Carathis, still seated on her camel, foamed with indignation at the spectacle which obtruded itself on her chaste view; she thundered forth without check or mercy:  “Thou double-headed and four-legged monster! what means all this winding and writhing? art thou not ashamed to be seen grasping this limber sapling, in preference to the sceptre of the pre-adamite Sultans? is it then for this paltry doxy that thou hast violated the conditions in the parchment of our Giaour? is it on her thou hast lavished thy precious moments? is this the fruit of the knowledge I have taught thee? is this the end of thy journey? tear thyself from the arms of this little simpleton, drown her in the water before me, and instantly follow my guidance.”

In the first ebullition of his fury Vathek resolved to make a skeleton of Alboufaki, and to stuff the skins of Carathis and her blacks; but the ideas of the Giaour, the palace of Istakar, the sabres and the talismans, flashing before his imagination with the simultaneousness of lightning, he became more moderate, and said to his mother, in a civil but decisive tone:  “Dread lady! you shall be obeyed, but I will not drown Nouronihar; she is sweeter to me than a Myrabolan comfit, and is enamoured of carbuncles, especially that of Giamschid, which hath also been promised to be conferred upon her; she therefore shall go along with us, for I intend to repose with her beneath the canopies of Soliman; I can sleep no more without her.”

“Be it so!” replied Carathis, alighting, and at the same time committing Alboufaki to the charge of her women.

Nouronihar, who had not yet quitted her hold, began to take courage, and said, with an accent of fondness to the Caliph:  “Dear Sovereign of my soul!  I will follow thee, if it be thy will, beyond the Kaf in the land of the Afrits; I will not hesitate to climb for thee the nest of the Simurgh, who, this lady excepted, is the most awful of created existences.”

“We have here then,” subjoined Carathis, “a girl both of courage and science!”

Nouronihar had certainly both; but, notwithstanding all her firmness, she could not help casting back a look of regret upon the graces of her little Gulchenrouz, and the days of tenderness she had participated with him; she even dropped a few tears, which Carathis observed, and inadvertently breathed out with a sigh:  “Alas! my gentle cousin! what will become of him!”

Vathek at this apostrophe knitted up his brows, and Carathis inquired what it could mean.

“She is preposterously sighing after a stripling with languishing eyes and soft hair, who loves her,” said the Caliph.

“Where is he?” asked Carathis.  “I must be acquainted with this pretty child; for,” added she, lowering her voice, “I design before I depart to regain the favour of the Giaour; there is nothing so delicious in his estimation as the heart of a delicate boy, palpitating with the first tumults of love.”