'I doubt it,' Menedemos said. 'What kind of a man would do business with someone who'd been screwing his wife?' 'There are people of that sort,' Sostratos said. 'Back in Athens, Theophrastos called them ironical men: the sort who chat with people they despise, who are friendly to men who slander them, and praise to their faces men they insult behind their backs. They're dangerous, because they never admit to anything they're doing.' 'Men like that aren't proper Hellenes, if you want to know what I think,' Menedemos said. 'Well, I agree with you,' Sostratos answered, 'but that doesn't mean they don't exist. And it doesn't mean they aren't dangerous.' Menedemos waved his words away. 'You worry too much.' 'I hope so,' Sostratos said, 'but I'm afraid you don't worry enough.' Menedemos did stop going round to Gylippos' house, even though checking on the peafowl chicks would have given him a perfect excuse to visit. He thought Sostratos was mistaken - Gylippos didn't strike him as lacking self-respect to the point of staying polite to an adulterer - but he decided not to take any needless chances. And if Phyllis wants to try again, she knows where to find me, he thought. He sold the last adult peahen, along with four chicks, to a rich farmer who lived just outside of Taras. 'To the crows with me if I know what I'll do with 'em,' the fellow said, 'but I think it'd be kind of fun to have a peacock strutting around the barn. I seen the one that Samnite bought, and I decided I wanted one my own self. I figure my chances for getting one peacock out of all the chicks are pretty fair.' 'Of course.' Menedemos wasn't about to argue with him, not when he was putting down good silver for the birds. 'And you can breed them and sell birds yourself and make back what you're paying me and more besides.' 'That's right. I sure can,' the farmer said. Menedemos wasn't so sure he could. Once these chicks grew up, a lot of people in and around Taras would be breeding and selling peafowl. There would be a lot more birds for sale, too. Prices were bound to drop. But if the farmer couldn't see that for himself, Menedemos didn't feel obliged to point it out to him. The Tarentine had brought an oxcart and a couple of cages with him. The one for the peahen was a little small, but he got her into it. Off he went, the creak of the cart's axle almost as raucous and annoying as the peahen's screeches. Sostratos was flicking beads back and forth on a counting board. 'How does it look?' Menedemos asked. 'Not too bad,' his cousin answered. 'We'll show a tidy profit when we get home.' Sostratos looked up from the beads. 'Now that you've sold the last of the grown peafowl, do you plan on sailing back toward Rhodes?' 'Not yet, by Zeus,' Menedemos answered. 'Doesn't look like we'll be able to get to Syracuse, not with the Carthaginians pressing it so hard, but I was thinking of taking the Aphrodite up the western coast of Italy toward Neapolis. How often do the cities there get the chance to buy Khian wine and papyrus and ink and Koan silk? They should pay through the nose.'
Вы читаете Over the Wine Dark Sea
