Arthur Rex (12 page)

Now in spite of himself Arthur was cheered by the alchemical foolishness. “Well, Merlin,” he said, “never have I seen such a collection of glowworms. This is no magic. Undoubtedly there was also some practical explanation of the disembodied arm which rose clutching Excalibur from the lake: a lever, a pulley, a wire. With age and experience of kingship I am no longer so credulous. Yet I understand the value of such illusions for the people, who require the legendary.”

“True enough,” said Merlin, “but to believe in themselves kings need it even more, and therefore they must be able to distinguish genuine magic from false. The secrets of the Lady of the Lake are her own. I can not divine the doings of women, real or faery. But as to this lamp, it is indeed magical, abstracting its energy as it does from the very air, which though it is invisible to the human eye can be seen by the penetrating vision to be a thronged fluid in which particles swim, the which, knocking together, make a force. Thus if one walk across a fur, then touch a sword, a spark would leap from finger to steel. In this globe I have imprisoned a quantity of such sparks, the which I gathered by a certain means. You see, I have explained this thoroughly as to the essentials, yet it remaineth a mystery.”

But King Arthur had got bored before Merlin completed his statement on the light and anyway suspected that the wizard spoke with some persiflage at his expense, which he must needs permit, for Merlin’s devotion to him and to Britain could never be doubted.

“My friend,” said King Arthur, “I have done an evil thing by reason of my lasciviousness, the which I fear I have helplessly inherited from my father, for apparently Pendragon blood is thicker than the pure Welsh spring water of my foster-parent Sir Hector, a chaste and honest knight. And if I was once so inordinate, then I might well be again if I were in the presence of a woman.”

“Sire,” said Merlin, “not all women are your kinsfolks.”

“Yet,” said Arthur, “who might tell, with all the seed my father did broadcast?”

“But,” Merlin said, “Uther Pendragon did bed in the main the female issue of churls or defeated paynims, generally virgins of very tender age, as is so often the taste of kings. Except with your mother, the fair Ygraine, his spirits were not wont to rise for women who approached him in rank. And in that case, it was a thing of destiny, the same destiny that in its further workings brought to you your half-sister Margawse, from which encounter there will doubtless be more consequences which you will be unable to alter.”

“Then I am fundamentally a slave, I whom you call the most glorious king of all?” said Arthur.

“No man is free who needeth air to breathe,” said Merlin.

“Nevertheless,” said King Arthur, “I believe I must get married. Now, King Leodegrance hath a daughter who would seem suitable, being of appropriate age. Also, he is now my vassal and hath expressed a wish that I take this castle as mine own, along with the round table in the great hall, for which I have a special purpose, and his hundred knights as well, who are off currently on a quest, but from which they will soon return unsatisfied, owing to its peculiar nature. However, I do not think this quest, being of a religious type, frivolous. And questing is furthermore always the proper pursuit for a knight: the sedentary grow fat and lecherous.”

“Have you seen this princess?” asked Merlin. “And doth she please you?”

“I have never,” said Arthur. “The point is that this Guinevere is at hand here in Cameliard, and the round table as well, and, when they return, the hundred knights. She is therefore recommended by convenience. Also, she is accustomed to living in this castle, which, if I decided to make it the principal seat of my court, would therefore not need to be redecorated for my queen. Whereas Caerleon is very rude.” But the truth was that Caerleon was unpleasant to him because of memories of Margawse.

“Sire,” said Merlin, “would it not be reasonable, if you are marrying so as to be protected from illicit desire, to determine first whether the woman you shall marry be licitly desirable to you?”

“Aha,” said Arthur. “Nay, there thou speakest again with a fiend’s disregard for the moral law, Merlin. I shall be prohibited by my vows of marriage from traffic with any other woman, whomever I do wed: her identity being irrelevant.”

“True,” said Merlin, “I know little of woman, but even so me-thinks there be none who exist without a sense of self, and all the more so when a party to a marriage of convenience rather than in the connection called love, for pride is to be considered.”

“Pride is a sin,” said King Arthur, “and never to be considered in a Christian queen. We might assume that this princess hath been reared to be pious, for though Leodegrance, being an old friend of my father’s, is surely no better than he should be, he can be relied upon to bring up a daughter properly, sequestering her once she has reached womanhood. Therefore she can not, having known no man, be vain.”

“I have noticed before now this Christian confusion of pride with vanity,” said Merlin, “which is perhaps due to the first adherents of that faith having been slaves. And with the passing of the old Greeks, the distinction between both and
hubris,
a much more noble concept, hath been forgotten.” He brought his globe of light to his white-haired face and gazed profoundly into its glow. “I can,” he said, “see no woman.”

“It may be,” said King Arthur, “that thy nigromancy is no longer as puissant as it was once, Merlin. Producing Excalibur was one thing, marriage is another. Perhaps I must rely on reason now.”

Now on the morrow King Arthur went to King Leodegrance, who was lying on a bed groaning.

“My lord,” said Leodegrance, “forgive me for not rising. But as I foresaw I have me an ache in my guts from eating too much of your beef, as well as a heavy head from your wine.”

“My lord Leodegrance,” said Arthur, “I shall accept your offer of the round table, the hundred knights, and the land of Cameliard with this castle, the which I shall make my principal seat. And now I ask of you another boon: the hand of your daughter in marriage.”

And King Leodegrance pulled a face of amazement. “Guinevere?” Then he did belch and rub his belly.

“She is I believe available?”

“I expect so,” said the older king, pursing his lips. “But to be queen of Britain might require sterner stuff. This is a girl, my friend, who doth dream incessantly by daylight, though until a year or so ago was as lively as a child could be. But melancholy was concomitant with the onset of her courses, and spots as well. I am afraid that she hath turned quite plain of both face and mind.”

“These news do not discourage me,” said King Arthur. “For what I seek in a queen, as I admire it most in a woman, is modesty above all.”

And Leodegrance pulled back his lips to suck his teeth. “Modest she is certainly, and hath good reason so to be.”

“Then might I have her for a wife?” asked Arthur.

The old king did writhe upon his bed. “I tell you, my lord, my bowels are most unhappy with what my palate did so enjoy. In one’s dotage one pays the debts incurred in one’s youth. There was a time when I was as great a trencherman as old Uther, though at venery he did never have a match.”

Then suddenly King Arthur knew a great apprehension. “My lord,” he asked, “the late King Uther Pendragon my predecessor, whom I never knew, was he your guest at Cameliard when your late queen was yet living?”

“The late queen,” said Leodegrance, smiling in spite of his distress, “did have a great aversion to him, by reason of his stench. For Uther did rarely bathe within a twelvemonth, and disdained all scents as being appropriate only to vile sodomites.” Wincing the old king produced a laugh. “One learned to keep upwind of Uther Pendragon.”

But King Arthur was relieved to hear this, for the reason that then Guinevere was not likely to be another of his half-sisters.

“My lord,” said he, “I await your answer.”

“Oh,” said King Leodegrance, “well of course you may marry Guinevere if in spite of what I have said you persist in this aim. Will be a great honor for me, and a greater one for her, for who else would have her?”

And after groaning again and complaining of his sore guts, he clapped his hands and a page appeared, and he told this varlet to fetch the princess to him.

Now Arthur was overcome with shyness and said he would go away until these news had been imparted to Leodegrance’s daughter, and so he went a-falconing.

Meanwhile the varlet returned without Princess Guinevere, saying she was in the aviary contemplating the peafowl and did refuse to budge from it, and Leodegrance did have him whipped for failing in his task, and at length though ever more ill the old king arose from his bed and himself went to find this chit, for actually he was quite keen on getting her married before his death, which he believed imminent.

But when he entered the aviary, causing a commotion of feathers, she was no longer there, and he succeeded only in befouling his slippers on the abundant droppings that covered the floor, and he ordered that the churls who had neglected to muck out the great cage be punished by the loss of one hand each, but rather the left than the right, for he was a merciful monarch and not a cruel paynim. But nonetheless he knew that owing to his mildness Cameliard had long been in decay, for as a horse would not gallop unless feeling the spur, neither would a lackey labor earnestly without the threat of pain.

Now whilst Leodegrance did wander feebly throughout the castle looking for his only daughter, King Arthur was in the meadow without the walls watching his tercel dive through the sky to plunge its talons into prey, of which his retainers relieved it though often with difficulty, for this raptor was not well trained in relinquishment.

And it happened that though it was a gray day and the heavens of a color like unto dull pewter, Arthur did become aware of a golden radiance coming from one of the towers of the castle, and he looked towards it, but it was so bright that he could not distinguish its source, and he decided that it was again Merlin with some cunning alchemical device.

But when he turned to look at the still quivering body of the canary, which had been torn from the claws of his tercel and brought for his inspection, it was transformed into a fish, and Merlin thereupon made himself appear, chuckling at the amazement of the lackey, who did drop it upon the grass, where it flopped and gasped, and he crossed himself wonderingly.

“Thou hast left thy magical light upon the tower,” said King Arthur, “and it has grown considerably brighter, but methinks the better use of it were at night.”

“’Tis no glow of mine,” said Merlin, squinting at the heights of the castle. Then turning away and producing from the folds of his robe a square of clear glass, and next a lighted candle, he held the flame so that its soot did obscure the glass, and when it was well blackened he placed it before his eyes and stared again at the tower.

“’Tis a woman,” he said, “or a girl merely.”

“Give it me,” said King Arthur, and he took the smokened glass and looking through it he saw the most beautiful maiden in the world. And a great wonder arose in him, for she could never be Princess Guinevere, who was plain and had spots.

“Alas, Merlin,” said he, “that thy powers can not apply to women, for I would fain know the identity of that maiden, who now goeth within the tower, yet her shimmer remains behind.” But next he groaned and said, “Alas, too, that I am pledged to marry the plain Guinevere, for I know that I shall want yon maid all the years of my life.”

Meanwhile, within the castle King Leodegrance had returned to his bed feeling very seedy, and now that he was done looking for her, Guinevere came to him.

“Father,” said she, “there is a beastly knight who is hawking in the meadow, and I would have him put to death.”

“Ah, Guinevere,” said Leodegrance, “I did search for thee everywhere, feckless child.”

“Or stretched upon the rack or broken on the wheel,” said Guinevere, “for his detestable peregrine hath murdered my dear canary, the which I had taken for an airing upon the balcony.”

“Enough of thy prattle, chuck,” said Leodegrance. “I have managed to get for thee a husband, indeed the most noble to be found on this island.” He took his hand from his belly and raised it in triumph. “Thou shalt be queen to Arthur of Britain, and as dowry I must provide no more than the round table, my company of knights, and the land of Cameliard, from all of which I have long wanted to be rid.”

“But,” said Princess Guinevere, “I do not wish to be married never, Father, and I do not care to be queen of Britain, wherever that may be, for it has an ugly name as if it were a land of toads.” And she made more complaints, to the which Leodegrance did not listen carefully, believing it mere maidenly rubbish.

Therefore he soon ordered her to be still and hie her to her chambers before Arthur returned, for she did have a slatternly appearance.

“Have thy women wash thine hair and dress thee in thy best robe. And for another, I would that thou coverest thy spots with powder,” said Leodegrance. “For I do not know whether Arthur hath yet given his binding pledge to wed thee, and certes he might change his intent were he to see thee as thou art currently, with jam-smears on thy skirt and canary-droppings on thy sleeves. But then, poor wretch, thou hast not since early childhood had a mother to tend thee, and what could I, a man, do in this regard?”

“How tiresome!” Guinevere cried petulantly. “Well, if I do this, then thou must punish that cruel knight, tearing away his fingernails with hot pincers, flaying him alive, or quartering him with four stallions.”

Then she went away for to return to her tower, but passing through a corridor she met face to face with the very knight whose tercel had murdered her gentle bird who would sit upon her finger and sing sweetly to her. And never had she hated a man more.

But King Arthur, for it was he, once again saw the glorious radiance when he looked at her, the which was too much for his eyes, and therefore he averted his head while bowing and saying, “My lady, your servant.”

“Felon!” cried Guinevere. “Thy lady shall be the Iron Maiden, and she will embrace you with spikes.”