Harry Turtledove - Over the Wine-Dark Sea

With a handful of men at the oars to put the merchant galley exactly where he wanted her, Menedemos guided her toward the quays alongside which the round ships floated. "Go somewhere else!" a man called from the stern of the nearest big, tubby merchantman. "We're all together here, loading up on grain for Agathokles."

"That's what I'm here for, too," Menedemos said as Diokles eased the Aphrodite up against the pier.

"You?" The fellow on the round ship laughed loud and long, displaying a couple of teeth gone black in the front of his mouth. "We can carry eight or ten times as much in the Leuke here as you can in that miserable little boat. Take your toy home and sail it in your hip-bath." He laughed again.

"Toy? Hip-bath?" Menedemos was tempted to yell, Back oars!, and then spurt forward to ram the round ship. How much grain would that sneering fellow carry then? But, unfortunately, no. It wouldn't do. Menedemos said, "However much or little we haul, Syracuse'll still get more with us than without us - and Agathokles'll pay us for it, too, same as he'll pay you."

"Well, all right. When you put it like that, I suppose you've got something," the other Hellene said. "And when the Carthaginians come after us, you can be the one who fights 'em off." He laughed again, louder than ever.

But he wasn't laughing by the time the Aphrodite's crew finished screaming abuse and the details of their battle with the Roman trireme at him. He was white with fury, his fists clenched, his lips skinned back from his teeth. He had to stand there and take it, as did the other sailors on his ship. Had they chosen to answer back, the men from the akatos would have made them regret it - for, while the round ship held more cargo, the merchant galley held more crewmen.

A fellow wearing an unusually fine, unusually white wool chiton bustled up the pier toward the Aphrodite. "Are you here to carry grain to Syracuse?" he asked.

"We certainly are," Menedemos answered - this chap, unlike the man aboard the round ship, looked to have some clout. "Who are you, sir?"

"My name is Onasimos," replied the fellow with the fancy tunic. He also, Menedemos saw, had buckles on his sandals that looked like real gold. With a bow, he continued, "I have the honor to be the Syracusan proxenos here in Rhegion, and I'm doing what I can to help the polis I represent."

In normal times, a proxenos looked out for the interests of citizens of the polis he represented in the polis in which he dwelt. He was, necessarily, a man of some wealth and importance in his home town. He might aid in lawsuits. He might, at need, lend money. He got no pay for his services, only prestige and business connections. When the polis he represented was in danger, he might do extraordinary things, as Onasimos looked to be doing now.

"How do we get the grain?" Menedemos asked him.

"It's in the warehouses," Onasimos said. "Gods be praised, Great Hellas had a good harvest this past spring. I have plenty of slaves and free men ready to bring it aboard for you."

"Good." Menedemos dipped his head. "Now - about arrangements for payment."

"You've probably heard Agathokles is offering four times the going rate for grain delivered to Syracuse," Onasimos said.

Menedemos tossed his head. "I hadn't heard exactly how much he offered, as a matter of fact. But I have heard a lot of Agathokles himself - including the way he got rid of the Syracusans who weren't of his faction earlier this year. Anyone who could come up with that little scheme wouldn't think twice about going back on a promise to pay a merchant skipper."

The Syracusan proxenos looked pained. "I assure you, my dear fellow - "

But Menedemos tossed his head again. "Don't assure me, O best one. Let me ask some of the other captains and see what I find out."

Had Onasimos called his bluff and told him to go ahead, he might have believed the proxenos' protests. As things were, Onasimos sighed and said, "Oh, very well. I'll pay you the going rate now, and you can collect the rest on delivery."

"I'm sorry." Menedemos tossed his head for a third time. "The going rate isn't enough to make me want to risk the Carthaginian fleet. I know the Carthaginians are supposed to be splendid torturers, but I don't want to find out how they do what they do for myself."

He waited to see what Onasimos would say to that. The proxenos glared at him. He smiled his sweetest smile in return. Onasimos sighed again. "You're one of the canny ones, I see. All right, then - one and a half times the going rate in advance, but not an obolos more. If I give you everything promised ahead of time, you might just sail off with the grain and never go near Syracuse."

Menedemos thought about squeezing the proxenos some more. He glanced toward Sostratos. His cousin ignored him - Sostratos wanted no part of the Syracusan venture. Menedemos sent him a covert dirty look. He wanted to know what Sostratos thought, for his cousin was often better at haggling with these fancy types then he was himself. But Sostratos seemed determined to sulk.

That left it up to Menedemos. Onasimos had a point. Some men, with silver in their hands, would sail away from Syracuse. Not me, of course, Menedemos thought. But Onasimos didn't, couldn't, know that. "All right," Menedemos said. "One and a half times the going rate it is. Sostratos!"

His cousin jumped. "What?"

"You'll keep count of how many sacks of grain Onasimos' men bring aboard the Aphrodite here," Menedemos said. "As soon as we get paid our first installment for hauling them, we're off with the rest of the fleet."

"I'll have a man of my own doing the counting," Onasimos said.

"Good." Menedemos smiled that sweet smile at him. "I'm sure his count and Sostratos' will match very closely, then." The Syracusan proxenos' answering smile looked distinctly forced. He was going to try to cheat me, Menedemos thought. Why am I not surprised?

Muttering under his breath, Onasimos tramped back down the pier. About half an hour later, a line of men carrying leather sacks, each with a talent of grain, came out from the interior of Rhegion. "Where do you want these?" asked the man heading up the line. He carried no sack himself; he was obviously the fellow who would do the counting for Onasimos.

"Sostratos!" Menedemos called, and Sostratos, still seeming just this side of mutinous, went up onto the pier and stood beside Onasimos' man. For that worthy's benefit, Menedemos continued, "Now - I'll want you to start at the stern, just forward of the poop deck, and work toward the bow, one row of sacks at a time, till she holds as much grain as she can."

"Right," Onasimos' man said, and shouted orders at the men he was in charge of. They came down the gangplank and started loading the grain.

By the time they finished, the Aphrodite rode a great deal lower in the water. That worried Menedemos. Not only the extra weight but also the extra amount of hull now in the sea would slow the merchant galley. She didn't need to be slow, not when she might have to flee from Carthaginian warships. But he couldn't blame Onasimos for wanting to put as much grain into her as he could: the proxenos was doing his best to feed the people of the city he served.

"How many sacks of grain did we take on?" Menedemos asked once the last sweating hauler left the akatos.

"By my count, 797 sacks," Sostratos answered.

Onasimos' man sneered. "I reckoned it as 785." Sostratos bristled. Anyone who accused him of inaccuracy was asking for trouble.

Menedemos had no time for that kind of trouble. He said, "We'll split the difference. What does that come to?"

Sostratos counted on his fingers, his lips moving. "It would be 791," he said. "But I still think this fellow - "

"Never mind," Menedemos broke in. He nodded to Onasimos' man. "Tell your master we've got 791 sacks of grain aboard. As soon as we get paid, we're ready to go. Agreed?"