Talk of lizards was safe enough. When Lydos returned with the hydria, he couldn’t have noticed anything the least improper. A sour expression on his face, the slave emptied the jar not far from where the little animal had taken shelter. It fled again, this time across the courtyard. It vanished into a crack in the mud-brick inner wall of the house.

Menedemos laughed. “Poor thing must have thought Deukalion’s flood was sweeping down on it.”

“Yes.” Baukis gave Lydos a severe look. “You don’t need to drown the plants, you know.”

“Sorry.” He sounded anything but.

“Be more careful next time,” Baukis told him. His nod was so impatient, so perfunctory, that Menedemos would have called him on it if Baukis hadn’t. But she did: “Be more careful, Lydos, or you will be sorry.”

That got through. “Yes, mistress. I’ll remember,” the slave said, and this time Menedemos believed him.

“See that you do, because I’ll remember, too,” Baukis said. “Now go on.” Lydos hurried away, carrying the hydria.

“You handled that very well,” Menedemos said.

“Oh, slaves aren’t so hard. I was dealing with slaves before I was married, too, you know,” Baukis said. But then she checked herself. “Most slaves aren’t so hard. On the other hand, there’s Sikon.”

“Yes.” For a moment, Menedemos left it at that. Baukis and Sikon had feuded ever since she came to Philodemos’ house. She wanted to be a good household manager, and was convinced he was trying to bankrupt the place with the fancy fish he bought. He wanted to turn out the best suppers he could, and was convinced she wanted everyone in the house to live on barley porridge, beans, and salt fish. The truth, as usual, lay somewhere in between-or so Menedemos thought, anyhow. He said, “Cooks are a law unto themselves, you know.”

“Really? I never would have noticed,” Baukis said tartly. But then she relented: “I suppose it is better not to be quarreling with him all the time.”