"God is God, and Mahomet is His Prophet!"
When poor Alischar, on his part, awoke from his sleep, and found himself alone in his bed, fear unutterable came into his mind, and he began to cry out for his Smaragdine like one possessed. But his cries were as useless as his searches: he could find his love nowhere, and concluded that the vile Giaour had deceived him for the sake of abstracting her. At first he sat in a corner shedding hot tears, hour after hour, by himself; but perceiving that his tears were of no avail, he tore his garments, took a stone in each hand, and walked through the town beating his breast alternately with these stones, and crying out all the time in a loud voice of distress, "O Smaragdine! Smaragdine!"
The children collected about him, and first one and then another of them entreated him to tell his story. He did so, and whoever heard him pitied him. After he had in this way gone through the whole town, he happened to see an old woman of his acquaintance sitting at her door, and saluted her respectfully. The old lady, being knowing in such matters, perceived at once the symptoms of a desolate lover, and asked him the reason of his distress. He told her all, and she said to him,
"I am very much grieved for your case, my son; but take courage. I certainly think my assistance will be of much advantage to you. Go hence immediately, buy one of the bread-baskets in which the hawkers carry their loaves about, and put a few articles of female attire in it. I undertake to go about with the wares, and I flatter myself you will ere long hear some tidings of Smaragdine."
Alischar was out of himself with joy even at this small glimpse of hope; he covered the hand of the old dame with tears and kisses, and forthwith fetched her what she had asked for. She made herself ready without delay to commence her operations, and in the course of her wanderings came, after no long space of time, to the very house of Beschadeddin.
She happened to enter at a moment when the female slaves of the house were misusing poor Smaragdine.
"And what," says she, "has the poor child done to you that you should treat her so roughly?"
"In truth," they answered, "we do what we do against our own inclination, but we must obey our master's orders."
"Not when he is from home, surely," says the old woman again; "do have a little pity. Oblige me so far as to unbind this unfortunate, and refresh her a little with some food."
The slave-girls, whose hearts were by no means destitute of sensibility, loosed her bands, and left her for a moment alone with the old woman. She made good use of the happy occasion, told her in whose name she had come, and said that if she would take care to be at the window exactly at midnight, Alischar would be there at that moment, when she might easily drop upon his shoulders and regain her freedom. With this she hies away to Alischar to make him acquainted with her success. She assured him that Beschadeddin being from home, the slaves had promised to leave Smaragdine unbound for that one night, and he needed not many words to make him undertake the adventure.