CHIEF OF POLICE The credit is entirely due to my honourable friend.

CALIPH (Insisting) Come hither both.

(They are fitted with half a robe of honour each amid laughter.)

SOLDIERS Long live those whom the Caliph delights to honour!

CAPTAIN OF MILITARY (Under his teeth) Mutinous swine!

CALIPH And now bring forth the King of the Beggars.

(The KING OF THE BEGGARS is brought in chained hand and foot, but still dressed in gold.)

The Salaam to my host of yesternight.

RAFI, KING OF BEGGARS The Salaam, O man of Basra. I see thy fellow-merchant in the robes of the Grand Vizier. But the negro, that most disgusting Negro, seems to be absent. To Ha.s.san, my congratulations on his advancement.

CALIPH Thou dost speak with the impudence of a king, but thy subjects are taken from thee. They will soon be black crows in the pine-wood by the walls.

RAFI Had I but known thee last night, thou man of Basra, whom men call Caliph of the Faithful--O thou ma.s.sacrer of good men--had I but known thee, had I but known thee!

CHIEF OF POLICE Shall I tear out his tongue?

CALIPH Let him talk. I have found a man who does not flatter me. Let me study the hatred in his eyes.

RAFI It is not enough for thee to misrule a quarter of the world.

Thou art not only a fool tyrant, but a mean tradesman, thou dog-hearted spy!

JAFAR It is not decent to let this man continue his coa.r.s.e abuse, O Master.

Wilt thou not end him?

CALIPH He shall end in his time.

(To KING OF THE BEGGARS) Thy impudence will not redound to thy advantage, Rafi! Wherefore dost thou not bite the tongue of insolence with the tooth of discretion?

RAFI I am a man in the presence of death.

CALIPH There a thousand paths to the delectable tavern of death, and some run straight and some run crooked.

RAFI Cut, scourge, burn, rack thy uttermost. The n.o.bler the aim the baser the failure. Do not I deserve to feel every separate pain of those whom my folly has sent to cruel death?

CHINESE PHILOSOPHER I am a hundred and ten years old, and I have never heard a remark in more exquisite taste.

CALIPH It is well. But before I send thee to a death so cruel that thy conscience will be fully satisfied in this world and the next, answer me this: Hast thou forgotten that unparalleled lady whom the zeal of my servants ravished from thy embrace?

RAFI Thou devil of Eblis! Have I forgotten? Have I not prayed thou shouldst forget?

CALIPH Shall a gallant man forget the name of a beautiful woman?

We will look on her, for whom thou didst attempt to raze the central fort of Islam.

(To ATTENDANTS) Bring in this lady, Pervaneh.

RAFI (In supplication) O Master of the World! O Master of the World!

CALIPH Thou changest tone abruptly but late.

RAFI I was insolent only that her name should be forgotten in thy anger and my death, O Splendour of Islam!

CALIPH A crafty excuse for impoliteness. Wilt thou now begin to be polite to the tyrant whose coffin was to be nailed over his open eyes?

He who hopes for his audience to forget the subject of his discourse should moderate his style.

RAFI G.o.d blind me that I may not see her!

CALIPH Why? Dost thou not love her still? Is not the sight of his beloved to the victim of separation like the vision of a fountain to him who dies of thirst?

Ha.s.sAN (Aside) But if that fountain be a fountain whose drops are blood?

RAFI Thou, thou hast held her in thy arms! O G.o.d, have pity on my soul!

CALIPH But with this knowledge thou didst still desire her, and was ready to wreck Bagdad for the sparkle of her eyes.

RAFI But first the blood of her possessor should have washed her honour clean.

CALIPH Thou art a most ridiculous man. Thou hast built thy monstrous tower of crime on a foundation of painted smoke. Dost thou imagine I have tasted all the fruit of my garden?

RAFI Allah has given thee men's bodies, but it is for him alone to torment the soul. By thy faith, O Caliph, speak the truth!

CALIPH Do I know every slave whom my industrious officials sweep in from the streets? To my knowledge I have never set my eyes on this woman of thine.

HERALD The maiden Pervaneh!

CALIPH Let her come before me.

(PERVANEH is ushered into the Presence.)

PERVANEH (With due reverence) O Master of the World!

CALIPH It is written in the Sacred Law: In the King's presence a woman may unveil, without fear of censure.

PERVANEH Ah, Master, but only the eagle dare look upon the sun.

CALIPH Thy speech is proud enough for all the eagles, Lady Pervaneh, and I doubt not thy eyes, which I desire to see, are steady in the blaze of danger. Must I command thee to unveil?

PERVANEH Alas, Master of the World, my eyes are dim with long confinement in a jewelled cage, and the wings of my soul are numb.

Only on the hills of my country where the rolling sun of Heaven has his morning home, only on their windy hills do the women of my country go unveiled.

ISHAK (To himself, half singing) The hills, the hills, the morning on the hills!

CALIPH (To PERVANEH) I command thee to unveil.