He had two days to wait for a ship, in which time I showed him Samos. As we strolled the waterfront, he asked me what song I meant to sing at the contest.
“A hymn to Apollo. But I’ll have to work on it, to sing it solo. It was meant for a choral ode.”
“Why a solo, then? It’s the choral odes people come to hear.”
“Dear man, because I have no chorus.”
“But you could have one on Keos. How long do you take to teach a song?”
“Seven days; at a pinch I’ve done it in less. When I had a chorus.”
“Then whatever’s troubling you? We’re citizens, aren’t we? Just tell me how many, and if you want men or girls or boys, and I’ll have them for you.”
“But, Theas, how can you? You don’t know anything about music, except what you like to hear.”
“Oh, I know that,” he answered cheerfully. “But I know where to go, to get it done.”
Yes. He was the heir of Leoprepes of Iulis. If he said he could do it, he could. So I agreed; thinking in myself that if once more I was going to take and take and show him no return, I would as soon be dead. Even love cannot cast out pride.
He sailed some days ahead of me, to make smooth my path. Theodoros came with me to see him off, complaining that he had not stayed to see the statue polished and set up. Kleobis had a cold, and stayed indoors.
He was lending me the kithara. It is a costly instrument, which only a master of the craft can make; the money I’d saved for one had gone since Ephesos fell, part of it on a gay Samian robe to do the tavern credit. I could not take that to Keos; even my old one from Ephesos had to have half the border stitched back out of sight.
At the very last, on my sailing day, Kleobis begged off. He said his cold still hung about; would be nothing if he looked after it, but on a ship would most likely fly to his chest. He would stay in Samos, and make an offering for me on the day.
I was sad, but not much astonished. He had lost heart, he felt unlucky; he feared, perhaps, that on Keos he would find himself forgotten. I did not forget how the best doctor in Iulis had tended his sick apprentice; he could hardly fare worse in Samos, which had physicians of some renown. So I embraced him, told him to take good care of himself, and said that if I had any success, all Keos should hear my teacher’s name.
In some ways it was a relief to me. My father was too well-bred to insult a guest; but Kleobis was, after all, the father I had chosen in his stead, and I could not think the visit would have gone off easily.
I packed up the kithara, as I’d done over the years till I could almost do it sleeping, in its leather case, the embroidered sling folded around the soundbox, the spare strings in their pocket outside. “No one but I shall carry it a step,” I said, “till I bring it back.”
“Did you pack the wax and the resin? Don’t forget to warm the wax, don’t use too much, polish alone unless the wood feels dry.” I promised; I had known it all since I was sixteen. “Have you a spare plectrum?” I showed him two, one silver and one bone. “Good, good … I was as near to Sappho once as I am to you. A little dark thing; not much better-favored than you; which in a woman means worse … If now she flies you, soon will she follow; Taking no gifts now, soon be the giver; Wanting no love now, soon be the lover, For all her striving … I tell you, Apollo is a gardener who knows how to prune a vinestock. Go gather your grapes, my son.”
“If Apollo pruned me, I know who has fed and tended me. The grapes are yours.” I felt like weeping, and turned away. “Don’t come to the harbor. It’s a cold sharp wind, for all it’s sunny. Keep warm indoors.”
He laid aside his cloak, allowing that I was right. As I left, he said again that he would make an offering for me.
Among the people come to see me off I found, with astonished joy, Anakreon.
“We shall meet again, dear boy,” he said, putting both hands on my shoulders with his head aslant, and narrowing his green eyes. “But I think not in a tavern, except to drink. Come, you know as well as I do, yes? Keos has a surprise in store. I wish I could be there, but my host requires me. Ibykos hasn’t come. Now I wonder why, when I reminded him …? We shan’t quarrel, my dear. The hatter and the shoemaker don’t spoil each other’s trade. Now remember, let us see you here again, if only for a celebration.”
I was seen off, too, by a young hetaira I had visited once or twice. She had put on her best robe and all her paint; it was plain she really wished to claim my acquaintance in public. I was so touched that I embraced her on the gangplank. Oh yes, I was humble when I was young.
I expected to be met in Koressia by Theas, with a spare mule for me. As we turned the point, I described his bright head; then, as the sail was lowered and we rowed in, I saw the cluster of men about him. It was like an embassy. And one of them was my father.
Left to himself, I doubt if he would have known me. Till Theas hailed me, he was still looking about. I don’t know what he had expected, surely not a shepherd boy in a sheepskin; but whatever it was, he was not seeing it. As for me, it seemed he should have been much taller, and without a bald patch on his crown; he should have made me ill at ease, not causing him to be so. My sins against him would be different now.
He embraced me, which he’d not done when I left home, but which was proper with people watching; and that was just how it felt. I asked after his health and he after my journey. Then he presented me to his friends who had come to meet me. I understood now. Just as Theas had been told to stay at the best inn in Samos, all this had been planned to cloak me in respectability. I found myself thinking, O Zeus, how soon can I escape from all these people and get to work?
I conveyed my master’s regrets. Only my father remembered who he was, and that was not for his singing. Theas was at ease with everyone, a man among the men, and treated so by our father. He did not break the harmony; he was a son of the house, part of its riches, like a fine piece of vineyard. I, such as I was, was my own creation, and that of a foreign bard. What I brought to the house would come only from me. He was not used to it. Never mind, I thought; we are wanderers all, from Homer onward. One sings, and one moves on.
Our ride to the farm was quite a cavalcade; the friends had been invited to celebrate my return. I thought, like a passing traveler, how good the land looked and how small the house. My mother at the door had aged more than my father. She kissed me, and said I should have sent word that I was safe, which I knew was true. As her eyes dwelt on me, I remembered our father saying once that I got my looks from her side of the family. Whoever it was he had reproached her with, dead, I suppose, before my birth, I must have grown more like him.
While she bustled about with the food and wine, I slipped inside to find Philomache. She was waiting, dressed in her best, to appear for the short time proper to a modest maiden. In these years she had bloomed, with the thin delicate skin of red-haired beauty; her only defect was that she was small, like me. She stared amazed at this man who had come pushing through the curtain; then rushed to me crying, “Sim! I never knew you! How much better-looking you are!” She stood back from me, and added, “I mean, you look like someone important, now.”