Arthur Rex (32 page)

“But perhaps ’tis yet a finer game than thou dost appreciate,” said Morgan la Fey, “for having said all of that, I confess to using lust (for I am beautiful) to ruin lesser men so that with their help I can destroy the king, who since his lone encounter with thy mother is immune to desire.”

“But what can destroy King Arthur?” asked Mordred.

“His death, alone,” said Morgan la Fey, “and brought about by some great shame such as by the machinations of a blood-relative.”

Now at this moment Mordred made a sad reflection. “Well, dear Aunt,” said he, “we too, you and I, shall die. Is evil then worth doing? What then doth it achieve that is greater than good: both are transitory.”

And Morgan la Fey said in answer, “There are those of us to whom bringing pain to others is a remarkable satisfaction, dear Mordred. And do we not thereby serve Life? For only the dead are anesthetic, and whereas pleasant feelings are short-lived and never are vivid enough to escape a consciousness of the passing of Time, in the degree to which it is intense pain doth give at least the illusion of being eternal. And to a great man the greatest (and perhaps the only) pain be shame.”

Then Morgan la Fey smiled upon little Mordred, and she said, “And now I shall demonstrate the sort of pain felt by persons without principles of virtue, such as thee, dear Mordred, and also I shall repay thee for pinching my dug earlier (though thou didst that in ignorance of mine identity, and whilst I have great admiration and affection for thee as a pestilent little fellow, it is my absolute obligation as an evildoer always to seek revenge).”

And with the sharp toe of her slipper she kicked Mordred full hard in the stones, from which savage blow he sank to the floor and writhed in agony for a time that seemed indeed eternal.

But finally he arose, saying, “I thank thee for this valuable lesson, dear Aunt. Now may I assure thee that I shall furnish myself with a dagger and that, with all respect, if you do assail me again, now that we are quits, I shall rip out your belly.”

“As thou shouldst do,” said Morgan la Fey with great approval. “At the tender age of ten years, Mordred, thou art the vilest little swine that could be imagined even in my venomous fancy, I am pleased to say. I can teach thee few more things, methinks, but perhaps I might assist thee to evoke some of the evil which, owing to extreme youth, as yet lies dormant in thy black heart.”

And to celebrate their foul pact, Mordred and Morgan la Fey did go to the cellars of that castle, where a number of rats had been kept separate from one another and starved, and they brought them together in a cage and watched them devour one another with murderous fangs, much blood, and hideous noises.

And now we leave these vassals of Satan for to go with Mordred’s half-brother (and full brother to Gawaine, Agravaine, and Gaheris), and he was a fine young man named Gareth, and he came to King Arthur’s court for to become a knight of the Round Table.

But Gareth, who was King Arthur’s nephew, did not wish to have this relationship known before he had proved himself, nor did he wish to be recognized by his three brothers who were knights, until he could join them as a full equal at the Round Table, for he was a young man of great independence and probity, having spent the years of his later childhood (by reason of his older brothers’ absence and Mordred’s infancy) by himself.

Now reaching Camelot at the time of Pentecost, when King Arthur was obliged to grant any boon asked of him by a person not a felon, Gareth went to the court and finding a moment when none of his brothers was there he asked the king to grant him three gifts.

“Well,” said King Arthur, “these are two more than I am pledged to grant. Is thy need thrice as great as that of any other petitioner?”

And Sir Kay was present and he heard this and being already in a peevish mood owing to the many miscarriages in the preparations for the Pentecostal feast (for a great lot of cutlery had been ill polished by the feckless footmen and fifty firkins of clotted cream had got lost, &tc.), he said to Gareth, believing him an impudent knave, “Fellow, begone.”

“Nay,” said King Arthur smiling to Gareth, “I would hear thy requests.”

Now Sir Kay, who did dislike things not done by the book, made a grimace, but of course he held his peace.

“I thank you, Sire,” said Gareth, “and I beg your pardon for my discourtesy, which was not intentional, but I have been reared rudely and I am ignorant of the customs at Camelot.”

“Thou art a comely youth,” said King Arthur, “and from thy speech and carriage it can be seen that thou wert not basely born. And from thy white hands one could not say that thine upbringing was too rude. For I did myself have a rustic rearing, as my dear Kay doth remember, and mucked out the stables and slept oft with the hounds, and I think it was no loss to me.” And here he looked fondly at his foster-brother and seneschal, and Sir Kay, who had not the same pleasure in remembering bucolic Wales, did scratch his nose.

“Sire,” said Gareth, “with all respect, I should not like to tell you at this time of my provenance, nor to give you my name. As to the boons I would ask of you, the first is that I be permitted to stay here at Camelot for one year and to be put to service in whatever function you should choose, however mean or servile. Then, having proved my good intent, at the end of that twelvemonth I shall come to you and ask the remaining two boons.”

Now Sir Kay was offended again, and he cried, “Sirrah, this is gross insolence to represent thyself as nameless. It is contumacious towards the king, and discourteous to the knights.”

“Well,” said King Arthur to Gareth, “what hast thou to say in self-justification of this peculiarity?” But the king was not angered but rather amused by the young man’s strange ways, for he recognized that he was highborn (those of royal blood being ever able to identify their own kind), even though he did not suspect he was his own nephew.

“Sire,” said Gareth, “I would prove myself with deeds, not words.”

“Yet is it not thy word which thou wouldst have me to take now?” asked King Arthur. But he smiled and he said, “But I do like to encourage the zeal of youth. Most young men who come here apply for to become knights. Thou art unique.”

“And base, methinks,” said Sir Kay looking disagreeable.

“Very well, then,” said King Arthur to Gareth. “I shall grant thy first request, if thou dost understand that at Camelot a man is asked to do nothing but to live up to his pledge. Thou canst leave at this moment with no loss of honor. But if thou dost remain, be assured that I will take thee at thy word, and for one full year thou must work, without complaint, as a kitchen-lackey.”

Now Sir Kay was offended that King Arthur had so little respect for the royal kitchens that he would send there a man for a taxing trial of character. But he must needs submit to the royal command, and therefore in ever worse humor he led Gareth to the kitchens and took him to the scullery, where there were countless dirty pots rising in stacks to the ceiling, and some of these vessels were so large that they could stew an entire sheep.

“Now,” said Sir Kay, “these vessels must be cleaned and then polished to such a fine gloss that they might be used as looking-glasses. And when that hath been done they will be filled and put again onto the fires, and before thou hast got to the end of this lot, the first of it shall be back again, and so on
ad infinitum.”

And even as he spake, into the scullery came two cooks, in greasy singlets and running with sweat (for great fires burned all day in the kitchens, and those who worked there had skin the color of bricks), and these two men carried a great pot between them, the which had been used for breakfast porridge for an hundred and fifty knights. And this pot they hurled down with a great noise, and foully cursing as is the wont of cooks they went away, and though Sir Kay did not like this he could do little about their ways, for persons who work with food must needs be humored, else spitefully they may pollute the dishes.

And giving Gareth a pail of sand and a scrubbing-brush Sir Kay left him there and then he went to speak with the head cook about the menu for the feast of Pentecost, for which there were thirty-two courses, each separated from the next by the serving of an ice flavored with another fruit, and some of the fruits for these sorbets came from the ends of the earth, and there were no names for them, yet sometimes they were easier to find than certain local foods owing to the fecklessness of those who grew them conjoined with that of those who made deliveries, and Sir Kay continued to be in a bad mood throughout the day, and when in the middle of the afternoon he happened to be in that part of the kitchen where the lackeys peeled potatoes, and he espied Gareth there with a paring knife, he waxed wroth.

“Fellow,” said he, “thou hast defied mine order, and never have I known such frowardness.”

“Nay, my lord, with all respect,” said Gareth. “I have followed your orders to the letter. But having polished all the pots I thought I should not sit idle, and therefore I came here to lend a hand.”

“O mendacious varlet!” cried Sir Kay.

But Gareth asked him to look at the shining vessels which were mounted in great stacks against the walls, and Sir Kay went to them and he saw his mirror-image in their gloss.

But he was yet suspicious, and he had Gareth take every pot out from the stacks, and in every one the interior was bright as a looking-glass.

Yet by no means was Kay mollified. “Who saw thee at this work?” he asked. “Methinks thou hadst secret helpers, for this is a task which previously required six scullions, who took all day at it.”

“My lord,” said Gareth, “sometimes one man may do what many together can not, owing to his lack of distraction.”

Now hearing this some other scullions who were peeling potatoes as slowly as possible, and who would steal away from their work as soon as they were not under the eye of Sir Kay or the cooks, began to hate Gareth with all their hearts, for already he had peeled twice as many potatoes as they had all together, and they determined to take revenge upon him. And their own hands were gnarled and of a dark hue (a deal of which was dirt), whereas those of Gareth, even after his labors, were fine and long-fingered and white as a lady’s.

And Sir Kay noticing Gareth’s hands found them an additional impudence, and he said, “Sirrah, how can thine hands have remained so white if thou didst labor so much? There is something about thee which is not honest, and I do not like it at all.”

And Sir Kay went away then, but he determined to keep a watch on this varlet, whom he did suspect of trickery. And from that time forward he called him Beaumains, which is to say, Fair Hands.

Now when Kay had gone the other scullions gathered around Gareth, and they said to him, “Is it thy purpose to mock us, shitpot?”

But Gareth replied sweetly, “Nay, my friends, I would work amicably amongst ye.”

“Then,” said they, “thou must reduce thine effort by four-fifths, for our rule is that we each of us peel sufficient potatoes to fill but one pail per day.”

“But by working regularly one can fill at least two pails every hour,” said Gareth.

And this speech was so offensive to them that they found some sticks and set upon him, for to beat him senseless. But Gareth was marvelous strong, and he seized each pair of them by the necks and he cracked their heads together until they begged for mercy.

And then Gareth released them all, and he said sweetly (for he was a gentle man and even when fighting he seldom felt ire), “I would not disturb your arrangements, for I am newly come here, nor do I expect to remain forever.” And he did not say what he then thought, which was that they would all be here until they died, for he was a kind man. “Meanwhile, it is more interesting for me to work than to be idle, and though I have eaten many potatoes I have never before known how they were prepared for the cooking.”

Now these scullions believed he was a great liar to say that, as if he were a nobleman and not as basely born as they, and they would have tried to beat him again did they not fear his strength.

“Therefore,” said Gareth, “what I propose is this: that I peel all the potatoes, thus freeing all of ye to find more rewarding jobs, or indeed to go on holiday.”

Now at first this proposal seemed attractive to them, for the negative reason that they should have to do no work, because none intended to look for another job in the kitchen or anywhere else. But soon the cleverer ones amongst them began to think of the consequences, for they had no idea what a holiday was except a time at which the noble folk ate a more elaborate meal than ordinarily, and therefore the kitchen-lackeys had to work harder than they usually did.

“Well,” said they, “if we were found doing no work, we should be whipped, and if we sought other jobs, they would either be more taxing than potato-peeling, in which case we do not want to do them, or they would be easier, in which case the lackeys who now perform them would never surrender them to us. Therefore thou wouldst bring to us nothing but discomfort or pain.”

And seeing the reason in this, Gareth knew shame. “I see I have intruded where I am out of place,” said he, putting down his paring knife. “I hope I have not damaged ye much, and I thank ye for the lesson I have been taught.”

But now Gareth wondered what job he might do at once well enough to satisfy his own need to allay boredom and yet not so well as to attract the resentment of those whose regular employment it was: for they would be sure to see what they did as dreary labor, while for him it would be amusement.

And he arrived near one of the great fireplaces where whole beeves were turning on spits, and a varlet held a long ladle, with which he gathered up the hot juices which fell from the meat into an huge copper pan, and these he poured back onto the roasting beeves, the which were all the while being turned slowly by another scullion, who held the handle of the spit.

And as Gareth came near and felt the heat of the fireplace upon his face, the varlet who held the basting-ladle dropped it and he fell fainting to the hearth.

And the other, he who turned the spits, cried to Gareth, “Wet him down, there’s a good fellow.” And taking one hand from his task he pointed at a pail near by. So Gareth fetched this pail and he emptied the water thereof onto the face of the varlet who had collapsed, but though he came to his wits he confessed to being sore ill, and he seized the empty pail and was sick into it.