longing. Now, because I baffled her
arts she knew me more cunning than I seemed, and as night advanced she
affected to be possessed with pleasure in me, and took me in her arms and
sought to fascinate me, and I heard her mutter once, 'Shall I doubt the
warning of Karaz?' So presently she said, 'Come with me'; and I went with
her under the curtain of that apartment into another, a long saloon,
wherein were couches round a fountain, and beyond it an aviary lit with
lamps: when we were there she whistled, and immediately there was a
concert of birds, a wondrous accord of exquisite piping, and she leaned
on a couch and took me by her to listen; sweet and passionate was the
harmony of the birds; but I let not my faculties lull, and observed that
round the throat of every bird was a ringed mark of gold and stamps of
divers gems similar in colour to a ring on the forefinger of her right
hand, which she dazzled my sight with as she flashed it. When we had
listened a long hour to this music, the Princess gazed on me as if to
mark the effect of a charm, and I saw disappointment on her lovely face,
and she bit her lip and looked spiteful, saying, 'Thou art far gone in
the use of magic, and wary, O girl!' Then she laughed unnaturally, and
called slaves to bring in sweet drinks to us, and I drank with her, and
became less wary, and she fondled me more, calling me tender names,
heaping endearments on me; and as the hour of the middle-night approached
I was losing all suspicion in deep languor, and sighed at the song of the
birds, the long love-song, and dozed awake with eyes half shut. I felt
her steal from me, and continued still motionless without alarm: so was I
mastered. What hour it was or what time had passed I cannot say, when a
bird that was chained on a perch before me--a very quaint bird, with a
topknot awry, and black, heavy bill, and ragged gorgeousness of
plumage--the only object between my lids and darkness, suddenly, in the
midst of the singing, let loose a hoarse laugh that was followed by peals
of laughter from the other birds. Thereat I started up, and beheld the
Princess standing over a brazier, and she seized a slipper from her foot
and flung it at the bird that had first laughed, and struck him off his
perch, and went to him and seized him and shook him, crying, 'Dare to
laugh again!' and he kept clearing his throat and trying to catch the
tune he had lost, pitching a high note and a low note; but the marvel of
thi