Thessalonica

“They’re not talking about fennel,” Theodore said in a voice George didn’t think he was supposed to overhear. “They’re talking about one of us--unless they’re talking about both of us.”

“I know that,” Sophia replied indignantly, as if her brother had mistaken her for a halfwit. “But I don’t want to come right out and say it, do I?”

George suffered a coughing fit at the same time as Irene made wheezing noises, the way some people did when flowers bloomed in springtime. Had their children been a little farther away--on the island of Britain, for instance, George thought--both of them would have howled laughter.

As they went back inside, Irene found a way to make them both serious again. She asked, “Now that the Slavs and Avars have found they can’t knock the wall down with crowbars and such, what do you think they’ll try next?”

“I don’t know if they’ve found they can’t knock the wall down this way,” George answered “I just think the Slavs took as much punishment as they could stand right then, which may not be the same thing.” He considered. “They seem to be taking turns, soldiers one try, powers the next We still don’t know all the different powers they have, but my bet is, we’ll find out.”

“Find out what?” Theodore asked when they came into the workroom.

“Find out who’s been trying to listen to every word we say,” his father answered with a growl that concealed memories of trying to find out what his own parents had been up to when he was Theodore’s age and younger.

“Is the fennel all right?” Sophia asked, mildly enough to keep George from thinking she was practicing one of John’s routines.

“The fennel is fine,” George said. “The two of you, on the other hand, are nosy. Irene, which of them do you suppose is nosier than the other?”

“Both,” Irene said, which confused George but confused Theodore and Sophia even more, thereby accomplishing its purpose.

Claudia came in with the sandal George had repaired not long before. Now it had two broken straps, not just one. Despite that detail, Claudia said, “You didn’t fix this very well, George.”

“I am sorry,” George replied, examining the damage. “If you use a shoe to hit people, you know, it won’t wear so well as it would if you only walked in it.”

“That’s not very good.” Claudia’s voice was indignant. Not only did irony roll off her like dye from a well-greased area of leather on a boot, she also remained as convinced nothing was ever her fault as if she were an aristocrat rather than an artisan’s wife. “Shoes should be strong enough to stand up to whatever you do to them.”

“I’ll try to get this back to you in a couple of days,” George said resignedly He knew he wasn’t going to make her see the world or her place in it any differently. What Dactylius saw in her--except someone bigger and stronger and fiercer than he--was beyond the shoemaker.

Claudia’s pale eyes flashed fire. “A couple of days?” she said.

Not being married to her, George could take a firmer line than her husband. “Yes, a couple of days, I’m afraid,” he answered. “I have a lot of work here that I’m trying to do, and I don’t have a lot of time to do it. You can blame that on the Slavs and Avars, if you like, along with everything else.”

“I do. Oh, I do,” Claudia said. “They’ve done nothing but make my life miserable ever since they got here. As far as I’m concerned, they ought to go away and never come back.”

“As far as I’m concerned, they ought to go away and never come back, too,” George said, though he concerned himself with the Slavs and Avars more for what they were liable to do to Thessalonica as a whole than for how they were inconveniencing him in particular.

Claudia let out a melodramatic sigh she probably meant to be martyred instead. “All right, George. A couple of days, since you’re the one who says so.” She swept out, dissatisfied but doing her best to bear up under the disappointment: an actor in a mime troupe couldn’t have conveyed the emotion more clearly.

Once she was gone and George was sure she wouldn’t make any sudden reappearances, he said, “I admire Claudia--I really do.” That drew from the rest of his family the disbelieving exclamations he’d expected. He held up a hand. “No, wait. Hear me out. How many other people in this whole city can you think of who make me glad to go up on the wall and fight the Slavs and Avars?”

No one answered him, by which he concluded he’d won his point.

George and Theodore jostled for places near the altar in St. Demetrius’ basilica. Up in the women’s gallery, Irene and Sophia were probably doing the same thing. They sometimes came home from church with stories of pushing and shoving. Once or twice, they’d come home with bruises on their arms.

Theodore twisted past a plump man. Turning back to his father, he said, “I’ll bet Dactylius’ wife watches the divine liturgy from wherever she pleases.”