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In the meantime the Princess Carathis, whose affliction no words can describe, instead of restraining herself to sobbing and tears, was closeted daily with the Vizir Morakanabad, to find out some cure or mitigation of the Caliph’s disease.
He ended by depriving him of his command and putting him under arrest, while he sent the caliph a report in which Tarik was sharply blamed and the merit of his exploits made light of. He would have gone farther and put him to death, but this he dared not do without the caliph’s orders. As it proved, Al-Walid, the Commander of the Faithful, knew something of the truth.
Within the space of an hour both were seized with violent palpitations, and a general numbness gradually ensued; they arose from the floor, where they had remained ever since the Caliph’s departure, and, ascending to the sofa, reclined themselves at full length upon it, clasped in each other’s embraces.
In the end the poor old man broke down, and he could only murmur,— "Grant me his head, O Commander of the Faithful, that I may shut the lids of his eyes." "Thou mayest take it," was Soliman’s reply. And so Musa left the caliph’s presence, heart-broken and disconsolate. It is said that before he died he was forced to beg his bread. Of Tarik we hear no more.
Tarik, as we have told in the previous tale, had been sent to Andalusia by Musa, the caliph’s viceroy in Africa, simply that he might gain a footing in the land, whose conquest Musa reserved for himself. But the impetuous Tarik was not to be restrained.
The Caliph’s proposal was received with the greatest delight, and soon published through Samarah; litters, camels, and horses were prepared. Women and children, old men and young, every one placed himself in the station he chose.
They clambered up the sides of the Caliph’s seat, and, placing themselves each on one of his shoulders, began to whisper prayers in his ears; their tongues quivered like the leaves of a poplar, and the patience of Vathek was almost exhausted, when the acclamations of the troops announced the approach of Fakreddin, who was come with a hundred old grey-beards and as many Korans and dromedaries; they instantly set about their ablutions, and began to repeat the Bismillah; Vathek, to get rid of these officious monitors, followed their example, for his hands were burning.
The Sultana Dilara, who till then had been the favourite, took this dereliction of the Caliph to heart with a vehemence natural to her character, for during her continuance in favour she had imbibed from Vathek many of his extravagant fancies, and was filed with impatience to behold the superb tombs of Istakar, and the palace of forty columns; besides, having been brought up amongst the Magi, she had fondly cherished the idea of the Caliph’s devoting himself to the worship of fire; thus his voluptuous and desultory life with her rival was to her a double source of affliction.
The sabres, whose blades emitted a dazzling radiance, fixed more than all the Caliph’s attention, who promised himself to decipher at his leisure the uncouth characters engraven on their sides.
They were left in Spain until they had completed the conquest of that kingdom, then both were ordered to appear before the caliph’s judgment seat. This they did in different methods. Tarik, who had no thirst for spoil, made haste, with empty hands, to Damascus, where, though he had no rich presents for the commander of the faithful, he delighted him with the story of his brilliant deeds.
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