The Golden Mean - Annabel Lyon [74]
“That’s interesting.”
“Yes. That’s where I differ from my own teacher, insisting on particulars instead of universals. A less formally beautiful system, more pragmatic, but infinitely more flexible and applicable, if you—”
“No, not that part. What you said about the balance point this time. You’ve said it before, but—” He holds out his hands again in that familiar gesture. He’s staring at his own hands, thinking this time, not mocking.
“The truth in the body,” I can’t help saying.
“You can’t mean to prize mediocrity.”
I want to laugh at the way he’s skipped across the stepping stones. “Not at all. Moderation and mediocrity are not the same. Think of the extremes as caricatures, if that helps. The mean, what we seek, is that which is not a caricature. Mediocrity doesn’t enter into it, you see?”
“You.” Very slowly, holding out his left hand. Holding out his right: “My father.”
“Caricatures?” I say, very gently, not to discourage him. He seems very young just at the moment, a small boy trying so hard to understand.
“Extremes,” he says, just as carefully, still staring at his hands. “As though my father, to counter an extreme tendency in himself, prescribed the opposite extreme in you to create a balance in me.”
“That is—”
“I’m thinking, too, of my brother.”
“Who?”
He looks at me.
“I mean, you told me you didn’t have a brother. I’ve never heard you mention him since that day, how many, five years ago?”
“Am I an extreme, next to him? And what would be the mean of the two of us?”
“Do you swim?”
“Of course.”
“Do you?”
“A little.”
“I could teach you.”
He says nothing, waiting for what’s to come.
“I’ve been meaning to give your brother a day at the beach, a day out. We could all go together.”
“A swimming lesson.”
“A lesson in moderation. We spoke of pride before, and the excess of pride. Vanity, might we call that?”
“Yes.” I know he’s thinking of his father and the honours he grudged him at Maedi.
“And a lack of pride, a want of pride: shame.”
The flush begins to creep up his pretty cheeks.
“You’re ashamed of your brother. You are, aren’t you?”
Very softly: “We share blood.”
“He speaks. He’s clean. He doesn’t smell. He can ride, on a lead. He’s like a very, very small child in a grown man’s body. Once you get past the incongruity, it gets easier.”
“You would come?”
At first I’m not sure what he’s getting at.
“You wouldn’t leave me alone with him?”
I promise.
“Only my father might summon me first. If his embassies to Athens and Thebes fail, I might have to leave right away. Tomorrow, maybe, even.”
“I can’t tomorrow anyway,” I say. “I have some business tomorrow.”
“The day after tomorrow, then, if my father doesn’t send for me.”
I agree.
“What business, anyway? You don’t seem like a man of business to me. What’s tomorrow?”
“NO,” PYTHIAS SAYS.
“Love.” We’re in her room, early evening. She sits in her bed, propped with many pillows. I’ve come to present my case, not plead it. “She’s defiant. It’s intolerable.”
“She’s smart and competent. How has she defied you? Tell me and I’ll speak with her.”
I won’t tell her, not this truth. “She threatened to poison us.”
Pythias gives me a look. “She threatens to poison everyone six times a day. It’s how we know she’s happy. Since when are you such a tyrant with the slaves? Tycho refuses to bathe with the others and you haven’t sold him.”
“I’ve had Tycho for twenty years. Are you going to make a horse bathe if it doesn’t want to?”
“Tycho’s not a horse.”
I stand. This conversation is done. I do not say: Her function is devotion to you and she cannot perform her function. Her fear is uninteresting. A hawk’s fear, a dog’s fear, a horse’s fear is of no account. They perform the functions they are trained for or they do not. Her rebellion is more than just an inconvenience; it’s an affront to the natural order of things. It offends against everything I’ve pinned my sanity on, sweet stability and order, everything in its right