We sat and munched nuts.
‘We must speak of payment,’ Gorgo said quickly, as if discussing a distasteful ailment with a physician. ‘I realise that a man does not run a ship the length of the Inner Sea for nothing.’
I had already discussed this in Athens with Cimon and Aristides — and Jocasta, who was more interested in the life of the Spartan queen than any story I’d ever told her. We’d agreed that I would charge the Spartans nothing.
This is politics. Generosity matters. In fact, I could ill afford to sail for several months without making a profit, but with some ‘help’ from rich Athenians, we — the Athenians, in this case — could appear generous and supportive.
‘I will carry a cargo each way,’ I said airily. I met her eye — so odd to look a woman in the eye every time you spoke. I think that’s why Gorgo reminded me so much of Briseis. ‘I do not intend to charge you anything for taking your heralds to Susa.’ I nodded. ‘Think of it as little Plataea’s contribution to the defence of Greece.’
This obviously pleased Gorgo a great deal, and she took my hand and pressed it.
Leonidas returned from exercise, wearing only a chlamys, like an Athenian ephebe. His body was as near perfect as a man’s can be — although his lower legs and shins were a mass of ugly bruises.
I took his hand. ‘Pankration?’ I asked.
The King of Sparta laughed. ‘How did you guess? And worse tomorrow.’ He raised his eyebrows briefly in an expression of self-knowledge. ‘It is harder at my age to pretend to be a hero of twenty-five.’ In fact, the Agiad King of Sparta was nearer sixty than fifty.
I nodded ruefully.
‘You should come!’ Leonidas said. ‘Many men here would seek to measure themselves against you.’
I laughed. ‘I’m sure they’d beat me black and blue,’ I answered.
‘Better you than me,’ said the king.
Leonidas was introduced to Alexandros and to Hector, who was open mouthed with wonder at being in the presence of the Great King of Sparta. I confess that I was more than a trifle awed myself.
He turned to me and sat on the bench where Gorgo had been sitting. ‘You know I sent a delegation to Delphi last year?’ he asked. ‘I wanted to hear from the oracle what was to come for us if we resisted. And do you know what she answered?’
‘No,’ I said.
‘Good, because if you did, I’d have quite a breach in my security arrangements.’ The king smiled ruefully. He was very easy to like — he had a kind of magnetic charm coupled with humour that was very appealing. He nodded and lowered his voice. ‘She said that if Greece was freed, she would owe her freedom to Green Plataea. And she said, “The strength of bulls or lions cannot stop the foe. No, he will not leave off, I say, until he tears the city or the king limb from limb.”’
I winced. ‘That’s. . not the prophecy I’d have wanted to hear,’ I agreed.
Leonidas shrugged. ‘The gods do as they will. But when I heard that you spoke Persian and had ships, I wondered if you were the tool by which Green Plataea would serve Greece.’
I suspect I grinned. ‘I’ll do my best, o King,’ I said, and bowed.
I had expected to pick up my two heralds and go, but in fact we dawdled a week in Sparta, and I’d have stayed longer. There is much to love there, as I, as a man who enjoyed watching women, must tell you that there are more beautiful women in Sparta than most places, and when you stare at them they stare back. One old hag of thirty, fresh from hard exercise and wearing nothing over her loveliness but a chiton of linen, caught my eye and shocked me by crossing the agora and asking me my name.
That wouldn’t happen in Athens.
‘Arimnestos of Plataea,’ I said.
‘I guess you like what you see,’ she said. She laughed. ‘At my age, it is always a pleasure to catch a worthy man’s eye.’
Indeed, my eye was caught. She turned away, but her eyes didn’t leave mine until her head was fully turned.
I almost followed her up the hill.
Men — Spartiates — mostly live in barracks like Cretan noblemen, and their wives keep house (with helot slaves) and mind the children (mostly done by slaves) and run the estates by which the men pay their mess bills. Odd as this arrangement might seem, it works as well as any other. To a Plataean, every Spartan woman seemed like the very epitome of athletic beauty, and Hector spoke for us all when he said (watching the old crone of thirty sway delightfully away from us), ‘If I were a Spartiate, I’d never spend a minute in those barracks.’
I suspect we all three of us sighed.
It was also impossible to guess whether any of these remarkable women were available. By the standards of Athens or Plataea, they were all so forward that they might have been porne. And I could remember Plataeans who had been to Sparta on pilgrimage making claims about their lusty infidelities — but none of the women I met seemed — somehow — the types. They were direct — it is true. And sensual and athletic. But not, more’s the pity, licentious.
Like upper-class Athenians, the men were more prone to run mad over a pretty boy than over their wives, but — just as in Athens — it was hard to tell how much of that was emulation and prowess, and how much was really. . love. Or whatever passed for love in the hothouse world of barracks and Agoge.
At any rate, on my second day in Sparta, the king took me to meet his mess and dine with them, which was accounted one of the highest honours in the Greek world. It’s good that it is such an honour, because the food was terrible. I think they make a special effort whenever a foreigner comes. The black broth tasted as if pig excrement had been involved in making it. I never had such foul bread in all the years of my slavery. The Phoenicians give better food to their oarsmen.
But I digress.
I was also invited to the exercise field, a little less civilised than one of the better Athenian gymnasiums, but you have to realise that the Athenian upper class often emulates the Spartan aristocracy. So the gymnasiums are not so different. The sun is hotter, and you cannot smell the sea air.
I boxed a little with the king. That was a great honour, too — despite his bruises, he didn’t spar with everyone. And by boxing with me, he made me anyone’s equal, and so men virtually queued up to fight me. An older man — one of the king’s guard — slipped past me with a beautiful feint and broke my nose — this in the first minute — and then was most solicitous in fixing it. He said something, reached out and pulled hard, and reset it.
And then he expected to go back to our contest.
Spartans.
I took a dip in their cold water to clear the pain — I don’t think I impressed my opponent at all — and to get the pain-fatigue out of my muscles, and then I went back, towelled dry by helots, and chose a younger man for a bout of pankration. I knew I had to — there’s no avoiding pankration in Sparta, and if I ever planned to walk among these men with my head high, I had to endure it.
Spartans, of course, bite and gouge and do other things in a pankration match that are forbidden elsewhere. My young opponent was quite heavily built and fresh from the Agoge, and I’m pretty sure, given my swollen nose and the ease with which my first opponent had downed me, that he saw me as easy prey. He was very polite.
I let him catch my arms, gave a twist I’d learned from Polymarchos, and threw him.
He bounced to his feet. I got a nice cheer — a buzz — from the other men watching.
I backed up a couple of steps, and my opponent came at me.
Now that I’d taught him not to grab at my hands, I raised them, and when he refused the bait, I threw a flurry of punches. I caught him twice and stunned him, which allowed me to catch his right arm in my left and then pass my left hand under his elbow.
And down he went. He tried to resist, and got some muscles pulled for his pains. I could have dislocated his shoulder or dropped him on his head, but I was a guest.