Karystos,” his cousin said musingly. “There's a marble quarry nearby, I know that. And there's something else about the place, too. Something ...” He snapped his fingers in annoyance, unable to come up with it. “They've got that strange stone there, the stuff that won't burn,” Menedemos said. “They weave from It, and when the towels get dirty, they just toss 'em in the fire.” “Asbestos! That's right,” Sostratos said. “Thank you. I was going to be worrying at that all day, like a dog with a bone. Now I don't have to. That stuff sells well, and it's not very bulky. We might do some business.” “We might,” Menedemos said dubiously. “Nothing to make us late back to Kos, though, especially not in country Kassandros holds.” Sostratos looked forward, to where Polemaios was pointing something on the Euboian coast out to one of his henchmen. In a low voice, Menedemos' cousin said, “If Ptolemaios decides he wants anything to do with that fellow once he gets a good look at him, I'm a trouser-wearing Persian.” Menedemos knew he wouldn't have wanted anything to do with Polemaios. Nevertheless, he said, “My dear, that's not your worry, or mine either. Our job is to get him there and get paid for it, and that's what I intend to do.” Menedemos kept a wary eye on the coast himself as the Aphrodite made her way south, especially when the merchant galley neared one of the many headlands or little offshore islands. Lots of those little islands speckled the channel between Euboia and the mainland. Sheep or cattle grazed on some of them; others seemed just as the gods had made them. A piratical pentekonter or hemiolia might have used any one of them for concealment before rushing out against a merchantman. You're getting as nervous as that Athenian Sostratos was talking about, Menedemos thought. He wouldn't have fretted so much without such a valuable passenger aboard. Polemaios' bodyguards made the Aphrodite better able to fight off marauders than she would have been otherwise, but Menedemos didn't want to have to put that to the test. As he had when Kissidas brought his kinsfolk aboard at Kaunos, he kept trying to get as many glimpses as he could of Polemaios' wife. He had little luck there; she stayed up on the foredeck, and the crowd of armored bodyguards did a good job of shielding her from his gaze. Even if he had got a clear look, it wouldn't have told him much, not when, like any respectable woman who had to leave her house, she kept on the veil that shielded her from the gaze of lustful men. He knew as much, but kept peering her way anyhow. Presently, Polemaios came aft and ascended to the poop deck. Antigonos' nephew towered over Menedemos; he was one of the biggest men the Rhodian had ever seen. He wasn't lean and gawky like Sostratos, either, but massively built, broad in the shoulders and thick through the chest. He made a host in himself. He was so massively made, in fact, that Menedemos lifted a hand from a steering-oar tiller, made a brushing motion with it, and said, “Excuse me, best one, but please step to one side or the other. I do need to be able to see straight ahead.” “Oh. Right.” Polemaios didn't apologize. Menedemos would have been surprised if he'd ever apologized to anyone. But he did move, and had the sense to move to starboard rather than to port. If trouble suddenly boiled up, it was much more likely to come from Euboia, on Menedemos' left hand, than from the Attic mainland to his right. After a couple of minutes of silence, Antigonos' nephew asked, “How big a fleet did Ptolemaios bring to Kos?” “Close to sixty ships,” Menedemos answered. For the first time in their brief acquaintance, Polemaios smiled. Even smiling, he remained formidable. “Plenty to give my dear uncle a kick in the balls,” he said. “Not half what he deserves, either.”
