“Guilty as charged, but one has to say something,” Risley said. “Seems that’s all my crowd ever does—talk, talk, about the Sacred Band of Thebes and Phaedo and Socrates and David and Jonathan and the Myrmidons and formosus Alexis. Then they bat their eyelashes and retire, each to his own chaste bed. As for getting down to business, nothing. I do hate pussyfooting. I mean, what’s the point, among men?”
