“No doubt, but he's a foreigner,” Kleiteles said. “Too many freed-men holding down businesses that used to belong to citizens. I'm glad I've got a couple of sons, and I burn incense to the gods every day to keep them safe.” He sighed. “So many things can happen to children when they're growing up, and that's in time of peace. With the war heating up again ...” He grimaced and sighed again. “Incense can't hurt,” Sostratos said gravely. Menedemos knew his cousin meant it probably wouldn't help, either, but the proxenos didn't take it that way. Sostratos went on, “We just got some fine balsam from a couple of Phoenicians in Knidos. I'd be pleased to give you a drakhma's weight of it tomorrow, to help repay your kindness to us.” “Thank you very much,” Kleiteles said with a broad smile. “I've been burning myrrh; I'm sure the gods would fancy a fresh scent in their nostrils.” “Remind me in the morning, best one, before we go back to the Aphrodite , and I'll take care of it,” Sostratos said. “I'm a little absentminded, I'm afraid.” And so he was, but only in matters having to do with history or philosophy or birds or beasts—never in business. Menedemos dipped his bead in unreserved approval. The balsam was a nice touch. I should have thought of it myself. The Rhodian proxenos' slave brought in the wine. Kleiteles ordered a stronger mix than he had the night before. After a couple of cups, he sang a bawdy song in a strong, true baritone. It wasn't a regular symposion, but it came close. Kleiteles looked expectantly toward Menedemos. Thinking of Xenophanes crossing the Styx gave Menedemos his inspiration. He quoted Kharon, the ferryman of the dead, from Aristophanes' Frogs: “ 'Who's off to a rest from evils and affairs? Who's off to the Plain of Oblivion, or to take the fleece from a donkey, Or to Kerberos' crew, or to the crows, or to Tainaron?' “ He'd been to Cape Tainaron himself the year before. These days, instead of being nowhere to speak of, it was a hiring center for mercenaries. Menedemos rolled on with the Frogs, going through Dionysos' preposterous confrontation with the chorus of croakers. Kleiteles laughed out loud. “That's good stuff,” he said, raising his cup in salute to Menedemos—and perhaps to Dionysos, too. “Koax,koax” He chuckled again, then swung his gaze toward Sostratos. “And what have you got for us, best one?” Menedemos wondered if his cousin would lecture, as he often liked to do—perhaps about Lysandros the Spartan, who'd evidently-been an important fellow a hundred years before. But Sostratos had something else in mind. “Me?” he said. “I'm going to talk about gryphons.” And he did, at some length: about the gold-guarding gryphons of the north and the one-eyed Arimaspioi who were supposed to steal their hoarded gold from them; about the way the nomadic Skythians and the Hellenic artists in their pay portrayed gryphons (he's listened more to Teleutas than I thought, went through Menedemos' mind); and about the way gryphons, if there were such things, really looked—all without mentioning that the Aphrodite carried a gryphon's skull along with its other cargo. Menedemos had heard the pieces of the talk before, but never all together. He was impressed almost in spite of himself. When Sostratos talked about something that interested him, he interested those hearing him, too. He certainly interested Kleiteles. “Euge!” the proxenos exclaimed. “How do you go on about beasts you say are mythical as if you'd seen one just the other day?”
Вы читаете The Gryphon's Skull
