“I told you so,” said Thettalos to me. “But you would load us up like pack mules. These lads are right. Who’ll help us lighten the weight?”
We got in this way through all five gatehouses. Luckily the Gauls were off duty; they can drink like camels, and we would never have finished up with a last jar in hand, which I rightly guessed that we would need.
By the time we were in Ortygia it was almost dark. A linkboy came touting us; we hesitated, then took him on. It would show us up, but looked more natural for party guests. I had been at pains to learn the way to Archidemos’ house, to avoid asking, but the boy led us easily; it was his trade to know the streets. We skirted the barrack quarter without mishap; it had been wise to dress well, like the friends of someone important. He had just told us the house was round this corner, when he peered ahead, stopped and drew back. We did the same.
It was a good street; all one saw of the houses was high courtyard walls, broken with thick doors and a lodge or two. Outside one doorway, a little way down, was a knot of soldiers. They were loafing about, keeping rather quiet; a child could see (and this one had done so) that they were up to no good.
“This is serious,” I said. “Not like the gatehouses.”
The boy, pressed flat to the wall, said quickly that if the gentlemen did not mind the dirt, he could take us round to the back. We girded our robes, and followed him through alleys just wide enough for a laden donkey, where hens darted squawking from before our feet. Presently he turned and said, “This way, sirs.” This alley was cart-width, and fairly clean. Further on a little fire was burning, with five men sitting round it; slaves, I assumed, till we got a little nearer. Then we saw they were soldiers.
The torch wavered; I started to draw back; then Thettalos said softly, “Too late, don’t stop.” He strode on, pushing the boy impatiently aside, towards the fire. The back gate of a house, no doubt the one we sought, was just beside it. The soldiers stared; a Gaul, a Roman and three Greeks. Even sitting, one could see the Gaul was gigantic. His mustaches almost brushed his chest.
Thettalos said, “Can any of you gentlemen tell us the way to Diotimos’ house? This son of fifty fathers swore he knew the street, and now he’s lost us.” One of the Greeks looked up. Thettalos said swiftly, “Diotimos son of Lykon, the Kyrenian.”
“Never heard of him.” They offered us others of the name, all of whom we rejected. I said it was clear we had been hoaxed; this was what came of wineshop friendships. I was about to add that we were strangers in those parts, when I saw the way they were eyeing our clothes and rings, and noticed that the boy, though still unpaid, had run away. So I told them, with a good deal of self-importance, who we were, adding that the mud had ruined my new robe, which I had meant to wear next day for my audience with the Archon.
They exchanged doubtful looks. My accent had shown I was from Athens. One of the Greeks, who must have been at some time in the theater, peered up. “If you’re the actor, let’s hear a speech.”
“By all means,” I said. “But first, since we’ve lost our party, would you care to help out with this?” I offered the basket with the last of the wine jars. “To Hades with Diotimos, I’d sooner drink with honest men.”
This fine was well received. It was a big amphora, and of course the wine was neat. No one complained of the lack of water. I thought the Gaul would never stop pouring it down. When next they demanded a recital, it was merely for diversion. “I will give you,” I said, “The Death of Ajax, if someone will lend me a sword.”
There was a flash of metal; then the Gaul seemed to jump right at me. The other four grabbed him back; this I could not see well, because Thettalos had thrown himself in between. Bawling with laughter, the Greeks explained that the Gaul, not having followed the dialogue, had thought they were about to cut our throats, and meant to help. It was all over in moments. Thettalos looked like a man who has done the natural thing, and thinks no more about it.
The Gaul begged my pardon, but added that no other man should have his sword. I bore up under this news (the weapon was about three feet long) and took a Greek one. As I walked off to acting distance, it came to me that I had never handled a real sword before. With its greasy handgrip, old blood in the crevice of the tang, hacked blade and razor-bright edge, it was quite unlike a stage prop.
Needless to say, I gave them Polymachos’ version of the death, known to all actors as the Barnstormer’s Delight. Besides being just their mark, it has that passage where Ajax calls the gods to witness his wounds, and so on, endured in the cause of the Greeks, because of whose ingratitude he is going to run himself through. The soldiers all looked like veterans; the Roman was fairly seamed with war scars. It was, without doubt, the most shameful performance of my life—I dared not look at Thettalos—but I could not complain of the house. They twice stopped the speech with cheering. At the end, since there was nowhere to go off, I had to kill myself on stage; which, having been brought up in the decencies of the theater, I had no notion how to do. I contrived it by turning my back, fearing to the last that I would slice a finger off. As I lay in the dust, loudly acclaimed, I felt myself being lifted in enormous hands. The Gaul thought I had really done it.
I was now everyone’s darling. Returning the sword with thanks, and plied with wine, I said they must be guarding some man of high rank, no doubt, to be posted here all night—a love visit, maybe?
This brought me more than I bargained for. It is a kind of wit I can do without. Athenians, used to the good-natured phallic humor we all enjoy at the Lenaia, have no notion how nasty such jokes can be when cruelty informs them. I kept thinking that these were just five men out of thousands in Syracuse alone, all much the same. They were some time accounting for Plato’s attachment to Dion’s cause, going on to add that it was a pity when they caught him he would have to be finished off quickly, before his rich friends got wind of it. They recounted, like men who sigh for the good old days, how he might have been dealt with in the old Archon’s reign. There had been that Phyton, the general who had wasted everyone’s time by holding out for months at the siege of Rhegium, till everyone inside was skin and bone, the women not worth having nor the men worth selling. Phyton had been hung all day from the top of a siege tower, where the news was shouted up to him that they had just drowned his son. This he took as good news, which spoiled the joke; but when he was taken down, they whipped him through the streets, where each man could suit his fancy. At this the Roman, who had not said much till now, remarked that he had been there, and had seen no sport in it; the man was a good soldier, and bore it, one could only say, as if he had been a Roman. He himself and his mates had decided to put a stop to it by rushing the punishment squad and getting Phyton away. But they had done too much shouting first, so the squad had settled the matter by throwing him in the sea to find his son. There was some argument about this; but the Roman remained obstinate.
The Gaul, who had been getting a speech ready for some time in what Greek he knew, now said he had once seen Plato with his own eyes. It seemed none of the rest had done palace duty. Pressed to tell more, he brooded awhile, and said, “He looked like an Arch-Druid.” The Roman, interpreting, said Druids were a kind of holy warlock among the Gauls; they could call thunder, lightning, mist and wind, wither men away with a curse, and fly at will through the air. The Gaul confirmed all this, and began to look askance at the wall which hid such a person. One of the Greeks, however, pointed out that if Plato could fly through the air at will, by now he would be doing it.
“Sooner or later,” another said, “he’ll come out upon his feet. We’re staying till the midnight watch; then five more of the lads are coming.”