Uther and Igraine/Book 2/5

V

NOT a word of Uther yet, no sound of his name in Winchester, though Igraine lived on in Radamanth's house, and hoped for light in the dark.

Gorlois had had the truth, and she wondered what would come of it. Lulled by an ingenuous reasoning into the belief that she would be free of the man, she began to breathe again and to take liberty in her hand. She did not think Gorlois could plague her longer after the blunt answer she had given him. His pride would drag him aside, make further homage impossible, and there the matter would end.

If Igraine believed this, then she was in very gross error. Many men never show their true fibre till they are given the blunt lie, and Gorlois was never more himself than when baffled. There was much of the hawk about him, and Igraine had underrated his pride if she expected it to take league with her against its kinsman passion. Her measure only uncovered the darker side of the man's nature, and sounded the doom of a lighter, gayer chivalry. Gorlois's pride and self-love never dragged in the wind, but held him taut to the storm, as though determined to weather all the perversities of which a woman's heart is capable. In truth, Igraine had done the very thing least likely to free her from the man's thought; she had taunted his passion and thrown down a challenge to his pride.

Gorlois kept his own counsel, and frowned down the mischievous curiousness of his friends when they laughed at him and asked how the girl framed for a wife. He struck Brastias his squire to the ground for daring to jest sympathetically on the subject. Those who went about his house and hunted and diced with him soon found that he was in no temper for light raillery or the sly privileges of an intimate tongue. The fabric of a mere nice romance had stiffened into sterner, darker proportions. There was the look of a dry desire in the man's eyes, a lean hungry silence about him that made his men whisper. Some of them had seen Gorlois when he hunted down the heathen. They knew his temper, and the cast of his features when there was some lust of enterprise in his heart.

About that time a knight came from Wales thrusting a woman's beauty upon every man with the point of his spear. As had been his custom elsewhere, he set up a green pavilion outside the walls, and daily rode out armed to the sound of a trumpet to declare a certain Amoret of Caerleon the fairest gentlewoman in Christendom. He was a big man, red and burly, and had overthrown every like fanatic for love's sake on this particular adventure. Gorlois heard of the fellow with no little satisfaction. Every finger of him itched to spill blood, and he took the deed on him, vowing it should be the last peace-offering to Igraine.

Arming one morning, he rode down and fought the Green Knight in his meadow outside the walls. It took them an hour to settle the matter. At the end thereof the errant from Wales was lying impotent and bloody in his tent, and the name of Amoret aped the ineffectual moon. Afterwards Gorlois rode into the town, war-stained as he was, found Igraine at her window, and presented her the Green Knight's token on the point of his spear.

It was a woman's sleeve in green silk, and edged with pearls. Igraine saw a crowd of upturned faces about the man on the white horse. His bright arms seemed to burn in upon her, and to light a sudden impatience in her heart. She took the green sleeve from the spear, and looking Gorlois full in the face, in reckless mood she threw the thing down under his horse's hoofs.

There was a great hush all through the street at the deed, and Gorlois started red as a man struck across the face with a whip. His eyes seemed to grow large, like the eyes of an angry dog. Never had folk seen him look so black. He stared up a moment at Igraine, shook his spear, and trampling the green sleeve under the hoofs of his horse, rode away without a word through the glum and gaping crowd.

Igraine had thrown down the glove with a vengeance. It was a mad enough method of beating off the pride of a man such as Gorlois whose temper grew with the blows given, and who knew no moderation in love or in hate. Gorlois had ridden home through the town that day to have his wounds dressed, and to spend half the night in a fury of cursing. Yet for all his bitterness he had the power of level thought, and of taking ground for the future. He would read this woman a lesson; that much he swore on the cross of his sword; and the early morning saw him again at Radamanth's, strenuous to speak his mind.

The goldsmith happened to know that Igraine was alone in the garden. Without noise or ceremony he sent Gorlois in to her, locked the door on them both, and went to watch from a narrow window on the stairs. He swore that Gorlois should have his own way, and not go balked for a woman's whim.

Igraine was sitting sewing in the arbour of laurels with the little gold cross hanging down over the bosom of her dress. A grass walk led to the arbour between beds of flowers. As she sat stitching she heard the sound of feet in the grass, and saw a shadow slanting across the entry. She expected Lilith, but looking up, found Gorlois.

He was white from his wounds of yesterday and the blood he had lost by the Green Knight's sword. His left arm lay in a sling of red silk. Igraine noted in her sudden half-fear how his eyes were very bright, and that his beard looked coal-black below his bloodless cheeks. There was something in his face too that made Igraine cautious.

She rose and folded her embroidery in the most unperturbed and quiet fashion, though she was thinking hard all the same. Gorlois watched her, and held back for her to speak, with a hollow fire creeping into his eyes, for the girl's passionless mood chafed him. He had no gentleness towards her for the moment; such love as he knew had been blown into a red beacon by starved and covetous desire.

"A word with you," he said.

The speech was rough and pertinent, showing the trend of the man's purpose. He had abandoned superficialities. Igraine, gathering up her silks, turned and faced him with the frankness of a full moon. Gorlois saw her lips tighten, and there was a temper swimming in her eyes that promised abundant spirit and no shirking. If he had launched out to rouse her from passive antagonism, he could not have chosen a better method.

Igraine made a step towards the house, but two strides put Gorlois in her path.

"Make way---"

"Not a foot till you have the truth out of me."

"Have a care,--I will be stormed at by no man."

"Woman, look at me."

Igraine was looking at him with all the temper she could summon. If Gorlois thought to ride straight over her courage, he was enormously mistaken. She would match him for all his hectoring.

"If you are not a fool," she said, "you will end this nonsense, and go."

"Am I a scullion? "

"You should know, my lord."

"I have not bled for nothing."

"As you will."

"What have you to say to me? "

Igraine lost all patience, tossed her embroidery aside, and simply flashed out at him with all her soul.

"Say! " she said; "I have somewhat to say, and that bitter; listen if you will. You, Gorlois of Cornwall, who bade you make my name a byword in Winchester? Listen to me,--hear the truth, and profit--you who pestered me with mad tricks till I hated it all and held it insolence. Who asked you to make me gossip for a city, did I? Who took your presents? Who told you the truth? Who threw your token under the hoofs of your horse to shame you? I have mocked you enough, now leave me in peace, or rue it."

"By God, madame--"

"Don't echo me. Go, get out of my sight;. I hate you!"

Gorlois flushed to the temples in this wind of passion. The girl looked splendid to him in her great anger, her head thrown back and her eyes steady on him as stars. The scorn of her beauty leapt over him like crimson light, and he was more a sensation than a man. He had a great thirst in him to grip her with his hands, to bend her straight body as he would bend a bow, to strangle up the scorn in her throat with his own breath. He went near her, stooping and staring in her face.

"Igraine."

"Mark my words."

"You golden shrew, you temptation of tempers-"

"Hold off--"

"By God! I'll tame you, don't doubt me."

Igraine, very watchful, slipped past him suddenly like light, and walked for the house with a sweeping air that bade him keep his distance. Coming to the door of the house, she tried it but found the lock shot. The red badge of a new anger showed upon either cheek. She turned on Gorlois; her eyes blazed out at him.

"A pretty trick!"

"What now, madame? "

"You had this door locked."

"Never."

"You lie in your throat."

"Radamanth--"

"Open it."

"I have no key."

Igraine's figure seemed to dilate and grow taller, and her eyes shone well-nigh as bright in colour as her, hair.

"Obey me."

"Not if I had the key."

"Obey me."

"I will be master before the sun is at noon."

"You dog! "

A sudden madness whirled Gorlois away. He went red from the neck, clutched at Igraine's wrist and held it. For a moment they stood rigid. The girl could not shake him off although he had but one hand to hold her. His breath was hot upon her face as he pressed her back against the wall, and held her there till his lips touched her neck. Igraine, breathing fast and straining from him with all her strength, set a hand on his face and thrust him away. She twisted her wrist free, and slipped from between him and the wall. Then the door opened, and Radamanth stood by them.

Igraine slipped away with a white face, and running above to her chamber threw herself down on the bed, cried for Pelleas. She heard Gorlois stride through the house, heard the gate crash as he went out into the street. Shame and loneliness were on her like despair, and she was weak and shaken after her anger, and very hungry for love and comfort. The world seemed a dull blank about her, cold, irresponsive, and grey as a November evening. Every hand seemed against her. Even Radamanth, the man of serious years, had turned the key upon her, more kind to Gorlois than herself. Her thoughts were very bitter as she lay and brooded over it all.

Presently she heard some one coming up the stairs. Darting to the door, she bolted it, and went back to the bed, while a hand rapped out a somewhat diffident summons, and Radamanth's voice came in to her.

"My dear niece," it said.

Igraine made no answer.

"My dear niece, let me have a word with you."

Still no answer. Radamanth tried the door and found it fastened.

"Gorlois is gone," he said.

Igraine remained obdurate, with face drawn and sullen-eyed. She heard him shuffle down the stairs again, go into his parlour, and shut the door very gently, like a man who is ashamed. Then all was quiet save for casual footsteps in the street, and the garrulous chatter of a starling on the tiles.

Noon had come and gone a long while, and still Igraine lay in her room and moped. She felt sore and grieved to the heart, all her sanguine courage was at low ebb. Winchester seemed a prison-house where she was shut up with Gorlois. The man's greed and power of soul seemed to stare upon her till white honour folded its hands over its breast and turned to flee. Oh for Pelleas and the brave look of those honest eyes, the staunch touch of those great hands. He seemed to stand up above the world, above the selfishness, the lust, the violence, like a pine on some lonely hill. She could trust, she could believe. To find him would give her peace.

As she lay there that noontide a new purpose came to her, and lighted up hope. It was frail and flickering enough, but still, it burned. She would leave Radamanth's house and go afoot into the world to find a shadow. Anything was better than lying cooped in the place for dread of Gorlois. She had long contemplated such a measure, and that morning in Radamanth's garden gave her decision and made her strong.

She rose up from the bed and hunted out her old Avangel habit from a cupboard in the wall. Then she set to to doff the rich stuffs Radamanth had given her, the embroidered tunic, the coloured leather shoes, the goodly enamelled girdle. In their stead she stood again in the old grey gown, hood, and sandals, with a little thrill of delicious recollection. It was like stepping back into the dream of an enchanted past.

She had hardly ended the transformation when there came a shy tap at her door, and a mild voice calling to her from the landing. It was the girl Lilith. Igraine felt a sudden warmth at her heart as she let her in and barred the door again. Lilitb stood and stared at her, her great brown eyes wide with astonishment.

"Why this old dress, Igraine? "

"I will tell you, dear."

"And you have been crying, for your eyes are red."

Igraine took the soft-voiced little woman to the window-seat and told her sadly enough all the doings of the morning. Even Lilith looked ashamed and showed her anger openly. Radamanth had confessed nothing of what had passed in the garden.

"I never loved my father less before," she said. "I should never have thought this mean trick of him. I am ashamed, Igraine."

"Never trouble, dear, you are my joy in Winchester."

"And why this old nun's habit? "

"I am going to leave you, child."

Lilith clutched at her with both hands, her face suddenly white and almost piteous.

"Oh, no, no, Igraine!"

"I must, dear."

"Forgive--"

"It is not that alone. I cannot rest here longer. Gorlois and the city have crushed the heart out of me."

Lilith lifted up her child's face to her, and then began to sob unrestrained on Igraine's bosom.

"It seems cruel," she whimpered.

"No, no, it is best for me after all."

"But where will you go, Igraine?

"Heaven knows, dear. I cannot rest here longer after this morning. I feel as if I should stifle."

"Don't go, Igraine."

"Hush, dear, don't weaken me. I am hard put as it is."

They were both weeping now. Lilith's slim body shook as she lifted up her face to Igraine's, and looked at her through her tears. She had learnt to love Igraine, and jealousy of her tall and splendid kinswoman had had no place in her heart. Lilith possessed to perfection the power of sympathy, and being a simple little soul who lived wholly for the present, she perhaps felt the more for that very reason. She could not say evil enough of Gorlois, nor put too much kindness into her kisses as she sat with her head on Igraine's shoulder.

"You cannot go out alone in the world," she said presently.

Igraine was silent.

"I know father would never forgive himself."

"There are convents, child. They would guard and give me harbour for a time."

"A convent--but you hate the life."

"If I could only hear of Uther, I would--"

"Yes, yes, I know. But will you go, Igraine?"

"My mind is made up; nothing can change it."

"Then let me come with you."

Igraine kissed her, but shook her head at the suggestion.

"I love you for the wish, dear, but I could never drag you into my own troubles, and it would be very wrong to Radamanth."

That afternoon they had many words together in Igraine's room, and dusk caught them still talking. Igraine had made Lilith promise that Radamanth should know nothing of her flight till the following morning. Lilith proved a little obstinate at first, but yielded in the end for fear of grieving Igraine. With the dusk she crept downstairs and brought up food. Igraine made a meal, while Lilith, with her tears still falling, put up food and a few trifles into a bundle, slipping in all the little store of money she had. Then she ran softly downstairs to see if the way were clear. Radamanth had gone to supper with a merchant friend, and the house seemed quiet and very lonely. In the passage-way the two girls took leave of each other, Lilith clinging to Igraine for a moment with all her heart. With sad eyes Igraine left her, and went out into the night.