Page:Tales from the Arabic, Vol 1.djvu/306

281 merchandise and open him a shop.’ ‘How much will that be?’ asked he, and she said, ‘A hundred dirhems.’ Quoth the thief, ‘[That makes five hundred dirhems; I will pay it;] but may I be divorced from my wife if all my possessions amount to more than this, and that the savings of twenty years! Let me go my way, so I may deliver them to thee.’ ‘O fool,’ answered she, ‘how shall I let thee go thy way? Give me a right token.’ [So he gave her a token for his wife] and she cried out to her young daughter and said to her, ‘Keep this door.’

Then she charged her husband keep watch over the thief, till she should return, and repairing to his wife, acquainted her with his case and told her that her husband the thief had been taken and had compounded for his release, at the price of seven hundred dirhems, and named to her the token. So she gave her the money and she took it and returned to her house. By this time, the dawn had broken; so she let the thief go his way, and when he went out, she said to him, ‘O my dear one, when shall I see thee come and take the treasure?’ ‘O indebted one,’ answered he, ‘when thou needest other seven hundred dirhems, wherewithal to amend thy case and that of thy children and to discharge thy debts.’ And he went out, hardly believing in his deliverance from her. Nor,” added the vizier, “is this more extraordinary than the story of the three men and our Lord Jesus.”

And the king bade him depart to his own house.