Menedemos wouldn’t have wanted Diokles angry at him. Yes, he was somewhere between fifteen and twenty years younger than the oarmaster, but Diokles had courage to spare and a formidable physique his loincloth displayed to good advantage. Most of the time, Diokles was as good-natured as any man could be. When he wasn’t, though…
“Ahoy, the Aphrodite !” The hail came from the base of the pier. A barefoot man also wearing only a loincloth-surely a sailor-hurried up toward the merchant galley. “Ahoy!” he called again. “Looking for another rower?”
“Hail, Teleutas.” Now Menedemos sounded unhappy. In a low voice, he asked Diokles, “He’s not one of the men you’re waiting on, is he?”
“He sure isn’t,” Diokles answered at once. “He always shows up at the last minute, looking for whatever he can get.”
“Do we want him aboard?” Sostratos said. “He is a thief, even if he hasn’t stolen from his crew, and he’s no braver than he has to be.”
“I know. I know,” Menedemos said. “He works as little as he can get away with, too. But he’s here, and the other fellows aren’t.”
Sostratos gnawed his lower lip. Diokles looked as if he’d bitten into bad fish. Menedemos felt the same way. But neither his cousin nor the keleustes said no. With a sigh, Menedemos waved Teleutas on. The sailor grinned and came down the gangplank and onto the Aphrodite . He had his own pillow to protect his backside from the hard rower’s bench where he’d soon perch.
A quarter of an hour later, one of Diokles’ chosen men wove his way up to the akatos. Watching him, Menedemos hoped he wouldn’t fall off the pier and into the sea. He made it down the gangplank and aboard the Aphrodite , though Sostratos had to grab him to keep him from falling flat on his face on the poop deck.
Up on the wharf, Lysistratos laughed. He’d seen plenty of sailors board their ships in that condition. So had Philodemos, but Menedemos’ father looked disgusted, not amused. The glance he shot his son said he thought Menedemos made a habit of getting that drunk as soon as he put Rhodes under the horizon. That wasn’t fair, or true, but Menedemos knew his father wouldn’t listen if he said so.
He turned his attention to the sailor instead. “Hail, Nikodromos,” he said, his voice as sweet as unmixed Ariousian from Khios. “Take your place, my dear-we’re going to sweat the wine out of you.”
“Whatever you want, skipper,” Nikodromos said grandly. He found an empty rower’s bench and sat down-almost fell down again.
“Maybe we ought to wait for one more man,” Sostratos said. “The shape he’s in, he’ll foul the stroke till noon.”
“We’ll survive it, and so will he,” Menedemos answered. “He’ll sober up faster by working than any other way.” His chuckle was thoroughly nasty. “And he’ll be sorrier about it than he would be any other way, too.”
“We won’t make much of a show leaving the harbor if he’s too sozzled to keep time,” Sostratos said.
Menedemos gnawed on the inside of his lower lip. That got home. He liked to leave Rhodes with every bench manned, and with the oars rising and falling as smoothly as if the Aphrodite were a five in the Rhodian navy. Most of the sailors had pulled oars in a navy five or a smaller trireme at one time or another, so the hope was by no means forlorn. With Nikodromos drunk, though, he wouldn’t be able to look like a warship today.
He was still wondering whether to change his mind when somebody else-not a sailor, but one of the harborside loungers who might be found in any port around the Inner Sea-ran along the pier calling, “I thought you were already loaded here, but there’s a troop of slaves carrying amphorai headed this way.”
Menedemos and Sostratos exchanged glances of consternation. “Damonax!” they said together. So did their fathers, up on the quay. Menedemos realized he’d just had his mind made up for him. “Cast off!” he called, and the linen ropes that bound the Aphrodite to the wharf came in at bow and stern. He dipped his head to Diokles. “Let’s get moving, best one.”
“Right you are, skipper.” The oarmaster held up a small bronze square on a chain and a little mallet with which to strike it. He raised his voice till it carried all the way to the bow: “You ready, boys?” The rowers set themselves at their oars, staring back at him and waiting for the word of command. He smote the square, at the same time calling out, “Rhyppapai!”
The rowers all pulled, even Nikodromos. Diokles clanged the square again, and also used his voice to give the stroke. “Rhyppapai!” At the last syllable, the men pulled. “Rhyppapai!” The Aphrodite slid forward, a little farther, a little faster this time as she began to gain momentum. “Rhyppapai! Rhyppapai!”
“Farewell! Safe voyage!” Lysistratos called from the end of the quay. Menedemos’ father didn’t say anything, but he did wave. Menedemos lifted one hand from the steering-oar tillers to wave back.
Sostratos peered over the Aphrodite ’s stern, back toward the quay she’d just left. “Oh, my,” he said a couple of minutes later. “Here come those slaves-and to the crows with me if Damonax isn’t with ‘em.”
“Tell me what’s going on,” Menedemos said. “I can’t look over my shoulder right now.” The merchant galley shared the calm but crowded waters of the Great Harbor with several fishing boats and a couple of round ships. Menedemos chuckled. “Wouldn’t do to take my eye off where I’m going and ram somebody when I wasn’t looking, eh?”
“I should hope not,” Sostratos said. “The damages a jury would vote if you did something like that…” He shivered at the idea. “I don’t even want to think about it.”
“Well, neither do I,” Menedemos said, steering toward the narrow outlet at the north end of the harbor. “And we won’t have to-if you do your job and tell me what’s happening back there.”
“All right.” But then, maddeningly, his cousin paused again. “Sorry,” Sostratos said after a moment. “A round ship just passed between us and the quay, so I couldn’t see. Now I can. The slaves have set down their amphorai, and Damonax is saying something to our fathers. Whatever it is, he’s upset-he’s pounding his fist into the palm of his other hand. A teacher of rhetoric couldn’t do it any better.”
“Won’t make an obolos’ worth of difference with my father,” Menedemos predicted.
“Looks as if you’re right,” Sostratos said. “ Uncle Philodemos is just standing there, tossing his head again and again. What’s that line in the Iliad where Akhilleus has been praying to Zeus that Patroklos should drive Hektor away from the ships of the Akhaioi and come back safe himself? Zeus hears, but-?”
“ ‘The father granted him the one prayer, but tossed his head at the other,’ “ Menedemos quoted at once; he knew Homer well.
“Thank you, my dear. That’s just the line I wanted,” Sostratos said. “The only difference is, your father’s not granting any of Damonax’s prayers. And Damonax is getting madder and madder, too. Now he’s cupping his hands in front of his mouth-he’s going to try to shout to us.”
Thin and faint across the widening stretch of water, Menedemos heard, “Ahoy, the Aphrodite ! Come back and pick up some cargo!”
“Shall I answer him?” Sostratos asked. “I could yell back to the pier, I think.”
“Not a word!” Menedemos said. “Put a hand behind your ear and pretend you can’t make out what he’s saying.” Sostratos did. He wasn’t the greatest actor, but across four or five plethra of seawater he didn’t have to be.
Damonax yelled again. This time, Menedemos really did have trouble making out what he was saying. Sostratos kept that hand behind his ear. He started to laugh. So did several of the rowers, who also looked back at where they’d been. “Don’t foul up the stroke, you whipworthy rascals!” Diokles shouted at them. “ Poseidon ’s prick, you’re clumsy enough already.”