In Greek, Menedemos answered, “Is this the house of Zakerbaal son of Tenes, the cloth merchant?”
A pause inside. The dog kept barking. Then, very suddenly, it stopped with a yelp, as if someone had kicked it. One word came through the door, in heavily accented Greek: “Wait.”
Menedemos waited. After what seemed to him much too long, the door opened. A short, wide-shouldered, muscular man looked out at him. “I am Zakerbaal. Who are you, and what do you want?” he asked. His Greek was considerably better than his slave’s.
“I’m Menedemos son of Philodemos, of Rhodes,” Menedemos began.
“Ah. The fellow from the merchant galley.” Zakerbaal nodded. His heavy features brightened into a smile. “You’re at Sedek-yathon’s inn these days, aren’t you? Tell me, has his wife tried pulling you into bed yet?”
“ Zeus!” Menedemos muttered, gaping at the cloth merchant. A moment later, he realized he would have done better to swear by wing-footed Hermes, messenger of the gods and god of rumor. He pulled himself together enough to dip his head in agreement and say, “Yes, that’s right, best one. Er-how did you know?”
“Merchants hear about merchants, my master,” the Phoenician answered. “I wondered if you might call on me. Or did you mean about the innkeeper’s wife? She is no secret in Sidon, believe me. But come in. Drink wine with me. Eat dates and raisins. Show me your wares. What have you there?”
“Silk from Kos, the finest fabric in the world,” Menedemos said proudly.
“I know of it. I will gladly look at it,” Zakerbaal said. The reaction was polite, interested, but less than Menedemos had hoped for. Was Zakerbaal so formidable a bargainer? Or was it that, never having seen silk, he didn’t know how splendid a cloth it was? Menedemos hoped for the latter.
He followed the Phoenician into the courtyard of his house: a courtyard rather bare by Hellenic standards, for it had no garden. The dog growled and lunged at Menedemos, but a chain brought it up short. Zakerbaal spoke in his own guttural language. Servants brought stools and took the dog away. They fetched a basin of water, in which Zakerbaal ceremoniously washed his hands. Menedemos followed his host’s lead. Refreshments followed. The wine was quite good. “Where does this come from?” Menedemos asked.
“Byblos, my master,” Zakerbaal replied.
As was the Phoenician way, he served the wine neat. That concentrated its bouquet, which measured up against that of any Menedemos had ever known, even the finest Khian and Thasian vintages. “Very good,” he repeated. Its flavor didn’t quite match that marvelous, flowery bouquet, but it was more than worth drinking: good enough, in fact, to make Menedemos wonder whether he could get some and bring it back to Rhodes.
With the wine, Zakerbaal’s slave brought out figs and dates and raisins and balls of dried chickpeas fried in olive oil and dusted with cumin. Menedemos found those very tasty, but spicy enough to raise his thirst. He drank more wine to put it down.
Zakerbaal chatted affably about matters of little importance while his guest ate and drank. Presently, the cloth merchant said, “Perhaps you would be so good, my master, as to show me some of this famous Koan silk you have. Your servant has heard of it, and would be glad to learn its quality.”
“I’d be happy to, most noble one,” Menedemos answered. His hands were steady as he undid the rawhide lashing that held one of his leather sacks closed. His wits were steady, too, or he thought they were. He hadn’t been silly enough to pour down a lot of unmixed wine, not with a dicker ahead of him. He took out a bolt of the finest, filmiest silk he had and held it up against the sun so Zakerbaal could see how nearly transparent it was. “Imagine a beautiful woman wearing-or almost wearing-robes of this,” he told the Phoenician.
Zakerbaal smiled. Whatever he was imagining, he liked it. He reached for the silk but politely stopped before touching it. “May I feel of it?” he asked.
“Of course.” Menedemos handed him the fine, fine cloth. “There’s nothing like it in all the world.”
“Perhaps,” was all Zakerbaal said. His fingers traveled the fabric as delicately, as knowingly, as if exploring that imaginary woman’s body. He held the silk up to his face so he could peer through it, even breathe through it. When he lowered it, he nodded to Menedemos. “This is good. This is very good. I must tell you, though, my master, and I mean no offense: I have seen better.”
“What? Where?” Menedemos yelped. “There is no better fabric than Koan silk.” He’d heard plenty of ploys for lowering prices. This had to be another one. “If you’ve got better, O marvelous one”-a bit of sarcasm Zakerbaal might or might not notice-”please show it to me.”
He confidently expected the Phoenician to say he’d just sold it, or that he’d seen it year before last in another town, or to give some other excuse for not producing it. Instead, Zakerbaal called out to the slave again, rattling off a string of Aramaic gutturals and hisses. The slave bowed and hurried away. Zakerbaal turned back to Menedemos. “Be so kind as to wait but one moment, my master. Tubalu will fetch it.”
“All right.” Cautiously, Menedemos sipped more wine. Did Zakerbaal really believe he had cloth finer than Koan silk? Menedemos tossed his head. The barbarian couldn’t possibly. Or, if he did, he had to be wrong.
Tubalu took considerably longer than the promised moment. Menedemos began to wonder if he would come back at all. But he did, carrying in his arms a good-sized bolt of cloth. He bore it as tenderly as if it were a baby. Even so, Menedemos turned to Zakerbaal in perplexity and annoyance. “I mean no disrespect, best one, but that is only linen, and not the finest linen, either.”
The Phoenician nodded. “Yes, that is only linen. But it is also only a cover for what lies within, just as your leather sacks cover your Koan silk and keep it safe.” He took the bolt of linen from Tubalu as carefully as the slave had carried it. Unfolding it, he drew from it the fabric it concealed and held that out to Menedemos. “Here. Behold with your own eyes, with your own fingers.”
“Ohhh.” Menedemos’ soft exclamation was altogether involuntary. For the first time, he understood exactly how Sostratos had felt the moment he set eyes on the gryphon’s skull. Here, too, something completely unexpected and at the same time completely marvelous came before a Hellene for the first time.
Menedemos hadn’t cared so much about the gryphon’s skull. One had to love wisdom for its own sake more than he did to get excited about ancient bones, no matter how unusual they were. This… This was different.
He’d shown Zakerbaal the finest Koan silk he had. Next to the fabric the Phoenician merchant showed him, that cloth might almost have been coarse wool by comparison. Here, it was as if someone at a loom had managed to weave strands of air into cloth. The delicate blue of the dye only made the resemblance stronger, for it put him in mind of the color of the sky on a perfect spring day.
Then, ever so gently, Menedemos touched the cloth. “Ohhh,” he said again, even more softly than before. Under his hand, the fabric was as soft, as smooth, as the fanciest courtesan’s skin to a lover’s fingers.
Zakerbaal didn’t even gloat. He only nodded again, as if he’d expected nothing else. “You see, my friend,” he said.
“I see.” Menedemos didn’t want to stop stroking the… silk? He supposed it had to be silk, though it was far finer, far smoother, far more transparent than anything the Koan weavers made. He forced himself to stop staring at it and looked up to Zakerbaal. “I see, O marvelous one”- for once, he meant that literally-”I see, yes, but I don’t understand. I know cloth-well, I thought I knew cloth-but I never dreamt there could be anything like this. Where does it come from?”