The Isle of Stone

6.

In the months since he left on campaign he hadn’t thought much about home. He might have said it was because he was engrossed in fighting the war, but that would have been fooling himself. Demosthenes preferred not to think about Athens. He was visibly pained when her memory crossed his mind. To dwell on the place was to be reminded of what she had become over the course of seven disastrous years.

He had once owned a town house pleasantly situated on the Hill of the Nymphs. A lifetime before, when the wind was right, he could sit in his parlor, sip good wine from a silver cup, and listen to the tinkling of the cymbals at the still-uncompleted Sanctuary of Hephaestus. When he couldn’t sleep, he need only look out his window and be lulled by the dimming of the cressets on the renovated Acropolis. On festival days, after a morning at the theater watching some offering from Sophocles or Aristarchus or Ion, he would round the sacred mount and stop in the marketplace to check the catch of the day. Sometimes he would pause, the fish under his arm, to laugh at a comic interview between Socrates and some self-important big dome. He was a nodding acquaintance of Pericles on his rounds of the city, though it was always sad to see the great man hounded by a train of unwashed, unemployed Furies, remonstrating with him as they hinted that a three-obol loan would fill their bellies nicely.

He would sometimes linger too long at these errands, arriving home with the fish going stiff in its sack. Ianthe would give it to him then, a bolt of black hair loosed over her eye, wagging her head as she did at his irresponsibility, to be wasting his time listening to those fools downtown. Demosthenes smiled as he did when she railed, taking her soft face in his hands to cover it with kisses, and more kisses after that, until she would look at him and ask if he’d been drinking. He would exclaim, “Only the nectar of your gaze!” The fish landed on the table, the lovers in their room. Demosthenes’ smile soured on his lips as he remembered that table where, come the plague, he was destined to sit by his dear, dead Ianthe, moving neither to eat nor wash, for all the days it took to wring out the last of his tears.

It was not the same city anymore. Thousands of the displaced had set up shanties in the narrow area between the north and south long walls to Piraeus. Their cooking fires sent up a haze of smoke that put the city under a pall thicker than usual; the enormous pits dug for their sewage overflowed with the winter rains, spreading their filth and foul odor over the roads. Other refugees found shelter where they could, in doorways and porticoes, laid up with reeking blankets in the stoas. Panhandlers waited around every corner, hands out, never sparing a harsh word for fellow citizens who hurried past, their heads buried in their cloaks. Demosthenes had once ascended the Acropolis to deposit a contract; on his way out, he saw a man show his regard for Pericles by squatting by his Maiden Temple, staining the freshly hewn marble with his shit.

Worse than this physical degradation was the steady sapping of the people’s spirit. By unspoken mutual consent, the wars of the past had always been quick affairs; even the Great Wars against the Persians had been forced to a conclusion in only a few years. Now, in the face of this endless conflict, faces everywhere were stricken, unable to believe what their eyes told them. Lively public debate had been replaced with the useless clash of irreconcilable dogmas. Make peace! Stay the course! How dull it all was! The summer invasions had slipped Athens from her moorings, cutting her off from the country around her, making the city seem no more than a vessel adrift, shorn of its oarbanks. To think that the rich used to scorn the simple Attic wines, the plain homegrown olives or figs that were now such sentimental luxuries! Under the circumstances, even the gods suffered: the loss of pilgrims from half of Greece made for empty seats in the theater during the Festival of Dionysus. Like many others, he could hardly remember how the Eleusinian Mysteries were conducted in peacetime, before the Lacedaemonians cut the way to the sanctuary. Instead, celebrants had to content themselves with an austere procession by sea, without the joy of the traditional roadside offerings and choruses. The unceasing obsession with security obliged the bodies of loved ones who died in summer-like his beloved Ianthe-to wander like shades in Hades. Instead of going to their rest, they were temporarily buried inside the walls, then exhumed and moved, half-corrupted, to the outside graveyards after the invaders were gone.

Despite himself, Demosthenes sat in his little command tent on the beach at Pylos and brooded over these things. He was encouraged now only by the possibility that the Lacedaemonians would understand that they must make terms to save their men on Sphacteria. He had seen some reason lately to believe they would send emissaries. First, although it was an exhausting task, the blockade was working-little more than the occasional swimmer was reaching the island. Quite a few of those had been picked up, lugging behind them such meager supplies as poppy seeds fixed in blocks of solid honey, or sacks of un-shelled nuts. Others were found facedown in the bay, drowned. His spies in Messenia told him that the Peloponnesians on the mainland would not even launch their ships. This had forced the Spartans to offer freedom to any helot who reached the island with a boat; some of these might even have slipped through the screen at night or in foul weather. A few fishing boats were seen wrecked on the shore after thunderstorms. But these never seemed numerous enough to amount to a serious problem.

Second, word had arrived from home that the army of King Agis was rushing to Pylos. News that the annual invasion of Attica was abandoned after only two weeks must have been received with jubilation in the city. What other evidence was necessary to prove that the Spartans were worried? The troops on the island, after all, represented one tenth of their entire citizen army. While fools who knew nothing of war took the Lacedaemonians to be indomitable, Demosthenes knew firsthand how reluctant they were to sacrifice their precious Spartiates. The possibility that the Athenians’ little stockade would become the nucleus of a new Messenian revolt must also have weighed on their enemies’ minds. He could only hope that these developments would strengthen the hand of the peace faction over the warmongers in the Assembly. By seizing this insignificant piece of Messenia, the Athenians stood to force concessions from the enemy that a dozen naval victories couldn’t achieve-if only they agreed to negotiate in good faith.

All uncertainty on this score was dispelled when Leochares brought him a letter from home. It was brought in by supply ship in the form of a short scroll. Demosthenes was about to break the seal when he looked up and saw Leochares was still standing there, his curiosity having overwhelmed his tact.

“I’ll tell you what it says, my friend,” the general said, “but for now let’s observe the formalities.”

Leochares blushed to his ears. “Yes, of course,” he said, backing out. Demosthenes watched him go. This man, one of the best officers he had ever served with, had learned that both his elder brothers had been killed in the fighting, one off Sicily, the other in the Chalcidike. Since then his face had taken on that ashen cast often seen among the Athenians in those days. He performed his duties well, of course-but it was competence rooted in obligation, in the fact that there was little else he could do.

Demosthenes broke the seal and scanned the first lines of the letter: To Demosthenes, son of Alcisthenes, citizen of the deme of Colonus Agoraeus, General-select of the?geides tribe, from his friend and colleague in the People’s service, Cleon, son of Cleaenetus, felicities and greetings. The People rejoice at the news of your recent victory over the Spartans in Messenia. Please understand that this comes as no surprise to your friends here in the Assembly, who have had nothing but the highest regard for your talents…

Even without the salutation Demosthenes would have known the author was Cleon. Only the demagogue would arrogate upon himself the right to speak for “the People.” The sole question in his mind was whether Cleon had the sophistication to draft his own letters: it was well known that he was the scion of a low-born family in the skinning trade. The fact that old Cleaenetus had made a lot of money as a tanner, and then discarded his former friends to consort exclusively with the nobles, only seemed to amplify his absurdity, like a manure carter who collected droppings from only the best homes. The son had at least charted his own course-Cleon was now a shit peddler of a different stripe, devoting his energy to flattering the scum and layabouts who dominated the Assembly. We have learned further that your forces have trapped a large number of Spartiates on a mountain [sic]. This achievement greatly pleases the People, for it affords the opportunity now to exact terms from the enemy that are right and proportionate to their injury. And while we have every confidence that it is not necessary to say so, we expect that you will not fall prey to misplaced compassion, but allow the assault to proceed apace, so that the Lacedaemonians will understand that time is not on their side. We therefore write to you now with the understanding that no unauthorized accommodations will be made before the People have had their chance to dictate terms. The Assembly expects that peace emissaries with plenary powers will arrive in Athens as this letter reaches you. And so your friends bid you continued good fortune in your campaigns, and that you will continue to prove ever a faithful servant of the public good, as those who await your return endeavor themselves, until victory crowns the efforts of all of us who keep the People’s trust…

Demosthenes threw the scroll across the tent. The People’s trustkeeper, it seemed, had decided to “dictate” terms that were “right and proportionate to their injury.” Would that “the People” have understood the true precariousness of their position! The wind-lashed ramparts of the island prevented a landing in force in all but a few easily guarded places. To attack with infantry, on ground covered with thickets, against an enemy who undoubtedly knew the field better than anyone, would risk having his troops scattered and annihilated. And while he could maintain the blockade for the present, his long supply line back to Piraeus would be cut with the arrival of the fall storms. By then the fleet would have to leave, whether the Sphacteria garrison had surrendered or not. These were facts even a tanner’s son should have been able to grasp.

The letter had unrolled flat in its flight across the tent. Retrieving it, Demosthenes saw it had a postscript: P.S. As we are most interested in assuring solidarity with our friend Demosthenes, we have instructed the courier to delay his return to await his answer to our message.

So much for the People’s confidence in him! Rolling up the scroll, he called for Leochares. The latter stuck in his head with scarcely a moment’s delay.

“Yes?”

“Tell the guards I’ll see the Spartan emissaries now. And tell the steward to bring a wine jug-the good Chian white, perhaps-and three cups.”

“Yes, sir!”

Back at his desk, Demosthenes searched for his stylus under the mountain of tablets and dispatches. As a third of his mind cursed his disorder, and a second third Cleon’s presumption, the remainder was busy composing his response: Greetings to Cleon, son of Cleaenetus, from Demosthenes of Colonus. Only now being in receipt of your most recent letter, I must first express my thanks for your confidence in my modest efforts in Messenia. As you must know, there is none among us who would rather see the Lacedaemonians defeated unconditionally. I must report, however, that the military situation here has already obligated me to conclude a truce with the enemy that is, of course, on the most favorable terms to Athens. If you will indulge me, I will explain the tactical problems that led me to believe that a cease-fire will be in our long-term interests…