Thereat he stared on vacancy with a serious eye, and he could scarce
credit her earnestness, but she repeated the same. So presently he
thought, 'This old hag appeareth deep in the fountain of events, and she
will be a right arm to me in the mastering of one, a torch in darkness,
seeing there is wisdom in her as well as wickedness. The thwackings?--sad
was their taste, but they're in the road leading to greatness, and I
cannot say she put me out of that road in putting me where they were. Her
age?--shall I complain of that when it is a sign she goeth shortly
altogether?'
As he was thus debating he regarded the old woman stealthily, and she was
in agitation, so that her joints creaked like forest branches in a wind,
and the puckers of her visage moved as do billows of the sea to and fro,
and the anticipations of a fair young bride are not more eager than what
was visible in the old woman. Wheedlingly she looked at him, and shaped
her mouth like a bird's bill to soften it; and she drew together her
dress, to give herself the look of slimness, using all fascinations. He
thought, ''Tis a wondrous old woman! Marriage would seem a thing of
moment to her, yet is the profit with me, and I'll agree to it.' So he
said, ''Tis a pact between us, O old woman!'
Now, the eyes of the old woman brightened when she heard him, and were as
the eyes of a falcon that eyeth game, hungry with red fire, and she
looked brisk with impatience, laughing a low laugh and saying, 'O youth,
I must claim of thee, as is usual in such cases, the kiss of contract.'
So Shibli Bagarag was mindful of what is written,
If thou wouldst take the great leap, be ready for the little jump,
and he stretched out his mouth to the forehead of the old woman. When he
had done so, it was as though she had been illuminated, as when light is
put in the hollow of a pumpkin. Then said she, 'This is well! this is a
fair beginning! Now look, for thy fortune will of a surety follow. Call
me now sweet bride, and knocker at the threshold of hearts!'
So Shibli Bagarag sighed, and called her this, and he said, 'Forget not
my condition, O old woman, and that I am nigh famished.'
Upon that she nodded gravely, and arose and shook her garments together,
and beckoned for Shibli Bagarag to follow her; and the two passed through
the gates of the city, and held on together through divers streets and
thoroughfares till they came before the doors of a palace with a pillared
entrance; and the old woman passed through the doors of the palace as one
familiar to them, and lo! they were in a lofty court, built all of
marble, and in the middle of it a fountain playing, splashing silvery.
Shibli Bagarag would have halted here to breathe the cool refreshingness
of the air, but the old woman would not; and she hurried on even to the
opening of a spacious Hall, and in it slaves in circle round a raised
seat, where sat one that was their lord, and it was the Chief Vizier of
the King.
Then the old woman turned round sharply to Shibli Bagarag, and said, 'How
of thy tackle, O my betrothed?'