"Mary Renault - Greece 4 - The Last Of The Wine" - читать интересную книгу автора (Renault Mary)

Just then someone relieved his watch. We went to one of the fires, where he shared his wine with some
friends, and presented me to them. You can see, he said, that he has not done growing yet, from the size
of his hands and feet. Then I felt that he was apologising for me, because anyone could see I should
never be as big as he was; I remembered how he had wanted to expose me at my birth; so as soon as it
was civil, I took my leave.

I was kindling my torch at a fire that was burning near the statue of the Twins, when a man, who had just
come down from the temple, walked up to me. He had his helmet off, and turning with my torch alight I
saw that it was Lysis. I had seen him before in armour, exercising with the horsemen; he looked very well
in it. He said, Did you find your father, son of Myron? I thanked him and said yes. He stood for a
moment, so that I almost thought he had come out on purpose to speak to me; but he only said, Good,
and went back up the steps again.

Next day no more had been heard of the enemy, and the troops went home. The next storm to shake
the City concerned Alkibiades.

His sail had scarcely dropped under the horizon before the informers crept out. The tale of the Eleusis
party was told in full. Even the woman, whose role it would be unholy to hint at (let the Twice-Born
guess; they will be right), was found and induced to testify. Now that his face was out of sight, and his
voice out of hearing, everyone saw the madness of trusting the army to such a man. So the state galley,
theSalaminia, was sent to fetch him and his friend Antiochos the pilot, who had been denounced too. He
was not to be seized, however, lest trouble with the seamen and the Argives should break out again. The
trierarch of theSalaminia was to offer him civilly the trial he had asked for, and convoy him back in his
own ship.

I remember, on the day of the decree, coming in to find my father standing by the big press with a
painted winecup in his hands. It was one he rarely used, for it was valuable, one of the finest pieces of the
master Bacchios. In the bowl was a picture, red on black, of Eros coursing a hare; it was inscribed on
the one side MYRON and on the other ALKIBIADES. My father was turning it in his hands, like a man
in two minds; when he saw me, however, he put it back in the press.

Nothing but Alkibiades was talked of in the City. In the street, the palaestra and the markets, old tales
were told of his insolence and riot. Those who had once spoken for him would only debate, now, how he
came to be what he was, after being brought up by so good a man as Perikles. The answer was always
the same: the Sophists had corrupted him. They had taken him up as a lad, caught by his beauty and
quick mind; they had puffed him up with vanity, taught him impious free-thinking (here someone usually
quotedThe Clouds) until he dared to chop logic with Perikles himself. After which he, having got from
them what served his turn, laughed at their talk of wisdom and virtue, and went away.

I listened sick at heart, waiting for the name that always came up before long. It was common
knowledge, people said, that Sokrates had been in love with the youth, and wanted to make a greater
Perikles of him; would follow him to his loose revels, rebuke him in front of his friends, and drag him off
like a slave, out of jealousy, unwilling to have the boy an hour out of his sight. I felt the disgrace as if it
were my own. Since I could not silence the men, I spoke to Xenophon. We were scraping each other's
backs after wrestling; as I worked on him with the strigil, I said I could not see any crime in trying to
make a bad man good. He laughed at me over his shoulder. Scrape harder; you never scrape hard
enough. I will say for you, Alexias, you stick to your side. Well, let's be fair to him; all these people were