of their naval recruits.
At the very end of summer, in mid-September, Themistocles and Cain dined again. By now, they conferred with each other almost as equals.
“It is Salamis,” Themistocles declared confidently. “The narrow straits between the island and the mainland must be the venue of battle. Our more maneuverable warships will have a critical advantage there. If we lure the whole Persian fleet into combat in that confined space, our ships will outmaneuver them decisively. Our smaller numbers will actually benefit us!”
Once he made up his mind, there was no arguing with Themistocles. Cain could see the logic of the Athenian leader’s rationale. Themistocles had pondered naval strategy day and night for years now.
“But first we must lure Xerxes’s fleet into the straits?” Cain asked.
“Correct. If we can achieve that, I know in my bones that victory will be ours.”
“I have a suggestion, then. You remember the story of the Trojan Horse?”
“Of course, who doesn’t know it?” Themistocles waved his hand impatiently.
“But listen, my friend. Odysseus won success at Troy long ago by planting a false rumor that the Greek forces were abandoning the siege. You and I know the story very well, but does Xerxes? Why not try a similar ruse?”
“And what do you have in mind?” Having funded the budget for the fleet’s new flagship and marveled at the vessel’s offensive capabilities, Themistocles knew Cain too well to doubt his friend’s resourcefulness.
“I will pose as one of your trusted slaves and go to Xerxes under protection of being your private messenger with a story that sounds credible: that disputes have fractured the Greek resistance and that you, Admiral Themistocles, are sympathetic to the Persian cause. This should lead Xerxes to believe that if he enters the straits of Salamis now, before the other Greeks retreat, a victory that will annihilate the bulk of their forces will be his. But if he waits, that opportunity will slip away. I can hint that the Athenians, urged on by you, will defect to the Persian side.”
Themistocles sat silent for a full minute. Then he leveled the piercing gaze of his gray eyes on Cain.
“It is a brilliant plan, wrought with treachery and betrayal. If you succeed in this mission, I will be in your debt when I am acclaimed as the man who saved Greece. You may expect my gratitude. But I warn you, Agathon. If you betray the city of Athena to the barbarians, I will hunt you down, torture you, and slay you myself.”
Cain was, for once, at a loss for words.
***
On the morning of September 24, an earthquake struck in the vicinity of the island of Salamis. The night before, Cain had rowed a small boat across from Salamis to Phaleron, the harbor near Athens where over a thousand Persian ships were arrayed. He told Xerxes exactly what the Great King wanted to hear. After hearing Cain’s report that Xerxes had taken the bait, Themistocles, superstitious like most Greeks, interpreted the earthquake as a favorable omen.
Soon after midnight on September 25, by the light of a moon waning to last quarter, the Persian vessels silently rowed westward from Phaleron. Miles of them stretched in ghostly formation. Rounding the curved headlands near Athens, the fleet passed the small island of Psyttaleia and prepared to enter the Salamis channel, barely a mile wide at its narrowest point.
Toward dawn, Xerxes summoned his chariot and rode to a golden viewing throne, which the Persians had set up on the slopes of Mount Aegaleos on the mainland. He would observe the battle from there, just as a spectator seated high up in an outdoor theater on a hillside might view a play. The king’s presence on the hillside was well advertised. It would motivate maximum performance from his troops, who knew well that any slacking might imperil their heads. Confident of an overwhelming victory, Xerxes had ordered that not one Greek sailor or marine be spared. He prepared to rejoice at the dismemberment of Greece.
Themistocles had publicly invited Cain to accompany him on the new flagship Phobos, from which the admiral would command the Athenian contingent of 180 vessels on the left wing of the line. Although he was reluctant to place himself in harm’s way, Cain could find no plausible excuse for refusing. After all, he had designed the flagship himself. And besides, every escape route from Greece had been sealed by the fo
rces of the invading Persian Empire.
It was fight or die.
“When will you give the order to launch?” he asked Themistocles as they stood near the ship’s mast in the predawn darkness.
“Not until an hour after sunrise. The Persian vessels are still arriving,” Themistocles gestured toward the opposite mainland shore. “The fishermen on Salamis have told me that a sea breeze from the south, an aura, can be expected in early to midmorning. The wind will favor us. It will make the water choppy—better for our maneuverable ships and worse for their taller, top-heavy vessels.”
“You have thought of everything,” Cain complimented him.
“Not quite, Agathon,” Themistocles replied grimly. “There is no escape plan if we lose.”
CHAPTER 38
The Straits of Salamis, 480 BC
THE BATTLE LASTED ALL day long. Nearly a quarter of a million men and twelve hundred ships clashed at Salamis. For the Greeks, the stakes were nothing less than the survival of freedom, of language, of a culture: of an entire way of life.
After the first assault, Cain watched in silence as Themistocles dealt with a rapid-fire series of messages and orders. While their oars swept the water, the rowers of every Greek warship raucously chanted a song of praise to Apollo, mingling their prayers with cheers and fiercely stoking their courage against the foe. The rowing master and the bow officer yelled orders to keep the oarsmen stroking in unison, while a piper marked time by playing rhythmically. Striking a ship and disabling or sinking her was the prize in such a battle, and the thud of bronze rams and the splintering of wooden hulls split the air. As the men warmed to their work, the mild breeze could not diffuse the stench of their sweat.
High on his throne of royal state, Xerxes of Persia, the king of kings, surveyed the scene in the straits. The course of battle was not what he had expected. Far from deserting the narrow channel, the Greek fleet glided with sleek determination in an unbroken line, and here and there they succeeded in breaking the front row of opposing Persian vessels and fouling these as the leading ships retreated clumsily through the second and third rows.
“Are there messages from the Athenians, Mardonius?” Xerxes queried his top general and senior advisor. “Have they proposed terms of alliance?”
“No, sire,” replied the seasoned warrior. “It appears as if that talkative slave Themistocles sent has misled us.”
“Misled us, you fool? He has tricked us! Artemisia was right. She begged me not to do battle in the straits. Now see where your stubbornness has led us!” The monarch looked darkly at Mardonius, who lowered his eyes in submission.
“Now, then!” Xerxes rose and pointed downward into the distance. “Isn’t that her ship? Do you recognize the insignia?”
Mardonius looked out through the smoke of the battle in time to see what they thought was a Greek vessel being rammed, certainly a rare occurrence that day. The attacking ship was commanded by Artemisia, the queen of the Carian city of Halicarnassus in southwest Asia Minor. A Persian ally, she was the only woman commander at Salamis.
“She’s done it!” shouted Xerxes. “Brave queen! Oh, gods, my men have turned into women, and my women into men!”
A scribe standing beside the throne dutifully recorded the Great King’s words, along with a memorandum of honorary tribute to Artemisia.
***
It was now midafternoon. The battle still favored the Greeks, but their Persian opponents had not yet shown any signs of retreat. Suddenly, the flagship’s pilot shouted, “Two vessels in pursuit, sir!”
“Full speed!” ordered Themistocles. Because of the flagship’s larger crew and greater speed, outpacing the Persian pursuers would not be difficult. But the Persians had caught Themistocles in a pincer movement, forcing him to draw closer to one of the largest clusters of enemy vessels.
“Launch the catapults, and activate the reaper!” Themistocles shouted, and the order was passed from stern to bow. “Now we’ll clip the tails of these dogs!” the commander cried.
As the flagship plunged forward, six marines churned a gear-studded apparatus and the gigantic metal arms of the war reaper extended from the vessel’s starboard side.
“Will you risk a ramming from them?” Cain shouted to his commander.
“They’ll never get the chance!” Themistocles rejoined gleefully. “They would be running the fatal risk.”
At that very moment, the flagship sideswiped a Persian ship in a daring maneuver. With grinding efficiency, the reaper shredded the port side of the enemy ship. Cain could see scores of mangled bodies—young Persian oarsmen literally torn to pieces by the lethal weapon he himself had engineered. The sight of their body parts—severed arms, legs, and heads—revolted him. Blood spattered the Greek oarsmen. Cain felt a painful twinge of guilt. Designing this carnage machine was not at all the same thing as seeing its murderous capabilities in action.
But the Athenian flagship was still not in the clear. During the time consumed for the reaper to accomplish its gory work, a Persian warship had approached from the port side. Themistocles’s pilot took evasive action, but too late to prevent two zealous Persian marines from swinging down a rope from their vessel over the rail of the flagship.
Cain, whose attention was riveted on the reaper’s operation to starboard, was oblivious of the Persian threat. One of the attackers launched a spear at his back, but it was somehow deflected in midflight. Simultaneously, Themistocles shouted a warning. The string of his bow twanged, skewering one of the Persian assailants with an arrow in the chest.
The other marine leaped at Cain from behind, and both men crashed to the deck with a thud. Momentarily stunned, Cain quickly gained the advantage, rolling on top of the now helmetless Persian while raising his knife. The eyes of a boy in his late teens darted up at Cain, who hesitated. But his young adversary felt no such compunction, freeing his own knife hand and stabbing Cain in the thigh, then reversing positions to prepare a mortal strike.
Instead, the attacker’s blade dropped feebly to the deck as Themistocles’s sword found its mark in the youth’s back.
***
By sunset, it was clear that Themistocles had calculated the Greek chances correctly. Crushingly outnumbered, the Greeks had managed to disable or sink nearly three hundred Persian ships while sustaining only moderate losses themselves. As the blood-red rays of the dying sun tinted the waters of the strait, the Persian vessels limped eastward, rounded the promontory at Piraeus, and regained the refuge of Phaleron harbor, where land troops would shelter them.
Meanwhile, in the narrow straits of Salamis, thousands of Persians were desperately swimming for shore after their ships had been sunk and their own fleet had abandoned them. Greek archers mercilessly hewed them down.
Xerxes had indeed presided over a huge massacre—but not the one he had ordered.
***
On the shore of Salamis that night, Themistocles and Cain witnessed a sacrifice of thanksgiving to the gods and then reviewed the day’s events before a roaring bonfire surrounded by hundreds of cheering soldiers. Though Cain shared their joy of victory, he suppressed his anxiety at the sight of their “sacred” offering of Persian soldiers being roasted alive in the blaze. He felt as if the eyes of his young assailant were still staring out at him from the flames.
“You have more reason than most to give thanks!” Themistocles exclaimed to his friend. “I cannot explain why the Persian’s spear didn’t find its mark. The gods must keep you under their protection!”
His friend’s jubilant words triggered a remembrance of God’s pronouncement to him thousands of years before:
“I will give a sevenfold punishment to anyone who kills you. I will set a mark on you to protect you from those who would kill you.”
Cain was amazed. It occurred to him that today, for the first time ever, an assailant had made a direct attempt on his life—yet God had not forgotten his promise! Instead, it seemed his comrade Themistocles had become the human face of his mark of pro
tection. His gaze remained fixed on the blaze in the distance. Was God now exacting, through Greek hands, his manifold, fiery vengeance on Cain’s behalf? He shuddered at the thought.
But could Cain “give thanks” for all of this? He was not exactly caught up in gratitude. Yes, his life had been saved, but for what? Thousands of years of wandering, deception, loneliness, and sadness had now culminated in his signature accomplishment of the day, the slaughter of young warriors made possible by his latest innovation. No, thanksgiving was far from his mind. Nevertheless, he felt duty-bound to acknowledge his debt to the man who had slain his attackers.
“I would not bet on the god who challenged you in archery!” he managed to quip.
Just then, a messenger arrived on the run. Recovering his breath, he whispered into the commander’s ear. When the emissary had departed, Themistocles breathed a long sigh.
“Your masterpiece has burned beyond salvage, Agathon. Phobos is no more.”
“How did this happen?” Cain asked him.
Themistocles shrugged his shoulders. “Persian saboteurs may have infiltrated the docks. The firing of our flagship might have been a last-ditch attempt to intimidate us. Or perhaps it was the work of Greek turncoats.”
“But you can surely build another if you need to. Are the plans on file with the naval registry?”
“No, I never filed those plans. I wanted to make sure that the Persians, if they were victorious, would not have access to our military secrets.”
Or perhaps, thought Cain, you paid some Greek lackeys to carry out this act of arson for the same reason. Themistocles was indubitably mercurial, but he was also the most cunning politician Cain could remember.
