Themistocles. This was before the Persians came, lad; you were not even born yet. My father, Aristeides, whom men called the Just for his fairness and honesty, argued against Themistocles on the matter of whether to meet the coming enemy with a large army or a large navy. The argument became so heated that an ostracism was called, and Aristeides lost.” He smiled. “My father even had to cast a vote against himself. He offered to help a man who didn’t know how to write. The man said he wanted to vote for Aristeides-he was a farmer from out of town, you see, and didn’t know to whom he was speaking. My father, intrigued, asked what the man had against Aristeides if he had never met him, and the farmer replied he was sick of all this constant talk of ‘Aristeides this’ and ‘Aristeides that,’ and ‘Aristeides and all his fine virtues.’ So my unfortunate father meekly wrote his own name on the shard and dropped it into the voting box!” Lysimachus laughed. “Themistocles had the right of it, I admit it; the navy he created was what saved us.
“But that’s the past, and it’s the future that worries me. There’s a party in this city willing to kill for power, and that is very, very dangerous. The next logical step is armed coup.”
Sophroniscus looked alarmed. “Do you think something like that is brewing?”
Lysimachus shrugged. “Who can say?”
Sophroniscus muttered to himself, “I will move the family treasury outside the city tomorrow.”
“When was the last time something like this happened?” I asked, curious.
Lysimachus thought about it while he held out his cup to be refilled.
“The last political killing? You’d have to go back to when the last tyrant was expelled. That’s what…three, four generations ago?”
I was exhausted by the day and disappointed by the evening. I could not keep my eyes open a moment longer and so asked Father for permission to retire. He gave it, and I departed while Lysimachus continued his discourse on the dangers to Athens. I noticed Sophroniscus glance at me curiously.
The next morning at breakfast, our kitchen slave brought two small bowls of bread soaked in wine. She smiled at me as if to silently say that she sympathized. She would have heard every word that had been said last night. Certainly every slave in the house knew I had disagreed with my father.
Sophroniscus let me finish the meal and then led me into the workshop at the back of our house. Inside was a marble statue of a horse that had won at the last Panathenaic Games, commissioned by its owner as an offering in thanks to the Gods for his victory.
The statue was almost finished. I sighed, picked up the necessary cloth, and began rubbing its rear end. This was the story of my life; great events were happening all about me, I could feel the world was changing, and here I was rubbing the rear end of a stone horse. Sophroniscus began chipping away at another block with mallet and chisel, his preliminaries for another work. He usually left me to finish a piece while he commenced his next job. I continued the tedious rubbing, silent.
Sophroniscus observed my deep unhappiness and said, “Cheer up, son. There’s no reason you shouldn’t discuss politics in the Agora with the other young men. It’s a fine thing for any man to think about the future of the state. It’s simply not possible for anyone but the rich to do it full time, and especially not for a man who’s destined to be a sculptor.”
“But Father, I don’t want to be a sculptor.”
“You don’t-” Sophroniscus put down his tools in amazement and repeated, “You don’t want to be a sculptor?”
“No.”
“But I always thought…that is, you always said you did.”
“No, Father, you always talk about how I will.”
“Why didn’t you tell me before?”
“I did, I tried rather, several times. But Father, you always talked over me.”
I had never before seen Sophroniscus shocked. He paced across the workshop, stopped to touch the piece I had been smoothing and ran his finger along it, picking up the dust. “This is a terrible disappointment. You do good work.”
“I’m sorry, Father.” And it was not a lie; I don’t believe I have ever felt such sadness as that moment. But we had been building toward this confrontation for years and I was not going to step back from it now that the moment had come.
“What would you do then? You cannot earn money as a politician, Nicolaos. That’s where you spend it. Who ever heard of paying a man to wield power? The idea’s ridiculous.”
“But Father, what if I can make money doing politics?”
“Then I would say you are practicing magic, or you are corrupt. I hope you are neither. We talked last night of how such men are usually caught in the end.”
“This commission from Pericles-if I succeed I will earn a substantial reward.”
Sophroniscus scoffed. “Enough to live on? I doubt it.”
“Enough to start with. I hope so.”
“And what of the next commission? And the one after that? I tell you important politicians aren’t murdered every day, my boy. It’s not exactly a thriving industry, no, nor even a small trade.”
“I see myself acting as an agent to men such as Pericles. It is a trade, Father, a kind of political trade.”
“Morally dubious and physically dangerous. Very dangerous.”
“More dangerous than serving in the army?”
Sophroniscus considered. “Perhaps not.”
“Yet, Father, you served in the army when the Persians came.”
“And will again if they return. That is the simple duty of every citizen to protect his city.”
“Isn’t what I propose the same thing then, sir?”
“We are discussing the difference between an honorable death facing the enemy in combat, and a knife in the back in the dead of night. I know which risk I’d prefer.”
“I’m willing to take that chance, Father.”
“Humph. The confidence of youth. I can see, son, that you are bent on this course. I could order you to give up this commission and return to your proper work but…you wouldn’t be happy, would you?”
“No, Father.”
“I still believe your thought of a political trade is fantasy, but I will allow it to this extent. Go and do your political work, son-” My face broke into a huge smile. “But! Mark my words. If this commission of yours fails, if you do not win this supposed reward, if you do complete it and Pericles refuses to pay you, if at the end of this bizarre exercise you have not earned a drachma, then you will return and we will continue your training in sculpture as before, and there will be no more words about it.”
“You are very fair, Father.”
“Stupid is more like it, but I see I must indulge you in this to get it out of your system. Furthermore, young man, even supposing you do earn your first commission, I wonder where the next will come from. I am giving you two years to prove you can make a life of this. If you fail, back you come. I hope there will still be time to teach you a proper trade before you’re too old.”
“Thank you, Father.”
“Now the only problem is, who am I going to find to help an old man in his work. I doubt I can cope on my own anymore,” Sophroniscus said mildly. He wasn’t really particularly aged, but he liked to pretend that he was in his declining years and sometimes referred to himself as an old man. “There will be times I need you to assist me, son. The heavy work is more than one man can manage.”
“Of course, Father! I don’t mean that I don’t want to help my father, I mean that I…er…”
“Don’t want to do it a lot?” Sophroniscus offered with a smile.
“I’ll help!” a boy’s voice called from above. Sophroniscus and I both looked up in surprise to see Socrates kneeling on the top of the latest marble block. The little rat must have heard every word of our conversation.
“You, Socrates? I never thought you would be the one to take up sculpting.”
“I would like to try, Father. Please may I?”
Sophroniscus made a show of thinking about it. “You are young to start, but if it is your wish you can begin with the simpler pieces.” A blind man could see he was jumping with joy at the thought of having a son to pass on his trade. I had hurt the poor man deeply. Socrates had offered a perfect solution. Now I suppressed a smile.
Later I asked Socrates, “Did you truly mean what you said in there? If you didn’t, Father is going to be even
