Arabian Nights Page #4

apart from uncle Abdulah... he's wanted

for bigamy and murder, in that order...

Anyway, back in Constantinople,

Fasil invited Bacbac to supper... and

Bacbac never turned down a free meal.

You know Prince Sinbad?

Oh, he is so ugly even starvation

won't look him in the face!...

I tell you, I tell you... no

tide would take him out...

when he eats a banana,

he eats it sideways...

And his wife! Oh! Her face is all

dried and wrinkled like a prune!

She's the kind of woman

you have to look at twice

the first time you don't believe it!

At her wedding, everyone kissed the groom!

Bacbac?

I think he's dead.

Dead? He can't be dead. You're

fooling us, aren't you Bacbac?

Another one of your jokes!

He must have suffocated. Probably a bone,

a fish bone got stuck in his throat...

oh, poor Bacbac. We must

tell the authorities.

They'll blame us...

It was an accident!

They'll still blame us, he

was the Sultan's favorite...

"There they go, the people whom

killed poor little Bacbac."

We'll lose all our customers!

Reputation shattered, credit

destroyed, income lost...

what're we going to do?

We could take him to that

old physician next door.

It's too late for a physician,

he needs an undertaker.

I mean leave him there...

Let someone else take the blame -

that sounds good!

We'll leave him here...

Iet's go.

Who's that?

Can I help you?

We came to see Dr. Ezra - for our friend...

if it's not too late.

It's never too late with Dr. Ezra.

You wanna bet?

I'll get him - your friend

doesn't look too good.

Let's go. Come on, hurry.

Ezra, we have a customer.

Another penniless vagrant?

No, he's paid... he's outside on the landing.

Show him to me, my dear,

before he gets away!

He's waiting on the stairs.

- Be careful.... - I can't

see where he... ahh!

Ezra...

Ezra, Ezra, speak to me!...

You must wear your glasses, Ezra...

how do you feel?

I don't know.

You don't know - you're a physician!

So I'm a physician... so what else

you want you should tell me?!

Sir... your friends said

you don't feel very well..

- I'm sure my husband can

help you... - No, he can't.

- Of course you can. - No, l

don't think so. He's dead.

The fall down the stairs!

A terrible accident!

It's worse than that... he comes here

for medical help and he ends up dead...

what will this do to your reputation, Ezra?

He looks familiar.

Oh - the Sultan's Jester!

Alas, poor Bacbac

- I knew him well.

We're doomed! We'll be

blamed... we're foreigners!

Help me carry him upstairs... hurry!

It's amazing how quickly people

can improvise when they have to...

the Ezra's had to take a gamble,

forgetting that gambling is only a

way of getting nothing for something.

There's nothing worse than

being alone in a strange city.

Lift his arms up so he'll slide down easier.

It's as if he doesn't like what we're doing.

Nonsense!... He'd see the funny side of it.

Oh, Buddha, send me a sign... say I'm

not forsaken in a foreign land...

Robbers! Thieves!

Ha!

My hands are lethal!

Dead.

I told you about my hands!

I know you...

the famous Bacbac...

the Sultan's Jester...

ahhh!

Why did you come down my chimney?

It's a joke to set the whole town laughing...

The laugh's on you, Jester Bacbac...

no, the laugh's on me...

they'll say I murdered

you... I'll be hanged...

Think of something, Hi-Ching,

think of something...

Murder! I'm being attacked!

You'll get no money from me!

You'll - get - not - a

- penny - from - me....

Guards, guards, seize this

man... he just tried to kill me!

Instead, you killed him.

I - I did... splendid!

You're drunk.

- This is Bacbac, - Drunk?

...the Sultan's Jester.

Bacbac?

And you killed him.

Why should I kill him, we

haven't even been introduced?

That is for a judge to decide.

And when he has, we'll hang you!

The trial of Jerome Gribbin was

the social event of the season.

The judge in the case was

the venerable Judge Zadic.

Judge Zadic was totally incompetent,

but being a judge, nobody had noticed.

...which I suggest is

death, death by hanging"

Why did you kill him?

I thought he was trying to rob me.

Bacbac rob you?! Forty years

administering justice...

worst excuse I ever heard!

I made a mistake.

You certainly did... all Constantinople

will miss poor Bacbac...

we will never see the like of him

again... A fellow of infinite jest...

"infinite jest," that's a good one,

write that down, clerk, before I forget it.

Bacbac lightened our lives...

he gave us laughter, rich and

overflowing, laughter from the heart...

a heart as big as he was small...

we knew him, we loved him,

we laughed with him...

we'll remember him all our days.

I sentence you to hang.

No!

No, no, please, no!

Who is this Chinese person?

I killed the poor hunchback.

I stuffed him in the alcove.

No!

I killed poor Bacbac, and dropped

him down Hi-Ching's chimney.

No!

- I killed poor Bacbac.

- I don't understand...

I killed him, my hands are lethal!

I tripped over him in the dark!

He's very short-sighted... you

can't hang a man for that!

It was a fishbone!

- I'm still the best tailor in

Constantinople! - My head's splitting...

Order in the Court! Order! Order!

I'll have a lamb shish-kebab!

Your Majesty.

Who killed my funny man Jester Bacbac?

I did!

Who do I hang, Sayiddi?

Nobody. It was an accident!

Besides being my Jester,

Master Bacbac was my friend...

and if I knew him right

he would've appreciated

The manner of his death...

it was his final jest...

dear Bacbac didn't have to

be alive to be funny...

even dead, he made us laugh!

Is that the end of the story?

Not quite... as they were

walking away they saw...

This is a different story!

Ah- it's the best one yet...

it's extraordinary...

- full of excitement and thrills

and... - Don't trick me again!

Once you start I want to know how it ends!

There's something devilish in there...

I see demons in them!

Our Mullahs say every good

story has a moral.

What's the moral of Bacbac's death?

Firouz, Dr. Ezra and the others learned to

take Responsibility for their actions...

we all should.

But if they had, Bacbac wouldn't've

fulfilled his destiny to make people laugh,

even when he was dead.

That's true... stories're less

simple than we think they are...

this new story for instance...

No, no, no, no!

What's the matter, Sire?

What can I do for you?

I just missed killing you, and you ask

if there's something you can do for me?

I'm concerned for you.

Be concerned about yourself, Scheherazade.

I'm concerned about you, my love.

Why?

I love you.

Why?

You need me.

It's going badly... The Sultan's

missed another chance...

his brother wouldn't have.

Schehzenan never hesitated...

he was the Executioner's friend...

there're some who think the

wrong brother is the Sultan.

You spoke before about meeting death.

I didn't meet him, I passed

him on the Street of Sighs...

I told a close friend what had happened,

and he said he'd seen Death too in the street

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