Tides of War (58 page)

The executioner, a physician of Brauron, chanced to be within the prison on another errand; he was kind enough to donate an interval with us, myself and Critobulus, Crito, Simmias of Thebes, Cebes, Epigenes, Phaedo of Samos, and the others. The practitioner, whose name was not revealed and who was unknown to us by sight, wore a plain white chiton as we all. He apprised us that tomorrow he would appear in the robe of his office; he wished to forewarn us that the sight might not, by its unexpectedness, evoke dismay.

We would be permitted to remain in the cell with Socrates until the end and to claim his body as soon as death had been pronounced and the certificate recorded. There would be no “final repast,” as the subject’s belly must be empty; nor may wine be taken later than noon, as its effect acted in contravention to the poison.

Crito asked what we may do to render our friend’s passage more endurable. Hemlock was painless, the doctor declared. Its effect was a progressive loss of sensation, commencing from the feet, the subject remaining alert and lucid up to the final stages. Nausea might be experienced as the drug reached the midsection; thereafter accelerated numbness, followed by loss of consciousness and, ultimately, cessation of heartbeat. The drug’s deficiency was that it took time, often as long as two hours. It was best if the subject remained quiet. Stimulation could impede the poison’s effect, necessitating a second dose and even a third. “He will feel cold, gentlemen. You may wish to bring a fleece or woolen mantle for his shoulders.”

Our party exited in silence. I had forgotten entirely about Polemides (who by now had no doubt filed his attestation of guilt) and would have departed without another thought had not the porter hailed me as we crossed the court, asking after the designated claimant for his, the assassin’s, body. For a moment I feared sentence had already been carried out; I was seized with grief and anguish. But no, the official informed me, Polemides’ execution would be tomorrow, at sunset, as Socrates’.

Death would be on the
tympanon.
He could not say how long they would drag it out. The assassin—so clever was he, the porter observed—had confessed not to treason, but to “wrongdoing.” By this technicality (as that was indeed the specific charge against him) he had ducked the disgrace of having his body dumped unburied beyond the borders of Attica; the corpse would be transported to the Funerary Depot beside the Northern Wall, where it may be recovered by his kinsmen. “A boy has been round, sir, claiming to be the prisoner’s son. Absent another, may the officers release the body to him?”

“What does the prisoner say?”

“He says to ask you.”

It was now well after dark; I had been up for a day and a night and could look forward to the same tomorrow. Yet clearly I could not go home. I hailed a “skylark” and, pressing a coin into the lad’s hand, dispatched him with a message for my wife that I would be delayed.

When I entered Polemides’ cell, he was writing. He rose at once, in hale spirits, clasping my hand in welcome. Had I been with Socrates? Of course. The prison could speak of nothing else.

I had thought I would chafe at this chore and discover myself in anger at him, for the labor he had put me through for nothing. To my surprise the opposite obtained. Immediately within the cell, I felt the weight of distress lift from my bones. It was bracing, the assassin’s acceptance of his fate. It shamed me.

“What are you writing?”

“Letters.”

To whom?

“One to my son. One to you.”

At once tears sprang; a sob wrenched from my throat. I must hide my face.

“Sit,” the prisoner bade. “There’s wine brought by my boy, take some.”

I obeyed.

“Just let me finish this. I won’t be long.”

He inquired, as he wrote, of Socrates. Would the philosopher exit on shank’s highway? Would he “mount the midnight mare”? Polemides laughed. No secret endured long within these walls, he observed; he had overheard all the getaway schemes, of Simmias and Cebes hiring horses and armed escorts; he knew which officials had accepted bribes, and even how much. Sundry informers had already put their blackmail to Crito and Menexeus and been paid off to come down with lockjaw.

“He won’t run,” I said. “He’s as stubborn as you.”

“Well, you see, we’re both philosophers.”

Polemides reported that he had yarned several times with Socrates, when they chanced to be granted exercise at the same hour. What had they talked about? “Alcibiades, mostly. And a bit of conjecture on life after death.” He laughed. “I’m to be boxed on the Whore, did you hear?”

He had learned he would be executed on the
tympanon.

He asked what we prated about, who closeted all day about our master. Customarily I would not speak of this, yet now…“We talked of the law and adherence to it in the face of death.”

Polemides considered this gravely. “I would like to have heard that.”

I watched as the assassin scripted his valedictory. His hand was firm and sure. When he paused periodically, seeking a word, one could not but be struck by the recollection of Alcibiades, possessed of the identical trait, so charming when he spoke, of drawing up until the proper phrase presented itself.

In the lamplight the prisoner looked younger than his seasons. His trim waist, product of years of campaign, made it no task to envision him as a lad at Lacedaemon, with such hopes, more than thrice nine years gone. I was struck by the irony, the inevitability, of his passage, and Socrates’, to this enclosure and this end.

Might I importune him for the conclusion of his tale? Did it matter? Surely no longer to mount a defense. Yet that wish persisted to hear what remained, from his lips, to its period.

“You must tell me first,” he replied. “A horse trade. What Socrates said today about the law…in return for my tale to its end.”

I resisted, for much of our master’s matter was commendatory to me.

“Of course it was, Jason! Do you think I muster with any but the noblest?”

I told him then. It had gone like this:

Our circle had gathered in Socrates’ cell. A number continued to urge escape. I added my voice. With an escort at arms our master need fear nothing on the highway. He could travel to any sanctuary we, or his friends of other nations, could provide him.

I had been foolish enough to look to a direct answer. Of course the philosopher accorded none. Rather he addressed himself to Crito’s son, youngest among us, who sat at his knee along the wall.

“Advise me, Critobulus, may one make distinction between justice and the law?”

A groan escaped my lips of such violence as to evoke mirth from all, not least Socrates. Again I put my case. The time for philosophical debate was over! This was life-and-death. One must act!

It was not Socrates who admonished me, but Crito, his oldest and most devoted friend. “Is that what philosophy is to you, my dear Jason? A pastime for the parlor, with which we divert ourselves while fate clasps us in clemency, but in the hour of extremity cast aside?”

I told them to chastise me all they wished, only heed that course I exhorted. Socrates regarded me with patience, which infuriated me the more. “Do you remember, Crito,” he continued, still not addressing me, “the oration our friend Jason put to the people during the trial of the generals?”

“Indeed I do. And a fire-breather it was!”

Please, I urged our master, do not mock me. For the issue of that day proved my point precisely.

“And how is that, my friend?”

By miscarrying justice! By putting good men to death in madness. “The
demos
may summon you back from Elis or Thebes, Socrates, but not from hell.”

“Yes, there’s the fire, Jason! The flame you showed that day and the brightest you have burned in all your life. I was proud of you then as of few others before or since.”

This abashed me. I fell silent.

“You spoke of law and charged the people not to despoil it, following Euryptolemus, who had made such an intrepid speech in defense. This was the crime you charged the people with, if memory serves: you declared that jealousy drove the meaner man to destroy the better. Is this correct? I only wish
to reiterate precisely, that we may examine the matter and perhaps gain illumination.”

I acknowledged that it was, desiring, however, to return to the matter of escape.

“I believe what distresses you now,” our master resumed, “is that you feel such miscarriage recurring. My own conviction, you warrant, has arisen not from merit of the case, but from hatred felt by men toward one who styles himself their better. Is this correct, Jason?”

“Is this not exactly what has happened?”

“Do you believe the people capable of ruling themselves?”

I replied in the negative, emphatically.

“And who would govern best, in your view?”

“You. Us. Anyone but them.”

“Let me phrase the question differently. Do we believe that the law, even an unjust law, must be obeyed? Or may the individual take it on himself to decide which laws are just and which unjust, which worthy of obedience and which not?”

I protested that it was not justice which Socrates had received, and thus its disallowance was legitimate.

“Let us hear your opinion, Jason. Is it better to perish through injustice inflicted upon one by others, or to live, having inflicted injustice on them?”

I had lost patience with this and remonstrated vehemently. Socrates inflicted injustice on no one by taking to flight. He must live! And by the gods, each of us would move heaven and earth to secure this!

“You forget one, Jason, upon whom I would be inflicting injustice. The Laws. Suppose the Laws sat among us now. Might they not say something like this: ‘Socrates, we have served you all your life. Beneath our protection you grew to manhood, married, and raised a family; you pursued your livelihood and studied philosophy. You accepted our boons and the security we provided. Yet now, when our verdict no longer suits your convenience, you wish to put us aside.’ How would we answer the Laws?”

“Some men must be set above the laws.”

“How can you strike this posture, my friend, who argued with such fervor, that day, the contravening course?”

Again abashment took me. I could not stand in the face of his conviction.

“Let me restore your memory, my dear Jason, yours and those of our
friends who stood present that day, and bring to these here, who were then too young, enlightenment afresh.

“After Alcibiades’ banishment following the defeat at Notium, the city sent out Conon to assume command. That authority not be concentrated in the hands of one man, however, the Council compassed him within a corps of ten generals, among whom were our friends Aristocrates and the younger Pericles. Under this collegial command, the fleet engaged the enemy in a great battle at the Arginousai Islands, destroying seventy of their warships, including nine of ten Spartan vessels, while losing twenty-five of our own. You were there, Jason. Do I recite accurately? Correct me please if I miscarry.

“At this hour, the close of fighting, all fortune had favored the Athenians. But in battle’s aftermath a blow arose with terrible swiftness, as storms do in those seas at that time of year, so I am told, and the men in the water—our men, from those ships holed and sunk—could not be recovered. Those assigned by the generals, among them Thrasybulus and Theramenes, proven leaders, could not master the tempest. All in the water were lost. These comprised the crews of some twenty-five vessels, five thousand men. The city, when it learned of this, was riven in conflicting directions, the first in rage and horror clamoring for the blood of those who had failed to rescue the shipwrecked seamen, the second straining to absorb the calamity as one must all in war, acknowledging the severity of the storm, which was ratified by all reports, nor failing to recollect the greatness of the victory.

“It chanced, however—you who were there cannot but recall—that the Feast of the Apaturia fell proximately after the battle, that customarily joyous season when the brotherhoods assemble to rededicate their bonds and enroll the youths entering their fraternities. It happened, I say, that so many were the gaps in the ranks vacated by those sailors and marines lost at sea, that men broke down to behold the magnitude of the loss. And this despair, inflamed by the rhetoric of certain individuals, some of legitimate motive, others seeking to deflect blame from themselves, erupted to a conflagration. The city clamored for blood. Six of the generals were arrested (four received warning and fled first). The people proceeded against them at once, trying them not individually as the law prescribed, but in a block, as one. Pericles, Aristocrates, and the other four were made to defend themselves in chains, as traitors. Do I say true, Jason? And you, Crito and Cebes, who were there, draw me up if I narrate imprecisely.”

All concurred that Socrates’ depiction was faithful in spirit and fact.

“The generals were tried in open Assembly. My tribe held the prytany; the lot of
epistates
chanced to have fallen to me. I was president of the Assembly, the lone occasion of my life on which I have held so lofty a post, and for one day only, as the laws prescribed.

“The prosecutors spoke first; then the generals, one after the other in their own defense, but refused by the mob’s impatience the prescribed interval of the law. Only two spoke in their defense. Axiochus first, then Euryptolemus, nor did he or any of his family ever honor their name more than by his gallantry in that hour. He confined his arguments, shrewdly in the face of the mob, to an exhortation to give each general his day in court. ‘In this way you may be sure of exacting the fullest measure of justice, punishing the guilty to the maximum while avoiding the terrible crime of condemning those who are blameless.’