GERAINT'S QUEST OF HONOR.
One morning Prince Geraint went into Arthur's hall and said:
"O King, my princedom is in danger. It lies close to the territory whichis infested with bandits, earls and caitiff knights, assassins and allsorts of outlaws. Give me your kind good leave and I will go there todefend my lands."
The king said the prince might go, and sent fifty armed knights toprotect him and pretty Enid as they traveled away on their horses acrossthe Severn River into their own country, the Land of Devon.
After Geraint had come into Devon he forgot what he had said to the kingof ridding his princedom of outlawry, he forgot the chase where he hadalways been so clever in tracking his game, forgot the tournament wherehe had won victory after victory, forgot all his former glory and hisname, forgot his lands and their cares, forgot everything he ever did,and did nothing at all but lie about at home and talk with Enid. At lastall his people began to gossip about their fine prince who once had beenillustrious everywhere and now had become an idle stay-at-home who spenthis time in making love to his wife.
ENID HEARD OF GERAINT FROM HER HAIR-DRESSER.]
Enid heard of the tattling about Geraint from her hair-dresser, and onemorning as he lay abed, she went over it all to herself, talking aloud.She wished, that he would not abandon all his knightly pursuits butwould hunt and fight again and add to his lustre. She felt very bashfulabout mentioning the matter to him as she was very shy by nature andlived in a time when wives were altogether over-ruled by their husbands,yet to say nothing she thought would not be showing herself a true wifeto Geraint. All this and more Enid went over to herself.
The drowsy prince, half awake, just half heard her and quitemisunderstood her meaning. When she said that in keeping quiet about thegossip she was not a true wife to him he supposed she meant that she nolonger cared for him, that he was not a handsome and strong enough manto suit her. This grieved him deeply and made him very angry with her,for Geraint had really given up all the glory of the king's court justto be alone with Enid, although no one knew it. And the thought that nowshe looked down upon him infuriated all his heart. A word would havemade everything right but he didn't say it.
Springing up quickly from his bed he roused his squire and said, "Getready our horses, my charger and the princess' palfrey. And you,"turning a frowning face to the princess, "put on the worst looking,meanest, poorest dress you have and come away with me. We are going on aquest of honor and then you will see what sort of soldier I am."
Enid wondered why her lord was so vexed with her and replied, "If I havedispleased you surely you will tell me why."
But Geraint would not say; he could not bear to speak of it. So Enidhurried after her poor old faded silk gown with the summer flowers amongits folds, which she had worn to ride from her old home to Caerleon, andhastily dressed.
"Do not ride at my side," Geraint said as they both mounted their horsesto start away. "Ride ahead of me, a good way ahead of me, and no matterwhat may happen, do not speak a word to me, no not a word."
Enid listened, wondering what had come over her lord.
"There!" he cried as they were off, "we will make our way along with ouriron weapons, not with gold money." So saying, he loosed the great pursewhich dangled from his belt and tossed it back to his squire who stoodon the marble threshold of the doorway where the golden coins flashedand clattered as they scattered every which-way over the floor. "Nowthen, Enid, to the wild woods!"
At that they made for the swampy, desolated forest lands that werefamous for their perilous paths and their bandits, Enid with a whiteface going before, Geraint coming gloomily nearly a quarter of a mileafter.
The morning was only half begun when the white princess became awarethat behind a rock hiding in the shadow stood three tall knights onhorseback, armed from tip to toe, bandit outlaws lying in wait to fallupon whoever should pass. She heard one saying to his comrades as hepointed toward Geraint:
"Look here comes some lazy-bones who seems just about as bold as a dogwho has had the worst of it in a fight. Come, we will kill him, and thenwe will take his horse and armor and his lady."
Enid thought, "I'll go back a little way to Geraint and tell him aboutthese ruffians, for even if it will madden him I should rather have himkill me than to have him fall into their hands."
She guided her palfrey backward and bravely met the frowning face whichgreeted her, saying timidly:
"My lord, there are three bandit knights behind a rock a little waybeyond us who are boasting that they will slay you and steal your horseand armor and make me their captive."
"Did I tell you," cried Geraint angrily, "that you should warn me of anydanger. There was only one thing which I told you to do and that was tokeep quiet; and this is the way you have heeded me! a pretty way! Butwin or lose, you shall see by these fellows that my vigor is not lost."
Then Enid stood back as the three outlaws flashed out of their ambushand bore down upon the prince.
Geraint aimed first for the middle one, driving his long spear into thebandit's breast and out on the other side. The two others in themeanwhile had dashed upon him with their lances, but they had broken onhis magnificent armor like so many icicles. He now turned upon them withhis broadsword, swinging it first to the right and then to the left,first stunning them with his blows, then slaying them outright. And whenall three had fallen he dismounted, and like a hunter skinning the wildbeasts he has shot, he stripped the three robber knights of their gaysuits of armor, and leaving the bodies lie, bound each man's sword,spear and coat of arms to his horse, tied the three bridle reins of thethree empty horses together and cried to Enid.
"Drive these on before you."
Enid drove them on across the wastelands, Geraint following after. Asshe passed into the first shallow shade of the forest she describedthree more horsemen partly hidden in the gloom of three sturdyoak-trees. All were armed and one was a veritable giant, so tall andbulky, towering above his companions.
THE THREE OUTLAWS BORE DOWN UPON THE PRINCE.]
"See there, a prize!" bellowed the giant and set Enid's pulses in aquiver. "Three horses and three suits of armor, and all in chargeof--whom? A girl! Isn't that simple? Lay on, my men!"
"No," cried the second, "behind is coming a knight. A coward and a fool,for see how he hangs his head."
The giant thundered back gaily.
"Yes? Only one? Wait here and as he goes by make for him."
"I will go no farther until Geraint comes," Enid said to herselfstopping her horse. "And then I will tell him about these villains. Hemust be so weary with his other fight and they will fall upon himunawares. I shall have to disobey him again for his own sake. How couldI dare to obey him and let him be harmed? I must speak; if he kills mefor it I shall only have lost my own life to save a life that is dearerto me than my own."
So she waited until the prince approached when she said with a timidfirmness, "Have I your leave to speak?"
"You take it without asking when you speak," he replied, and shecontinued:
"There are three men lurking in the woods behind some oaks and one ofthem is larger than you, a perfect giant. He told them to attack you asyou passed by them."
"If there were a hundred men in the wood and each of them a giant and ifthey all made for me together I vow it would not anger me so as to haveyou disobey me. Stand aside while we do battle and when we are donestand by the victor."
At this, while Enid fell back breathing short fits of prayer but notdaring to watch, Geraint proceeded to meet his assailants. The giant wasthe first to dash out for him aiming his lance at Geraint's helmet, butthe lance missed and went to one side. Geraint's spear had been alittle strained with his first encounter, but it struck through thebulky giant's corselet and pierced his breast, then broke, one-half ofit still fast in the flesh as the giant knight fell to the earth. Theother two bandits now felt that their support and hero was gone, andwhen Geraint darted rapidly on them, uttering his terrible warcry as ift
here were a thousand men behind him to come to his aid, they flew intothe woods. But they were soon overtaken and pitilessly put to death.Then Geraint, selecting the best lance, the brightest and strongestamong their spears to replace the one he had broken on the giant, heplucked off the gaudy armor from each brigand's body, laid it on thebacks of the three horses, tied the bridle reins together and handedthem to Enid with the words, "Drive them on before you."
So Enid now followed the wild paths of the gloomy forest with two setsof three horses, each horse laden with his master's jingling weapons andcoat of mail. Geraint came after. As they passed out of the wood intothe open sky they came to a little town with towers upon a rocky hill,and beneath it a wide meadowland with mowers in it, mowing the hay. Downa stony pathway from the town skipped a fair-haired lad carrying abasket of lunch for the laborers in the field.
"Friend!" cried Geraint, as the lad trotted past him, for he saw thatEnid looked very white, "let my lady have something to eat. She is sofaint."
"Willingly," the youth answered, "and you too, my lord, even althoughthis feed is very coarse and only fit for the mowers."
He set down his basket and Enid and Geraint alighted and put all thehorses to graze, while they sat down on the green sward to have somebread and barley. Enid felt too faint at heart, thinking of theprince's strange conduct, to care a great deal for food, but Geraint washungry enough and had all the mowers' basket emptied almost before heknew it.
"Boy," he cried half-ashamed, "everything is gone, which is a disgrace.But take one of my horses and his arms by way of payment, choose thevery best."
The poor lad, who might as well have had a kingdom given him, reddenedwith his extreme surprise and delight.
"My lord, you are over-paying me fifty times," he cried.
"You will be all the wealthier then," returned the prince, gaily.
"I'll take it as free gift, then," the lad answered. "The food is notworth much. While your lady is resting here I can easily go back andfetch more, some more for the earl's mowers. For all these mowers belongto our great earl, and all these fields are his, and I am his, too. I'lltell him what a fine man you are, and he will have you to his palace andserve you with costly dinners."
"I wish no better fare than I have had," Geraint said, "I never atebetter in my life than just now when I left your poor mowers dinnerless.And I will go into no earl's palace. If he desires to see me, let himcome to me. Now you go hire us some pleasant room in the town, stall ourhorses and when you return with the food for these men tell us aboutit."
"Yes, my kind lord," the glad youth cried, and he held his head high andthought he was a gorgeous knight off to the wars as he disappeared upthe rocky path leading his handsome horse.
The prince turned himself sleepily to watch the lusty mowers laboringunder the sun as it blazed on their scythes, while Enid plucked the longgrass by the meadows' edge to weave it round and round her weddingring, until the boy returned and showed them the room he had got in thetown.
"If you wish anything, call the woman of the house," Prince Geraint saidto Enid as the door closed behind them. "Do not speak to me."
"Yes, my lord," returned Enid, still marvelling at his cold ways.
Silently they sat down, she at one end, he at the other, as quiet aspictures. But suddenly a mass of voices sounded up the street, and heelafter heel echoing upon the pavement. In a twinkling the door to theirroom was pushed back to the wall while a mob of boisterous younggentlemen tumbled in led by the Earl of Limours, the wild lord of thetown, and Enid's old suitor whom her father had rejected long ago, a manas beautiful as a woman and very graceful. He seized the prince's handwarmly, welcomed him to the town and stealthily, out of the corner ofhis eye, caught a glimpse of unhappy Enid nestled all alone at thefarther end of the room.
The prince immediately sent for every sort of delicious things to eatand drink from the town, told the earl, to bid all his friends for afeast and soon was gaily making merry with the men, drinking, laughing,joking.
"May I have your leave, my lord," cried Earl Limours, "to cross the roomand speak a word with your lady who seems so lonely?"
"My free leave," cried the merry Prince Geraint, who did not know theearl, "Get her to speak with you; she has nothing to say to me."
As Limours stepped to Enid's side he lifted his eyes adoringly, bowed ather side and said in a whisper:
"Enid, you pilot star of my life, I see that Geraint is very unkind toyou and loves you no longer. What a laughing stock he is making of youwith that wretched old dress you have on! But I, I love you still asalways. Just say the word and I will have him put into the keep and youwill come with me. I will be kind to you forever."
The tears fluttered into the earl's eyes as he spoke.
"Earl," replied Enid, "if you love me as you used to do in the yearslong ago, and are not joking now, come in the morning and take me byforce from the prince. But leave me tonight. I am wearied to death."
So the earl made a low bow, brandishing his plumes until they brushedhis very insteps, while the stout prince bade him a loud good night, andhe moved away talking to his men.
THE EARL MADE A LOW BOW.]
But as soon as he was gone Enid began to plan how she could escape withGeraint before Earl Limours should come after her in the morning. Shewas too afraid of Geraint to speak with him about it, but when he hadfallen asleep she stepped lightly about the room and gathered the piecesof his armor together in one place ready for an early departure on themorrow. Then she dropped off into slumber. But suddenly she heard a loudsound, the earl with his wild following blowing his trumpet to call herto come out, she thought. But it was only the great red cock in theyard below crowing at the daylight which had begun to glimmer now acrossthe heap of Geraint's armor. She rose immediately in her fright to seethat all was well, went over to examine the weapons and unwittingly letthe casque fall jangling to the floor. This woke Geraint, who started upand stared at her.
"My lord," began Enid, and then she told him all that Earl Limours hadsaid to her and how she had put him off by telling him to come thismorning.
"Call the woman of the house and tell her to bring the charger and thepalfrey," Geraint cried angrily. "Your sweet face makes fools of goodfellows." Geraint loved Enid still and he was in as great perplexity asshe, for after misunderstanding what she had said he no more knewwhether she cared for him truly than she knew what was troubling him andmaking him act in this unaccountable manner.
Enid slipped through the sleeping household like a ghost to deliver theprince's message to the landlord, hurried back to help Geraint with hisarmor and came down with him to spring upon her palfrey.
"What do I owe you, friends?" the prince asked his host, but before theman could reply he added "take those five horses and their burdens ofarms."
"My lord, I have scarcely spent the price of one of them on you!" criedthe landlord astonished.
"You'll have all the more riches then," the prince laughed, then turningto Enid, "today I charge you more particularly than ever before thatwhatever you may see, hear, fancy or imagine, do not speak to me, butobey."
"Yes, my lord," answered Enid, "I know your wish and should like toobey, but when I go riding ahead, I hear all the violent threats you donot hear and see the danger you cannot see, and then not to give youwarning seems hard, almost beyond me. Yet, I wish to obey you."
"Do so, then," said he. "Do not be too wise, seeing that you aremarried, not to a clown but a strong man with arms to guard his own headand yours, too."
The broad beaten path which they now took passed through toward thewasted lands bordering on the castle of Earl Doorm, the Bull, as hispeople called him, because of his ferocity.
It was still early morning when Enid caught the sound of quantities ofhoofs galloping up the road. Turning round she saw cloudsful of dust andthe points of lances sparkling in it. Then, not to disobey the prince,yet to give him warning, she held up her finger and pointed toward thedust. Geraint was pleased at her cu
nning, and immediately stopped hishorse. The moment after, the Earl of Limours dashed in upon him on acharger as black and as stormy as a thunder-cloud.
Geraint closed with the earl, bore down on him with his spear, and in aminute brought him stunned or dead to the ground. Then he turned to thenext-comer after Limours, overthrew him and blindly rushed back upon allthe men behind. But they were so startled at the flash and movement ofthe prince that they scrambled away in a panic, leaving their leaderlying on the public highway. The horses also of the fallen warriorswhisked off from their wounded masters and wildly flew away to mix withthe vanishing mob.
"Horse and man, all of one mind," remarked Geraint, smiling, "not a hoofof them left. What do you say, Enid, shall we strip the earl and pay fora dinner or shall we fast? Fast? Then go on and let us pray heaven tosend us some Earl of Doorm's men so that we can earn ourselves somethingto eat."
Enid sadly eyed her bridle-reins and led the way, Geraint coming after,scarcely knowing that he had been pricked by Limours in his side, andthat he was bleeding secretly beneath his armor. But at last his headand helmet began to wag unsteadily, and at a sudden swerving of the roadhe was tossed from his horse upon a bank of grass. Enid heard theclashing of the fall, and too terrified to cry out, came back all pale.Then she dismounted, loosed the fastenings of his armor and bound up hiswounds with her veil. Then she sat down desolately and began to cry,wondering what ever she should do.
ENID SAT DOWN DESOLATELY AND BEGAN TO CRY.]
Many men passed by but no one took any notice of her. For in thatlawless, turbulent earldom no one minded a woman weeping for a murderedlover than they now mind a summer shower. One man scurrying as fast asever he could travel toward the bandit earl's castle, drove the sandsweeping into her poor eyes, and another coming in the oppositedirection from out the earl's castle park in seeming hot haste, turnedall the long dusty road into a column of smoke behind him, andfrightened her little palfrey so that it scoured off into the coppicesand was lost. But the prince's charger stood beside them and grievedover the mishap like a man.
At noon a huge warrior with a big face and russet beard and eyes rollingabout in search of prey, came riding hard by with a hundred spearmen athis back all bound for some foray. It was the frightful Earl Doorm.
"What, is he dead?" cried the earl loudly to Enid, as he spied her onthe wayside.
"No, no, not dead," she quickly answered. "Would some of your kindpeople take him up and bear him off somewhere out of this cruel sun? Iam very sure, quite sure that he is not dead."
"Well, if he isn't dead, why should you cry for him so? Dead or notdead, you just spoil your pretty face with idiotic tears. They will nothelp him. But since it is a pretty face, come fellows, some of you, andtake him to our hall. If he lives he will be one of our band, and ifnot, why there is earth enough to bury him in. See that you take hischarger, too, a noble one."
And so saying, the rude earl passed on, while two brawny horsemen cameforward growling to think they might lose their chance of booty from themorning's raid all for this dead man. They raised the prince upon alitter, laying him in the hollow of his shield, and brought him intothe barren hall of Doorm, while Enid and the gentle charger followedafter. They tossed him and his litter down on an oaken settle in thehall, and then shot away for the woods.
Enid sat through long hours all alone with Geraint besides the oakensettle, propping his head and chafing his hands, but in the lateafternoon she saw the huge Earl Doorm returning with his lusty spearmenand their plunder. Each hurled down a heap of spoils on the floor, threwaside his lance and doffed his helmet, while a tribe of brightly gownedgentle-women fluttered into the hall and began to talk with them. EarlDoorm struck his knife against the table and bellowed for meat, andwine. In a moment the place fairly steamed and smoked with whole roasthogs and oxen, and everybody sat down in a hodge-podge and ate likecattle feeding in their stalls, while Enid shrank far back startled,into her nook.
But suddenly, when Earl Doorm had eaten all he would, and all he couldfor the moment, he revolved his eyes about the bare hall and caught aglimpse of the fair little lady drooping in her niche. Then herecollected how she had crouched weeping by the roadside for her fallenlord that morning. A wild pity filled his gruff heart.
"Eat, eat!" he shouted. "I never before saw any thing so pale. Beyourself. Isn't your lord lucky, for were I dead who is there in all theworld who would mourn for me? Sweet lady, never have I ever seen a lilylike you. If there were a bit of color living in your cheeks there isnot one among my gentle-women here who would be fit to wear yourslippers for gloves. But listen to me and you will share my earldom withme, girl, and we will live like two birds in a nest and I will bring youall sorts of finery from every part of the world to make you happy."
As the earl spoke his two cheeks bulged with the two tremendous morselsof meat which he had tucked into his mouth.
Enid was more alarmed than ever.
"How can I be happy over anything," replied she, "until my lord is wellagain?"
The earl laughed, then plucked her up out of the corner, carried herover to the table, thrust a dish of food before her and held a horn ofwine to her lips.
"By all heaven," cried Enid, "I will not drink until my lord gets up anddrinks and eats with me. And if he will not rise again I will not drinkany wine until I die."
At this the earl turned perfectly red and paced up and down the hall,gnawing first his upper and then his lower lip.
"Girl," shouted he, "why wail over a man who shames your beauty so, bydressing it in that rag? Put off those beggar-woman's weeds and robeyourself in this which my gentle-woman has brought you."
It was a gorgeous, wonderful dress, colored in the tints of a shallowsea with the blue playing into the green, and gemmed with preciousstones all down the front of it as thick as dewdrops on the grass. ButEnid was harder to move than any cold tyrant on his throne, and said:
"Earl, in this poor gown my dear lord found me first and loved me whileI was living with my father; in this poor gown I rode with him to courtand was presented to the queen; in this poor gown he bade me ride as wecame out on this fatal quest of honor, and in this poor gown I am goingto stay until he gets up again, a live, strong man, and tells me to putit away. I have griefs enough, pray be gentle with me, let me be. O God!I beg of your gentleness, since he is as he is, to let me be."
Then the brutal earl strode up and down the hall and cried out:
"It is of no more use to be gentle with you than to be rough. So take mysalute," and with that he slapped her lightly on her white cheek.
Enid shrieked. Instantly the fallen Geraint was up on his feet with thesword that had laid beside him in the hollow of the shield, making asingle bound for the earl, and with one sweep of it sheared through theswarthy neck. The rolling eyes turned glassy, the russet-bearded headtumbled over the floor like a ball, and all the bandit knights and thegentle-women in the hall flitted, scampering pell-mell away, yelling asif they had seen a ghoul. Enid and Geraint were left alone.
THE RUSSET-BEARDED HEAD TUMBLED OVER THE FLOOR LIKE ABALL.]
Now Geraint had come out of his swoon before the earl had returned, andhe had lain perfectly silent and immovable because he wished to testEnid and see what she would do when she thought he was sleeping orfainted away, or perhaps dead. So he had listened to all that had takenplace and had heard everything that Earl Doorm had said to her and allthat Enid had replied, so now he knew that she loved him as ever andthat she stood steadfast by him. All his heart filled with pity andremorse that he had brought her away on this hard, hard quest, and hadmade her suffer so much and had been so rough and cold.
"Enid," said the prince tenderly, very tenderly. "I have used you worsethan that big dead brute of a man used you. I have done you more wrongthan he. I misunderstood you. Now, now you are three times mine."
Geraint's kindness burst upon Enid so abruptly and was so unforeseenthat she could not speak a word only this:
"Fly, Geraint, they wi
ll kill you, they will come back. Fly. Your horseis outside, my poor little thing is lost."
"You shall ride behind me, then, Enid."
So they slipped quickly outside, found the stately charger and mountedhim, first Geraint, then Enid, climbing up the prince's feet, andthrowing her arms about him to hold herself firm as they bounded off.
But as the horse dashed outside of the earl's gateway there before themin the highroad stood a knight of Arthur's court holding his lance as ifready to spring upon Geraint.
"Stranger!" shrieked Enid, thinking of the prince's wound and loss ofblood, "do not kill a dead man!"
"The voice of Enid!" cried the stranger knight.
Then Enid saw that he was Edryn, the son of Nudd, and feeling the moreterrified as she remembered the jousts, cried out:
"O, cousin, this is the man who spared your life!"
BEFORE THEM IN THE HIGHROAD STOOD A KNIGHT OF ARTHUR'SCOURT.]
Edryn stepped forward. "My lord Geraint," he said, "I took you for somebandit knight of Doorm's. Do not fear, Enid, that I will attack theprince. I love him. When he overthrew me at the lists he threw mehigher. For now I have been made a Knight of the Round Table and amaltogether changed. But since I used to know Earl Doorm in the old dayswhen I was lawless and half a bandit myself, I have come as themouthpiece of our king to tell Doorm to disband all his men and becomesubject to Arthur, who is now on his way hither."
"Doorm is now before the King of Kings," Geraint replied, "And his menare already scattered," and the prince pointed to groups in thethickets or still running off in their panic. Then back to the peopleall aghast whom they could see huddling, he related fully to Edryn howhe had slain the huge earl in his own hall.
TO THE ROYAL CAMP WHERE ARTHUR CAME OUT TO GREET THEM.]
"Come with me to the king," astonished Edryn said.
So they all traveled off to the royal camp where Arthur himself came outto greet them, lifted Enid from her saddle, kissed her and showed her atent where his own physician came in to attend to Geraint's wound. Whenthat was healed he rode away with them to Caerleon for a visit withQueen Guinevere, who dressed Enid again in magnificent clothes. Thenfifty armed knights escorted Enid and the prince as far as the banks ofthe Severn River, where they crossed over into the land of Devon. Andall their people welcomed them back.
Geraint after that never forgot his princedom or the tournament, but wasknown through all the country round as the cleverest and bravestwarrior, while his princess was called Enid the Good.