Page 12 of Sword Dance

“I know he wasn’t having an assignation with—with … But the point is, Gelon doesn’t know that, does he?”

And anyway, Damiskos was about to add, Eurydemos is in love with Nione. Then he remembered that he had assumed Eurydemos was in love with Nione on the strength of that poem about a fruitless tree … which possibly meant something else entirely.

Had Eurydemos been waiting in the garden for Varazda, who hadn’t arrived because he had retreated to his own bed after the scene with Gelon? Somehow that didn’t quite fit. What had Aristokles been doing, if that were the case?

“Well,” said Damiskos, “as you say, he is a monomaniac. I hope he will not cause you or your servant any more trouble.”

Aristokles shuddered.

“Have you told our host?” Damiskos asked.

“What? Told her what?”

“Told her,” said Damiskos patiently, “what happened last night. That one of her other guests attacked Pharastes.”

“No, no.” Aristokles waved a hand. “Nothing to do with her.”

“I beg to differ. If it had happened under your own roof, to one of your own guests, I’m sure you would want to know.”

“Yes, yes, of course, and I will tell her at the—at the appropriate juncture.” Aristokles had been looking away impatiently toward the door, but now he glanced back sharply at Damiskos. “I beg you would not say anything yourself.”

That sounded quite sincere, and Damiskos found it somewhat alarming.

“I don’t know what you’re up to, Aristokles,” he said, “but I don’t like it. Refusing to take action when one of the other guests attempts to rape your freedman—”

“Attempts to—? No, no—you’ve got it quite wrong. That wasn’t what he was doing at all.” The Boukossian seemed surprised by the suggestion.

“How do you know?” Damiskos countered. “Did you ask your servant what happened?”

“Of course I did,” Aristokles snapped. “Look, you simple little soldier, you have no idea what is going on here. There are things in motion—affairs of the highest—you have no idea.”

“Really.”

“Really. Now leave me and Pharastes alone.”

Damiskos narrowed his eyes at the Boukossian. “I will … if you’ll leave Nione Kukara alone.”

“Oh, yes, yes, yes,” Aristokles crowed. “I knew this was about jealousy at heart. I could tell you—the things I could tell you. You’ve no idea.”

“So you keep saying.”

Damiskos could tell that Aristokles was making a colossal effort not to tell him absolutely all about it, and he had a feeling that if he just waited long enough, and looked unimpressed enough, the Boukossian would lose the struggle. Unfortunately, they were interrupted by a slave with a broom peeping through the dining-room doors to see whether she could come in to sweep, and this gave Aristokles all the distraction he needed to think better of whatever he had been about to say. He pulled himself together, sleeking back his hair with one hand, and cast Damiskos a dark look as he stalked out of the room.

* * *

Still turning the conversation over in his mind, Damiskos went out to the garden, where he was met by an entirely normal scene of Nione breakfasting at her private table with Phaia. She beckoned him over to join them.

“Shall we take a walk down the shore to look over the factory this morning?” Nione suggested when he had taken a seat.

“Yes. Excellent.”

He was startled to catch an obviously hostile look from Phaia. It was gone in an instant, and he thought perhaps it hadn’t had anything to do with him. Sometimes he himself was accused of frowning forbiddingly at people when he thought he was simply giving them a neutral look.

“May I come too?” Phaia asked, turning to their host. “I haven’t seen the factory.”

“Of course, if you like.” After a moment, almost shyly, she added, “I should love to show it off to you.”

Damiskos ate in silence while the two women talked. He wasn’t inclined to honour Aristokles’s request that he say nothing to Nione of what had happened last night. But he wasn’t inclined to talk about it in front of Phaia either, so for the moment he had little choice but to keep quiet.