Dionysios fingered his beard. "Why didn't you tell me this sooner?"
"Sir, I didn't know you wanted to haul the whole lot of catapults to the other end of Sicily, and so soon! Besides, the wainwright is not under my orders."
Dionysios sighed. "Even I cannot think of everything. Well, keep up production. Any surplus catapults can be mounted defensively on the walls of Syracuse. I shall order double guards around this building. Pyres, you are now master of the Arsenal. I'm putting the wainwright under your orders; try to speed him up. Lithodomos will start at once on his new duty, gathering food stores for the campaign. Philistos, round up all the soldiers who have stood sentry go here since yesterday. They probably know nothing, or we should have had word; but I mean to question them anyway. Rejoice, all! Stay, Zopyros; I have more to say to you."
The group broke up. Dionysios, followed by Zopyros and the bodyguards, went out of the Arsenal. Dionysios questioned the sentry, but the man had seen nothing. The tyrannos turned away and strolled along the edge of the Spring of Arethousa. To Zopyros he said musingly:
"A ruler cannot afford to take so casual a view of treason as our friend Archytas seems to. Perhaps he is right in thinking we shall never find the culprit, but I mean to try." Dionysios struck his open hand with his fist. "But now? The villain was not so obliging as to drop his wallet at the site of the crime. What I need, even more than new engines of war, is an infallible method of uncovering spies and conspirators. While I have little faith in the supernatural, I would not overlook any means ..." He turned to stare at Zopyros through narrowed eyelids. "I understand you had some experience with a witch in Africa?"
"Yes, sir; I spent a day and a night in her lair."
"Did she give you any reason to think that such a person could help us?"
"No, sir, she did not; although she mightily impressed the other Phoenicians who came to her sitting."
"How did she do that?"
Zopyros told about Saphanbaal's little tricks—the alum in the fire and the fish scales on the roof of the cave. "... and when they asked her questions, she gave the same sort of artful, ambiguous answers that our oracles give. You know, when the Pythia of Delphoi told King Croesus:
If Croesus shall o'er Halys River go,
He will a mighty kingdom overthrow,
she carefully neglected to state which kingdom would fall. But such was the sitters' faith that half the time they almost answered the questions themselves. When Saphanbaal hesitated, they prompted her. They didn't try to expose her chicaneries; they wanted to believe."
"Hm," said Dionysios, tugging at his beard. "So the effectiveness of your witch lies, not in the power she actually possesses, but in that which her followers impute to her, eh?"
"That's it exactly, sir."
"One might say the same of rulers like me—albeit not in public, of course."
"You mean," said Zopyros, "you may never find an infallible means of detecting conspiracies; but, if everybody in Syracuse believed you to have such a method—"
Dionysios snapped his fingers. "You've thrown three sixes!" He spoke to his bodyguards: "Lag behind us ten paces, boys. I would speak in confidence to this man." He turned back to Zopyros. "If my people thought I had such power, the guilty might cither give themselves away by their actions or, at least, refrain from further treasonable acts. Is that what you mean?"
"I don't doubt it, O President. The Phoenicians have a saying: 'The guilty flee where no man pursueth.' "
Dionysios chuckled. With a cynical smile on his handsome features, he said: "Zopyros, my boy, how would you like a pound of silver for doing absolutely nothing?"
"Wiry—ah—sir, money is always useful ..."
"Especially to a thrifty fellow like you. By doing nothing, I mean simply keeping your mouth shut. To most of our fellow Hellenes, that were a harder task than walking on red-hot sword blades; but you do not seem to be a typical Hellene. Can you do it?"
"Yes, sir."
"Good! Hold yourself in readiness at the next engineers' banquet, which is—let me think—six nights hence."
Zopyros and Archytas sat on the edge of the Spring of Arethousa. Archytas said: "I say, are you really going to join his army?"
"I think so. It's a chance to get a wider variety of engineering experience."
"Take care that, in grasping at the shadow, you lose not the substance."
"Don't you approve?"
"Approve? I think you're crazy!
Why risk your gore for a city other than your own, and moreover one ruled by a tyrannos instead of by its citizens?"
"It doesn't sound very risky, being on the boss's staff. The catapults should be out of bowshot."
"Yes, until Dionysios tells you: 'Captain So-and-so has just been killed; Captain Zopyros, take his place and lead his company up the scaling ladders!' And whoever told you Dionysios stays back out of the fighting? Mere in Syracuse he's cautious to timidity, wearing that iron vest, accompanied everywhere by guards, and having all visitors searched. But in the field, they say, he's quite the dashing hero."
"One's fate is in the hands of the gods."
"Moreover, the divine Pythagoras would never approve. What have you got against those poor devils in Motya?"
"Nothing, but I don't think my presence will add much to their danger. What else could I do, Archytas? The Dionysios is not a man to take no for an answer."
"You could gather up your family, slip quietly out of town, and go back home to T'aras. Kteson is in disgrace, so there shouldn't be any trouble from that source."
"That's craven advice! Is this what you plan to do?"
"I can't," said Archytas.
"Why not?"
"Because I haven't yet persuaded Klea's father to give her to me in marriage."
"Ah, love!"
"Look who's talking! But seriously, aren't you letting your head be turned by the pretty officer's uniform?"
"Oh, I admit I shall look rather well in a crested helm. But the real reason I'm joining is the chance to get ahead in my profession. Any city would hire a man who had been engineering officer on the staff of the great Dionysios in one of his campaigns."
"Well, it's your fate. I still think you'll be sorry. You haven't considered the most ominous possibility of all."
"That I shall be killed? One must take some chances—"
"No. I mean that, if you survive, you may become one of the big boss's cronies."
"What's so bad about that?"
Archytas smiled. "Then you will have to listen to Dionysios' endless recitals of his mediocre poetry, and you'll have to act enthusiastic about it!"
Korinna was much perturbed by the news of Zopyros' new post. She clung to him, crying that he would be killed. When Zopyros reassured her, she said:
"But Hieron and I shall be here all alone! You can't go off, leaving us in a strange city, with hardly any acquaintances, and no man to watch out for us in time of trouble!"
"I can move you to Ortygia. Some quarters in the fortress will be vacated when the officers set out on the expedition. I'm sure I can make arrangements with the President."
"You don't understand, Zopyros dear. Ortygia may be safe against outside attack, but it's full of those ruffianly foreign soldiers. Who's to protect me against them?"
"Most of the mercenaries will be away on the campaign, darling, and you can always call upon Archytas."