By the trees Igraine slackened and turned breathless on the man as he came towards her through the long grass. Her eyes were dim and frightened, her lips twitching, and there was a bleak hunted look upon her face that made her seem white and old. Pelleas's blood ran cold in him like water; a vague dread sapped his manhood; he stared at Igraine and was speechless. The girl put her arm before her eyes and shook as she stood. Pelleas fell on his knees with a cry, and reached for her hand. "Igraine, Igraine!" She snatched her arm away and would not look at him. "My God, what is this, Igraine?" "Don't touch me; I am Gorlois's wife!" A vast silence seemed to fall sudden on the world. It might have been dead of night in winter, with deep snow upon the ground and no wind stirring in the forest. To Igraine, swaying in an agony with her arm over her face, the silence came like the hush that might fall on heaven before the damning of a lost soul to hell. She wondered what was in Pelleas's heart, and dared not look at him or meet his eyes. God in heaven! would the man never speak; would the silence crawl on into an eternity! At last she did look, and nearly fell at the wrench of it. Pelleas was standing near her looking at her with his great solemn eyes as though she had given him his death. His face seemed to have gone grey and haggard in a moment. "Gorlois's wife!" was all he said. Igraine hung her head, shivered, and said nothing. Pelleas never stirred; he seemed like so much stone, a mere pillar of granite misery. Igraine could have writhed at his feet and caught him by the knees only to melt for a moment that white calm on his face that looked like the mask of death. A voice that was almost strange to her startled her out of her stupor of despair. "How long have you been wed, Igraine?" "Nine months, Pelleas." The man seemed to be struggling with himself as though he strove after the truth, yet could not confront it for all his strength. When he spoke his voice was like the voice of a man winded by hard running. He appeared to urge himself forward, to goad his courage to a task that he dreaded. There was great anguish on his face as he looked into the girl's eyes. "I must speak what I know, Igraine." The words seemed slow with effort. Igraine watched him in silence, full of a vague dread. "Gorlois has spoken to me of his wife." "Say on, Pelleas." Pelleas hesitated. "The truth--tell me the truth." She was almost clamorous. Pelleas plunged on. "Gorlois told me how his wife was faithless to him, how she had fled with Brastias, the knight who had ward over her at Caerleon. I never knew her name until this hour."