And, then again, Sostratos found himself ever more tempted to find out just how interested in straying Zilpah might be. Maybe that was just because he’d gone without a woman for a long time. Maybe a trip to a brothel would cure him of it. But maybe such a visit wouldn’t, either. He was beginning to understand the attractions the game of adultery held for Menedemos. One willing woman might be worth several who lay down for a man because they had no choice.

His cousin had always insisted such things were true. Sostratos had always mocked him, scorned him. Now he discovered Menedemos had, at least to some degree, known what he was talking about. Few discoveries could have alarmed him more.

His eyes slid toward Zilpah again. Angrily, he made himself look away. Did she know what he was thinking? If she did, what did she think? Was it, Oh, dear, here’s another traveler who’s liable to make a fool of himself? Or was it, He wants me. Do I want him, too?

How do I find out? Sostratos wondered. He scowled and made a fist. Sure enough, he was liable to be walking down Menedemos’ road. “No,” he muttered.

“What do you mean, no?” Aristeidas asked.

“Nothing. Nothing at all,” Sostratos said quickly, and sipped his wine. His ears heated. How can I find out whether she wants me without putting my head on the block? He liked that version of the question much better. I won’t take any chances to find out, not the way Menedemos does.

That made him feel better, but only for a little while. If he hadn’t been trained to root out self-delusion, it probably would have satisfied him longer. As things were, though, he had to wonder, How do I know what I want? A man who wants a woman isn’t likely to think straight.

Aristeidas said, “Maybe you ought to go get laid, you don’t mind my saying so. The girls at this place around the corner are pretty friendly-or they act like they are, anyhow.”

If he hadn’t added that last little bit, he might have persuaded Sostratos. As things were, he only reminded him of the difference between what was paid for and what was freely given. “Another time,” Sostratos said.

“They’re funny there, you know?” Aristeidas went on. “Our women always singe off the hair between their legs or else shave it off, the way you shave your face.”

Sostratos plucked at his beard. “I don’t shave my face,” he pointed out.

“No, the way you would if you did,” the sailor said confusingly. “The whores here don’t shave their bushes, or singe them, or anything. They just let ‘em grow. It looks funny, if you ask me.”

“Yes, I guess it would,” Sostratos agreed. Some men, he supposed, might find the difference exciting. Others might find it disgusting; Aristeidas seemed close to feeling that way. At first, Sostratos thought it wouldn’t matter to him one way or the other. Then he imagined Zilpah with a hairy delta at the joining of her legs. The thought roused him more than he’d expected it to, but was that because he imagined hairy private parts or Zilpah’s private parts? He wasn’t sure.

Zilpah said, “Greetings, my master.” She wasn’t talking to Sostratos, but to another lodger who’d just walked into the inn.

“Hail,” the newcomer replied in Greek. He paused for a moment inside the doorway, letting his eyes adjust to the gloom within. Seeing Sostratos and Aristeidas, he waved. “Hail, Rhodians,” he said, and headed over to their table.

“Hail, Hekataios,” Sostratos answered. “Always good to talk to a fellow Hellene.”

Aristeidas didn’t seem to share his opinion. The sailor got to his feet. “I’ll see you later, young sir,” he said. “I’m sure you’ll still be around whenever I come back.” He left before Hekataios perched on a stool.

Perched, Sostratos thought, was the operative word. Hekataios of Abdera-a polis on the southern coast of Thrace-was a birdlike man: small, thin, sharp-featured, quick-moving. “How are you?” he asked Sostratos, speaking Ionic Greek with a strong Attic overlay. Sostratos’ Doric accent had that same overlay, so the two of them sounded more like each other than less educated, less traveled men from their home cities would have.

“Well, thanks,” Sostratos answered.

Zilpah came up. “What would you like, my master?” she asked Hekataios.

“Wine. Bread. Oil,” he replied in extremely rudimentary Aramaic.

“I would also like bread and oil, please,” Sostratos told the innkeeper’s wife.

As Zilpah went off, Hekataios returned to Greek: “I’m jealous of you. You really speak the language. I didn’t think I’d need to when I started traveling through Ioudaia, but Hellenes are so thin on the ground here, I’ve had to start learning ‘ow to go bar-bar-bar myself.” Every once in a while, but only every once in a while, he would forget a rough breathing, as Ionians usually did.

“I’m not fluent,” Sostratos said. “I wish I knew more.”

“I’d have an easier time with my researches if I could make those funny grunting noises, but I do seem to manage even without them.”

Zilpah came back with the food and drink. As Sostratos dipped a chunk of brown bread in olive oil, he said, “Jealous? Speaking of jealous,

0 best one, you have no idea how jealous I am of you. I have to buy and sell as I go. I can’t travel about the countryside for the sake of love of wisdom.” He was also jealous of the wealth that let Hekataios of Abdera do exactly that, but kept quiet about that bit of envy. To him, the other was more important.

Hekataios shrugged. “When I was in Alexandria, I got interested in the Ioudaioi. They’re such a peculiar people.” He rolled his eyes. “And so I decided to come here and find out about them for myself.”

“You’re lucky Antigonos’ men didn’t decide you were spying for Ptolemaios,” Sostratos said.

“Not at all, my dear fellow.” Hekataios tossed his head. “I had written out for me a safe-conduct stating that I was a lover of wisdom traveling for the sake of learning more about the world in which I live, and so was not to be harassed by mere soldiers.”

“And it worked when you got to the frontier?” Sostratos asked.

“Plainly not. Plainly I was seized and tortured and crucified,” Hekataios answered. Sostratos coughed and flushed. He could be sarcastic himself, but he’d met his match and then some in Hekataios of Abdera. The older man relented: “As a matter of fact, Antigonos’ officers ‘ave been more than a little helpful. From everything I’ve heard and seen, Antigonos himself is a man of learning.”

“I suppose so,” Sostratos said. “I know Ptolemaios is. But I wouldn’t want to have either one of them angry at me, and that’s the truth.”

“There I cannot argue with you in the least,” Hekataios agreed. “Then again, however, the weak are always wise not to fall into the clutches of the strong. So it has been since the gods-if gods there be-made the world, and so it shall remain as long as men stay men.”

“It’s a good thing you said that in Greek, and that Ithran wasn’t here to understand it,” Sostratos observed. “Let a Ioudaian hear ‘if gods there be’ and you’ve got more trouble for yourself than you really want. They take their own invisible deity very, very seriously.”

“I should say they do!” Hekataios dipped his head. “They always have, as best I’ve been able to determine.”

“Tell me more, if you’d be so kind,” Sostratos said. “This sort of thing is meat and drink to me. I wish I had the chance to do what you’re doing.”

1 wish I didn’t have to worry about making a living, was what that boiled down to. Hekataios’ family had to own land out to the horizon up in Abdera, or to have got wealthy some other way, to let him spend his life traveling and learning.

He smiled what struck Sostratos as a superior smile. But that half sneer didn’t last. What could be more attractive than somebody who was interested in what one was doing? “As I was telling you the last time we talked,” Hekataios said, “these Ioudaioi came here from out of Egypt.”