Arthur Rex

by Thomas Berger

  “My lord,” saith Isold, “if you love me, do not mention to me the name of this knight unduly, whom I purpose to avoid.”

  Therefore King Mark was very happy with his wife, though he pretended to be distressed in complying with her wishes. And he was also pleased with the prospect of submitting Frocin to the torture and determining whether his Iron Maiden would perform effectively on a dwarf, for though he made use of Frocin’s intelligences and found him entertaining, he would enjoy even more causing such a tiny man to suffer intense pain with the sanction Heaven doth give for the correction of liars.

  Now when night came King Mark conducted La Belle Isold into their chamber, but before he joined her in bed he went to the closet for to bog into the stool there, and he seemed to remember it as the place he had seen in his dream the night before, and he was some vexed by the suspicion that he had sleepwalked there during the preceding night, as one sometimes does when nocturnally going to void urine, and there lingered unduly, dozing, while his nephew stole in and performed the uncle’s office ’twixt the sheets with the aunt. O unnatural lese-majestical incestuous act!

  But then wiping his breech he emerged from the closet and saw the beautiful Isold, her sable hair spread over the white satin pillow, and he could believe her the cause of no evil that could come to him.

  And she smiled beautifully and gave him a goblet, saying, “My lord, the loyal Brangwain, who is an adept in white-witchery, hath concocted for us an aphrodisiacal potion, the which causes an increase in the passionate humors and, more, their long endurance.”

  And King Mark did grasp this goblet and gulp down the contents thereof, for he was not young, whereas his queen was but a girl, and in truth he did wonder, what with his memory of the preceding night, whether he could stand so soon again to the occasion, for all the ardency of his brain.

  Now he had hardly swallowed the potion when he fell fast asleep, on seeing which La Belle Isold did go out upon the balcony and signal with a lighted lamp to Sir Tristram, who awaited in the garden below, and he began to mount the vines. But whilst he was climbing, Isold returned to the bedchamber and, to spare her lover the work of removing the king’s body to the closet, she summoned the robust Brangwain to do this job.

  Meanwhile the vile Frocin, who had concealed his tiny body in the shadows of the balcony, did sprinkle flour onto the railing there and also upon the floor, and when Tristram arrived he did unwittingly make marks in it with his hands and boots.

  Now Tristram and Isold did have their joy together until the coming of the dawn, and in the morning he departed, and Brangwain returned King Mark to the bed, where once again he awoke with the assumption that he had exerted himself all the night in the labors of Venus, which art their own reward, and he supposed he should soon have the further pleasure of torturing Frocin for his malicious prevarications.

  Therefore so soon as Isold had gone away, he summoned to him the vile dwarf, saying, “Sirrah, prepare for thine agonies, for I did lie here all the night, not leaving bed at all, and therefore thou shalt die horribly for thy libels against the queen and my nephew.”

  But Frocin said, “Then what explanation for these footprints in the flour?” And he pointed to the traces of white on the carpet, and then led King Mark onto the balcony, to show him its floor and the railing. But a strong wind had come up during the night, the which had blown away the loose flour, and then some rain had fallen which dampened that which remained and made little particles of dough from it.

  And looking at these King Mark said, “Caitiff, this is but the turd of birds. Beg God quickly to bring thee the balm of death, for I shall have thy tiny testes torn away with hot pincers.”

  “Hold you, for the love of Christ,” cried Frocin. “If I take these pellets to the kitchens and have them baked into tiny biscuits, shall I have proved they are never avian mards but rather dough-balls, rolled by wind and rain from the flour I sprinkled here to show the spoor of adultery?”

  Now King Mark was frustrated, certes, and perplexed as well. “Whoever did or did not creep here, I lay within that bed all the night.”

  “Sire,” said Frocin, “may I suggest the possibility of your being captive of a spell?”

  “Worked by whom?” asked the king. “For certainly La Belle Isold doth not have demoniac powers, and I was near no other person.” But then he remembered the potion he had drunk, and also that Brangwain was an adept in white magic, but perhaps it was rather black, for the white came from God and could never be used to the detriment of a king. Therefore once again he had sufficient doubt to stay the torture of Frocin, and when the dwarf returned with the pellets of dough baked into little cakes, proving they were not the shit of birds, his suspicion burgeoned, and as to the traces of white on the carpet of the chamber, which came to and fro between bed and window, he was no longer certain they had their source in the Arabic powders used by Isold to dust her soft body.

  So when Frocin begged his leave to prepare another trap, he agreed. But he said, “Yet if they are so cunning as somehow to have fooled me when I was here all the night, I have the paradoxical sense that I can never catch them at it unless I go away!”

  “Or to pretend to, Sire,” said Frocin, “while actually watching from a place of concealment.”

  Therefore did King Mark announce to all the court that day that he would leave before noon for to go boar-sticking in a remote forest and not to return to Tintagel until the following day. And with a great entourage he left, but he had not gone far beyond the horizon when he ordered them to halt and make camp, and he secretly returned to the castle, where in the subterranean dungeons he pleasantly passed the day in watching the punishment of malefactors, his presence there unsuspected by La Belle Isold and Sir Tristram, who as ever maintained only polite relations during the day if indeed their paths crossed at all.

  But Frocin went to him who but for Tristram would have been the foremost knight of Cornwall, Sir Andret, and knowing he suffered great envy, said to him, “My lord, there is a game afoot the issue of which will mean the ruin of all who now have worship: not only Sir Tristram and our Queen Isold, but King Mark as well. For the first two will this night be proved foul adulterers, and when Mark discovers that his kicky-wicky doth bed with his nephew, he will order her burned at the stake. Sir Tristram will never suffer this, but will kill the king, whose other knights, restrained by you, will not defend him until he is well dead. Then you shall run Tristram through from behind, while he is distracted. You may then take the crown for yourself, and if you wish, La Belle Isold.”

  But this Andret, who was secretly a vile sodomite (which Frocin knew), did never lust for Isold, and also he was suspicious of the loathsome Frocin, of whom he worried that he might espy him with his varlets and report this impious perversity to King Mark. Therefore he asked, “And how would this profit thee, shameful dwarf?”

  “You would perhaps reward me for making you king,” said Frocin, “and you would rely on my subsequent intelligences to make your crown secure, so that treachery of the kind that we practiced against King Mark could never be performed by others against you.”

  Now Sir Andret pretended to agree with this plan, but privately he did intend to kill Frocin as well, for never could a dwarf be trusted.

  And as for Frocin, he made the same suggestion to three other knights: Denoalen, Guenelon, and Gondoïne, with the difference that to each he gave the plan to kill the man who came before him, so that Andret would run Tristram through; then Denoalen would kill Andret; Guenelon, Denoalen; and finally Gondoine would thrust his sword to the hilt between the shoulders of Guenelon. Thus would Frocin rid Cornwall of all its foremost knights but one, and then he would poison him, and so ruin the country absolutely for persons of normal size, and become himself the first dwarf-king in the British island, for of an evil race he was the evilest. (And the only good dwarf was the one who guarded King Arthur’s treasure at Caerleon, who could turn into a dragon, and who was in the service of the Lady of the Lake.)


  Now when night fell, though he believed that King Mark was gone away, Sir Tristram went towards Isold’s balcony using his old route through the garden, for it would never do for anyone to see him in her hallway within the castle. And as he approached the wall the previously cloudy heavens opened to admit the light of a full moon, and though it was a windless night, a leaf fell from an oak in this light and looking aloft Tristram saw from behind a crouching figure on a high branch which did command a view of Isold’s chamber.

  And believing this to be a wretch who was up to no good, Sir Tristram shook the branch violently, and the king fell down to the ground and was knocked senseless, and not knowing who he was, for the moon went behind a cloud again, Tristram tied him fast with the king’s own belt and threw him behind a bush, and then he mounted to the chamber of La Belle Isold, where he stayed till dawn.

  Therefore the king was unconscious for another night, and when he awakened in the morning it was after Tristram had gone away through the garden, forgetting him in his transports of remembered bliss. And Mark did cry out for some hours before he was found and released by his gardeners, who thinking he was gone boar-sticking were malingerers.

  Now, sore and dirty, he summoned to him the vile Frocin and would have sent him to torture had not the malicious dwarf blamed this latest miscarriage on Sir Andret, whom he did call a sodomite and traitor.

  And King Mark swore a terrible oath, crying out in chagrin whether there was anyone he could trust? And a young page was there, who was one of Sir Andret’s male harlots, and he stole away to Andret and reported this to that knight, who thereupon fled from that land. Therefore Guenelon became the second knight of Cornwall, and you can be sure he hated Tristram for being first, and conspiring with Frocin he did make many plans to discredit Sir Tristram, but they were all frustrated by God for a long time, for He doth not always permit the punishment of some sinners by others more evil, and He allowed Sir Tristram and La Belle Isold to enjoy their stolen love for many a year before demanding from them a grievous payment.

  Now we must leave Sir Tristram for a while, for to consider the story of Sir Launcelot, who was an even greater knight but alas! certainly as great an adulterer, to an even worse end.

  BOOK III

  Of Sir Launcelot and Elaine the maid of Astolat; and how the wicked Sir Meliagrant abducted the queen.

  NOW, AS HE HAD PROMISED King Arthur, Sir Bors of Ganis did travel to the remote monastery where his cousin Launcelot was then immured of his own volition, for Launcelot did ever despise the world and wish to be away from it by any means that were not suicide, which was a great sin. And therefore he would oft fight against giants and other monsters, or if mere men an whole army, in the hope that he would be killed honorably. But God, who knoweth all, saw that these efforts were informed by the yearning for death, and jealously He would not allow Launcelot to exercise what was His own exclusive prerogative. Therefore Launcelot possessed, unhappily for him, what other men yearn for hopelessly: invincibility.

  So when Bors came to his little cell, where Launcelot prayed all the day and sometimes removed his hair shirt to excoriate his sore back further with a scourge, he found his cousin pale and weighing scarcely more than seven stone, for he ate nothing but sufficient thin gruel to keep him alive.

  “Cousin,” said Sir Bors, “I come to call thee forth into the world, for to serve King Arthur.” And he told him of the Round Table and its company of worthy knights.

  “Well,” said Launcelot, “man is superior to animals only in that he knoweth his wretchedness in the sight of God.”

  “But,” asked Sir Bors, “doth God love a cloistered virtue? Thou art a young man, Launcelot. Shouldst thou not earn the right to contemn life by living it?” For Sir Bors was ever a wise knight, with a measured view of all things and a sense of the eternal equilibrium.

  “Methinks that fighting evil is but finally to give it a reputation which unaided it could not aspire to,” said Launcelot, who deliberated on such matters incessantly.

  “Cousin,” said Sir Bors, “carried beyond a certain point such a train of thought is necessarily heretical, for we know the right.”

  “True,” groaned Launcelot. “I fear I am incorrigible.” And he did take off his hair shirt and prepare to whip himself, and his cousin saw the festering sores on his back.

  “Nay,” said Bors, and he took away the scourge from Launcelot. “The greatest failing of all is not to use the gifts that God hath given us. Thou art the knight of most prowess who ever was in all the world.”

  “I do not know that I am,” said Launcelot. “And I do not know that, being such, I could exercise my gift at arms for ought but vanity on mine own part, and envy on the part of others. Therefore, going into the world to fight against evil I should in a very real way but increase its sway.”

  “Cousin,” said Sir Bors, “consider this: that vanity has rather brought thee, and keeps thee, here. Further, that man is born to sin, but some sins are worse than others. And finally, that there is at least some aesthetic if not moral distinction between squeezing life to make it groan and groaning oneself in private.”

  Now Launcelot did have great affection for Sir Bors his cousin, who was no slave to any passion and who could not see the essential differences amongst men, thinking them but accidental. And knowing that such men could be most marvelously persistent, with the strength of their innocence and ignorance, as to be so invincible morally as he was in the lesser struggle pursued with lance and sword, he realized he would be bested in this argument.

  Therefore Sir Launcelot submitted to the suasion of his cousin Bors and bathed for the first time in a year, and he put on his armor, which hung loosely and did clatter upon his emaciated frame, and he said good-by to the good monks who kept this monastery, the which were called the Little Brothers of Poverty and Pain, and he did travel towards Camelot with Bors.

  However they had not got far when Launcelot felt the effects of his self-imposed travail and he grew too weak to retain his seat upon the horse Sir Bors had brought for him, and therefore they stopped at a place hight Astolat and applied for lodging at the house of a knight called Sir Bernard, who granted them this freely for he was a man of worship.

  And Launcelot was even more ill when he awakened next morning, but he concealed this from Sir Bors, saying he was too weary for to continue on to Camelot at this moment, and he insisted that Bors go on without him.

  “Very well,” said Sir Bors, “but I shall not leave without thy promise to follow when thou art strong enough.”

  And Launcelot did assent to this, with the provision that only death should inhibit him, for privately he believed that he was dying, and he was gratified in that belief.

  Therefore Sir Bors left and when he was gone Launcelot did ask the daughter of Sir Bernard, who was named Elaine and who had come to nurse him, to fetch a priest to administer to him the last rites. But Elaine would not do this. Rather she went to the chapel and prayed to God to allow Launcelot to live, and God granted her plea, but what she could not know was that, as is His wont, He did place upon her an obligation to repay this gain by a certain loss. And Elaine had fallen in love with Launcelot and hoped to marry him.

  So Launcelot began to recover under the care of the fair Elaine, who was (now that Isold had been married) the most beautiful maiden in the world, with hair of glowing brown and amber-colored eyes, and skin so soft that velvet did scratch it. But though she had fallen in love with him at first sight and continued to love him more, Launcelot was but affectionate to Elaine, and he thought of her with loving-kindness but not with passion, like unto the feeling for a sister. Nor did he understand that she loved him, for he was like King Arthur in that the ways of women were always strange to him, whereas he knew the quality of any man from watching him walk or ride.

  Therefore the fair Elaine was ever more sad, and sometimes she felt so desperate as to consider committing the great sin of wishing she had never helped Launcelot to recover, if he were to
be but a brother to her, of which she already had two.

  And these two brothers, who were named Tirre and Lavaine, did admire Launcelot greatly, for they were but squires at this time, and whilst he was recovering they sought him out and talked endlessly of weaponry and war and all manner of such masculine things. Therefore Elaine had less and less of him as he grew stronger. Now the day came when he could go out of doors and instruct Tirre and Lavaine in the use of lance and sword and correct their style as they charged upon the manikin or quintain, which is to say, the post with a crosspiece that doth swing to smite the unskilled tilter as he charges upon it with an improper technique, and you can be sure that Sir Quintain did many times knock these varlets from the saddle with his circulating arms, and the men did laugh merrily, but the fair Elaine brooded only on her unrequited love.

  Then Tirre did hear that King Arthur would hold another tournament a fortnight hence, open to all comers, and those who won their matches would take the place of certain knights of the Round Table who had died when upon quests (for a year had gone by since the previous tourney), and Tirre and Lavaine were eager to enter this competition. Therefore they begged Launcelot to take them to Camelot with him, for he did purpose at last to go there according to the pledge to Bors, being now entirely hale, thanks first to God but secondly to the fair Elaine.

  “Very well,” said Launcelot to the sons of Sir Bernard, “ye may go with me to Camelot, for to enter this tournament, and I have me an idea the which will provide some sport. With thee, Tirre, I shall exchange shields. Therefore thou shalt compete as Launcelot, and I with the blank shield of a squire.”

  Now, Elaine being excluded utterly from these matters, the which consumed all the spirit of the men, she did sit alone in misery as the fortnight dwindled, for Launcelot no longer needed her for nursing nor in any other wise, and she was benevolently neglected by him as if she were a hound—nay, he did caress the bitch which sat at his feet when he ate and he threw her bones, but he did not so much as this for the fair Elaine, who was sufficiently beautiful to break the heart of any other knight in the land, excepting Tristram.