We pushed into the bushes. As I saw light, I also heard people talking, and stopped dead, gripping Thettalos’ arm. One of the voices was Dionysios’.
Thettalos, who read my eyes, stood soundless. It was not a time to be found where one had no business, creeping up on the Archon. I recalled Pythagoras’ saying, which I had quoted to Chairemon so lightly.
Thettalos had paled a little, but was already edging softly towards a gap in the leaves. One must study, as he said to me later, how men behave.
At first I could only hear Dionysios’ voice, eloquent with self-pity. Now and again one of the men with him, some two or three, would say, “Yes, indeed,” or “Everyone can witness that,” or “How true!” They were coming towards us; as their words got clearer, fear that they might discover us made me deaf. They paused, however, as they naturally would on coming to a thicket, and I allowed myself to breathe. Dionysios was saying, “But no, a friend of Dion’s can’t do wrong for him. Anyone, a traitor who eats my salt and corrupts my soldiers, anyone before me.” He almost sobbed. He was half-drunk, but quite sincere.
Someone said, “Birds of a feather, sir. You have been too generous to his insolence. The truth is—forgive me for my plain speaking—you don’t value yourself enough. It feeds his pride.”
“When I think—” Dionysios was beginning; then he broke off. They were now walking away; I crept along to share Thettalos’ peephole. There was the Archon with his friends; and crossing the lawn to them came three men, the oldest leading. Thettalos, who was watching entranced, mouthed a name at me with questioning brows. I nodded.
The two younger men stood silent, in attitudes of formal grief. Plato came forward. His shoulders and heavy head were stooping more than I remembered; his beard, which had had some gray in it, was nearly all white, though there was black still in his brows. His eyepits had deepened; from their caves gazed his eyes, piercingly gray. I could almost see Dionysios’ gaze shifting, through the back of his head. However, encouraged no doubt by his admirers, he decided to put a face on it. “Yes, Plato?” he said. “What is it?”
“I am here,” said Plato, “at the instance of these friends of mine. They are afraid you may be taking some new action against Herakleides, in spite of the promise you made me yesterday. I believe he has been seen hereabouts.”
Dionysios’ back jerked upright, giving at the same time a kind of wriggle. “Promise?” he said, sounding indignant. He had tried, also, to sound surprised.
At this one of the other two rushed forward, flung himself on his knees before the Archon, and clasped his hand. He made some plea, broken by weeping. Dionysios allowed his hand to be cried on, drawing himself up and looking powerful. Perhaps for once he felt like his father. Plato stood watching this scene with distaste. After a while he stepped forward, and put his hand on the man’s bowed shoulder. “Courage, Theodotes,” he said. “Dionysios would never dare break our agreement in such a way.”
Dionysios’ pose collapsed. His hand having been let go before he could snatch it back, he folded his arms furiously. “With you,” he said, “I agreed to nothing. Nothing at all.”
As I said, Plato had aged. His stoop had settled into his bones; he would never draw himself straight again. Nonetheless, at these words he grew alarming. Once, I remember, in some old country theater, I came to the skeneroom with a torch at night, and found myself face to face with a great old eagle-owl, hunched in his dark corner, his round eyes glaring into mine. I almost dropped the torch and burned down the building.
“By the gods, you did!” He thrust forward his beak; I could almost see the lifted feathers. The sycophants clucked; the friends looked panic-stricken. In case Dionysios had not taken his meaning the first time, he added, “You promised just what this man is begging for.” He turned his back on the Archon, and walked off.
There was a silence; then Dionysios told Herakleides’ friends to get out of his sight. Next moment he was gone himself, I suppose to urge on the soldiers. The lawn was full of powerful emptiness, like a theater after a play.
We scouted our way back to the public path before either of us spoke. Then Thettalos said, “He called him a liar, in front of all those people.”
I said, “And two of them Dion’s friends.”
“Will he kill him?”
“I don’t know.” I could feel myself trembling a little. “His father would have done it. I don’t suppose he knows himself what he means to do. It’s with the gods.”
“A terrible old man! Niko, can’t we try to get him away? It’s like leaving Prometheus to be gnawed by rats. At least he deserves a vulture.”
“My dear, he has a dozen devoted friends in the city. The best thing for us is to find Speusippos and warn him. He may need it.”
Menekrates, when he heard our news, decided at once to send his wife and children out of town, to her father’s place. She could take some valuables with her, in case rioting broke out. The house was in a turmoil of packing.
We called twice at the house where Speusippos was staying, but he was out, they could not say where. The rest of the day we spent going over Chairemon’s script; but next morning, resolved that Speusippos should be found without more delay, we called again. The porter, who knew me well, said he and the master were both at the house of Archidemos, the philosopher, where Plato was a guest. We stared. He went on carefully, “I understand, sir, the Archon needed the guesthouse. So he asked him to stay with friends.”
We looked at each other with relief. “So Plato is well,” I said, “and staying with friends of his own?” He answered yes. “And your master and Speusippos are both there too?”
“That I can’t say, sir. But that was where they were going.”
No doubt he was keeping things back, but we felt satisfied and walked off in relief, remarking that Plato must be even more glad to go than Dionysios to see the back of him. As Thettalos said, it was the end of a famous friendship, but at least he could go home. I thought of Dion, and how he would take the news.
Our minds now at rest about Plato, we settled down to find a cast and begin rehearsals. There was no chorus, only musical interludes, which would be looked after by a music-master. Chairemon was a very modern author. The third actor I had in mind was free, and brought me a friend to audition for the fourth, who had a few lines; I took him on. The extras were easy. Chairemon had found a reasonable choregos; he was said to be mean by Sicilian standards, and therefore pleased to have Athenian actors, who don’t demand bullion trimmings over everything and real gold crowns. I am a little too vain to hide in a heap of ornaments, so we suited well.
We had been rehearsing two or three days when on the way home I said to Thettalos, “My dear, I said nothing before the others, but whatever are you doing with Thersites?”
He met my eye in a way I knew, which meant he was going to try and talk me round. “Don’t you think it would be new, and in the spirit of the times, to play him for sympathy?”
“What times? The play is about the Trojan War.”
“Well, but it’s true Achilles did kill Patroklos, or cause his death. In Homer, the first thing you hear of Thersites is that he stood up to Agamemnon when he was in the wrong. Who else did?”
“Achilles. Diomedes. Chryses. Odysseus.”
“Well, Thersites spoke for the common people.”
“No, my dear, just for the mean ones. He is the voice of envy, which hates great good worse than great evil. In this Chairemon has followed Homer. Penthesilea is the part to play for sympathy; Thersites offers you contrast.”
“It’s in the modern spirit,” he said. “It’s antioligarchical. Let us show the common man rebelling; they can do with that in Syracuse.”
“God help the Syracusans if they recognize themselves in Thersites. They have forgotten greatness; all the more reason to remind them of it. Achilles’ anger lasted a few days of his life, but scarcely a dramatist has stepped outside them. It is quite bold of Chairemon to show him at his best; why be afraid of it?”