Harry Turtledove - Over the Wine-Dark Sea

"Sostratos . . ." Menedemos said, and Sostratos displayed one of the chicks. Menedemos gave a highly colored description of what an adult peacock looked like, ending, "It were not too much to call him the most magnificent bird in the world."

To his surprise, the roustabout burst into raucous laughter. "Tell me another one," he said. "You're going to sell us those ugly birds for half the money in the world, and they'll stay ugly, and you'll be gone. Do you think we're that stupid?"

Oh, a pestilence, Menedemos thought. We've sailed so far, we've come to a place where the people have no idea what a peacock is like. How are we supposed to sell the chicks if no one believes they'll grow up to be beautiful? He hadn't thought of that when he decided to stop at Pompaia.

As Sostratos put the chick back into the cage, he said, "The rich folk here will know what peacocks are, I think. And even if they don't, the Hellenes up at Neapolis will."

"I hope so," Menedemos said. "We'll find out when we go into the market square, I expect."

"Silk and wine will sell," Sostratos said. "Silk and wine will sell anywhere."

"That's true." Remembering that it was true made Menedemos feel a little better. With a small sigh, he said, "I suppose we can sell leftover chicks back in Rhodes, too, but we'll get more for them here in the west - if we can get anything at all for them, that is."

"Shall we go find out?" his cousin asked.

Before answering, Menedemos gauged the sun. It was sliding down toward the western horizon, but would still be a while getting there. "Why not?" he said. "We'll do some business today, I expect, and we'll let word get around tonight."

When he and Sostratos entered Pompaia, they didn't go in alone. They made a procession of it. Menedemos led, his hands free. "Peafowl chicks!" he called in Greek. "Rare wines from Khios! Fine silk from Kos!" Sostratos carried a cage with several chicks in it. Behind them strode sailors with bolts of silk in their hands, and others hauling amphorai of Ariousian between them on carrying poles.

The procession would have been more impressive if Menedemos hadn't had to pause a couple of times to ask passersby how to get to the agora. Not everyone spoke Greek, either, which made things more complicated. Even though the blank housefronts and narrow, winding, smelly streets put him in mind of a polis that had never heard of Hippodamos and his grid, he was acutely aware of having come to a foreign part of the world.

Sostratos noticed something he hadn't: "Look! Some of the signs over the shops must be in Oscan, because that certainly isn't Greek."

"You're right," Menedemos said after a moment. "I hadn't paid much attention to them."

"I hadn't either, not at first," Sostratos said. "A lot of the poleis here in Great Hellas still use old-fashioned alphabets with characters you'd never see in Athens, for instance, but even when I can figure out what all the letters are supposed to sound like, the words they spell out don't make any sense."

"I suppose they do if you're a Pompaian," Menedemos said. "I didn't even know the Samnites could write Oscan. Looks like they can, though."

"So it does," Sostratos agreed. "I wonder if the Romans, up farther north still, have an alphabet of their own."

Menedemos looked back over his shoulder at his cousin. "There are times, O marvelous one, when you find the least important things in the world to worry about."

Sostratos chuckled. " 'O marvelous one,' is it? You sound like Sokrates when he's being sarcastically polite to some poor fool. And I wasn't worried. I was just - "

"Curious," Menedemos broke in. "You always are. But before you start learning to write history in Oscan, remember that we're here to sell things first."

"I know that." Sostratos sounded angry. "Have I ever disrupted anything because I'm interested in history?"

"Well, no." Menedemos admitted what he couldn't deny.

"Then kindly leave me alone about it." Sostratos still seemed hot enough to fire a pot.

Menedemos might have given him a hot answer, too, but they finally came out into Pompaia's agora, and he started crying his wares instead. Not far from the agora stood the temple Leptines had mentioned, its columns and walls cut from the rather dark local stone and the decorative elements brightly painted, just as they would have been in a Hellenic polis.

"Hardly seems like barbarian work," one of the sailors said.

"I was thinking the same thing," Menedemos answered. "The architect was probably a Hellene." Then he raised his voice again: "Perfume from Rhodes! Silk from Kos! Fine Ariousian, the best in the world, from Khios! Peafowl chicks!" He turned to Sostratos. "I wish you did know some Oscan. Then more of these people would be able to understand."

His cousin pointed. "I think we'll do all right." Sure enough, Pompaians were converging on the men from the Aphrodite.

One of them, a plump, prosperous-looking fellow in a toga - a garment Menedemos found very strange and not very attractive - surprised him by going over to the cage with the peafowl chicks and addressing Sostratos in good Greek: "Are these the young of the big, shiny bird with the crest and the incredible tail?"

"Why, yes," Sostratos replied. "How do you know of peafowl? I didn't expect anyone here in Pompaia would."

"As it happens, Herennius Egnatius brought his through the town day before yesterday, on the way up to his home in Caudium," the man said. "Everyone who saw the male was amazed. He said he bought it from a couple of Hellenes in Taras. And so, when I saw you . . ."

"At your service, then," Sostratos said. "I would be lying, though, if I told you I knew which chicks would become peacocks and which peahens." Here in Pompaia, Menedemos might have told that lie. He didn't expect to be back any time soon to be called on it. But Sostratos had forestalled him, so now he had to make the best of it.

The Pompaian didn't seem displeased. "Life is full of gambles, is it not?" he said. "If I bought two of these little birds, I should have a reasonable chance of getting at least one peacock, eh? What is your price?"

Menedemos spoke before Sostratos could: "Two Tarentine minai apiece."

With a cough, the man in the toga said, "That is a lot of silver."

"It's a lot less than Herennius Egnatius paid for his birds," Sostratos put in.

"Which does not make what I said any less true," the Pompaian replied. "Half your price might strike me as reasonable."

"Half my price strikes me as unprofitable," Menedemos said. The Pompaian smiled. He might be a barbarian in a peculiar garment, but he knew the start of a dicker when he heard one.

And it turned out to be quite a quick dicker, too, for he wanted to buy as much as Menedemos wanted to sell. They didn't take long to settle on one mina, sixty drakhmai for each bird. The local spoke a couple of crackling sentences of Oscan to the retainers who stood near him, then returned to Greek: "I shall go to my house to get the money. And when I return, I may have a thing or two to say about your wine, as well."

Menedemos bowed, "Just as you say, O best one. Would you care to talk about the price now, so you'll know how much silver to bring back here to the market square?"

The Pompaian plucked at his graying beard. "Do you know, that is not a bad notion. You Hellenes have a knack for picking smooth ways to do things. How much will you try to steal from me?"

"Sixty drakhmai the amphora," Menedemos said calmly.

"What?" Now the local dug a finger in his ear, as if to make sure he'd heard right. He spoke in Oscan, presumably translating the price. His retainers all made horrified noises. Not a bad ploy, Menedemos thought. The Pompaian went back to Greek again: "You Hellenes say your gods drink something called nectar, is it not so? Have you got nectar inside those jars?"