He moving up with pliant courtliness,Greeted Geraint full face,but stealthily,In the mid-warmth of welcome and graspt hand,Found Enid with the corner of his eye,And knew her sitting sad and solitary.
Then cried Geraint for wine and goodly cheer To feed the sudden guest,and sumptuously According to his fashion,bad the host Call in what men soever were his friends,And feast with these in honour of their Earl;'And care not for the cost;the cost is mine.'
And wine and food were brought,and Earl Limours Drank till he jested with all ease,and told Free tales,and took the word and played upon it,And made it of two colours;for his talk,When wine and free companions kindled him,Was wont to glance and sparkle like a gem Of fifty facets;thus he moved the Prince To laughter and his comrades to applause.
Then,when the Prince was merry,asked Limours,'Your leave,my lord,to cross the room,and speak To your good damsel there who sits apart,And seems so lonely?''My free leave,'he said;'Get her to speak:she doth not speak to me.'
Then rose Limours,and looking at his feet,Like him who tries the bridge he fears may fail,Crost and came near,lifted adoring eyes,Bowed at her side and uttered whisperingly:
'Enid,the pilot star of my lone life,Enid,my early and my only love,Enid,the loss of whom hath turned me wild--What chance is this?how is it I see you here?
Ye are in my power at last,are in my power.
Yet fear me not:I call mine own self wild,But keep a touch of sweet civility Here in the heart of waste and wilderness.
I thought,but that your father came between,In former days you saw me favourably.
And if it were so do not keep it back:
Make me a little happier:let me know it:
Owe you me nothing for a life half-lost?
Yea,yea,the whole dear debt of all you are.
And,Enid,you and he,I see with joy,Ye sit apart,you do not speak to him,You come with no attendance,page or maid,To serve you--doth he love you as of old?
For,call it lovers'quarrels,yet I know Though men may bicker with the things they love,They would not make them laughable in all eyes,Not while they loved them;and your wretched dress,A wretched insult on you,dumbly speaks Your story,that this man loves you no more.
Your beauty is no beauty to him now:
A common chance--right well I know it--palled--For I know men:nor will ye win him back,For the man's love once gone never returns.
But here is one who loves you as of old;
With more exceeding passion than of old:
Good,speak the word:my followers ring him round:
He sits unarmed;I hold a finger up;
They understand:nay;I do not mean blood:
Nor need ye look so scared at what I say:
My malice is no deeper than a moat,No stronger than a wall:there is the keep;He shall not cross us more;speak but the word:
Or speak it not;but then by Him that made me The one true lover whom you ever owned,I will make use of all the power I have.
O pardon me!the madness of that hour,When first I parted from thee,moves me yet.'
At this the tender sound of his own voice And sweet self-pity,or the fancy of it,Made his eye moist;but Enid feared his eyes,Moist as they were,wine-heated from the feast;And answered with such craft as women use,Guilty or guiltless,to stave off a chance That breaks upon them perilously,and said:
'Earl,if you love me as in former years,And do not practise on me,come with morn,And snatch me from him as by violence;Leave me tonight:I am weary to the death.'
Low at leave-taking,with his brandished plume Brushing his instep,bowed the all-amorous Earl,And the stout Prince bad him a loud good-night.
He moving homeward babbled to his men,How Enid never loved a man but him,Nor cared a broken egg-shell for her lord.
But Enid left alone with Prince Geraint,Debating his command of silence given,And that she now perforce must violate it,Held commune with herself,and while she held He fell asleep,and Enid had no heart To wake him,but hung o'er him,wholly pleased To find him yet unwounded after fight,And hear him breathing low and equally.
Anon she rose,and stepping lightly,heaped The pieces of his armour in one place,All to be there against a sudden need;Then dozed awhile herself,but overtoiled By that day's grief and travel,evermore Seemed catching at a rootless thorn,and then Went slipping down horrible precipices,And strongly striking out her limbs awoke;Then thought she heard the wild Earl at the door,With all his rout of random followers,Sound on a dreadful trumpet,summoning her;Which was the red cock shouting to the light,As the gray dawn stole o'er the dewy world,And glimmered on his armour in the room.
And once again she rose to look at it,But touched it unawares:jangling,the casque Fell,and he started up and stared at her.
Then breaking his command of silence given,She told him all that Earl Limours had said,Except the passage that he loved her not;Nor left untold the craft herself had used;
But ended with apology so sweet,Low-spoken,and of so few words,and seemed So justified by that necessity,That though he thought 'was it for him she wept In Devon?'he but gave a wrathful groan,Saying,'Your sweet faces make good fellows fools And traitors.Call the host and bid him bring Charger and palfrey.'So she glided out Among the heavy breathings of the house,And like a household Spirit at the walls Beat,till she woke the sleepers,and returned:
Then tending her rough lord,though all unasked,In silence,did him service as a squire;Till issuing armed he found the host and cried,'Thy reckoning,friend?'and ere he learnt it,'Take Five horses and their armours;'and the host Suddenly honest,answered in amaze,'My lord,I scarce have spent the worth of one!'
'Ye will be all the wealthier,'said the Prince,And then to Enid,'Forward!and today I charge you,Enid,more especially,What thing soever ye may hear,or see,Or fancy (though I count it of small use To charge you)that ye speak not but obey.'
