Page:The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Vol 6.djvu/369

339 from place to place, till they came to the pavilion, which when the princess beheld and saw that it had been newly repaired, she said to the old woman, ‘O my nurse, seest thou yonder pavilion? It has been repaired and its walls newly plastered.’ ‘By Allah, O my lady,’ answered she, ‘I heard say that the keeper of the garden had taken stuffs of a company of merchants and sold them and bought bricks and lime and stones and plaster and so forth with the price; so I asked him what he had done with all this, and he said, “I have put the ruined pavilion in repair, and when the merchants sought their due of me, I said to them, ‘Wait till the princess visits the garden and sees the repairs and they please her: then will I take of her what she is pleased to bestow on me, and pay you your due.’” Quoth I, “What moved thee to do this thing?” And he said, “I saw the pavilion in ruins, the coigns thrown down and the plaster stripped from the walls, and none had the grace to repair it; so I borrowed the money on my own account and reinstated the place; and I trust in the princess to deal with me as befits her dignity.” Quoth I, “The princess is all goodness and generosity and will no doubt requite thee.” And he did all this but in hopes of thy bounty.’ ‘By Allah,’ replied the princess, ‘he hath dealt nobly in rebuilding it and hath done the deed of a man of worth! Call me my purse-keeper.’ The old woman accordingly fetched the purse-keeper, and the princess bade the latter give the gardener two thousand dinars; whereupon the nurse sent a messenger to him, bidding him to the princess’s presence.

When the gardener received the summons, he trembled in every limb and said in himself, ‘Doubtless, the princess has seen the young man, and this day will be the most unlucky of days for me.’ So he went home and told his wife and children what had happened and gave them his last injunctions, and they wept for him. Then he took