Cleitus didn’t quite trust me. ‘May I bring a friend?’ he asked carefully.
‘Or two,’ I said.
He disappeared out his pavilion’s back door and returned with a sword and thorax and two large men — marines.
I eyed the fine wine and cheese and round cakes carefully piled by couches, clearly prepared for a nice upper-class wedding discussion, with remorse. ‘With luck I’ll be back in a few minutes,’ I said to Aspasia.
She sighed. ‘Is this a sample of our shared family lives?’ she asked.
Then we were off across the sand, to the headland.
Cleitus didn’t even ask who Ka might be.
Instead, he asked, ‘What’s this about?’
I looked at him a moment. ‘I may be wrong in everything I’m about to say,’ I said. ‘But I have suspected Themistocles for a month. He is in contact with the Great King and right now, unless we’ve taken too long, he is preparing to send his slave Siccinius to the King across the bay.’
Cleitus walked on for several paces.
‘Shit,’ he said.
We surrounded his tent. It was past midnight. I could hear his voice and that of Siccinius. He was drilling Siccinius on what the man should say.
Even now, it’s difficult to be sure. Is it treason to hedge your bets?
I say yes. I say, when most men cannot build themselves two beds, it is treason to do so.
I had Ka knock on his tent pole and then I went in, followed by Brasidas, Polymarchos, Cleitus and his friends. We were quite a crowd.
‘Gentlemen,’ Themistocles said. His voice was even, but I heard the catch.
‘Themistocles,’ I said, ‘there is a boat prepared on the beach with two slaves to row it — and you ordered it prepared. You are telling your slave what to say to the Great King — we all heard you. I accuse you of treason.’
‘I am used to dealing with small minds incapable of understanding my mind,’ he said slowly, as if puzzled and hurt. ‘But you are a subtle fox, a man of deep thought, and I expect better of you.’ Then he saw Cleitus and he reacted as if in surprise. ‘And you, Cleitus,’ he said, as if this was even more of a disappointment.
‘Treason,’ I said.
‘There is more to life than sword cuts, spear blows and boarding actions,’ he said to me. ‘I am working to panic the Great King into a hasty decision.’
‘By telling him that you have kept us from launching an assault on the Hellespont,’ I said. I’d just heard the bastard drilling his minion on his plan.
‘Yes!’ he said. ‘We need him to run, Arimnestos. Imagine five years of war fought in Attica and Boeotia. Imagine all the olive trees cut, all the farms burned, every house ruined, every temple thrown down.’
‘I can imagine all that, and not send messages to the Great King.’
‘And yet you have spoken to him three — or is it four, times?’ he asked. ‘And I have never spoken to him once. Which of us is a traitor? You went to him of your own free will — against our instructions!’
Cleitus looked back and forth. ‘I am not this Plataean’s greatest friend,’ he said, ‘but I’ve never heard anyone sane accuse him of being an ally of the Medes.’
Brasidas nodded. ‘Have you informed Eurybiades of your plan to deceive the Great King?’ he asked.
The two men locked eyes, and it was Themistocles who flinched.
Brasidas nodded at me. ‘Before you make more accusations, Athenian, let me say this. I can speak to Demaratus any time I want. He has long been the Great King’s confidante. Shall I ask him how he views you?’
I had brought the former Spartan for muscle. I tended to forget who he was.
It was silent in the tent.
‘I play a deep game,’ Themistocles said, which made me smile. It was probably true. ‘We have been starved for news this whole campaign. Remember the Vale of Tempe! I will not let that happen again.’
And again, I was on the horns of dilemma. Was he lying? I was sure he was.
Or he wasn’t.
Gods — or he didn’t know himself.
‘What news do we gain?’ I asked. ‘Wait. Will you allow me to speak to your slave?’
Themistocles shrugged. ‘Be my guest,’ he said wearily.
I took Siccinius outside, to a campfire, and Brasidas came with me, and Ka. Polymarchos stayed with Cleitus, and one of Cleitus’s marines, Antiphon, came with us.
Siccinius was shaking. ‘I only do what he tells me,’ the man said. ‘And by Hades, it is killing me with fear. I am a slave — the Great King can have me burned alive, pulled apart by horses. What can you do to me?’
I knelt on one knee by him. He was on a camp stool, and my other friends were close around him. But by arrangement, Ka pulled out his beautiful bronze canteen — loot, I fear, from Artaphernes’ trireme — and gave him some wine, good, Chian wine.
‘I can make you a citizen of Plataea,’ I said. ‘I can see to it that you have a shop or a small farm or a school in which to teach children. All you need to do is answer my questions.’
‘Hades,’ the man said. He sounded miserable.
But he answered all our questions.
Listen, friends, a man like Themistocles can either lie without changing his face, or worse, make himself believe anything he says is true. Such men are as dangerous as mad dogs, even when they lead you to great victories, or perhaps especially then. But Siccinius was really just a bright, brave man of otherwise average merit, enslaved by war and circumstance. Spying had burned away a great deal of his courage, and you must understand: everyone comes to the end of courage. It is one thing to face the spears one day — I have said this before — and another to live in fear every day until your whole life is a curse and nothing is real, nothing is good, there are no gods. Blessed father Zeus, friends, if you have not fought a long war, you cannot imagine how dark the bottom of that pit can be.
Eh, lads?
I won’t bore you with everything he said. I’ll only say that nothing he said damned his master absolutely. Some of it was pretty dark — he’d been ten times to visit Mardonius or the Great King, and he’d made a trip before Artemisium.
But … many of Themistocles’ best notions had been products of Siccinius’s spying.
In effect, there was no easy answer. Was Themistocles a traitor?
I was, in fact, no wiser, except that his lover and slave did not think his master was a traitor — thought him, in fact, the architect of the greatest and most complex deception ever planned.
I cannot love Themistocles. But I could not, in honour, find him guilty.
‘You go to the Great King tonight?’ I asked Siccinius.
‘Yes, lord,’ the younger man said.
‘You know the Lord Cyrus, a soldier?’ I asked.
‘He that spoke against you?’ Siccinius asked.
‘I still cannot discern whether you tried for our release or not,’ Brasidas said.
‘Lord, I did as I was bid, for the good of Greece,’ Siccinius said.
Brasidas nodded, rising. ‘I will vote to make him a citizen of Plataea,’ he said. ‘He’s a man, if nothing else.’ He walked off to the tent of Themistocles.
I took the slave by a shoulder. I reached into my chiton and withdrew, from the fold I’d made, the needle case and handed it to him. I, too, could plot, and make arrangements. ‘Give this to Lord Cyrus,’ I said. ‘I give you my word that it is not treason. He is an old friend.’
He took it.
‘Nor is it a poison pill. Read the message yourself, if you must, but give it to him and I will guarantee my eternal gratitude and your freedom.’
He smiled. ‘I swear this is my last trip,’ he said. Then he looked away. ‘I’ve sworn that since the first trip.’
‘May the goddess stand by you,’ I said.
I went then and bowed to Themistocles. ‘I will neither publicly accuse you nor apologise,’ I said. I looked at Cleitus, who nodded. ‘I will watch you. If your story proves out — well, you may apply to me and I will praise your subtlety as the greatest since Hermes stole cattle from Lord Apollo. If I catch you in direct treason …’ Again I shrugged. ‘I will take some action.’