Like most literate Hellenes, Sostratos murmured the words on the papyrus to himself as he read. Halfway through the account of the battle, he paused, shaking his head in wonder. No matter how often he read Thoukydides, his admiration never flagged. Father Zeus, if you are kind, one day let me write half as well as that man did. Let me think half as well as that man did. It was, he supposed, a peculiar sort of prayer, but no less sincere for that. Menedemos hurried into the kitchen. 'I trust we'll have something specially luscious tonight, Sikon,' he said. 'Well, I hope so, young master,' the cook answered. 'I do my best, no matter how hard things are.' He complained all the time. From everything Menedemos had seen, that and petty thievery were diseases of cooks. Even the comic poets agreed with him. Trying to soothe Sikon's ruffled feathers, he said, 'I know the sitos will be splendid. It always is. Nobody in Rhodes bakes better bread with wheat or barley than you do. But what have you got for the opson?' The relish course of a supper wasn't so thoroughly under the cook's control as the staple. If the fishermen had had an unlucky day, the opson would suffer. 'Well, there's always salt-fish. We've got plenty of that, on account of it keeps,' Sikon said. 'And I did manage to get my hands on some sprats - a few, anyhow. I'll fry 'em in olive oil and serve 'em slathered with cheese. Add in some pickled olives, and it shouldn't be too bad.' 'Salt-fish? Sprats? Olives?' Menedemos' voice grew more horrified at every word. 'For opson? For a proper supper? With guests?' He clapped a hand to his forehead. 'We're ruined. Father will kill me, and then I'll kill you.' Sostratos would have pointed out the logical flaw in that; Menedemos was sure of it. He didn't care. This was disaster, nothing less. Only when the cook brought a hand up to his mouth to try to stifle laugher did Menedemos realize he'd been had. Sikon said, 'Well, maybe these will do better, then,' and swept the damp cloth off the seafood lying on the slate countertop. 'What have we here?' Menedemos murmured, and then answered his own question: 'Prawns. Some lovely squid. Eels. And . . . a Rhodian dogfish. Oh, lovely, lovely!' He might almost have been talking about a hetaira who'd finally doffed her undertunic of silk from Kos and let him see her naked. 'The gods will envy us tonight. All we feed them is thighbones wrapped in fat - and there's no telling what sort of meat people will bring home from a sacrifice, either. But fish, now - with fish, you know what you're getting ahead of time.' 'And you pay for it, too,' Sikon grumbled, for all the world as if he'd spent his own money and not the household's. Menedemos also had no doubt that he'd squirreled away for his own enjoyment some of the seafood he'd bought. Who in the history of the world had ever seen a skinny cook? But all that was by the way. Menedemos clapped Sikon on the shoulder. 'You have what you need. I know you'll do us proud tonight.' 'I'll do me proud tonight,' Sikon said. 'Maybe somebody won't be happy with his own cook, and he'll hire me to do up some feast of his. Every obolos I stick in my mouth brings me that much closer to buying back my freedom.' 'If you ever should, I'm afraid everyone in the house would starve,' Menedemos said. He let it go at that; like most slaves, Sikon worked better in the hope of eventual liberty.
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