The Indians jabbered at him, crying "Malmal!" Siladites pulled Aias' ear with his goad. Still the elephant would not move, but shook himself and squealed angrily, lashing the air with his trunk. Behind him, the rest of the hipparchia waited. The children became unruly.
"Elisas!" I said. "Have you any more melons?"
"Nay, Troop Leader. We have not seen a melon since we left Syria."
"What else have we to tempt him?"
The Syrian shrugged, looking at me past Aias' legs. "This is a poor country for fruit this time of year. I will try some dried figs."
Elisas made one of the camp men put down his load. The Syrian opened the bag and took out a small sack of figs. As he feared to squeeze past Aias' legs, he tossed the bag of figs to Kanadas.
The Indian fed a fig to Aias, who flipped it into his mouth with his trunk and reached out for another. Kanadas backed off, trying to lure the elephant forward. But Aias stood rooted to his spot, waving his trunk and grumbling. Several times Kanadas went through this performance, but the elephant refused to move for the sake of a fig. The crowd of Ephesians laughed and jeered. Kanadas said:
"If we could offer big fancy cake, he might move."
I said, "See if there's a big fancy cake in Ephesos. If not, get the best you can. The rest of you, come on forward. Fear not; Aias will no step on you if you're careful."
The hipparchia crowded past the elephant to the deck. Elisas disappeared shorewards.
The camp men and grooms put down their burdens and lined up for their final pay. Tire ship's captain, Polyphron of Miletes, lent me a table on which to spread out money and pay sheets. I paid them off without major disputes and bid them farewell. One said:
"Any time the king sends you to the land of the Hyperboreans, Hipparch, let me know and I'll join you."
"I too," said others. With many farewells, they filed back past the elephant and clown the mole.
"Inaudos!" I said. "Go you not also?"
The Kordian fell to his knees. "Let me come with you, Hipparch! I be your personal servant! Only three oboloi a day, with food and one new suit a year! I save your life, maybe!"
"I hadn't planned on this. Why are you so eager to come? Surely your wife will never track you down in Ephesos, and you can find work here."
"I want to see Athens. Everybody talk about Athens. I feel like fool, to come so near Athens and then turn back."
"All right, we'll carry you on the payroll as far as Athens."
Captain Polyphron said: "I 'ope you'll not wait much longer, 'Ipparch. It's a long row to Samos harbor, and fain would I not reach it after dark."
I told him of the difficulty with Aias. The Indians still stood by the elephant's head, now coaxing and now scolding. At last Kanadas shouted a long sentence in his own language. Then he and Siladites turned their backs, stepped on the deck, and walked down the ramp to the pen.
Aias tried the deck with his forefoot again, then quietly stepped aboard and inched down the ramp after the Indians. The ship's structure groaned with the weight, but held.
Elisas arrived sweating with an enormous loaf of bread under his arm. He panted: "Where is the elephant, Troop Leader? Oh, there he is! The big pig! No fancy cakes in Ephesos, and the baker said it would take all day to make one, so I bought this loaf. And now the polluted elephant goes aboard without awaiting it!"
The little man looked ready to weep. I said: "Well done, Elisas. You may eat the loaf yourself, or share it with Aias if you like."
Aias made himself at home in the pen, which formed a huge square hole in the main deck. So tall was the elephant that as he stood on the reinforced oar deck, his eyes were on a level with the main deck. A wooden parapet around the edges of the pen, however, kept him from actually looking out.
"Kanadas!" I said. "What said you to Aias to change his mind?"
Kanadas smiled a rare smile. "I said: Siladites and I go to Athens on this great ship. We happy to have you come too, but if you will not, then stay here in Ephesos and starve."
Now the four Dahas, who had also been paid off, said farewell. They wrung Vardanas' hand and mine and walked down the mole. They vaulted on their horses. Each whipped out an arrow and loosed it at the sky. Then they galloped off with wild Sakan whoops towards their distant homeland. One of the spare horses they took with them was Vardanas' Rakous, which they promised to deliver to the Persian's kin at Sousa.
Kanadas, watching from the rail, said: "I wish I go with them." A tear ran down his dark face. "It is against my religion to travel over sea."
"Everything's against your religion, laddie," I said.
"Of course. That shows it is very pure, moral religion." He wiped his eyes. "Miss wives and children, too." He glanced at Aias' pen. "Also worry about Mahankal."
"Why? D'you fear he'll be seasick?"
"That will be bad, but is not what I meant. Rutting time due, and if he have no lady elephant he becomes dangerous."
"I know not what to do about that. There's no female beast within ten thousand furlongs who'd fit his monstrous member."
Captain Polyphron blew a trumpet. The anchor weights were drawn up. A three-banker towed us slowly away from the mole, its oars thumping and splashing. The Ephesians cheered and waved.
The towrope was cast off. Polyphron winded his horn again. One by one the oars were thrust out through the oar holes in the ship's side and secured by sailors to the thole pins in the outrigger. Another trumpet blast set our oars in motion. Up they rose, then forward, then down with a splash, and then back. The beat of the coxswain's gavel, slow at first and then quickening, came up to us as we headed out into the blue Aegean under fair spring skies.
Book Nine
ATTIKA
The Destroyer moved but slowly, as she had only half her normal complement of three hundred and twenty rowers. The place of the rest was taken by Aias' pen and food crib. As was most of the fleet at Ephesos, the Destroyer was manned by free hired rowers. Polyphron explained:
"It costs more in the short run, but you're in less danger of having them seize the ship, tear all the free men to pieces, and row off to become pirates, than with a shipful of slaves."
We crept across the angle of the Ikarian Sea towards Mount Mykale. As the morning passed and Samos rose higher out of the sea, we could see the opening of the strait that sunders this isle from the mainland.
The sky was fair, the breeze light. Nonetheless, the waves were big enough to give a slight but regular motion to the ship, like unto an easy single-foot. Vardanas and the Indians became violently seasick. The elephant grumbled.
Finding that I, too, had a slight headache, I took a walk about the deck. I passed Pyrron and Nirouphar in converse. Nirouphar looked pale, while Pyrron, leaning lazily against the rail, spoke:
"... now observe, my dear, and you will see an exemplification of one of the major arguments in favor of the sphericity of the earth.
Notice how, as time passes, Ephesos disappears below the curvature of the sea, while Samos rises out of it."
"Oh, for Mithras' sake, stop lecturing for once!" said Nirouphar. "I feel unwell."
I hid a smile and walked on. Later I returned, sat beside the lass, and held her hand without speaking. She smiled gratefully; for once my habit of long silences was appreciated.
In the middle of the day, the oars of the lower banks were shipped to release the rowers for their midday meal. When each group had eaten in turn, the short oars were put out again. During the afternoon we rowed around Poseidon Promontory, with its splendid temple of Poseidon, and entered the strait. Aias fell silent as the ship's motion quieted.