The Orpheus Descent (37 page)

‘I suppose you have come to see me?’

‘And what’s more, I have to say, so far you’ve only understood a small fraction of the difficulty which this involves …’

Plato
, Parmenides

Love draws you to Beauty. Beauty leads you to Truth. And Truth is immortal.

For a moment, I felt as if I’d broken through the clouds and was standing on a mountaintop bathed in sunlight. The love in my heart fused with the longing in my soul and I thought I understood everything Diotima had told me. I was flying.

‘What did Agathon find when he went through the door?’

Diotima lay back in my lap and gave me a strange, dissatisfied look. ‘I’ve told you as much as I can.’

The sun went in. I landed with a bump. ‘But you haven’t told me anything. Just riddles and metaphors.’

‘Words are part of the wall we have to get through.’ She pointed to the circle she’d drawn in the earth. The damp ground had already begun to ooze shut, muddying the shape. ‘We call this a “circle”. But if we called it a “straight line”, it would still be the same thing. Language is a weak tool: it describes things, but it doesn’t get to the
being
of the thing.’

‘There you go again,’ I complained. ‘
Walls
,
tools
– more metaphors.’

‘Metaphors are the closest we can come. To put it into words brings it down to the level of language – and all that languages
are
is metaphors.’ She bit her lip, frustrated with me. ‘Didn’t you ever have an experience that seemed to go beyond words?’

‘Last night.’ Even thinking about it sent small tremors through me.

‘So describe it to me.’

I blushed – but she wouldn’t let me off the hook. ‘Well, um, you undressed, and then I took off my tunic, and then I put my …’ I mumbled away into nothingness. ‘This is ridiculous.’

‘You see? Some things are too real to be put into language.’

‘But I need to understand.’

She turned away and began walking into the trees, brushing past the papyrus fronds. I called after her, ‘Did Agathon find it in the book?
The Krater
?’

A rustling in the reeds across the lake made me look back. Dion had returned with the boat. He gave Diotima a shy stare that stayed on her while I clambered in. He started to row away. Diotima stood on the shore and watched us go.

‘Wait,’ I called. I could feel something being pulled out of my heart as the space opened between us. ‘Aren’t you coming?’

‘I can’t come to Ortygia. There’s a lion in that cave who’d gobble me up if he got his hands on me.’

She said it frivolously, like a little girl playing pretend. But the grimace on Dion’s face was real enough, and all too grown-up. I wondered again about his place in things. Where were his loyalties?

My thoughts were a mess as we rowed across the lake: a tangle of frustrated questions and ignorance. Diotima’s mysteries had set me on fire; I had to know them, however much she wrapped them up in riddles and allusions.

What was Agathon looking for?

The same as you.

But was it the secret Agathon discovered that killed him? Or was it the nymph he fell in love with?

As we approached the landing, I saw a guard hurrying up the steps to the palace, presumably to report to the tyrant that I had come back as promised. Or perhaps to tell the boy to get back to the library. When I got there, I found him still staring at the same scene of Aeschylus I’d set him that morning.

I gave him some Aesop – the fable of the Fox and the Grapes, nothing controversial – and told him to compose two columns on the moral. He scowled, which was something. I stared out of the window, at the crimson sky and the sea, and tried to put my thoughts in some sort of order.

Was it the mystery I wanted, or Diotima? Did I think that by possessing one I could understand the other? The Voice of Desire screamed so loud I couldn’t tell what it was saying.

Too many metaphors, the Voice of Reason complained. Wings, walls, nymphs, souls: every question I asked, Diotima obscured it in clouds of words.

Socrates, baiting a sophist: ‘I don’t want this “if you like” or “that’s your opinion” sort of argument; I want to prove the
real
you and me.’

Metaphors insinuate and suggest; they mislead the mind like a painter’s trick of perspective. You think they add meaning, but all they are is images. They create similarities where none exist. They’re illusions. Lies.

From now on, I resolved, I’ll steer clear of metaphors and other figures of speech. They’re too dangerous for the situation I’m in.

When the lesson was over, I found Dion on one of the terraces overlooking the harbour. His hair was oiled and combed, and he wore a vividly dyed robe. Lesser men would have looked pretentious in it – I’d have felt ridiculous – but Dion carried it off easily. I guessed Dionysius was hosting a dinner that night, though I hadn’t been invited. If the tyrant had really wanted to torture me, he’d have made me go.

We greeted each other, and talked warily around a few general subjects – the weather, the theatre, common acquaintances. The impact of our first meeting had cooled to second thoughts: now, neither of us trusted ourselves. Or each other.

Two bushy cypresses grew at either end of the terrace, filled with starlings. The screech of their chatter made it impossible to eavesdrop on us. And I had to believe that the golden youth I’d glimpsed, thirsty for virtue, was still there inside the shell.

‘Your brother bought a book from a man in Locris called Timaeus,’ I said.

‘He buys a lot of books.’

‘This is one he paid a hundred drachmas for. It’s called
The Krater.
’

He shrugged.

‘Do you know where it is?’

‘Most of his books are in the library.’

I turned and looked Dion in the eye. For all their confidence, there are still ways of asserting authority over eager young men. Socrates taught me that much.

‘Do you know the book I mean?’

Suddenly, like athletes at the starter’s call, the starlings rose off the tree in a cloud. They flew out over the water, spiralling and twisting in the air like smoke.

The soul is the impression we leave when we die – smoke lingering in the air when the fire’s burned out.

No metaphors, I reminded myself sternly.

Dion picked up a leaf and began pulling it apart.

‘The book was gibberish. The ravings of a madman. Dionysius was so furious he’d spent a hundred drachmas on it, he ordered it to be burned.’

I gripped the balustrade and stared at the foamy water swirling below, hoping there was more. ‘And?’

‘I don’t like to see knowledge destroyed. I persuaded him to send it to the temple treasury instead.’

‘I need to see it.’

‘There’s no point. My brother was right: it’s nonsense.’

Words are part of the wall we have to get through.

‘I’ll judge that for myself.’

Dion straightened a fold in his robe. ‘Then you’ll have to ask Dionysius. No one except the chief priest enters the temple sanctuary without his permission.’

Dion went in to dinner; I headed back to my room. In the colonnade by Dionysius’ ball court, I met Euphemus and another man coming the other way. The companion was short, fat and balding, sweating from trying to keep pace with Euphemus. He smiled as if I should remember him.

‘We were coming to find you,’ Euphemus said.

‘Our new Athenian,’ his companion added. ‘The scourge of tyrants.’

The moment he spoke, I remembered who he was. The strange man who’d found me in the garden the day before, who’d thought I should have brought him letters. So much had happened since then I’d almost forgotten.

‘Did you get your letter from Athens?’ I asked.

‘That was a misunderstanding.’ He chuckled, then abruptly broke off. ‘Or perhaps not.’

‘Leon thought you were me,’ Euphemus explained.

‘An Athenian, a philosopher, the boy’s tutor – you can see why I was confused.’

Another smile, eager to please. I didn’t care. Euphemus was the least of my worries now.

Leon glanced over his shoulder and licked his lips. ‘I’m glad we found you. There’s a passage of Herodotus we’d like your opinion on.’

He unrolled a book and fussed until he found the line he wanted. He pointed a fat finger to it, inviting me to read.

‘To yourself, if you don’t mind.’

I leaned over.
When night fell, Gyges took his knife and hid behind the door. Then, when the king had fallen asleep, Gyges entered his room and struck him dead.

I looked up, surprised and confused. ‘What do you want to know?’

‘We’d just like your opinion.’

I tried to think of something intelligent. ‘There’s a variant of this story I’ve heard,’ I said. ‘Gyges finds a magic ring which makes him invisible, which lets him sneak into the king’s palace.’

‘How quaint.’

‘It poses the ethical question: do we behave well because it’s the right thing to do, or just because we’re worried we’ll get caught?’

I glanced at Euphemus, expecting him to launch into one of his monologues. But he stayed quiet. Instead, Leon exclaimed, ‘But that’s precisely what we wanted to talk to you about. Ethical questions.’

‘I’ll try.’

‘Now this passage here …’ He rolled the scroll on and pointed. I read, silently,
It was a heavy blow to Croesus to learn that his son was dead, because the stranger whom he had sent as the child’s guardian had turned out to be the murderer.

I was missing something. I checked with Euphemus again, but he wouldn’t meet my eye.

‘You keep on talking about a question.’ I looked from one to the other. ‘Well? What is it?’

Leon fiddled with his thumbs. ‘Really, you’ve hit the nail on the head already. Is a good man willing to do the right thing? Even if he might get caught.’

‘I think you misunderstood. If he’s doing the right thing, he doesn’t have to worry about being caught.’

‘Well, that’s just it, isn’t it? Good and bad, right and wrong. Tricky.’ He nodded twice more. ‘That’s why we came to you.’

‘Socrates would have said that a man who knows what’s good could never do something bad.’

‘Take Thrasybulus,’ Euphemus said suddenly. ‘Would you say that what he did was right or wrong?’

I stared, trying to make sense of the question. Athenian history was so far from my mind that it took me a moment to put the pieces together. Thrasybulus is the general who came out of exile to overthrow the Thirty Tyrants, fifteen years ago. He led the Democrats in the battle where my inglorious uncle Critias died.

At first I thought Euphemus was simply mocking me again, trying to get a rise with an old argument. Then the penny dropped.

I looked up and down the corridor. I lowered my voice. ‘Are you asking …?’

‘Will a good man do a bad thing in a good cause?’ Euphemus nodded grimly. Leon jabbed a finger at me, in case I had any doubt which good man they had in mind.

‘You’ve changed your tune,’ I said to Euphemus. It was easier than answering the question. ‘I thought you admired …
him
.’ I didn’t dare say the name aloud.

‘Let’s say I changed my mind.’

‘And you?’ I turned to Leon. ‘What’s your part in this?’

Euphemus answered for him. ‘Dionysius has had a long reign. Do you think Agathon was the only one to suffer?’

I looked at Leon more closely. Suddenly, his constant motion, the awkward laughs and sudden twitches, seemed less like a clown and more like a man trying desperately hard to shift a weight he couldn’t bear.

I pitied him, whatever he’d endured. But it wasn’t my business.

‘If you want to do this thing, go ahead and good luck. But without me.’

‘We need you.’

‘Why?’

Leon pointed back to the scroll, still open in my hands. I read it again.

… the stranger whom he had sent as the child’s guardian had turned out to be the murderer.

A line of sweat trickled down my spine. A pain started spreading through my chest.

‘It has to be done,’ Leon said. ‘No point killing the lion and leaving the cub.’

‘We need someone with access to the boy,’ Euphemus added.

I looked from one to the other. I looked at Herodotus and thought about Gyges’ ring. What
would
I do with it? Would I creep, invisible, into the tyrant’s bedroom and stab him in his sleep, safe in the knowledge no one would ever know?

Diotima: In their hearts, all men think that behaving badly will get them further than doing the right thing. Good men are just too frightened of getting caught.

The day before he died, I went to visit Socrates. He sat on a stone bench in the prison, his feet shackled to the floor, his head slumped over in sleep. Summer heat made the place stink like a toilet. Outside, the Scythian guards were unusually quiet. I’d been there so often that month I’d got to know them well.

He looked so peaceful that, even with the urgency of the moment, I couldn’t bear to wake him. I sat by his feet, toying with the key the warden had thoughtfully left on a hook outside. I wondered what he was dreaming.

‘I can’t believe you can sleep at a time like this,’ I murmured.

‘At my age, there’s no point resenting the fact that I have to die.’

I’d spoken so softly I’d barely heard myself. But Socrates was sitting up, wide awake. His face – his bulbous, florid, beautiful face – looked down on me like a child in a crib. Even there, at the end, no malice or hurt clouded his eyes.

‘Have you been here long?’

I shook my head. ‘Everything’s prepared. The warden’s gone out to the agora and won’t be back for half an hour. The guards have been called to a fire in the Kerameikos. Simmias and Crito are waiting outside with a fast horse, and we’ve paid off the informers so that even if someone sees you go, they won’t remember it.’ I knelt to unlock his shackles – but Socrates stopped my hand.

‘Do you think I should change the principles I’ve taught just because the circumstances have changed? Or was that all just
for the sake of argument
?’

‘But you can’t die like this,’ I raged. ‘It’s … It’s …
absurd
.’