“‘It is simple enough,’ said I. ‘This person to whom your purse was given, and I, were in the same inn. We fell to talking of our adventures along the road, for he also was a stranger, and he told me the singular tale how he had recovered from the authorities a purse which he honestly thought his own, for it was very like one which he himself possessed; but that on finding his own purse later on in his wallet he was overwhelmed with regret at the thought of the loss he had occasioned; at the same time he made me his confidant, telling me that he intended to restore it this very evening at sunset to the authorities and that any one claiming it after that hour and proving it was his could recover it at the public offices. But he warned me of one thing: the officers (he told me) were convinced (from what indication I know not, perhaps from the presence of something in the purse, or perhaps from something they had heard) that the owner dealt in pearls.’
“Here the young man interrupted me, and assured me he had never bought or sold pearls in his life, nor thought of doing so.
“I answered that no doubt this was so. But that when the authorities had a whim it was well to humour them. He would therefore do well to approach the officer who guarded the gate of the Chief Magistrate’s house, with the simple words, ‘I am the Seller of Pearls,’ on hearing which his path would be made smooth for him, and he would receive his belongings.
“The young man thanked me heartily; he even warmly embraced me for the good news I had given him, and felt, I fear, that his purse and his small fortune were already restored to him. It was a gallant sight to see him in the last of the light swinging down the mountain side with a new life in him, and I sincerely regretted from my heart the necessity under which I was to imperil his liberty and life. But you will agree with me, my dear nephews, that I could not possibly afford to have him at large.
“When he had gone and when it was fully night, there being no moon and only the stars in the warm dark sky, I rapidly took my burdens from their hiding-place and proceeded, though with some difficulty, up the mountain side, staggering under such a weight, and deviating from the track so that there should be less chance of finding myself interrupted.
“I slept for a few hours. I awoke at dawn. I counted my total fortune, and found that it was just about 12,000 dinars, the most of it in silver.
“Carefully concealing it again, I left its hiding-place and glided round the mountain until I came to a place where a new track began to appear, which led to a neighbouring village. Here I bought an ass, and returning with it to my hiding-place and setting my treasure upon it I went off at random to spend the day in travelling as rapidly as I might away from the neighbourhood by the most deserted regions.
“I came, a little before sunset, upon a hermit’s cave, where I was hospitably entertained and the tenant of which refused all reward, asking me only to pray for him, as he was certain that the prayers of youth and innocence would merit him a high place in Heaven.
“With this holy man I remained for some four or five days, passing my time at leisure in his retreat among the mountains, and feeding my donkey upon the dried grasses which I brought in by armfuls at dusk from the woodlands. Upon the fifth day of this concealment the hermit came in pensive and sad, and said to me:
“‘My son, with every day the wickedness of this world increases, and the judgment of God will surely fall upon it in a devastating fire! I have but just heard that the Chief Magistrate of our capital city, using as a dupe an innocent stranger, sold to one of the great jewellers of the place for no less than 10,000 dinars a quantity of pearls, every one of which now turns out to be false and valueless! Nay, I am told that the largest are made of nothing but wax! And, what is worse, not content with this first wickedness, the magistrate under the plea that the young stranger had disappeared confiscated the gems again and had the poor merchant most severely beaten! But—worse and worse! the poor youth having innocently returned that very night to the city, was seized by the guard and beheaded. Ya, ya,’ said the good old man, throwing up his hands, ‘the days increase, and their evil increases with them!’”