Of Merchants & Heros (35 page)

They were solid, hard-living, country men who knew how to fight and kill; I do not think they had ever set eyes on the likes of Doron before. They stared open-mouthed, gaping like chicks in a nest, totally absorbed in the sight, oblivious to everything else.

Lucius, ignoring them, swept past and up the gangboard. But Doron paused, rolled his dark eyes, gave them a broad smile, and flourished the embroidered hem of his new cloak, as if to say: Are you not envious? For see what a pretty coat he has bought me.

We sailed shortly after, a swift-moving convoy of three sleek quinqueremes, painted black and gold, with white-tipped oars. On the third day we rounded the point of Aigina; and then, gleaming like a pearl in a bed of green, the high-city of Athens showed in the distance.

The sky was cloudless and blue as sapphire, and on the plateau the Virgin’s temple shone clear and sharp. Someone came up beside me at the rail. It was Lamyros.

He whistled slowly through his teeth and said, ‘I have seen Africa and Spain and Gaul, and I have even sailed beyond the Pillars of Herakles, out to the encircling ocean, where twice each day the sea recedes from the land. But never have I seen anything like this. It is like a thing built by gods. And Philip wants to destroy it? Then truly he must be as mad as people say.’

‘He
is
mad,’ I replied, ‘and there is an insane kind of glory in being remembered as the man who destroyed a thing of irreplaceable beauty. But I don’t think even he wants to destroy it. He wants it for himself, like every tyrant. But if he cannot, then he would rather see it burn.’

I glanced back over my shoulder. The marines, who liked to make out the world had nothing new to show them, had fallen silent and were staring. It seemed everyone – the helmsman, the men at the rigging, the pilot’s mate – had paused to look. But then I heard Doron’s sudden bright laughter coming from the deck-house, and saw that I was wrong. He and Lucius were reclining on a heap of cushions, shaded by the awning, talking softly and drinking in turns from one silver wine-cup which they shared, intent on nothing but each other.

By the time we rounded the harbour entrance at Piraeus a crowd had gathered.

I looked about for Menexenos and saw him straight away, up under the great cresset-beacon on the harbour wall, in the place he knew I would look first.

I raised my arm in greeting, and, seeing me, he grinned and raised his in return.

Standing there on the low steps, apart from the crowd, in his simple white tunic, with his hair falling about his brow, he looked like the image of some god, and for the second time that morning I found that beauty had taken my breath away.

As I looked, someone moved up beside him, a woman in green and saffron and scarlet, looking like some exotic flower. I laughed and waved. It was Pasithea.

Presently, when the ship had docked, and we were standing on the quayside talking, Menexenos motioned along the wharf and said, ‘Who is that youth, the one making all the fuss?’

‘That,’ I said, ‘is Doron. Lucius found him at Sami.’

He looked again. Doron had commandeered a team of stevedores who had been busy unloading a neighbouring ship. They had brought a crane, and he was directing from the quay as they lifted his clothes-chest from the hold. He had spoken to them with a good deal of arrogance – never a wise idea with Athenian workmen – which had set them against him from the start. Now his frequent cries of ‘Stop!’ and ‘Wait!’ and ‘No, you fools!’ had unnerved them, or annoyed them, and the chest hung suspended over the water, swaying in its cradle of ropes, while they argued about how to proceed.

‘He looks very young,’ said Menexenos, turning back to me.

‘He
is
young. Sixteen, so he says.’

‘He looks nearer fourteen.’

‘I know he does. He has a child’s build, or a girl’s. I don’t suppose he’s ever set foot inside a gymnasion in his life.’

‘Then what is he doing here? He’s not a soldier, surely.’

I laughed out loud. ‘No. Certainly not that. Just at the moment he has Lucius dancing like a trained monkey.’ I told him about Sami.

Menexenos frowned.

‘I wonder what he expects from Lucius. Does he suppose he will teach him virtue?’

‘To tell you the truth,’ I said smiling, ‘I don’t think he cares much about virtue. But he likes the expensive gifts Lucius buys him. That clothes-chest is stuffed with treasures from just a week together. As for Lucius, he is in love, besotted.’

‘Really?’ said Menexenos, gazing up at the chest suspended over the water. ‘I wonder what he sees in the boy. It cannot be a meeting of minds, or a care for the Good . . . But what, Marcus? What is so funny?’

I shook my head. Then, seeing the sincere, puzzled look on his face I broke into a laugh. He looked questioningly at Pasithea, and at this she laughed too.

‘Sometimes, Menexenos,’ she said, ‘you really are an innocent.’

‘What, I, Pasithea?’ he said, looking put out. ‘Not so. It is Lucius who is the innocent, if he can really be such a fool.’

Laughing I said, ‘Well you already know he’s a fool. Actually I can’t help feeling sorry for him, seeing him taken in by that sly trickster. But who will tell him? Certainly not I.’

I grinned and laughed with Pasithea. And in my heart I thanked the gods that, out of so many, I had found Menexenos.

The quayside was full of crowds and noise and bustle – people jostling and calling for their friends, porters touting for business or pushing handcarts, stevedores chanting as they worked; water-sellers, wine-sellers, food-sellers, and, sitting on the wall behind, dockside whores of both sexes, making eyes at the sailors.

Amidst all this I became aware of a stirring behind me. I thought nothing of it, until I saw Menexenos’s eyes suddenly go up.

Then I glanced round, just as a large red-faced man emerged, elbowing his way through the crowd, saying irritably in a Latin accent, ‘Let me pass; let me pass.’

It was Caecilius.

I looked at him in amazement.

‘What?’ he said crossly. ‘Do you not know me?’

‘Sir,’ I said, finding my voice. ‘I had no idea . . . I thought you were in Patrai.’

‘I was. Now I am here, on business for your friend Lucius Flamininus. Did he not tell you, though you have sailed so far together? You surprise me.’

Then his glance was caught by Pasithea and he paused.

‘Greetings, Caecilius,’ she said, ‘I trust I find you well.’

‘Hello madam,’ he said, unsurely, and I saw his brow move in a frown as he wondered to himself how she knew his name, and whether he had met her before, and whether he should admit it.

Eventually he coughed and looked away. ‘Well, anyway,’ he said, turning to me, ‘you will find me at the house of Tuchon the Phoenician shipowner, in the street behind the arsenal. Anyone knows his house, it is the one painted red and blue, with the gilded statues outside. Come when you have finished with your friends, if you can find time.’

Just then, from behind, Doron’s high-pitched, nasal voice suddenly rose above the din like some shrill bird-call, crying out indignantly, ‘No, leave it there I tell you! Oh, where is Lucius?’

Caecilius turned, craning his neck.

‘Who is
that
?’ he said, a sneer forming on his lips.

‘A particular friend of Lucius’s, sir.’

‘Ah! A friend of Lucius’s. I see. Of course. Well I must be getting along. I am a busy man.’

He gave Menexenos a brief nod, frowned once more at Pasithea, turned, and pushed off through the crowd.

Later I went to him. He grumbled at me for a while, as if somehow I should have known he was in Athens. But I could see he was eager to get onto his own affairs, and before long he said, ‘Well, anyway, you will be pleased to hear my friend Tuchon has included me in a nice deal, supplying munitions from workshops on the islands, for which there is quite a need at present. War breeds opportunity, as I have told you before.’

He paused and waited for me to nod. I nodded, and considered Tuchon.

I had met him on my way in. He was a Phoenician from Sidon with sleek black oiled hair, who reeked of some pungent Asiatic scent and flaunted his wealth in his clothes and jewellery. He was, in short, a man in my stepfather’s mould – all except the scent, which in those days no Roman would dare to venture out in.

Caecilius, meanwhile, was talking on, explaining how he had secured from some associate of Lucius’s a contract to supply the fleet and marines, and, since the need was urgent and unexpected, he had been able to push up his price. Lucius, he said, was eager to make his mark while Titus was still busy in Epeiros: he was planning an attack on Eretria in Euboia – ‘a secret still; mind who you tell’– a city held by Philip, which was causing great disruption to allied shipping. ‘I knew my friendship with Titus would prove useful,’ he said, raising a plump didactic finger. ‘Always look to the long term, Marcus. Remember that. A useful lesson.’

‘Yes, sir. I see.’

He leaned back into the soft cushions, folded his hands across his belly, and peered at my uniform, seeming to see it for the first time.

‘What has Titus promoted you to? A captain?’

‘A tribune.’

‘Ah, a tribune.’ He nodded. ‘I suppose, then, you will be going off with the army, and leaving me to handle business alone?’

‘Of course, sir,’ I said carefully, ‘business comes first, that is clear, and I thank you for reminding me. I am sure Lucius will excuse me from my duty, if I tell him you require my help. He will not be pleased, and we are short of men, but—’

‘What are you thinking?’ he cried, lurching forward. ‘You must not displease Lucius at any cost. Have you not been listening to anything I’ve told you?’

‘You are right, sir,’ I said, nodding thoughtfully. ‘I shall go and fight. That would be best.’

‘Quite so; quite so.’ And then, ‘
Can
you fight? Who taught you? I hope you are better at war than you are at business.’

News came from Epeiros. Philip had asked for a meeting with Titus, supposing he could persuade the new young consul to come to easy terms, or, failing that, waste his time in drawn-out negotiations.

He soon discovered that Titus was not another vacillating Roman general, to be pushed back and forth across Epeiros until his consulship was over. At the meeting, Titus told him that if he wanted peace with Rome he must abandon his strongholds in Thessaly, Euboia and Korinth. These cities – Demetrias in Thessaly, Chalkis in Euboia, and the great towering fortress of Akrokorinth – the Greeks called the Fetters of Greece, because whoever held them held effective control of Greece.

If Philip withdrew from these cities, Titus told him, and pulled back his armies from Greece, he could have peace. Otherwise Rome would fight. He had come to free Greece, not conquer Macedon. That was what he intended to do.

But Philip, when he heard this, flew into a rage. He did not fear Rome. He would not be dictated to by some Roman upstart. He vowed to drive Titus and his army back into the sea.

Pomponius sent for me as soon as he heard I was back in Athens.

When I arrived at his residence, he sent for wine, and, when it arrived, actually poured it for me himself and handed me the cup.

Then he said, ‘What are we to do? I imagine you have heard the news from the East?’

I told him I had only just arrived, and had heard nothing.

‘Oh dear,’ he said, shaking his head and looking grave. ‘While Attalos has been occupied in Greece, Antiochos has taken advantage of his absence to attack Pergamon.’ He gave me a bleak look, shook his head again, and went on, ‘It is all going wrong. Antiochos is closing on us from Asia, and Philip bears down on Greece. And now Titus is trapped in the passes of Epeiros . . . I fear, to be quite frank with you, Marcus, that we have taken on more than we knew.’

He looked at me hopelessly and waited.

‘Well, sir,’ I said, setting down my cup, ‘it is war, and now we must fight it.’

‘But think, Marcus, what will happen if we lose. They will not stop at driving us from Greece, you know. They will be in Italy within a year.’

‘Then,’ I said, ‘we must not lose. Titus knows what he is doing.’

‘I hope you are right.’

I looked him in the eye and answered, ‘I am sure of it.’

What I did not tell him, however, was how little confidence I had in Lucius.

I had seen Lucius that morning. After what I had heard, I was starting to fear he would bring down disaster on us all.

I did not tell Pomponius; but, that night, I confided in Menexenos.

I was sitting naked on the edge of the bed, absently dabbing my finger through the single lamp-flame as I talked. Menexenos lay in a tangle of sheets beside me, propped on one elbow, listening.

I was telling him how I had been summoned to Lucius’s quarters in Piraeus, and, arriving at the outer office, had found the clerks rushing about in a great state, while, from beyond the door, Lucius’s angry voice barked out.

I had paused in the antechamber, and asked the officer at the desk what the matter was.

Word had come, he told me in a hushed tone – for Lucius terrified them all – that the combined fleets of Attalos and the Rhodians were already at sea, making for Euboia. As soon as Lucius had heard, he had flown into a fury.

‘Well he can’t sail without the fleet,’ I said.

He blinked at me. ‘Tell him that yourself, if you dare. Everyone else has tried. What do you think all this fuss is about?’

Just then the door flew open and a harried clerk rushed out. The man at the desk said, ‘You’d better go in.’

I went through to the map-room.

As soon as I saw him I realized that Lucius was beyond heeding advice from anyone. He was blustering, cursing, red-faced. He had already commandeered the transport ships that happened to be in Piraeus. He would sail for Euboia next day at first light. The fleet – ‘cursed, slow and useless’ – was ordered to follow as soon as it arrived.

‘And so,’ I said, turning to Menexenos, ‘we are to go rushing off to Euboia before we are ready. This is how wars are lost.’

He threw out his arm, resting his hand on my thigh.

‘What is it with that man?’ he said. ‘Surely it makes no difference to wait for the fleet.’