Arthur Rex by Thomas Berger

  Now the morning came when Launcelot and her brothers were to leave for Camelot, and as Elaine could not bear to bid Launcelot farewell she did remain in her chamber weeping. But to her surprise she heard a knock at the door, and when she opened it, there stood Launcelot himself, the last person she expected to see, and in her confusion she confessed her love for him.

  But as it happened Launcelot did not attend carefully to her words, for he was altogether distracted by a wish to repay her for her nursing of him to health, the which he did not value as such, yearning for death; yet he could not suppose she would know that, and therefore what she had done had great moral worth.

  Therefore he said to her, as if to a child, “If it would please thee, I shall wear thy token in my helm when riding in the lists.”

  Now herself distracted equally, the fair Elaine heard this as requital of the love she had professed, and she tore away from her best robe of red cloth-of-gold a sleeve and gave this to Launcelot, who affixed it to his helmet. Now to Elaine this was symbolic of her heart, but to Launcelot it was but the emblem of his affectionate friendship with a young girl who had brought him warm broths.

  And while she swooned in happy thought of him, Launcelot rode to Camelot taking Tirre and Lavaine, and Tirre carried the shield bearing Launcelot’s device of lions rampant, and Launcelot carried the one that was blank.

  Now the tournament was begun with a great free-for-all that soon eliminated the less proficient knights, but both Tirre and Lavaine were still in their saddles when it was done, for Launcelot had stayed near to them in the press and unhorsed whoever came near, for he had no equal as a knight.

  And King Arthur was watching, with Gawaine and Bors and Kay, and he said to Bors, “Thou hast told us of thy cousin, and I see that he is worthy enough, but scarcely as yet deserving of the highest praise, which should rather go to him who wears the red sleeve in his helm, who furthermore, on the evidence of his blank shield, is but a squire. More than once he has disposed of a threat to thy Launcelot.”

  Now Sir Bors recognized the style of his cousin’s attack, which was unmistakable, in that of the knight referred to by King Arthur, and knowing of Launcelot’s peculiar ways, among which was a dislike of public renown, he correctly divined the true state of affairs. However, not wishing to betray Launcelot, he said to King Arthur, “I confess I am amazed, Sire. Never have I seen such a knight as he who wears the red sleeve.”

  “No doubt,” said Sir Gawaine, whose loss of envy applied only with Tristram, “he is good, perhaps very good, but as yet he hath never faced an opponent of great worth.”

  Mischievously Sir Bors then said, “Dost imply, my dear Gawaine, that he is not thy match?”

  But Gawaine had learned to restrain the show of envy, and he replied simply, “He seemeth a worthy knight.”

  But Sir Kay did seethe and say, “Well, he hath not yet faced one of us of the Round Table, and methinks the boy doth need a lesson in humility.” And he thereupon donned his helmet, took up his lance, and rode to challenge the Knight of the Red Sleeve.

  King Arthur groaned and said to the other knights, “Why oh why must Kay seek to prove himself upon the field? Prithee, Gawaine, go and follow him lest we be utterly shamed.”

  Now Gawaine was hoping for such a command, for he felt he would burst of chagrin if he could not try himself against this arrogant squire, and quickly he mounted and passed Kay at the gallop, shouting “Have at you!” to the knight with the red sleeve in his helm, then closing his visor and charging with lowered lance.

  And soon Gawaine came crashing to the earth, being flung from his horse by a wondrous means, as if he had grown wings, for never did he feel the impact of the other’s lance point. And when he recovered his senses he did rise and draw his sword, and the other courteously dismounted and took his own blade from the scabbard.

  Now Gawaine was a swordsman of most marvelous merit, as had been seen in his fight with Sir Tristram, and he carried his attack to his opponent, hacking away great pieces of the blank shield until finally the other knight held little but its straps, and King Arthur watching was much cheered, and even Sir Bors began to worry that Launcelot had not yet recovered from his residence amongst the Little Brothers of Poverty and Pain.

  (Meanwhile, denied the Knight of the Red Sleeve, Sir Kay did attack the man he believed to be Launcelot the cousin of Sir Bors, and he was soon thrown, for it was rather young Tirre, who had been trained by Launcelot.)

  But the reasons for Launcelot’s apparent setback were two: firstly, that Gawaine was so great a swordsman (as great, so went the jest of the pages, on the field as between a maiden’s thighs) that even for Launcelot to defeat him was not an easy matter; and secondly, that Launcelot believed he here saw an opportunity to die without sinning.

  O foolish man, for God doth detect every nuance of the sick will! And to His servant Launcelot He now made it known that the only unforgivable sin is committed by the man who doth not use his gifts and therefore acts the coward to his own self, mocking the God who made him. So Launcelot with one great stroke severed Sir Gawaine’s sword just beneath the hilt and knocked him to the ground. Then he raised Sir Gawaine’s visor and putting his blade there he asked him to yield.

  And Gawaine did so, saying with great graciousness, for as with Tristram his envy had been honestly expunged, “My lord, you are the greatest knight I have ever contested with, and perhaps the greatest in the world. Would that you were of our company of the Round Table.”

  “’Tis for that purpose I have come here,” said Launcelot, helping Gawaine to his feet and embracing him. “But, my dear Gawaine, I am sore all over from thy puissant blows. Never shall we fight together again except side by side against a common enemy and not each other, for never again could I expect that, just as I was about to surrender to thee, thy foot would slip on the grass and give me the advantage.”

  “Nay, dear Launcelot,” said Gawaine, who now realized who his late foe was, “thou art my better, as is Sir Tristram, and I thank God ye are both my friends, so that I am that happy man who can love his superiors.” Then he took him to King Arthur.

  “Well, Launcelot,” said Arthur, “thou didst have thy jest, which also had its serious significance, for given what we heard of thee from thy cousin Bors, methinks some opponents would have been overly wary of thee, and some overly eager to try themselves against the greatest of all. ’Twere better the way it happened, and the impersonal standards of quality have been maintained. We are sworn at the Round Table to fight for the Right, which is eternal, and not for the self, which is on temporary loan from Heaven.” And he then knighted him.

  “Sire,” said Sir Launcelot, “I pray to God I shall never bring shame to the Round Table.”

  “It is curious to me,” King Arthur said, “that thou, alone amongst my knights, and the greatest of them, doth have this worry. Modesty is a good, but methinks this goeth beyond that.”

  And Launcelot asked to speak with the king apart, and Arthur granted this plea. “Sire,” then said Sir Launcelot, “I have an awful secret, the which I may impart only to you. And that is that I am invincible.”

  “But for some place upon thy body, surely?” asked King Arthur. “Like unto Achilles with his heel or the German Siegfried who was made immune to wounds by dragon’s blood except for where the linden leaf stuck to his back.”

  “Nay,” said Launcelot, “I am not invulnerable to wounds, nor am I immortal. I can and will die, but I can not be defeated by living knight.”

  “I see,” said Arthur. “Therefore thou canst take no pleasure in fighting. Gawaine, with his human envy, is the happier for it, being constrained ever to strive. But I ask thee to consider this, that God hath given thee the privilege not to be vulgar. O lonely man! Well do I understand this situation, being a king. Arthur and Launcelot shall be friends, joined in a unity like unto that of the head with the arms. I am thy king, and thou art my champion.”

  Then King Arthur took Sir Launcelot to meet Guinevere,
little knowing that the common cause so lately identified was so quickly to be divided into parts.

  But Queen Guinevere, who had fallen in love with Launcelot when she had heard Sir Bors’s account of him, did not at first recognize the subject of her fantasy in the living knight, and but coolly accepted his obeisance.

  And as for Launcelot, who had never been a passionate man, he saw only queenly condescension and not the woman, and that she was the fairest in the world did not occur to him, except in the abstract, which is to say, without carnality.

  Then they left her presence for to go have their meat at the Round Table, with all their company. And the contest of Sir Kay with young Tirre, who owing to the shield he then believed was Launcelot, hath not been forgotten here: the former was soon defeated by the latter, and his brother Lavaine also won his own match, and both became knights of the Round Table.

  Now the knights had all but reached the end of their meal, and the lackeys were only just serving the treacle tart, when a huge knight rode into the hall on an enormous horse, and both man and animal were all green in every particular.

  Not only was the knight wearing green armor, but also his face was green within the opened visor. And the hide of his horse was green, as was the mane. And the only weapon carried by the Green Knight was a great green battle-ax. Indeed he was a wondrous sight and caused much amazement, and all the company of the Round Table fell silent except for King Arthur, who performed as he was required by the laws of hospitality.

  “Sir knight,” said he, “thou art welcome to sit down and eat, but I would fain have thine horse taken to the stables.”

  “Nay, King Arthur,” cried the knight in a great voice appropriate to his size. “I come here not to feed but rather to find the knight who hath the courage to trade blows with me.”

  “The tourney hath ended,” said King Arthur. “Prithee wait for the next, unless thy purpose be evil.”

  “My purpose,” said the Green Knight, “is precisely that which you must determine by means of your own response, for I seek a knight with the heart for a peculiar adventure, the which he shall never understand unless he survives it.”

  “Well,” said King Arthur, “that distinguishes it in no wise, for ’tis true of all adventures that deserve the name.”

  “Yet I believe mine is unique,” said the Green Knight, “for what I propose is that one of your knights exchange blows with me. Now, he must strike me first, so powerfully as he will.”

  “Thou art an huge man,” said the king, “and well armored, but methinks that Launcelot might well cut through thy steel and wound thee mortally.”

  “Indeed?” cried the Green Knight with much joviality, and he dismounted from his green charger and removed his helmet, and his hair was green as grass. “But to remove all possible obstruction I shall even bare my neck, and lie down prone. Now may I suggest that the weapon be mine own ax, for no sword has yet been made that can penetrate my skin.” And he lay down on the floor.

  Now all the knights were in a state of wonderment, but Sir Kay, who had lately brought in a great cheese of Stilton for to serve after the pudding, saw here an opportunity to prove himself as knight, and he went to the great battle-ax which the green giant had dropped, and he strove to lift it, but he could not.

  And King Arthur urged Sir Launcelot to undertake this adventure. But Launcelot was concerned for the pride of his friend Gawaine, who he could see greatly yearned to have at the Green Knight but was restrained by courtesy. Therefore Launcelot spake as follows.

  “With respect, Sire, unless this be a command, methinks I am no match for this verdant giant,” he said, innocent of vanity and therefore never thinking this might make him seem a coward. “Pray let me defer to Sir Gawaine.”

  King Arthur granted this request. Yet he did not, and would never, understand the modesty of Sir Launcelot, though he did love him for it. And all throughout their lives Arthur and Guinevere and Launcelot did love one another, though each pair in a different way, and men may be dear friends sans sodomy, as a lover and his cuckold be as brothers.

  Therefore with great joy Gawaine did leap from his siege, take up the great ax, and with one blow strike off the head of the Green Knight, which went a-rolling the vast length of the great hall of Camelot, struck the far wall, and came rolling back unto the very feet of King Arthur. And the wondrous thing was that this head did roar with laughter throughout its journey to and fro! Then the green body rose and taking up the green head, placed it upon the green neck, and mounted the green horse.

  “Well struck, Sir Gawaine,” cried the Green Knight. “And now that I have felt the strength of your arm, I shall test your moral mettle. One year from today, you must meet me at a place of my choosing, there to accept one blow from me, or else be damned as an arrant poltroon!” And guffawing he did prick his horse and gallop out of the castle.

  Now Sir Gawaine said, “Obviously there is some magic in this adventure, but whether wicked or benign magic is to be proved: for green is neither white nor black.”

  “’Tis the color of vegetable fecundity,” said King Arthur, “and this knight may well be of the druidical persuasion, his purpose being to challenge Christian principles.”

  “I shall meet him one year hence,” said Gawaine, “and only God knows whether I shall keep my head after that meeting.” And with a jolly laugh very like that of the Green Knight, he sat him down once more at the table and fell to his pudding with hearty appetite, for Sir Gawaine had yet a great zest for life.

  And Sir Kay now came with the wheel of cheese, and said enviously, “But for the grease on my fingers, I should have lifted the ax and done as well as thou, Gawaine.”

  “Methinks,” said Gawaine, “that God arranges each adventure for a particular knight, that chance doth never come into play. Now, I am the special defender of women. No woman is yet evident, but no doubt one will appear a year hence.”

  “And meanwhile,” said Kay, “thou shalt prepare by jousting with as many females as thou canst find.”

  But Sir Kay could never provoke the greatest knights, who rather felt sympathy for him, and Sir Gawaine said now, “Thine adventure will come one day, and thou shalt perform thy role with courage and grace. Thou art a better knight than thou dost understand, my dear Kay.”

  But Kay’s needs would have been better met by a malice which answered his own, and bitterly he went away, pushing the trolley which held the cheese.

  “Now, blast him,” said King Pellinore, “where doth he go? I wanted a bit of that Stilton for to nullify the taste of that damned sweet, which else will pollute my tongue all day. The Froggies eat their pudding last, but damn me if I can see that bloody custom.”

  And King Arthur chided him for his blasphemous oaths at the Round Table, for Pellinore though a devout knight was forgetfully foul-mouthed.

  “I am concerned for Kay,” Arthur then said. “His standards are such that he will not allow the lackeys to do some of the jobs that should be theirs. Any varlet could wheel about that cheese and scoop out and serve the portions, but Kay doth insist that only he can do it properly, with an eye to the veining and the ripeness and whatnot, the which seemeth to me inconsequential rubbish, for cheese is so much clabbered milk at bottom, whatever its coloration when it begins to go rotten. Indeed, I have always found it filthy stuff and seldom touch it.” In such matters as this, Arthur confided only in Pellinore, the only fellow king at hand. “But look you, Kay insists on serving his brother knights, on the one hand, and on the other, he doth resent being in the situation of a servant.”

  But King Pellinore did merely roll his eyes and scratch at his louse-bites, for he had no patience with Sir Kay, not thinking him even a good seneschal so to take away the cheese before he could feed on it.

  Now Guinevere though queen was a woman and therefore did not sit to meat with the assembled men of the Round Table, but she took her meals apart, with the ladies of the court, and providing for them was Sir Kay’s especial pleasure, for though wo
men understood nothing of the preparation of food, their tastes were more delicate and sensitive than those of men, and instead of the roasts of beef, joints of mutton, and gammon from wild boars that inevitably appeared upon the Round Table, for the ladies Kay had his cooks prepare turbot poached in court-bouillon, fowls scented with juniper berries, and gâteaux St.-Honoré.

  But on this day they were eating a mayonnaise of chicken, which had been preceded by poached eggs in jelly and was to be followed by wild strawberries and clotted cream, for the weather was so warm that beneath their robes they wore only two silk petticoats and the fires had been allowed to dwindle to coals, for it was August in Britain and the sun sometimes showed itself through the rain clouds.

  It was to the ladies’ dining hall that Sir Kay now went though not with the Stilton, for that was a man’s robust cheese. Instead he had a chafing-dish upon his trolley, in the which he would sauté mushrooms for a savory.

  But scarcely had he bowed to the queen, then put his butter in the copper basin and waited for it to froth over the charcoals, when a knight burst into the hall in full armor, except that he did not wear his helmet but rather grasped it in his left hand, so that his head could be seen, and it was to a degree handsome, but there was an ugliness in his smile, which was very like a sneer.

  And Guinevere said to him, “Knowest thou not that it is a thing most lewd and villainous to come to where ladies are eating and look at them. O barbarous wretch!” For he was an alien knight and not of the Round Table, and all the ladies did gasp at his unnatural act.

  But far from being ashamed, the strange knight did snigger contemptuously.

  “Caitiff, defend thyself,” bravely cried Sir Kay, who confronted the knight with only a little paring knife, nor did he wear mail while frying mushrooms.