A robbery of stuffs had been committed in the city and as it was a great
matter I was cited,[102] I and my fellows: they[103] pressed hard upon
us: but we obtained of them some days’ grace and dispersed in search of
the stolen goods. As for me, I sallied forth with five men and went
round about the city that day; and on the morrow we fared forth into the
suburbs. When we found ourselves a parasang or two parasangs away from
the city, we waxed athirst; and presently we came to a garden. There I
went in alone and going up to the water-wheel,[104] entered it and drank
and made the Wuzu-ablution and prayed. Presently, up came the keeper of
the garden and said to me, “Woe to thee! Who brought thee to this
water-wheel?” and he smote me and squeezed my ribs[105] till I was like
to die. Then he bound me with one of his bulls and made me work the
water-wheel, flogging me as I walked round with a cattle-whip[106] he
had with him, till my heart was a-fire; after which he loosed me and I
went out, knowing not the way. Now when I came forth, I fainted: so I
sat down till my trouble subsided; then I made for my comrades and said
to them, “I have found money and malefactor, and I affrighted him not
neither troubled him, lest he should flee; but now, come, let us go to
him, so we may contrive to lay hold upon him.” Then I took them and we
repaired to the keeper of the garden, who had tortured me with tunding,
with the intent to make him taste the like of that which he had done
with me and lie against him and cause him eat many a stick. So we rushed
to the water-wheel and seized the keeper. Now there was with him a youth
and, as we were pinioning the gardener, he said, “By Allah, I was not
with him and indeed ’tis six months since I entered this city, nor did I
set eyes on the stuffs until they were brought hither.” Quoth we, “Show
us the stuffs;” upon which he carried us to a place wherein was a pit,
beside the water-wheel, and digging there, brought out the stolen goods
with not a thread or a stitch of them missing. So we took them and
carried the keeper to the Prefecture of Police where we stripped him and
beat him with palm-rods till he confessed to thefts manifold. Now I did
this by way of mockery against my comrades, and it succeeded. The
company marvelled at this story with the utmost marvelling, and the
eleventh constable rose and said, “I know a story yet stranger than
this: but it happened not to myself.”