The Gryphon's Skull

first to Sostratos and then to Menedemos as he went up the gangplank to stand on the quay beside Aristarkhos. “Thank you for your help on Telos,” Menedemos replied. Thank you for your help here, Sostratos thought. Maybe jealousy had made him misjudge Euxenides. They could have made their own steering oar on the island, even if it wouldn't have been so perfect as the one the officer had turned out. But for Euxenides' acquaintance with Aristarkhos here in Knidos, though, things might have gone hard for them. Aristarkhos asked, “What cargo are you carrying, Rhodians?” “Perfume and purple dye,” Menedemos answered. “Papyrus and ink,” Sostratos added. His cousin shot him a warning look. He realized he might have done better to keep quiet about the papyrus. It came from Egypt, Ptolemaios' stronghold. Reminding Antigonos' captain about it might cause trouble. Aristarkhos only grunted. “Where are you bound?” he asked. “Athens,” Sostratos and Menedemos said together. Sostratos wondered if that admission were wise. For the past eight years, Demetrios of Phaleron had ruled Athens as Kassandros' puppet, and Kassandros was no friend to Antigonos, either. But Aristarkhos merely grunted again, remarking, “With that cargo, you would be.” He leaned forward, trying to see better as twilight thickened. “Will you stop at Kos on the way?” Anther dangerous question. Lying might be safer, but also might be more dangerous. Sostratos decided to tell the truth, as calmly and reasonably as he could: “Of course we will, O best one. We are traders, and we are neutral. They make silk on Kos, and you can't get it anywhere else in the world. We'll buy some to take with us, and we'll sell crimson dye there,” “When I left Rhodes bound for Miletos, they warned me ahead of time they planned to put in at Kos,” Euxenides said. “This was before we knew Ptolemaios' whole war fleet was heading that way.” “All right, fair enough,” Aristarkhos said. His suspicions finally seemed to have dissolved. “Will you want to spend a day in the market square here before you go on?” Sostratos and Menedemos looked at each other. Sostratos could think of nothing he wanted less. What he wanted was to get to Athens as fast as he could. But what he wanted and what was expedient were liable to be two different things. “Thank you,” he said. “That's very kind.” He'd made the right choice. He saw that at once, by the way Aristarkhos relaxed. The officer turned to Euxenides, saying, “Come on, let's get you back to the barracks before it's too dark for us to see where we're going.” They walked down the quay together. “Just what I want—a day in Knidos' market square,” Menedemos said. “It would take a special miracle from Zeus to make enough to pay the whole crew an extra day's wages.” He reached up and set a hand on Sostratos' shoulder. “And I'm sure you're even happier about the layover than I am.” “Oh, of course.” Sostratos' sounded even glummer than his cousin had. But then he brightened. “You never can tell what we might find, though. Who would have thought we'd come across the gryphon's skull in Kaunos?” “Yes, who would?” Menedemos' tone suggested he would have been just as well pleased never to have set eyes on it. He sighed. “We couldn't even hope to find the Rhodian proxenos' house without a torchbearer now. Do you feel like going to an inn, or will the poop deck do for the night?”