Menedemos laughed. No matter how much Sostratos knew, he could be naive as a child. “My dear, think about how many ships go back and forth between here and Salamis,” Menedemos said. “If I were Menelaos, I wouldn’t just know how many ships old One-Eye has here. I’d know the name of every rower on every one of them, and I’d know the name of every rower’s father, too. And you can bet your last obolos that Menelaos does.”
Now it was his cousin’s turn to say, “Oh,” in a gratifyingly small voice. “Yes, that is reasonable, isn’t it?”
Menedemos guided the Aphrodite to a mooring place at the end of a quay. The longshoremen who caught the lines to make the ship fast stared at the scantily clad Hellenes aboard her. They shouted questions in their harsh language. Sostratos gave halting answers. Menedemos caught the merchant galley’s name, those of his father and uncle, and that of Rhodes. But for the handful of names, he understood not a word his cousin was saying.
A big round ship was tied up next to the akatos. More longshoremen carried sacks of grain off her, down the quay, and into the city. As they worked, they chanted: “Hilni hiya holla-ouahillok holya.”
“What does that mean?” Menedemos asked Sostratos.
“What does what mean?” his cousin answered. Menedemos pointed to the men unloading the round ship. Sostratos cocked his head to one side. Menedemos got the idea he hadn’t even noticed the chant till it was pointed out to him. After a bit, Sostratos shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t think it means anything at all, though I wouldn’t swear to that. If I had to guess, I’d say it was something rhythmic they sing to help the time pass while they work.”
“Could be,” Menedemos said. “We have chants like that. I just wondered if this one made any sense.”
“Not to me.” Sostratos pointed toward the far end of the wharf. “And here comes an officer to ask us questions.”
“Oh, hurrah,” Menedemos said, meaning anything but, “Gods-detested arrogant snoops, the lot of them. I don’t care if they work for Antigonos or Ptolemaios or one of the other Macedonian marshals. To the crows with ‘em all.”
Antigonos’ man was quite tall-several digits taller than Sostratos and close to twice as wide through the shoulders. He had blue eyes, blondish hair, and a once-fiery beard now streaked with gray. Menedemos wondered for a moment if he was a Keltic mercenary, but he proved to be a Macedonian. “Who are you, and where are you from?” he asked, not bothering to sharpen his slurred accent. “Don’t see many strange Hellenes here, and that’s a fact.”
“This is the Aphrodite , out of Rhodes,” Menedemos told him.
“ Rhodes, eh?” The Macedonian didn’t seem to know what to make of that. “Your little island built some ships for Antigonos, but you do a lot of business with Ptolemaios, too.”
“Yes, we’re neutral,” Menedemos said, wondering if there were any such thing with the world as it was these days. “We have no quarrel with anybody.”
“Ah, but what happens when somebody has a quarrel with you}” the Macedonian asked. Then he shrugged. “What are you carrying?”
“We’ve got papyrus and ink, Koan silk, fine Rhodian perfume, some of the best olive oil you’ll ever see, Lykian ham, smoked eels from Phaselis, and a nice stock of books to help pass the time.”
Antigonos’ officer didn’t laugh at the olive oil. The way things had gone, Menedemos took that as good news. The Macedonian said, “Books, eh? Why would you bring books?”
“Didn’t Alexander himself travel with them?” Menedemos replied. “If they were good enough for him, why not for you?”
“On account of he had his letters, and I don’t.” The Macedonian’s expression sharpened. “Coming from the west, you’d’ve stopped in Salamis, wouldn’t you?”
“That’s right,” Menedemos said.
“Well, what did you see there?” the officer demanded. “How many war galleys in the harbor? Are they building more? Is Menelaos in town, or is he somewhere else on Cyprus? What’s he up to?”
Before answering, Menedemos sent Sostratos a significant look. If Antigonos’ men were so interested in learning what was happening on Cyprus, how could his cousin doubt that Ptolemaios’ forces on the island also closely questioned sailors coming from Phoenicia? “Didn’t pay much attention to the harbor,” Menedemos said.
“Oh, yes-likely tell.” Antigonos’ officer curled his lip in what he no doubt thought to be an aristocratic sneer.
“By the gods, it’s true,” Menedemos said. “I don’t care about war galleys; they’ve got nothing to do with me. If there’d been a couple of other akatoi in the harbor, you can bet I’d’ve noticed them. We did see Menelaos, though. He’s there.”
“Ah, that’s something.” The Macedonian eagerly snatched the bone Menedemos tossed him. “Where’d you see him? What was he doing?”
“He was at a tavern, not far from the harbor,” Menedemos answered.
“What was he doing? Was he getting drunk?” Yes, the officer was eager, all right. “Do you know if he gets drunk a lot?” Given the Macedonian reputation for pouring down cup after cup of neat wine, the questions weren’t so surprising. If Cyprus’ commander were drunk all the time, the place would be easier for Antigonos’ men to attack.
But Menedemos and Sostratos both tossed their heads. Sostratos said, “He didn’t seem drunk at all. He came to the place for the same reason we did: to hear Areios the kitharist play and sing.”
That drew the Macedonian’s interest, too, but not in the way Menedemos would have expected. “Really?” he said. “How was he? I’ve heard of him, but I’ve never seen him perform. I saw Stratonikos a few times when I was back in Hellas. He’s the best I know-but the tongue on that man! If a viper had it, he wouldn’t need to bite you-he’d just stick out that tongue and you’d fall over dead.”
“That’s the truth!” Sostratos said, and he and the Macedonian spent the next quarter hour chatting-sometimes arguing-about the virtues of various kitharists and swapping stories about Stratonikos. For all his uncouth accent, the officer plainly knew what he was talking about. Menedemos listened in growing bemusement. He would no more have expected the fellow to care about the kithara than he would have thought a Phoenician might set up as a philosopher. You never can tell, he thought.
At last, with obvious reluctance, Antigonos’ officer tore himself away.
Sostratos had succeeded in charming him; he said, “I enjoyed the talk, O best one. Gods give you profit here in Sidon.” He went back into the city whistling the tune to one of Areios’ Alexandrian love songs, which Sostratos had taught him.
“He wasn’t a donkey after all,” Menedemos said.
“No, but he brayed like one. Macedonians!” Sostratos answered. “When he got excited there, I was missing about one word in four.”
“That doesn’t matter,” Menedemos said. “What matters is, he liked you, and so he’ll give us a good character. Well done, my dear.”
“Thanks,” Sostratos said. “And tomorrow we’ll see what we can find here in Sidon.”
“Yes.” Normally, one of the things Menedemos would have looked for in a new city was the bored wife of a merchant or an officer. Because of his oath, he wasn’t supposed to do that. Harlots all summer, he thought, and sighed. Then he shrugged. It wasn’t as if Sostratos had asked him to stay away from women altogether. His cousin knew him better than that.
Walking through the narrow streets of Sidon, Sostratos kept craning his neck up and up. He didn’t particularly want to do it, but he couldn’t help himself. When he glanced over at Menedemos, he was relieved to find his cousin doing the same thing. Menedemos gave him a sheepish look. “I know the buildings won’t fall down on us, but I can’t stop thinking they might,” he said.
“Yes, I know. I feel like that, too,” Sostratos said. “I wonder why they build so tall. And what happens when there’s an earthquake?”
“Things fall down, I suppose.” Menedemos spat into the bosom of his tunic to turn aside the evil omen. After another couple of paces, Sostratos imitated him. Logically, he saw no connection between the act of spitting and an earthquake that might come in the next instant or might not come for the next hundred years or more. How the one could keep the other from happening was beyond him.