King Arthur hastened to the grim baron’s castle and told him one by one all the answers which he had received from his various advisers, except the last, and not one was admitted as the true one. “Now yield thee, Arthur,” the giant said, “for thou hast not paid thy ransom, and thou and thy lands are forfeited to me.” Then King Arthur said:
“Yet hold thy hand,
thou proud baron,
I pray thee hold
thy hand,
And give me leave to speak
once more,
In rescue of my
land.
This morn as I came over a
moor,
I saw a lady set,
Between an oak and a green
holly,
All clad in red
scarlett.
She says all women
would have their will,
This is their
chief desire;
Now yield, as thou art a baron
true,
That I have paid
my hire.”
“It was my sister that told thee this,” the churlish baron exclaimed. “Vengeance light on her! I will some time or other do her as ill a turn.”
King Arthur rode homeward, but not light of heart, for he remembered the promise he was under to the loathly lady to—give her one of his young and gallant knights for a husband. He told his grief to Sir Gawain, his nephew, and he replied, “Be not sad, my lord, for I will marry the loathly lady.” King Arthur replied:
“Now nay, now nay, good
Sir Gawaine,
My sister’s
son ye be;
The loathly lady’s all
too grim,
And all too foule
for thee.”