And the broker, the old miser, obstinate as are the half-fuddled, began to mumble, ’I came not here to drink, O Ukleet, but to make a bargain; and my bags be here, and I like not yonder veil, nor the presence of yonder Vizier, nor the secresy of this.  Now, by the Prophet and that interdict of his, I’ll drink no further.’

And Ukleet said, ’Let her not mark your want of fellowship, or ’twill go ill with you.  Here be fine wines, spirited wines! choice flavours! and you drink not!  Where’s the soul in you, O Boolp, and where’s the life in you, that you yield her to the Vizier utterly?  Surely she waiteth a gallant sign from you, so challenge her cheerily.’

Quoth Boolp, ’I care not.  Shall I leave my wealth and all I possess void of eyes? and she so that I recognise her not behind the veil?’

Ukleet pushed the old miser jeeringly:  ’You not recognise her?  Oh, Boolp, a pretty dissimulation!  Pledge her now a cup to the snatching of the veil, and bethink you of a fitting verse, a seemly compliment,—­ something sugary.’

Then Boolp smoothed his head, and was bothered; and tapped it, and commenced repeating to Bhanavar: 

             I saw the moon behind a cloud,
          And I was cold as one that’s in his shroud: 
               And I cried, Moon!—­

Ukleet chorused him, ‘Moon!’ and Boolp was deranged in what he had to say, and gasped,—­

Moon!  I cried, Moon!—­and I cried, Moon!

Then the Vizier and Ukleet laughed till they fell on their backs; so Bhanavar took up his verse where he left it, singing,—­

                    And to the cry
          Moon did make fair the following reply: 
          ’Dotard, be still! for thy desire
          Is to embrace consuming fire.’

Then said Boolp, ’O my mistress, the laws of conviviality have till now restrained me; but my coming here was on business, and with me my bags, in good faith.  So let us transact this matter of the jewels, and after that the song of—­

                        ’’Thou and I
                         A cup will try,’’

even as thou wilt.’

Bhanavar threw aside her outer robe and veil, and appeared in a dress of sumptuous blue, spotted with gold bees; her face veiled with a veil of gauzy silver, and she was as the moon in summer heavens, and strode mar jestically forward, saying, ’The jewels? ‘tis but one.  Behold!’

The lamps were extinguished, and in her hand was the glory of the Serpent Jewel, no other light save it in the vaulted chamber.

So the old miser perked his chin and brows, and cried wondering, ’I know it, this Jewel, O my mistress.’

She turned to the Vizier, and said, lifting the red gloom of the Jewel on him, ‘And thou?’

Aswarak ate his under-lip.

Then she cried, ‘There’s much ye know in common, ye two.’

Thereupon Bhanavar passed from the feast on to the centre of the vault, and stood before the tomb of Almeryl, and drew the cloth from it; and they saw by the glow of the Jewel that it was a tomb.  When she had mounted some steps at the side of the tomb, she beckoned them to come, crying, in a voice of sobs, ‘This which is here, likewise ye may know.’