I fetched the doctors to her
and she recovered slowly; and I would have had her take a bath;
but she said, "There is something I long for, before I go to the
bath." "What is it?" asked I, and she replied, "I have a longing
for an apple, that I may smell it and bite a piece of it." So I
went out into the city at once and sought for apples, but could
find none, though, had they been a dinar apiece, I would have
bought them. I was vexed at this and went home and said to my
wife, "By Allah, my cousin, I can find none." She was distressed,
being yet weak, and her weakness increased greatly on her that
night, and I passed the night full of anxiety. As soon as it was
day, I went out again and made the round of the gardens, but
could find no apples anywhere. At last I met an old gardener, of
whom I enquired for them, and he said to me, "O my son, this
fruit is rare with us and is not now to be found but in the
garden of the Commander of the Faithful at Bassora, where the
gardener keeps them for the Khalif's table.' I returned home,
troubled at my ill-success, and my love and concern for her moved
me to undertake the journey to Bassora. So I set out and
travelled thither and bought three apples of the gardener there
for three dinars, with which I returned to Baghdad, after having
been absent fifteen days and nights, going and coming. I went in
to my wife and gave her the apples; but she took no pleasure in
them and let them lie by her side; for weakness and fever had
increased on her and did not leave her for ten days, at the end
of which time she began to mend.
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