and perhaps even admiration.
He said nothing, however, and when the others had descended, he at last looked away and followed them.
Archimedes sat down heavily on the floor beside his catapult. 'Am I a royal engineer or not?' he asked no one in particular.
'He hasn't paid you a copper,' said Marcus sourly. 'I'd say you're not.'
'But he ordered more catapults,' said Archimedes wonderingly, 'and a demonstration. And he asked me to dinner.' To dinner, and a bit of music. Would Delia be at the dinner? No: respectable women didn't go to dinner parties with men. But perhaps he would see her? He might even get another chance to play music with her. Delicious thought!
He smiled up at the two slaves, and found that they were both staring at him as though he were a dangerous dog. He blinked.
'I'd like it better if he'd paid you,' said Marcus bluntly. 'You're owed fifty drachmae, and he hasn't agreed on a price for any of the rest. Sir, you-'
'Can you really move a ship single-handed?' interrupted Elymos.
Archimedes suddenly beamed. He had always wanted to see how much weight one man could shift with an unlimited supply of rope, but nobody had ever before offered him the rope. He jumped to his feet, consumed with eagerness. 'Elymos,' he ordered, 'you go back to the workshop and tell them the Welcomer passed. Tell them to get out the wood for another one-talenter, in the same amounts as before, and tell them that I'll be ordering the wood for a hundred-pounder tomorrow. Marcus, you go home and give them the news.'
'Where are you going?' Marcus demanded suspiciously.
'Down to the docks, to see about my demonstration!' And he ran off down the steps, bright-eyed and smiling.
Marcus groaned. 'Demonstrations of ideal mechanics!' he said in disgust. 'Dinners and music!' He kicked the catapult stand. 'What am I supposed to tell them at home? He's agreed to work for nothing!'
'Epimeles isn't going to like this,' moaned Elymos. 'He thought that once they fired the Welcomer, Eudaimon would go. And Eudaimon must know that!'
'It was Eudaimon who put that razor in the strings?' asked Marcus.
Elymos nodded. There seemed no point in lying about it now, to another slave.
'So that my master wouldn't get his job?'
Elymos nodded again. He was not surprised that Marcus had guessed this. His own life centered on the workshop, and he tended to assume that everyone knew about things- like Eudaimon's incompetence- which were important there.
Marcus stood still a moment, thinking. It was clear to him now that the king had expected the attempt at sabotage: he had hinted as much, and Eudaimon at least had understood. When Eudaimon offered to help restring the catapult, Hieron had refused him any opportunity to conceal the evidence of his crime; instead, the king had posted Eudaimon's superior as a witness. But as soon as the razor reached Hieron, it and Eudaimon had both disappeared, and the only result of the incident seemed to be that the king now expected Eudaimon to obey Archimedes without argument.
The only conclusion was that the king had enough evidence to charge Eudaimon with treason, but was using it to blackmail him instead. Why? And why hadn't the king given a job to Archimedes? Marcus began to chew on his lip. Hieron had a reputation for cunning, for unexpected twists of policy and unforeseen alliances. He had risen to power through the army, and yet had never used violence to get his way. He had never needed to: Syracuse had given him everything he wanted, though afterward she had sometimes found herself confusedly wondering why. Marcus had a sudden suspicion that he had just witnessed two demonstrations of supreme ability that day: one of technical competence, by Archimedes, and the other of manipulation, by Hieron. He had no idea what Hieron's manipulations were supposed to achieve, but he felt uneasily certain that they weren't finished yet and that his master was in the middle of them. Why?
There was a sound of footsteps on the stairs, and Straton hurried up, holding a letter. He glanced round the catapult platform, then looked irritably at Marcus. 'Where's your master?' he demanded.
'Gone into the city to see about arranging a demonstration of ideal mechanics,' said Marcus bitterly.
'He should have waited for the authorization for it!' said Straton, flapping the letter. 'Where's he off to? The naval docks? Herakles! Does he really think he can move a ship single-handed?'
'Yes,' replied Marcus. 'You want to bet he can't?'
Straton looked at him, tapping the letter uncertainly against his hand.
'You owe me a stater,' said Marcus deliberately. 'You want to try to win it back?'
Straton sucked his teeth. 'I don't owe you anything! The bet was that your master would be offered the job of whoever was in charge of whatever he was set to do. Eudaimon still has his job.'
Elymos gaped at them.
'You're quibbling,' said Marcus. 'Eudaimon was in charge of catapults. Now Archimedes is in charge of catapults- isn't he?'
Straton shrugged uneasily. 'King Hieron hasn't said.'
'No,' agreed Marcus sourly. 'King Hieron hasn't even said whether he's going to pay my master the fifty drachmae that are owing to him. But the whole sense of our bet was that my master's war machines would be better than anyone else's. Now you know that's true- so pay up!'
Straton cast an embarrassed glance at the Welcomer. For all his ignorance of catapults, he was aware that this one was exceptional. He sighed, and fumbled in his purse.
'Of course,' said Marcus, with deceptive casualness, 'if you like you can add another stater to your stake, and bet that Archimedes can't move a ship single-handed.'
Straton frowned, hesitating, staring at Marcus. Then he shook his head. 'I'm not betting against your master again,' he declared. Then suddenly he grinned and flipped Marcus the Egyptian stater. 'Here,' he said. 'Take it and good luck. I know how to get it back! I'm going to lay Philonides odds of three to one that your master shifts that ship, and I don't doubt for a minute he'll take 'em!' He slung his spear over his shoulder and hurried off with the letter, still grinning.
Marcus scowled as he put the stater in his own purse. He had expected to enjoy winning that bet, but the image of the of the king's bright smile hung in his mind and soured the pleasure. Jobs were one thing: you knew what you were expected to give and what you could expect to receive. What Hieron was offering was undefined, and who knew what he might want in return for it?
'You bet that soldier that your master would be offered the job of any engineer he was set under?' asked Elymos, into the heavy silence.
'That's right,' said Marcus shortly.
'Kallippos is good,' said Elymos doubtfully.
Marcus shot him a look of irritation. 'As good as Archimedes?'
Elymos looked at the Welcomer. Then he shook his head. 'I suppose not,' he said wonderingly.
For some reason, Marcus was even more irritated, and suddenly eager to get home. He glanced around the catapult platform once more, and noticed Archimedes' cloak lying abandoned in a crumpled heap under the artillery port. He went to pick it up, then paused and gazed out at the road north.
The king expected a siege. 'It was very stupid of him to expect me to sack a catapult engineer,' he had said, 'when I'm expecting a siege.' Soon, perhaps, a Roman army would be encamped there, in that field before him where goats browsed now. Marcus shut his eyes and imagined the camp: the neat squares pitched within an entrenchment, the campfires smoking, the sound of voices speaking in Latin. There was a bitter surge in the back of his throat. He had heard no Latin spoken for thirteen years now. Soon the Romans and their allies would be here: his own people. They had come to Sicily in a bad cause, and they threatened the city which had become some kind of home to him, the people he had come to care about. If they conquered, he would probably die. But they were his people still. He glanced up unhappily at the menacing shape of the catapult beside him, and reflected that if he were really loyal to his own, he would cut Archimedes' throat.
