Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine. Vol. 50, No. 1 & 2, January/February 2005

I have to admit that Tysander was right. I get involved in reading my scrolls, in arguing with Socrates, or discussing atoms with Anaxagoras and Pericles, and forget about my appearance. On the other hand, Pericles’ lovely new mistress Aspasia never seems to mind, and since I am really in love with her, despite my own young mistress, Selkine, who perhaps not coincidentally resembles Aspasia, I don’t worry too much.

Tysander grumbled and sheared away. I sat sheeplike answering his questions about whether or not Pericles would be at the theatre and about whether Sophocles would ever act again, now that he’d gained such fame as a playwright. Finally, Tysander declared he’d done the best he could so that I’d look at least presentable for the theatre festival.

I paid him a full obol instead of the usual half. Tysander is a fountain of information when one needs it, and since Pericles often asks me to solve knotty crimes, I like to keep on Tysander’s good side.

I left and decided to wander round the agora to see if I could get a cheap lamp, as mine was turning rather black from my burning so much olive oil well into dusk to read the latest piece of Herodotus’ scrolls. His material on Egypt is fascinating. I have promised myself to hook a ride on one of my half brother’s merchant ships to see the pyramids.

I passed a group of rather scruffy-looking peasants betting on a quail-baiting game. They had drawn a circle in the dust and were about to rap the quail on the head, half of them betting that the quail would back out of the circle, the other half betting that the creature would stand its ground. I hoped the quail had enough brains to back out. It’s a good strategy when your enemies are numerous and larger than you are, but I guessed that Sophides and his friend, part of the nine thousand Athenians who defeated the massive twenty thousand-man army of Persia at Marathon, would have disagreed. The quail held his ground.

I walked down the Panathenaic Way toward the Acropolis, checked out a few lamps from a dealer, then decided to walk over to the tent of Aphorus. He deals in flute girls, and one of them, a pretty girl named Phryne, had once been of some help to me in solving the murder of a lovely young woman. I wanted to see how she was.

I threaded my way past the tanners and cobblers, but before I reached Aphorus’ tent, I saw some friends by the street of the blacksmiths and forgers. It was Phidias, our great sculptor; Sophocles; and Tidius, the actor who was working with Sophocles for the festival.

“By Zeus,” Phidias said, “Kleides with a fresh haircut. Must be intending to worship Aphrodite tonight. Hardly recognizable, right, Sophocles?”

“Hardly, except for the glint of wisdom in the sophistic eye.”

Sophocles was always as charming and kind as Phidias was satiric and irreverent.

“Looking for the lovely young Selkine?” Phidias asked. “I thought I saw her and a servant heading for the fountain house at the South Stoa. Or, let me see, was it Aspasia you were looking for?”

“But,” I said, “why do you assume I was looking for either of them? Perhaps they heard about my handsome new haircut and were looking for me. Socrates and I have warned you again and again to watch your assumptions.”

Phidias laughed and clapped me on the shoulder. “I assume you’ll go to the theatre with Pericles and myself tomorrow. Sophocles will, of course, be driving poor Tidius mad with frantic last-minute instructions on how he wants his plays presented.”

Phidias turned to Sophocles and Tidius. “Are you really going to shock us all by presenting a suicide enactment on stage?”

Tidius shook his great graying head and glared at Phidias. “I hope you aren’t telling everyone about this. The audience, of course, will know the story of Ajax going mad and killing sheep he thought were his enemies because he lost the honor to Odysseus of being declared the most valuable warrior in the Trojan War. Everyone knows the story of Ajax committing suicide over his disgrace, but how Sophocles and I will present that suicide should remain unknown until we actually perform it at the theatre.”

Phidias clapped his hand over his mouth in mock horror. “May the god of theatre and wine, great Dionysus, forgive me for this trespass.” He waved his hand about. “But if everyone in the agora knew exactly what you were going to do on stage, Tidius, they’d come eagerly anyway. We all remember your great performance, many years ago, in Aeschylus’ play about the Persians. We’ll never see its like again.”

I noticed Tidius stiffen and his head pull back. I was sure that Phidias had meant to mollify Tidius, but instead he had offended the great actor. Tidius’ age, I suspected, had become a sore spot. Our open-air theatres where actors had to project their voices to over fifteen thousand people required stamina and good, strong lungs.