The Gryphon's Skull

Not wanting to be taken for someone who ate opson at the expense of sitos helped keep Sostratos mannerly. He dipped his head to show his host he agreed with Menedemos' comment. Actually, he thought his cousin was exaggerating for politeness' sake. The squids were good—like most Hellenes, Sostratos was very fond of seafood— but nothing exceptional.

“You're too kind,” Kissidas said. “I forgot to ask before: what have you got aboard? With an akatos, I wouldn't expect you to be carrying grain or timber or cheap wine or oil.”

“No, the Aphrodite's not a bulk hauler, though she's carried grain before,” Menedemos said. “We've got perfume from Rhodian roses, and some of the finest crimson dye to come out of Phoenicia since Alexander sacked Tyre twenty years ago.”

“And papyrus out of Egypt, and pots of first-quality ink from Rhodes,” Sostratos added.

“A few other odds and ends, too: things for men who aren't satisfied with the everyday,” Menedemos said.

“The luxury trade, sure enough—I knew it as soon as I saw your ship,” Kissidas said. “And what do you hope to get here? This isn't a town with a lot of luxuries to sell; we make our living from our crops, and from the timber and mines in the mountains.”

Sostratos and Menedemos shrugged in such perfect unison, they might have been actors on the comic stage. “We'll go into the agora tomorrow and see what your traders have,” Sostratos said. “And we'll gladly sell for silver, too. Plenty of that in these parts, if we can pry it out of people.”

“I wish you the best of luck,” Kissidas said. “But Antigonos squeezes us pretty hard. He—” He broke off as the house slave came in to light lamps and torches, and didn't resume till the man had left the andron. Even afterwards, he kept the conversation innocuous for a while. He had to be worrying about informers.

Menedemos, if Sostratos knew his cousin, had to be thinking about taking one of Kissidas' slave girls to bed. But no women showed themselves, and the fellow who took Sostratos and Menedemos out of the andron led them to a pair of beds in one crowded room. The lamp flickering on the table between the two didn't throw much light, but did shed enough to show Menedemos' expression. It was so eloquent, Sostratos snickered.

“Oh, shut up,” Menedemos told him. “You're not a pretty girl.”

“I'm not even an ugly girl,” Sostratos agreed, “though I suppose I would be, were I a girl.”

“That old-fashioned beard you wear certainly wouldn't help,” Menedemos said.

Sostratos snorted. “Things could be worse. We could be lying there on the planks of the poop deck.” He pulled his chiton off over his head, wrapped himself in his himation, and lay down. Menedemos did the same. Both bed frames creaked as the leather lashings supporting the wool-stuffed mattresses sagged under the men's weight. Menedemos blew out the lamp. The room plunged into blackness. Sostratos fell asleep almost at once.

When Menedemos woke up in the Rhodian proxenos' guest bedchamber, he needed a moment to remember where he was. His cousin's snores from the other bed soon gave him a hint. Gray morning twilight was leaking through the wooden shutters over the window. Outside, not very far away, a jackdaw started screeching: “Chak! Chak! Chak!”

The bird's racket made Sostratos' snores falter. He tried to wrap the himation around his head and sleep through the noise, but had no luck. When he muttered something unpleasant and sat up, Menedemos said, “Good day.”

“Not too bad,” Sostratos answered around a yawn. “Is our host awake?”

“I haven't heard anything stirring except for that jackdaw.” Menedemos reached down and felt around under the bed till he found the chamber pot. He stood up to use it, then passed it to Sostratos—Kissidas' hospitality hadn't extended to one for each guest.

“Miserable noisy bird,” Sostratos said. “If I could see it instead of just listening to it, I'd try to drown it in here.” He set down the pot.

Menedemos shrugged on his tunic. “Let's find the kitchen and seen if we can get some bread and oil and olives, or maybe an onion. Kissidas' slaves will be up, whether he is himself or not. Then we can go back to the Aphrodite, get some sailors to haul things for us, and see what kind of luck we have in the agora.”

“And what the Kaunians are selling,” Sostratos said.

“And what the Kaunians are selling,” Menedemos agreed. “Never can tell what you'll find in a place like this: things from the town, things from the rest of Karia—and, no matter what Kissidas says, things from the other end of the world. Ever since Alexander kicked the Persian Empire open for us Hellenes, we've come across all sorts of strange things we'd hardly known about before. Peafowl, for instance.”

“They were nothing but trouble,” Sostratos said.