Prevod

There was once a man who married his cousin, his father’s brother’s daughter. They had been brought up together in the same house. One day the boy’s father said to his brother, “Brother, here is my son and there is your daughter. Let us promise them to each other and celebrate their marriage while we are still alive.” His brother agreed. They betrothed the two young people and, in due course, married them. Some time passed, and their parents died. The young man and his cousin lived together in happiness and contentment. Every day he went out to work in his shop, and at noon he came home to eat. At night, however, whenever his wife fell asleep, she began to sigh. Her husband was puzzled. “What can be troubling her?” he wondered. “We have plenty of money, and she lacks for nothing. Why all this sighing?” The next morning he went out. An old man came and sat in his shop, and he said to him, “Could you give me some advice?” “About what?” the old man asked. “At night, when my wife falls asleep, she begins sighing in her sleep.” “Listen,” said the old man. “Buy a black ram without a single mark on it. Bring it home and tie it beside the bedroom. If she asks you about it, tell her you mean to rear it. Then, when she falls asleep and begins to sigh, take the ram and slaughter it. Cut it open, take out its heart, and lay it over her heart while she sleeps. Nothing will tell you the secrets of a heart but another heart.” The man went away and bought a ram. He brought it home and tied it by the bedroom door. “What is this, my dear?” she asked. “We are going to rear it,” he told her. He waited until she was asleep. As soon as she began to sigh, he got up, slaughtered the ram, took out its heart, and laid it over hers. Then he sat listening. She went on sighing, and the ram’s heart spoke to the woman’s heart. “Heart,” it said, “what troubles you so that you sigh?” “I sigh for my body,” the woman’s heart replied, “and for what is to happen to it.” “Tell me what is to happen to it.” “She will beg, and sell her body, and work in a bathhouse.” The husband was distressed. When she woke in the morning, she asked, “Why has the ram been slaughtered?” “It was at its last gasp, so I slaughtered it,” he said. He skinned it for her, left her to cook some of it for their meal, and went to his shop. At noon he returned, and she set the food before him. Seeing how troubled he looked, she asked, “What is the matter with you?” “Nothing,” he replied.

“If you will not tell me,” she said, “I shall kill myself, or go away. I will not stay here any longer.” When he saw that she was swearing to it, and growing ever more insistent, he told her what the heart had said. “You will beg, and sell your body, and work in a bathhouse.” She looked at him and said, “Eat, and put it out of your mind. Where would I ever find it in me to dishonour you? Above all, you are my own cousin!” He ate and went out to his shop. Then she said to herself, “Oh, my sorrow! Is this my fate, my destiny—to sink so low, to beg and sell my body? Better to die!” She fetched a rope and hanged herself from the ceiling. Her cousin came home and found her dead. He took her down, filled with remorse. “Ah, if only I had never told her!” he cried. He went to the neighbourhood undertaker and said, “Bring me a woman to wash her.” The man went, brought what was needed for her burial, and made the arrangements. They carried her away and buried her. After the burial, when everyone had gone home, two birds alighted on the grave, calling, “You who flee, God’s decree will prevail!” The birds opened the grave over her; they were angels sent by God. She opened her eyes and found herself inside the grave.

She climbed out, took off her shroud, and wrapped it around herself, then made her way into town. Feeling hungry, she began to beg. “A little charity, kind sir, for the love of God!” One person gave her a small coin, another a little more, another half a loaf, until at last she came to the door of a women’s bathhouse. She stepped into the entrance and begged from the bathhouse keeper. “Give me something, mistress, for God’s sake.” The woman looked at her and said, “My daughter, you are young and pretty. What has brought you to begging?” “This is what God has allotted me, mother,” she replied. “What if I were to do you a kindness and let you stay here with me? Would that suit you?” “Whoever wishes to do good need not ask permission!” she answered. So she stayed with her and became her assistant. One day a woman who led a troupe of rabab players came to bathe. She saw the girl and took a liking to her. “What a pretty young woman!” she said. She called the bathhouse keeper over and asked, “Where did you find her?” “She is a stranger here,” the woman replied. “You must let me have her. I will teach her the trade.” “Very well,” said the bathhouse keeper. “If she wishes to go, I agree.”

“Call her over to me,” said the woman. The bathhouse keeper called the girl and spoke to her. “She would like to take you with her and teach you the trade. You will do very well with her.” So the girl went with the woman, who began teaching her the oud and the rabab. But the woman was also a procuress. When men came to her and said, “We like that woman; we want to spend the night with her,” she would agree. And so the poor girl began to ply that trade as well. Now let us return to her husband. He had said, “I will never take another wife after my cousin.” But in time he grew weary of living alone, and people urged him, “Come now, take a wife! You have been a bachelor long enough.” So he sought a bride and prepared to marry. As he made arrangements for the wedding, he decided to have musicians and rabab players. He went and engaged the very woman who had taken his wife in and taught her. The woman came, bringing her apprentice with her.

They entered the house. His wife stepped inside and recognized her home and her room. Coffee was brought to them, and they had supper. When the gathering was ready, she rose to sing. And what did she sing? “The house is mine, the bed is mine, the bedding mine—and the sleeper a stranger!”

She sang and wept. Her cousin looked up and recognized her voice. “Did my wife not die? Did I not bury her?” he wondered. Yet there she stood, just as she had always been, and the voice was hers. Glory be to Him who made her likeness! At once he said to the man who had given him his daughter, “Take your daughter home, and forgive me for the expense you have incurred. As for me, I have found my cousin again!” Then he sent everyone away, and he and his cousin spent the night together like a newly married bride and groom.