He was at the appointed spot the moment darkness closed, determined to stand there and wait patiently for the time when his love should appear. But alas! his sorrow had cost him many slumberless nights, and now that he thought himself secure of his happiness again, long-absent sleep came, and overpowered him suddenly where he stood on the street.
It happened that just about this time a thief was passing down the same street. Perceiving that Alischar was fast asleep, this fellow eased him of his turban, and setting that on his head, was about to proceed on his way. Smaragdine, at this moment standing in the window, saw the gleam of her lover's turban, and never doubting that it was worn by Alischar himself, opened the lattice, and said to the thief in an audible whisper,
"Come, come, love, I am ready to come down."
"Here is a fine adventure," quoth the thief to himself; "let us make the best of it."
With this he placed himself below Smaragdine's window, received her on his shoulders, and darted off with her like lightning.
"Oh," says she to him, "you are so strong, you trot as nimbly as if you were a horse under me; and the good old woman had persuaded me that grief had weakened you so that you could scarcely drag your own limbs along."
The gentleman, on his part, made no answer to these observations, and Smaragdine at last began to feel his face, which being very rough and half covered with hair, her error was apparent, and she began to cry out with all her might,
"Who art thou? who art thou?"
"Silence!" answered the thief: "I am Hirvan the Kurd, and I belong to the band of Ahmed-ed-deyf. We are forty of us, all jolly brothers of the trade, and a happy life shall you lead with us."
Smaragdine perceived into what horrors her error had plunged her: she committed her soul to God and her body to the Prophet, and allowed Hirvan to proceed with her in silence.