“Euripides? What are you going on about now?” Sostratos knew he sounded cross. He hated being clumsy, especially in front of his graceful cousin.
“Don’t you know Aristophanes’ Frogs?” Menedemos chuckled. “When Dionysos goes down to the house of Hades to bring back a good tragedian, Aiskhylos and Euripides square off. And Aiskhylos sinks Euripides like a round ship full of dear Protomakhos’ marble, for he shows you can fit, ‘He lost his little bottle of oil,’ into the metre of any of Euripides’ prologues.”
“Oh. I’d forgotten that one, yes.” Sostratos knew and liked Euripides better than Aristophanes. He mentally started the prologue to Iphigeneia in Tauris. Sure enough, the phrase fit right in. Meleagros? Yes again. Clever Melanippe? No doubt about it. Aristophanes knew his versifying, all right. Sostratos decided to gibe at his cousin, not the comic poet: “I thought you called Protomakhos’ wife ‘dear,’ not the man himself.”
Menedemos just grinned and stuck out his tongue, as if he were the Gorgon on the bottom of a drinking cup. “Here’s the Parthenon. Where’s this Kleokritos we’re supposed to meet?”
“I can’t pull him out from between my gum and my cheek like an obolos, you know,” Sostratos said. “Now he’ll be the one who’s late, and he’ll have to do the apologizing to us instead of the other way round.”
“Don’t hold your breath,” Menedemos said. “The next Athenian- or even slave in Athens-I hear saying he’s sorry about anything will be the first. These people are the rudest I’ve ever run across.” Even as he spoke, his head tipped back so he could get a better look at the frieze above the entrance to the temple. He clicked his tongue between his teeth in reluctant approval. “Rude or not, though, they knew what they were doing when they made this place.”
“Yes.” Sostratos dipped his head. “Pheidias was in charge again, though this was too much work for him to do by himself.”
The reliefs, freshly painted, might have been carved yesterday, not more than a century before. Flesh tones and robes of yellow and red stood out from the deep blue background. Horses seemed about to bound forward. So did centaurs. Pointing to them, Menedemos said, “I used to think they were creatures out of myth.”
“So did I,” Sostratos said. “Now that I’ve seen a gryphon’s skull, I’m not so sure as I used to be.”
A bent-backed, white-bearded man leaning on a stick came out of the Parthenon and made his slow, painful way past the Rhodians. Menedemos said, “Can we go inside? You’ve talked about the statue of Athena ever since we left Rhodes.”
“Why not? We shouldn’t stay long, in case Kleokritos comes, but the image was made to be admired.”
When they went inside and left the sunlight behind, their vision needed a little while to adjust to the dimness. A broad central aisle was separated from a narrow outer one at the sides and back of the sanctuary by columns set on two levels. That interior colonnade led the eye to the great cult statue at the far end of the shrine.
Sostratos had seen it before. Even so, his breath came short. Beside him, Menedemos stopped in his tracks. “Oh,” he said softly. It wasn’t really a word: just an expression of amazement and awe. One small step at a time, he approached the statue of Athena. Every so often, he would say, “Oh,” again. Sostratos didn’t think he knew he was doing it.
The image of the goddess had to be twenty-five cubits tall, or even a bit more: say, seven times as tall as a man. Everything that would have been flesh on a living woman was of ivory, the pieces so cleverly joined that Sostratos couldn’t tell where one left off and the next started. Athena’s robes, her triple-crested helm, and her hair were covered in thin sheets of glittering, shimmering gold.
It shimmered all the more because a shallow pool of clear, clean water in front of the statue reflected light from outside up onto it. The slightest breath of air-perhaps even the Rhodians’ footfalls-stirred the surface of the water, and stirred the reflected light, too.
Athena held a winged Victory in her right hand. Next to her might, the Victory seemed tiny. Sostratos had to remind himself it was several digits taller than he. The goddess’ left hand rested on and supported a great shield. Somewhere on the shield were the portraits of Perikles and Pheidias that had landed the sculptor in so much trouble. Sostratos thought he might find Perikles if he searched. Other images had given him a notion of what the great leader of Athens looked like. Pheidias? He tossed his head. Was a man truly immortal if no one recognized him?
Between the shield and Athena’s left leg, a great serpent coiled and reared. The scales of its back were picked out in gold, those of its belly in ivory.
Sostratos and Menedemos stood at the far edge of the reflecting pool, staring up and up and up at the statue. After a long, long silence, Menedemos said, “Well, my dear, you were right, and I’m not ashamed to admit it. We haven’t got anything like this at home. I’m glad I’ve seen it. If I hadn’t… well, what point to coming to Athens if I hadn’t?”
“The core of the statue is of wood,” Sostratos said. “All told, a couple of hundred minai of gold cover it-and the ivory, of course. It-”
His cousin held up a hand. “Never mind the details. I don’t want to know. I see what it is, and that’s enough.”
“Really?” Sostratos said. “I think knowing how it’s put together makes it more marvelous, not less.”
“You would,” Menedemos said.
They might have squabbled then, but someone called to them from the direction of the entrance: “Are you fellows the Rhodians I’m supposed to meet?”
Sostratos and Menedemos both turned. A man stood silhouetted in the bright doorway. “Kleokritos?” Sostratos asked.
“That’s me,” he answered. Sure enough, he didn’t say he was sorry for being late. Sostratos and Menedemos walked away from the statue to greet him. They both kept looking back over their shoulders at it. Kleokritos laughed under his breath. He was about thirty-five; his cleanshaven face helped him seem younger. He spoke a pure Attic Greek, and looked like a Hellene. Even so, Sostratos wondered whether he was freeman or slave. Few free Hellenes would have subordinated themselves to another man as he had to Demetrios of Phaleron. Not my worry, gods be praised, Sostratos thought. After the introductions and small talk, Kleokritos went on, “So you fellows have something special to sell, do you?”
“I should say so.” Sostratos held up his little bottle of oil-and made very sure he didn’t lose it. “Olive oil flavored with Lesbian truffles.”
“Is that so?” Kleokritos had sharp, foxy features. He might have suddenly spied a duck swimming near the edge of a pond. “Yes, the boss might like something like that. You realize you’ll have to give me a taste? I’d look like a proper fool buying something like that without making sure it is what you say it is.”
“Certainly, O best one.” Sostratos pulled the stopper from the jar. He hid the nervousness he felt. He’d shaved the truffles he’d got from Onetor fine as he could, to make them give up the most flavor, but he hadn’t tasted the oil since. You should have, you fool. He wished it had had longer to sit. If it were little more than ordinary olive oil to the tongue…
Kleokritos plunged a forefinger into the jar, then stuck the digit in his mouth. When he assumed the expression of a fox that had just dragged a duck out of a pond, Sostratos knew the oil was all it should be. “Well, well,” Kleokritos said, and then again: “Well, well.”
“You see,” Menedemos said.
“Yes, I do.” Kleokritos dipped his head. “May I have another taste?” Sostratos held out the lekythos to him. He smacked his lips. “That’s quite something, isn’t it? I don’t suppose your price will be cheap, either.”
“Truffles cost several times their weight in silver,” Sostratos pointed out.