Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 6.djvu/318

290 gave them the cakes, which they ate, and delivered the boy to Hassan Shouman, saying, ‘This is Zureic’s child; hide it.’ So he hid it and fetching a lamb, gave it to the hall-keeper, who cooked it whole, wrapped in a cloth, and laid it out, with a shroud over it, as it were a dead body.

Meanwhile Zureic stood awhile, waiting at the door then gave a thundering knock, and his wife said to him, ‘Hast thou brought the purse?’ ‘Didst thou not take it up in the basket but now?’ answered he, and she said, ‘I let no basket down to thee, nor have I set eyes on the purse.’ ‘By Allah,’ quoth he, ‘the sharper hath been beforehand with me and hath taken the purse again!’ Then he searched the house and found the basket of cakes gone and the child missing and cried out, saying, ‘Alas, my child!’ Whereupon the woman beat her breast and said, ‘I will complain of thee to the Vizier, for none has killed my child but this sharper, and all because of thee.’ Quoth Zureic, ‘I will answer for him.’ So he tied the kerchief [of truce] about his neck and going to Ahmed ed Denef’s lodging, knocked at the door. The hall-keeper admitted him and Hassan Shouman said to him, ‘What brings thee here?’ Quoth he, ‘Do ye intercede with Ali the Cairene to restore me my child and I will give him the purse.’ ‘God requite thee, O Ali!’ said Hassan. ‘Why didst thou not tell me it was his child?’ ‘What has befallen him?’ asked Zureic, and Hassan answered, saying, ‘We gave him raisins to eat, and he choked and died; and here he is.’ Quoth Zureic, ‘Alas, my child! What shall I say to his mother?’ Then he rose and opening the shroud, saw it was a lamb cooked whole and said, ‘Thou makest sport of me, O Ali!’ Then they gave him the child, and Ahmed ed Denef said to him, ‘Thou didst hang up the purse, proclaiming that it should be the property of any sharper who should avail to take it, and Ali has taken it; so it is his.’ Quoth Zureic, ‘I make him a present of it.’ But