4
Zenothemis, who is here before you, being an underling of Hegestratus, the shipowner, who he himself in his complaint states to have been lost at sea (how, he does not add, but I will tell you), concocted with him the following fraud. Both of them borrowed money in Syracuse. Hegestratus admitted to those lending money to Zenothemis, if inquiries were made, that there was on board the ship a large amount of grain belonging to the latter; and the plaintiff admitted to those lending money to Hegestratus that the cargo of the ship was his. As one was the shipowner and the other a passenger, they were naturally believed in what they said of one another.
5
But immediately on getting the money, they sent it home to Massalia, and put nothing on board the ship. The agreement being, as is usual in all such cases, that the money was to be paid back if the ship reached port safely, they laid a plot to sink the ship, that so they might defraud their creditors. Hegestratus, accordingly, when they were two or three days’ voyage from land, went down by night into the hold of the vessel, and began to cut a hole in the ship’s bottom, while Zenothemis, as though knowing nothing about it, remained on deck with the rest of the passengers. When the noise was heard, those on the vessel saw that something wrong was going on in the hold, and rushed down to bear aid.
