Page:Works of Voltaire Volume 03.djvu/338

"I shall know the truth of the matter in a moment," said Rustan.

"We shall see that," said Topaz.

The whole scene then vanished. Rustan again found himself in the house of his father, which he had not quitted, and in his bed, where he had slept an hour.

He awakes in astonishment, perspiring all over, and quite wild. He rubs himself, he calls, he rings the bell. His valet de chambre, Topaz, runs in, in his nightcap, and yawning.

"Am I dead or alive?" cried out Rustan; "shall the beauteous princess of Cachemir escape?"

"Does your lordship rave?" answered Topaz, coldly.

"Ah!" cried Rustan, "what, then, is become of this barbarous Ebene, with his four black wings! It is he that makes me die by so cruel a death."

"My lord," answered Topaz, "I left him snoring upstairs. Would you have me bid him come down?"

"The villain," said Rustan, "has persecuted me for six months together. It was he who carried me to the fatal fair of Cabul; it is he that cheated me of the diamond which the princess presented me; he is the sole cause of my journey, of the death of my princess, and of the wound with the javelin, of which I die in the flower of my age."

"Take heart," said Topaz; "you were never at Cabul; there is no princess of Cachemir; her father never had any children but two boys, who are now at