“Well,” said Gawaine, “I cannot call it a reward when I am attacked by two of your armed men. Should you like me to assail you with a halberd and a mace?”
“Hardly,” said the lord, but he smiled. “Yet you appear whole, whereas I passed their bodies being hauled away in a cart.”
“My lord,” said Sir Gawaine, “on the morrow I meet the Green Knight, and though I thank you for your hospitality, I shall be relieved to have it come to an end, for between us there is no common language.”
And so he retired for the night. But while he slept he had bad dreams, for the ghost of the dead Elaine of Astolat came to him and chided him for his failure to confess to the lord what he had been given by the lady, thereby violating his pledge, and she reminded him that she had died for loyalty to an idea of herself.
Therefore when Sir Gawaine awoke, he went to find the lord for to tell him everything that had happened on the previous day. But nowhere could he find him throughout the castle, nor indeed did he see the lady or anyone else, nor the scented pleasure-chambers. In fact, the entire castle was but a ruin and covered in years of moss and vines, and it was apparent that no one had inhabited it since the days of the giants who lived in Britain before the first men came there after the fall of Troy.
Thus it was in sadness that Sir Gawaine rode to seek the Green Knight, for he realized that the last three days of his life had been spent in some magical test at which he had proved himself untrustworthy, mendacious, and adulterous.
Now he was not long in reaching a valley where a green chapel stood, and before it was tethered a green-colored stallion. And when he dismounted and went within he saw the same huge green knight who had come to Camelot one year before.
“Sir Gawaine,” said the Green Knight, brandishing his great green battle-ax, “are you prepared to keep our bargain?”
“I have come here only for that reason,” said Gawaine, removing his helm and baring his neck. “And I would fain have you get it over with quickly.”
“Why for?” cried the green man. “Who rushes to his death?”
“Our bargain, sir,” said Gawaine, “will be completed when you strike off my head. There is no provision in it for argument.”
“I am no quotidian headsman,” said the Green Knight, “and I do not crop necks for profit nor pleasure. Tell me why you are in haste to lose your self, the which is truly the only thing a man possesseth, if but temporarily.”
“I am not pleased with mine,” said Gawaine. “I have not done well. I have lately broken a vow and lied.”
“Which is no more than to say, you have been a man,” said the Green Knight and in a jovial voice. “And with only these failings, are better than most.”
“And worse,” said Gawaine, “I have adulterated with the wife of mine host.” And with a groan he threw himself into the stones of the floor of the chapel so that the Green Knight could chop off his head.
“Sir Gawaine,” said the Green Knight, raising his ax high over his head, “you are the most humane of all the company of the Round Table, and therefore, unlike the others, you are never immodest. To be greater than you is to be tragic; to be less, farcical.”
And with a great rush of air he brought the ax down onto Gawaine’s bare neck and the blade struck the stones with a great clangor, and red sparks sputtered in the air.
But Gawaine was still sensible, and he flexed his shoulders and stretched his neck, and then he felt with his hands that his head was yet in place.
Therefore he sprang to his feet and drew his sword. “Well, sir,” he said, “you have had your one blow. I am not to be held at fault if you missed me! Then have at you!”
But the Green Knight threw down his ax and laughed most merrily. “Feel your neck,” said he, “and you will find that you have been wounded slightly.”
And Gawaine did as directed, and there was a slight cut in the skin, the which bled onto his fingers.
“That is your punishment,” said the Green Knight. “You are no adulterer, dear sir, for that was no one’s wife but rather the Lady of the Lake. You did however break your pledge to the lord of Liberty Castle, and you did prevaricate. But had you told the full and literal truth and fulfilled to the letter the terms of your agreement, you would have been obliged to use the lord as you did the lady.”
“Yes,” said Sir Gawaine, and having escaped the death for which he had been prepared, he felt an unique joy though his demeanor remained sober. “But I had done better to explain that at the time.”
“Indeed,” said the Green Knight. “And therefore, your slight wound. But in the large you performed well: a knight does better to break his word than, keeping it, to behave unnaturally. And a liar, sir, is preferable to a monster.”
“Then can it be said, think you,” asked Sir Gawaine, “that sometimes justice is better served by a lie than by the absolute and literal truth?”
“That may indeed be so,” said the Green Knight, “when trafficking with humanity, but I should not think that God could be ever deluded.”
Then Sir Gawaine knelt to pray, and when he rose he saw that the Green Knight had lost his greenness and had dwindled in size, and in fact was no longer a man, but a woman, and she was the Lady of the Lake.
“My dear Gawaine,” said she, “do not hide thy face. Thou hast done nothing for which to be ashamed.”
“Lady,” said Sir Gawaine, “’tis not all of it shame. I confess that I am vexed that once again you have chosen to gull me. Remember that on the first occasion I did seemingly kill a woman and now I apparently made love to another. Yet each of them was you, and both events were delusions.”
“And from neither have you come away without some reward,” said the Lady of the Lake, who in her true appearance was even more beautiful than in any of her guises. “And would you rather that each time the woman had been real?”
“No, my lady!” cried Gawaine. “But I might ask why my natural addiction to women must invariably be the cause of my difficulties. Methinks I was happier as the lecher of old. I have since been only miserable. And for that matter, what service did I render to Elaine of Astolat, whom I did love without carnality? Better I had made to her lewd advances, the rejection of which would not have altered her fate, but would have freed me!”
“Why,” asked the Lady of the Lake, “didst thou assume thine overtures would have been rejected? Gawaine, thou wert never commanded to be a prude.”
And so having made her favorite knight the more puzzled, the Lady of the Lake did void that place in the form of a golden gossamer, the which floated from the door of the chapel and rose high into the soft air without.
BOOK X
How the vile Mordred made common cause with his wicked aunt Morgan la Fey; and of his good brother Gareth.
NOW KING ARTHUR TOOK every opportunity to bring Guinevere and Sir Launcelot together, for he admired Launcelot above all men in the world, whereas he believed that Guinevere despised that greatest of all knights, and it is natural for a husband to wish that his wife be at one with him in his enthusiasms.
But the queen showed more public disdain for Sir Launcelot than she had ever done, and not only because by this means she sought to avoid suspicion, but also for the reason that she could not understand the admiration which two men might feel for each other without being either of them sexually unnatural. For Sir Launcelot notwithstanding that he had cuckolded his king held Arthur in great reverence, and whilst Guinevere insofar as she was a queen believed this was as it should be with a knight and his sovereign, as a woman she did wonder whether it was unmanly.
And so we leave them all in this situation, the which existed for many years.
But meanwhile Mordred the bastard was growing up in the Orkneys, those isles at the northernmost limits of the world, beyond which is the realm of the ice-monsters. And even as a wee child Mordred was wicked and when playing with wooden swords he sharpened his blade and hardened it over coals, so that it would not splinter when he smote his playfellows, and
he wounded so many of them that the children of noblemen were kept from him, and therefore he frequented the spawn of serfs, the which if he hurt or even killed them had no recourse, for a prince will be a prince the world over (except in Arthur’s Britain where there were none, for his only offspring was Mordred).
Now Mordred’s mother was Queen Margawse, and his foster-father (who believed he was his real one) was King Lot, and though neither of them was better than they should have been, they recognized in Mordred a malignancy to which they could never attain, and it being generally true of all bad people that they dislike being in the proximity of someone worse (for this maketh them feel stupid, whereas in the company of good people they feel cunning), Margawse and Lot decided when Mordred was ten years of age to expose him in a waste land where a wyvern was known to roam and to devour all things that were quick.
Therefore they had their knights take Mordred to this remote place, which was on the mainland, in the pretense that a tournament would be held there. But even at this tender age Mordred was quite clever enough to see this as a ruse by means of which he would be disposed of.
Therefore when he was tied to a great rock by these knights and then they rode away, and next the loathsome wyvern came to devour him, he did not quaver in fear, though this ferocious beast had the body of a serpent with great leathern wings and a head like an horse’s (if that horse were ten times larger than naturally), and the nail on the claw it thrust towards Mordred for to probe him, as it always first did to its meat, was longer than his childish body.
But Mordred, who knew that no beast was a match for a man in shrewdness, said, “My lord Wyvern, think you it is good husbanding of your resources to eat me, a mere morsel of four stone, when more than fifteen hundred pounds of fresh fat knights are beyond yon hill?”
And the wyvern retracted its talons and in a trice flew over the hill and ate those knights along with their horses and armor, and then with a heavy belly it lay down and slept for three weeks, which gave Mordred more than enough time to loosen his bonds and to void that region.
Now he had traveled some distance afoot and he was hungry and weary, for this place was arid, but then coming over the brow of a hill he saw in a valley a beautiful palace of which the towers were made of spun sugar. And when he arrived before its portal he saw that the stones of which the walls were built were actually sweet cakes, and the trees which grew near by were weighted down with sugarplums.
Then the gate swung open, as if of itself, and Mordred went into the palace, which within was a place that any normal boy would have found jolly, with the pillars so many great peppermint sticks and merry music being played by elves on rebecs and flutes.
And a beautiful lady came to him, and she said, “Welcome, sweet boy.” And then she sat down upon a silken couch, and she took him into her lap, and she did caress him dearly.
But in a moment she screamed and sprang up, and Mordred would have fallen to the floor had he not been so agile.
“Vile little bastard!” cried the lady. “Thou didst pinch my tit!” And she rubbed herself at her bosom.
“Well,” said Mordred, “I am not so easily gulled, lady. There is but one reason why such a palace as this would be found in a desert, and that is to lure children within for to eat them.”
And the lady raised her eyebrows. “Thou art an interesting child,” said she. “If indeed thou art a child and not an imp in the temporary guise of one. If the latter, knowest thou who I am? I am in thy service, which is to say, evil.”
“Lady,” said he, “I am Mordred, and I am ten years old. Having lately been exposed by my parents, I owe no fealty to anyone. If this evil which you serve will give me an home, I shall be its willing vassal.”
Now the lady did exclaim, “Mordred! I am thine aunt, Morgan la Fey. And though I am much pleased to see thee, do not expect an embrace, for I never touch another except to gain power over him and work his ruin.”
“And for mine own part,” said Mordred, “I always pinch or prick anyone who touches me in affection. But I am very happy to be with you, for I have always heard your name mentioned with loathing, and if people detest you so much, you must be altogether admirable.”
“Thou hast the right instincts,” said Morgan la Fey. “But these are not sufficient in themselves, for all children have a natural attraction towards evil, the race of mankind being a monstrosity upon the earth, but persons are often distracted when they grow older. I must undertake thy tutelage, so that as thou dost mature, thou remainest as rotten as thou wert born.”
“Well,” said Mordred, “methinks there is little danger of my acquiring any decency, though I might well hypocritically pretend to be a sweet child at times so as to gull certain persons into a belief that I am harmless.”
“Splendid,” said Morgan la Fey. “’Tis a means which I myself use sometimes, and one of the most effective, for the reason that mortals, who live in fear, tend to dismiss from their attention him of whom they are not afraid, and therefore he can accomplish a great deal of wickedness without being detected. Whereas if he doth boast openly of his devilry, all will be on guard against him.”
“My dear aunt,” said Mordred, “you are the only human being with whom I have ever felt a common cause. Indeed, until this moment I have felt quite alone in the world, for though my parents can not be called good folk, methinks the evil they have done is largely a result of fecklessness and not a devotion to the bad. For example, exposing me to the ravages of the wyvern might be seen as wicked, for I am their child. But if they were malefactors of true mettle, they would have murdered me outright and not submitted me to an ordeal which might well go awry and fail in its purpose—as indeed it hath. And furthermore, it were the better service to evil to preserve me, for never since being born have I displayed the least decent trait.”
“Yea,” said Morgan la Fey, “thou seest these matters very clearly, Mordred, and though I have ever detested the thought of being a mother, I do wish I were thine, for thou art all I could ask of an offspring. My sister Margawse doth not deserve thee.”
“Not to mention my father King Lot,” said Mordred.
And Morgan la Fey did look sharply at her small nephew. “Dost speak ironically, Mordred?” she asked.
“Never to you, dear Aunt,” said he. “But I see from your reaction that I have been naïve. Lot is not my father?”
“Now, Mordred,” said his aunt, “doth it seem likely that thou wouldst be born in wedlock?”
“Then,” happily asked Mordred, “my mother was a strumpet?”
“Nay,” said Morgan la Fey. “She doth lack the imagination for that. Thy mother, Mordred, is merely an adulteress.”
“These are nevertheless good news to me,” said Mordred. “I trust my natural father is a more effectual rogue than Lot, whom I have ever despised.”
“Thou art thoroughly indecent, I am pleased to say,” said Morgan la Fey. “Yet thou art withal yet a child. The great purpose in doing evil is to defy the good, dear boy! Therefore thou shouldst be at a terrible disadvantage if thy father were a notable felon—indeed thou couldst have no choice in such a case but (unhappy thought!) to serve virtue. For the rule of human life, which can never be abrogated, is that the son will necessarily oppose the father, at least in principle if not in person, so that the issue of great lechers are prudes, the wise man is the scion of the foolish stalk, the hero generates a coward, and a criminal like thyself comes from the loins of King Arthur.”
Now Mordred, who was yet a boy of ten, however vicious, here fell to weeping uncontrollably, and Morgan la Fey regretted that she could not touch him in tenderness, for despite her wickedness there was still some femininity in her. However she soon (and guiltily) repressed this obnoxious feeling and commanded her nephew to do the same to his grief, for in the service of evil such demonstrations of negative emotion are confessions of failure, and only positive gloating is permitted, as when one watches the excruciating torture of a helpless victim and screams in glee whil
e he howls in agony.
Therefore Mordred dried his eyes and regained command of himself, and he begged the pardon of his aunt Morgan la Fey. “I shall not soon weep again,” said he, “for nothing worse could possibly happen to me than to learn that I am the son of the finest king in the world.”
“Well,” said the wicked Morgan la Fey, “it is not however as unfortunate as it could be. Thou art not his legitimate son, but rather his bastard. Take comfort in the knowledge that thy very existence is a thing of shame to him, and that engendering thee is his sole stain. Were he as wicked as thou and I, he would put thee to death. But being good, he shall feel obliged to love thee.”
“Now, my dear aunt,” said Mordred, “is it not just that which will make it worst?”
“Nay,” said Morgan la Fey, “for the pain that comes from love is the greatest on earth, and he who is loved hath the most effective instrument of torture that can be used on the lover, whom he can torment with impunity. The cunning device of the Christian religion is to maintain that love bringeth joy, while it is precisely the reverse which is true: that love doth bring only agony to the lover.”
“Yea,” said Mordred, “already I have divined that that is true of ardent passion, which is all pain if unsatisfied but boring if surfeited, but what of the paternal and other forms of familial love, and the loving-kindness of friendship? For though I am incapable of feeling any of those (except towards thee, my dear wicked aunt, but methinks our exchange of affection is due to a community of interest more than to blood), I am aware that banal humanity makes much of them.”
“That these are feelings professed to by the rascal many,” said Morgan la Fey, “should in itself be evidence of their falsity. A child ‘loves’ his father because he is afraid of him, and this fear is the other face of hatred. Whereas a father ‘loves’ a son while the boy is small, because he as yet has no fear of him, and this so-called love is therefore disguised contempt. Then the boy grows up, and he and his father arrive at a kind of equilibrium of power, and this truce is again called ‘love.’ Finally the elder becomes a dotard, which is to say that through age he has become as weak as a child, and in power (which is the only quality worth considering on earth or in Heaven) the father hath become a son, and he fears his new parent and is in turn despised by him. And once again this is called filial-paternal love.”
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