Then they led the little wizard to the King, and he said:
“Sire, bid your huntsmen leash the hounds and saddle the horses, proclaim a seven days’ hunt in the forest and seven nights abroad therein, and hang me high if you do not hear this night what converse Tristan holds.”
So did the King unwillingly; and at fall of night he left the hunt taking the dwarf in pillion, and entered the orchard, and the dwarf took him to the tall pine-tree, saying:
“Fair King, climb into these branches and take with you your arrows and your bow, for you may need them; and bide you still.”
That night the moon shone clear. Hid in the branches the King saw his nephew leap the pallisades and throw his bark and twigs into the stream. But Tristan had bent over the round well to throw them and so doing had seen the image of the King. He could not stop the branches as they floated away, and there, yonder, in the women’s rooms, Iseult was watching and would come.
She came, and Tristan watched her motionless. Above him in the tree he heard the click of the arrow when it fits the string.
She came, but with more prudence than her wont, thinking, “What has passed, that Tristan does not come to meet me? He has seen some foe.”
Suddenly, by the clear moonshine, she also saw the King’s shadow in the fount. She showed the wit of women well, she did not lift her eyes.
“Lord God,” she said, low down, grant I may be the first to speak.”
“Tristan,” she said, “what have you dared to do, calling me hither at such an hour? Often have you called me —to beseech, you said. And Queen though I am, I know you won me that title—and I have come. What would you?”