Archimedes just shrugged. "I'm going to stay away from him as much as I can," he said.
"Absolutely right," said his mother approvingly. "He's senior to you, and you don't want trouble." She frowned, sniffed, and glanced around at Marcus. "Oh, it's you," she said. "Go and wash."
Marcus bobbed his head and retreated back into the courtyard. He was engaged in cleaning himself when Philyra came out of the old workroom, still frowning. She paused when she noticed him, then came over resolutely. Marcus at once pulled his dripping tunic back on, embarrassed to be naked in front of the young mistress.
"How much do the supplies for a one-talent catapult cost?" asked Philyra.
"I don't know," Marcus admitted. "The strings would be the worst of it. They sell prepared hair by the drachma weight, and for a one-talenter you must have to buy it by the pound."
Philyra was silent for a moment. "He can build it- can't he?" she asked at last.
"He's good," said Marcus flatly. "He can."
Philyra studied him a moment, then let out a long unsteady breath. "I don't know anyone else who makes machines."
He nodded; naturally she had no way of judging her brother's skill. "In Alexandria," he informed her, "the best engineer in the city offered him a partnership. He wouldn't take it, of course- it wasn't geometry- but he could have had it if he'd wanted. He's exceptional. This fellow Eudaimon's absolutely right to be worried. Mistress, the only worries I have are about what happens if something outside your brother's control goes wrong."
She let out another long breath, looking at him closely, trying to determine how far she would trust his word. Then she smiled, relaxing. "Medion left his cloak at the workshop."
"At least we know where he left it," said Marcus. "In Alexandria I was always having to run all over the Museum looking for it."
She giggled. The sweet soft sound seemed to bubble a moment in his heart. "Fifty drachmae a week!" she repeated reverently, smiling over it. "We could buy back the vineyard! And I…"
She stopped herself. The vineyard sold to pay for her brother's Alexandrian education should have been her dowry, but she had always tried very hard not to acknowledge that painful fact. Her father, she knew, had hoped to save a new dowry for her from his earnings, but his savings had all been eaten away during his illness. She was of an age to marry, she had school friends who were married already, but with no dowry she was unlikely to find a bridegroom. That was a humiliation she tried not to think about, and not the sort of thing a young lady should confide to a household slave. She scowled at Marcus, who was waiting, his face open and alive, for her to finish her sentence.
Marcus abruptly understood how that sentence would have ended, and busied himself by bending down for his bucket of dirty water. Of course. He had silently disapproved of the vineyard sale precisely because it had seemed to him to cheat the daughter of the house of an essential in order to pay for a luxury for the son. But now he found that he was in no hurry to see Philyra dowried and married off. He would miss her. No need to worry yet, though. It would take some time to amass a dowry for her, even at the rate of fifty drachmae a week. And with the war…
He was determined not to think about the war. "If you'll excuse me, mistress," he muttered, and went to tip the water over the scraggle of pot herbs by the door. Philyra watched him a moment in surprise, taken aback by the way he had pulled off a sore subject unprompted. She had not thought he had either the sensitivity or the wit.
The following morning Archimedes set off early for the catapult workshop. Philyra, setting out to do the shopping about midmorning, found only Marcus in the courtyard: Agatha, who normally accompanied her, was helping her mother in the kitchen, and the boy Chrestos had exercised his talent at making himself scarce when he was needed. She looked at Marcus a moment, thoughtfully, then clapped her hands to summon him over and handed him the basket.
Walking behind her along the narrow street in the morning sun, looking at her straight back, respectably swathed in a white woolen cloak, Marcus found his steps light with an unaccustomed happiness. Philyra was starting to trust him a little. He prayed silently that the gods would offer him the opportunity to prove his honesty. He kept his eyes firmly shut to the reason he wanted her good opinion: there was nothing to be had there, except pain. Getting that good opinion, winning her trust and liking- that was a pleasure no one could deny him.
They went first to the baker's, and then to the greengrocer's shop around the corner. The groceress, a thin shrewish woman named Praxinoa, looked at them warily. Philyra bought some leeks and some olives, and paid for the goods with one of her brother's Egyptian silver pieces. The groceress studied the money a moment before putting it in her box and taking out the change. "How's your brother settling in?" she asked Philyra, with an eagerness that surprised the girl.
"Very well," Philyra told her; then, eager for the neighbors to appreciate the family's improved status, went on, "He's found work already. He's building catapults for the king."
"Catapults, is it?" asked the groceress. "Huh." She glanced around, then leaned closer to her customer and said in a low voice, "Perhaps that explains it, then. I had a fellow in here just before you came, asking about your brother."
"What?" asked Philyra, startled and alarmed. "Who?"
"I don't know who," said Praxinoa, with relish. "Never seen him before. He wasn't anybody from the neighborhood. He was smartly dressed, though. Official, I thought. Must be because of those catapults. They're strategic, aren't they?" Her eyes glittered, hungry for scandal.
"Yes," said Philyra, trying to sound resolute, though her heart had speeded up. In Syracuse, official interest could be very, very dangerous. "They probably ask about everyone who works in the catapult workshop."
"They do in Alexandria," put in Marcus dismissively. "Saw it there, too."
Praxinoa subsided, disappointed. "Learned about catapults in Alexandria, did he?"
Outside the shop again, Philyra looked at Marcus angrily. "You think it really was somebody from the king, because of the catapults?"
"I can't think of anything else it would be," Marcus told her.
Anger gave way to anxiety- and embarrassment at asking advice from a household slave. "Did people come and ask about him in Alexandria too?"
Marcus shrugged. "No. But in Alexandria he wasn't allowed in the royal workshops. King Ptolemy thinks a lot of his catapults, and never allows foreigners anywhere near 'em. Archimedes looked at some machines on the wall with his engineer friend, that was all. But catapults are strategic. I don't think this is anything to worry about."
Philyra nodded, but she was still frowning as they walked on. Phidias had never attracted any disquieting official interest. Of course, Phidias had never earned fifty drachmae in a week, either. Things were changing. She wished she felt more confident that all the changes would be for the good.
Archimedes was obliviously enjoying the workshop. In the past he had always made his machines himself, assisted frequently by Marcus and occasionally by an unskilled slave lent for a particular task: there had always been a great deal of sawing, hammering, and blistered hands in between the interesting parts of machine-making. Now he only needed to say "I want a beam this big to be joined to that beam with tenons," or "I need an iron heel plate this shape to fit that aperture," and within an hour, there it would be. It removed the drudgery from machine-making and left only the agreeable inventive side.
He wore a linen patch over his eye for his first few days in the workshop, tying it on with Delia's cheekstrap. He had already resolved to give the king's sister her new cheek strap when he went to the house to announce the catapult's completion; in the meantime, it gave him a secret thrill each time he tied on the old one. He did not tell his family where he'd acquired the little leather strap, however. He thought they would disapprove.