So he and the other merchants
repaired to the garden, taking with them all that they required
of food and so forth, and sat, eating and drinking and carousing,
till noon, when my master, having need of something from the
house, said to me, "O slave, mount the mule and go to the house
and get such and such a thing from thy mistress and return
quickly." I did as he bade me and started for the house, but as I
drew near, I began to cry out and weep copiously, whereupon all
the people of the quarter collected, great and small; and my
master's wife and daughters, hearing the noise I was making,
opened the door and asked me what was the matter. Quoth I, "My
master and his friends were sitting beneath an old wall, and it
fell on them: and when I saw what had befallen them, I mounted
the mule and came hither, in haste, to tell you." When my
master's wife and daughters heard this, they shrieked aloud
and tore their clothes and buffeted their faces, whilst the
neighbours came round them. Then my mistress overturned the
furniture of the house, pell-mell, tore down the shelves, broke
up the casements and the lattices and smeared the walls with mud
and indigo. Presently she said to me, "Out on thee, O Kafour!
Come and help me tear down these cupboards and break up these
vessels and porcelain!" So I went to her and helped her break up
all the shelves in the house, with everything on them, after
which I went round about the roofs and every part of the house,
demolishing all I could and leaving not a single piece of china
or the like in the house unbroken, till I had laid waste the
whole place, crying out the while, "Alas, my master!" Then my
mistress sallied forth, with her face uncovered and only her
kerchief on, accompanied by her sons and daughters, and said to
me, "Go thou before us and show us the place where thy master
lies dead under the wall, that we may take him out from the ruins
and lay him on a bier and carry him to the house and give him a
goodly funeral.
Pages:
468
469
470
471
472
473
474
475
476
477
478
479
480
481
482
483
484
485
486
487
488
489
490
491
492