In his rage Sir Palomides cut off his armour and threw it from him and fled away on his horse. Then the white knight also went away, and none knew who he was. The king sent after him, to tell him he was the winner of the lady, whom he should wed, but the messengers could not find him. Men marvelled much at this, that the victor knight should not come to claim the rich lady for his wife with the wide lands that went with her. When Sir Tristram returned to the private postern where La Belle Isoude had led him forth secretly, he found her standing breathless, and she was pale and red by turns, and could not speak at first. 'Thou--thou hast not failed?' she said, and clasped her hands. 'Nay,' said Sir Tristram, laughing. 'He will never trouble you again. And, by Our Lady, I wished there had been six of him, for I never felt more full of fight and strength than I do this day.' 'But--but have ye not claimed the prize?' said La Belle Isoude, and hid her face that was so deathly white. 'Nay, nor will I,' said Sir Tristram, 'for I crave not to be married. I would be free and go forth into strange lands to seek adventures.' He went from her, with the tune of a hunting song upon his lips, and saw not how La Belle Isoude trembled against the wall and was near to swoon. For La Belle Isoude herself was the Lady of the Laundes who should be given to the victor, though this was known to none but herself and the king and queen. The king and queen and all the court marvelled who should be the stranger knight, and why he had departed, and some suspected Sir Tristram, but none knew of this except La Belle Isoude and Governale his squire, and none dared charge him therewith. La Belle Isoude kept her counsel, and strove to seem lighthearted. It fell upon a day that Sir Tristram was disporting himself with other knights at a game of ball upon the green before the castle, and had left his sword hung upon the post beside his seat in hall. The queen, with La Belle Isoude, passed through the hall to go to see the men at their sport, and on her way she espied Sir Tristram's sword, and the strange device of a serpent which was upon the handle. She said it was a marvellous piece of work, and never had she seen the like of it. Then, by ill hap, she drew the sword from the scabbard, and they both admired it a long time, looking at its keenness and brightness and the words of mystery engraved on it. Suddenly the queen gave a little cry as of terror, and she pointed to where, within a foot and a half of the point, there was a piece broken out of the edge. Then, very hastily, the queen ran with the sword into her bower, and from her treasure-chest she drew a casket, and from the casket she drew a tiny piece of doeskin, and from that she took a fragment of steel. While her daughter marvelled what it all might mean, the queen took the piece of steel and placed it in the broken part of Sir Tristram's sword, and it fitted so that the break could hardly be seen.