Chapter V: Book II: Gorlois (1)

I

Radamanth the goldsmith was held in no little honour and esteem by the townsfolk of Winchester. Even the market women and the tavern loungers stood aside for him in the street as he made his stately march in black robe and chain of gold. He was a man possessed of those outward virtues so well suited to commend a character to the favour of the world. He was venerable, rich, and much given to charity. His coffers were often open to infirmary and church; his house near the market square was as richly furnished as any noble's, and he gave good dinners. No man in Winchester had a finer aptitude for pleasing all classes. He was smooth and intelligent to the rich, bland and neighbourly to his equals, quite a father to the poor, and moreover he had no wife. Every Sabbath he went at the head of his household to the great basilica church in the chief square, worshipped and did alms as a rich merchant should.

Disinterestedness is a somewhat unique virtue, and it must not be supposed that Radamanth lived with his eye on eternity alone. It must be confessed that self-interest was often the dial of his philanthropy, and expediency to him the touchstone of action. Nothing furthers commerce better than a pious and merciful reputation, and Radamanth knew the inestimable value of a solid and goodly exterior. Wise in his generation, he nailed the Cross to his door, and plied his balances prosperously behind the counter.

Thus when the girl Igraine trudged sad-eyed into Winchester in her gown of grey, and appeared before him as a homeless child of the Church, he took her in like the good uncle of the fairy tale, and proffered her his house for home. Possibly he pitied her for her plight after the burning of Avangel, for she seemed much cast down in mind and very deserving of a kinsman's proper comfort. Then she was of noble family, a coincidence that no doubt weighed heavily in Radamanth's opinion. It was good to have so much breeding in the house, to be able to say with a smirk to his friends and neighbours, "My niece, the daughter of Malgo, Lord of the Redlands, slain and plundered of the heathen in Kent." Igraine brought quite a lustre into Radamanth's home. He beamed on her with sleek pride and satisfaction, gave her rich stuffs for dress, a goodly chamber, and a little Silurian maid to wait. Moreover, he gave his one child and daughter Lilith a grave lecture on sisterly companionship, advised her to study Igraine's gentle manners, and to profit by her aristocratic and educated influence. Luckily Lilith was a quiet girl, not given to jealousy or much self-trust, and Igraine found as warm a welcome as her unhappy heart could wish.

No few days had passed since that dawn on the hill above Winchester when Igraine had started up from under the green boughs to find Pelleas gone. They had been days of keen trouble to the girl. Often and often had she hated herself for her vain delay, her over-tender procrastination, that had brought misery in place of joy. The past was now a wounded dream to her, ripe and beautiful, yet fruited with such mute pain as only a woman's heart can feel. Igraine had conjured up love like some Eastern house of magic, only to see its domes faint goldly into a gloom of night. She felt as much for Pelleas as for herself, and there was a blight upon her that seemed as though it could never pass. She was not a woman given to tears. Her trouble seemed to live in her eyes with pride, and to stiffen her stately throat into a pillar of rebellious strength.

Not a word, not a sign had come to her of Pelleas. Taken into Radamanth's house, served, petted, flattered, she went drearily through its daily round, sat at its board, talked with the guestfolk, while hope waited wide-eyed in her heart and kept her brave. Pelleas had told her that he was for Winchester, and assuredly, she thought, she might find him and confess all. She often kept watch hour by hour at her window overlooking the street. In her walks she had a glance for almost every man who passed on foot or horseback, till she grew almost ashamed of herself, and feared for her modesty. Her eyes always hungered for a red shield and harness, a black horse, a face grieving in dark reserve and silence. At night she was often quite a child in herself. She would take the little gold cross from her bosom and brood over it. She even found herself whispering to the man as she lay in bed, and stretching out her arms to him in the dark as in pain. For all her pride and courage she was often bowed down and broken when no one was near to see.

It was not long before she found a confidant to befriend her in her distress of heart. Lilith, the goldsmith's daughter, had great brown eyes, soft and very gentle; her face was wistful and white under her straightly combed hair; she was a quiet girl, timid, but very thoughtful for others. The two appealed each other by contrast. Lilith had soon read trouble in Igraine's eyes, and had nestled to her in soul, ready with many little kindnesses that were like dew in a dry season. Igraine unbent to her, and suffered herself to be enfolded by the other's sympathy.

One day she told her the whole distressful tale. It was in the garden behind the house, a green and pleasant place opening on the river, and flanked with stone. The two were in an arbour framed of laurels, its floor mosaicked with quaint tiles. Igraine sat on the bench with Lilith on a stool at her feet. They were both sad, for Lilith was a girl whose heart answered strongly to any tale of unhappy mood. Igraine had made mere truth of the matter, neither justifying nor embellishing. Her clear bleak words were the more pathetic for their very simpleness. Lilith had been crying softly to herself. Her brown eyes were very misty when she turned her white face to Igraine's with a grievous little sigh.

"What can I say to you?" she said.

"Nothing," said Igraine, taking her hands and smiling through misery.

"I have never the words I wish for, and when I feel most I can say little."

"You understand; that is enough for me."

"Ah," said Lilith, with a fine blush and a shy look, "I think I can feel for you, Igraine, almost to the full, though I seem such an Agnes. I am woman enough to have learnt something that means all to a girl. I am very sad for your sake."

"Child."

"I will try to comfort you."

Igraine's eyes burned. She kissed Lilith on the lips and was mute. For a while they sat with their arms about each other, not daring to look into each other's eyes. Then the girl kissed Igraine's cheek, and touched her hair with her slim fingers.

"Perhaps I can help you," she said.

"Help me?"

Lilith flushed, and spoke very quickly.

"Yes--to find Pelleas. I tell you what I will do. I will send a friend of mine to question all the guards at the gates whether they have seen such a one as you have described ride in."

Igraine hugged the girl.

"And then you say this Pelleas was in the King's service. I have never heard of a knight so named; but there are so many, and I hear only gossip. I know a girl in the King's household. I will go and ask her whether she knows of a tall, dark knight whose colour is red, who rides a black horse, and is named Pelleas. You do not know how much I may not learn from her. I feel wise already."

Igraine plucked up heart and spirit. She felt sorry that she had not spoken of her trouble to Lilith before, for she had lost many days trusting to her own eyes and her little knowledge of the town. She kissed the girl again, and almost laughed. Then in a flash she remembered a speech of Pelleas's which she had forgotten till that moment.

"Fool that I am," she said; "the very chain he wore he had it from your father, and here in my bosom I have the little cross that nigh lost him his life. Surely this may help us in some measure."

Lilith looked at the cross that Igraine had taken from under her tunic, where it hung by a little chain about her neck.

"We will show it to my father," said the girl, "and ask him thereof. He may have record of such a chain, and to whom it was sold. Who knows? Come, Igraine, we will show it him after supper if you wish."

And again Igraine kissed her.

It was Radamanth's custom, after the business of the day had been capped by an honest supper, to sit in his parlour and drink wine with certain of his friends. He had a particular gossip, an old fellow named Eudol, who had been a merchant in his time, and had retired with some wealth. These two would spend many an evening together over their wine, taking enough to make their tongues wag, but never exceeding the decent warmth of moderation. Eudol was a lean old gentleman with a white beard and a most patriarchal manner. He was much of a woman's creature, and loved a pretty face and a plump figure, and he would father any wench who came in his way with a benignity that often made him odious. He had a soft voice, and a sleek, silken way with him that made folk think him the most tender-souled creature imaginable.

These two were at their wine together when Lilith and Igraine went in to them that evening. Radamanth since his spouse's death had grown as much a father as trade and the getting of gold permitted. In his selfish, matter-of-fact way he was fond of this timid, brown-eyed creature he called daughter. His affections boasted more of science than of sentiment. Lilith, unusually bold, went and sat on the arm of his chair, and patted his face in a half-shy, half-mischievous fashion. Eudol laughed, and shook his head with a critical look at Igraine.

"More begging," quoth he. "So, cousin Igraine, you look fresh as a yellow rose in the sun."

Igraine laughed, and sat down to talk to him, while Lilith questioned her father. The goldsmith bore his daughter's caresses with a sublime and patient resignation. She began to tell him about the chain, keeping Igraine and her tale wholly in the background. When she had said enough for the sake of explanation, she showed her father the cross, and waited his words.

Radamanth fingered it, turned it this way and that, and found his own mark thereon.

"I wrought and sold three such chains as you describe," he said; "but what is such a chain to you, child, and whence came this cross?"

Lilith flushed, hesitated, and glanced at Igraine.

"The cross is mine," quoth the latter.

Radamanth eyed her as though he were not a little desirous of questioning her further, but there was a very palpable coldness on his niece's face that forbade any such curiosity. He had a most hearty respect for the girl's pride, and never dreamt of any degree of tyranny that might seem vulgarly plebeian to her more noble notions. The remembrance of her parentage and estate had always a most emollient effect upon his mind.

"Well, well," he said, "I'll meddle discreetly, and go no further than I am asked."

Eudol winked at the company at large.

"Never ask a lady an uncomfortable question," quoth he.

Lilith beamed at him shyly.

"You are very wise," she said.

Radamanth rose from his chair, and going to a great press took a book from it. He set the book on the table, and after much turning of pages, discovered the record that he sought. Following the scrawling lines with his finger, he read aloud from the ledger:

"Gold chain of special weight, large links, two gold crosses pendant over either breast. Of such three were wrought and sold.

"The first to Bedivere, knight of the King's guard.

"_Nota bene_--unpaid for."

Eudol set up a sudden brisk cackle.

"The man, the very man, I'll swear."

Igraine gave him a look that made his mouth close like a trap and his body stiffen in his chair. Radamanth continued his reading.

"The second chain was sold to John of Glastonbury. The third to the most noble Uther, Prince of Britain."

Radamanth closed the book, and returned it to the press--orderly even in trifles. Lilith and Igraine had exchanged a mute look that meant everything. Slipping away without a word to either man, they went to Igraine's bedroom, a great chamber hung with heavy red hangings and richly garnished. A carved bed stood in the centre. The two girls sat on it and stared into each other's eyes. Igraine was breathing fast, and her face was pale.

"Know you Bedivere?" she said.

Lilith shook her head.

"Or John of Glastonbury?"

"No."

"Or Uther?"

Lilith's brown eyes brightened.

"Noble Uther I have often seen," she said, "riding through Winchester on a black horse. A dark man, and sad-looking. He would be much like your Pelleas."

Igraine was very white. There seemed a race of thoughts in her as she played the statue with her eyes at gaze, and her lips drawn into a line of red. Her hands hung limply over the edge of the bed, and she seemed stiffened into musings. Lilith sidled close to her, and put her warm arms round her neck, her soft cheek to Igraine's.

"We may learn yet," she said.

"Uther," said Igraine as in a dream.

"Can it be?"

Igraine drew a long breath and sighed like one waking.

"I must see him," was all she said.

Lilith kissed her.

"I will go to the King's house to-morrow," she said; "the girl may tell us something of use. I have heard it said that Uther has not been in Winchester for many a week. Ah, Igraine, if it should be he."

They looked deep in each other's eyes, and smiled as only women can smile when their hearts are fast in sympathy. Then they went to bed in Igraine's bed, and slept the night through in each other's arms.

Early next day they went together to the King's house that stood by the gardens and the river. At the kitchen quarters Lilith inquired for the girl who served as a maid in the household. Being constrained by a most polite lackey, she went in to see the woman, while Igraine kept her pride and herself in the porch, and watched the people go by in the street. Presently Lilith came out again with a frown on her mild face, and her brown eyes troubled. She took Igraine aside into the gardens that lined the great highway skirting the palace, and led her to where a fountain played in the sun, and stone seats ringed a quiet pool. White pigeons were there, coquetting and sweeping the ground with their spread tails, their low cooing mingling with the musical plashing of the water. An old beggar woman sat hunched in a corner, and three or four children were feeding the fish in the pool. All about them the gardens were thickly shadowed with great trees and glistening lusty laurels.

Igraine looked into Lilith's face.

"I see no news in your eyes," she said.

Lilith brooded at the pool and the children, and seemed disquieted, even angry.

"I have learnt little, Igraine," she said, "and am disappointed. I will tell you how it was. The old wretch who oversees the women found me talking with the girl Gwenith, read me a sermon on interfering with household work, scolded me for a young gossip, and had me packed off like a beggar."

"What a harridan!"

"I have learnt a little."

"Quick!--I thirst."

Lilith hurried on for sympathy.

"The girl has never heard of a knight named Pelleas," she said, "and there are so many dark men about Court that your description was little guide. As for Uther, no one knows where he is at present. Folk are not disquieted, for he seems to be ever riding away into the woods on adventure. So much gossip could read me."

Igraine's face clouded.

"Did you ask of Bedivere?" she said.

"Oh, yes; a silly, vain fellow, with a red beard and sandy hair."

"And John of Glastonbury?"

"Gwenith could tell me nothing of that man. Dame Martha caught us talking, and it was then she scolded--the ugly, red-faced old hen. She said"--and Lilith blushed--"that I was an idle, silly hussy to gad and gossip after Court gentlemen. Now that wasn't fair, was it, Igraine?"

"No, dear. I should like to have a talk with Dame Martha."

Lilith rose to the notion.

"She would never scold you, Igraine. You look far too stately."

"Simpleton! a scold would spatter Gabriel."

"Well, if I were Gabriel I know what I should do to Dame Martha."

"You quiet-faced thing--why, you are quite a vixen after all!"

"Ah, Igraine, was there ever a woman without a temper?"

"No, dear, and I wouldn't give a button for her either."

Suddenly, as they sat and talked, the beggar woman lifted up her head to listen, and the children turned from feeding the fish in querulous, childish wonder. There was something strange on the wind. Igraine and Lilith heard a gradual sound rising afar off over the city--a noise as of men shouting, a noise that waxed and waned like the roar of surges on a beach. It grew--rushed nearer like a storm through trees,--deep, sonorous, triumphant. The girls sat mute a moment, and looked at each other in conjecture.

"What can it be?"

"God knows!"

"The heathen?"

"Not that shout."

"Then--Uther."

Igraine caught a deep breath.

"Listen! it comes nearer. Come away, I must see."

Passing through the gardens they came again to the highway skirting the palace. Men, women, brats, monks, all Christendom, seemed swarming up from the city, and there was already a great throng in the street. The breeze of shouting came nearer each moment. Igraine climbed the pediment of a statue that rose above the balustrading of the gardens; the ledge gave room to both Lilith and herself. Together they stood and looked down on the crowd that began to swarm at their feet--soldiers, nobles, dirty craftsmen, courtezans, fat housewives, churchmen--their small prides lost in one common curiousness. The street seemed mosaicked with colour. The broken words and cries of the crowd were flung up to Igraine like so much foam.

"Gorlois, say you?"

"Noble Gorlois."

"A thousand heathen."

"What--all slain!"

"Where?"

"Under the walls of Anderida."

"Come to my house and I will give you red wine, and play to you on the cithern."

"Thank the Virgin."

"Great Gorlois."

"If it is true I'll burn twenty candles."

"Give over trampling me."

"A thousand heathen."

"Ho! there--some rogue's thieved my purse."

"They are coming."

"Let's shout for him."

"Great Gorlois."

Up between the stone fronts of the palace and the dwindling houses and the rolling green of the gardens came a blaze of gold and purple, of white, green, blue, and scarlet, a gross glare of steel thundered on with the tramp of men and the cry of many voices. A river of armour seemed to flow with a brazen magnificence between the innumerable heads of the crowd. Clarions were braying, banneroles adance. The sun flashed on helmet and shield, and made a brave blaze on the flanks of the great serpent of war as it swayed through the thundering street, arrogant, triumphant, glorious.

Well in the van rode a knight on a great white horse. His armour was all of gold, his trappings white with gold borders, and stars of gold scattered thereon. His baldric was set with jasper, his sword and scabbard marvellous with beryl and sardonyx. A coronet gemmed with one great ruby circled his casque, and shot red gleams at the archer sun.

Behind him came a veritable grove of spears,--lusty knights, their saddles weighed down with the spoil of battle, with torque, bracelet, sword, and axe. Further yet came pikemen, mass on mass, bearing each on his spear-point a heathen head,--pageant of leers, frowns, scowls of red wrath, wild eyes, blood, and blood-tangled hair.

The great knight on the white horse rode with a certain splendid arrogance, and his eyes were full of fire under the arch of his casque. It was easy to see that the noise and pomp were like wine to him, and that his pride blazed like a beacon in a wind.

"Gorlois, great Gorlois!" thundered the crowd.

By the palace there was such a press that the white horse came to a halt, hemmed in by a sea of vociferous faces. Igraine, in a gown of violet, was leaning from her statue, and looking at Gorlois. Her glance seemed to magnetise him, for he turned and stared full at the girl as she stood slightly above him in the glory of her beauty and her pride.

Long looked Gorlois, like a man smitten with a sudden charm. Then he wrenched the coronet from his casque, and spurring his horse through the crowd, rode close to the statue whose knees were clasped by Igraine's arm. It was the statue of Fame crowned by Love with a wreath of laurels. So, Gorlois, with head bowed, held up the coronet on the cross of his sword, and gave Igraine his glory.

II

Splendid in arms, magnificent in fortune, Gorlois of Cornwall held high place in the war lore and romances of the green isle of Britain. Ask any pikeman or gallowglass whose crest he would have advance in the van in the tough tussle of a charge home, and he would tell you of Gorlois or of Uther. Question any merchant as to the most prolific purse in the kingdom, and he would beam seraphically and talk to you of Gorlois. So much for the man's reputation.

Physically he was tall, big-chested, lean-limbed, with a square jaw and eyes that shone ever alert, as though watching a knife in an enemy's hand. You could read the swift, soaring, masterful spirit of him in the bleak lines of his handsome face, and the soldierly carriage of his head. He was quick as a hawk, supple and springy as a willow, keen and eager in his action as a born fighter should be. When you saw him move, the lean hard fibre of him seemed as tense and tough as the string of a five-foot bow. Though he might seem to the eye all impulse, there was a leopard reason in him that made him the more formidable. He was no mere fighting machine--rather a man of brain and sinew whose cunning went far to back his strength.

Meliograunt ruled in Cornwall in those days, Meliograunt who was to rear young Tristram for the plaguing of Mark, and the love of the fair Isoult. Gorlois was Meliograunt's nephew, holding many castles, woods, and wild coastlands towards Lyonesse, lording it also over other lands in Britain, houses in London and Winchester, and some mountainous regions in Gore, where Urience held sway. Mordaunt had been his father, a great knight who had done many brave deeds in his day. His grandsire, Gravaine, famed for his wisdom, had fought abroad and died in battle. Gorlois had ancestry enough to breed worship in him, and after Ambrosius and black Uther he held undoubted precedence of all knights in Britain.

Unblemished fortune is not always the nurse best suited to the dandling of a man's mind. It had been so with Gorlois. He was one of those beings whose life seemed to promise nothing but triumphal processions and perpetual bays of victory. Selfishness is such a glittering garment that it needs a great light to reveal its true texture to the wearer. Flattered, praised, obeyed, bent to, it became as natural for Gorlois to expect the homage of circumstance as to look for the obedience of his cook. There was much that was Greek about him in the worst sense, a certain sensuous brilliancy that aimed at making life a surfeit of rare sensations, with an infinite indifference for the hearts of others. Gorlois liked to see life swinging round him like a dance while he stood pedestalled in the centre, an earthly Jove.

The man had given Igraine his coronet on the cross of his great sword. That meant much for Gorlois. He was not a gentleman who had need to trouble his wits about women, for there were many enough ready to ogle their eyes out in his service. Yet in his keen way he had conceived a strong liking for the girl's face. A species of sudden admiration had leapt out on him, and brought him in some wonder to a realisation of the power of a pair of eyes. Igraine was such a one as would attract the man. In the first place she was very fair to look upon, a point of some importance. She was tall, big of body, and built for grace and strength, things pleasant to Gorlois's humour. Above all she was proud and implacable, no giggling franion hardly worth the kissing, and Gorlois had grown past the first blush of experiences of heart. He was sage enough to know that a woman lightly won is often soon lost, or not worth the winning. Let a man's soul sweat in the taming of her, and there is some chance of his making an honest bargain.

Moreover, like many a man of restless, soaring spirit, Gorlois ever hungered for romance, and the mysterious discomforts and satisfactions that hedge the way into a woman's bosom. Certain men are never happy unless they have the firebrand of love making red stir for them in heart and body. Of some such stuff was Gorlois. He had a soul that doted on nights spent at a window under the moon. All the thousand distractions, the infinite yet atomic cares, the logical sweats of reasoning were particularly pleasant to his fancy. He loved the colour, the exultation, the heroism, the desperate tenderness of it all. Battle, effort, ambition, lost half their sting for Gorlois when there was no woman in the coil.

Igraine's home was soon known to him, thanks to the apt vigilance of a certain page much in favour with Gorlois for mischief and cunning. The boy had Igraine's habits to perfection in a week or two. By making love to the girl who served her, he put himself into the way of getting almost any tidings he required. Every morning he would slip out early, meet Igraine's girl, Isolde, under the shadow of the garden-wall, and, under cover of a kiss, he would inquire what her mistress might be doing that day, pretending, of course, that his interest on such a subject merely arose from his desire to have Igraine out of the way, and her girl free. The lad quite enjoyed the game, Isolde being a giggling, black-eyed wench, who loved mischief. Of course he ended by falling in love with the reckless earnestness of a boy, but that kept him well to business. Betimes he would run home and tell his master where Igraine would probably be seen that day.

Gorlois's proud face began to come into the girl's life at every turn. Igraine would see him often from her window as he rode by on his white horse, looking up, and very eager to greet her. He would pass her in the aisles of the great basilica in the market, walking in gold and scarlet, amid silks and cloths from the East, vases, armour, skins of the tiger and camelopard, flowers, fruit, wine, and all manner of merchandise. On the river which ran by the end of Radamanth's garden his barge often swept past with the noise of oars and music, and a gleam of gold over the hurrying water. In the orchards without the walls his face would come suddenly upon her through a mist of green, and she would be conscious of his eyes and the nearness of his stride.

One Sunday morning she found him laving his hands in the labrum beside her before entering the long narthex porch of the church, and he was near her all through the service, watching her furtively, noting the graceful curves of her figure as she knelt, the profusion of her hair, a thousand little things that are much to a man. When the sacrament was given, he knelt close beside her, and touched the cup where her lips had been. Apparently Gorlois was content for a while with the rich delight of gazing. His bearing was courteous enough, and he never exposed her to any public rudeness that could warrant her in resenting his persistent, though distant, homage.

The great baths of Winchester stood in a little hollow near the southern gate of the city, a white pile of stone set about with quiet gardens. They had fallen into some decay and disrepute, but still in the summer-time girls and men of the richer classes went thither to bathe. On sunny mornings, in the great marble bath of the women, girls would flash their white limbs, and sport like Naiads in the laughing water. Afterwards they would have their hair dressed and perfumed, and then go to sun themselves in the rose-walks like eastern odalisques. The music of flute and cithern might often be heard in the grass-grown peristyles. The library attached to the place had once boasted many scrolls and tomes, but it had long ago been pillaged by the monks of the great abbey.

Lilith had taken Igraine there more than once. One morning Igraine had bathed, tied her hair, and had passed out into the garden alone. The place was of some size, boasting twenty acres or more, full of winding paths, grass glades, and knolls of bushy shrubs, where one might lose one's self as soon as think. Children often played hide-and-seek there, and idling up some green walk you might catch a giggling girl, with hair flying, bursting out of some thicket with a lad in full chase. Or in some shady lawn you might come upon a company of children dancing as solemnly as little elves to the sound of a pipe.

Nooks and grass walks were almost deserted at this hour, the gardens being most favoured towards evening, when the day was marked by a deepening discretion. Igraine had no purpose in the place. She knew that Lilith was somewhere within its bounds. She also knew that Lilith had no particular need of her that morning, and as the day was hot and slothful, Igraine's only ambition was to waste her time as pleasantly as possible till noon.

Turning round a holly hedge that hid a statue of Cupid, she came full upon a woman seated on the stone bench that ringed the statue's pedestal. The woman wore a light blue tunic, and a purple gown that ran all along the seat in curling masses. She was combing her fair hair as though she had only lately come from the bath. Her white glimmering arms were bare to the elbow, and she was humming a song to the sway of her hair, while many rings laughed on her slim white fingers. She had not heard Igraine's step upon the grass, but saw suddenly her shadow stealing along in the sun. Lifting her face, she stared, knew on the instant, and went red and grey by turns. Her comb halted, tangled in a strand of hair, and she was very quiet, and big about the eyes. Igraine remembered well enough where she had seen that would-be innocent stare, and that loose little mouth that seemed to bud for lawless kisses.

Morgan, with her face as white as her bosom, drew the comb from her hair, and flourished it uneasily betwixt her fingers. She was frightened as a mouse at the tall girl standing big and imperious so near, and her eyes were furtive for chance of flight. Igraine in her heart was in no less quandary than was dead Madan's wife. She could prove nothing against the woman, for Pelleas was lost and away, and even the man's name might be a myth likely to involve further mystery. She had as much to fear too from Morgan's tongue, as Morgan had from her knowledge of that night in the island manor.

Morgan, too flurried for sudden measures, sat biting her lips, while her blue eyes were fixed on Igraine with a restless caution. Neither woman said a word for fully a minute, but eyed each other like a couple of cats, each waiting for the other to move. The shrubs around were so still that you might imagine they were listening, while Cupid, poised on one foot, drew his bow very much at a venture.

"Good-morning, holy sister."

Igraine said never a word.

"I am glad to see you so improved in dress, that olive-green gown looks so well on you."

Still no retort.

"By the saints, sister, you are very silent. I hope you were not kept long on that island?"

Igraine arched her eyebrows and gave the girl a stare. She knew what a coward Morgan was, and guessed she was in a holy panic, despite her cool impudence and seeming ease of mind. Woman-like, she conceived a sudden strong desire to have Morgan whimpering and grovelling at her feet, for there is some satisfaction in terrorising an enemy, even if one can do no more.

"I presume, madame," she said, "you thought me safely packed away in that island, and likely to die of hunger, or be taken by heathen."

Morgan forced a smile, and began to bind her hair for the sake of having something to do in the full glare of Igraine's great eyes.

"You did not think I could swim."

"Madame, I could think anything of you. Nuns are so clever."

"After all, I am not a nun."

"Of course not. You could not be bothered with vows in summer-time. I turned nun myself once for a month, it being convenient."

Igraine began to fret and to lose patience.

"You are over venturesome, madame," she said, "in coming to Winchester."

"So!"

"I believe they hang folk here at times; they might even break your slim white neck."

Morgan's lips twitched, but she did not blench from the argument.

"You speak of hanging," she said, "and the inference is rather peculiar. Listen a moment, my good convent saint: your knight on the black horse would most certainly have needed the rope, if my man had not mended vengeance with that poniard."

"Pelleas and the gallows! You're a fool!"

Morgan smiled back at her very prettily.

"After all, your man did first murder," she said.

"On a traitor cur in Andredswold!"

"Madame, my husband."

The woman's contention was not so illogical when Igraine came to consider it in a less personal light. Morgan may have loved the man Madan for all she knew, and she could feel for her in such a matter. She looked at her with less scorn for the moment, and less injustice of thought.

"Perhaps you have grieved much," she said.

Morgan gave a blank stare.

"Grieved?"

"You loved your husband?"

"I did, while he lived."

"And no longer?"

"What is the use of wasting one's youth on a corpse?"

Igraine retracted her late sympathy, and returned to enmity. Morgan had risen, and was ruffling herself like a swan in her part of the great lady, and gathering her purple gown round her slim figure with infinite affectation.

"I cannot see that we have cause to quarrel further," she suggested.

"Indeed!"

"Seemingly we are quits, good Sister Morality. I have lost my man, you yours."

"You are very logical," said Igraine.

"Why should we women grieve?"

"Why indeed?"

"There are many more men in the world."

"Madame, I do not understand you."

Morgan gave a malicious little laugh that ended in a sneer. She touched her hair with her jewelled fingers, blew a kiss to Cupid, and again laughed in her sly mischief-making way. In a moment words were out of her lips that set Igraine's face ablaze, her heart at a canter, and mulled all further parley. Morgan saw trouble, dodged, and ran round the statue. Igraine was too quick for her, and winding her fingers into the woman's hair, gave her a cuff that would have set a helmet ringing. Morgan tripped and fell, dragging Igraine with her, and for a moment there was a struggle, green and purple mixed. Igraine, the heavier and stronger, came aloft on the other soon. Then a knife flashed out. Morgan got two quick strokes in, one on the girl's shoulder, a second in her left forearm. Igraine lost her grip, and fell aside in a stagger of surprise and pain, while Morgan, taking her chance, squirmed away, slipped up, and ran like a rabbit. She was out of sight and sound before Igraine had got back her reason.

Here was a pretty business. The girl's sleeve was already red and soaked, and the slit cloth showed a long red streak in the plump white of her flesh. Blood was welling up, and dripping fast to the grass at her feet. Despite the smart of her wounds and her temper, she saw it would be mere folly to chase Morgan. Following instinct, she ran for home, holding her right hand pressed over the gash in her shoulder.

In the main avenue who should she meet but Gorlois, carried in a litter, and looking out lazily from behind half-drawn curtains. His quick eyes caught sight of Igraine as she passed. He saw the blood and the girl's white face, and he was out of the litter like a stag from cover, and at her side, with spirited concern. Igraine was white and half dazed, her green gown soaked and stained. Her eyes trembled up at Gorlois as she showed him her gashed arm, with a smile and a little whimper that made him storm.

"Who did this?"

He had stripped his cloak off, and was tearing it into strips, while his jaw stiffened.

"An old foe of mine."

"Describe him."

"A woman, my lord."

"The damned vixen. Her dress?"

"Blue tunic, and gown of purple."

Gorlois turned to certain servants who stood round gaping at the girl in her blood-stained dress, and their lord tearing his cloak into bandages with characteristic furor.

"Search the gardens--a woman in blue and purple; have her caught. By my sword, I'll hang her."

He rent Igraine's sleeve to the shoulder, and wound the strips of his cloak about her arm with a strength that made her wince.

"Pardon," he said in his quick, fierce way; "this will serve a season; stern heart, good surgeon."

Igraine smiled, and made light of it, while he knotted the bandage. Some of his men had scattered among the shrubs and into the dark alleys of the place, for Igraine could hear them trampling and calling to each other. While she listened, and before she could hinder him, Gorlois had lifted her as though she had been but a sheaf of corn, and laid her in the litter. He drew the curtains. The bearers were at the poles, and setting off at a good stride they were soon in the town.

By the time they reached Radamanth's doorway Igraine, despite her spirit, was faint from loss of blood, and all atremble. Gorlois, tersely imperious, lifted her up as she lay half dazed and stupid, carried her in his arms into the house, and taking guidance from a white-faced maid, bore Igraine above to her chamber, and laid her on her bed. Then he kissed her hand, and leaving her to the women, hurried off to send skilled succour.

III

It was not long before Gildas, the court physician, a dear old scoundrel with a white beard and a portentous face, came down in state to attend on Igraine. He was an old gentleman of most solemn soul. His dignity was so tremendous a thing, that you might have imagined him a solitary Atlas holding the whole world's health upon his shoulders.

He soon dabbled his fingers in Igraine's wounds that morning, dropped in oil, and balmed them with myrrh and unguents under a dressing of clean cloth. He frowned all the time, as was his custom in the sick chamber, as though wisdom lay heavy on his soul, or at least as though he wished folk to think so. The only time you saw Gildas smile was when you payed him a fee or complimented him upon his knowledge. Tickle his pocket or his vanity, and he beamed on you. That morning he told Radamanth that his niece's wounds were serious, but that he trusted that they would heal innocently, treated as they had been by credited skill. Gildas always pulled a long face over a patient's possibilities; such discretion kept him from pitfalls, and enabled him to claim all the credit when matters turned out happily.

The streaks of scarlet in the white waste of skin soon died cleanly into mere bands of pink, and Igraine had little trouble from her wounds, thanks to the great Gildas. In fact, she was in bed but three days, while Lilith played nurse, chatted and sang to her, or leant at the open window to tell her of those who passed in the street. Master Gildas came and went morning and evening with the prodigious regularity of the sun. The girls aped him behind his back, and Igraine, with some ingratitude to science, made Lilith empty the ruby-coloured physic out of the window. It happened to spatter a lean booby of a man as he passed, who, looking up, flattered himself that Lilith must have sprinkled him with scented water by way of showing her affection. So much for Gildas's rose-water and flowers of dill.

The man of physic marched each day like a god into Gorlois's house to tell how the Lady Igraine fared at his hands. Such patronage was worth much to Gildas, and knowing how the wind blew, he puffed religiously upon the new-kindled fire. The girl's glamour had caught up Gorlois in a golden net. He had loved to look upon her and to dream, but now the perfume of her hair, the warm softness of her body, the very odour of her shed and scarlet blood were memories in him that would not fade.

One evening a posy of flowers came tumbling in at Igraine's window.

Lilith looked out, and saw Gorlois.

"For the Lady Igraine," were his words.

Lilith smiled down, and ventured to tell him that Igraine was much beholden to his courtesy and succour, and would thank him with her own lips when well of her wounds. She took the flowers to Igraine, who was listening in bed in the twilight.

"Shall I throw a flower back?" asked the girl.

"It would be courteous."

Lilith did so. The bloom struck Gorlois on the mouth like a blown kiss. The man put the thing in his bosom with a great smile, and went home to spend some hours like a star-gazer in his garden, while his musicians tuned their strings behind the bushes. At such a season Gorlois loved sound and colour. The voices, sweetly melancholic, thrilled up into the night--

"Her head is of brighter gold than the broom-flower,
Her breast like foam under her green tunic;
Like a summer sky at night are her glances;
Her fingers are as wood anemones in a daze of dew;
Of her lips,--who shall tell!
The gates of a sunset
Where love dies.
Her limbs are like May-blossoms
Bedded on a green couch:
The night sighs for her,
And for the touch of her hand."

Of course Morgan had escaped capture. Gorlois's men had hunted an hour or more, and had caught nothing, not even a glimpse of the purple gown for which they searched. Radamanth, who had had the affair from Gorlois's own lips, came and told Igraine, and began to ask her who this woman foe of hers was. Igraine put him off with a fable. She had no thought of letting him have knowledge of her love for Pelleas, and she was glad in measure that Morgan had escaped capture, and so left her secret in oblivion. The woman might have proved troublesome if brought to bay, for she had as much right to claim the truth as had Igraine. Better let a snake go than take it by the tail.

In a week or so there was nothing left to mark the incident save the red lines in Igraine's white skin. Flowers and fruit came daily in from Gorlois, and every evening there was music under the window, till she began to consider these perpetual courtesies. She was woman enough to know whither they all tended. As for Radamanth, he was more kind to her than ever, seeing how the wind might blow favours into his ready lap. Gorlois was a great and noble gentleman, and the goldsmith had an intense respect for the nobility.

The very first day that Igraine walked abroad again after her seclusion, she fell in straight with Gorlois. By Gildas's advice, she had gone, presumably for her health's sake, to the baths with Lilith; and Gorlois, warned by the leech himself, followed alone, and overtook them near the porch. He was very gracious, very sympathetic, very splendid. He begged a meeting with Igraine after she had bathed, and since the girl had something in her heart that made her wish to speak with him, she consented, and left him in the laconicum, proposing to meet him in the rose-walk an hour later. Truth to tell, she intended questioning him as to Pelleas, whether Gorlois had heard of a knight so named; and also as to Uther, whether he had yet been heard of in any region of Britain. She knew Gorlois would take her consent as favour. Still, she imagined she could venture a little for her heart's sake without much prick of conscience.

An hour later, true to her word, she went alone into the rose-walk, a grassy pathway banked with yews, and hemmed with a rich tangle of red blooms. Gorlois was there waiting as for a tryst. He was full of smiles and staunch glances as he led her to a seat that was set back in an alcove, carved from the dense green of the yews, where they might talk at leisure, and out of sight. Igraine's hair lay loosened over her shoulders to dry in the sun. It had been perfumed, and the scent of it swept over Gorlois like a violet mist. He sat watching her for a while in silence, as she plied her comb with the sun-shaken masses pouring over her face like ruddy smoke.

"Lady Igraine," he said at length.

The girl's eyes glimmered at him slantwise from behind her hair.

"I knew your father, Malgo, before his death."

Igraine merely nodded.

"I am claiming to be the friend of his daughter, seeing that I have learnt the very colour of her several girdles, the number and pattern of her gowns since I rode into Winchester."

The venture in flattery was perhaps more suggestive than Igraine could have wished.

"You must waste much time, my lord."

"But little."

"I am sorry I have so poor a wardrobe, that you have fathomed the whole of it in less than a month. To tell the truth, when I came into Winchester, I had only one gown, and that rather ragged."

"They did not give you green and gold at Avangel?"

"No, the good women wore grey to typify the colour of their souls."

Gorlois laughed in his keen quiet fashion. The girl's eyes were wonderfully bright and subtle, and he had never seen such a splendour of hair. He longed to finger it, to let it run through his fingers like amber wine. Leaning one elbow on the stone back of the seat, and his head on his palm, he watched the silver comb rippling at its work, with a kind of dreamy complacency.

The girl's voice broke out suddenly upon him.

"My lord?"

Gorlois attended.

"You know many of the knights and gentlemen famed for arms in Britain?"

"I may so boast myself."

"I was once befriended, a piece of passing courtesy, yet I have always been curious to learn the character and estate of the man who did me this service. Have you heard of a knight named Pelleas?"

Gorlois fingered his sharp-peaked black beard, and looked blankly irresponsive.

"I have never known such a knight," he said.

"Strange."

"Never so. We men of the woods and moors often ride under false colours, sometimes to try our friends on the sly, sometimes to escape cognisance. The man who befriended you may have been Pelleas in your company."

Igraine cut in with a laugh.

"And Ambrosius at home," she said; "even Princes love masquerading in strange arms. Meadow-flower that I am, I have never seen the stately folk of the court--Ambrosius or Uther. I have heard Uther is an ugly man."

"If strength makes a man ugly, Uther may claim ugliness."

"Well?"

"Picture a dark man with black hair, eyes packed away under heavy brows, a straight mouth, and a great clean-shaven jaw that looks sullen as death."

"Not beautiful in words."

Gorlois stretched his shoulders, and half yawned behind his hand.

"Uther is a man with a conscience like a north wind," he said; "always lashing him into tremendous effort for the sake of duty. He has the head and neck of a lion, the grip of a bear. You have never known Uther till you have seen him in battle. Then he is like a mountain thundering down against a sea, a black flood plunging through a pine forest. A quaint, gentle, devilish, God-ridden madman; I can paint him no other way."

Igraine laughed softly to herself.

"A man worth seeing," she said.

"I should judge so."

"Tell me, is it true that Uther has gone into the wilds, and been seen of no man many days?"

"Uther left Winchester more than two months ago, and no word of him has come to Ambrosius."

"Curious."

"Madame, nothing is curious in Uther. If I were to hear some day that he had ridden down to Hades to fight a pitched battle with Satan, I should say, 'Poor Satan, I warrant he has a sore head.'"

"Indeed!" quoth Igraine.

She shook her hair, tilted her chin, and looked at Gorlois out of the corners of her eyes. She guessed her power, was young, and a woman. It tempted her to read this creature called "man" in his various forms and phases, and hold his heart in the hollow of her hand. Her interest in Gorlois was no discourtesy to her love for Pelleas. She had seen few men in her time; they seemed strange beings, strong yet weak, wise yet very foolish, sometimes heroic, yet utter children.

Gorlois, who had the sun in his eyes, beheld her as in an unusual mist. He was warming to life, for his brain seemed full of the sound of harping, and his blood blithe with summer. Stretching out a hand he touched Igraine's hair as it poured over her shoulders, for the red gold threads seemed magnetic to his fingers, and the glimmer of her eyes made his tough flesh creep.

"You have wonderful hair," he said.

"I learnt that long ago," drawing the strand away.

"The dawn of knowledge."

"It reaches not so very far from my feet."

Igraine hung out a flag, as it were, to try the man. She knew the look of Pelleas's eyes, and she wanted Gorlois for comparison. Standing up, she shook the glistening shroud about her while it seemed to drop perfumes and to spark out passion. The man's malady showed plainly enough on his face, but his eyes did not please Igraine. There was too much selfishness, not enough abasement. She knew Pelleas would have looked at her as though she was a saint in a church, and he but a lad from the brown ploughland. Igraine thought that she loved mute devotion far better than the bold impatient hunger on Gorlois's face.

The man leant back and tilted his beard at her, while his eyes were half shut for the sun.

"I have heard it told that women are ambitious. Is it truth?"

Igraine, all gravity again, with her tentative mischief banished, looked at her knees, and said she could not tell. Gorlois waxed subtle.

"Are you ambitious, Igraine?"

"Ambitious, my lord?"

"Have you never wished to stand out like a bright peak above the world?"

"No."

"Or to have the glory of your beauty filling the gate of fame like a scarlet sky?"

Igraine forced a titter.

"I suppose you are a poet, sir."

"Only a fool, madame."

"Ah!"

"All poets are fools."

"How do you contrive that?"

"Because they are for ever praising women."

"And yet you are a poet, my lord!"

"How could I be else, madame, since I am a man?"