ARISTON LAYS A PLOT
Ariston, uncle of Clearchus and formerly guardian of his fortune, sat
at his work-table before a mass of papyri closely written with
memoranda and accounts. His house stood by itself in a quarter of the
city that had once been fashionable but now was occupied chiefly by the
poorer class of citizens. Its front was without windows and its stone
walls were yellowed and stained with age. Its seclusion seemed to be
emphasized by the bustle of life that surrounded it and in which it had
no part.
The room in which Ariston sat was evidently used as an office, for rows
of metal-bound boxes of various shapes and sizes were piled along its
walls. A statuette of Hermes stood in one corner upon its pedestal,
and its sightless eyes seemed bent upon the thin, gray face of the old
man as he leaned with his elbows upon the top of the table, polished by
long use. Lines of care and anxiety showed themselves at the corners
of his mouth and about his restless eyes. The light of the swinging
lamp that illuminated the small room, even in the daytime, made shadowy
hollows at his temples and beneath his cheek-bones.
Little was known of the personal concerns of the old man in Athens.
Although he mingled with the other citizens without apparent reserve,
he never discussed his own affairs. The general impression was that he
was a good Athenian who had been faithful to the trust reposed in him,
and who had won a modest competence of his own for the support of his
age. This idea was encouraged by the parsimonious habits of his life
and by the trifling but cautious ventures that he sometimes made in the
commercial activity of the city. His most conspicuous characteristic,
in the minds of his acquaintances, was his mania for gathering
information concerning not only Athens and Greece, but distant lands
and strange peoples as well. This was looked upon as a harmless and
even useful occupation, and it accounted for his evident fondness at
times for the company of strangers, who, no doubt, contributed to the
satisfaction of his curiosity.
Great would have been the astonishment if some orator had announced to
the Athenian Assembly that the humble old man was really one of the
richest citizens of Athens, as well as the best informed concerning the
plans and hopes of the rulers of the world and of the probable current
of coming events. Laughter would have greeted the assertion that much
of the merchandise which found its way to the Piræus belonged to him
and that the profits realized from the sale of silks and spices, corn
and ivory, went into his coffers. Yet these statements would have been
true a year before. In Athens the rich were required to contribute to
the public charges in proportion to their wealth, and the saving that
Ariston was able to effect by making his investments abroad and
concealing them through various stratagems from the knowledge of his
neighbors was sufficient, in his opinion, to compensate him for the
trouble and the risks that such a course involved. He would rather
have suffered his fingers to be hacked off one by one than part with
the heavy, shining bars of gold that his prudence and foresight had
amassed.
If the history of each separate coin and bar could have been told, it
would have revealed secrets which their master had forced himself to
forget. Some of them were the price of flesh and blood; some had been
gained by violence upon the seas or among the trackless wastes of the
desert; some had been won at the expense of honor and truth; for in his
earlier years Ariston had been both bold and unscrupulous in his
cunning, and his craving for riches had always been insatiable. As his
years and his wealth increased he became more circumspect and
conservative. He even sought to expiate some of his earlier faults by
furtive sacrifices to the Gods, and especially to Hermes, whose image
he cherished.
But the Gods had turned their faces from him, and his repentance, if
repentance it could be called, had been unavailing. Misfortune had
come upon him, and calamity seemed always to be lying in wait for him.
If his vessels put to sea, they were sunk in storms or captured by
pirates. His factories and warehouses were burned; his caravans were
lost; his debtors defaulted; and if he purchased a cargo of corn, its
price at the Piræus was certain to be less than the price he had paid
for it in the Hellespont. One after another the precious bars which
had cost him so much to obtain were sent to save doubtful ventures and
losing investments, until at last all were gone. Sitting in his dingy
room, on the day of the arrival of Chares and Leonidas at the house of
Clearchus, he was at last in a worldly sense what his neighbors thought
him to be; and the marble face of Hermes, with its painted eyes, smiled
malignly at him from its corner.
But there was still hope left to him. Although the widespread web of
his enterprises had been rent and torn by misfortune, there yet
remained enough to build upon securely if he had but a few more of the
yellow bars to tide over his present distress. Without them he might
keep afloat for a few months longer; but the end would be utter ruin.
At least he still owned the great dyeing establishment in Tyre, which
had never failed to yield him a handsome revenue. He recalled how he
had taken it from Cepheus for one-fourth its real value. It was no
concern of his that Cepheus had stolen it from young Phradates. What
did the details of the transaction matter now, since they were known
only to himself and to Cepheus, who would not be likely to reveal them,
and to Mena the Egyptian, the young man's steward? Mena had stolen so
much himself from the spendthrift that he would never dare to tell what
he knew. And yet the fellow had it in his power to rob Ariston of the
last remnant of his fortune.
A discreet knock interrupted Ariston's reflections. He brushed his
parchments and papyri hastily into an open box that stood beside his
chair and closed the lid. "Enter!" he commanded.
An aged slave opened the door. "Mena, of Tyre," he said.
Cold sweat broke out on Ariston's forehead, but he gave no outward sign
of his consternation. "Bring him hither," he directed.
The Egyptian, who had been watching the sluggish goldfish floating in
the weed-grown cistern of the court, entered the room with an air of
importance. He turned his alert face, with its sharp, inquiring
features, upon Ariston.
"Greeting!" he said, extending his hand. "It is long since we have
seen thee in Tyre."
"Yes," Ariston replied, leading him to a seat opposite his own, "I am
getting too old for travel."
"You have indeed grown older since I saw you last," Mena said, looking
at him attentively. "I hope it is not because Fortune has been unkind."
Ariston winced, and the change in his expression was not lost upon the
shrewd Egyptian.
"What brings you here?" he asked, shifting the subject.
"We are travelling, my beloved master and I," Mena answered.
"Phradates is with you, then?" the old man asked with an alarm that he
was unable to conceal.
The steward paused before he answered, gazing at Ariston with eyes half
closed and a faint smile upon his lips.
"Phradates is here," he said at last. "I know of what you are
thinking. We have been friends too long to have secrets from each
other. You need have no fear. Cepheus is dead and I have too many
causes to despise Phradates to take his part."
He paused again and suddenly his face became convulsed with a spasm of
hatred.
"I could strangle him!" he cried, clenching his hands as though he felt
his master's throat beneath his fingers.
Ariston breathed more freely. At any rate, his property in Tyre was
safe.
"Why don't you do it, then?" he asked coolly.
"Because the time has not yet come!" Mena replied fiercely. "For every
insult that he has given me and for every blow that he has made me
feel, he shall suffer tenfold! His fortune is dwindling, and in the
end it will be mine. Then let him ask Mena for aid!"
"I did not know that you had so much courage," Ariston remarked.
"I have not watched you in vain," Mena replied, "and it is to you that
I now come for assistance."
"To me!" Ariston exclaimed.
"To you," Mena repeated. "Be not alarmed, for what I have to propose
will be for our mutual benefit. Phradates has been throwing money
right and left since we set out from Tyre. Great sums he spent in
Crete and still greater in Corinth. Since his arrival here he has been
fleeced without mercy. You will understand that I have tried to
protect him, but merely to save him from injury. He might have lost
his life only this morning had I not been there to guard him from an
attack by two desperate characters with a crowd of slaves, who set upon
us while we were returning from the dice. Luckily, I succeeded in
beating them off, but the noble Phradates was thrown from his chair and
his noble nose was battered. Soon he will be in want of more money.
Of the property that remains to him, he has quarries on Lebanon, which
employ a thousand slaves, silk mills in Old Tyre, where as many more
are kept busy, and a score of ships in the trade with Carthage. He
believes the value of the quarries and the mills to be only half what
it really is and reports have been made to him that two-thirds of the
vessels of his fleet have been lost. All this he will pledge for
anything that it will bring when he learns that his money is gone. It
is for us to get possession of that pledge. I have a few talents, but
not enough. I will take care that the loan is never repaid and our
success is certain. What do you say?"
Ariston looked at the statue of Hermes. It was a fancy of his that he
could draw either a favorable or an adverse augury from the expression
on the face of the God as it showed in the wavering light of the lamp.
He could detect no change in the mocking smile that seemed to hover
about the marble lips. It left him with no conclusion.
"What you have told me," he said to Mena, "makes it necessary for me to
tell you something in return. I am a ruined man."
"Ruined! You!" Mena exclaimed incredulously.
"It is true," Ariston replied. "Of all that I had, nothing remains to
me intact except the dye-house in Tyre and a small fleet of corn ships
that has but now arrived from the Euxine. The worst is that I have
debts that must be met if I am to save other ventures."
"But you have the property of your nephew to draw upon," Mena suggested.
"I had it," the old man said, "but it was turned over to him more than
a year ago. Since then all my losses have befallen."
"But you are his heir," the Egyptian replied meaningly. "Is he
married?"
"No; but he soon will be," Ariston replied.
The two men exchanged glances, reading each other's thoughts in their
eyes. Neither cared to put into words what was in his mind.
"Leave it to me," Ariston said at last. "I think it can be managed.
Clearchus knows nothing of my affairs, and if I can once more get
control of the property all will be well. I think we may safely assume
that he will not marry. For the rest, we must wait and see. Let us
talk of this pledge that Phradates is to make for our security."
He produced his tablets and a stylus and the conspirators were soon
buried in a mass of calculations. When Mena took his leave, every
detail had been arranged.
Hardly had Mena disappeared in the direction of the Agora when a man of
unusual stature, with brawny arms and a heavy black beard, turned into
the street in which Ariston lived and stood staring doubtfully about
him. There was a hint of the sea in his sunburned face and rough
garments.
"If you are looking for the Piræus, my friend, you will not find it
here," said a fruit dealer who chanced to meet him.
"What do you know of the Piræus, grasshopper?" returned the stranger,
halting and looking at the merchant with contempt. "I am searching for
the house of Ariston, son of Xenas. Do you know where in this accursed
street it is?"
"Tut, tut; fair words, my friend," the merchant replied, carefully
keeping his distance. "What do you want with Ariston?"
"That is his affair and mine, but not yours," growled the stranger.
"I'll warrant it is nothing good," the fruit dealer said, "but you will
find his house at the end of the street, near the wall."
Without stopping to thank him, the stranger strode on in the direction
that he had indicated. The merchant stood for a moment gazing after
him, wondering whence he came and what he wanted; but finding no answer
to these questions in his own mind, he shook his head like a man who is
assured of the existence of something that should not be and continued
on his way to his shop in the Agora to relate his suspicions.
Ariston himself came to the door in response to the stranger's knock.
He was admitted at once and without a word. Ariston led him in silence
to his own room and seated him in the chair that Mena had occupied half
an hour before. Instead of summoning a slave, the old man went himself
to fetch a flask of wine and a trencher of bread and cheese.
"Can it be done?" he asked in an eager voice, leaning forward in his
favorite attitude with his elbows on the table while the other ate and
drank.
"It can be done, but it will not be easy," his guest replied.
"Not easy to carry off a woman who has only slaves to guard her?"
Ariston exclaimed. "Are your men cowards, then, Syphax?"
"No, my men and I are not cowards, old Skinflint," Syphax said, "but
you may as well understand now that we do not intend to risk our lives
for nothing."
He delivered this speech with the blustering air of a bully, gazing
boldly into the old man's face. Ariston, naturally of small stature,
looked more than ever shrunken and withered in contrast with his
companion; but at the sound of the other's threatening tone, his face
hardened and there came a cold gleam into his eyes.
"I am glad you are not afraid, Syphax," he said in a voice so soft that
it sounded almost caressing. "Have you forgotten Medon? Your eyes saw
his death. He was a brave man, too, your old chief. I think I can
hear him yet as he called upon the Gods in his torture. They could not
help him. Poor Medon!"
The face of Syphax paled under its tan at the recollection that Ariston
had conjured up and an involuntary shudder ran through him. His bold
eyes wavered before the persistent stare of the little old man, whom he
could have crushed in one of his hands.
"What are you willing to pay?" he asked hoarsely, pushing away his food
half finished.
"You would do it for nothing, if I asked you, Syphax," the old man
replied, still in the same soft voice, "but I have no wish to be hard
with you. This is a matter in which I have a deep interest and I am
willing to pay well for it. When you have taken her safely on board,
you will sail to Halicarnassus, where you will search out Iphicrates,
son of Conon, and give him this letter. If he finds you have done your
work well, he will pay you a talent in silver. But if the girl has
been harmed in any way, not a drachma will you get and worse will
befall you than befell Medon."
"The work is worth five times as much," Syphax grumbled with downcast
eyes, "but I suppose I have no choice."
"None, my dear Syphax, and I am a poor man," said Ariston. "Let us
regard the matter as settled. Now, how do you intend to proceed?"
Syphax roused himself like a man whose professional skill has been
called upon.
"The house stands thus," he said, indicating its position on the table
with a huge finger. "On this side is the grove where I and a dozen of
my men will lie hidden with the litter. One of my fellows will scale
the roof and let himself down inside. He will open the door to us and
the thing will be over in a moment."
"Where will you embark?" the old man asked, nodding approval.
"My ship will be lying off-shore with a boat in waiting. We will carry
her in the litter to this spot, about two stadia beyond the Piræus,
which we shall have to pass. We shall make the attack soon after the
middle watch of the night when the moon will be low."
"You should have been a general, Syphax," the old man said. "You have
a better head for strategy than most of those the Athenians employ. Go
to your work and forget nothing. I must attend the Assembly, where
Demosthenes is to stir up the citizens against Alexander, son of
Philip. They say the boy is dead."
"Alexander dead!" Syphax exclaimed.
"The story is that he was killed by the Illyrians, and Demosthenes has
a man who saw him die," Ariston replied indifferently. "I think the
man is lying and that Demosthenes knows it. But these affairs have
nothing to do with you. Be off to your business."
When the adventurer had gone, Ariston returned to his room and prepared
to write. From his expression of content, it was evident that he was
satisfied with what had been done.
"To Iphicrates, son of Conon," his letter ran. "I am sending to you
Syphax, a freebooter from Rhodes, who will deliver to you a young
woman. You will take her into your house and guard her with care until
you hear from me again. Syphax will present to you an order for a
talent of silver. Defer the payment until you have the girl, and then
do with him as you will. As a pirate and a robber, he has richly
merited death. May the Gods protect you."
As Ariston was carefully sealing this letter, a gaunt, sour-visaged
woman entered the room. She was his wife and the one person on earth
in whom he had confidence. Like most secretive men with whom duplicity
is a daily study, he sometimes felt the need of telling the truth, if
only to note the effect of his schemes upon another's mind. But even
to his wife, whose covetousness was equal to his own, he never revealed
all that was in his brain. Her lonely life was spent in a constant
endeavor to piece out from what he imparted to her the full extent of
his plans. She admired his intellect, but deep in her heart she feared
him, and, womanlike, she was tormented by the suspicion that somewhere
she had a rival to whom he told what he concealed from her. The
consciousness of her own deficiency of charms made her manner all the
more harsh and forbidding. As soon as she entered the room she noted
that he was in an easy mood, and she made haste to take advantage of it.
"Who were these men?" she asked. "What are you about now?"
"Affairs of state, Xanthe, that are not for women to know," he said
mockingly.
"All that concerns you concerns me," she replied. "Am I to do the work
of a slave here like a mole in the dark? Who are these women you were
talking of with that evil-looking man?"
"So you were listening!" Ariston said with a frown.
"Yes, I was, if you must know it," Xanthe said defiantly. "Do you
think I am to know nothing? If you had consulted more freely with me
before, we would not now be the paupers that we are, and many times I
have told you this, but you will not listen to me because I am a woman."
There was something in this remonstrance that made an impression upon
Ariston's mind, smarting as he was over the loss of his fortune. It
might have been better, after all, if he had told her more.
"We were talking of only one woman," he said, with an impulse of
frankness. "She is Artemisia."
"Artemisia!" Xanthe exclaimed. "Don't try to deceive me. Why should
you wish Artemisia to be carried off? Is not Clearchus to make her his
wife?"
"It is for that very reason," Ariston replied. "I do not wish him to
do so."
"Why not?" Xanthe demanded in a tone of suspicion.
"Sit down and let us talk rationally," Ariston said. "Suppose they
marry and have children. His property would be lost to us forever."
"That is true," Xanthe assented. "I had not thought of that, and we
need it so much more than he. If he should die, would it belong to us?"
"It would," her husband answered, "and now you know why I wish to
prevent the marriage."
He rose, and she aided him to adjust the folds of his himation.
"I am going to the Assembly," he said. "If we have war with Macedon,
the price of corn will advance. Look to the house and let none enter
while I am away."
It was not until after he had gone that Xanthe began to wonder how she
and Ariston were to profit by preventing the marriage, since their
nephew would still be alive and in the possession of his property. It
could not be that Ariston intended to have him slain. She shuddered at
the thought, for she was fond of Clearchus, and he had always been kind
to her. Besides, such a crime could not be committed without almost
certain detection. Ariston must have formed some other scheme for
bringing about his object. She reproached herself for not having
questioned him on this point while he was in a frame of mind to answer.
The opportunity might not occur again and she could only guess at what
was to come. The half-confidence that he had given her left her more
watchful and suspicious than ever.
Syphax meantime had found his way back to the Agora and was about to
enter a wine-shop when he felt some one pluck him by the elbow.
Glancing back, his eyes met those of Mena.
"Ah, my fox," he exclaimed, "what brings you to Athens?"
"Necessity and my master," Mena replied. "And you?"
Syphax shook his head and made as if to move away, but Mena was not to
be denied. An hour later they were still together, sitting side by
side in a corner of the wine-shop, and it was fortunate for Ariston
that the Egyptian was his ally instead of his enemy, for all that
Syphax could tell, he knew.