The Mask of Apollo: A Novel

13

ON MY VOYAGE OUT, ARCHYTAS HAD PROMISED to reward me if I brought useful news from Syracuse. Among all my concerns this had slipped my mind; but he himself was not one to forget such things, and he made me a most handsome present, saying it was partly a good-tidings gift, no man having ever brought him better. What with this, and the profit from the tour, I might not be as rich as Philistos would have made me, but I would get along well enough.

Plato was in Syracuse all that winter.

Sometimes I surprised myself by the trouble I took to get news of him. Once it would just have been for Dion’s sake, or perhaps Axiothea’s. Even now, as was natural, I still resented him sometimes, but found I could not indulge it without feeling small. When I had seen him sitting with young Dionysios, seeing all through him, yet patient as a shepherd with a sickly lamb, and fearless of the wolves around, I had known the man was noble. The day stuck in my mind, when I had brought Dion’s letter urging him to go. Actors are vain; it’s true even of the best; but one does not feel one’s talent, even when most pleased with it, as a burden one must bear in trust for other men. It was not pride in him; he knew. I thought of it often.

Megakles, Dion’s brother, was living in Corinth, a city where Syracusans feel at home; but Dion himself had bought an estate near the Academy, beyond the olive groves. The house was just the proper size for someone of his rank in Athens; his Syracusan one would have looked hubristic. But with his beautiful things set up there, it seemed just the same. He asked me to supper once or twice when he was entertaining poets and their friends, though not, of course, on his philosophic evenings.

Speusippos having stayed with Plato, the Academy was being run by Xenokrates, so, knowing what he thought of actors, I did not intrude. When news of Plato came in, Axiothea would send me a message to meet her in the olive grove, or by some hero-tomb in the Sacred Way. If the news was short, and would have gone into her note, we did not notice it. We had become fond of one another; though she liked the calm spare life of the Academy, she liked, too, to hear of the world outside, from someone who did not disapprove. She was setting into a strange archaic beauty. I have seen such faces in old shrines; there is an Artemis at Aigina very like her.

The Messene strait being so narrow, ships cross all winter in any but the worst of weather, so the Syracusan Pythagoreans could keep their brethren posted. They were in touch with Speusippos, who came and went somehow from Ortygia; no doubt Dionysios, who had always been jealous of him, would have been well pleased if he had slipped off. But he put up with the snubs and slights, which I could well imagine, to be with Plato and to link him with his friends.

At first the news was good; Dionysios was heaping him with honor, entertaining him, deferring to his advice. He had been able to realize Archytas’ dearest wish by recommending a peace treaty with the Tarentines, which was already signed.

Archytas’ letters were full of this; Speusippos’ own were a good deal franker. He made them cryptic with false names, and, for greater safety, addressed them to people outside the Academy, sometimes to me. When he got home, he was at pains to get them back and burn them, in case Plato ever saw them; but I kept this one. The device was his usual one, of someone gossiping about a fashionable hetaira.

Everyone is amazed at the conduct of young Damiskos. When first he courted Heliodora, he vowed no price would be too high. [The price meant accepting Plato’s precepts.] Having now drawn back, one would think he might have more pride than to hang about her door and keep sending flowers. Lately she asked him why, if he still desired her friendship, he did not pay up like a man, since he could afford it. And his answer? That his friends had advised him her price would encumber his estate; he wanted to beat her down. How absurd, to someone of her fame and reputation! She is generous in conversing with the youth, whose manners can do with polishing; but that he should presume to be jealous is as vexatious as it is laughable.

The other day there was an absurd but painful scene. She was spending a quiet hour at her music when he rushed in and offered her the direction of his whole inheritance—a gift more to himself than her, for she would do it to his advantage. By now she knows him better than to be transported; she waited to hear more. Can you guess the rest? His condition was that she should shut her door to Dikaios, her friend of twenty years, and proclaim this coxcomb as her favorite. She behaved, as I need not tell you who know her, with the greatest dignity. He left, I think, ashamed. But the folly and the turmoil made her feel ill, and she made no more music that day. I am sorry to say that she is not well, and this did nothing to improve things.

A few days later, the fears this letter had raised were realized. Archytas wrote that Plato was very sick, perhaps to death; for so concerned was Dionysios, he had sent his own wife to nurse him.

Speusippos’ code-letters ceased; nothing mattered but Plato’s life, and he wrote openly to Xenokrates. Just when things looked worst, news stopped for nearly half a month, because the winter storms had cut off Tarentum from Korkyra.

Dion had made many friends in Athens. They called to express sympathy and ask for news; when he had company I did not like to trouble him. At first he seemed glad to see me; I was the only one who had been there, and could picture, nearly as well as he could, what was going on. He was too proud to show his feelings among his new acquaintances as he had to me at Tarentum. After a while he grew withdrawn even with me, and I left him in peace, asking news from Axiothea.

At last, a ship got through. Archytas wrote, enclosing back letters from Speusippos. Plato was on the mend. The Archon’s wife had tended him like a daughter. Perhaps she had been sent to watch that no one poisoned him, or laid the pillow on his face. At all events, it did not seem Dionysios himself could have been better cared for.

It was with an easier mind, therefore, that I went into rehearsal for the Lenaia. I had been chosen early in the draw and offered the lead in a new play by Aphareus, Atalanta in Kalydon.

I liked the play. It had fine acting roles, both for Atalanta and Meleager. His part was most tempting, with a lovely scene where he lies dying, while his stern mother Althaia burns the magic faggot that holds his life. I could have used in it all those effects which had made such a hit in Orpheus. The fact was that I could see more in the Atalanta, which had much subtlety and truth, but did not want to own it. In a female lead, I would be measured against Theodoros.

He had been chosen at once by the sponsor who drew first pick, with such alacrity that there must be some perfect role for him; no knowing what, for new plays are well-kept secrets. Though still fairly young, he was at the height of his powers; if women, which the gods forbid, were allowed to play in tragedy, I am sure the best of them could not have spoken for her sex more movingly, or with more fire, than he. It would be wise to take Meleager, and make the best of it.

I was sitting at home with the play in my hands, wondering how to get the most from the death scene, when I felt a pair of eyes staring at my back. Unwillingly I turned, knowing too well what I would see. The sun was westering. The mask stared out into full light, stern, radiant, without pity.

I went over, and looked reproachful. But he only laughed at me, in the dark behind his eyes. So I chose Atalanta, doubling it with Queen Althaia, and asked for Anaxis as Meleager. I was glad to offer him something, for he was then very dejected; he had lately risked half his savings in a trading ship to the Euxine which had gone down. Land prices kept rising, the more he saved; this had been his last chance of buying back his father’s land. Now he was almost back where he started. (Things have changed since then. He owns the family estate, and has bought the next-door farm, since he took up politics.)

I enjoyed rehearsals. Once I was played in, I stopped wondering what Theodoros might be doing, and thought only of what I would do. It was a part with plenty of light and shade—complex, spirited, harshly tragic, with a noble close.

At the presentation, Theodoros and his company appeared with golden wreaths, showing they had a rich choregos, and the title of their play was given out: Ariadne Forsaken.

Well, I thought, there’s the thing settled. He can’t miss with that if he tries. The crown will have to have the judges’ tears dried off it before he puts it on.

I felt dashed for an hour or two, but it was only what I had expected, and losing to Theodoros, at least one lost to someone good. It was not like being beaten by modish tricks.

It was so-so weather on the day of the performance. We drew second turn to play, and Theodoros was on last. It was blowing, threatening rain, and clearing up by turns all day; I don’t think it favored any one play above the others.

Since I knew where the crown was going, I put it out of my mind, and just played for my own enjoyment, and for that of people, like Axiothea, whose judgment I respected. At the end, we were quite pleased with our reception. That’s done, I thought, as I stripped and got dressed; now I’ll watch Theodoros, and not give way to jealousy. It keeps one from learning, and one can’t see such an artist every day.

As always, he was a pleasure when he only walked across the stage. Moreover, the play had clearly been written for him. If another sponsor had drawn him first, whoever did the part would have had to play Theodoros. But the poet had the real one, and had given him nothing to do but play himself. Every effect he had ever melted the theater with was written in for poor Ariadne. You would have thought he was a juggler in need of five balls and a stool to do his act, not an artist who wanted stimulus. He did his best to give it freshness, but it was like seasoning stale fish. All the same, he was such a delight to hear that I felt sure he must have won, until the herald gave out that I had.

So I had to get my costume on again, and be crowned, and make my bow; then back to the dressing room, with the crowd about me. I was just combing my hair, when a voice behind cried, “My dear! Superb! It killed me to miss the end, I was almost too late to dress.”

It was Theodoros. We had met once or twice at parties, but he was always surrounded, and I hardly knew him. He took me by the shoulders and kissed me on both cheeks. No one in the business had a bad word for Theodoros, and now I could see why.

“I sat there, my dear,” he said, “quite hating you for having that lovely role and knowing what to do with it. But I had to give in like all the rest.”

I knew enough to be honored by this foolery. His dignity could be freezing; he stood no nonsense from the richest of sponsors, nor, I believe, from kings. He kept this kind of thing for equals.

“May I come to your party? A married woman, dear, even though forsaken. A girl from the country needs a chaperone, among all these horrid men.”

So began our friendship, which lasted till his death. There was only one shadow on the day, one of those unlucky chances. Dion, while in Athens, attended all the sacred festivals, including those of Dionysos; he would have thought it uncouth to slight the customs of his hosts. But I had never thought for a moment he might come backstage. This, however, he did. The play had not offended his morals or his piety, and he had been struck, it seems, by my performance as old Althaia, when she repents her vengeance after having destroyed her son. What with this and that, he decided to greet me; but by the time he made up his mind to it, the other gentlemen had gone; it was mostly actors and hetairas and old friends; and Theodoros, who had hated his own role, was burlesquing it, kneeling on a table for the Naxian shore, with words of his own invention. When Dion was seen in the doorway, the skeneroom hushed like a class when the headmaster enters. Theodoros changed in a flash from a screaming whore to an ambassador, but still too late. Shocked as he must have been, Dion’s courtesy never faltered, and he said his piece. For an instant our eyes met, his saying, “How can you endure this life?” and mine, “You might try to understand.” But I don’t expect it was worse than his supposings, which had not prevented his former kindness. He soon forgave me, and greeted me as before.

From the Lenaia to the Dionysia never seems very long. I had a good role, but this time so did Theodoros; he won, and well deserved to win; and without him I might still have lost to Philemon. But I had been well received; I was now a leading man sponsors wanted, and felt well enough content. Soon after, a letter came to my house from Dion, speaking gracefully of my performance, then saying, “You will share, I know, our rejoicing at the news of Plato’s return. He is already in Tarentum, and will sail for Athens with the first fair wind.”