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me, when he felt us to be lacking in diligence in some task or another.
    "Aedon," he snapped after roughly lining up the three of us before him, "do Spartan boys shirk their duties? Do they argue with their parents?"
    "No, Father," the boy automatically replied, but his voice lacked sincerity and his eyes were merry. Gryllus looked in disgust from Aedon's face, to Proxenus', to mine and back again, and his own expression took on a hard cast.
    "Proxenus, what's that in your hand?"
    "Honey cake, Uncle," Proxenus mumbled, his mouth full. Proxenus had chosen an inopportune time for his snack.
    "Honey cake? Open your hand." Proxenus did, and Gryllus slapped the contents roughly to the floor and ground it underfoot. Proxenus flushed crimson, and his eyes welled up with hot tears, but he remained silent.
    Gryllus looked at the boys sternly, his voice low and heavy with disdain for our pitiful softness. The sinews in his neck stood out in his tension. "Spartan boys your age get one meal a day. Watery black broth, not with their families, but on the ground outside, with their classmates. Spartans believe that a well-fed soldier is a poor soldier, so as children they are starved. If their classmates are caught stealing food, the entire class is beaten—not because of the stealing, but because they were clumsy enough to be caught. If they survive the beatings, they are taught to beat their comrades in turn. Do you understand?"
    We all nodded, our eyes wide.
    Gryllus again searched our faces, his one eye staring intently. After a moment he raised his gaze and stared off into the middle distance. We still stood at attention in front of him, expectantly, and as he looked back down at us he sighed. Then his face resumed its hard expression.
    "They tell of a Spartan boy who once stole a fox cub," Gryllus said, "for to the Spartans even a fox is food. He was seen running away, and the owner caught him. Before the boy was seized, however, he had just enough time to stuff the cub into the front of his tunic. When the cub's owner demanded to know where the beast was, the boy denied any knowledge. That is what he was trained to do. The interrogation went on for some time, until the boy suddenly fell down dead where he had been standing. When his body was examined, it was found that the hungry fox had chewed his way directly into the boy's intestines, but the lad, in his mindless Spartan way, had remained quiet at the cost of his life."
    Proxenus stood his ground, but Aedon's lower lip began trembling. As Gryllus coolly watched, he blanched, and suddenly whirling, ran out of the room. We could hear the sounds of his retching as he made his way outside. Proxenus and I stood silently watching Gryllus, who stared back at us impassively for a moment, then calmly strolled out, leaving us alone. For nights afterwards, I was wakened in the darkness by a trembling Aedon as he crawled into bed with me, terrified at nightmares of Herculean Spartans overpowering his house. Proxenus, however, remained in his own bed, tossing and turning, gamely taking on the attackers single-handedly.

CHAPTER TWO
     
     
     
     
     
    AEDON RACED THROUGH the crowded streets, dodging porters and carts as he ran, merrily snatching samples of fruit and sweets from the baskets carried by the women and girls on their way to their market stalls. Racing up the hill of the Acropolis and through the Propylaean Gates, he stopped, panting and perspiring, at the newly completed Parthenon to inspect the progress being made on construction of the garishly painted marble temples in the vicinity. He came here almost every day, to converse with the stonemasons and builders, who knew him by name, and to ask endless questions of the chief architect, Callicrates, who only half jokingly would sometimes ask him to check a calculation or two.
    After Aedon had closely scrutinized the footings for the new pillars to be erected in the Temple to Nike, I reminded him that it would soon be time for his