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“You have humiliated this good lady without a cause,” Parzival cried. “If you will not restore her to favor and give her back her good name, I will not let you live!”
“I cannot do that,” Duke Orilus replied. “She has given me too much grief—be—traying me with some stranger in the woods.”
“Then you are lost.” Parzival raised his sword.
The duke did not want to die and said so.
Parzival lowered his sword arm. “There is a lady in Arthur’s court who has suffered humiliation on my account,” he said. “Go there and say that the Red Knight has sent you to offer her your service.”
“That I will do and gladly,” the duke answered.
“But,” said Parzival, “that is not all. I cannot let you go unless you repent of your wrong to this good lady, your wife.”
When the duke saw that Parzival would not relent, he swore finally that he would restore his wife to favor. Parzival let him stand and returned to him his sword and lance.
“Now that you have sworn,” Parzival said, “I will tell you that this lady is completely innocent of any wrongdoing. I know, for I was that foolish youth. Here is the ring I took from her against her will. The brooch, I’m sorry to say, is gone. I gave it in payment to a greedy man. You, sir, have nothing to forgive. Your wife has never betrayed you. I only pray that she will forgive us both.”
This the good duchess was glad to do. Her husband wept to think of the wrong his jealousy had caused. He gave her back her lovely garments
and procured a beautiful mare for her to ride, its saddle trimmed with hundreds of silver bells. Duke Orilus and his duchess asked Parzival to go with them to Arthur’s court, but he sadly refused. His cousin had told him that his failure at Wild Mountain stripped him of all knightly honor. How could such a one approach the noble Arthur? He bade the now happy duke and duchess farewell.
Parzival traveled alone for many a weary day. It began to snow, though it was not long past the feast of St. Michael and the Angels and so not yet winter. To Parzival, night and day, summer and winter were the same dreary time. He mounted his horse at dawn and rode past dark, but he did not know where he was going.
Nor did he know that Arthur had ridden out from the court at Camelot with his queen and a large company of knights and ladies. The king had decreed that this would be a time of hunting and pleasure. No one was to joust or seek adventure in battle. Arthur’s men had made a camp of bright-colored pavilions with banners flying. The word of this encampment soon spread through the countryside, so that Duke Orilus and his duchess quite easily found their way there. When the duke sought the lady to whom he was to offer his service, he found to his surprise that it was his own sister. As for Sir Kay, that knight was somewhat disquieted to realize that the foolish youth he had despised had sent yet a third knight to Lady Cunneware’s protection.
Since Parzival did not know that the king of the Britons was encamped nearby, he had no way of knowing when he woke up that snowy morning that one of the king’s falcons had flown out from its falconer the day before and had not returned. This same bird was in the tree above his head, and when he set out on his day of aimless travel, the bird, who felt at home in the company of knights, followed him.
The two of them, lost knight and lost bird, traveled together. The knight’s way was the harder, for the snow had covered any semblance of a path, and his horse would often stumble on rocks and fallen branches. At length they came to a clearing in the forest. There in the clearing was a flock of wild geese who, pausing on their southward journey, were searching the frozen ground for food. The falcon hurled itself like a stone from the sky upon the throat of one of the geese. The goose wrung itself free and, in a thrashing of wild wings, all the geese flew up and escaped. But the wounded goose left behind three drops of blood, bright red upon the snow.
Parzival stared at the blood as though dazed. Somehow, in those three drops he saw the warm cheeks and bright mouth of Condwiramurs, his wife. With all that had happened since he had ridden away from her, her face had grown dim, but now, staring at the snow, her lovely face was all that he could see. He could not take his eyes away, nor did he want to. He was like a senseless man, imprisoned in a dream.
Now it chanced that Arthur’s court was encamped hardly more than a javelin’s throw from that very spot. Just then a servant boy, who belonged to that same Lady Cunneware whom Parzival had vowed to help, came through the clearing on the way to run an errand for his mistress. He did not recognize his lady’s champion, now a knight in fine red armor. He ran as fast as he could through the snow back to the encampment to raise an alarm.
“Help!” he cried. “Help! There is a strange knight just on the other side of the camp. His helmet is badly dented and his shield is hacked by many conflicts. He’s come to threaten the king!” the boy shouted. “Shame on you, all you cowardly knights!”
Now every knight in the encampment wanted to rush out at once and dispatch this evil knight, but since Arthur had forbidden battle, they could not go until the king had released them from the ban against jousting.
The king and queen, however, were still sound asleep in their pavilion, so what should the eager knights do? Young Segramors, who was the queen’s kinsman, simply pushed aside the curtain and went straight into the king’s tent., He woke up the king and queen, and, hardly apologizing for his rudeness, told them what the servant boy had said and asked permission to challenge the mysterious stranger.
Arthur was angry both at the intrusion and the request. “If I let you go after I have expressly forbidden warfare at this place, everyone will want to joust and do battle. There’ll be no end to it.”
But Guenever was fond of her young cousin. She wanted him to gain honor in the sight of the Round Table knights, so she coaxed and pleaded until, finally, the king gave the young knight leave to go.
Segramors was delighted. He had himself armed as quickly as possible and followed Cunneware’s servant boy to the place just beyond the camp. There they spied poor Parzival still staring at the drops of blood upon the snow.
Segramors called out to him. “I do not know who you are, sir, but you should know that you have no business here. Why, it is almost as though you cannot see just yonder in plain sight the tents of a king encamped there with his many knights. You are foolish to threaten him thus. Surrender yourself to me now and save your life.”
Parzival, lost in the sickness of love, did not even hear this challenge. Segramors called out again, but still the visitor was silent. Indeed, he did not even turn his head to acknowledge Segramors’s threat.
Segramors spurred his horse into a gallop. At this, the sorrel whirled to spare his own life. As the horse turned him about, Parzival lost sight of the blood drops and found himself being borne down upon by a charging knight. He weighed his lance and knocked the startled Segramors right over the rump of his horse and into the snow.
The other knights, gathered at the edge of the clearing, could see Segramors dumped backward over his horse’s crupper. They waited, hardly breathing, for the strange knight to leap off his own horse and end the battle, but the visitor had already turned his back on Sir Segramors. What arrogance! The knights sent pages to pull the prone Segramors to his feet and lead him to his tent, where he could repair his wounded dignity. The knights themselves rushed to Arthur’s pavilion, all clamoring at once for leave to dispatch this haughty interloper.
It was Sir Kay who prevailed. His reputation for gallantry had been in doubt ever since that unfortunate day when he had beaten Lady Cunneware. “My Lord,” he said, “if you do not give me leave to trounce this menace once and for all, I will resign from your service. There he waits—waving his lance in sight of the queen. He is disgracing us all.” So Arthur gave his steward permission to challenge the stranger, perhaps thinking that Sir Kay had much to redeem since there were now three knights at court with the sworn duty to see that Sir Kay minded his manners.
Sir Kay took time to have his horse groomed and his armor polished. Then he sallied forth to the clearing with his pages in attendance and his banners streaming.
“Sir,” he called out to Parzival, “you must know that you, have insulted the king of Britain and his lady. You will not get by so easily with me as you did with that green boy who challenged you earlier. Turn and surrender at once, else it will go very hard for you.”
