Forcing his way through the crowd at the door, he entered the room, and his eye immediately fell upon the youth accused, standing apparently under arrest, between two of the servants. Hastily walking up to him, Hassan fixed his searching gaze on the countenance of the youth and said, “Kasem, tell me, by your life and by your father’s head, have you committed this crime?”
“Wallah, I have not!” replied the youth, looking up in Hassan’s face with a firm voice and clear, untroubled eye; “but our lord will not hear nor listen: the sword has been stolen from my room, but who is the thief is only known to Him to whom the absent is present.”
During this short dialogue the Pasha had continued, like an angry lion in a cage, pacing up and down the upper end of the room as if “nursing his wrath to keep it warm” by rapid motion as well as by curses and threats; his eyes were inflamed, and his face red up to the very temples. These violent bursts of passion, although of late less frequent than of old, when they procured him his name of Delì (mad), were well known to his followers and servants, and while they lasted none dared to speak a word to him. Suddenly he stopped and shouted to the youth, “Viper! son of a dog! wilt thou confess thy crime, and where thou hast hid the sword?”
“My lord,” replied the youth in a humble yet sincere tone of voice, “I have told you all I know: the sword has been stolen from my room—I know not where it is.”
“Dog of a liar!” cried the Pasha in a still louder tone. “Take him away and beat him till he confesses: give him three hundred on the feet, and throw him into the dungeon. Away with him!”
With a hasty signal to the man who held the youth to delay a moment, Hassan came forward, and, to the astonishment of all the household, walking composedly to within a few feet of the Pasha, said to him—
“My lord, let me entreat you to have a little patience, and defer the punishment of this youth; perhaps we may find the sword or discover the thief.”
“And who are you?” cried the Pasha, astonished at this unwonted audacity; “who are you that dare to offer me your unasked counsel, and come between me and my revenge?”
“I am your servant Hassan, whom you have already loaded with favours, and therefore it is that I love my lord so well that I wish his displeasure rather than see him commit an act of injustice.”
“Begone,” roared the Pasha, “if you would not drive me mad. When that imp of Satan has stolen a sword, the reward of my services and my blood, am I to be told by an upstart like you that I may not punish him?”