She came back with it herself, instead of bringing along an enormous Keltic body servant. Menedemos thought that wise. Before long, soldiers loyal to Demetrios son of Antigonos would be coming into the agora. They were liable to react to an enormous Kelt the way hounds reacted to a boar.

Sure enough, Demetrios’ soldiers did enter the agora later that afternoon. They seemed more travelers than warriors, though. Some of them gaped at the buildings lining the south and west sides of the market square. Others craned their necks to peer up at the even more magnificent buildings of the akropolis. A whiff of panic swept through the agora when they first appeared. As soon as the merchants found out they weren’t intent on rapine and murder, the panic blew away. The Athenians started trying to sell them things instead.

So did Menedemos. He held up one of his little jars. “Perfume! Fine perfume from Rhodes, island of roses! Make some Athenian girl glad to see you when you give her perfume!”

A soldier came over to him, “How much?” he asked. Menedemos told him. He scowled, then tossed his head. “You’ve got to be joking, pal. I can pay a platoon of Athenian girls to be glad to see me for that kind of money.”

“Ah, but the ones you get with this are worth a platoon of the ordinary sort,” Menedemos said.

“Some are better in bed than others, sure,” the soldier said, “but none of ‘em’s that much better,” Menedemos did not make a sale.

When he got back to Protomakhos’ house as the sun was going down, he found Sostratos had news: “They’ve dug a trench around the fortress in Mounykhia. None of Kassandros’ men gets out,”

“You think the fortress will fall?” Menedemos asked.

“I don’t see how it can do anything else,” his cousin answered. “No sign of Demetrios son of Antigonos in Athens yet, either. Maybe he does keep promises. Wouldn’t that be strange?”

“I wish he would come,” Menedemos said. “We’ve still got some wine and truffles and perfume left. He’s Antigonos^’ son. He can’t be poor. Maybe he’ll buy things now that the other Demetrios has fled.”

“Maybe he will, or maybe his officers will,” Sostratos said. “I certainly hope so. Right at the moment, they’re besieging some of our best

customers.”

“Rude of them, isn’t it?” Menedemos remarked.

Sostratos raised an eyebrow. “That’s one way to put it, yes.”

The Rhodians kept trying to do business in Athens, but nobody seemed eager to spend much silver-or perhaps to show much silver- till people saw what sort of master Demetrios son of Antigonos would make. The siege of the fortress at Mounykhia went on. Every so often, a few men came in or went out during brief truces. People said Dionysios, the commander, was dickering with Demetrios over surrender terms. Menedemos had no idea how the people who said that knew it, but say it they did.

Demetrios didn’t need all the soldiers he’d brought along to maintain the siege. He sent others west to Megara, to take that polis away from Kassandros. In the earlier days of Hellas, Megara was a prominent polis, but the rise of Athens eclipsed it. Its walls didn’t hold Demetrios’ men out for long. Only pleas from Athens to spare a former rival kept the city from being plundered.

Protomakhos, who brought word of that to Menedemos and Sostratos, went on, “Demetrios has some sense of what looks good in the eyes of Hellenes. That’s probably why he spared the place,”

“That’s more than his father does,” Sostratos said. “Antigonos is like a shark. He’ll bite off your leg first and worry about what you think of it later.”

“So I’ve heard,” Protomakhos agreed. “But Demetrios is smoother than that. He asked Stilpon the Megaran philosopher if any of his men had robbed him, and Stilpon answered, ‘No, I haven’t seen anybody carrying away any knowledge,’”

Menedemos and Sostratos laughed. Menedemos said, “Demetrios didn’t stop all the plundering, from what I’ve heard. His men might have left the Megarans their immovable property, but they did steal most of the slaves in the town, maybe for themselves, maybe to resell to dealers.”

“I heard the same thing,” the Rhodian proxenos said. “As Demetrios was heading out of Megara, he told Stilpon, ‘I leave this a city of free men.’ And StOpon answered, ‘I should say you do, for you’ve taken all our slaves.’”

“Talking back to the man who’s just captured your city takes nerve,” Menedemos said. Protomakhos dipped his head.

Sostratos asked, “If Demetrios has left Megara, where’s he going?”

“That I don’t know,” Protomakhos answered, “Wherever he can give his foes-and his father’s-the most trouble, is my guess.”

But that guess proved wide of the target. Sostratos was the one who found out what Antigonos’ son had been up to after leaving Megara. A few days after Protomakhos brought the news of Demetrios’ departure, Sostratos said, “He’s gone to Patrai, or rather, just outside of Patrai.”

“To Patrai!” Protomakhos exclaimed. “That’s well west of Corinth, isn’t it?-on the north coast of the Peloponnesos. What made him go there?”

“Not ‘what,’ O best one-’who,’” Sostratos answered. Something in his voice made Menedemos look up sharply. His cousin wasn’t looking his way, but out of the andron and across the courtyard. Still, Menedemos sensed that Sostraios was really talking to him as he continued, “It seems Kratesipolis invited him to pay her a call.”

Menedemos knew the name. Still, he thought it best to let Protomakhos be the one who responded. Respond the Rhodian proxenos did; “The woman who was ruling Sikyon, not far from Patrai, not long ago?”

“That’s the one.” Sostratos dipped his head. “She’s the widow of Alexandras son of Polyperkhon, and she’s still supposed to be a famous beauty.”

“Polyperkhon didn’t amount to much, did he?” Menedemos remarked. No one could possibly have argued with him; the Macedonian officer, a man of the generation of Antigonos and, indeed, of Philip of Macedon, had ruled varying chunks of Hellas since not long after the death of Alexander the Great, but he’d never managed to make himself a major player in the wars of the Macedonian marshals.

“No, my dear, but the story’s about his daughter-in-law-and about Demetrios,” Sostratos said. “He went after her like a hound after a hare. He dashed off to Patrai with just a few officers, and when he got there he set up his tent well apart from theirs. He wanted to have a… private visit with Kratesipolis.”

“He’s a young man, isn’t he? The age of you two Rhodians, more or less?” Protomakhos chuckled reminiscently. “When you’re that age, a lot of the time, your spear stands and you just have to flesh it in piggy-or you think you do, anyhow.”

Now Menedemos was the one who gazed out at the courtyard as if it were the most fascinating thing in the world. If Protomakhos suspected… But he didn’t seem to. Sostratos’ voice still held that sharp edge as he went on, “Demetrios almost paid for his folly with his neck, too. Some of Kassandros’ men got word he was there, and he barely escaped them when they came to call.”

The story wasn’t about adultery. How could it be, with Kratesipolis a widow? But it was about a man doing something stupid on account of a woman and almost dying on account of it. Just for a heartbeat, Menedemos’ gaze flicked toward Sostratos. His cousin looked almost indecently smug. Yes, he’d enjoyed telling it, sure enough.

Blind-fortunately-to the byplay, Protomakhos said, “Maybe Demetrios has learned his lesson. Maybe he’ll come back here and finish off the siege down at Mounykhia. By Zeus, I hope so. Business won’t get back to normal till he does.”

“I hope he does, too,” Sostratos said. “But somebody who’s mad for women like that, he’s liable to keep right on doing crazy things as long as he lives.” No, he wasn’t looking at Menedemos. But he was talking to him.