Arthur Rex (26 page)

And Launcelot and Kay did then escort Guinevere back to Britain, finding another route than the sword-bridge (and dotty King Bademagu never knew they had ever been in his land, and he mourned for his son Sir Meliagrant when he found him dead and believed him the victim of a dragon). And at this time neither the queen nor her champion yet was in love with the other, and both found Sir Kay’s presence to be agreeable on the journey to Camelot, for they would have been bored if alone together.

Now when they arrived at court, King Arthur and the company of the Round Table greeted them with much cheer, and when Arthur was alone with Guinevere he said to her, “Having sent Launcelot to your aid, I did not fear for your well-being.”

But Guinevere raised her fine white brow and said, “Methinks Sir Kay did earn some honor.”

“I am happy for him,” said Arthur. “I feared he might be despatched before Launcelot arrived. Now tell me of Launcelot’s fight with Meliagrant, for he is much too modest to do so.”

“Sir Meliagrant,” said Guinevere, “died very well, in distinction to the way he lived.”

“Yes,” said Arthur, “I can understand that. It is a kind of glory to be killed by the noble Launcelot.”

But this subject was tiresome to Guinevere and she took her lap dog and fondled him and fed him sweetmeats, and so endured much more talk of Launcelot by Arthur, who though her husband was the king and could not be interrupted except contumaciously.

And finally King Arthur said, “How blessed we are to have him, for Sir Tristram hath been rendered
hors de combat
by an adulterous love and doth stay in Cornwall in its sinful interests, and now even Gawaine (who went to aid Kay but never got beyond Astolat) hath returned ill, to which one might prefer his lechery of old, as being less debilitating.”

“Is this not inevitable?” asked Guinevere. “You have cleansed the whole of Britain of evil. What’s left to fight? The wicked must come as invaders, like Meliagrant, from elsewhere.”

“A worser evil can come from within,” said Arthur. “Tristram, that most noble of knights, hath been quite corrupted by the Irish witch Isold, and foolish Gawaine doth dote upon some chit of Astolat, who loveth not him but Launcelot!”

“What is this story?” asked Guinevere, who had now heard the first thing that had interested her in ever so long, and King Arthur related it.

“But you can be sure that the great Launcelot hath no attraction in return,” said Arthur with a derisive chuckle. “Indeed, he knoweth not of hers for him, and he would not give a bean for it if he did.”

Now Guinevere secretly waxed wroth at this smugness of men, but she exempted Sir Gawaine from her anger, for even as a lecher he did cherish women (which accounted for his successes with them, for never did he use force nor prevarication, but said simply, Come, sweet chuck, let us have some sport), and when Arthur finally went away Guinevere sent for the gallant Gawaine and asked him about this matter of the maid of Astolat.

“Lady,” said Sir Gawaine, “I have lost mine heart to one who can only love another, and as in all matters’ of true love, methinks, nobody is to be blamed. For of all roads to sorrow, that of love is quickest.”

“I am saddened to see the saddening of a joyful knight, who hath pleased so many maids and been equally pleased by them,” said Guinevere. “When Sir Gawaine doth grieve because of a woman, the world is out of joint.”

“Lady,” said Gawaine, “my grief is rather due to a man, and would that he were base and ignoble, and that I were superior to him in any wise!”

“What is this adoration ye every one have for Launcelot?” Guinevere asked peevishly. “Is he a god and not a man?”

“At what all men try to do well, he doth best,” said Gawaine. “Therefore he hath no envy. He hath no vanity, he hath no greed, he hath no anger nor gluttony, nor doth he have lust. For all of these do come from a lack of knightliness.”

“He is then complete unto himself?” asked Guinevere, and her distaste for this paragon ever increased.

“But for sloth,” said Sir Gawaine. “A tendency towards acedia is his only weakness.”

“Well,” said Guinevere, “and that were appropriate in one who so easily overwhelms.”

But Gawaine did not hear her wryness, and when she dismissed him he returned to his chambers, where he found Sir Launcelot waiting.

“Most noble Gawaine,” said Sir Launcelot, “the king hath told me of thy melancholy. Would that I might cheer thee some. Shall we go hawking? In the meadows without Camelot I lately saw many coneys, of which thy tercel would make short work. Come along, dear friend, let’s to the mews.”

“Launcelot, friend of my bosom,” said Sir Gawaine, “I am too full of woe for sport.”

“I am myself no stranger to the black humors,” said Launcelot, “the which, when they are worst, I can not relieve except by scourging myself.”

“As we are different in gifts,” said Gawaine, “mine own being no match for yours, so are we otherwise in constitutions. Self-inflicted pain, I fear, would be irrelevant to my current condition.”

“The king,” said Sir Launcelot, “did tell me only that thou dost grieve, and not the wherefore of it, and he hath urged me to cheer thee if I can.”

“My uncle is the wisest of kings,” said Gawaine. “There should never be a division ’twixt Launcelot and Gawaine, else the Round Table could not preserve its integrity.” And he winced. “But vanity, methinks, is not conquered once for all, but must every day be fought and brought down!” Here he had difficulty in continuing.

“What canst thou not tell to me?” asked Sir Launcelot. “I who would put his right arm into the fire for thee.”

“In some matters,” said Gawaine, “an enemy were friendlier than a friend to talk to.” He smote his one hand with the other. “I love the fair Elaine.”

Now Launcelot smiled in relief and he clapped his friend on the shoulder. “Well, Gawaine,” said he, “I feared thou hadst some serious malady of the soul, such as we all, being born in sin, do know from time to time. Did God shed His blood for us in vain? Are we beyond redemption? Each man must face these terrible questions. But thou art in anguish only over some little maid? My friend, worthy Gawaine, go to.”

“And thou dost not even remember her,” said Gawaine wonderingly. “Elaine of Astolat, who lately nursed thee?”

“Well now, certainly I do,” said Sir Launcelot. “A fine girl, and virtuous, and I wore her token at the tourney. Gawaine, how pleased I am to hear this! Her father Sir Bernard is a loyal and God-fearing knight, and her brothers are splendid lads, and have joined the Table. Now bless me if I can see cause for melancholy in this anywhere.”

But Gawaine groaned and looked away, and then Launcelot frowned as a thought came to him, and he said, “Ah,” and did stare away. “Forgive me, my friend,” he said finally, “’tis a delicate matter, but is it the state of thine health that worries thee?”

“Health of the body?” asked Gawaine. “Methinks I am hale enough.” But he was puzzled by the question, and he begged his friend for an elucidation of it.

“The fair Elaine is a virgin, gently reared,” said Launcelot.

And then Gawaine’s brow descended. “Nay, Launcelot, I have no boils on my privities! God did never so punish my concupiscence. He hath rather chosen this means: I love Elaine, but she doth love only thee.”

Launcelot shook his head. “If true, this is most distressing,” said he, “for I can not think of this maid except as my sister.”

“Therefore,” said Gawaine, “all three of us are miserable.”

Launcelot pondered unhappily on this state of affairs. Then he asked, “Shall I go to Astolat and plead for thee?”

“Alas,” said Sir Gawaine, “I fear that that would serve only the cause of confusion, for I was lately there, pleading for
thee.”

“For me?” asked Launcelot in amazement. “I tell thee, my friend, I can not love this maiden, nor any woman, now or in any time, never.” And this he said with notable intensity.

Now it was unthinkable that Launcelot was a vile sodomite, and therefore Sir Gawaine was puzzled. “Then I have done no kindness to the fair Elaine,” said he. “But how could I have done otherwise, when she was dying for love of thee, than to give her the hope that thou wouldst return and requite?”

“God hath not made it easy to hearten some people,” said Sir Launcelot. “For what they want they can not have. Sir Kay, for example, with whom I lately played the same part as thine here, but was properly corrected by our gracious queen, who is a remarkable woman, Gawaine, with a virile sense of justice. I was not prepared to find that, I confess, in someone female and passing comely.”

Now Gawaine did wonder at this tepid tribute, and he said, “Certes, Guinevere is the most beautiful woman in the world.”

“So be it, then,” said Launcelot, “and God bless her always. But now, what are we to do with poor Elaine, if I can not love her, and she can not love thee, and thou canst love no other?” He frowned in compassion and said, “I do not speak in intentional absurdity.”

“Yet, of course, ’tis absurd,” said Gawaine sorrowfully, “the which is proved merely by hearing it said. And thou and I have better things to do, no doubt, when once we have determined we can do nothing here.”

“Nobly spoken,” said Launcelot. “But I think I have me an idea for the temporal salvation of the fair Elaine (for only God can grant the eternal). Near the monastery of the Little Brothers of Poverty and Pain, where lately I was in retreat, is, though segregated from them, a sisterhood of the same order. Now to this convent I shall urge old Bernard to send his daughter, where within this devout sorority, in the perpetual adoration of the Christ, whose brides they are, Elaine will find the true and the only happiness.”

Now Sir Gawaine was himself all too worldly to be much cheered by this, though he knew that it was right, and he said, “But forgive me for asking this: Were it not even more kind if thou went to Astolat and with thine own lips talked of this matter with the fair Elaine?”

“She is a maid, Gawaine,” said Launcelot sternly, “and under the management of her father. Only with a caitiff would it be lawful to abrogate paternal authority, to a virtuous end, but Sir Bernard is a most noble and pious old knight.”

“Yet,” said Gawaine, the defender of women, “the grief is hers primarily. Sir Bernard doth not understand her malady, nor me-thinks never will, for such old noblemen though honorable are coarse towards female sensibilities.”

“Then, on thy plea, I shall go there,” said Sir Launcelot. “But only with the permission of the queen, at whose disposal I am ever.”

Therefore he did take himself to Guinevere, saying, “Lady, I would go to Astolat on mercy’s mission.”

“Ah,” said Guinevere, “thou goest to thy little maid?”

“A maid, madam,” said Sir Launcelot, “but not mine, by your leave.”

“Thou shalt make her thine?” asked the queen.

“Nay,” said Sir Launcelot, “I shall send her to a nunnery.”

“Art thou a whoremonger?” asked the queen. “Fie, for shame!”

“O villainous commerce!” cried Launcelot in horror, supposing she had misheard him. “I did refer to a place where the good sisters immure themselves away from the vile world, a convent, madam, a female monastery.”

“At London, I am told,” said Guinevere, “this is oft the name by which a bordel went. But I know thee for a literal knight, Launcelot. Now tell me why thou dost disdain this maid. She is plain? But if she were, should Gawaine be so taken with her? She is foolish? But is that not the nature of all maidens, and why men do crave them, calling them in endearment ‘pretty fool’?”

“Lady,” said Launcelot, “I fear you do mock me often if not always, and whilst I can not properly protest, I must confess that I have noticed this.”

“Were thy sword as dull as thy wits,” said Guinevere, “thou wert not invincible. I grant thee, however, that I am unjust, for I am but a consort, which is to be as close to power as one might come without having any of it, and therefore to be farther away than the basest of slaves.”

“Madam,” Sir Launcelot said earnestly, “over me your power is not limited.”

“Except by the king,” said Guinevere, “who hath given me that much.”

Now Launcelot was so puzzled that he said, in disrespectful exasperation, “Well, lady, what would you have?”

“The power to declare thee not my champion,” said Guinevere.

“Lady,” said Launcelot, “that is a matter between you and your husband, our sovereign, whom God hath put upon the throne, and to whom I am but a vassal.”

“Sir Launcelot,” said Guinevere, “dost find me beautiful?”

“Than whom no one is more so,” said that knight.

“I wonder,” said Guinevere, “whether thou art alone in that opinion?”

Now, believing this to be but womanly vanity, the claims of which not even a queen was immune to, Sir Launcelot said, “Surely not, madam, for ’tis asserted throughout the realm.”

“Thou hast so heard,” said Guinevere.

“Most lately from the noble Gawaine,” said Launcelot.

“A lascivious knight,” Guinevere said in mock disapproval.

“If so once, then no longer,” Launcelot assured her. “Gawaine is the very man who would send me to Astolat, for he doth grieve for this maid.”

“Who doth love thee alone, poor soul!” said Guinevere. “But can not understand that thou wert made for finer things.”

“Again I hear your mockery, madam,” Sir Launcelot said. “Lady, I assure you that I have ever striven to be pious. My motive is good, however feeble (being but human) my means. But as I am your champion, your virtue must be my standard. Would you not have me go to Astolat? Then I shall not go.”

“Sir Launcelot, I would never have thee oppose the direction of thy conscience,” said the queen. “For in so doing I might cause thee to turn into a woman, thou who art (with Arthur) the model of virility, to the condition of which all knights aspire. Go thou to kill or cure this lovesick maiden.”

But having got her leave, Launcelot was yet dissatisfied, though perhaps more with himself than with his queen. “Madam,” said he, “know you that if I could return the love of this maid, I should. But I can not abrogate my vow. What is a man finally but his word? His prowess at arms comes from God, but his oath is his own, and the seed of all his honor.”