" "O our lord the
Sultan," said Dendan, "this thy dream denotes that thou hast a
brother or a brother's son or an uncle's son or other near
kinsman of thy flesh and blood [of whom thou knowest not]." When
the King heard this, he looked at Kanmakan and Dendan and Nuzhet
ez Zeman and Kuzia Fekan and the rest of the captives and said in
himself, "If I cut off these people's heads, their troops will
lose heart for the loss of their chiefs and I shall be able to
return speedily to my realm, lest the kingdom pass out of my
hands." So he called the headsman and bade him strike off
Kanmakan's head, when behold, up came Rumzan's nurse and said to
him, "O august King, what wilt thou do?" Quoth he, "I mean to put
these captives to death and throw their heads among their troops;
after which I will fall upon them, I and all my men, and kill all
we may and put the rest to the rout; so will this be the end of
the war and I shall return speedily to my kingdom, ere aught
befall among my subjects."
When the nurse heard this, she came up to him and said in the
Frank tongue, "How canst thou slay thine own brother's son and
thy sister and thy sister's daughter?" When he heard this, he was
exceeding angry and said to her, "O accursed woman, didst thou
not tell me that my mother was murdered and that my father died
by poison? Didst thou not give me a jewel and say to me, 'This
jewel was thy father's'? Why didst thou not tell me the truth?"
"All that I told thee is true," replied she: "but thy case and my
own are wonderful and thine and my history extraordinary.
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