I came to my senses in the new sick quarters. The slaves and camp followers had arrived with tents and provisions from our old camp on the west side of the Hydaspes. The camp surveyors were pacing off distances and ordering people to their proper places. Grooms set up horse lines and took our beasts away to care for them, while the mercy killers cut the throats of the fatally wounded, and the scavengers stripped and dragged off the slain. It was dark before a physician got around to cleansing my wound and tying it up again.
I spent several unhappy days in sick quarters. My wound swelled and ached. The slaves who cared for the sick were slow and slack, and too few. The rain pattered on the tent for days at a time, for in India the rains fall in summer instead of in winter as in Hellas. The tent leaked, dripping on me and soaking my pallet.
At this time I was much alone, having no slave of my own. My concubine was dead and, not being a southern Hellene, I had no bent towards love affairs with men. Hence, I had no one to trouble over me, though this did not fret me so much as it would some folk.
At least once a day somebody came to visit. Betimes it was King Alexander himself, speaking a few words to each man in sick quarters. He looked at their wounds and spoke with the physicians about treatments and chances of healing. The first time he came to my tent he said:
"Rejoice, O Leon! How goes it?"
I murmured respectfully. He knew me well by sight, though we had never been intimate. Alexander was a short man, broad of shoulder and mighty of thew, with many scars lining his fine-featured face and muscular limbs. At close view one could see that he was no longer the young demigod who had left Macedonia eight years before. The ruddy gold of his hair was turning dull, with streaks of gray. The winter winds of Baktria had roughened his skin and filled it with little red veins.
The man who now looked godlike was Alexander's secretary, Eumenes of Kardia. He stood, smooth and ruddy, at the king's elbow with a tablet on which to note any divine thoughts that Alexander might utter. But then, Eumenes had been writing letters to kings and adding up the army's payroll during all those years when the rest of us were out in all weathers, chasing the wild Sakai across their boundless plains.
"You shall soon heal," said Alexander, smiling, "if I must issue a decree to that effect. You did well in the battle. It has been told me how you rallied your troop when the Poros attacked them on his elephant. What can I do for you?"
I decided to hammer while the iron was red. "O King, seems it not strange to you that after seven years' service, including three great battles and many skirmishes, my rank should be only that of troop closer?"
Alexander laughed and said to Eumenes: "Hermes attend us! Does it not beat all how men at death's door still think of promotion?" He clapped me lightly on the shoulder. "Present your plea to Eriguios, who will pass it on through proper channels. Alexander will do you justice, whether it be what you expect or not. Farewell for now!"
As he went out, I was tempted to call after him, pursuing the matter of promotion. But I knew the king's uncertain temper too well. When he chose to unbend he could be the most charming of men, but a soldier who presumed too far on his affability might find the ting turned suddenly haughty, and receive a tongue-lashing or worse. So I kept my peace. Learn to profit from the follies of others, as we say in Thessalia.
Other regular visitors were Eriguios the squadron leader and the flank guards of my troop, Gration of Trikka and Sthenelos of Athens. Eriguios, more bookish than most soldiers, brought over the books he carried and read them to me. I enjoyed especially Aineias' On Tactics, Simon's On Horsemanship, and Xenophon's The Cavalry Commander. Xenophon was my favorite author, being the only philosopher I knew of who applied his mind to matters of practical use in everyday life.
Then my wound began to heal. One day Eriguios found me hobbling about on a stick. I said:
"As you see, I shall soon be back in my command. I have some promotions to propose."
"Say on," he said.
"First, I think I should be confirmed as troop leader."
"It pleases. I will recommend the promotion to Demetrios."
"Then I would fain have Gration made troop closer in my place; Sthenelos moved from left flank guard to right flank guard; and Thyestes of Pharsala made left flank guard."
"I like not Sthenelos' affected ways," said Eriguios, waving his fingers languidly in mimicry of the Athenian.
"Belike, but he's a fell fighter and quick of wit."
"So be it, then. Thyestes is that little red-faced fellow, is he not?"
"Aye. He's a double-pay trooper the now."
"But is he a man of any family?"
"Nay, no birth at all. He's the bastard son of a soldier and a miller's daughter. But he's a daredevil horseman, and I think he has the makings of an able officer. Which carries the greater weight?"
The next day the rain stopped long enough for the king to order the long-deferred celebration of victory. During the games there was a stir in the camp as Phratapharnas, viceroy of Parthia, rode in. He led a squadron of Thracian horse which the king had left with him in Persia to put down rebels. Phratapharnas could have sent the Thracians under someone else, but I suppose he wished to ingratiate himself with Alexander and see some new country. Persians think nought of taking horse for ten thousand furlongs, for no more compelling reasons.
On the following day Alexander founded a new city, Nikaia, near our camp. He traced out the walls by riding slowly round the circuit in a chariot and sprinkling barley meal out of a sack. When birds flew down to eat the meal, Aristandros, the chief soothsayer, prophesied that, as these birds gathered, so should a mighty multitude gather to make this city a metropolis. Aristandros was rightly called a great soothsayer because he ever contrived that the omens came out as Alexander wished.
I was watching the Alexander walk back to his tent, talking in lively fashion to the crowd of Indian kings, Macedonian generals, Greek poets and philosophers, and other notables, when Eriguios joined me, saying:
"I have been looking for you, Leon. The king assents to all your proposals for the troop but one."
"Which?" I said.
Eriguios grinned. "The one about yourself."
My jaw dropped. I clenched my fists. "By the Dog of Egypt! Of all the unjust—"
I caught a warning glance from Eriguios and mastered myself. Time had been in the Macedonian army when men spoke their feelings boldly, as one would expect free Hellenes to do. But, since the king had acquired foreign ideas of imperial power, courtly etiquette, and divine attributes, wise men did not complain too loudly where he or his sycophants might hear.
"What's the matter?" I said.
"Do not look as though you would murder me; I but jested. He has picked a Macedonian to lead the troop, to be sure; but that is nought in your disfavor. He has another task for you, at which you will have a troop leader's rank and pay."
"Another task? What sort?"
"I know not. He sent word by Demetrios that you should visit the royal tent this afternoon."
After the noonday meal, I put on my uniform, limped over to the royal tent, and gave my name to Ptolemaios the Companion, now king of Egypt. He greeted me pleasantly and bade me wait. I sat on a log between a stinking, sheepskin-clad Massagete, wearing a Scythian necklace of bear claws and amber, and an Indian bedecked with jingling ornaments of silver and turquoise. There was the usual coming and going: bejeweled envoys from Indian states, messengers from Persia, Hellas, and other western lands, as well as officers of our own army.
Finally, at Ptolemaios' signal, I hobbled into the tent between a pair of shaggy Sakan guards. The king, wearing a long yellow Persian robe, sat amongst his people at a table littered with scrolls and maps.