“Sir,” she answered, weeping the while, “I have suffered much from evil fortune. I was the only daughter of an emperor, who had wide dominion over the land of the West, setting his throne where flows the famous stream of Tiber. Being such, I was betrothed in my early youth to the only son and heir of a most wise and mighty king. Never surely was prince so fair and faithful as he, never one so gentle and debonair. But alas! ere the day appointed for our marriage came, my lord fell into the hands of cruel enemies, and was most foully slain. When this ill news came to me, I said to myself: ‘Now will I at least do due honour to the dear body of him whom I loved.’ So I set forth from my father’s house upon this quest. Long did I wander over the world, a virgin widow, nor did I find that for which I sought. At last I chanced to meet this Saracen, who now lies dead upon the plain. He constrained me to go with him, and would fain have won me for his wife, but I ever said him nay. And now he lies dead. An evil man he was, one of an evil brotherhood of three—Sansloy, the eldest; Sansjoy, the youngest; and this Sansfoy, of middle age between the two.”
“Be contented, fair lady,” answered the Knight; “you have done well. You have found a new friend and lost an old foe. Friend, be he ever so new, is better, I trow, than foe, new or old.”
So the two rode on, he making merry with gay talk, as became a courteous knight, and she, with much modest show of bashfulness. After a while they came in their journey to two fair trees, which spread their branches across the road. Lovely trees they seemed, and fair was the shade which they cast. Yet was the place held in ill-repute of all the country-side; never did shepherd sit beneath them to rest or play upon his oaten pipe, for all men held it to be unlucky ground. But of this the good Knight knew nothing, so, the sun being now high in heaven, and of so fierce a heat that a man might scarcely abide it, he dismounted and bade the lady do likewise, so that they might rest awhile, and anon, in the cool of the evening, might pursue their journey. So the two sat them down and talked.
Now the Knight, being in a merry mood, said to himself: “Surely, this is the fairest of women; it is meet that she should be crowned.” So saying, he plucked a branch which he would have shaped into a garland for the lady’s head. Then, lo! from the place where the branch had been plucked came trickling drops of blood, and there issued forth a lamentable voice which said: “Stranger! Tear not in this cruel fashion the tender human limbs which are covered by the bark of this tree. Fly also from the place, fly, lest haply the same fate should come upon you as came upon me in this place, both on me and on the dear lady also who was my love.”
Much was the Knight astonished to hear such words, and for a while he stood speechless. Then he said: “What ghost is this from the world below, what wandering spirit that talks in this strange fashion?”
Then there came this answer: “No ghost am I from the nether world, nor wandering spirit of the air. I was a man, Fradubio by name, as now I am a tree, being charmed by the arts of a wicked witch. But I am yet a man, for I feel the winter cold and the summer heat in these branches, even as a man might feel.”
Then said the Knight: “Tell me now, Fradubio, be you tree or man, how you came to suffer in this fashion. It is good for a man to tell his trouble; he who hides it in his heart makes his griefs to be twice as great.”
Then did Fradubio tell his tale, “Know, stranger, that I suffer this trouble through the arts of a false sorceress, Duessa by name; nor I only, for she has brought many knights into a like evil case. In my youth, which indeed is not long passed, I loved a fair lady, whom you may see, not indeed in the fashion of a lady, but as yonder tree which joins its branches with these. Once upon a time, when I was riding abroad with her, I chanced to meet a knight, who also had a fair lady for a companion. A fair lady I called her, and so she seemed, but she was in truth this same false witch Duessa. Said the strange Knight: ‘I do declare that this lady is the fairest dame in all the world, and this I will make good with my sword and spear against all the world.’ For the witch had cast her spells over him and deceived him. And when I put forth the same challenge for my own lady, we fell to fighting, and he fared so ill, that he fell by my hand.
“So now there were two fair ladies, for so it seemed, Fraelissa, who was fair in truth, and Duessa, who by her wicked arts had made herself so to seem. And I knew not to which I should give the prize of beauty, for it seemed the due of each. But while I doubted, this wicked witch raised by evil arts such a mist as made Fraelissa’s face to lose all its fairness. Which when she had accomplished, she cried: ‘See now how this false dame has lost her beauty, for indeed it was but borrowed. Many has she deceived in time past, even as now she has deceived you.’ When I heard this, I would fain have killed the fair lady that had been my true love. But this the false Duessa, feigning compassion, would not suffer. Only with her magic arts she changed her into that tree which you see yonder.
“Now you must know that for every witch, be she as crafty as she may, there is one day in every year when she is constrained to take her true shape. And on this day I chanced to see Duessa as she was in truth, old and foul of hue, fouler than one had thought woman could be. Nor did she fail to perceive that I had discovered the truth, though indeed I sought to bear myself as before, having it in my mind secretly to escape, and fly from her company. So she practised upon me the same wicked arts that she had used with my Fraelissa, changing me into the semblance of a tree. And here we stand, banished from the company of men, and wasting weary days and nights.”