When Marthe with her entire family visits Cincinnatus in the fortress, her son Diomedon kills a cat:
"Mali é trano t'amesti..." - полным голосом пропел Марфинькин брат.
Диомедон, оставь моментально кошку, - сказала Марфинька, - позавчера ты уже одну задушил, нельзя же каждый день. Отнимите, пожалуйста, у него, Виктор, милый.
'Mali é trano t’amesti,’ Marthe’s brother sang in full voice; ‘Diomedon, leave the cat alone this instant,’ said Marthe. ‘You already strangled one the other day, one every day is too much.'
-Ну-с, не поминай лихом, - сказал тесть и с холодной учтивостью поцеловал Цинциннату руку, как того требовал обычай. Белокурый брат посадил чернявого к себе на плечи, и в таком положении они с Цинциннатом простились и ушли, как живая гора. Дед с бабкой, вздрагивая, кланялись и поддерживали туманный портрет. Служители всё продолжали выносить мебель. Подошли дети: Полина, серьёзная, поднимала лицо, а Диомедон, напротив, смотрел в пол. Их увёл, держа обоих за руки, адвокат. Последней подлетела Эммочка: бледная, заплаканная, с розовым носом и трепещущим мокрым ртом, - она молчала, но вдруг поднялась на слегка хрустнувших носках, обвив горячие руки вокруг его шеи, - неразборчиво зашептала что-то и громко всхлипнула. Родион схватил её за кисть, - судя по его бормотанию, он звал её давно и теперь решительно потащил к выходу. Она же, изогнувшись, отклонив и обернув к Цинциннату голову со струящимися волосами и протянув к нему ладонью кверху очаровательную руку, с видом балетной пленницы, но с тенью настоящего отчаяния, нехотя следовала за влачившим её Родионом, - глаза у неё закатывались, бридочка сползла с плеча, - и вот он размашисто, как из ведра воду, выплеснул её в коридор; всё ещё бормоча, вернулся с совком, чтобы подобрать труп кошки, плоско лежавшей под стулом. Дверь с грохотом захлопнулась. Трудно было теперь поверить, что в этой камере только что...
‘Well, let’s let bygones be bygones,’ said the father-in-law and, with cold politeness, kissed Cincinnatus’s hand as custom demanded. The blond brother sat the dark one on his shoulders and in that position they took leave of Cincinnatus and departed, like a live mountain. The grandparents were shivering, bowing and holding up the hazy portrait. The employees kept carrying out the furniture. The children approached: Solemn Pauline raised up her face; Diomedon, on the contrary, gazed down at the floor. The lawyer led them away by their respective hands. The last to fly up to him was Emmie, pale, tear-stained, her nose pink and her mouth wet and quivering; she was silent, but suddenly, with a slight crackle, she rose on her toes, twined her hot arms around his neck, whispered incoherently and uttered a loud sob. Rodion seized her by the wrist — -judging by his grumbling he had been calling her for a long time; now he dragged her firmly toward the exit. Arching back her body, turning toward Cincinnatus her head with its streaming hair and extending to him, palm upturned, her lovely arm (with the appearance of a ballet captive but with the shadow of genuine despair), Emmie unwillingly followed Rodion as he dragged her; her eyes kept rolling back, her shoulder strap slipped off, and now, with a swinging motion, as though he were emptying a water bucket, he splashed her out into the corridor. Then, still muttering, he returned with a dustpan to pick up the corpse of the cat that lay flat under a chair. The door slammed with a crash. It was now hard to believe that in this cell, only a moment ago… (Chapter IX)
In his Essays Montaigne (who famously said: “When I play with my cat, how do I know that she is not playing with me rather than I with her?”) mentions Diomedon, a courageous Athenian soldier who was sentenced to death, despite a naval victory he gained over the Spartans (Lacedaemonians):
I am ready to conceive an implacable hatred against all popular domination, though I think it the most natural and equitable of all, so oft as I call to mind the inhuman injustice of the people of Athens, who, without remission, or once vouchsafing to hear what they had to say for themselves, put to death their brave captains newly returned triumphant from a naval victory they had obtained over the Lacedaemonians near the Arginusian Isles, the most bloody and obstinate engagement that ever the Greeks fought at sea; because (after the victory) they followed up the blow and pursued the advantages presented to them by the rule of war, rather than stay to gather up and bury their dead. And the execution is yet rendered more odious by the behaviour of Diomedon, who, being one of the condemned, and a man of most eminent virtue, political and military, after having heard the sentence, advancing to speak, no audience till then having been allowed, instead of laying before them his own cause, or the impiety of so cruel a sentence, only expressed a solicitude for his judges’ preservation, beseeching the gods to convert this sentence to their good, and praying that, for neglecting to fulfil the vows which he and his companions had made (with which he also acquainted them) in acknowledgment of so glorious a success, they might not draw down the indignation of the gods upon them; and so without more words went courageously to his death. (Book One, Chapter 3)
If a Spartan baby was judged to be unfit for its future duty as a soldier, it was most likely abandoned on a nearby hillside. Left alone, the child would either die of exposure or be rescued and adopted by strangers.
Marthe’s son Diomedon is a lame boy:
Диомедон, в серой блузе с резинкой на бёдрах, весь искривляясь с ритмическим выкрутом, довольно всё же проворно прошёл расстояние от них до матери. Левая нога была у него здоровая, румяная; правая же походила на ружьё в сложном своём снаряде: ствол, ремни. Круглые карие глаза и редкие брови были материнские, но нижняя часть лица, бульдожьи брыльца - это было, конечно, чужое.
- Садись сюда, - сказала вполголоса Марфинька и быстрым хлопком задержала стекавшее с кушетки ручное зеркало.
Diomedon, in a grey blouse with an elastic at the hips, twisting his whole body in a rhythmic distortion, nevertheless quite rapidly covered the distance between them and his mother. His left leg was healthy and rosy; the right one resembled a rifle in its complicated harness: barrel, straps, sling. His round hazel eyes and sparse eyebrows were his mother’s, but the lower half of his face, with its bulldog jowls — this, of course, was someone else’s. ‘Sit here,’ whispered Marthe and, with a quick slap, arrested the hand mirror which was trickling off the couch. (Chapter IX)
Mali é trano t'amesti is an anagram of smert' mila; eto taina (death is sweet; it's a secret). How do we know that Сincinnatus is not playing a cat-and-mouse game with Death rather than she with him?