“‘And at what cost?’ I moaned in a hollow voice.
“He turned to a written list of fees, then to a special memorandum of his own. He made a short calculation upon an abacus and answered, ‘three hundred dinars.’
“I kept my mouth from blasphemy and asked him when the sum would be required.
“‘It is a mere formality,’ said he, ‘this written opinion, but we must have a record.’
“‘Yes, yes,’ said I.
“‘And I will,’ said he, ‘take the opportunity of obtaining the same before you come again.’
“Once more I returned to my disgusting rooms, took money from my secret hoard and, returning, put into the Scrivener’s hands a little parcel of 300 dinars. He dropped them thoughtfully through his fingers in little streams till they nearly filled his metal box.
“‘It is a pretty box, is it not?’ he said. ‘I took it for a bad debt from one of my clients, who most unfortunately died by his own hand in a fit of melancholy after the most distressing disappointments in his suits at law.’
“‘And as to the date?’ I said.
“‘The date?’ Once more he consulted another document, then clapped his hands for the slave who sat in his outer apartment, and having asked him a question in some incomprehensible jargon, received an answer no less mysterious. Then he turned to me and said: ‘It will come on at some date after the next New Moon but one.’