Vile traitors! Mordred plays deep then, and makes power about him. I fear that he is falser than you dream. The rumour runs that treachery was at work Conniving with these rebels in the North. My life upon the hazard, it was he. The Queen is but a pawn in Mordred’s game That plays--who knows?--for kinship. Guenevere, This poison that he brews and breathes abroad Is but to start dissension round the King And split the realm in two. But that my Queen Should suffer torture for his use! The traitor! If this impalpable fog could take a shape, A body--there before me--a throat to strangle, A breast to strike at and to kill! GUENEVERE Ah, now I have a shield and a sword--what care I now For the world’s evil tongues? You are come back, And spring is in the sky. Is it not sweet To taste and feel? The blue sky, the warm air, Trembling among the young leaves. Now I feel As when we went a-Maying in the woods Together and alone. Pluck me a flower. There at the window one peeps in. (LAUNCELOT _brings her a rose. She caresses his hand._) So sad? So sad still? Come into the golden sun. Look, every small shoot thrills up to the light. Smell the sweet rose upon its thorny briar. LAUNCELOT Sweet as old hours remembered. GUENEVERE (_very softly_) Sweet as those To come. LAUNCELOT (_madly embracing her_) Ah, Guenevere, to suffer so. I am yours, yours, only yours--(_abruptly breaking away_)--O God, have pity! GUENEVERE Why should we not take what there is of joy, So little as there is, so little? LAUNCELOT Guenevere, I have sworn. There’s burning fire Between us. (_Pushes her from him._) GUENEVERE Where is your joy gone? In what strange countries have you been from me? This--this is not the Launcelot I knew. LAUNCELOT That Launcelot must die. Think of him slain, As in my anguish I have fought to slay him! Where have I been? I have been down in the darkness, near great Death. I have had dreams upon my fever-bed, Trances that touched the mortal sense of Time To nothing; and Eternity looked in To the inmost of my soul, There seemed no lifting of a hand but had Its shadow vast in heaven---- GUENEVERE We are sinners all. Put these black dreams behind you---- LAUNCELOT And no deed But, like a wave that writes upon the sand Ebbed from its naked witness, I remembered What in the fault and soilure of our nature I have wrought amiss. Guenevere, I am afraid To see my very self, as God sees it. GUENEVERE