My father said, “Well, I agree, they are often like children. But children can be taught. Perikles did it. Who does it now? Now their folly is tended and fanned for gain.”—“Whoever complains of them,” said someone, “it shouldn’t be Alkibiades. He invented demagogy. Just because he practises it with a certain grace, don’t let us close our eyes to that.”—“Let us credit him with the invention, if you wish,” said Kritias, “but not with perfecting the art. He should have known better than to insult his strongest ally. He will pay for it.”
“I must be slow tonight,” Tellis said. “What ally do you mean?” Kritias smiled at him, not without contempt. “Long ago,” he said, “there lived a wise old tyrant. We do not know his name or city, but we can infer him. His guards were sufficient, perhaps, to protect his person, but not to rule with. So out of the stuff of mind he created twelve great guardians and servants of his wilclass="underline" all-knowing, far-shooting, earth-shaking, givers of corn and wine and love. He did not make them all terrible, because he was a poet, and because he was wise; but even to the beautiful ones he gave terrible angers. ‘You may think yourselves alone,’ he said to the people, ‘when I am closed in my castle. But they see you and are not deceived.’ So he sent out the Twelve, with a thunderbolt in one hand and a cup of poppy-juice in the other; and they have been excellent servants ever since, to whoever knew how to employ them. Perikles, for instance, had them all running his errands. You would have thought it might have taught Alkibiades something.”
It was the first time in my life that I had heard talk of this kind. My mind went back to the dawn of this same day, when I had stood in the High City; it seemed a small thing to have kept my body to myself, when this had no defence from his filthy hands.
My father, who clearly thought that my presence might have been better remembered, sent me round with the wine as a reminder. Then he said, “For that matter, nothing is proven yet. Reason asks a motive, no less than the law. Nothing could profit him so much as to conquer Sicily; the difficulty, I imagine, would be to stop the people crowning him king. If any Athenian broke the Herms, look for one who has his own eyes on a tyranny, and fears a rival.”
Kritias said, “I doubt whether anyone will look so far, when the story of the Eleusis party gets about.”
At this, there was a sound all round the room, of men filling their lungs to speak, and emptying them in silence. My father said, “The boy is an initiate.” But they had thought again, and no one spoke.
It was my father in the end who broke the pause. “Surely,” he said, “even our heavy-handed friends of the Agora will hardly be solemn over that, after so long. Any good speech-writer … One knows what young men are who begin to reason, and think themselves emancipated. A procession with torches round the garden; new words to a hymn-tune; a surprise in the dark and some laughter; and the end nothing worse than a little love-making, perhaps. It was the year we … He had scarcely grown his beard.”
Kritias raised his brows. “Why no. I don’t imagine that would raise much dust today. Did he get the notion so long ago? I was speaking of this winter’s party. He will hardly pass that off as a boyish romp, I am afraid. They raided the store, you know, for the ritual objects. It will take a very good speech-writer to explain that away. They did everything. The prayer, the washings, the Words; everything. Did you not know, Myron?” My father put his wine-cup from him and said, “No.”
“Well, those who were there will have taken care to forget it by this time, no doubt. Unluckily, as it was late and some confusion prevailed, the slaves were overlooked and remained till the end. Some were uninitiate.”
At this I heard, all round the couches, an indrawn breath. Kritias said, “They did the Showing, too. They brought in a woman.” He added something, which it is unlawful to write.
There was a long silence. Then a man in the far corner said, “That is not only blasphemy. It is hubris.”
“It is more dangerous than that,” Kritias said. “It is frivolity.” He picked up his cup and set it down again, to remind me it was empty. “He will destroy himself because he cannot keep his mind on serious things. His capacity is excellent; he begins a business of some gravity, knowing himself capable of success, and discounting the results of failure. Then something crosses his path: a quarrel, a love-affair, a practical joke that he can’t resist. He enjoys dangerous improvisations. He has the soul of an acrobat. Recall his public debut, to contribute to the war fund. No one knows better the value of an entrance. But he won’t leave his fighting quail at home; and this when the ban is on. It gets out of his mantle; in the event, people are tickled, and tumble about the Theatre trying to catch it for him. Ignoring all who might be useful later, he receives it from a nobody, the pilot’s mate of a warship; they go home together, and the man is about him to this day. Another time, entering on affairs, he will take a course in debate. He goes to Sokrates; not a discreet choice, but far from a foolish one, for the man, though mad, is a most accomplished logician; I have profited from him myself and don’t care who knows it. His processes, of course, all lead towards a rationalism which he himself refuses to accept; one knows these eccentrics. But Alkibiades, who by this time has tasted everything beautiful in the City, of all three sexes, is taken by the man’s extraordinary ugliness, and suffers him to extend the lesson in all directions. Before very long, he has caught his lover’s vagary for reforming the gods, and, by a simple syllogism, infers that unreformed gods are fair game. Hence the dangerous little mummery you spoke of, Myron. Nowadays he has given up improving the Olympians, though in matters of love he could probably instruct them. And danger, like wine, has to be strong now to quicken his blood.”
I stood beside the wine-mixer, the jug in my hand, looking at Kritias. I was wishing him dead. I remember thinking that if I could make him meet my eye, my curse would be more effectual; but he did not look.
Then Tellis, who had not spoken for some time, said in his quiet voice, “Well, we began by discussing the Herm-breaking. If we can be sure of anything, I should say, we can rule improvisation out. A couple of hundred men could scarcely have done it, all round the City in a night. Were they knocked up here and there by drunks, and no one remembers? None of these chance people refused, and denounced them? No, Myron is right; it was planned to a hair, and not by Alkibiades.”
Kritias said smoothly, “No one, I am sure, will think worse of Tellis for supporting his host.”
The men had been drinking, and were full of their affairs. But I, who was watching, saw Tellis’ face stiffen, as at the first bite of a sword-thrust. When you have thought yourself among good friends, who have given the best proof of their liking for your company, it strikes hard to be called a sycophant for the first time. I knew he would never sup with the club again. I went over to him and filled his cup, knowing no other way to show what I felt; and he smiled at me, trying to greet me as he always did. Our eyes met above the wine-cup, like men’s who have picked up the sound of a lost battle before the trumpet blows the retreat.