The Once and Future King (46 page)

Fifteen years after leaving Elaine, Lancelot was still at court. The King’s relations with Guenever and her lover were much as they had always been. The great difference was that everybody
was older. Lancelot’s hair, which had already turned badger—grey when he first came back from his madness as a fellow of twenty—six, was quite white. Arthur’s also was prematurely snowed – but both men’s lips were red in their silky nests of beard. Guenever alone had contrived to keep the raven on her head. She looked a splendid figure when she was forty.

Another difference was that a new generation had come to court. In their own hearts the chief characters of the Round Table felt the ardent feelings which they had always felt – but now they were figures instead of people. They were surrounded by younger clients for whom Arthur was not the crusader of a future day, but the accepted conqueror of a past one – for whom Lancelot was the hero of a hundred victories, and Guenever the romantic mistress of a nation. To these young people, a sight of Arthur as he hunted in the greenwood was like seeing the idea of Royalty. They saw no man at all, but England. When Lancelot rode by, laughing at some private joke with the Queen, the commonalty were amazed that he could laugh. ‘Look,’ they would say to each other, ‘he is laughing, as if he were a vulgar person like ourselves. How condescending, how splendidly democratic of Sir Lancelot, to laugh, as if he were an ordinary man! Perhaps he eats and drinks as well, or even sleeps at night.’ But in their hearts the new generation was quite sure that the great Dulac did no such things.

Indeed, a lot of water had flowed under the bridges of Camelot in twenty—one years. They had been the years of building. When they began, they had been years of perrières and mangonels trundling along the rutty highways from one siege to another, to hurl destruction over castle walls – of movable wooden towers on wheels, going lumbering against recreant keeps, so that the archers, shooting down from the top of them, could throw death into treacherous strongholds – of companies of engineers marching along in clouds of summer dust, their picks and shovels on their shoulders, to undermine revolted bartizans so that the great stones caved and fell tottering. When Arthur had been unable to take a strong—arm castle by assault, he had caused tunnels to be dug under selected parts of the wall. These tunnels,
being supported on beams of wood which could be burned away with fire at the proper moment, had collapsed, bringing the rubble—filled baileys down on top of them.

The early years had been times of battle, in which those who insisted on living by the sword had been made to die by it. They had been years lit by whole towersful of combatants roasting like so many Guy Fawkes – for the great objection to a pele tower as a stronghold was that it made a first—class chimney – years ringing with the sound of battle—axes thudding on battle—axe—proof doors – which were constructed by nailing the first ply of boards horizontally, and the second ply vertically, so that the wood could not be split along the grain – years illustrated by the shambling tumble of Norman giants – who were most conveniently dealt with by cutting off their legs first, so that you could get a fair reach at their heads – and by the flicker of swords round helmets or elbow—cops, a flickering which, in extreme cases, was attended by such a shower of sparks as to make the struggling knights seem perfectly incandescent.

Wherever you went, during the first years, every vista had been terminated by a marching column of mercenaries, robbing and pillaging from the Marches – or by a knight of the new order exchanging buffets with a conservative baron whom he was trying to restrain from murdering serfs – or by a golden—haired maiden being rescued out of some lofty keep by means of leather ladders – or by Sir Bruce Saunce Pité riding a full wallop with Sir Lancelot coming deliverey after him – or by a few surgeons carefully ransacking the wounds of an unfortunate combatant, and making him eat onions or garlic, so that, by smelling at the wound, they could discover whether the intestines had been perforated or not. When they had examined the wounds they dressed them with the oily wool from the udders of sheep, which made a natural lanolin dressing. Here would be Sir Gawaine sitting on his antagonist’s chest, and finishing him off, through the ventails of his helm, with the long sharp poignard called the Mercy of God. There would be a couple of knights who had suffocated themselves in their own helms during the course of a battle, a misfortune which frequently
happened in those days of violent exercise and small vents. On one side would be a commodious gibbet set up by some old—fashioned princeling to hang King Arthur’s knights and the common Saxons who trusted them – a gibbet perhaps nearly as sumptuous as that constructed at Montfaucon, which could support sixty bodies depending like drab fuchsias between its sixteen stone pillars. The humbler gallows had rungs on them, like the footholds on telegraph poles, so that the executioners could scramble up and down. On another side would be a demesne so hedged about with man—traps in its shrubberies that none dared walk within a mile of it. In front of you, there might be a daffish knight who had been caught in a buck—trap, which, swinging him into the air on the end of a stout branch released by the action of the trap, had left him dangling helplessly between heaven and earth. Behind you, there might be a savage tournament or faction fight going on, with all the heralds crying out, ‘
Laissez les aller
’ to ranks of chivalry who were about to charge – a cry which was exactly equivalent to the shout, ‘They’re off!’ which is still to be heard at the Grand National today.

The World had been expected to end in the year one thousand, and, in the reaction which followed its reprieve, there had been a burst of lawlessness and brutality which had sickened Europe for centuries. It had been responsible for the doctrine of Might which was the Table’s enemy. The fierce lords of the Strong Arm had hunted the wild woodlands – only, of course, there had always been exceptions like the good Sir Ector of Forest Sauvage – till John of Salisbury had been forced to advise his readers: ‘If one of these great and merciless hunters shall pass by your habitation, bring forth hastily all the refreshment you have in your house, or that you can readily buy, or borrow from your neighbour: that you may not be involved in ruin, or even accused of treason.’ Children, Duruy tells us, had been seen hanging in trees, by the sinews of their thighs. It had been no uncommon sight to see a man—at—arms whistling like a lobster, and looking like porridge, because they had emptied a bucket of boiling bran over his armour during a siege. Other
spectacles even more dramatic have been mentioned by Chaucer: the smyler with the knyf under the cloke, the careyne in the bush with throte y’corve, or the colde deeth with mouth gaping upright. Everywhere it had been blood on steel, and smoke on sky, and power unbridled – and, in the general confusion of the times, Gawaine had at last contrived to murder our dear old friend King Pellinore, in revenge for the death of his own father, King Lot.

Such had been the England which Arthur had inherited, such the birthpangs of the civilization which he had sought to invent. Now, after twenty—one years of patient success, the land presented a different picture.

Where the black knights had hoved, all brim and furious by some ford, to take toll of anybody rash enough to pass that way, now any virgin could circumambulate the whole country, even with gold and ornaments upon her person, without the least fear of harm. Where once the horrible lepers – they called them Measles – had been accustomed to ramble through the woods in white cowls, ringing their doleful clappers if they wanted to give warning, or just pouncing on you without ringing them if they did not, now there were proper hospitals, governed by religious orders of knighthood, to look after those who had come back sick with leprosy from the Crusades. All the tyrannous giants were dead, all the dangerous dragons – some of which used to come down with a burr like the peregrine’s stoop – had been put out of action. Where the raiding parties had once streamed along the highways with fluttering pennoncels, now there were merry bands of pilgrims telling each other dirty stories on the way to Canterbury. Demure clerics taking a day’s outing to Our Lady of Walsingham, were singing
Alleluia Dulce Carmen
, while the less demure ones were warbling the great medieval drinking—song of their own composition:
Meum est propositum in taberna mori.
There were urbane abbots, tittupping along on ambling palfreys, in furred hoods which were against the rules of their orders, and yeomen in smart tackle with hawks on their fists, and sturdy peasants quarrelling with their wives about new cloaks, and jolly parties going out to hunt without
armour of any sort. Some were riding to fairs as great as that of Troyes, others to universities which rivalled Paris, where there were twenty thousand scholars whose ranks eventually provided seven popes. In the abbeys all the monks were illuminating the initial letters of their manuscripts with such a riot of invention that it was impossible to read the first page at all. Those who were not doing the chi—ro page were carefully copying out the Historia Francorum of Gregory of Tours, or the Legenda Aurea, or the Jeu d’Echecs Moralisé, or a Treatise of Hawkynge – that is, if they were not engaged upon the Ars Magna of the magician Lully, or the Speculum Majus by the greatest of all magicians. In the kitchens the famous cooks were preparing menus which included, for one course alone: ballock broth, caudle ferry, lampreys en galentine, oysters in civey, eels in sorré, baked trout, brawn in mustard, numbles of a hart, pigs farsed, cockintryce, goose in hoggepotte, venison in frumenty, hens in brewet, roast squirrels, haggis, capon—neck pudding, garbage, tripe, blaundesorye, caboges, buttered worts, apple mousse, gingerbread, fruit tart, blancmange, quinces in comfit, stilton cheese, and causs boby. In the dining halls the older gentlemen, who had spoiled their palates with drinking, were relishing those strange delicacies of the Middle Ages – the strong flavours of whale and porpoise. Their dainty ladies were putting roses and violets in their dishes – baked marigolds still make an excellent flavouring for bread—and—butter puddings – while the squires were showing their weakness for sheep’s—milk cheese. In the nurseries all the little boys were moving heaven and earth to persuade their mothers to have hard pears for dinner, which were stewed in honey—syrup and vinegar, and eaten with whipped cream. The manners of the table, too, had reached a pitch of civilization far beyond our own. Now, instead of the plates made of bread, there were covered dishes, scented finger bowls, sumptuous table cloths, a plethora of napkins. The diners themselves were wearing chaplets of flowers and graceful draperies. The pages were serving the food with the formal movements of a ballet. Wine bottles were being placed on the tables, but ale, being less respectable, was being put beneath.
The musicians, with strange orchestras of bells, large horns, harps, viols, zithers and organs, were playing as the people ate. Where once, before King Arthur had made his chivalry, the Knight of the Tower Landry had been compelled to warn his daughter against entering her own dining hall in the evening unaccompanied – for fear of what might happen in the dark corners – now there was music and light. In the smoky vaults, where once the grubby barons had gnawed their bones with bloody fingers, now there were people eating with clean fingers, which they had washed with herb—scented toilet soap out of wooden bowls. In the cellars of the monasteries the butlers were tapping new and old ale, mead, port, clarée, dry sherry, hock, beer, metheglyn, perry, hippocras, and the best white whisky. In the law courts the judges were dispensing the King’s new law, instead of the fierce law of Fort Mayne. In the cottages the good wives were making hot griddle bread enough to make your mouth water, and putting fine turf on their fires regardless of expense, and herding fat geese on the commons enough to support twenty families for twenty years. The Saxons and Normans of Arthur’s accession had begun to think of themselves as Englishmen.

No wonder that the young, ambitious knights of Europe flocked to the great court. No wonder that they saw a king when they looked on Arthur, a conqueror when they looked on Lancelot.

One of the young men who came to court in those days was Gareth. Another was Mordred.

‘We don’t see many arrows thrilling in people’s hearts nowadays,’ remarked Lancelot one afternoon at the archery butts.

‘Thrilling!’ exclaimed Arthur. ‘What a splendid word to describe an arrow vibrating, just after it has hit!’

Lancelot said: ‘I heard it in a ballad.’

They went away and sat in an arbour, from which they could watch the young people practising their shots.

‘It is true,’ said the King gloomily. ‘We don’t get much of the old fighting in these decadent days.’

‘Decadent!’ protested his commander—in—chief. ‘What are you so gloomy about? I thought this was what you wanted?’

Arthur changed the subject.

‘Gareth is shaping well,’ he said, watching the boy. ‘It’s funny. He can’t be many years younger than you are, yet one thinks of him as a child.’

‘Gareth is a dear.’

The King put his hand on Lancelot’s knee and squeezed it affectionately.

‘Some people might say that you are the dear,’ he said, ‘so far as Gareth is concerned. It has come to be quite a legend how the boy arrived at court anonymously, so that his own brothers didn’t recognize him, and how he worked in the kitchen, and got nicknamed Beaumains when Kay wanted to be nasty, and how you were the only person who was decent to him until he did his great adventure and became a knight.’

‘Well,’ said Lancelot defensively, ‘his brothers hadn’t seen him for fifteen years. You can’t blame Gawaine for that.’

‘I am not blaming anybody. I was just saying that it was nice of you to take notice of a kitchen page, and help him along, and knight him in the end. But then, you always were nice to people.’

‘It is strange how they come here,’ said his friend. ‘I suppose they can’t keep away. Any boy with a bit of go in him feels that he has to come to Arthur’s court, even if it is to work in the kitchen, because it is the centre of the new world. That is why Gareth ran away from his mother. She wouldn’t let him come, so he ran away and came incognito.’

‘Nonsense. Morgause is a bad old woman – that’s all you can say about her. She forbade him to come to court because she hated you, but he came for all that.’

‘Morgause is my half—sister, and I have hurt her badly. It
can’t be nice for a woman to have all her sons going away to serve the man she hates. Even Mordred, her last.’

Lancelot looked uncomfortable. He had an instinctive dislike for Mordred, and did not like having it. He did not know about Arthur being Mordred’s father – for that was a story which had been hushed up in the earliest days, before either he or Guenever came to court, just as Arthur’s own birth had been. But he did feel that there was something strange between the young man and the King. He disliked Mordred irrationally, as a dog dislikes a cat – and he felt ashamed of the dislike, because it was a confused principle of his to help the younger knights.

‘It must have hurt her worst of all when Mordred came,’ pursued the King. ‘Women are always fondest of their last babies.’

‘So far as I can learn, she was never particularly fond of any of them. If she was hurt by their coming to court, it was only because she hated you. Why does she?’

‘It’s a bad story. I would rather not talk about it.

‘Morgause,’ added the King, ‘is a woman – is a woman of pronounced character.’

Lancelot laughed rather sourly.

‘She must be,’ he said ‘from the way she is carrying on. I hear she is making a dead set at Pellinore’s son Lamorak now, although she is a grandmother.’

‘Who told you?’

‘It’s all over the court.’

Arthur got up and walked three steps in agitation.

‘Good God!’ he exclaimed. ‘And Lamorak’s father killed her husband! And her son killed Lamorak’s father! And Lamorak is hardly of age!’

He sat down and looked at Lancelot, as if he were afraid of what he might say next.

‘All the same, that is what she is doing.’

The King suddenly and vehemently asked: ‘Where is Gawaine? Where is Agravaine? Where is Mordred?’

‘They are supposed to be on some quest or other.’

‘Not – not in the North?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Where is Lamorak?’

‘I think he is staying in Orkney.’

‘Lancelot, if you had only known my sister – if you had only known the Orkney clan at home. They are mad on their family. If Gawaine – if Lamorak – O my God, have mercy on my sins, and on the sins of other people, and on the tangle in this world!’

Lancelot looked at him in consternation.

‘What are you afraid of?’

Arthur stood up for the second time, and began talking fast.

‘I am afraid for my Table. I am afraid of what is going to happen. I am afraid it was all wrong.’

‘Nonsense.’

‘When I started the Table, it was to stop anarchy. It was a channel for brute force, so that the people who had to use force could be made to do it in a useful way. But the whole thing was a mistake. No, don’t interrupt me. It was a mistake because the Table itself was founded on force. Right must be established by right: it can’t be established by Force Majeure. But that is what I have been trying to do. Now my sins are coming home to roost. Lancelot, I am afraid I have sown the whirlwind, and I shall reap the storm.’

‘I don’t understand what you are talking about.’

‘Here comes Gareth,’ said the King calmly, suddenly, and as if everything were over. ‘I think you will understand in a minute.’

While they had been talking, a messenger in leather leggings had arrived at the butts. The King had seen him out of the corner of his eye as he hastily sought Sir Gareth and handed him a letter. He had watched the boy reading the letter, once, twice, three times, and later as he spoke confusedly with the man. Now, after handing his bow to the messengers without noticing that he was doing so, Gareth was coming to them slowly.

‘Gareth,’ said the King.

The young man knelt down and took the King’s hand. He
held it as if it were a banister or a life—line. He looked at Arthur with dull eyes, and did not cry.

‘My mother is dead,’ said Gareth.

‘Who killed her?’ asked the King, as if it were the natural question.

‘My brother Agravaine.’

‘What!’

The exclamation was from Lancelot.

‘My brother has killed our mother, because he found her sleeping with a man.’

‘Keep quiet, Lancelot, please,’ said the King. Then to Gareth: ‘What did they do to Sir Lamorak?’

But Gareth had not finished the first part of his story.

‘Agravaine cut off her head,’ he said. ‘Like a unicorn.’

‘The unicorn?’

‘Please, Lancelot.’

‘He killed our mother in her blood.’

‘I am sorry.’

‘I always knew he would,’ said Gareth.

‘Are you sure the news is true?’

‘It is true. It is true. It was Agravaine who killed the unicorn.’

‘Was Lamorak the unicorn?’ asked the King gently. He did not know what his nephew was talking about, but he was anxious to help. ‘Is Lamorak dead?’

‘Oh, Uncle! It says that Agravaine found her naked in a bed with Sir Lamorak, and he cut off her head. Now they have hunted Lamorak down as well.’

Lancelot was less patient than the King, because he knew fewer of the sorrows which had happened in the early days.

‘Who were they?’ he asked.

‘Mordred, Agravaine, and Gawaine.’

‘So it comes to this,’ said Sir Lancelot, ‘that your three brothers have first murdered King Pellinore – who would not willingly have hurt a fly – murdered him because he killed their father by accident in a tournament – then murdered their own mother in bed – and finally butchered Pellinore’s young son Lamorak, for being seduced by their mother, who was three
times as old as he was. I suppose they set upon him all against one?’

Gareth held the King’s hand tighter, and began to droop his head.

‘They surrounded him.’ he said numbly, ‘and Mordred stabbed him in the back.’