Straton cast an embarrassed glance at the Welcomer. For all his ignorance of catapults, he was aware that this one was exceptional. He sighed, and fumbled in his purse.
"Of course," said Marcus, with deceptive casualness, "if you like you can add another stater to your stake, and bet that Archimedes can't move a ship single-handed."
Straton frowned, hesitating, staring at Marcus. Then he shook his head. "I'm not betting against your master again," he declared. Then suddenly he grinned and flipped Marcus the Egyptian stater. "Here," he said. "Take it and good luck. I know how to get it back! I'm going to lay Philonides odds of three to one that your master shifts that ship, and I don't doubt for a minute he'll take 'em!" He slung his spear over his shoulder and hurried off with the letter, still grinning.
Marcus scowled as he put the stater in his own purse. He had expected to enjoy winning that bet, but the image of the of the king's bright smile hung in his mind and soured the pleasure. Jobs were one thing: you knew what you were expected to give and what you could expect to receive. What Hieron was offering was undefined, and who knew what he might want in return for it?
"You bet that soldier that your master would be offered the job of any engineer he was set under?" asked Elymos, into the heavy silence.
"That's right," said Marcus shortly.
"Kallippos is good," said Elymos doubtfully.
Marcus shot him a look of irritation. "As good as Archimedes?"
Elymos looked at the Welcomer. Then he shook his head. "I suppose not," he said wonderingly.
For some reason, Marcus was even more irritated, and suddenly eager to get home. He glanced around the catapult platform once more, and noticed Archimedes' cloak lying abandoned in a crumpled heap under the artillery port. He went to pick it up, then paused and gazed out at the road north.
The king expected a siege. "It was very stupid of him to expect me to sack a catapult engineer," he had said, "when I'm expecting a siege." Soon, perhaps, a Roman army would be encamped there, in that field before him where goats browsed now. Marcus shut his eyes and imagined the camp: the neat squares pitched within an entrenchment, the campfires smoking, the sound of voices speaking in Latin. There was a bitter surge in the back of his throat. He had heard no Latin spoken for thirteen years now. Soon the Romans and their allies would be here: his own people. They had come to Sicily in a bad cause, and they threatened the city which had become some kind of home to him, the people he had come to care about. If they conquered, he would probably die. But they were his people still. He glanced up unhappily at the menacing shape of the catapult beside him, and reflected that if he were really loyal to his own, he would cut Archimedes' throat.
7
That evening Delia was informed that her brother wished to speak to her in his library. She was somewhat taken aback at the choice of location. Hieron generally received the leaders of Syracuse's army and city council in his dining hall or study, and talked to members of his household wherever they happened to be. The library was his private retreat. She picked her way through the gardens and along the colonnade with a mixture of curiosity and foreboding.
The library was a small room- the book collection of a private individual, not of a city- and it faced onto the smallest of the house's three courtyards. Three of its walls were lined from floor to ceiling with book racks, a neat crisscross of lathes from which the parchment title tags of the scrolls hung down, making the whole room flutter; the fourth wall held the door and a window. The only furniture was a couch, a small side table, and a lampstand. When Delia entered she found her brother reclining on the couch, frowning over a book which lay scrolled open in the light of the three lamps burning on the stand.
"Hieron?" she said, and he looked up with a smile, then sat up, swinging his feet off the couch and gesturing for her to sit. As she did so, she glanced at the open book, then stared at it hard. It was full of geometrical diagrams.
Hieron grinned and offered the scroll to her. The title tag informed her that it was Euclid's Conics, Book 3. She waved her hand at it in refusal and mock terror.
"I don't understand it either," said Hieron. "I was just trying to see if something I saw today was in it. It isn't."
At this Delia guessed the reason for the summons. "You've seen Archimedes son of Phidias?" she asked eagerly. She had told her brother about her discovery as soon as he returned from Messana.
Hieron nodded. "And you're right about him," he said. He rolled the scroll up carefully. "He is a very, very clever young man, and could undoubtedly be of value to the city." The rollers clicked together; he tapped them straight and slid the book into its parchment case. "The question is," he went on in a low voice, "how valuable is he, and how much am I willing to pay for him?" And he rested the scroll against his chin, eyes fixed thoughtfully on nothing.
"Did the catapult work?"
"Oh, the catapult!" said Hieron dismissively. "Yes, it works. As far as your friend is concerned, it's a good medium-sized catapult, and he hopes it will earn him fifty drachmae and a job alongside Eudaimon."
"Oh," said Delia, disappointed. "Alongside."
Hieron lifted his eyebrows. "I'm keeping Eudaimon. I can't afford to lose any engineers just now, and his work is acceptable when he has a machine he can copy. Now he can copy Archimedes'. Once he understands what it is he's copying, I expect he'll be downright enthusiastic about it. It will take him a while to work it out, though, and unfortunately he's going to have to be kept on a tight leash while he does. That's in hand." The king tapped the scrolled book against his chin again. "The question is, what am I to do with Archimedes?"
"Hire him, of course!" exclaimed Delia.
Hieron shook his head and sighed. "As what?"
"As an engineer- what else? And if you expect Eudaimon to copy from him, you ought to make him Eudaimon's superior."
"Yes, but do I gave him a rank and salary equal to Eudaimon- or to Kallippos? Or do I make up my mind that I'm going to keep him in Syracuse whatever he costs, and plan accordingly? I was hoping, sister, that you, who know the man better than I do, could give me a bit of advice."
Delia stared. "I-" she began; then changed it to, "But you said it was just a good medium-sized catapult!"
Hieron shook his head. "I said, as far as he's concerned. It's a one-talenter with a range of five hundred feet and an accuracy equal to the best arrow-shooter, and it can be pivoted with one hand. Archimedes is too young and inexperienced to realize how exceptional it is, but Kallippos didn't know whether to go wild with admiration or with jealousy." There was a pause, and then the king added, with a smile, "Being Kallippos, of course he did neither. He just scowled at it and hissed. But I'd bet anything he's in the workshop right now trying to replicate the pivot."
"I don't think I can advise you at all," said Delia, in a small voice. "I didn't expect- I just thought it was a matter of him replacing Eudaimon. Is he really that good?"
Hieron nodded seriously. "He may be even better. I've asked him to give a demonstration of ideal mechanics. He offered to move a ship single-handed. I'll see how that turns out before I make up my mind what to do about him."
"I don't understand," said Delia after a moment. "Why do you have to make up your mind about him now? Why not just- well, give him a job and keep promoting him?"
Hieron shook his head. He hitched himself up on the couch and turned himself to face her squarely. "Imagine I'm him."
"You don't look a bit like him," she said, smiling.
"Now, what is that supposed to mean? You think I should lose some weight? No, imagine I'm the son of Phidias, a mathematical engineer raised by a mathematical astronomer, the sort of man who amuses himself during his idle moments by working out theorems too advanced for Euclid. I studied in Alexandria at the Museum. I liked it. I didn't want to come home. But there's a war starting, my father's ill, and my family depends on me. I am a dutiful and affectionate son. I come home, I look for work making war machines, I find it. Right so far?"