"Troop Leader Leon, I am a worthless vagabond. Even after you beat me in Soustara, I still took more than my just tenth from the tradesmen, though I became more careful. You, however, not only forgave my earlier sin, but also saved my life in the Tigris. Since then my sins have weighed me down. In Karchemis I have prayed to Baalos in the temple and have confessed to the priest. To him I bared all my sins. He told me I should suffer the lash of the seven demons of guilt until I told you my fault and repaired my wrong. So here is all the money I have taken from the merchants, over my allowed tenth, after deducting my offering to the temple. Does it please my lord?"
"Zeus!" I said. "As that playwriting fellow said, wonders are many, but none is more wonderful than man." I counted out the money. "Let's say no more about it. If you can keep yourself as honest as this for the rest of the journey, I'll try to reward you at the final reckoning."
"I thank you, noble Hipparch," he said, and turned away.
"One moment," I said. "To keep the demons of guilt at bay, hadn't you best give me back those two didrachmons you just now picked up from the pile?"
"You are my father and mother," he said, and handed me back the two coins. "Good for my morals that you have such sharp eyes. I thought you would not notice."
The road bore southwest and wound through a pass, called the Syrian Gate, in the forest-clad Amanos Mountains. When we came out of the pass and sighted the sea before us, I raised a shout of "the Sea!" as Xenophon's men had done many years before. Tire Thessalians echoed it.
On a strip of land betwixt the Amanos and the sea, I found the half-built city of Alexandreia-by-Issos. The workmen were laboring on the town in leisurely fashion. The sight of the elephant brought the work to a halt as everybody downed tools and rushed to see the sight.
"Who commands here?" I said, first in Greek, then in Persian, and lastly in my foul Syrian.
A Syrian said: "I am the master mason Pabilos, contractor for stonework. Can I sell you some fine building stone? If the noble hipparch mean to settle here, he will want a good stone house, not a mud hut that melts in the rain—"
"Save your breath, friend," I said. "I seek the viceroy Menes."
"He is at Myriandros; he comes here but twice or thrice a month to see how the work progresses. Would you not like a good building lot if I can get one for you at half the regular price?"
"Nay! Whither lies Myriandros?"
"Half a day's journey along the coast." Pabilos pointed southwest. "If the noble hipparch want a house in the Greek style, I can—"
"No house, thank you," I said, and led the hipparchia off on the coastal road.
Myriandros was no half-day's journey for the hipparchia; so hardened were we to travel that we reached it in two hours. A soldier directed us to the house of Achatos, the mayor. There were a pair of ruffianly guards lounging in front of the door, who reminded me unpleasantly of those at Persepolis.
The first man they fetched was Mayor Achatos, a tubby Syrian with a worried look. "Good Troop Leader," he said, "cannot your business be put off? Will it not wait till the morrow?"
"Why?"
"Our noble viceroy—may Baalos bless him—is sick. Indisposed is he."
"What ails him?"
"A toothache."
"Then my business will not wait. I am here on the express orders of King Alexander."
Achatos sighed and disappeared. Presently he came back with another Syrian, Menes' secretary, Chiramos. I had to go through the same argument again. At last Chiramos went away, promising to do what he could.
Achatos gave me a sharp look. "Are you intimate with the king? Are you close to him?"
"I am in constant touch with him by post," I said. "What about it?"
"Then can I make a plea to you in confidence? May I submit a private petition?"
"Surely."
Achatos jerked his thumb. "Can you do aught towards getting him out of here?"
"Menes?"
"Yes. In confidence, mind you. My life is in the hollow of your hand. But I am beset; I am desperate; I am frantic."
"What is the matter with him?"
"Oh, no doubt he is no worse than other officials. But, as he likes Myriandros, he settles here for months at a time. The town has to pay for his keep and that of his folk. He takes my best rooms and then complains about the quarters. His bodyguards pinch my daughters' buttocks and make lewd proposals to them. It is but a matter of time before they are raped or seduced, if indeed it have not already befallen unbeknownst to me. Could you persuade Alexander to order him to Damascus or some such place big enough for him? You would not find the town of Myriandros ungrateful."
Pressed for money as we were, I should probably have wrung as big a bribe as I could from the man, had not a roar from within interrupted us. A muffled voice exclaimed in Persian:
"I care not if it be Alexander's pet monkey, sent from India to plague me. I said I would hear no more petitions today! Get rid of him!"
There was a murmur of speech, and at last the same voice said: "Oh, Mithras smite the fellow! I will see him, but only for a moment."
The man who strode out was a tall stout Persian with a graying beard and a cloth tied around his swollen jaw. He mumbled in bad Greek:
"I am Menes. What is your business?"
In Persian I told him of my mission. "So I need a ship, arranged to carry an elephant. Here is my letter of authorization from Eumenes." He glanced at the letter, then groaned and clutched his jaw. "No, no, it is not the letter, but my cursed tooth. I have tried medicine, magic, and prayer; but nothing does any good."
"In Thessalia we knock the aching tooth out with a hammer and a nail when it gets unbearable."
"I thought of that." Menes lowered his voice. "But, do you know, Hipparch, I have a deathly fear of such surgery? I, a big strong man who has fought in great battles? Now, let us see this letter." He moved his lips as he read it slowly, then pursed them. "I doubt if I can help you. Where is this elephant?"
"Outside in the street."
Menes and I walked out. The viceroy looked a little taken aback by the hipparchia, drawn up around our carts as if we expected a battle. Our experience with governors had made us wary. At the sight of Aias, however, Menes turned to me with a smile on his stern face.
"The pain of my tooth went away as soon as I laid eyes on the beast," he said. "It must be a good omen."
But then he frowned as he sauntered round the elephant, looking him up and down. "What does it weigh?"
I asked Kanadas, but he knew no more than I. "Nobody knows," I said. "After all, there is no scale in the world for weighing such a mass. I should guess several hundred talents."
"Hmm," said Menes. "That looks bad. It is not so much the weight as the fact that it will all be gathered into one place, if you understand me. Also, as the elephant moves about, the ship will tip. Let me think. It would take one of the largest rates..." he continued, half to himself. "We have a pair of eighters, the Terrible and Horrible, at Tyre. Then we have the four fivers of the Victory class, the Victory and Triumph at Arados and the Fame and Glory at Sidon. But these are all laid up out of commission, and it would take months to refit one and make it into an elephant barge. There are also some big ships in reserve at Alexandreia-in-Egypt, but those would do no more good than these I have mentioned."
"Why are there no suitable ships in readiness?" I asked.
"At the close of King Dareios' naval effort in the Western Sea, King Alexander sent word to lay up most of his larger ships, because they were too costly to run and were no longer needed for battles. The three-bankers, he said, would suffice to keep down pirates."