Arthur Rex
Page 38
Yet one happy thing did result from the sad love of Sir Tristram and La Belle Isold. For after the period of mourning had passed, the noble Kaherdin took the loyal Brangwain as his wife, and they lived together happily thereafter.
But as for King Mark of Cornwall, who had become a good king for a while, when he heard of the deaths of his queen and his nephew he first made the greatest grief, but then he came to reflect that being kind and decent had had no effect on the events of his life, and he waxed greatly bitter about this. And therefore he henceforth determined to be bad again, for he was alone in the world now and to be good by himself, with no intimates to share his virtue, did bore him, and he began to reign in a very cruel manner once more.
And you can be sure that King Arthur would have punished him had he known about this, but he did not. For King Arthur could think of nothing but the quest for the Holy Grail, which he had decided was to be the true work of the Round Table, and one by one he sent all of his knights upon it.
BOOK XVI
How Sir Launcelot was cured of his illness by Elaine the daughter of the maimed king Pelles; and how Galahad was conceived.
NOW WHEN WE LEFT SIR Launcelot he was living like a beast in the wild, and though he had lost his weapons and armor he was yet the most formidable man in the world, and when he was attacked by lions and boars and great serpents he destroyed them with his bare hands or he crushed them with great trees which he tore up by the roots, and then he ate these creatures raw. And it may well have been that, as some have written, he did lose his reason for a while, yet never could he forget Guinevere, in which feeling he was like Tristram with regard to Isold, but also he hated Guinevere for evoking it from him, whereas Sir Tristram did never hold hatred in his heart for anybody.
Now not even the great Launcelot had the kind of constitution which would sustain him in this sort of life forever, and eventually he fell into a faint on the floor of the forest and he lay there so long that the dead leaves of autumn did cover him up and then the first snows of winter, and no doubt he would have been dead by Christmas had not a party of poachers come there, looking for a bear in hibernation, the which they might unearth while he lay helplessly sleeping and take him captive and sell him to be tortured for the public entertainment of children at Yuletide, than which nothing would provide more merriment, especially when the savage beast had been blinded and was then whipped while bound in chains.
And these poachers coming where Launcelot lay saw steam arising from the mound of snow-covered leaves, and believing it was an hibernating bear, they quietly uncovered it and threw a net upon it and dragged it along for some distance through the snow before they knew it for a man, so long had his hair grown and his fingernails, and his skin was black with filth.
But when they determined his proper breed they took him for a detestable felon who had been hiding there to elude punishment for his misdeeds, and therefore they carried him to the castle of the king of that country, who was named Pelles, and they hoped to be rewarded for his capture. And Sir Launcelot being very ill could not speak during this time.
Now the guards on the gate of the castle relieved the poachers of Sir Launcelot and they cast him into a dungeon. And when the poachers asked for their reward these guards said, “With pleasure,” and they beat these men with sticks until they ran away.
And King Pelles, who was maimed and lay upon a bed always, was not told of this, and therefore Sir Launcelot might have died in the dungeon, where he lay forgotten by all, had not King Pelles had a fair daughter who did kind things at all times but especially in the season of Christmas, when she took warm clothing and sweetmeats to the poor wretches who were imprisoned.
And therefore after Mass on Christmas Day she descended to the dungeons beneath the castle, and there she found Sir Launcelot, who was covered with filth and hair and unconscious. But being a princess she could see that he was too fine a man underneath the filth to be a criminal, and therefore she had him brought out of that dungeon and carried to a chamber in the castle, where he was washed and shaved and put into costly clothing. And then though he was very pale and thin he was very handsome, and this princess fell in love with him, and her name was Elaine.
And so it came about that another Elaine was to save his life, for that is what this princess did, and she cared for him and she fed him from her hand for many days, and finally he was able to speak in a murmur though he still did not come awake.
And what he said was the name of Guinevere.
Now Elaine went to her ladies-in-waiting and she asked them had they ever in their lives heard the name Guinevere, and they all said surely it was the name of King Arthur’s queen.
“Indeed it is,” said the fair Elaine, “but is it the name of anyone else as well?”
But they none of them had heard of anybody else with that name in all the world, and they all believed it unique unto that noted queen (which it was, unlike Elaine, the name of this princess and also the dead maid of Astolat and the third half-sister of King Arthur, who was a good woman and did keep to her wifely duties and was never heard from in an ill way).
Therefore Princess Elaine returned to the sick knight, and to him she asked, “And what of Guinevere?”
And Sir Launcelot, who was not yet awake and in his right mind, said, “Alas! She is loved criminally by Launcelot.”
And Elaine was therefore the first noble person to know of this illegal love (though it was well known to the base). But at this time she still did not know who this knight might be, for it was possible that he was a man so shocked by knowing of the love between Guinevere and Launcelot that he spake of it in his sleep-of-illness, for he looked to be a knight of the most austere virtue and when he spake the name of the queen he did not do so in tenderness.
And when he finally came to full consciousness in the succeeding days Sir Launcelot did not tell to Princess Elaine his true name, for he was full of shame when he learned of how he had been found and brought to the castle, and he called himself Sansloy. And when he talked with Elaine it was of piety. And therefore she did not believe that he was Sir Launcelot, and she did not wish to believe it, for she wanted his love for herself.
But it was again as it had been with the maid of Astolat (and as it would have been with any other woman named Elaine or indeed anyone else except Guinevere), for Launcelot had no interest in her as a woman, whilst her love for him grew ever stronger. And he returned her look of adoration with but distant kindliness, and she had the feeling that if she replaced herself at his bedside with any of her ladies-in-waiting Sir Launcelot would not have noticed the change.
And when at length he was fully cured he asked to see King Pelles, to thank him for his hospitality, and Elaine took him to the room where the king used a bed as his throne, for he had been maimed for many years and never could walk.
“Royal Pelles,” said Sir Launcelot to this maimed king, “I thank you for the care I have been given at your castle. Obviously you are a king of great worship.”
“Well,” said King Pelles from his bed, “as decent folk we offer succor to any man of virtue in distress, but never have I seen such a fine-looking knight as thee! Methinks thou art of King Arthur’s Round Table. And what is thy name?”
“Sansloy,” said Sir Launcelot.
“And dost have a question for me, Sir Sansloy?” asked King Pelles, and shifting his position slightly on the bed he did wince painfully, for his old wound had never healed.
“I do, Majesty,” said Launcelot. “I would know the names of the maids who attended me, so that I might reward them when my circumstances have improved. At the moment I have nought, having even lost mine armor and my weapons, and the clothes I wear were given me here.”
Now King Pelles did look unhappy for a moment. “Alas!” said he, “’tis not the question that would cure me, I fear. But thine is easy enough to answer: these maids which to thee in thy delirium have seemed many, are in truth but one, and she is my daughter the princess Elaine.”
Now when Sir Launcelot left his presence King Pelles marveled on the name he had given him, the which signified “Without Law” in the French tongue, and thinking that this was hardly an appropriate name for a knight of the Round Table, he considered whether he might be an infamous impostor, come to his kingdom to do him great harm.
Therefore Pelles called to him a knight of his own who had competed in the tournaments held at Camelot, and he asked him whether amongst King Arthur’s company there had ever been a knight named Sansloy, and this man said, Nay, not to his knowledge.
“Then go and look upon this knight who was lately ill but cured by my daughter the princess,” said King Pelles, “and tell me if thou canst recognize him.”
And so this knight did as he was commanded, and then he returned to the king, saying, “Sire, that is none other than the renowned Sir Launcelot, and well do I know him, for once at a tourney did I and five others ride upon him from all sides at the same time, and in the next moment we were all of us unhorsed, and he then dismounted and taking off his helm came to see whether we had been hurt. Not only is he the knight of the greatest prowess under the sun, but he is also the most kindest.”
(And Sir Launcelot was ever celebrated in such terms by the knights he did defeat.)
“By Heaven!” swore King Pelles (who was not the most devout king). “The incomparable Sir Launcelot, here in my land under an assumed name! ’Tis a strange thing.” And then he determined to ask Launcelot about this to his face, for though he respected a man’s privacy the king wondered that a knight of the Round Table would tell an untruth.
Therefore he had Launcelot brought to him, and he said to him, “Dost thou maintain that thy name is properly and solely Sansloy?”
“Nay, King Pelles,” said Sir Launcelot, “I can not do that and so prevaricate.”
“I am greatly relieved to hear it,” said King Pelles, “for if the speech of a knight of the Round Table may be doubted in any wise, no matter how petty, then all virtue hath become the subject for vile mockery.”
“Yet, Your Majesty,” said Launcelot, “it would be an offense against God to think we are any of us perfect. I did not lie when saying I call myself Sansloy, but I do confess to misleading you.”
“’Twould seem then, not a greatly evil matter,” said King Pelles.
“But,” said Sir Launcelot groaning, “it was intended to conceal me, if only from myself, and to hide a shame is but to compound it.”
“Shame?” asked King Pelles, and he did himself groan. “My dear Launcelot, what dost thou know of shame? King Arthur hath abolished it.”
“For himself alone,” said Launcelot.
But King Pelles believed this to be but the kind of modesty for which the knights of the Round Table were noted, and he called Launcelot to come sit near him on his bed.
“Sir Launcelot,” said he, “in me thou seest a king whom shame hath maimed. I have me a wound which will not heal never, until a knight of great purity doth come one day and ask me a certain question. Despite thy modest opinion of thyself, thou art known to be the greatest knight on earth. Furthermore thou hast appeared here in a magical way. The great Launcelot, found exposed in a forest, with neither sword nor armor, and brought here at the point of death—could this be possible unless a profound purpose was intended?”
But Sir Launcelot hung his head. “Believe me, King Pelles, nothing would please me more than to relieve you with the proper question, but as it happens I have none, and therefore I can not be the instrument of your earthly deliverance.”
Now King Pelles was greatly disappointed, for if Sir Launcelot could not help him, then who could? And he believed that God did everything with a purpose, but why had Launcelot come here if not for this reason? For King Pelles, who could find no one to ask him the proper question, had many questions of his own.
Now learning that this knight whom she had saved would soon go away the fair Elaine did not suffer these news passively, but rather she went to the king her father, and she spake to him as follows.
“Father, know you that Sir Sansloy must be detained and punished, for he lately did make a vile and indecent attempt on my virtue!”
And King Pelles said in apparent wrath (though secretly he did smile into his beard), “Very well, I shall have his head struck off, for this is the most loathsome and felonious thing I have ever heard of!”
But Princess Elaine fell to her knees and seizing his hand and kissing it she cried, “Oh never, dear Father, for he is the very most bravest and handsomest knight in the world!”
“Well then, if this is so,” said King Pelles, “then why would he force his attentions upon thee obnoxiously? For any maiden in the world would be overjoyed to have his love.”
“I believe now,” said the fair Elaine, “that I mistook his intentions.”
“Is it not rather the case,” asked King Pelles, “that thou hast fallen in love with him and wouldst keep him here for that reason?”
“You are the wisest of fathers,” said the fair Elaine.
“But furthermore,” said King Pelles, “he hath paid no especial attention to thee?”
And Elaine weeping confessed that this was true. “But until now he hath been ill, Father, and out of his right mind.”
“Dear girl,” said the king, and he patted her lovely head, “I am afraid that I too have been disappointed by him, but he is the great Sir Launcelot and surely he hath more important things to do than to treat our little ills in our obscure little kingdom.”
And Elaine now arose, and with a great determination in her heart. “So he is Sir Launcelot!” she cried. And though she did not tell this to the king her father, she believed that there was nothing in the world more important than that she should have his love, for the fair Elaine though very young and beautiful and gentle did have a will that was marvelous strong.
And knowing that this knight was Sir Launcelot, and having heard from his own lips while he was out of his right mind (the condition in which the heart speaketh with perfect truth) that he loved Guinevere illegally, the princess Elaine did therefore believe that she would not be sinful (or if so, at any rate and at the worst, much less sinful than he) if she won his love by a device.
And so she summoned to her her handmaiden Brisen (who was to her as the loyal Brangwain had been to Isold), and she told Brisen what she must do, scilicet, to furnish her a means by which she could assume the guise of Guinevere.
“Lady,” said Brisen, “this will I do gladly, for to make you happy I would lay down my life.” And therefore Brisen, who was the greatest enchantress then to be found amongst the good folk of the world, did fashion a golden ring which was the exact replica of one worn by Guinevere.
And this ring she did give to a page, for to take to Sir Launcelot, who was about to leave the castle. And when the page had gone upon this errand, Brisen told the fair Elaine to go to her bedchamber and to undress and to go to bed. And Elaine did this.
Now when Sir Launcelot was given this ring by the page he at first believed it a parting gift, the which King Pelles was adding to all the other generous things he had done for him, and once again he regretted that he could not ask the question which would cure the king’s wound, and again he remembered why he could not: because he was not pure. And in shame and sorrow he put his hands to his face, and so was the ring, which he had put onto his finger, brought near his eye, at which time he recognized it (though, as we know, erroneously) as that of the woman whom he loved more than his honor. And in this instant he forgot all of his shame, and he ran to catch up the page, who had left, and when he reached him he asked, “Who is it that sends this ring to me?”<
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And this page had been instructed by Brisen to give the following answer if he was asked this question (and it was the truth): “She who loves you inordinately.”
And Sir Launcelot demanded that he be taken to her from whom the page had come, for he assumed that Guinevere had come as guest to this castle, and the page believing that Brisen was the paramour of this knight, led Launcelot to her chamber.
But this room was an antechamber to that of the fair Elaine, and when the page went away and Sir Launcelot went within it, Brisen the enchantress put on him the most powerful of her spells, and when he went into the inner chamber and saw Elaine in her bed, he believed it was rather Guinevere.
And so great was his hunger for her that he made but one sob of passion and then he joined her. And Sir Launcelot and Elaine the daughter of the maimed king Pelles lay together all the night. And therefore had Elaine achieved her purpose!
But the dawn came finally, and with it the spell of Brisen lost its power, and when Sir Launcelot awakened and saw that he had held in his arms not Guinevere but Elaine, he leapt from the bed with a great cry of anguish, and then his feeling turned to rage (which never did he feel towards his opponents on the field of battle), and he went cruelly to place his strong hands upon the delicate white neck of Elaine and he would fain have strangled her. For once he knew that he had been deceived, he knew again the shame he had forgotten, and he despised all women but Guinevere in the best of times, and his love for her was always near to hatred. And by throttling the fair Elaine he would punish all women for his failure to keep his virile vows.
But before his fingers could close around her white throat the enchantress Brisen hearing his cry of rage came into the chamber and she put a new spell upon him so that his fingers lost their grasp and he came away from Elaine’s bed, and Sir Launcelot stood before Brisen like the obedient schoolboy which he had been as a child.