Now when it was the Nine Hundred and Sixty-fifth Night,
She pursued, It hath reached me, O auspicious King, that when the merchant, the father of Kamar al-Zaman, heard the saying of the Dervish, “I am Allah’s guest,” he replied, “Welcome to the guest of God: enter, O Dervish!” But he said to himself, “An the beggar be enamoured of the boy and sue him for sin, needs must I slay him this very night and bury him secretly. But, an there be no lewdness in him, the guest shall eat his portion.” Then he brought him into a saloon, where he left him with Kamar al-Zaman, after he had said privily to the lad, “O my son, sit thou beside the Dervish when I am gone out and sport with him and provoke him to love-liesse and if he seek of thee lewdness, I who will be watching you from the window overlooking the saloon will come down to him and kill him.” So, as soon as Kamar al-Zaman was alone in the room with the Dervish, he sat down by his side and the old man began to look upon him and sigh and weep. Whenever the lad bespake him, he answered him kindly, trembling the while and would turn to him groaning and crying, and thus he did till supper was brought in, when he fell to eating, with his eyes on the boy but refrained not from shedding tears. When a fourth part of the night was past and talk was ended and sleep-tide came, Abd al-Rahman said to the lad, “O my son, apply thyself to the service of thine uncle the Dervish and gainsay him not:” and would have gone out; but the Dervish cried to him, “O my lord, carry thy son with thee or sleep with us.” Answered the merchant, “Nay, my son shall lie with thee: haply thy soul may desire somewhat, and he will look to thy want and wait upon thee.” Then he went out leaving them both together, and sat down in an adjoining room which had a window giving upon the saloon. Such was the case with the merchant; but as to the lad, as soon as his sire had left them, he came up to the Dervish and began to provoke him and offer himself to him, whereupon he waxed wroth and said, “What talk is this, O my son? I take refuge with Allah from Satan the Stoned! O my Lord, indeed this is a denial of Thee which pleaseth Thee not! Avaunt from me, O my son!” So saying, the Dervish arose and sat down at a distance; but the boy followed him and threw himself upon him, saying, “Why, O Dervish, wilt thou deny thyself the joys of my possession, and I with a heart that loveth thee?” Hereupon the Dervish’s anger redoubled and he said, “An thou refrain not from me, I will summon thy sire and tell him of thy doings.” Quoth the lad, “My father knoweth my turn for this and it may not be that he will hinder me: so heal thou my heart. Why dost thou hold off from me? Do I not please thee?” Answered the Dervish, “By Allah, O my son, I will not do this, though I be hewn in pieces with sharp-edged swords!”; and he repeated the saying of the poet:—