She found him drunken and said to him, 'O my
son, none was the cause of thy release from prison but the wife
of the Master of Police, and she would have thee go about to kill
Alaeddin Abou esh Shamat and get his slave-girl Jessamine for her
son Hebezlem Bezazeh.' 'That will be the easiest of things,'
answered he, 'and I will set about it this very night.' Now this
was the first night of the new month, and it was the Khalif's
wont to pass that night with the Princess Zubeideh, for the
setting free of a male or female slave or what not else of the
like. On this occasion, he used to doff his royal habit and lay
it upon a chair in the sitting-chamber, together with his rosary
and dagger and royal signet and a golden lantern, adorned with
three jewels strung on a wire of gold, by which he set great
store, committing all these things to the charge of the eunuchs,
whilst he sent into the Lady Zubeideh's apartment. So Ahmed
Kemakim waited till midnight, when Canopus shone and all
creatures slept, whilst the Creator covered them with the curtain
[of the dark]. Then he took his naked sword in one hand and his
grappling iron in the other, and repairing to the Khalif's
pavilion, cast his grapnel on to the roof. It caught there and he
fixed his rope-ladder and climbed up to the roof; then, raising
the trap-door, let himself down into the saloon, where he found
the eunuchs asleep.
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