Over the Wine Dark Sea

  'I don't,' Sostratos insisted. Menedemos laughed in his face. Sostratos turned red. He waved toward Diokles, who was stretching on the rower's bench where he'd passed the night. 'He'll tell us the truth. Which of us was snoring last night, O Diokles?'   'I don't know,' the keleustes answered around a yawn. 'Once I closed my eyes, I didn't hear a thing till I woke up at dawn.'   'I did.' That was Aristeidas, the sharp-eyed sailor who often served as lookout. 'You get right down to it, both of you gents were pretty noisy.'   Sostratos looked offended. Menedemos felt offended. Then they happened to glance toward each other. They both started to laugh. 'Well, so much for that,' Sostratos said.   'I'm going to sleep on the foredeck from now on,' Menedemos said. 'Then I can blame it on the peafowl.' He peered north. No clouds gathered on the horizon, though the breeze had freshened. 'I hope the weather holds till we make Khios. What do you think, Diokles?'   If anyone aboard the akatos was weatherwise, the oarmaster was the man. Menedemos watched him not just turn to the north but scan the whole horizon. He smacked his lips, tasting the air as he might have tasted fine Khian wine. At last, after due deliberation, he said, 'I expect we'll be all right, skipper.'   'Good.' Menedemos had made the same guess, but felt better to have someone else confirm it. He grinned at the keleustes. 'If you're wrong, you know I'll blame you.'   Diokles shrugged. 'As long as the ship comes through all right, I won't worry about it.' He shrugged again. 'And if she doesn't come through, if I drown, I won't worry about it then, either, will I?'   Several sailors caressed amulets or muttered charms to avert the evil omen. Sostratos, thought, looked intrigued. 'So you think a man's spirit dies with him, do you?' he asked Diokles.   Menedemos recognized a question like that as an invitation to philosophical discussion. Diokles responded as matter-of-factly as he had to the query about the weather: 'Well, sir, folks say a lot of things: this one says this, and that one says that. All I know is, nobody who went down with his ship ever came back to tell me what it was like.'   That touched off a lively argument among the sailors as they hauled in the anchors and slung them from the catheads at the bow: one more bit of ship's business that the peafowl cages on the foredeck made more awkward. By Sostratos' expression, though, it wasn't the sort of discussion he would have heard at his precious Lykeion. A lot of the men were loudly certain they'd seen, or sometimes talked with, ghosts.   After a while, Menedemos' cousin turned to him, frustration on his face. In a low voice, Sostratos said, 'I don't want to offend anyone or make anyone angry, but I don't think I've ever heard so much nonsense all at once in my whole life.'   'On land, I'm sure I would agree with you,' Menedemos replied. 'Out here . . .' As Diokles had done, he shrugged. 'Out here, half the things I'd laugh at on land feel true.' His chuckle held less mirth than he would have liked. 'Out here, especially after we spend the night at sea, I don't even know exactly where I am. If I can't be sure of that, how can I be sure of anything