Sostratos considered that with his usual gravity. At last, he tossed his head. "All right? No. I won't be all right till Khios goes down under the horizon - and if it went down under the waves, I wouldn't shed a tear. But I'm . . . not mad any more, I don't think." He plucked at his beard, the picture of bemusement. "That was very strange. If he'd stayed here even another moment, I would have killed him."
"I noticed," Menedemos said dryly.
"I have to think about that," Sostratos said.
Diokles nudged Menedemos. Lost in thought, Sostratos didn't notice. The oarmaster said, "What we have to do is get out of here, skipper. I don't think anybody but us heard him, but I could be wrong."
"That's . . . probably not the worst idea I ever heard," Menedemos agreed. He raised his voice: "Bring in the lines. Bring in the gangplank. Man the oars. We've got what we came for, and we don't need to hang around any more."
None of the sailors argued with him. By the way they leaped to obey, they might have been thinking along with Diokles and wanted to get out of Khios while they still had the chance. The Aphrodite left the harbor in a hurry, almost as if several of Antigonos' war galleys were in hot pursuit. But the war galleys stayed snug and dry in their sheds, as they usually did when not on patrol.
Once out in the channel between Khios and the mainland, Menedemos swung the akatos south. "Lower the sail," he said. Again, the sailors hurried to follow his order. This time, escape wasn't on their minds. They'd rowed every digit of the way from Knidos up to Khios. Now the wind would do the work for them. The northerly breeze filled the sail. Running before it, the Aphrodite scudded over the waves. Her motion was different, smoother, now that she no longer fought them.
But that motion wasn't quite what it might have been. "Sostratos!" Menedemos called.
His cousin was making sure one of the peahens didn't do anything more than usually birdbrained. Not taking his eyes off the peafowl for a moment, he answered, "Yes? What is it?"
"Get the bird back in its cage," Menedemos said. "Then I'm going to ask you to shift those amphorai we got from Aristagoras farther toward the stern. I don't like her trim - she's down by the bow just a bit." He held his thumb and forefinger together to show he didn't mean much.
"Seems all right to me," Sostratos said, but then, before Menedemos could get angry, he went on, "You're the skipper, so it will be however it suits you." He chivvied the peahen forward and actually succeeded in chasing it into its cage without having to net it first.
That done, he told off several sailors to move the heavy jars of wine back toward the poop deck. He had plenty from whom to choose; with the sail sweeping the Aphrodite along, the oars went unmanned. Even so, the sailors grumbled. "Aristagoras had slaves lugging these miserable jars," one of them said, "and now we've got to do it."
"If you want to bring your slave along, Leontiskos, he can fetch and carry for you," Menedemos said sweetly.
"If I had one, I would bring him," Leontiskos said. But, seeing that his comrades were laughing at him, he settled down and helped do what needed doing.
"That's much better," Menedemos said when the work was finished. "My thanks to you all." It wasn't much better, but he could feel the difference; the Aphrodite responded to the sail and to the steering oars more readily than she had before.
Sostratos ascended to the poop deck and asked, "Now will you tell me what you plan to do?"
Menedemos considered. "I'll make you a bargain," he said at last. "I will tell you - if you answer a question of mine first."
"Go ahead," Sostratos said. Menedemos noticed that he hadn't promised to answer - he wanted to hear the question first.
Well, if he won't give, he won't get, Menedemos thought. Picking his words with care, he said, "Why did you let Aristagoras make you so angry?"
His cousin's face closed like a slamming door. "Why?" Sostratos echoed. "Isn't that obvious?" His voice showed nothing, either.
"If it were, I wouldn't ask," Menedemos told him.
"No?" Sostratos rolled his eyes, as if to call Menedemos an idiot without saying a word. Remembering how frayed his cousin's temper was, Menedemos fought to hold on to his own. When he didn't rise to the bait, Sostratos clicked his tongue between his teeth and said, "All right, I'll go through it like a mother teaching her little boy to count on his fingers."
There was another slap, another one Menedemos pretended not to notice. All he said was, "Thank you."
Sostratos stared out into the Aegean, as if that were easier than looking at Menedemos. In a voice Menedemos could barely hear, his cousin said, "That polluted whoremonger told me I'd never make a trader. He told me you were the only reason we made the bargain. He told me I told the truth too much, if you can believe the hubris in that."
"And he was trying to make you angry, and you let him," Menedemos said. "You still haven't told me why."
