The corpse lay on a fragile birch-wood litter. The torso and belly were a confusion of splits and tears crusted with congealed blood and dried mud, but the head and arms appeared unblemished. A soldier pulled aside the corpse's robes for Aschilos to examine it. Onlookers gathered, slowly at first, then in great numbers, forming a circle around the macabre remains. A cold shiver ran over Night's blue skin, and the golden manes of the torches, the dark edges of the chlamyses, and the thick horsehair crests on the soldiers' helmets waved in the Boreas. Silence had open eyes: All gazes followed Aschilos's movements as he performed the terrible examination. As gently as a midwife, he parted the lips of the wounds, then probed the horrific cavities with meticulous attention, like a reader sliding his finger over inscriptions on papyrus. His slave held a lamp over him, shielding it from the buffeting wind with his hand. All were silent save old Candaulus. When the soldiers had appeared with the corpse, he had started shouting in the middle of the street, waking the neighborhood, and there now remained a faint echo of his earlier raving. He limped around the circle of onlookers, apparently unaffected by the cold, though nearly naked, dragging his withered left foot a blackened satyr's hoof. He held out reedy, emaciated arms, leaning on the others' shoulders, crying, "Look at him! He must be a god! This is how the gods descend from Olympus! Don't touch him! Didn't you hear me? He's a god . . . Swear your allegiance, Callimachus! You, too, Euphorbus!"
A great mane of white hair grew untidily on his angular head like an expression of his madness. It waved in the wind, half-covering his face. But the crowd paid him little attention people preferring to look upon the corpse rather than at the madman.
The captain of the border guard emerged with two of his men from the nearest house, replacing his long-maned helmet: He believed it appropriate that he should display his military insignia in public. He peered through his dark visor at the gathered crowd. Noticing Candaulus, he gestured dismissively, as if brushing away a bothersome fly.
"Silence him, by Zeus," he said, not addressing any of the soldiers in particular.
One of them approached the old man and, raising his lance, with a single horizontal blow, struck the wrinkled papyrus of his abdomen. Candaulus gasped midsentence and doubled up soundlessly, like hair flattened in the wind. He lay writhing and whimpering on the ground. The crowd was grateful for the sudden quiet.
"Your report, Physician?"
The doctor, Aschilos, took his time to answer, not even looking up at the captain. He disliked being addressed as "Physician," even more when the speaker seemed contemptuous of every man save himself. Aschilos might not be a soldier, but he came from an old aristocratic family and had had a most refined education: He was conversant with The Aphorisms, observed the Hippocratic oath, and had spent long periods on the island of Cos, studying the sacred art of the Asclepiads, disciples and heirs of Asclepius. He was not, therefore, someone a captain of the border guard could easily humiliate. And he already felt insulted: He had been awakened by soldiers in the dark hours of the early morning and called to examine, in the middle of the street, the corpse of the young man brought down on a litter from Mount Lycabettus. And he was no doubt expected to draw up some kind of report. But as everyone well knew, he, Aschilos, was a doctor of the living, not the dead, and he believed that this shameful task discredited his profession. He lifted his hands from the mangled body, trailing a mane of bloody humors. His slave hurriedly cleansed them with a cloth moistened with lustral water. He cleared his throat twice and said, "I believe he was attacked by a hungry pack of wolves. He's been bitten and mauled . . . The heart is missing. Torn out. The cavity of the hot fluids is partially empty."
The murmur, with its long mane, ran through the crowd.
"You heard him, Hemodorus," one man whispered to another. "Wolves."
"Something must be done," his companion replied. "We will discuss the matter at the Assembly."
"His mother has been informed the captain announced, the firmness of his voice extinguishing all comments. "I spared her the details; she knows only that her son is dead. And she is not to see the body until Daminus of Clazobion arrives. He is the only man left in the family, and he will determine what is to be done." Legs apart, fists resting on the skirt of his uniform, he had a powerful voice, accustomed to imposing obedience. He appeared to address his men, but also evidently enjoyed having the attention of the common people. "As for us, our work here is done!"
He turned to the crowd of civilians and added, "Citizens, return to your homes! There is nothing more to see! Sleep if you can . . . Part of the night remains!"
Like a thick mane of hair ruffled by a capricious wind, each strand waving independently, the humble crowd gradually dispersed, some leaving separately, others in groups, some in silence, others commenting on the horrifying event.
"It's true, Hemodorus, wolves abound on Lycabettus. I've heard that several peasants, too, have been attacked."
"And now this poor ephebe! We must discuss the matter at the Assembly."
A short, very fat man remained behind, standing by the corpse's feet, peering at it placidly, his stout, though neat, face impassive. He appeared to have fallen asleep. The departing crowd avoided him, passing without looking at him, as if he were a column or a rock. One of the soldiers went to him and tugged at his cloak.
"Return home, citizen. You heard our captain."
The man took little notice, and continued to stare at the corpse, stroking his neatly trimmed gray beard with thick fingers. The soldier, thinking he must be deaf, gave him a slight push and raised his voice. "Hey, I'm talking to you! Didn't you hear the captain? Go home!"
"I'm sorry," said the man, though actually appearing quite unconcerned by the soldier's command. "I'll be on my way."
"What are you looking at?"
The man blinked twice and raised his eyes from the corpse, which another soldier was now covering with a cloak. He said, "Nothing. I was thinking."
"Well, think in your bed."
"You're right," said the man, as if he had woken from a catnap. He glanced around and walked slowly away.
All the onlookers had gone by now, and Aschilos, in conversation with the captain, swiftly disappeared as soon as the opportunity arose. Even old Candaulus was crawling away, still racked with pain and whimpering, helped on his way by the soldiers' kicks, in search of a dark corner to spend the night in demented dreams. His long white mane seemed to come alive, flowing down his back, then rising in an untidy snowy cloud, a white plume in the wind. In the sky, above the precise outline of the Parthenon, Night lazily loosened her mane, cloud-decked and edged with silver, like a maiden slowly combing her hair.
But the fat man whom the soldier seemed to have woken from a dream did not follow the others into the mane of streets that made up the tangled central district. Instead, he appeared to hesitate, to, think twice about his course of action, before setting off unhurriedly around the small square. He headed toward the house that the captain of the guard had left moments earlier and from which there now emerged he could hear it clearly a terrible wailing. The house, even in the dim light of dawn, revealed the presence of a family of considerable wealth it was large, on two floors, and had a vast low-walled garden spread out before it. At the entrance, a short flight of steps led up to a double door flanked by Doric columns. The door was open. A torch hung on the wall, and a little boy was sitting on the steps beneath it.
As the man approached, an old man appeared, staggering, at the door. He wore the gray tunic of a slave. At first, because of his unsteady gait, the fat man thought he must be either drunk or crippled, but then he realized that the slave was weeping bitterly. The old man barely glanced at him as he passed; clasping his face in his filthy hands, he stumbled up the garden path to a small statue of the guardian Hermes, mumbling disjointedly. The man could occasionally make out "My mistress!" and "Oh, woe!" The man turned his attention back to the boy, who was still sitting on the steps, his small arms crossed over his legs, watching without a trace of shyness.
"Are you a servant in this house?" he asked, showing him a rusty obol.
"Yes, but I could just as well be a servant in yours."
The man was taken aback by the swift answer and clear, defiant voice. The child couldn't be more than ten years old. A strip of cloth was tied around his head, only just controlling unruly blond hair the color of honey, although it was difficult to tell the exact shade in the torchlight. His small pale face bore no signs of Lydian or Phoenician origins, indicating instead that he was of northern, possibly Thracian, descent. With his small furrowed brow and lopsided smile, his expression was full of intelligence. He wore only a gray slave tunic, but seemed not to feel the cold, despite having bare arms and legs. He caught the obol skillfully and tucked it in the folds of his tunic. He remained sitting, swinging his bare feet.
Copyright 2002 by José Carlos Somoza