Thousand & One Nights:135th Night: The Mosul Youth & The Murdered Girl -5

On the third day at dusk she came with the girl. I received them with pleasure and delight and I lighted the candles to have a bright and clear view of the new guest. The girl unveiled herself and stood before me. By this time I was lost in indulgence of eating, drinking and dalliance and I never thought of improving myself in the way that my father and uncles had shown me.

When I sat to eat I kept feeding the girl, and it was her touch I enjoyed and I think she also enjoyed it. When we finished eating I set the wine and the fruits and sweets. The girl winked at me and I winked at her and the lady kept looking at me and at her, and said, "My darling, isn't this girl, whom I have brought you, more beautiful and charming than I?" 
I replied, "Yes, she is."
"Would you like to sleep with her?" she asked me.
I replied, "Yes, I would like to."
"Afterall, she is only a visitor here tonight while I am always here." Then girding herself, she rose in the middle of the night, prepared our bed, and I took the girl in my arms, placed her in the bed and began the dalliance, and then slept with her, while my friend prepared a bed for herself in the extra room, and slept there alone.

When I woke up in the morning, I found myself drenched, and thought that I was wet with perspiration. I sat up and tried to rouse the girl, but when I shook her by shoulders, her head rolled off, and I realised that she had been slain. I lost my senses, and crying out, "O gracious protector", and sprang up, and the world turned round and began to turn black before my eyes. Then I looked for my friend, and when I could not find her, I realised that it was she, who out of jealousy, had murdered the girl. I said to myself, "There is no power and no strength, save in God the Almighty, the Magnificent. What shall I do now. I thought for a while and finally said to myself, "I am afraid that the murdered girl's family will look for her; no one is safe from treachery of women." Then I took off my clothes, and dug out a hole in the middle of the hall and, placing the girl, with all her jewellery in it, covered it back with earth, and replaced the marble slab of the pavement. Then I put on clean clothes and, taking what was left of my money in a small box, locked up the house and left. I took courage, went to the landlord, paid him a year's rent, saying, "I am going to join my uncles in Cairo." Then I paid for my own voyage at King's Caravanserai and departed.

But morning overtook and Shahrazad lapsed into silence.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

( 16 )CHARLES DICKENS: DAVID COPPERFIELD: CHAPTER 16: I AM A NEW BOY IN MORE SENSES THAN ONE

Next morning, after breakfast, I entered on school life again.  I went, accompanied by Mr Wickfield to the scene of my future studies- a grave building in a courtyard, with a learned air about it that suited very well to the stray rooks and jackdaws who came down from the Cathedral tower to walk with a clerkly bearing on the grass plot - and was introduced to my new master, Doctor Strong. Doctor Strong looked almost as rusty, to my thinking, as the tall iron rails and gates outside the house; and almost as stiff and heavy as the great stone urn that flanked them, and were set up, on the top of red brick wall, at regular distances all round the court, like sublimated skittles for Time to play at.  Doctor Strong was in his library, with his clothes not particularly well brushed, and his hair not particularly combed, his knee-small unbraced, his long black gaiters unbuttoned, and his shoes  yawning like two caverns on the hearth-rug.  Turning upon me a lustreless eye, t...
Read more

Thousand & One Nights: 70th Night

Harun al Rashid on his roaming the country side, saw a fisherman who did not have any catch for the day and worried about his family's bread. The Caliph had brought him to the banks of Tigris and asked him to throw the net. When they pulled the net the catch was a locked heavy chest. The Caliph paid him one hundred dinars. The chest was taken to the palace. Now the story to continue: When the chest was opened there was a girl. She had been cut into nineteen pieces. The Caliph looked at her, felt very sad, and turned to Ja'far and said angrily, "You, dog of a vizier, people are being killed and thrown into river in my city while I take the responsibility of Doomsday. If you do not find her killer, I will hang you and forty of your kin with you." "O Commander of the Faithful, give me three days."Ja'far said. Ja'far went into the city, vexed, worried and sad. He had no idea what to do. He thought to himself, "Where shall I find the murderer?" ...
Read more

Thousand & One Nights: 66th Night:

When the wind began to blow, we set sail, and we sat chatting, my sisters asked me, "Sister, what will you do with this young man?" I replied, "I will make him my husband." Then I turned to him and said, "O My lord, when we reach Baghdad, I offer myself to you, and we will be husband and wife." The young man replied, "Yes, indeed, for you are my lady, and my mistress." I turned to my sisters and said, "Whatever goods we have are yours, my only reward is this young man. He is mine and I am his." We sailed under fair wind until we entered Sea of Safety and began to approach Basra. Night came. The young man and I fell asleep. My two sisters turned green with envy over him and harboured ill will towards me. They had been waiting patiently to get an opportunity. They carried me in my sleep, with my bed and threw me into the sea. They did the same to the young man. He was drowned. I wish I had drowned with him. But I was escaped. I was cast o...
Read more