Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 1.djvu/266

244 the string and drew out a little purse of blue silk, full of something that chinked like money. Hardly had I done so, when the soldier turned and feeling his pocket lightened, put his hand to it and found it empty; whereupon he turned to me and raising his mace, smote me on the head I fell to the ground, whilst the people came round us and seizing the soldier’s horse by the bridle, said to him, ‘Is it because he pushed against thee in the throng, that thou smitest this young man such a blow?’ But he cried out at them and said, ‘This fellow is an accursed thief!’ With this I came to myself and stood up, and the folk looked at me and said, ‘This is a comely youth and would not steal aught.’ Some took part for me and others against me and there was a great clamour, and the people pulled at me and would have rescued me from the trooper; but as Fate would have it, the chief of the police and the captain and officers of the watch entered by the gate at this moment; and the prefect, seeing the crowd about the soldier and myself, enquired what was the matter. ‘O my lord,’ replied the soldier, ‘this fellow is a thief. I had a blue purse in my pocket, containing twenty dinars, and he took it, whilst I was in the crush.’ ‘Was any one else by thee?’ asked the magistrate, and the trooper answered, ‘No.’ Then the prefect cried out to the officers of the watch, who seized me and stripping me by his order, found the purse in my clothes. He took it and found in it twenty dinars, as the soldier had said, whereat he was wroth and calling to the officers to bring me before him, said to me, ‘O young man tell me the truth. Didst thou steal this purse?’ At this I hung down my head and said to myself, ‘It is useless for me to say I did not steal the purse, for they found it in my clothes: and if I confess to the theft, I fall into trouble.’ So I raised my head and said, ‘Yes: I took it.’ When the prefect heard what I said, he wondered and called for witnesses, who came forward and attested by confession.