Worlds That Weren't

The councilors sprang to their feet. It was even better than he’d hoped. There with them were Androkles and Thettalos son of Kimon, two of his chief enemies-Thettalos had introduced the motion against him in the Assembly. “Alkibiades!” Androkles exclaimed in dismay. He could have sounded no more horrified if he’d seen Medusa standing before him-the last thing he would have seen before gazing upon her turned him to stone. No one else in the Tholos seemed any more delighted.

Bowing, Alkibiades answered, “Very much at your service, my dear. I will have you know that my whole army is in the city now. Those who are wise will comport themselves accordingly. Those who are not so wise will resist, for a little while-and pay the price for resisting.”

He bowed again, and smiled his sweetest smile. If his enemies chose to, they could still put up a fight for Athens, and perhaps even win. He wanted them to believe they had no chance, no hope. If they did believe it, their belief would help turn it true.

“Surely you are a kakodaimon, spawned from some pit of Tartaros!” Thettalos burst out. “We should have dealt with you before you sailed for Sicily.”

“You had your chance,” Alkibiades answered. “When the question of who mutilated the herms first came up, I asked for a speedy trial. I wanted my name cleared before the fleet sailed. You were the ones who delayed.”

“We needed to find witnesses who would talk,” Thettalos said.

“You needed to invent witnesses who would lie, you mean,” Alkibiades answered.

“They aren’t lying. They speak the truth,” Thettalos said stubbornly.

“I tell you, they lie.” Alkibiades cocked his head to one side. Yes, that was the sound of hoplites moving through the city, shields now and then clanking on greaves and corselets. And that was the sound of his name in the hoplites’ mouths. He’d told the truth here after all. By all appearances, his soldiers did hold Athens. He turned back to the men in the Tholos. “And I tell you this is your last chance to surrender and spare your lives. If you wait till my main force gets here, that will be too late. What do you say, gentlemen of Athens?” He used the title with savage irony.

They said what he’d thought they would: “We yield.” It was a glum, grumbling chorus, but a chorus nonetheless.

“Take them away,” Alkibiades told the soldiers with him. “We’ll put some honest people in the Tholos instead.” Laughing and grinning, the hoplites led the men of the Boule out into the night. Alkibiades stayed behind. He set down his shield and flung his arms wide in delight. At last! he thought. By all the gods-if gods there be-at last! Athens is mine!

As if nothing had changed in the polis, Simon the shoemaker drove hobnails into the sole of a sandal. As if nothing had changed, a small crowd of youths and young men gathered under the shade of the olive tree outside his shop. And, as if nothing had changed, Sokrates still argued with them about whatever came to mind.

He showed no inclination to talk about what had happened while he was away. After a while, a boy named Aristokles, who couldn’t have been above twelve, piped up: “Do you think your daimon was right, Sokrates, in urging you to go to the west?”

However young he was, he had a power and clarity to his thought that appealed to Sokrates. He’d phrased his question with a man’s directness, too. Sokrates wished he could answer so directly. After some hesitation-unusual for him-he said, “We won a victory in Sicily, which can only be good for the polis. And we won a victory in Sparta, where no foreign foe has ever won before. The Kings of Sparta are treating with Alkibiades for peace even while we speak here. That too can only be good for the polis.”

He sought truth like a lover pursuing his beloved. He always had. He always would. Here today, though, he wouldn’t have been disappointed to have his reply taken as full agreement, which it was not. And Aristokles saw as much, saying, “And yet you still have doubts. Why?”

“I know why,” Kritias said. “On account of Alkibiades, that’s why.”

Sokrates knew why Kritias spoke as he did-he was sick-jealous of Alkibiades. The other man had done things in Athens Kritias hadn’t matched and couldn’t hope to match. Ambition had always blazed in Kritias, perhaps to do good for his polis, certainly to do well for himself. Now he saw himself outdone, outdone by too much to make it even a contest. All he could do was fume.

Which did not mean he was altogether wrong. Alkibiades worried Sokrates, and had for years. He was brilliant, clever, handsome, dashing, charming-and, in him, all those traits led to vice as readily as to virtue. Sokrates had done everything he could to turn Alkibiades in the direction he should go. But another could do only so much; in the end, a man had to do for himself, too.

Aristokles’ eyes flicked from Sokrates to Kritias (they had a family connection, Sokrates recalled) and back again. “Is he right?” the boy asked. “Do you fear Alkibiades?”