"And so you have ridden all night?" Clearchus asked.
"All night, amid dangers and darkness, only to see you!" Chares replied gayly, throwing his arm around his friend's shoulder. "And now, have you anything to eat in the house? I am like a famished wolf."
"Come with me," Clearchus said, leading the way into a large room opening from the left of the court. The sunlight streamed in from the garden outside, over rich Persian carpets which covered the floor. The walls were frescoed with scenes from the Iliad of Homer, drawn with marvellous skill. Painted statuettes stood in niches of stone. Chairs and tables of ebony, cypress, and cedar were scattered through the room, and soft couches invited rest. Clearchus struck a bell, and a grave man of middle age appeared in the doorway.
"Send us food, Cleon," Clearchus said.
The steward withdrew, and two younger slaves entered. They quickly divested Chares and Leonidas of their riding cloaks and swords and washed their hands in bowls of scented water, drying them upon linen towels. They were followed by other slaves bearing trays of cold fowl, bread, and wine.
"This seems like getting home," Chares exclaimed, throwing himself upon one of the couches and leaning back luxuriously upon the cushions of down which the slaves hastened to arrange behind him while he helped himself to food from the table. "By the Gods, Clearchus, unless you stop growing handsome, Phœbus will be jealous of you!"
The Athenian flushed like a girl. He was a clean-cut, clear-eyed young man, hardly more than twenty-one years old, with a face and figure that might have served as a model for Phidias himself. Although slender, his form was graceful, with the ease that comes only from well-trained muscles. Brown curls covered his head, and the glance of his dark eyes was steady and straightforward, with a singular earnestness. His expression was thoughtful and his mouth betrayed a sensitive delicacy.
His parents had died when he was still a lad. His father, Cleanor, bequeathed to him an immense fortune, amassed in the mines, which had been managed by his uncle, Ariston, until he became of age. His wealth made him envied by the fashionable young men of Athens, but he had few friends among them. He cared nothing for their drinking-bouts, cock-fights, and gaming, and he had no ambition in politics except to do his duty as a citizen of Athens. Deep in his heart he worshipped the city and her glorious achievements, especially those of the intellect, with fanatical devotion.
Chares, too, belonged to a family of wealth and influence, for his father, Jason, had been one of the foremost men in Thebes. In height he stood more than six feet, and the knotted muscles of his arms indicated enormous strength. He was buoyant, light-hearted, irresponsible, and pleasure-loving. His affection for the Athenian, whom he had known from boyhood, was the strongest impulse in him.
They had first met Leonidas at the Olympic Games, where he won the laurel crown in the chariot race, and they had there admitted him to their friendship. Different as they were from each other, there seemed little in common between either of them and the swarthy Lacedæmonian who lay eating silently while they chattered gossip of mutual acquaintances. Leonidas was rather below the middle stature, all bone and sinew, practised in arms, and inured to hardships from his childhood by the unbending discipline of Sparta. His dark hair grew low down on his forehead and his black eyes were set deep under overhanging brows. He neither shared nor wished to understand the delight which Clearchus felt in a perfect statue or a masterpiece of painting. He scorned the philosophers and poets. Upon the questionable pleasures to which Chares gave his days and nights, he looked with good-natured contempt. The narrow prejudices of his country were ingrained too deeply in his character to be disturbed by any change of surroundings. He valued more highly the consciousness that in his veins ran a few drops of the blood of the Lion of Thermopylæ than all the riches of the world.