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

without relief as long as my life. I determined that I would go to the shore, and throw myself from a rock
into the sea. I lay resting, only waiting to get back enough of my strength to go, and seeing in my mind the
streets I should pass through as I left the City. Then I remembered Lysis meeting me in the road and
saying, Where are you going so fast, son of Myron? I tried to imagine myself replying to him, I am going
to leap in the sea, because my father beat me. At this thought, I knew that I was being absurd. So I
covered myself in bed, and at last fell asleep.

Later I learned that my father had sought me about the City, and must have known that I had not been to
the palaestra, but had punished me for my disrespect, as any father would. I have never beaten my own
boys so hard; but for all I know, they are the worse for it.

Next day I was slow to seek my mother at her loom; but she called me to her. When you were little,
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Alexias, were you angry at hearing you were to have a stepmother? I am sure you were; for in the tales
they are always wicked creatures. — Of course not. I have often told you how it was. — But surely
someone said to you that when a stepmother has a son of her own, she grows unkind to her husband's
child? Slaves are full of tales like that. I turned my face away and said No.

She rattled her shuttle through the loom. Old women are much the same. With a young bride, they love
to croak about the trials of a second wife; making sure she will be frightened not only of her husband,
which will happen in any case, but of his slaves, and even his friends who will know no more of her than
her cooking and weaving. More than anything, she is certain her stepson already hates her, and looks to
her coming as the worst misfortune of his life. And when, expecting all this, she finds a good son with
hands stretched out in welcome, nothing is so long remembered; no child can grow dearer than the first.
She ceased, but I could not answer her. You were a boy fond of your own way, she said, yet when you
saw that I was afraid of seeming ignorant, you told me the rules you had to keep yourself, and even how
you were punished for breaking them.

Her voice trembled and I saw she was going to cry. I knew I should have to run away without speaking;
but as I went, I caught her arm in my hand to let her know we parted friends. Her bones felt small, like a
hare's.

After this I grew used to the thought of the baby, and even told some of my friends. Xenophon gave me
advice on how I ought to train it. At times it seemed he wanted me to bring it up as a Spartan; at others,
as a horse.

I was now turned sixteen and had finished my schooling with Mikkos. Some of my friends were already
studying with sophists. I was careful not to open this subject with my father, for after recent events I
knew he would not let me go to Sokrates and might commit me to someone else. I meant to approach
him when the scandal had faded somewhat from his mind. A good part of my spare time I spent at our
farm, carrying out his orders and keeping an eye on things when he was busy; and sometimes Xenophon
and I hunted hares together. He had his own leash of harriers, which he had bred from his father's dogs;
he had trained them well to follow the line, and not be drawn off by foxes and other vermin.

I had almost forgotten theSalaminia when she returned. Everyone flocked to the harbour, to see how
Alkibiades would look, andif he would show any fear. Most people's anger had cooled by now; they