Without seeking for an answer to her prayer, she rose distractedly and went and flung herself upon the bed where Yûsuf lay. He moaned:
“My mother! Oh, alas, thy bitterness! How couldst thou seek to rob me of delight? Behold me dead! Now art thou satisfied? O Lord have mercy on me! O Calamity!”
Blubbering loudly, she implored forgiveness. Soon his arms went round her; they lay, hugging one another, sobbing, cooing, while the spectators wept aloud in tender sympathy. The Pasha’s face was hidden in his pocket-handkerchief. Murjânah Khânum murmured prayers beneath her breath.
“O my despair! my wickedness!” the mother shrieked.
“My grief, my desolation; now my joy!” sobbed Yûsuf.
“O Lord, relieve me, for my heart is bursting,” moaned the Pasha.
“Oh, what do I behold. How rapture pains me!” came from bystanders. All, in the selfish orgy of emotion, forgot the terrified and wondering bride, who, understanding not a word of what was said, surveyed a riddle. She asked the Pasha what the matter was. He answered with a hiccup of emotion:
“It is nothing, mademoiselle. It will soon pass. Have no fear!” which only added to her stupefaction.
She had seen such exhibitions in ill-governed nurseries, but never among grown-up folks before. To account for all the outcry she imagined some tremendous tragedy, and waited anxiously to learn its nature.
It was close on midnight ere the chamber emptied and, left alone with Yûsuf, she could put her question. Then he told her the whole story with frequent interjection of “Oh, how I suffered!” She learnt that she had narrowly escaped a cruel death. But how her danger bore upon the scenes she had just witnessed, or in what manner they were meant to reassure her, she could not divine. Yûsuf himself bestowed no thought on her predicament, immersed in contemplation of his own emotions. Feeling alone and outcast, she wept a little ere she went to sleep.