So the day after that day Sir Geraint and Enid departed from the Court of King Arthur, and travelling with a small party of noble attendants betook their way to Amadora (which was the name of the castle of Sir Geraint’s father), which place they reached within three days of easy journeying.
There they abided for several months, in which time there was hunting and hawking and jousting, so that the days were as full of joy and pleasure as it was possible to be.
Sir Geraint takes sport at his castle.
But in all that while Sir Geraint did nothing of knightly daring or adventure, so that by and by the people of Amadora began to talk to one another concerning the matter, saying, “How is this? Our Prince, the Lord Geraint, is surely besotted concerning his wife, for he is with her all the while. The time was when he took his joys, but when the time of those joys was past then he performed many works of knightly daring, so that all we of this place were very proud of him. When now doth he enter into any such undertaking? Never. He is always the first in the chase or with the hawk or in the joust, yet his youthful glory is now departed from him, so that he lieth forever, as it were, with his head upon the knees of his wife.”
Thus the people talked amongst themselves, and at last such words, or words like these, came to the ears of the Lady Enid and troubled her very sorely.
Enid regards Sir Geraint whilst he sleeps.
One day in the summer weather she awoke very early in the morning and the Lord Geraint lay upon his bed beside her. He had thrown aside the coverlets and he now lay with his great breast and his arms and shoulders bare to the softness of the air. These she beheld, how huge and mighty they were and how comely in their strength and power. Then she looked at her own arm, how slender and white it was, how lacking of strength, how feeble and childish in its weakness, and she thought to herself, “Is it then true what they say—that my white and tender limbs may hold my husband away from those great adventures to which he belongs? Is it then true that mine arms confine him in a little and narrow circumference? Alas! Is it true that the love of a woman can sap a man of all purpose and ambition in his life of activity? Nay; it is not true, for many knights who are wedded to other ladies are still noble knights in the field of adventure. Alas and alas! The weakness of my lord must indeed reside in me.” Here she sighed very deeply and with the deepness of that sigh Sir Geraint awoke from his slumbers and lay with his eyes still closed. Then she said, whispering as though to herself, “I am at fault and am no true, right wife for this noble hero.”
Sir Geraint hears her words.
Now Sir Geraint, lying with his eyes closed, overheard these last words that she thus whispered to herself. He heard her say that she was no true, right wife to him, and it seemed to him that she thus confessed that she was unfaithful to him. This thought was, as it were, a dagger thrust into his life, sudden, shining and very deep. And though he still lay with his eyes closed, he said to his heart, “Is she then false, and was I too late in bringing her away from the Court of King Arthur? Woe is me!”
Thereupon he opened his eyes, and looked her full in the face, and she, seeing that he was awake, smiled into his eyes. But he did not smile upon her in return, otherwise he said, “Lady, art thou there?” Then the smile slowly faded from her eyes, for she saw that he was in an angry mood. And so they regarded one another.