Over the Wine Dark Sea

  'Thanks, sweetheart.' Menedemos blew her a kiss. 'You'd look good in it.' She smiled at him in a marked manner. He smiled, too, even if he didn't think she was especially pretty. Pretty or not, a willing slave made a much better partner than one who was only doing what she had to do.   Sostratos said, 'I don't know how you do it, but you always do. You've got her eating out of the palm of your hand.'   'It's not that hard,' Menedemos answered. 'You could do it yourself, if you set your mind to it.'   'I don't think that much of her looks,' Sostratos said. Menedemos had expected him to say something like that. His cousin most often seemed to find reasons not to have a good time.   'Send the wine around again,' Krates told Gylippos' slaves -  sure enough, this symposion would center on drinking. The symposiarch waved to the flutegirls. 'Let's hear some music, too.' The girls raised the flutes to their lips and began to play a love song in the wailing Lydian mode. It wasn't a tune Menedemos knew, but a couple of guests started singing along to it.   He leaned over toward his host. 'Is that a Tarentine song?'   Gylippos tossed his head. 'I think it comes from Rhegion, the town right opposite Sicily on the Italian coast. It's been all the rage in Great Hellas for the past year or so, though.'   'I wonder how I missed it when I was in these parts last summer.' Menedemos shrugged. 'These things happen.'   As the two flutegirls played, a handsome young juggler came into the andron. He was naked; his oiled body gleamed in the torchlight. Gylippos' eyes and those of several other guests hungrily followed him as he kept a stream of balls and knives and cups in the air.   Menedemos turned to Sostratos. 'He's not bad at all. How'd you like him to play with your balls?' His cousin had been taking a sip of wine. He snorted and spluttered and did a good impression of a man choking to death. Menedemos laughed. He held up his own cup to show the slaves it was empty. One of them hurried to refill it.   As the juggler went from table to table, Krates got up from his couch and came over to Gylippos. 'What's next?' he asked. 'Have you got dancers out there in the courtyard?'   'I certainly do,' Gylippos answered, 'a pair of Kelts from the Keltic country this side of the Alps. Are you ready for them to come on?'   'I think so,' Krates said. 'People are getting jolly, and there's nothing like a couple of naked girls to liven things up.' He spoke to one of Gylippos' slaves, who went over to the doorway and called out into the darkness beyond.   The symposiasts clapped and whooped as the dancers, graceful as leopards, bounded into the andron and began turning cartwheels. Menedemos joined the applause, but more for politeness' sake than anything else. The girls were nicely shaped, but almost fishbelly pale, with hair the color of untarnished copper -  not to his taste at all. Both of them also were several digits taller than he.