“Hail yourself,” he said. “How are things here?”

“Tolerable, skipper, tolerable,” Diokles answered. “You’re out and about earlier than usual, aren’t you?”

“Work doesn’t wait,” Menedemos said. He didn’t always take that attitude. But he would have needed a much more enjoyable distraction than the innkeeper’s wife to make work wait. He went on, “One of the Hellenes from Antigonos’ garrison gave me the name of a merchant here who deals in fine cloth. I’m going to take some of our Koan silk over to him, see what it’ll bring in this part of the world.”

“Sounds good to me, skipper,” the keleustes said. “We’re a long ways from Kos, that’s for sure, so silk won’t come here every day, especially when it’s not going through fourteen middlemen. You ought to get a good price.”

“I hope so.” Menedemos hid a smile. On a Rhodian ship, everybody could speak knowledgeably of trade.

“Does this Sidonian fellow know any Greek?” Diokles asked-another relevant consideration, with Sostratos on his way to Engedi.

“That soldier said he did,” Menedemos answered. “Said he does a fair amount of business with Hellenes, so he’s had to learn.”

“All right.” The oarmaster dipped his head. “Good fortune go with you, then.”

“Thanks.” Menedemos poked through the cargo, wishing he’d made Sostratos leave him a more complete manifest. After a little while, though, he found the oiled-leather sacks that protected bolts of silk from seawater. They weren’t heavy, of course. He slung three of them over his shoulder and set off for the cloth merchant’s house.

The Hellene in Macedonian service had given him what sounded like good directions: the street opposite the entrance to the temple of Ashtart (Aphrodite ’s Phoenician counterpart), third house on the left. But Menedemos took a wrong turn somewhere. In a town built by Hellenes, he would have had an easy time spotting a temple, for it would have stood out above the roofs of houses and shops. But the Sidonians built tall. How am I supposed to find this polluted temple if they go and hide it? he thought irritably.

He tried asking people on the streets, but they started at him in blank incomprehension and gave back streams of gibberish. Not for the first time since coming here, he wished he’d spent part of the winter learning Aramaic, too. At last, he found a couple of Antigonos’ soldiers lurching out of a wineshop.

They were drunk, but they understood Greek. “The temple of Ashtart, is it?” one of them said. “You want a go at the temple prostitutes? Most of ‘em are ugly.”

“No, not the prostitutes.” Menedemos tossed his head, thinking, Maybe another time. “I’m trying to find a house near the temple.”

“Ugly girls,” the soldier repeated. His pal told Menedemos how to find the temple and even declined the tip the Rhodian tried to give him. That, to a Hellene, was a minor miracle. Menedemos followed his directions and found they worked. That wasn’t a minor miracle, but came close.

“Third house on the left, street opposite the entrance,” Menedemos muttered when he got to the temple. The street seemed more of an alley, narrow and cramped. Menedemos planted his bare feet with care. When he knocked on the door to the third house on the left, a dog inside began to bark. It sounded like a big, fierce dog. After a minute, somebody on the other side of the door said something in Aramaic.

In Greek, Menedemos answered, “Is this the house of Zakerbaal son of Tenes, the cloth merchant?”

A pause inside. The dog kept barking. Then, very suddenly, it stopped with a yelp, as if someone had kicked it. One word came through the door, in heavily accented Greek: “Wait.”

Menedemos waited. After what seemed to him much too long, the door opened. A short, wide-shouldered, muscular man looked out at him. “I am Zakerbaal. Who are you, and what do you want?” he asked. His Greek was considerably better than his slave’s.

“I’m Menedemos son of Philodemos, of Rhodes,” Menedemos began.

“Ah. The fellow from the merchant galley.” Zakerbaal nodded. His heavy features brightened into a smile. “You’re at Sedek-yathon’s inn these days, aren’t you? Tell me, has his wife tried pulling you into bed yet?”

“ Zeus!” Menedemos muttered, gaping at the cloth merchant. A moment later, he realized he would have done better to swear by wing-footed Hermes, messenger of the gods and god of rumor. He pulled himself together enough to dip his head in agreement and say, “Yes, that’s right, best one. Er-how did you know?”

“Merchants hear about merchants, my master,” the Phoenician answered. “I wondered if you might call on me. Or did you mean about the innkeeper’s wife? She is no secret in Sidon, believe me. But come in. Drink wine with me. Eat dates and raisins. Show me your wares. What have you there?”

“Silk from Kos, the finest fabric in the world,” Menedemos said proudly.

“I know of it. I will gladly look at it,” Zakerbaal said. The reaction was polite, interested, but less than Menedemos had hoped for. Was Zakerbaal so formidable a bargainer? Or was it that, never having seen silk, he didn’t know how splendid a cloth it was? Menedemos hoped for the latter.

He followed the Phoenician into the courtyard of his house: a courtyard rather bare by Hellenic standards, for it had no garden. The dog growled and lunged at Menedemos, but a chain brought it up short. Zakerbaal spoke in his own guttural language. Servants brought stools and took the dog away. They fetched a basin of water, in which Zakerbaal ceremoniously washed his hands. Menedemos followed his host’s lead. Refreshments followed. The wine was quite good. “Where does this come from?” Menedemos asked.

“Byblos, my master,” Zakerbaal replied.

As was the Phoenician way, he served the wine neat. That concentrated its bouquet, which measured up against that of any Menedemos had ever known, even the finest Khian and Thasian vintages. “Very good,” he repeated. Its flavor didn’t quite match that marvelous, flowery bouquet, but it was more than worth drinking: good enough, in fact, to make Menedemos wonder whether he could get some and bring it back to Rhodes.

With the wine, Zakerbaal’s slave brought out figs and dates and raisins and balls of dried chickpeas fried in olive oil and dusted with cumin. Menedemos found those very tasty, but spicy enough to raise his thirst. He drank more wine to put it down.

Zakerbaal chatted affably about matters of little importance while his guest ate and drank. Presently, the cloth merchant said, “Perhaps you would be so good, my master, as to show me some of this famous Koan silk you have. Your servant has heard of it, and would be glad to learn its quality.”

“I’d be happy to, most noble one,” Menedemos answered. His hands were steady as he undid the rawhide lashing that held one of his leather sacks closed. His wits were steady, too, or he thought they were. He hadn’t been silly enough to pour down a lot of unmixed wine, not with a dicker ahead of him. He took out a bolt of the finest, filmiest silk he had and held it up against the sun so Zakerbaal could see how nearly transparent it was. “Imagine a beautiful woman wearing-or almost wearing-robes of this,” he told the Phoenician.

Zakerbaal smiled. Whatever he was imagining, he liked it. He reached for the silk but politely stopped before touching it. “May I feel of it?” he asked.

“Of course.” Menedemos handed him the fine, fine cloth. “There’s nothing like it in all the world.”

“Perhaps,” was all Zakerbaal said. His fingers traveled the fabric as delicately, as knowingly, as if exploring that imaginary woman’s body. He held the silk up to his face so he could peer through it, even breathe through it. When he lowered it, he nodded to Menedemos. “This is good. This is very good. I must tell you, though, my master, and I mean no offense: I have seen better.”

“What? Where?” Menedemos yelped. “There is no better fabric than Koan silk.” He’d heard plenty of ploys for lowering prices. This had to be another one. “If you’ve got better, O marvelous one”-a bit of sarcasm Zakerbaal might or might not notice-”please show it to me.”