“Embroidered linen cloth from Mesopotamia,” Sostratos said. “Fine perfume from Rhodes, the island of roses. And genuine balsam from Engedi on the Lake of Asphalt in Ioudaia, the finest balsam in the world.”
“Balsam, eh?” Onetor scowled. “What do you want for that? It’s something I might be able to get rid of here on Lesbos.”
“They sell it in Ioudaia for twice its weight in silver,” Sostratos answered.
“Somesimes they sell it here in Hellas for twice its weight in silver, too,” Onetor said pointedly.
“Not always,” Sostratos said, just as pointedly. “And if I paid twice its weight, and I did, I’m not going to let it go for no profit. If you buy it from me, you won’t sell it at your buying price, either.”
“All that may be true—if you paid what you say you paid. But who knows about that?” Onetor sent Sostratos a sour stare. “Merchants are born liars.”
“No doubt you would know, being one yourself,” Sostratos said. Onetor’s expression got blacker. Sostratos gave him a polite seated bow. “We can go on insulting each other, best one, or we can do business. Which would you rather?”
Now the Mytilenean frankly stared. “You’re a cool customer, aren’t you?
“I try to stay cool, and I would like to be a customer,” Sostratos replied. “Shall we talk about balsam and truffles, or shall we go on and on about what a thief each of us thinks the other one is?”
To his surprise, Onetor started to laugh. “You are a cool customer, Furies take me if you’re not. All right, my dear, let’s talk about trading truffles for balsam, and just how much balsam you’ll give for a drakhma’s weight of my fungi. Maybe perfume, too, now that I think of it.”
Sostratos hadn’t expected anyone to be interested in balsam till he got to Athens. But he had a good notion of the most he could hope to get for it there. That, clearly, was less than he could get for truffles. Because Onetor had annoyed him, he named an outrageous price to open the dicker. As he’d hoped, the truffle-seller bawled like a castrated colt. Sostratos came down, but, because he’d started so high, he came down to a price he still liked.
Onetor had made a mistake, setting the value of his truffles so firmly as the dicker started. He’d made it plain he wouldn’t come down, but he couldn’t very well go up from the three drakhmai of silver for each drakhma’s weight of truffles, either. Sostratos was more flexible, and took advantage of that when haggling over both the balsam and the perfume. At last, he and the Mytilenean settled on prices that left neither of them too dissatisfied.
“While we’re talking here, my cousin is dickering with your brother,” Sostratos remarked.
“I hope Onesimos comes out of the deal with all his fingers and toes,” Onetor said. “If Menedemos is anywhere near as sharp as you are, best one, he’s too good for us poor fellows who stay in one polis all our days.”
“You give me too much credit, most noble one,” Sostratos murmured, not at all displeased at Onetor’s flattery. “And,” he went on truthfully, “you don’t give yourself enough. I think this is a bargain where we’ll both end up showing a nice profit.”
“I wouldn’t mind,” Onetor said. “For a while there, I thought you were going to talk me out of my skin and sell it in the Athenian agora.”
“Who’s your prettiest hetaira here? I’d get a better price for hers,” Sostratos said. Onetor laughed. The Rhodian asked, “Can you have your truffles ready this afternoon? I’ll have sailors bring the balsam and perfume here then, if that pleases you.”
“It pleases me fine. And if you’re going to get an amphora or two of Phainias’ oil and flavor it with truffles, you might also want to arrange to buy lekythoi here in Mytilene so you can sell the oil from the small jars. Kallikrates son of Kalligenes can probably sell you enough of them to do the job without making you wait.”
Sostratos wondered if this Kallikrates would give Onetor a kickback, but getting away in a hurry did matter. “I’ll talk with him,” he said. “Where’s his pottery?”
“Not far from here. Phainias can give you directions; he buys all his amphorai from Kallikrates,” Onetor said. That made Sostratos feel better. If the Rhodian proxenos bought from Kallikrates, the man was likelier to be reputable.
When he and Menedemos met at Phainias’ house, he found his cousin jubilant. “We’ll take Lesbian to Athens along with the Byblian,” Menedemos said. “Do you know what I did? Do you know?” He was almost beside himself with glee.
“No,” Sostratos replied, “but I suspect you’re going to tell me.”
“I traded him ten jars of Byblian for thirty of his best,” Menedemos said. “Ten for thirty! Can you believe it?”
“Euge!” Sostratos and Phainias both spoke together. The proxenos went on, “How did you pry such a bargain out of Onesimos? He’s one of the singiest men I know.”
“You won’t tell him?” Menedemos asked.
“By Zeus, best one, I won’t,” Phainias promised. “It would go against my duty as proxenos—and besides, Onesimos should deal in vinegar, he’s so sour.”
“Well, I thought so, too,” Menedemos said. “We were talking about wine, and I made sure we tried his Lesbian before he sent a slave down to the harbor to bring back my sailors with a jar of Byblian for him to sample. We’d had quite a bit of his wine before then, in fact. He thought he was getting me drunk and pliable. I had something else in mind, though.”
“I think I know what,” Sostratos said. “You are a sly rascal.”
“Why, thank you, my dear.” Beaming, Menedemos turned back to Phainias. “When the slave and the sailors got back with the Byblian, we broached the amphora. What you need to know about Byblian is, it has the most wonderful bouquet in the world. Maybe Ariousian is as nice on the nose coming out of the jar, but I can’t think of any other wine that is.” He sniffed and smiled and went on, “When Onetor got a whiff of it, he was so excited, he almost looked happy.”
“He must have been excited,” Phainias said.
“Oh, he was, all right. He was practically panting to make the deal, as a matter of fact. And then we tasted the Byblian, and that didn’t queer things, the way I feared it might.”
The Rhodian proxenos still wore a puzzled expression. Sostratos explained: “Byblian is a funny wine. It’s much nicer to the nose than it is to the palate. But if Onesimos had drunk a lot of his own Lesbian beforehand—”
“That’s right. That’s exactly right,” Menedemos broke in. “Once you’ve had a few cups of wine, it all tastes pretty much the same unless it’s real donkey piss. And Byblian’s not that bad; it just doesn’t have a flavor to match its bouquet. So when I sipped and praised it to the skies, Onesimos couldn’t tell I was giving it more than it deserved.”
“He usually deals in local wines, not ones from as far away as Byblos, so he wouldn’t know that about your vintage,” Phainias said.
“Which is what I was hoping for, and which is what happened,” Menedemos said happily. “He knows plenty about his own little corner of the business, and so he thought he knew everything about all of it.”
Sostratos said, “When Sokrates was defending himself before the Athenians, that was his complaint about artisans generally.”
“Since his jury was probably full of them, he was foolish to complain about them to their faces,” Menedemos said. Before Sostratos could rise to that, his cousin continued, “Me, I don’t want to get tangled up with the law in Athens any which way. Things are more complicated there than anywhere else in Hellas, I think.”
“It’s a big polis, far bigger even than Rhodes,” Sostratos said. “It’s no wonder everything’s more complicated there.” Having said that, he couldn’t very well go back and start a quarrel over Menedemos’ gibe about Sokrates. Menedemos grinned at him. He pretended not to notice, which only made Menedemos grin more.
Phainias said, “You people who do business in so many poleis are a wonder to me. How do you keep everything straight?”
“I don’t even
try,” Menedemos said. “I just count on Sostratos. He knows what all the various laws and customs are, who coins heavy drakhmai and who light, what’s good in each town and what’s not worth having, and so on.”
“I already said he was a clever fellow,” the proxenos replied. “I would say you’re not bad yourself, and I would be right about that, too.”
“Menedemos is so clever, he even thinks he can talk me into doing his share of the work,” Sostratos said. “But I’m clever enough to see that, and not to let him get away with it ... too often.”
“Too bad!” Menedemos said with great feeling.
“Go howl,” Sostratos replied. He and his cousin and Phainias all smiled. After a good day of trading, why not?
4
“Come on, you lugs,” Diokles called as the Aphrodite slid away from its mooring at Mytilene. “Put your backs into it. It’s not like you’re going to get heatstroke today.”
“You’re right about that,” Menedemos said from his station at the steering oars. The day was cool and overcast, the sky so gray he couldn’t find the faintest trace of the sun. It was, in fact, the sort of weather his father had warned him about while arguing against putting to sea too soon. Once more, he reminded himself he owed Sostratos’ nuisance of a brother-in-law thanks for getting his father to change his mind. That wasn’t something Menedemos himself had ever had much luck doing.
Sostratos said, “If it stays like this, we’re liable to have an interesting time navigating today. Sailing from here to Athens, we’ll be crossing one of the wider landless stretches of the Aegean.”
“It won’t be that bad,” Menedemos said, hoping he was right. “We’ll have Psyra, west of Khios, to sight on as we go west, and Skyros and Euboia should be coming up over the horizon by the time Psyra drops out of sight astern.”
“True—as long as the weather doesn’t get any worse than this,” Sostratos said. “If it starts raining, though, or if a fog rolls in ...”
Menedemos spat into the bosom of his tunic to avert the omen. After a moment, his cousin did the same. Bad weather was the main reason ships seldom put to sea from the middle of autumn to the beginning of spring. Storms were the most dramatic worry, but fog and mist might have been more dangerous. Not being able to tell where you were or to recognize landmarks till too late . . . What could be more terrifying?
Diokles said, “Even in the fog, we’ve got wind and wave and casting the line to keep us safe. Between knowing how deep the sea is and seeing what sort of stuff the lead brings up when it does touch bottom, we ought to have a pretty fair notion of where we are.”
“That’s right,” Menedemos said loudly, aiming his words not only at Sostratos but at the crew as well. He didn’t want the men worrying he’d end up in Byzantion when he was aiming for Athens. He also didn’t want them worrying he’d tear the belly out of the akatos on a rock he didn’t see soon enough. He didn’t want to worry about that himself, though he knew it could happen if he wasn’t careful.
Maybe Sostratos didn’t want to worry about that, either. He changed the subject, saying in a sly voice, “Are you slipping, best one? You haven’t said a word about either Phainias’ wife or Onesimos’.”
“I never saw Phainias’,” Menedemos answered. “And he gave us girls, so going after her wouldn’t have been sporting of me, would it?”
“That hasn’t always stopped you,” Sostratos observed.
He was right. Not caring to admit it, Menedemos said, “I did get a look at Onesimos’, as a matter of fact. She was about this tall”—he held the palm of one hand flat against his chest, just below the level of his nipples—”and about this wide”—he took both hands off the tillers to stretch his arms wide—”so as far as I’m concerned Onesimos is welcome to her.”
The listening sailors laughed. Sostratos said, “She’d be not far from our age, wouldn’t she? Do you suppose she was that fat when he wed her?”
“I wouldn’t know, and I don’t much care to find out,” Menedemos answered. “More women are like that than you’d think. They can’t get out to the gymnasion to exercise, the way men do. They just stay inside the women’s quarters and nibble all day long. Some men like them that way, too. For all I know, Onesimos is happy with her. But she wasn’t what I wanted.”
A line of pelicans flew by, not far from the ship. Menedemos admired their great white wings. He wondered if one of them would glide down to the water and scoop out a fish with its long, pouched beak, but none did. Sostratos also followed them with his eyes. He remarked, “They really do have heads shaped like axes, don’t they?”
“So they do!” Menedemos said; in Greek, the two words were very close in sound. “I never thought of that before.” He thumped his forehead with the heel of his hand, wondering why not.
Sostratos said, “I can imagine the first couple of Hellenes who ever saw pelicans. One of them turns to the other and says, ‘What’s that?’ And the second fellow goes, ‘I don’t know, but it’s got a head like an axe.’ And the name would have stuck.”
“Do you suppose that’s how it happened?” Menedemos asked, intrigued.
“I don’t know. I can’t prove it. But I wouldn’t be surprised,” his cousin answered. “Things like that must happen when people run into beasts they’ve never seen before. They have to call them something, and they try to find a name that fits. I’ll bet that’s how those big beasts that live in the Nile got called river-horses.”
“Hippopotamoi,” Menedemos said thoughtfully, and dipped his head. “I’ll bet you’re right.”
Diokles spoke up: “Sometimes people will make a joke of things, too. After all, what do we Hellenes call those big birds that live in the Egyptian desert, the ones that run faster than horses and kick like mules?”
“Strouthoi,” Menedemos and Sostratos replied together. They both started to laugh, for in Hellas the more common meaning for the word that also meant ostrich was sparrow. Menedemos said, “I can just see the first fellow who went down to Egypt and got a good look at one of them. He’d turn to his friend and he’d say, ‘By Herakles, that’s the biggest sparrow I ever saw.’ “
“I think Egypt did that to the first Hellenes who went there,” Sostratos said. “We made up names that kept us from showing how impressed we were. Why else would we have called those tall stone monuments obeliskoi? “
“Well, they do look like skewers, don’t they?” Menedemos said. “We could have called them phalloi instead, easy enough.”
“You’re right,” Sostratos said, “I hadn’t thought of that.” His grin was lopsided and wry. “Maybe it’s just as well they have the name they do.”
The sun didn’t come out. The clouds didn’t go away. Every so often, the Aphrodite made her way through mist or drizzle. Even when Menedemos wasn’t trying to peer through the spatters of moisture, visibility stayed bad. He sent a lookout to the foredeck, doing all he could do avoid unpleasant surprises.
“I wish we still had Aristeidas,” Sostratos said.
“So do I,” Menedemos said. “It’s not your fault we don’t, you know.”
“Whom would you blame, then?” his cousin asked.
“How about the polluted Ioudaioi who tried to rob you?” Menedemos suggested.
“I didn’t shoot enough of them,” Sostratos said morosely.
“My dear, you couldn’t have shot more than you did, not unless you were twins—and maybe not then. If you hadn’t shot as many of them as you did, you and Moskhion and Teleutas would have got killed, too. Would that have made you happier? “
“I didn’t shoot enough of them,” Sostratos said again, and then, very low, “Teleutas.” He looked disgusted.
Menedemos suspected his cousin wouldn’t have been nearly so upset if Teleutas hadn’t come back from the trip to Ioudaia. He’d liked Aristeidas much better than the other sailor himself, too. He couldn’t hash that out with his cousin now, not with Teleutas pulling an oar less than ten cubits away. What he did say was, “You did the best you coul
d. You did the best anyone could. You have no blood-guilt on your head. You committed no sin. You weren’t Oidipous, slaying his father at a crossroads. You should stop tormenting yourself about it.”
Sostratos started to answer, then checked himself. At last, after a long pause, he said, “That makes good logical sense. I try to be a logical man. Therefore, it should make me feel better. Somehow, though, it doesn’t, or not very much.”
“You mind if I say something, young sir?” Diokles asked, not missing a beat as he gave out the stroke.
“Please,” Sostratos said.
“I’m no philosopher, so maybe I’ve got it all wrong,” the oarmaster said. “If I do, I expect you’ll tell me. But it seems to me this logic stuff is only good for what you’ve got in your head, if you know what I mean. When it comes to what’s in your heart and your belly and your balls, logic goes out the window like a full pisspot.”
“Much truth in that,” Menedemos said.
“Some truth in it, certainly—but only some, I think,” Sostratos said. “If we don’t use reason to rule our passions, though, what are we but so many wild beasts?” He didn’t add, or so many adulterers, as he probably would have before meeting that Ioudaian innkeeper’s wife. That’s something, Menedemos thought.
“No doubt you’re right,” Diokles said. “But I don’t reckon we can rule everything all the time. We wouldn’t be people if we could.”
“We should be able to,” Sostratos said stubbornly.
“That’s not what Diokles said, and you know it,” Menedemos said.
His cousin sighed. “So it isn’t.” Sostratos looked out to sea, as if he’d had enough of the argument.
Menedemos looked out to sea, too, for different reasons. With the overcast and the spatters of rain, all he had to gauge direction were the waves and the breeze. He couldn’t find the sun, and neither Lesbos nor Psyra rose above his contracted horizon. He hated sailing under conditions like these. Navigation was somewhere between a guess and a bad joke. If the sea had been calm, he could have sailed in circles and never known it. He wasn’t doing that now—he was pretty sure he wasn’t, anyhow—but he hoped he wasn’t veering too far to the west or south. The one would only take him out of his way. The other might cause a meeting he didn’t want with Psyra or even Khios.
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