Of Compromises in Glathion
The records that it was not a great while before, in to Guenevere, Duke Jurgen had her the of in privacy. For have to be regarded, of course. Thus the time of a is not her own, and at any hour of day all of people are to an audience just when some most is famously: but the Hall of Judgment and at night.
"But I would doing such a thing," said Guenevere: "and must you think of me, to make such a proposal!"
"That too, my dearest, is a which I can only in private."
"And if I were to report your to my father--"
"You would him exceedingly: and from such it is our to the aged."
"And besides, I am afraid."
"Oh, my dearest," says Jurgen, and his voice quavered, his love and his very great to him: "but, oh, my dearest, can it be that you have not in me! For with all my and I love you, as I have loved you since I your my hands, and that I had beauty. Indeed, I love you as, I think, no man has loved any woman that in the long time that is gone, for my love is worship, and no less. The touch of your hand sets me to trembling, dear; and the look of your makes me there is anything of pain or or anywhere: for you are the thing God made, with in the new skill that had come to His fingers. And you have not in me!"
Then the Princess gave a little laugh of and repentance, and she the hand of her grief-stricken lover. "Forgive me, Jurgen, for I cannot to see you so unhappy!"
"Ah, and what is my to you!" he of her, bitterly.
"Much, oh, very much, my dear!" she whispered.
So in the Jurgen was to that moment he waited the door, and through the the half-open door and the door-frame saw Guenevere approach irresolutely, a white in the dark corridor. She came to talk with him where they would not be with interruptions: but she came perfumed, in her night-shift, and in nothing else. Jurgen at the way of these as his arms about her in the gloom. He always the of that warm and and body, under the thin of the shift, as his arms about her: of all their moments together that last minute either of them had spoken in his memory as the most perfect.
And yet what was enough, for now it was to the wide and of a king, no less, that Guenevere and Jurgen resorted, so as to talk where they would not be with interruptions. The of Gogyrvan was perfectly dark, under its canopy, in the hall, and in the dark nobody can see what happens.
Thereafter these two to talk together upon the of Glathion: but what in Jurgen's memory was that last moment the door, and the six tall upon the east of the hall, those which were of and silver, but were all an glitter, that time in the night when the moon was clear of the tree-tops and had not yet high to be off by the eaves. For that was all which Jurgen saw in the Hall of Judgment. There would be a period upon the each window would a narrow of moonlight: but the were set in a so that this soon passed. On the west were six also, but about these was a porch; so no light came from the west.
Thus in the dark they would laugh and talk with voices. Jurgen came to these well with wine, and in consequence, as he comprehended, talked like an angel, without himself to topics. He was often by his own brilliance, and it to him a there was no one to take it down: so much of his talking was necessarily just a little over the of any girl, and adorable.
And Guenevere, he found, talked at night. It was not the which him think that, either: the girl a she in the day time. A girl, less a princess, is not to know more than with a man's of ignorance, she contended.
"Nobody told me anything about so many matters. Why, I remember--" And Guenevere a little story, here irrelevant, of what had her some three or four years earlier. "My mother was then: but she had said a word about such things, and as I was, I did not go to her."
Jurgen asked questions.
"Why, yes. There was nothing else to do. I cannot talk with my and ladies now. I cannot question them, that is: of I can as they talk among themselves. For me to do more would be in a princess. And I wonder about so many things!" She instances. "After that I used to notice the animals and the poultry. So I out problems for myself, after a fashion. But nobody told me anything directly."
"Yet I say that Thragnar--well, the Troll King, being very wise, must have much clearer."
"Thragnar was a enchanter," says a voice in the dark; "and through the of his arts, I can nothing about Thragnar."
Jurgen laughed, ruefully. Still, he was sure about Thragnar now.
So they talked: and Jurgen marvelled, as millions of men had done aforetime, and have done since, at the girl's eagerness, now that were down, to discuss in detail all such as had them to ignore. About her ladies in waiting, for example, she him some very data: and men in she asked questions that Jurgen delicious.
Such combined--upon the whole--with a obtuseness, inconceivable. For to Jurgen it now appeared that Guenevere was with not the which might be of a princess. Contrition, at least, one might have looked for, over this and business: it him to note that Guenevere was to accept almost as a of course. Certainly she did not to think at all of any anywhere: the she was the of being very careful. And while she him in these private conversations, and submitted in to his judgment, her now appeared to be more than a wish to him. It was almost as though she were him in his foolishness. And all this six weeks! Jurgen: and he his finger-nails, with a side-glance toward the opinions of King Gogyrvan Gawr.
But in the Princess unchanged. In Jurgen her, but with no of intimacy. Very did occasion for them to be actually alone in the day time. Once or twice, though, he her in open sunlight: and then her were melting but wary, and the whole was flat. She did not him: but she a princess, of her station, and not at all the person who talked with him at night in the Hall of Judgment.
Presently, by common consent, they to avoid each other by daylight. Indeed, the time of the Princess was now pre-occupied: for now had come into Glathion a ship with sails, and having for its figure-head a that was painted with thirty colors. Such was the ship which Messire Merlin Ambrosius and Dame Anaïtis, the Lady of the Lake, with a great retinue, to Guenevere to London, where she was to be married to King Arthur.
First there was a week of and and high of every kind. Now the blared, and upon a that was with and King Gogyrvan sat and in his raiment, to judge who did the best: and into the came a press of and and and many famous knights, to for and a of pearls.
Jurgen shrugged, and custom. The Duke of Logreus himself with in the opening tournament, Sir Dodinas le Sauvage, Earl Roth of Meliot, Sir Epinogris, and Sir Hector de Maris: then Earl Damas of Listenise like a whirlwind, and Jurgen the of his horse. His part in the was ended, and he was of it. He to than in such festivities: and he now his with a most misery, he that had any other a more picturesque.
By day he was the Duke of Logreus, which in itself was a upon pawnbroking: after he discounted the of a king. It was the secrecy, the of everybody, which he enjoyed: and in the of what a was Jurgen, he almost of the that he was over the marriage of the lady he loved.
Once or twice he the tail-end of a from Gogyrvan's old eye. Jurgen by this time Gogyrvan, as a person of dealings.
"To take no of his own daughter," Jurgen considered, "is infamous. The man is his as a father, and to do that is not fair."
