Inside the actors’ enclosure, there was plenty of elbow room without five comedy choruses and their leading characters all crammed in together. As was customary, actors who weren’t involved in this year’s competition had come to hang around with their fellow professionals, as had the comic actors whose work was now done.
I spotted Apollonides. He laughed as I approached.
‘You’ve recovered from last night? Did you wake up with your head in a bucket?’
‘You don’t want to know,’ I said ruefully. ‘Have you seen Lysicrates?’
Apollonides thought for a moment. ‘I saw him by the Shrine of Dionysos a little while ago.’
‘Thanks.’ I waved farewell and hurried away.
I didn’t have long, and I really didn’t want to be one of those people irritating the rest of the audience by sneaking back to their seats after the first play has begun. I especially didn’t want to disappoint Zosime after I’d got her here in time for us to watch today’s tragedies.
To my relief, Apollonides was right. As I skirted the back of the stage building, I saw Lysicrates chatting with a group of friends, all sat on the front steps of the ancient temple. When I beckoned, he obligingly came to meet me. Better yet, he came alone.
‘How’s your head?’
‘Better than my stomach. Listen, I have a favour to ask.’ I drew him close with an arm around his shoulder. Quickly and quietly, I explained why I wanted to know of any actors who were particularly adept at foreign accents.
‘You’ll have to give me some time to think about that.’ He looked at me, wide-eyed with shock. ‘Should I ask around?’
‘If you must,’ I said uneasily. ‘But don’t let slip why you’re asking and don’t mention my name. These folk are always one step ahead of us. We need to find some way to outflank them.’
He nodded. ‘I’ll be careful.’
‘Make sure you are. They’ve already murdered one man and they started a riot in the agora the day before yesterday. Anyone could have been hurt or even killed in that uproar. They didn’t care.’ I didn’t want his blood on my hands.
The sound of the theatre crane got our attention. The stagehands were making their final preparations for the first play’s opening scene.
‘I’ll see you later.’ I hurried back to my seat.
I wasn’t the last one to arrive, but I cut it painfully close. Zosime’s expression was studiously neutral as she and Menkaure made room for me on the bench. I sat quietly, swallowing lingering queasiness and wishing the crowd wasn’t so loud.
The family behind us were discussing what they knew of the tragedies in this year’s competition.
‘Oloros will need something special to beat Myron,’ the mother prophesied.
Menkaure leaned forward to talk to me past Zosime. ‘Tomorrow’s trilogy will be about Tantalus and the curse he bequeathed to Pelops and then to Atreus.’
I’m sure it would be very fine, cannibalism and incest notwithstanding. That’s another reason why I’ve made my peace with being a comic playwright. I’d rather spend months polishing jokes about big red cocks and donkey dung than wading through grim tales of tainted blood.
The noisy conversations all around me hushed as the first actor walked out onto the stage. Theseus in his youth had arrived from Troezen with the sandals and sword he’d found hidden under a rock. These tokens were to prove he was King Aegeus’s son, heir to Athens’ throne.
Even burdened as I was with wine-sickness and other distractions, Dionysos worked his magic on me. Thanks to the actor’s mask and costume, no one saw an ordinary Athenian, a man we might pass in the street or the agora. Great Theseus stood before us, his passion ringing around the theatre in the very shadow of the mighty rock where he had built his citadel.
A chorus of citizens appeared to interrogate him. Who was he? What manner of man? Could they accept him as his father’s heir? The audience shuddered as the hero regaled these noble Athenians with tales of the monsters he’d defeated as he fought his way to their city. Each challenge revealed a different facet of his merits.
A shiver ran down my back when Medea appeared on King Aegeus’s arm. The chorus recalled how she had claimed sanctuary here. They confided their fears to the audience. It looked as if she was intent on claiming a good deal more.
Maybe so. To me, the witch looked extremely Persian in her dress and mannerisms. Her accent, too. Though I strained my ears for the voice underlying every word, I was forced to conclude whoever wore that mask wasn’t the actor we were looking for. This wasn’t the fake Ionian from the agora.
Had this trilogy’s patron insisted that Oloros put those particular words in Medea’s mouth? Who was responsible for the choice of costume and mask? Was it someone keen to stir up more fear and mistrust of anyone from the east? How far did this conspiracy reach?
Or was I getting paranoid? Medea is always an ominous figure and Oloros had hardly invented her origins in distant Colchis, in the furthest eastern reaches of the Black Sea. That has been part of her story since Jason first returned with the Argonauts.
Her attempts to kill Theseus are equally well known, relived here as she connived to send him off to fight the bull of Marathon. His victorious return was loudly cheered by everyone whose fathers and grandfathers had fought the Persians on that same plain.
But Medea wasn’t done. We sat tense as she tried to poison Theseus. We breathed sighs of relief when her scheming was uncovered. Defeated, she fled before Aegeus could call her to account. Her parting shot was a warning that she would watch and wait and take her first chance of revenge. Was that
