The girl’s brown eyes flashed proudly. “We have given him a wonderful name. There is no better in Athens. We call him Themistocles.”
Ephialtes laughed outright and pulled at Cimon’s tunic. “Come,” he said, “we must hurry on—to the business of naming the unborn citizens of Attica.”
The house of Leobotes was the last one before the widening of the street, where four other lanes like the fingers of a hand united at the palm, and the so-called “palm” was a small square beautified by an ornate drinking place. The two men refreshed themselves at the well before seeking to gain entrance at the home of Leobotes. The owner himself answered their knock.
It is a peculiar thing that we are sensitive at times to the proximity of extremely agreeable or antagonistic natures, though they be out of range of sight or hearing. Such a feeling of repellence Cimon possessed as he stood at the doorway of Leobotes. True he had never loved Ephialtes any too well, but there was a subtle charm of manner in the handsome young Greek that drew his victims toward him, an attraction that Leobotes with perhaps no baser traits of character, lacked.
Leobotes was a thin man with a pointed beard of sandy color and shifty eyes of a nondescript pale blue variety. His appearance was anything but inspiring, and Cimon felt his previous aspirations shrivel within him whenever he tried to meet the evasive glance of this friend of Ephialtes. Leobotes, as soon as he had been informed of the reason for the visit, set some wine before his guests and after taking a draught himself, rubbed his hands and smacked his lips as he turned to Cimon, whom he had known by sight as the son of the hero of Marathon.
“I am a patriotic and loyal citizen,” he began, “and I believe in promoting that which is for the good of our beloved city, and I believe equally,” he paused impressively, “in doing away with that which is a menace to Athens. Themistocles is only waiting his chance to sell our city and the freedom of its inhabitants to the highest bidder. How do I know? I was near him at Salamis and I heard the messages he sent by his slave to the Persian king, to block the Greek ships up in the bay.”
“Is it possible,” asked Cimon deeply impressed, “that he sent such word to Xerxes?”
“Not only possible,” exclaimed Leobotes, “it is a fact. As you know that was done too,” he concluded with an air of satisfaction.
“Yes it was done,” Cimon acknowledged, “but we won, did we not? Terror fell upon the Persians when they heard the loud chant of battle and the martial sound of trumpet from the Greek ranks and soon ships, Persian ships, were colliding, their oars—”
“Yes, I know all that,” Leobotes interrupted with impatience, “but that was all contrary to the way Themistocles had planned, and I believe the purpose of the deed and not the result should be the cause of punishment to the perpetrator.”