by Muhsin Mahdi
But morning overtook Shahrazad, and she lapsed into silence. Then Dinarzad said to her sister, “What an amazing 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!”
THE EIGHTY-FOURTH NIGHT
The following night Shahrazad said:
It is related, a King, that Ja’far said to the caliph:
When the people cried out, “He is mad,” Badr al-Din began to run, and they followed him, shouting, “Madman! Madman!” He entered the city and ran through the markets, with the crowd pressing on him, until he took refuge in a cook’s shop. This cook had been a scoundrel and a robber until he repented, became reformed, and opened a cookshop. Yet all the people of Damascus were still frightened by him and afraid of his mischief. When they saw Badr al-Din enter his shop, they retreated, dispersed, and went their ways. The cook looked at Badr al-Din and asked, “Young man, where do you come from?” Badr al-Din told him his story from beginning to end (but there is no point in repeating it here). The cook said, “This is a strange story. Keep it to yourself until God sends you relief, and stay with me in this shop, for I am childless and I will adopt you as my son.” Badr al-Din replied, “Very well,” Then the cook went to the market, bought him some clothes, and had him put them on. Then he took him before witnesses and adopted him formally, and from that day Badr al-Din became known in Damascus as the cook’s son, living with him and sitting by the scales in the shop.
So much for Badr al-Din Hasan; as for his cousin Sit al-Husn, when she woke up at dawn and did not find Badr al-Din by her side, she thought that he had gone to the privy. While she was waiting, her father, the Egyptian vizier Shams al-Din Muhammad the brother of Nur Al-Din Ali who was the father of Badr al-Din Hasan, came out, feeling unhappy because of the wrong he had suffered at the hands of the king, who had forced him to marry his daughter to the meanest of servants, a lump of a hunchback. He walked about until he came to his daughter’s bed and, standing by the net, called out to his daughter, “Sit al-Husn!” She replied, “Here I am, here I am,” and she came out, with a face that had turned more radiant and beautiful from the embraces of that deerlike Badr al-Din, and kissed her father’s hand. He said to her, “You cursed girl, you seem mighty pleased with that abominable hunchback!”
But morning overtook Shahrazad, and she lapsed into silence. Then Dinarzad said, “Sister, what a strange and entertaining story!” Shahrazad replied, “What is this compared with what I shall tell you tomorrow night if I live!”
THE EIGHTY-FIFTH NIGHT
The following night Shahrazad said:
It is related, O King, that Ja’far said to the caliph:
When Sit al-Husn heard her father say to her, “You seem mighty pleased with that abominable hunchback!” she smiled and said, “Stop, father! It was enough what I had suffered yesterday at the hands of the women who taunted me and mocked me with that mean hunchback, who is not worthy even to bring my husband his mule or his shoes. By God, in all my life I have never had a better night than last night. Stop mocking me with the hunchback, whom you had hired to ward off the evil eye from my young bridegroom!” When her father heard what she said, he glared at her and said, “Damn you, what is this talk! Hasn’t the hunchback slept with you?” The girl replied, “Stop mentioning the hunchback, that worthless creature! May God curse him. I slept in the lap of none but my true husband, the one with the dark eyes and the arched black eyebrows.” Her father yelled at her, “Damn you, shameless woman! Have you lost your senses?” She replied, “Ah, for God’s sake, father, stop torturing me and being hard on me. I swear by God that my husband, who took my virginity and made me pregnant, is a handsome young man, who is in the privy at this very moment.”
Her father went to the privy and there he found the hunchback standing upside down, with his head stuck in the toilet and his feet in the air. The vizier was taken aback and called out, “You hunch back!” The hunchback replied, “Yeah, yeah.” The vizier asked, “Why are you in this position, and who did this to you?” The hunchback replied, “Couldn’t you people have found anyone for me to marry except a girl who consorts with buffaloes and takes demons for lovers?”
But morning overtook Shahrazad, and she lapsed into silence. Then Dinarzad said, “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!”
THE EIGHTY-SIXTH NIGHT
The following night Shahrazad said:
It is related, O King, that Ja’far said to the caliph:
When the hunchback said to the father of the bride, “Couldn’t you people have found anyone for me to marry except a girl who consorts with buffaloes and takes demons for lovers? May God curse the Devil and my wretched lot,” the vizier said to him, “Get up and go!” But the hunchback said, “I am not crazy, for the sun has not risen yet, and I will not go from here until the sun rises. Yesterday I came here to relieve myself when a black tomcat suddenly emerged and screamed at me. Then he kept getting bigger until he was as big as a buffalo and spoke to me in a way that made me obey him. Leave me and go your way, and may God reward you and curse the bride!” But the vizier took him out of the toilet, and the hunchback, in that same condition, went at once to the king and told him what had happened to him at the hands of the demon.
Meanwhile, the father of the bride went back inside the house, amazed and bewildered, not knowing what to make of his daughter. He went to her and said, “Damn it, tell me your secret!” She replied, “Ah, father, what secret? By God, last night I was presented to a young man who spent the night with me, took my virginity, and made me pregnant. Here on this chair is his turban, and here are his robe and his dagger, and here under the mattress are his trousers, wrapped around something. The vizier took his nephew’s turban and, turning it in his hand, examined it and said, “By God, this is a vizier’s turban, tied in the style of Mosul.” When he examined it further, he felt inside it a scroll, folded, sealed, and sewn into the lining. Then he unfolded the trousers and found the purse with the thousand dinars and the piece of paper. When he unfolded the paper, he read, “Badr al-Din Hasan al-Basri has sold to Isaac the Jew the cargo of the first ship to arrive for a thousand dinars and has received the money,” and as soon as he read it, he screamed and fell into a swoon.
But morning overtook Shahrazad, and she lapsed into silence. Then Dinarzad said, “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!”
THE EIGHTY-SEVENTH NIGHT
The following night Shahrazad said:
It is related, O King, that Ja’far said to the caliph:
O Commander of the Faithful, when the vizier Shams al-Din came to himself and recalled what he had discovered, he was amazed, and when he opened the sealed paper and saw that it was in his brother’s handwriting, he was even more amazed and said, “Daughter, do you know who the man who took your virginity really was? By God, he is none other than your cousin, and these thousand dinars are your dowry. Glory be to the Omnipotent God who controls everything, for He has turned the cause of my quarrel with my brother Nur al-Din into a just resolution. I wonder how all this came about?” Then he looked at the letter again, and when he saw the date in his brother’s handwriting, he kissed it many times, and as he kept looking at the handwriting, he wept, lamented, and repeated these verses:
I see their traces and with longing pine
In their empty dwelling, and my tears flow.
And Him who had decreed their loss I beg
That He may on me their return bestow.
Then he read the letter and saw the dates of his brother’s arrival in Basra, the marriage contract, the consummation of the marriage, the birth of his son Badr al-Din-Hasan, and the year of his death. When the vizier realized what these dates meant, he shook with amazement a
nd delight, for when he compared the events of his life with those of his brother’s, he found them parallel, and when he compared the dates of his brother’s marriage in Basra, the consummation of that marriage, and the birth of his son, he found them to be identical with his own in Cairo, and when he pondered how shortly thereafter his nephew had arrived and consummated the marriage with his daughter, he concluded that all of this was planned by Providence. Then he took the letter and the piece of paper that he had found inside the purse, went at once to the king, and told him the whole story. The king was very much amazed and ordered that these events be dated and recorded.
Then the vizier went home and waited for his nephew all day long, but he did not show up, and when he waited a second and a third day and kept waiting until the seventh day, without any news or any trace of his nephew, he said, “By God, I will do what has never been done before.” He took an inkwell and a sheet of paper and wrote down a description of the entire wedding chamber and its contents. Then he ordered everything put aside, including the turban, the trousers, and the purse.
But morning overtook Shahrazad and she lapsed into silence. Then Dinarzad said, “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!”
THE EIGHTY-EIGHTH NIGHT
The following night Shahrazad said:
I heard, O happy King, that Ja’far said to the caliph:
Days and months went by, and when her time came, the daughter of the vizier of Egypt gave birth to a boy, who had a face as round as the full moon or the rising sun, a radiant brow, and rosy cheeks. They cut his navel cord and applied kohl to his eyelids, and his grandfather named him ’Ajib and committed him to the care of the nurses, stewardesses, and servants.
’Ajib grew, and when he was seven, his grandfather sent him to school, bidding the tutor educate him and teach him good manners. ’Ajib remained at the school about four years. Then he began to bully, beat, and abuse the other children. At last they got together and complained to the monitor about their maltreatment at the hands of ’Ajib. The monitor said, “I will tell you what you should do tomorrow, so that he will stop coming to school and you will never see him again. When he comes tomorrow, gather around him to play a game and say to each other, ‘No one can join us in this game, unless he tells us the names of his mother and father, for he who does not know the names of his parents is a bastard and shall not play with us.” The children were pleased, and the next day they came to school, and when ’Ajib arrived, they gathered around him and one of them said, “We will play a game, but no one can join in unless he tells us the names of his mother and father.” Everyone said, “Very well.” Then one said, “My name is Majid, my mother’s name is Sittita, and my father’s name is ’Iz al-Din,” and others said the like, until it was ’Ajib’s turn. He said, “My name is ’Ajib, my mother’s name is Sit al-Husn, and my father’s name is Shams al-Din, the vizier.” They said, “How can that be? By God, he is not your father!” He said to them, “Damn you, the Vizier Shams al-Din is indeed my father.” But they laughed at him and clapped their hands and said, “May God help him! He does not know his father! By God, he cannot play or sit with us.” Then they laughed, and dispersed, leaving him choking with tears. Then the monitor came to him and said, “’Ajib, don’t you know that the Vizier Shams al-Din is your mother’s father, your grandfather, and not your father? As for your father, neither you nor we know who he is. For the king married your mother to a hunchback, but the demons came and slept with her, and your father is unknown. Unless you find out who he is, you will not be able to face the schoolchildren, for they will treat you as a bastard. Don’t you see that even though your grandfather is the vizier of Egypt, the merchant’s son knows his own father and the grocer’s son knows his, but you don’t know your father? ’Ajib, this is a strange business!”
But morning overtook Shahrazad, and she lapsed into silence. Then Dinarzad said, “Sister, what a strange and entertaining story!” Shahrazad replied, “What is this compared with what I shall tell you tomorrow night if I stay alive!”
THE EIGHTY-NINTH NIGHT
The following night Shahrazad said:
I heard, O happy King, that Ja’far said to the caliph:
When ’Ajib heard the insulting remarks of the children and the monitor, he left at once and came crying to his mother Sit al-Husn. When she saw him, her heart was on fire for him, and she asked him, “Son, why do you cry? May God never let you cry again!” Sobbing, he told her what had happened; then he asked her, “Who, then, is my father?” She replied, “Your father is the vizier of Egypt.” He said, “You are lying. The vizier is your own father; he is my grandfather. Who, then, is my father?” When Sit al-Husn heard him speak of his father, her cousin and husband Badr al-Din Hasan, and recalled her wedding night, she wept bitterly and recited these verses:
Love in my breast he lit and went away
And left behind an empty hearth and heart.
His shrine is too distant to visit now,
A distance that has kept us worlds apart!
And when he left, my patience also left,
So did endurance, so did self-control.
And when he went away, he took with him
My joy, my peace, my rest, all; he took all
And left me my tears of unhappy love,
Which from my burning eyes profusely flow.
And when I long to see him once again,
And with vain longing wait for him to show,
I trace his image in my empty heart,
Which wells with thoughts, longing, and deep passion.
You, whose remembrance wraps me in its warmth,
Whose love I show, a sign of devotion,
Is there no ransom for the captive heart,
And for the afflicted no remedy,
And for the sick with love no medicine,
And for the defeated no victory?
O my dear love, how long this coy disdain?
When will you come back and be mine again?
While she wept and made her son weep with her, the vizier came in, and when he saw them, he asked, “Why do you weep?” His daughter told him what had happened to her son, and when he remembered his brother and nephew and his daughter’s puzzling story, he wept with them. Then he went at once to the king of Egypt and, kissing the ground before him, begged him leave to go eastward to the city of Basra to inquire about his nephew; he also begged him for royal edicts to all the provinces and cities, authorizing him to take custody of Badr al-Din wherever he found him. And he wept before the king, who took pity on him and wrote him letters and edicts to all the provinces and cities. The vizier rejoiced, thanked the king, and invoked God’s blessing on him. Then he returned at once to his house, and after he made preparations for the journey, he took his daughter and her son ’Ajib with him and departed.
But morning overtook Shahrazad, and she lapsed into silence. Then Dinarzad said, “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!”
THE NINETIETH NIGHT
The following night Shahrazad said:
I heard, O happy King, that Ja’far said to the caliph:
The vizier of Egypt, the uncle of Badr al-Din Hasan, journeyed with his daughter and her son for twenty days until he came to the city of Damascus and saw its rivers and birds, just as the poet described them:
Once in Damascus I spent such a night
That time swore ’t would never the like allow.
We slept carefree under the wing of night
Till morning smiled and beamed with dappled brow,
And dewdrops on the branches hung like pearls,
Then fell and scattered when the zephyr blew,
And birds chanted the words traced on the lake,
As the wind wrote and the clouds the points drew.
The vizier dismounted and pitched his tents at a place called the Plain of Pebbles, saying to his followers, “Let us rest here for two or three days.” Then the pages and servants went on their errands into the city, this to sell, that to buy, another to go to the bath. ’Ajib too went into the city to see the sights, followed by a eunuch carrying a red club of knotted almondwood, “with which if one hit a camel, it would go galloping as far as Yemen.”8 When the people of Damascus saw ’Ajib, who in spite of his very young age was all beauty, charm, and perfect grace, just like him of whom the poet said:
The scent is musk, the cheek a rose,
The teeth are pearls, the mouth is wine,
The frame a bough, the hip a barge,
The hair is night, the face a moon divine,
they followed him, while others ran ahead and waited for him to pass by, so that they might gaze on him, until, as if it had been foreordained, the eunuch stopped in front of the shop of ’Ajib’s father, Badr al-Din Hasan al-Basri.
Badr al-Din had been living in Damascus for twelve years, during which time the reformed cook died, leaving his shop and all his property to his adopted son, Badr al-Din. In the course of the years Badr al-Din’s beard had grown and his understanding had matured. When his son and the servants stood before him …
But morning overtook Shahrazad, and she lapsed into silence. Then the king said to himself, “By God, I will not have her put to death until I find out what happened to the vizier Badr al-Din Hasan, his son, his uncle, and his cousin. Then I will have her put to death as I did the others.”
THE NINETY-FIRST NIGHT
The following night Shahrazad said:
I heard, O happy King, that Ja’far said to the caliph:
When ’Ajib and the servant stood before Badr al-Din’s shop, and he gazed on his son’s extraordinary beauty and grace, his heart began to throb, his stomach began to flutter, and he felt happy, as the blood hearkened to the blood, driven by instinctive sympathy and the divine mystery—Glory be to Him who controls everything. Looking at his son’s outlandish attire and at his wonderful face, Badr al-Din said to him, “O my lord and master of my life and heart, you for whom I would shed my blood, would you enter my shop to taste my food and make me happy?” (That day he had prepared a pomegranate-seed dish cooked in sugar.) At that moment, he remembered his happy days as a vizier’s son, and his eyes filled with tears and he recited the following verses: