When Sherkan heard this
all was certified that she was indeed his sister, he said to
himself, "How can I have my sister to wife? By Allah, I must
marry her to one of my chamberlains; and if the thing get wind, I
will avouch that I divorced her before consummation and married
her to my chief chamberlain." Then he raised his head and said,
"O Nuzhet ez Zeman, thou art my very sister; for I am Sherkan,
son of King Omar ben Ennuman, and may God forgive us the sin into
which we have fallen!" She looked at him and seeing that he spoke
the truth, became as one bereft of reason and wept and buffeted
her face, exclaiming, "There is no power and no virtue but in
God! Verily we have fallen into grievous sin! What shall I do and
what answer shall I make my father and my mother, when they say
to me, 'Whence hadst thou thy daughter'?" Quoth Sherkan, "I
purpose to marry thee to my chief chamberlain and let thee bring
up my daughter in his house, that none may know thee to be my
sister. This that hath befallen us was ordained of God for a
purpose of His own, and there is no way to cover ourselves but by
thy marriage with the chamberlain, ere any know." Then he fell to
comforting her and kissing her head, and she said to him, "What
wilt thou call the child?" "Call her Kuzia Fekan,"[FN#61] replied
he. Then he gave her in marriage to the chief chamberlain, and
they reared the child in his house, on the laps of the slave-
girls, till, one day, there came to King Sherkan a courier
from his father, with a letter to the following purport, "In the
name of God, etc.
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