PERVANEH Explain, O Master of the World.

CALIPH Between two deaths with torment and two lives with a separation.

Between a day of love and all the years of life.

PERVANEH Enlighten my understanding.

CALIPH I have considered this matter. I have decided this matter.

I will speak plain and clear.

(Rising) This is my irrevocable judgment from which there is no appeal.

I give a choice to Pervaneh and Rafi, the King of the Beggars, and I grant them till sunset to consult their hearts and make that choice together. They shall both live on these conditions: that the lady Pervaneh return forthwith to my harem to be my wife in lawful wedlock, and be treated with all the honour her boldness and her beauty merit. That the King of the Beggars leave Bagdad, and that these two lovers part for ever till they die.

But if they refuse this separation, I offer them one day of love, from sunset to-night to sunset on the morrow, unfettered and alone, with no more guard than may keep them from self-destruction.

But when that day is over they shall die together in merciless torment.

In the name of Allah the most merciful, the Divan is closed.

CURTAIN

ACT IV

SCENE I

In the vaults of the palace, outside the cell of the KING OF THE BEGGARS.

Drop Scene.

(Enter Ha.s.sAN)

Ha.s.sAN Which way? Which way? I am lost in this dark pa.s.sage. My voice rings around the arches. What's that noise? Is there an army coming?

Or are all the prisoners stamping with wrath?...No....It is only someone walking....I wonder who! And if this stranger asks me my business what shall I say to him? Do I know what brought me to this dismal region?

ISHAK (From the darkness) Who goes there? Who goes there? What dost thou here?

What is thy business?

Ha.s.sAN Who calls? I am Ha.s.san, inspecting the security of the imperial prisons.

Who art thou?

ISHAK Who am I? Ten books were written by Aflatun and twenty by Aristu to answer that mighty question, O Ha.s.san of my heart.

Ha.s.sAN Ishak! Come out of hiding, Ishak. What are you doing here?

ISHAK I gather mushrooms, O inspector of the vaults of vice!

Ha.s.sAN Have you come too? I do not know why I came. I hoped...I do not know why I came, but I think our hearts do beat together like the hearts of friends. Did you come here because of _them_?

ISHAK I came here to hear a play more tragic than the mysteries of Hossein, to listen to a debate more weighty than the council talk of kings....

Ha.s.sAN You do not mean?...

ISHAK I mean the debate of love and life.

Ha.s.sAN Could you spy on that? How cruel!

ISHAK The poet must learn what man's agony can teach him.

Ha.s.sAN Is it then not better not to be a poet?

ISHAK (Bitterly) Allah did not ask me that question when he made me a poet and a dissector of souls. It is my trade: I do but follow my master, the exalted Designer of human carpets, the Ruler of the world.

If he prepared the situation, shall I not observe the characters?

Thus I corrupt my soul to create--Allah knoweth what--ten little words like rubies in a row. As for you, I think you begin to understand the Caliph of the Faithful.

Ha.s.sAN Why speak of him? All men are brutes, you and he and I.

I thought that I was kinder than other men--but I was only more afraid.

This day is the first day of my exaltation, I have begun it the all but murderer of a woman, and I end it a spy on souls in trouble.

ISHAK Do not worry any longer, dear Ha.s.san, on the moral problem.

The moths of curiosity will always flutter round the lamp of circ.u.mstances.

Here comes the Guard, they shall direct us.

(Enter 2 GUARDS)

ISHAK (To the GUARD) Ho, soldier, whither?

Ist GUARD (Saluting) To the cell of the King of the Beggars, my masters, to relieve the Guard.

ISHAK What, will you stand inside the cell?

Ist GUARD Inside, O my masters.

ISHAK A shame, I say, a shame to spy on a pair of lovers. Will they fly off through the keyhole?

Ist GUARD We know the ways of prisoners, O my masters. Masrur is disappointed when we bring him corpses to be whipped.

(To 2nd GUARD) Is he not disappointed, Mohamed?