The Marathon Conspiracy (17 page)

That was why I knew something interesting had happened when I walked in to see Karinthos standing in our courtyard, during daylight, with an unhappy expression on his face and Socrates in tow.

Karinthos was shown into the andron, the room at the front of the house reserved for men. Sophroniscus was summoned from his sculpting workshop out the back.

It would, of course, have been rude to listen in, so in the moments it took Father to arrive, I ran up the steps two at a time to his private office, pushed through the door, threw myself flat on the floor, and put my ear to the floorboards. The andron was directly below me, and already I could hear every scrape, shuffle, and cough as Socrates and his teacher waited for the master of the house. Then I noticed there was a sizable crack between two of the boards; I put my eye to it. I had a perfect view from above.

I was just in time for Sophroniscus to walk in and greet Karinthos.

Karinthos got straight to the point. “I’m afraid, Sophroniscus, that Socrates can no longer attend my school.”

Sophroniscus rubbed his chin, looked concerned, and asked what Socrates had done. Had he burnt down the school?

“It’s worse than that. He asks me questions,” replied Karinthos.

“I thought students were supposed to ask questions,” Sophroniscus said, looking somewhat nonplussed.

“He asks
too many
questions,” said Karinthos grimly.

Socrates stood between the two men. His expression said, “Who? Me?”

The conversation continued for some time, but Karinthos was insistent. Socrates had to go.

I cringed. When the neighbors found out that Socrates had been expelled, it would shame our father.

I jumped up, ran down the stairs, flung open the door, and strode into the room. “There you are, Father! I wanted to ask you, can I borrow Socrates for … oh.” I stopped and stared at Karinthos. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you had company. Am I interrupting?”

“You’re interrupting,” Sophroniscus grumbled. “But say what you have to say.”

“I only wanted to ask, could I borrow Socrates for a few days?”

I waited for a reaction, but Sophroniscus and Karinthos merely stared at me. Then I told the greatest lie of my life. I said, “I need Socrates’s help with my investigation.”

Socrates beamed.

My stomach lurched. I’d be paying for this forever, but it had to be done, for my family’s honor.

“It might be as long as a month,” I warned them. “Then he’ll be free to go back to school.”

“That’s impossible, son,” Sophroniscus said. “We’re discussing Socrates’s schoolwork now, and I say he’s not to miss a day of school.” Father glared at Karinthos.

I said, “If that’s the only problem, Father, then set your mind at rest. As it happens, there’s a schoolteacher where we’re going. She comes with excellent credentials.”

“She?”
Karinthos almost exploded. “You propose to replace me with a
woman
?”

I said, “The priestess Doris is a famous teacher. But if you’re concerned, I suppose we could arrange a contest between you and the lady.” I smiled innocently. “To see which of you can recite the most Homer.”

“I won’t be party to such a travesty,” Karinthos said. “Everyone knows women can’t teach.”

“Does this concern you?” Sophroniscus asked Karinthos.

“Of course it does,” Karinthos said. “If people think you
withdrew your son from my lessons to send him to a woman, I’ll be a laughingstock. The other fathers would send their boys elsewhere.” No pupils at the school meant no fees for Karinthos. He blanched.

“But didn’t you just say Socrates couldn’t go to your school?” said Sophroniscus.

“I must insist the boy return.”

“I think we’re finished here,” said Sophroniscus. “Son, you have permission to take Socrates with you. Now I must return to my workshop. I have commissions to complete. For Olympia,” he added pointedly, for the benefit of Karinthos. To sculpt for the home of the Sacred Games is a high honor.

Karinthos said, “Very well, Sophroniscus, but when the boy is ready, I insist he return to school. I won’t have my hard work undone by some feebleminded woman.”

“If you insist, Karinthos,” Sophroniscus said. As he passed by me, he whispered, “Well done, son.”

T
HE EPISODE HAD
turned out well for everyone. Except me. Now I was stuck with Socrates for the rest of the investigation.

“Thanks, Nico!” Socrates said the moment Karinthos had stormed out. “Does this mean we’re partners?”

“It means you tag along and don’t say anything,” I said firmly. “Come with me.”

We were halfway down the street—Socrates had to trot to keep up—when two men stepped in front of us. Neither of them smiled, and both wore the leather wrist straps favored by the worst sort of street thug.

“Are you Nicolaos, son of Sophroniscus?” one demanded.

I’d been asked that question by men who didn’t smile enough times on past jobs that I knew what I had to do.

“No,” I lied. “Who, me? My name is … er … Markos. I’m a vegetable seller. Would you like to buy a box of quince?”

“But Nico,” Socrates spoke up at once, “quince isn’t a
vegetable. It’s a fruit. Quince hangs on its branch, so it must be a fruit, you see—”

“Shut up, Socrates!” I said in desperation.

“It’s him,” the second man said. “The kid called him Nico.”

I said, “Thanks a lot, Socrates.”

Quick as lightning the first man punched me in the diaphragm. I doubled over and gasped for air. The other hit me with a swinging uppercut to the jaw and I went over backward, straight into the open drain. Most of Athens’s byways consist of garbage, with an underlying layer of street. That’s because they build the houses to overhang to get more floor space, and people toss their rubbish straight out. The open drains run down the middle of every path.

I sprawled in a puddle that stank of urine and ancient wash water and rotting food. Something I didn’t want to look at floated beside my head.

I curled up in the filth, expecting them to start kicking me at any moment, hoping they’d leave Socrates alone, but instead they grabbed me by an arm each and hauled me up, faces screwed up in disgust. The vile liquid of the open drain had soaked into my exomis to stain it brown.

“Eww, you stink,” the first man said.

“Well, whose fault is that?” I complained.

“Just following orders,” he said in a friendly tone. “No hard feelings, right?” He punched me in the diaphragm again, just to make sure there were no hard feelings. I doubled but didn’t fall, and gasped for breath.

They relieved me of the knife I kept inside my exomis. Then they patted me down and found the other knife I kept secreted at my back, beneath my belt. Socrates watched from the side, openmouthed at the sudden violence.

“We’re all professionals here,” the first man said to me, and I wondered if he was about to invite me to a conference. “Don’t cause any trouble and we’ll all be fine, right?”

“Let Nico go!” Socrates demanded.

My stomach tightened into a knot. I was suddenly afraid they’d beat Socrates, too.

“Who’s the kid?” the first man asked. He appeared to be the leader.

“My brother. He’s not involved. Let him go, all right?”

“Can’t do that. He’d run for help. But this is very inconvenient.”

“Tell me about it.”

He turned to Socrates. “Listen here, kid. You see this knife?” He held up a vicious-looking blade, long and jagged.

Socrates stared at the knife with wide eyes. He nodded.

“You do anything to cause trouble, I’ll stick this blade in your brother’s heart. He’ll be dead before he hits the ground. Got it?”

Socrates nodded again and said nothing. I hoped he didn’t get it into his head to try to save me.

They led us through the streets of Athens, me in the middle, them standing close enough to return the knives they’d taken straight into my kidneys if I caused any trouble. Socrates trailed behind. We passed men going the other way. They looked at us strangely. The ones who could smell me kept their distance—but no one intervened. Someone would have come to my aid if I’d yelled, but I saw no point in getting some hapless random stranger killed.

They led me to a nondescript house on a nondescript street. From the look of it—the boarded-up windows, the unswept path, the door that creaked noisily when a man within opened it—I guessed they’d appropriated an abandoned building. The complete lack of furniture within confirmed it.

They led us through the barren courtyard to an old workroom at the back. It was dark within; these windows were boarded, too, and covered in black cloth. When someone behind us shut the door, it was black as night, but I heard the small sounds of men shuffling and breathing and I knew I must be surrounded. My eyes slowly adjusted until I perceived
before me a table, and behind it, standing straight as a pillar, was a man.

I couldn’t see his face, not because it was dark, but because he wore a helmet, a
hoplite
helmet that covered his entire face, the sort of helmet that went with a shield and spear and was worn by soldier-citizens of Athens. Yet the shadows in which he stood gave it another cast altogether. Two candles flickered upon the table between us. The yellow light shone upward into the expressionless metal face. I felt like I faced some remorseless automaton from legend. I’d thought Pericles had a talent for theatrics, but he had nothing on this man.

He said, “You are Nicolaos, son of Sophroniscus.”

“I am.”

His voice had the deep, muffled, resonant quality of a soldier at arms, a quality that came from speaking through the mouth slit of bronze armor. Somehow it always seemed to make a man sound more menacing.

He said, “I seek answers.”

“So do I.”

Socrates shuffled his feet beside us but said nothing. Even he was cowed.

I sensed rather than saw the two thugs who’d caught us at our backs, deep in shadow. If it weren’t for them, I might have grabbed Socrates and run.

“The answers I seek relate to the death of the hated tyrant,” our captor said.

“I’m with you so far.”

“And those who perpetuate his plot. I greatly fear that you’re one of them. I think, though, that you must be nothing but a hired hand; a bit player in this drama. Tell me the names of your employers, and I’ll let you live.”

I blinked. “The temple at Brauron.” This was public knowledge.

“Not them. Tell me the names of your
other
employers. I have
it on authority you’ve been bribed
not
to find the men who helped Hippias.”

“Would it help if I said I have no idea what you’re talking about?”

“I wouldn’t believe you. I’ve been warned what a dangerous man you are, Nicolaos, son of Sophroniscus. The word is you’ve carried out three missions for Pericles, all executed with utter ruthlessness; that you’re a master of deception; that your enemies were convinced you were a bumbling idiot, right up to the moment you destroyed them. Well, you might have fooled them, but you won’t fool me.”

“That’s not fair!” Socrates protested. “Nico really
is
a bumbling idi—er … that is—”

“Who is this child?” the helmeted man demanded.

“My little brother,” I said. “Try to ignore him; it’s what I do.”

As I spoke, I thought quickly. How could our captor know about my past missions? The first and third had been public knowledge, but the second was a secret. Whoever this man was, he had access to information that was supposed to be discreet. Information known only to Pericles and a select number of very senior Athenians.

“There’s nothing you can say or do that will convince me you don’t understand my meaning. Tell me who’s behind the plot.”

“What plot?” I said. “I genuinely have no idea what you’re talking about.”

There was something odd about the man’s voice. Without the visual clues of his face, it had taken me this long to spot it, but when I looked at his arms—the part of his body most exposed to view—they were thin, and the skin had the looseness of age. This was an old man, with an old man’s voice.

“Does this have something to do with Marathon?” I asked.

“Of course it does, you fool! Living among us still are the men who told Hippias they’d support him if he returned. The traitors who signaled to him after the battle.”

“What signal?” I asked, confused. Then I remembered Pericles had told me, days ago, of a signal that was flashed after the battle. I said, “Do you know who sent the message to the Persians at Marathon?”

“That’s what I’m asking you! They must be found. They must be destroyed.”

“Look, I don’t know who you are, but whatever this is about, it’s all ancient history. Nobody cares,” I said. “Trust me on this.”

“It’s not for me to trust you. It’s for you to obey me, like any good soldier in an army, like any good citizen of the state.” He paused. “You
have
served your time in the army, haven’t you?”

“I’ve completed my two years as an
ephebe
,” I told him, becoming a bit angry. To question whether a man had served his time as a recruit was to question whether he was fit to be a citizen of Athens.

“Then you know the importance of obeying a superior. Good. You should have no problem doing as I tell you, since I am clearly your superior.”

“I’m afraid I can’t,
sir
. I have no idea who you are. How do I know you’re superior to me? Also, my duty is to the Sanctuary of Brauron. Duty’s very important to me—”

“I fought at Marathon!” he shouted. “My brother died there! Don’t lecture me about duty. I’ll have you know I almost slew the tyrant!”

I blinked. “You did?”

“I did. He hid behind the enemy lines like a coward, but I pushed through and almost took him with a spear to his throat. I saw the blood gush, but somehow he lived. Does that change your attitude? Will you obey me?”

“I will not.”

He drew his sword from the scabbard that hung on the left side of his belt. “Do you know how many men I’ve killed with this sword?” he demanded.

“No.”

“Neither do I. I’ve lost count.”

Or more likely his memory was failing with old age. I wondered whether his story of having attacked Hippias was even true, or whether it was the fond imaginings of an old man. If he’d fought at Marathon, he must be at least fifty years old. He swept his sword round in a great, looping arc, a smooth, practiced movement that spoke of years of hard drilling. The sword slammed edge-first into the table before him. Splinters flew. I recoiled out of sheer reflex. When I opened my eyes, the table had split in two, the destroyed halves lying to either side of him.