The Arabian Nights (New Deluxe Edition) (79 page)

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The following night Shahrazad said:

I heard, O happy King, that Nur al-Din saw the captain standing on the middle of the ship and heard him saying, “O merchants, has any one of you anything else to do in the city? Think whether you have forgotten anything.” Everyone replied, “O Captain, we have nothing left to do.” Then Nur al-Din got on board with Anis al-Jalis and asked, “Where are you heading?” and when they replied, “Baghdad,” he said, “Very well.” Then the boat sailed and flew, as if the sails were wings, as the poet says:

Look at a ship that's ravishing in sight,

As she speeds like the lightning in her course,

Or like a thirsty bird that swoops from high

Down to the water with determined force.

Meanwhile the Mamluks, whom the king had dispatched, came to Nur al-Din's house and, forcing the door open, searched the whole place for him and Anis al-Jalis, but found neither trace nor news of them. After they demolished the house, they returned to the king and told him what they had done. The king said, “Search for him everywhere, and wherever you find him, bring him to me.” They replied, “We hear and obey.” Then he bestowed on the vizier a robe of honor and sent him home with comforting words, saying, “None shall avenge you but I.” Then the king issued a proclamation against Nur al-Din, and the criers proclaimed throughout the city, “O ye people, it is the will of King Muhammad ibn-Sulaiman al-Zainabi that whoever brings the vizier's son Nur al-Din Ali to him shall receive a robe of honor and one thousand dinars. He who hides him or looks the other way knows what will happen to him.”

In the meantime Nur al-Din and Anis al-Jalis sailed on before a fair wind, and God granted them safe passage, and they reached the city of Peace, Baghdad. The captain said to him, “O my lord, congratulations on your safe arrival. This city, which is teeming with people and full of life, is fair and peaceful. Winter has departed with its frost and spring has arrived with its roses; and now the streams are flowing, the flowers blooming, and the birds singing. It is like the city of which the poet said:

Behold a peaceful city, free from fear,

Whose wonders make it a gorgeous Heaven appear.”

Nur al-Din gave the captain five dinars, then disembarked with Anis al-Jalis.

Then they wandered about until God led them to an alley surrounded by gardens. It was well-swept and watered, with long benches, hanging cooling pots full of cold water, and a hanging trellis, which ran the whole length of the alley and led to a garden gate, which was shut. Nur al-Din said, “O Anis al-Jalis, this is a nice place.” She replied, “O my lord, for God's sake, let us sit down on this bench and rest for a while.” So they sat on the bench, after they drank some water and washed their hands and faces, and as they were caressed by the breeze and heard the sounds that rose from the garden, the warbling of the birds, the cooing of the doves in the trees, and the murmur of the water in the streams, they began to feel drowsy and fell asleep.

That garden had no equal in all of Baghdad, for it belonged to the caliph Harun al-Rashid and was called the Garden of Delight, and in it there stood a palace called the Palace of Statues, to which he came whenever he was depressed. The palace was surrounded by eighty windows and eighty hanging lamps, each pair flanking a candelabra holding a large candle. When the caliph entered the palace, he used to order all the windows opened and the lamps and candelabras lighted and order Ishak al-Nadim
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to sing for him, while he sat surrounded by concubines of all races until his care left him and he felt merry.

The keeper of the garden was an old man called Shaikh Ibrahim, a man for whom the caliph felt a great affection. Whenever Shaikh Ibrahim went out on some business in the city, he would find a group of pleasure-seekers and their whores congregating at the garden gate, and this used to pain him and make him angry. But he waited patiently until one day the caliph . . .

But morning overtook Shahrazad, and she lapsed into silence. Then Dinarzad said to her sister, “What a strange and entertaining story!” Shahrazad replied, “What is this compared with what I shall tell you tomorrow night if the king spares me and lets me live!”

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The following night Shahrazad said:

I heard, O happy King, that Ibrahim, the keeper of the garden, waited patiently until one day the caliph came and he informed him about the situation. The caliph said to him, “Whomever you find at the garden gate, do with him as you wish.” It happened that Shaikh Ibrahim went out on some business in the city on the very day of Nur al-Din's arrival, and when he finished and returned, he found two people covered with a cloak and sleeping on a bench, beside the gate. He said to himself, “By God, this is fine! Don't these two know that the caliph has given me permission to kill anyone I catch here? I will make an example of them so that none may come near the gate in the future.” He went into the garden and, cutting a palm stick, came out and raised his arm until his armpit showed, and he was about to fall on them with heavy blows, when he considered and said to himself, “Ibrahim, you are about to beat these two, who may be strangers or travelers whom fate has brought here. Let me uncover their faces and find out who they may be.” He threw away the stick and, stepping closer, uncovered their faces and saw that they were as bright as two shining moons, just like those of whom the poet said:

I saw two sleeping, high above the stars,

And wished that they would on my eyelids tread.

“A distant crescent and a rising sun,

A green bough and wild deer divine,” I said.

When he saw them, he said to himself, “By God, they are a handsome pair.” Then he covered their faces again and, going to Nur al-Din's feet, began to rub them. Nur al-Din awoke and, seeing a venerable old man rubbing his feet, felt embarrassed and, drawing them in, sat up and took the old man's hand and kissed it, saying, “Uncle, God forbid, and may He reward you!” Shaikh Ibrahim asked, “My son, where do you two come from?” Nur al-Din replied, “Shaikh, we are strangers.” He said, “You are my honored guests. Will you not rise and come with me into the garden to relax and enjoy yourselves?” Nur al-Din asked, “Shaikh, to whom does this garden belong?” The old man, wishing to put them at ease and induce them to enter, replied, “I inherited it from my father. My son, I am inviting you in only so that you may forget your cares, relax, and enjoy yourselves. “When Nur al-Din heard what Shaikh Ibrahim said, he thanked him and, rising together with Anis al-Jalis, followed him into the garden.

They entered through a vaulted gateway that looked like a gateway in Paradise and passed through a bower of trellised boughs overhung with vines bearing grapes of various colors, the red like rubies, the black like Abyssinian faces, and the white, which hung between the red and the black, like pearls between red coral and black fish. Then they found themselves in the garden, and what a garden! There they saw all manner of things, “in singles and in pairs.” The birds sang all kinds of songs: the nightingale warbled with touching sweetness, the pigeon cooed plaintively, the thrush sang with a human voice, the lark answered the ringdove with harmonious strains, and the turtledove filled the air with melodies. The trees were laden with all manner of ripe fruits: pomegranates, sweet, sour, and sour-sweet; apples, sweet and wild; and Hebron plums as sweet as wine, whose color no eyes have seen and whose flavor no tongue can describe.

But morning overtook Shahrazad, and she lapsed into silence. Then Dinarzad said to her sister, “What a strange and entertaining story!” Shahrazad replied, “What is this compared with what I shall tell you tomorrow night if the king spares me and lets me live!”

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The following night Shahrazad said:

I heard, O happy King, that when Nur al-Din looked at the beautiful garden, it pleased him and delighted him and reminded him of the happy times he used to spend with his friends and companions. He turned to the old man and said, “Shaikh, what is your name?” He replied, “My name is Ibrahim.” Nur al-Din said, “Shaikh Ibrahim, by God, this is a beautiful garden. May the Almighty God bless you with it. O Shaikh Ibrahim, you have already been kind enough to invite us to your place, and we cannot allow ourselves to demand any more from you, but take these two dinars and get us some bread and meat and the like.” Ibrahim was glad to take the two dinars, saying to himself, “They will not eat more than ten dirhams' worth, and I will keep the rest.” Then the old man went out and bought them plenty of good food.

In the meantime Nur al-Din and Anis al-Jalis went and walked around, enjoying the garden, until, as it had been foreordained, they came to the caliph's palace, which was called the Palace of Statues. When they saw its beauty and stateliness, they wanted to enter, but they could not. When Shaikh Ibrahim returned from the market, Nur al-Din asked him, “Shaikh Ibrabim, haven't you said that the garden belongs to you?” He replied, “Yes.” Nur al-Din asked again, “Then to whom does this palace belong?” The old man said to himself, “If I say that the palace does not belong to me, they will ask me to explain how so.” So he replied, “My son, the palace belongs to me too.” Nur al-Din said, “Shaikh Ibrahim, we are your guests and this palace is your place, yet you don't open it and invite us in to see it.” The old man, who felt embarrassed and duty-bound, disappeared for a while, then returned with a big key, opened the palace door, and said, “Please, come in.” Then he led them through the palace until they came to the elevated hall. When Nur al-Din saw the windows, the hanging lamps, and the candelabras, he recalled his former parties and exclaimed to the old man, “By God, this is a beautiful place!”

Then they sat and ate until they were satisfied. After they washed their hands, Nur al-Din went to one of the windows and, opening it, called out to Anis al-Jalis, who joined him to look at the trees laden with all kinds of fruits. Then Nur al-Din turned to the old man and said, “Shaikh, do you have anything to drink?” The old man replied, “My son, why do you wish to drink after you have already eaten? People usually drink before they eat.” Nur al-Din said, “This drink people take after they eat.” The old man exclaimed, “You don't mean wine?” Nur al-Din replied, “Yes, I do.” The old man said, “My son, God forbid; I have made the Holy Pilgrimage thirteen times and I don't even mention the word.” Nur al-Din said, “Let me say one word.” The old man said, “O my son, say it.” Nur al-Din said, “If that ass tied in the corner is cursed, will the curse fall on you?” The old man replied, “No.” Nur al-Din said, “Then take these two dinars and these two dirhams, ride that ass, and go to the wineshop. Stand at a distance, and when a customer comes, call him and say to him, ‘Take these two dirhams for yourself and buy me two good flagons of wine with these two dinars.' When he buys the wine and comes out of the wineshop, say to him, ‘Place the wine in the saddlebag and set it on the ass,' and when he does it, drive the ass back, and we will unload the wine. This way you will neither touch it nor be dirtied or defiled by it.” When the old man heard Nur al-Din's words, he laughed and said, “My son, by God, I have never met anyone wittier or more charming than you.”

The old man did what Nur al-Din asked, and when he bought the wine and came back, Nur al-Din and Anis al-Jalis rose and unloaded it. Then Nur al-Din said to him, “Shaikh, we are in your charge and you have to bring us what we need.” The old man asked, “My son, such as?” Nur al-Din replied, “Bring us from your storerooms the necessary wine service, utensils, and the like.” The old man gave them the keys to the storerooms and cupboards and said, “Take out what you need, while I get you some fruits.”