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Updated: June 29, 2025
I wish your august and most fortunate lover may avenge you of the malice of Zobeide, by calling you back to him; and when you shall be restored to his wishes, that you may remember the unfortunate Ganem, who is no less your conquest than the caliph. Powerful as that prince is, I flatter myself he will not be able to blot me out of your remembrance.
"My lord," answered Fetnah "Alas! madam," said Ganem, interrupting her at the word lord, "this is the second time you have done me the honour to call me lord; the presence of the women-slaves hindered me the first time from taking notice of it to you: in the name of God, madam, do not give me this title of honour; it does not belong to me; treat me, I beseech you, as your slave: I am, and shall never cease to be so."
However, the sight of the grand vizier, and the soldiers made her tremble, not indeed for herself, but for Ganem: she did not question clearing herself, provided the caliph would but hear her. As for Ganem, whom she loved less out of gratitude than inclination, she plainly foresaw that his incensed rival might be apt to condemn him, on account of his youth and person.
"Give me that note," said the caliph, interrupting her eagerly, "you were wrong to defer delivering it to me." The slave immediately presented to him the note, which he opened with much impatience, and in it Fetnah gave a particular account of all that had befallen her, but enlarged a little too much on the attentions of Ganem.
It is my will, that when you have read my letter, you cause search to be made for Ganem, and secure him. When he is in your power, you shall cause him to be loaded with irons, and for three days successively let him receive fifty strokes of the bastinado.
Ganem was one of the last who heard of it; for, as I have before observed, he hardly ever went abroad. Being, however, at length informed of it, "Madam," said he to the caliph's fair favourite, "you are supposed in Bagdad to be dead, and I do not question but that Zobeide herself believes it.
Matters being so ordered, the syndic announced Fetnah's coming to the sick man, who was so transported to see her, that he was again near fainting away, "Well, Ganem," said she, drawing near to his bed, "you have again found your Fetnah, whom you thought you had lost for ever." "Ah! madam," exclaimed he, eagerly interrupting her, "what miracle has restored you to my sight?
In the mean time, the enraged caliph dismissed his grand vizier, and only hearkening to his passion, wrote the following letter with his own hand to the king of Syria, his cousin and tributary, who resided at Damascus. "This letter is to inform you, that a merchant of Damascus, whose name is Ganem, the son of Abou Ayoub, has seduced the most amiable of my women slaves, called Fetnah, and is fled.
The caliph was highly pleased with Ganem's reply, and assigned him a considerable pension. He then descended from his throne, and causing only Ganem and the grand vizier, follow him, retired into his own apartment. Not questioning but that Fetnah was in waiting, with Abou Ayoub's widow and daughter, he caused them to be called in.
"They know that I am here only for one night, and they are eager as the hungry jackal is eager for food among the yellow dunes of the sand." He threw his burnous over his shoulder and moved away smiling, and murmuring in a luscious voice the first words of Ganem, the Slave of Love. "Let us go now, Boris," Domini said. He got up at once from the table, and they walked together round the bordj.
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