Said Boolp, ‘Hearing is compliance in such a case.’

And Ukleet continued, ’What a fortune is yours, O Boolp! truly the tide of fortune setteth into your lap.  Fail not, wullahy! to come with all you possess, or if you have not enough when she requireth it to complete the bargain, my mistress will break off with you.  I know not if she intend even other game for you, O lucky one!’

Boolp hitched his girdle and shrugged, saying, ’’Tis she will fail, I wot,—­she, in having therewith to complete the bargain between us.  Wa! wa!—­there!  I’ve done this before now.  Wullahy! if she have not enough of her rubies and pearls to outweigh me and my gold, go to, Boolp will school her!  What says the poet?—­

  ’’Earth and ocean search, East, West, and North, to the South,
   None will match the bright rubies and pearls of her mouth.’’

’Aha! what?  O Ukleet!  And he says: 

      ’’The lovely ones a bargain made
      With me, and I renounced my trade,
     Half-ruined; ‘Ah!’ said they, ’return and win! 
     To even scales ourselves we will throw in!’’’

How so?  But let discreetness reign and security flourisheth!’

Ukleet nodded at him, and repeated the distich: 

     Men of worth and men of wits
     Shoot with two arrows, and make two hits.

So he arranged with Boolp the same appointment as with the Vizier, and returned to Queen Bhanavar.

Now, in the dark of night Aswarak stood within the gate of the palace-garden of Mashalleed that was ajar, and a hand from a veiled figure reached to him, and he caught it, in the fulness of his delusion, crying, ‘Thou, my Queen?’ But the hand signified silence, and drew him past the tank of the garden and through a court of the palace into a passage lit with lamps, and on into a close-curtained chamber, and beyond a heavy curtain into another, a circular passage descending between black hangings, and at the bottom a square vault draped with black, and in it precious woods burning, oils in censers, and the odour of ambergris and myrrh and musk floating in clouds, and the sight of the Vizier was for a time obscured by the thickness of the incenses floating.  As he became familiar with the place, he saw marked therein a board spread at one end with viands and wines, and the nosegay in a water-vase, and cups of gold and a service of gold,—­every preparation for feasting mightily.  So the soul of Aswarak leapt, and he cried, ’Now unveil thyself, O moon of our meeting, my mistress!’

The voice of Bhanavar answered him, ’Not till we have feasted and drunken, and it seemeth little in our eyes.  Surely the chamber is secure:  could I have chosen one better for our meeting, O Aswarak?’

Upon that he entreated her to sit with him to the feast, but she cried, ‘Nay! delay till the other is come.’

Cried he, ‘Another?’