But when the royal tent his generals sought,
Proclaiming victory, fled was he who fought.
Despair possessed them, till they chanced to spy
A Dervish that paced on with downward eye;
They questioned of the King; he answer'd slow,
'Ye fought but one, the King a double, foe.'"
And, O my father, they interpreted of this that the King had been vanquished, he that was victor, by the phantom army of his fears.'
Now, the Vizier cried, 'Be the will of Allah achieved and consummated!' and he was silenced by her wisdom and urgency, and sat where he was, diverting not the arch on his brow from its settled furrow. He was as one that thirsteth, and whose eye hath marked a snake of swift poison by the water, so thirsted he for the Event, yet hung with dread from advancing; but Noorna bin Noorka busied herself about the roof, drawing circles to witness the track of an enemy, and she clapped her hands and cried, 'Luloo!' and lo, a fair slave-girl that came to her and stood by with bent head, like a white lily by a milk-white antelope; so Noorna clouded her brow a moment, as when the moon darkeneth behind a scud, and cried, 'Speak! art thou in league with Karaz, girl?'
Luloo strained her hands to her temples, exclaiming, 'With the terrible Genie?—I?—in league with him? O my mistress, surely the charms I wear, and the amulets, I wear them as a protection from that Genie, and a safeguard, he that carrieth off the maidens and the young sucklings, walking under the curse of mothers.'
Said Noorna, 'O Luloo, have I boxed those little ears of thine this day?'
The fair slave-girl smiled a smile of submissive tenderness, and answered, 'Not this day, nor once since Luloo was rescued from the wicked old merchant by thy over-bidding, and was taken to the arms of a wise kind sister,
