CHAPTER IX

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*THE SIEGE PERILOUS*

It does not matter just where we were when we told and heard these next few stories. Neither do I need to use quotation marks all through them. You will understand that we did tell them and hear them somewhere. They belong to no place. When King Arthur's knights set out from Camelot to seek the Holy Grail everything seemed at once to grow mysterious and marvellous and magical. Place and time were unknown and almost unthought of. Knights rode about without knowing or caring where they went. Sometimes they found more wonderful adventures than had ever been thought of before, and sometimes they rode for days and saw no house and no living thing. Friends met friends and did not know them; fathers fought with sons, and brothers with brothers. New knights won glory and knights who were old and tried were put to shame. Common men became prophets, and so prophets became common. The worst of men gave counsel to the best of knights, and the knights could scarcely tell whether the things that they were told to do were the best and the wisest or the most foolish and the worst. There were signs and omens and visions, and there were hard trials of courage and of faithfulness.

There are a hundred stories of what was seen and said and done. They are all different, and among them all much seems confused and dim and uncertain. But everywhere and through everything is seen, like a clear flash of fleeting flame, one perfect knight, the strongest, noblest, greatest knight who ever came to Arthur's court, the one best knight of all the world. Others wander and stray and are tempted and overcome and disheartened, and then there is a gleam of a fire-colored armor, and there is a swift stroke of a spear that never missed its aim, the wicked are overthrown, the helpless are rescued, and the knight has passed on toward his goal of the Holy Grail.

It all began on the night before the feast of Pentecost, when so many strange things happened. The King and the Queen and the knights were in the great hall at Camelot, and a woman, whom no one knew, rode into the hall on horseback. She dismounted and came before the King and said: "My lord, tell me which is Sir Lancelot."

"That is Sir Lancelot," said the King, pointing to where he sat.

"Sir Lancelot," she said, "I am sent to you by King Pelles. He asks you to come with me to an abbey in a forest not far from here."

"And what am I to do there?" Lancelot asked.

"I am not to tell you that," she said; "I am only to bring you to the abbey."

"I will go with you, then," said Lancelot, "if it is to please King Pelles."

"Lancelot," said the Queen, "to-morrow is the feast of Pentecost; shall you not be with us then?"

"Madame," said the woman, "he shall be back here by dinner-time to-morrow."

So Lancelot put on his armor and rode with the woman till they came to the abbey in the forest. There, when he was unarmed, some nuns came to him, leading a young man. "Sir Lancelot," one of them said, "this young squire is the grandson of King Pelles. He is strong and brave and noble. He has learned much and it is time now for him to be made a knight. He asks you, and so does King Pelles and so do we, that you will make him a knight."

Then Lancelot looked at the young man. He was scarcely more than a boy in his years but he was tall and strong. Lancelot thought that he had never seen so beautiful a face besides its beauty there was courage in it, and freedom and hope and all the rich flush and glow of a bright, new manhood. And a strange feeling came to Lancelot as he looked, and a voice seemed to be saying in his ears: "He has come! He has come!" Lancelot could not have told what it meant. He only felt that there was something in this young man that made him different from any other he had ever seen, something without a name, by which he knew that he was greater and finer and truer than the rest. "To-night, then," said Lancelot, "let him watch his arms in your chapel, and to-morrow I will make him a knight."

And so it was done. The young man watched his arms in the chapel while the others slept, and in the morning Lancelot made him a knight. Then Lancelot begged the new knight to come to the court with him, but he answered: "No, it is not time for me to go to the court, but I shall be there with you soon."

"So Lancelot rode back to Camelot alone. And then began the most wonderful day of all King Arthur's reign. When Lancelot had come and all the knights were sitting in the hall a squire ran in and went to the King and said: 'My lord, I have just come up from the river, and down there a great stone is floating on the water and there is a sword sticking in it.'

"That is a wonderful thing, truly," said the King; "we will go and see it."

So the King and the Queen and all the knights left the hall and went down to the river. And there, truly enough, was the stone, floating on the river, and there was the sword sticking in it, as the squire had said. And the King saw letters on the stone and he came near and read them: "No one shall ever draw this sword out of this stone except the one to whom it belongs, the best knight of the world."

"Surely," said the King, "I think that the best knights of the world are in my court; who will try to draw this sword?" and he looked toward Lancelot.

"I do not think," said Lancelot, "that the sword is mine, and I will not try to draw it."

But many of the other knights tried to draw the sword and could not, and the King looked at Lancelot again and said: "Will you not try to take this sword? Surely there is no better knight in the world than you."

"No," said Lancelot, "it is not for me. Remember, my lord, all the wonderful things that Merlin told long ago. The best knight of the world is not among us yet, but I believe that he is coming soon. Let us all go back to the hall, my lord, and keep our feast and wait for him."

And back they went to the hall, and they were scarcely in their places when there came another wonder. An old man came into the hall, leading a young man by the hand. They saw that he was an old man only by his figure and by his step and by the end of a white beard which they could see. For he wore a long, white robe, and a hood hung low down over his face, so that they could not see it. The young man was dressed all in flame-colored armor, and he had no shield or sword, but an empty scabbard hung by his side. They came and stood close to the throne and closer to the Siege Perilous. Bors sat near them, and it seemed to him that he knew, just as it had seemed to him once before, long ago, at the Castle of Carbonek, that this old man was Joseph of Arimathaea, who would have died hundreds of years ago, but that the power of the Holy Grail kept him alive. And he knew, too, that the young man was the beautiful child with the deep eyes and the bright, sweet face and the hair like gold, whom he had seen at the Castle of Carbonek. Percivale sat next to Bors, and it seemed to him too that he knew the old man, though how he could not tell. Next to Bors on the other side was Lancelot, and what he knew was that the young man was the one whom he had made a knight that morning at the abbey.

"King Arthur," said the old man, "I have brought you a new knight, Sir Galahad. You have waited for him long, for you were told of him before he was born, and his place at your Round Table was waiting for him before you yourself were born."

"He is welcome here," said the King, "and you are welcome too." But almost before he had spoken the old man was gone from the hall and the young knight in the flame-colored armor stood before him alone. Yes, there at last he stood, Galahad, whose name had been spoken with wonder or with hope or with doubt so many times. Only the best knight of the world, Merlin had said, should sit in the Siege Perilous, and the best knight of the world should be Galahad. How many times Arthur had looked at that seat and wondered why his best knight, Lancelot, could not sit there, and what the knight could be like who should be better than Lancelot. And now here he stood--Galahad.

But there was something else for the best knight of the world to do. The knights who filled the hall were not thinking then of the Siege Perilous. They were thinking of the stone floating on the river, and the sword sticking in it. The King saw them whispering together and pointing that way and he said to the young man: "If you are indeed that Galahad whom we have waited for so long, you are more welcome than any other who has come here since Lancelot, my best knight till now, the son of my old friend King Ban. It you are that true Galahad who was promised, then you will be the best of all my knights--better than Lancelot. Will you come and prove to us whether you are so?"

Then the King took the young man's hand and led him down to the river and all the rest followed them to see. And the King said: "Try if you can draw that sword, for none of my other knights can draw it."

"See, my lord," said the young man, "I have brought no sword, only this empty scabbard, for I knew that I should find my sword here." And he took hold of the sword that stuck in the stone and drew it out and put it in his scabbard.

There was no doubt of it now; the knight whom they had waited for had come. Yet the King's face was sad as he led the way back to the hall, for it seemed to him that now there could be little to wait for and the days of the Round Table would not be many more. But other thoughts came to him a moment later, when the new knight knelt before him to take the oath that would make him a knight of the Round Table. For then, just for an instant, it seemed to him that the time had gone back to the beginning of his reign. There was a look in the young man's eyes that brought back the day when Lancelot had knelt before him like this and had sworn this oath and when he had believed that Lancelot would surely be the one perfect knight. Yes, it was the same clear light that he had seen for an instant that day in Lancelot's eyes, the glow of something great and wonderful, he knew not what. But there was more in the face of this new knight. There was something which told Arthur that, though he swore that in all things he would be true and loyal to God and to the King, yet, without the oath, he could never have a thought that would not be true and loyal.

And the King scarcely knew whether it was great joy or great sorrow that made him almost tremble before this boy. And when he took his hand again they all saw that his face was white as he turned toward the seat that was next the throne. And there at last in that Siege Perilous were the letters, more of fire than of gold, as they seemed: "This is the seat of Galahad."

Those who could see whispered to those who could not and the word ran down the hall and then in an instant everyone was still. After all these years of waiting, after the wonders and the prophecies, would any one, even Galahad, dare to sit in that seat? They had feared that seat and had seen it empty so long that they could not believe it, and they all stood up in their places and strained their eyes and held their breaths in wonder and dread. And of all who were there Galahad alone had no fear and no dread. Only for an instant he stood there, with the eyes of all the rest upon him and his own upon the King's, and then he sat in the Siege Perilous.

Every seat at the Round Table was filled. For the first time since Merlin made that table for Uther Pendragon there were a hundred and fifty knights around it and no seat was empty. Then of a sudden the hall grew dark. Thick clouds seemed to have come over the sun and they heard a great wind outside. Then there was thunder that shook the castle and almost deafened them. It was over in a moment and through an upper window there shone one broad beam of sunlight. It slanted down from the top of the hall to near where Galahad sat, and still the rest of the hall was dark. And then came the strangest thing of all. They saw a soft, red glow of light, through the darkness of the hall, and it moved toward the place where the sunlight fell. They could not see what it was clearly, for it had a covering of white silk, and the red glow shone through this and filled the room. And the thing that shone was in the form of a goblet. It moved, as if someone were carrying it, but they could not see anyone. It moved till it came where the sun shone upon it, and then the hall was bright and the knights could see one another. And it seemed to each of them that the others looked greater and stronger and more beautiful than he had ever seen them look before. They knew, all of them, that this that they almost saw, but could not see, was the Holy Grail. It passed on again, away from the sunlight and across the hall, and the red glow was gone. The sunlight was gone too, and then the old light came slowly back and they all saw that the table had been covered with food.

At first they were all so full of wonder at the sight that none of them could speak. Then Gawain, who sat on King Arthur's left, rose and held up the cross-shaped hilt of his sword. "My lord," he said, "we know that it was the Holy Grail that passed before us just now. But we did not see it. So now I make this vow, my lord, that I will leave this court and seek the Holy Grail, that I may see it more openly than we have all seen it to-day. I will seek it for a year and a day, if I do not find it sooner, and if I have not found it then I will come back, believing that God does not wish that I should see it."

Then the knight who was next to Gawain held up the cross-shaped hilt of his sword, as Gawain had done, and made the same vow, that he would seek the Holy Grail for a year and a day, unless he found it sooner. And so it went around the table, and they all made the vow, and last of all Lancelot and Bors and Percivale and Galahad.

And Arthur had listened to them all and had spoken no word, but his face was pale and troubled. For he knew that if his knights went away upon this quest many of them would not come back, and he should never see all the places at the Round Table full again, as he saw them now. And when they had all made the vow he said in a low voice to Gawain: "When will you leave us to go upon this quest?"

"At once, my lord," said Gawain; "to-morrow."

"Not so soon as that," said the King. "Let me see all my knights together for one more day. We will have a tournament to-morrow. You shall all meet before me once more in one fine field of combat and then you may go."

And the knights all saw how sad the King was at their leaving him, and they were all glad to do as he wished. But the King had another reason for the tournament that was to be the next day. He did want to see all his knights together for one last time, but there was more than that. For here on his right, in the Siege Perilous, sat Galahad. He was the best knight of all the world, or he could not sit in that seat. Arthur knew--he could not tell how, but he knew--that when Galahad left the court to seek the Holy Grail he would never come back. The best knight of the Round Table, the best knight who had ever been in his court, would go away forever, and he had never seen him in one knightly combat and would never know how he could fight, how he could ride, or how he bore his arms. And this was the reason, more than the other, why Arthur wished to see one great tournament of all his knights.

So in the morning the meadow at Camelot was thronged again with the people who came out to see the tournament, all the more eager because they had heard of the wonders of the day before and of Galahad, and because they knew that he would be there in the field. The King sat in the highest place, with the Queen beside him, and it was with sad faces, though they were proud too, that they looked down upon their knights striving together in the tournament. They could scarcely have told afterward what any other knight did, for it seemed to them all that day that they saw only one knight. Wherever they looked they saw those flame-colored arms of Galahad flashing up and down the field. His horse never faltered, his spear never failed, his arm never grew weary. He bore no shield, but every spear that touched his armor was shattered, and when he pointed his own spear at any other knight and charged against him that knight went down. But the King and the Queen saw that, while the others were all falling before him, he never came near to Lancelot or to Bors or to Percivale. He would not joust with them and so they all three did nobly in the tournament too. And the King was so filled with the wonder of all that he saw Galahad do that when it was over he could scarcely speak to him. But he held his hand and looked long at him and said, in a voice that sounded strange and uncertain: "Galahad, I have seen the best that a knight can do."

That was their last night all together in the great hall at Camelot. After it came a sad morning. The knights were ready early and the King was ready to see them go, though he could scarcely take the hand of each and say good-by, so great was his grief at their going. The knights all mounted together and rode through the streets of Camelot, between the lines of people who had come out of their houses to see them go, and so out through the gate and away from the city. And the King and the Queen stood on a tower of the castle to watch them as long as they could. At first they could pick out here an armor and there a banner and know that this was Galahad, this Lancelot, and that Gawain. But when they were farther off they could not do this any more; they could only see the big, bright spot upon the road where the morning sunlight struck upon the armors, and then their eyes were tired with looking and something came across them so that for a moment they could not see at all. The bright spot on the road grew smaller and smaller. It flashed and twinkled and shivered. Was it a cloud of dust that rose now behind the knights and hid the glimmer of their arms, or was there something in the King's eyes again so that he could not see it? Once more he saw the far-off flash, fainter now, and yet again, and then the dust rose and there was no more to see. And so the noble fellowship of the Round Table passed away from King Arthur and out of his sight like a setting star.

*[Illustration: "The bright spot on the road grew smaller and smaller" (missing from book)]*

[Illustration: "A pasture where a hundred and fifty bulls were feeding"]

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