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When the Vizier returned to the tents, after having gotten the Viceroy's permission to take his debtor and depart with him, he called for the cook, and they brought Bedreddin before him, with his hands bound behind his back. When he saw his uncle, he wept sore and said, "O my lord, what is my offence against thee?" "Art thou he who made the mess of pomegranate-seed?" asked Shemseddin.
This Vizier, who was a very old man, had two sons, as they were two moons, never was seen their like for beauty and grace, the elder called Shemseddin Mohammed and the younger Noureddin Ali; but the younger excelled his brother in comeliness and fair favour, so that folk heard of him in distant lands and journeyed to Egypt to get sight of him.
If he would take a worn-out weds for boon, I'd proffer him A heart that at the parting hour was all to pieces torn. Then the Vizier sent for Agib; and his grandmother embraced him and wept, but Shemseddin said to her, "This is no time for weeping; it behoves thee to make ready to go with us to Egypt; perhaps God will reunite us with thy son, my nephew."
Then he and his son girded themselves, and he said to the latter, 'O my son, when a graybeard enters, I will meet him and carry him into the upper chamber and seat him at the table; and do thou, in like manner, receive the beardless youths and seat them at the table in the saloon. 'O my father, asked Alaeddin, 'why dost thou spread two tables, one for men and another for youths? 'O my son, answered Shemseddin, 'the beardless boy is ashamed to eat with men. And his son was content with this answer.
Shemseddin was concerned at his brother's absence and became exceedingly uneasy, when he found that he did not return, and said to himself, "This is because I spoke harshly to him that night, and he has taken it to heart and gone away; but I must send after him."
And they all said, "By Allah, it is good." Then said one of them, "My name is Majid, my mother's name is Alawiyeh and my father's Izeddin." And the others said the like, till it came to Agib's turn and he said, "My name is Agib, my mother is the Lady of Beauty and my father Shemseddin, Vizier of Egypt." "By Allah," cried they, "the Vizier is not thy father." Said he, "He is indeed my father."
Then he went to the market and accosting a druggist, said to him, 'Hast thou wherewithal to thicken the seed? 'I had it, but am spent of it, answered the druggist; 'ask my neighbour. So Shemseddin made the round of the bazaar, till he had asked every one; but they all laughed at him and he returned to his shop and sat down, troubled.
So they agreed upon this and Shemseddin said, "If it be the will of God that we both marry on the same night, and our wives be brought to bed on the same day, and thy wife bear a boy and mine a girl, we will marry the children to one another, for they will be cousins." "O my brother," asked Noureddin, "what dowry wilt thou require of my son for thy daughter!"
The merchant returned his salute, and the other, seeing him vexed, said to him, 'O my lord, what hath crossed thee? Quoth Shemseddin, 'These forty years have I been married to my wife, yet hath she borne me neither son nor daughter; and I am told that the cause of my failure to get her with child is the thinness of my seed; so I have been seeking wherewithal to thicken it, but found it not. 'I have a thickener, said Sheikh Mohammed; 'but what wilt thou say to him who makes thy wife conceive by thee, after forty years' barrenness?
Quoth Shemseddin, "Verily, thou errest in that thou wouldst make thy son more worthy than my daughter, and it is plain that thou lackest both judgment and manners. Thou talkest of thy share in the Vizierate, when I only admitted thee to share with me, in pity for thee, not wishing to mortify thee, and that thou mightest help me.
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