The fox, p.21
The Fox, page 21
“My young friend, if I may call you that, I spoke against Argos. Not for Sparta. Like Aristeas, I opposed sending Corinthian troops to Asia.”
“You have not been in Asia,” Doreius said.
“Perhaps I shall yet. You dedicated our spoils in Sparta’s name. We shunned your Asian campaign. Let it be forgotten.”
“It is not solely our campaign,” Doreius reminded him.
“Sparta is war-leader, and many of my countrymen are still angry. You know the jest about portioning out duties...” We did not. He went on. “Well, it was proposed that the Eleians, who arrange the Olympic Games so well, should arrange all the games in Hellas; the Athenians, being masters of ceremonies, should be put in charge of all festivals, and the Lakedaimonians be thrashed whenever another city does wrong.” Only the night creatures chirped their answers. “Spartans never understand that one.”
“There is diversity in laughter, too,” Doreius said.
“It spoils a jest to explain it, but I shall try. If a pupil fails to learn his lesson, his tutor is thrashed, is he not?”
A vision of the Commander thrashing one of our honoured elders flashed across my mind, and I laughed aloud.
“Yes, laughter has its diversity also,” Alkimenes agreed drily. I explained. “Just so. I should have remembered that your teachers are never slaves. Perhaps I can put it this way. At the last Olympiade, I saw an old man arrive late in the stadion, and there was not a place to be had. He wandered about, looking for a seat vainly, until he reached the Spartan section. There, every man stood as one to offer his place. And the old man – I remember him shaking his fist – shouted at the onlookers, ‘All Greeks know what is right. Only the Spartans do it.’ You see, we exact a fuller measure from the teacher of Hellas.”
Corinthians have a charming turn of speech, which is natural to them as the sudden lighting of their vivacious faces.
“I do not know,” said Doreius, “whether we have been praised or abused.”
“Both?” Alkimenes laughed. “In any event, I am throwing myself upon your mercy to show me the path. I know not where I am. But at least it is where Axiochos is not.”
“Alkimenes, who is Axiochos?” I asked.
“The son of Alkibiades. He mimics his father in every way; but where Alkibiades lavished his fortune with splendour, Axiochos flaunts his with vulgarity.” Son of Agis, I warned myself, this has nothing to do with you. My ears listened on. “Drunk Alkibiades was wittier still. Drunk Axiochos quarrels or vomits, or both.” Alkibiades was inescapable. This Axiochos gave it all a terrible immediacy. Axiochos, who in blood bore the same relationship to me as Hekataios to Doreius. No. Dinon was name-father to Hekataios, and Hekataios was the favourite of his father. I forced it all from my mind, to hear Alkimenes saying, “...Why, his speech is normal as yours or mine. But Alkibiades had a charming lisp, so Axiochos must lisp and make himself unintelligible, for which one can be thankful at times. It is strange...Alkibiades was the most dangerous enemy Corinth had, yet one cannot but admire him. Great men ought never to have sons.”
The two months passed. There were times it felt as though we had been forever in Olympia, but when we walked in procession, city by city, to take our oaths before the altar of Zeus Horkios under an open sky, the training months seemed hardly to have been at all.
The sanctuary grounds were filled with more than twenty thousand people. Barbarians, as well as Hellenes, stood amongst the onlookers – heavy-browed Phoenicians with sea-weathered faces, slender Egyptians in long, striped robes, bright-cheeked Macedonians with jewels fine as the Syracusans – but they were coarse, loud men, seen close. There was even a Persian, wearing trousers and a long high-necked coat with sleeves, although it was the hottest month of the year.
It was into this throng that Euagoras disappeared.
“The heralds’ competition,” Pityas suggested. “Maybe he has gone there.” I think he wished to watch it himself.
“No. He went towards the Temple of Zeus.” Apollodoros pointed. “Perhaps to hear the orators speak at the back.”
“Not Euagoras,” Aristokrates declared.
“He will have gone to the poets’ competition.” Doreius spoke with assurance.
“Let him go,” I said. “He is not in the Games.” He was the pentathlete’s responsibility here, and Megakles beckoned to me.
He had been observing the Athenian boxer for me. This boy’s trainer kept him a secret from other stadion boxers. Being a runner, Megakles aroused no suspicion.
“Anaxilas wants to talk to you,” I told Doreius.
The Syracusan brothers detached themselves from a loose group of their countrymen, and stood in the shade cast by a statue. Doreius spearheaded a way through the crowd. Syracusan athletes had worn all their finery for the oath-taking, and an onlooker paused to turn to a companion and remark audibly. “Ostentation!” then, taking in our shabby cloaks and bare feet as we approached, added, “More ostentation!”
Anaxilas looked unusually grave. He was a lively fellow, more often with a smile and a jest than a serious word. I wondered whether the onlooker’s insolence angered him, and hoped he would not desecrate the sanctuary grounds with a thoughtless blow. Tempers were short now; the Games were upon us. He sliced the air with his hand. “Let us leave this rabble!” It is impossible simply to walk out of such a press, but it seemed to be carrying us towards the paved road leading out of the grounds. “That Corinthian Aristeas–” Someone shouldered past, cutting off his words.
“A good runner,” Doreius allowed. “But I am not concerned.”
“In the race only I need concern you.” A smile touched the corners of Anaxilas’s lips, then faded. “Aristeas’s father is guest-friend to my father. He has played upon that to make me his messenger. His friend Nikomedes wishes to speak to Leotychides.”
“I would not go,” Megakles spoke up.
“Have done, Megakles. You were not asked.” Anaxilas scowled and fell into the uneasy silence of a man arguing with himself. “You have drunk my wine in my tent, Doreius.” He spoke finally. “I have shared your black broth.” He had lied politely that he liked it. “My father’s guest-friend is my father’s guest-friend, and I honour the gods, but are we not also guest-friends of a sort?” He turned to me. “Megakles is right, Leotychides. Do not trust Aristeas. He is of good family, but he is a hot-headed fellow who follows nothing but his own will. He cursed an islander who stepped on his foot.”
We shouldered our way through to the paved path, where we walked with less difficulty, as there were more people going in than coming out. Having said what he had to say, Anaxilas was in better spirits, and talked with Doreius about horses. It was I who first saw Aristeas. He stood at the edge of the sanctuary grounds in his sky-blue tunic, with a shoulder cloak of a darker blue. As we approached, he sauntered down the road, and came to an abrupt halt before me.
“You are standing in my path,” I told him.
“Anaxilas, have you not passed on my message?” The Corinthian pretended astonishment.
“He has.” I had decided what reply I should give. “Nikomedes is welcome in our camp.”
“But he awaits you under the Zeus-struck oak. Now.”
“Let him,” I replied.
“He wants a friendly word with you.” Aristeas’s eyes looked amber in the bright sunlight. “What do you fear?”
Fear. The word burst in my head.
“Remember what the Cretan told you,” Megakles whispered.
An athlete in Olympia is a too-taut bow. The bow snapped. I forgot the olive crown, my father, the Games, my companions. “I fear the gods, but not you, nor Nikomedes. Tell him I will go to him.”
Aristeas inclined his head in a movement that looked polite but bespoke anger, and turned away.
“We had all best go,” Anaxilas said. Whether a formal guest-friendship existed between us or not, the brothers were true friends.
“No, I told them. “He would think I feared.”
Small in the distance, I could see the blue tunic of Aristeas, as he sped with the steady pace of a good runner.
The oak stood between the Corinthian camp and our own. Its greater branches were blackened. Green leaves sprouted on a few slighter ones. The boy boxer leaned against the lightning-split trunk, one sandal on, the other in his hand. He was a pleasant-faced youth with light brown hair. Aristeas was disputing with him. I heard him say, “I told you he would not be alone.”
“Nor am I,” Nikomedes replied.
The Corinthians stepped forward. The four of us stood, wordlessly facing one another; Aristeas by the side of his friend, as though he held an invisible shield over him.
“Aristeas, leave us,” Nikomedes spoke finally. “We’re both boxers.”
Aristeas looked at Doreius. They withdrew, walking together without speaking. They were of a height. Runners. Rivals for an olive crown. What did one know of foreigners? Was it all a trick to lure Doreius here? I would have called out to him, but that would make me look fearful, and shame him as much as it would me. They halted out of hearing distance, about a spears-length apart.
Nikomedes seated himself under the tree. I took a place opposite him on the ground.
“Sorry I had to send for you in this way,” he began. “My trainer would be unbearable if he knew.” He had lively blue eyes. “Aristeas heard some talk about a boy boxer who refused a bribe. He knew I had been offered one, and was concerned.”
“That you would take it? Or that you would not?”
“He knows no fortune is large enough to buy my failure. But that boy is in danger.” He lowered his voice, although only the birds could hear us. “Something in his food...”
“What is this to me?”
“I thought it might be you. I know Spartans do not take bribes.”
“No one approached me. Have you warned the Athenian boy?” Did I want him to?
“The monster? He is safe enough. The great wagers are on him.” He fingered his broken sandal-strap. “He has been training for this since he was six. Make your cook taste everything you eat. Aristeas orders his cook to taste all his food.”
“We eat from a common pot.”
“Then it could be your wine. Make the server taste it.”
“Our servants belong to the City. I’m not certain it would be lawful to use one that way.” I pulled up a tuft of grass. “Why do they let barbarians watch the Games?”
“It need not be a barbarian.” He followed my glance. Aristeas and Doreius sat watching one another like fighting cocks. “Not Aristeas.” He laughed “Asian Greeks have learnt some tricks from their swift Corinthian neighbours.” His face became grave, with one of those swift Corinthian transitions. “I know Aristeas tried to anger you, but he would do no worse. And what he did was for me, although I did not want him to. He would not do it for himself.” He wanted me to think better of that disagreeable fellow. “He risks his father’s rage if he makes a valuable slave eat tainted–” He laughed. “But, of course! If your server poisons himself trying to injure you, you cannot be held to blame.”
“Nikomedes, you are not a fool.”
“Did you take me for one?” He was a merry boy. “It was Aristeas who reasoned it. His father’s cook, you know.”
“We are the only boys who matter. You and I and the monster.”
Nikomedes meant well. “That Athenian is slow to think.” This much, I could return his good will.
“So Aristeas says, but he is a runner.”
“I have a friend who has seen him training. A stadion runner–” He waved this away with a hand motion. “He is a boxer in his own city.” He listened. “Nikomedes, that Athenian could fight us together, and still be on his feet.” One had never ought to discuss such matters with rivals. How often Thermon had repeated that. “But he is slow to move and slow to think.” Forgive me, Thermon. “He is powerful, but I am quick. And so are you.”
He grinned. “You have watched me train.”
“How not?”
“I have observed you, too.”
We laughed and grasped one another’s arms in the grip of friendship. It was to be a friendship for life.
“He takes an eye-blink to think. We can use that eye-blink.”
“You are like me, Leotychides. You want to win it right.”
“I intend to win it right.”
“I told Aristeas you were a true boxer. It is something runners don’t understand. But you are wrong about one thing. I’m the one who is going to win.”
There is no greater bore than the man who relives his feats in the Games at every opportunity, so I will not set down such an account, although that Olympiade is clearer to me than anything that occurred a sennight past. The day of the boxing, the onlookers, tight-packed, seated on the natural incline of the valley within a valley that is the stadion. The heat of the sun beating down in the boxers’ square, as the lots were drawn each time for a fresh match...
The Athenian surprisingly submitted to a brave young Sikyonian, who was unable to continue. (The boy died on the journey back to Sikyon). In the end, it was Nikomedes I faced on the boxing ground for the olive crown. I remember Nikomedes, assured, alert, his sturdy body oiled and sanded: his lively blue eyes challenging, taunting and smiling in a way that was not smiling; his light-brown curls darkened with sweat just before he put on his helmet. I have held the memory far longer than I saw him thus. When the first blow was struck, he ceased to be another youth – and became that nameless, formless enemy on whom I vent the rage of years. Thermon had taught me to use that anger – not, as he thought, to master it – for it was something that came and went of its own volition. I could no more subdue it than I could summon it at will.
I remember the noise of the onlookers...I remember Doreius, Thermon, Pityas – the entire Spartan section
– crowding round...but I am becoming a Games bore.
The next day I woke late, in a tent. Why? The tents were for trainers. We slept in the open, on the ground. My friends tell me that the first thing I did was to feel my nose. Doreius assured me that it was intact, that I had taken the blows on my body and not my face – but again, according to my comrades, I continued probing until Doreius asked Euagoras to pass me the mirror the slight youth always carried with him. It was the touch of deference that gave me the courage to ask Doreius, “Did I win?”
The next question when, talking all at once, they described my victory, I kept to myself. “Is that all?” The elation that I felt so often in anticipation came later in the winners’ procession, when the herald intoned, “Leotychides, son of Agis, of Sparta.” But it was a cloud’s passing only. The high points of achievement are always but a cloud’s passing; the rest, the strong wine of anticipation and the mellow draft of recollection.
Doreius told me that a runner knows his glory when he crosses the finishing lines first; the boxer is too sore and fatigued and must wait: but, for all, it is but a cloud’s passing; boxer, runner, ruler, victorious general – “Is that all?” To be sustained, it must be surpassed. Only the most torpid man will not ask “Is that all?” And set his foot on the path to the higher peak.
Had Lykourgos asked it of himself, or had a god told him that it is necessary to shape the aspirations of mortals to achievement rather than acquisition, when it is in our nature to ask, “Is that all?”
“How is Nikomedes?” I asked.
“That Corinthian nearly bested you, my lad.” Thermon frowned. “Lucky you caught his left eye, and left him with sight in one side only.”
I sat up. My muscles screamed. “I put his eye out? Doreius, did I–”
It was Thermon who replied. “You closed it for a few days only. You won’t go far in the men’s boxing if you are so tender-hearted about your rivals.”
Doreius gave me the belt before the winners’ banquet. It was the same work as the one Megakles had worn. An ancient battle, warriors in chariots with golden shields and gilded armour. I had thought only to find this finery interesting. Doreius saw I admired it.
“I wagered my barbarian dagger on the Thessalian chariot.” We stood on the tent I had abandoned. “Anaxilas thought too much of the Halikarnassan’s large horses.”
“It is beautiful.” I started to fasten the belt about my cloak.
“Would you shame us?” It was his commander’s voice. “Or do you think you are going into battle? Put it away. It can be made to hold a sword.” He straightened the olive crown on my head.
“Doreius, did you forget to offer to Artemis? Hekataios says she refuses you nothing.”
“Is my brother the confidant of gods now? She did not refuse me this time. You have an olive crown, have you not?” I was shamed. I had asked Apollo only for my own. When I gave him it, I would pray for one for Doreius. (O, be careful what you ask the gods). “There will be other races,” he went on, but I knew Doreius ran to win. That was in him.
I removed the Polydoros ring, and was going to place it with the belt. I never wore it in the flock, where adornments are forbidden. Doreius passed it back to me. “Wear your father’s ring. You have honoured his name.”
I might have spoken then, but Pityas, Apollodoros and Aristokrates rushed in.
“Are we going now, Cockerel?” Pityas asked.
“I wasn’t aware you were winners.” Doreius took in their neatly combed hair and immaculate cloaks.
“Nor is Meleas, but he is going.”
“Meleas is going with a guest-friend,” I told them. “Some important man.” Meleas had arranged a place for Doreius. It was the only time Doreius accepted a privilege not earned by merit. This, too, was a gift.
“We are flock-brothers,” Apollodoros protested.
“Eleians understand nothing of flock-brothers.” Apollodoros rested a hand on Pityas’s shoulder. “Come along. The Philasians have offered us a cup of wine, and the Syracusans are revelling. We’ll not be dull.”
Aristokrates glanced about. “Where has Euagoras gone?”
On the way to the banquet, Doreius and I called at the Corinthian camp to see Nikomedes. His left eye was yellowing around the edges. He talked about his plans for the Isthmian Games, the Pythian Games and future Olympiades. Aristeas betook himself elsewhere. We heard him say, “Oh it is the Spartans, here to gloat,” in a voice meant to be overheard, so we kept the visit short.
