"T. H. White - The Once and Future King" - читать интересную книгу автора (White T.H)

looking down on her, but not seeing her at all.
"I should, of course, have pity on you," he said, "if not on Arthur."
"What do you mean?"
"I was thinking of a pattern, Jenny, a simple pattern."
She watched him without speaking.
"Yes. My father committed incest with my mother. Don't you think it would be a pattern, Jenny, if I
were to answer it by marrying my father's wife?"


12
It was dark in Gawaine's tent, except for a flat pan of charcoal which lit it dimly from below. The tent
was poor and shabby, compared with the splendid pavilions of the English knights. On the hard bed
there were a few plaids in the Orkney tartan, and the only ornaments were a leaden bottle of holy water
which he was taking for medicine, marked "Optimus egrorum, medicus fit Thomas bonorum," together
with a withered bunch of heather, tied to the pole. These were his household gods.
Gawaine was stretched face downward on the plaids. The man was crying, slowly and hopelessly, while
Arthur, sitting beside him, stroked his hand. It was his wound that had weakened him, or else he would
not have cried. The old King was trying to soothe him.
"Don't grieve about it, Gawaine," he said. "You did the best you could."
"It is the second time he has spared me, the second time in a month."
"Lancelot was always strong. The years don't seem to touch Mm."
"Why canna he kill me, then? I begged him to have done with it. I told him that if he left me to be
patched, I should but fight him fresh when I was mended.
"And, God!" he added tearfully, "my head sore aches!"
Arthur said with a sigh: "It was because you got both blows on the same place. That was bad luck."


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"It makes a body feel shamed."
"Don't think about it, then. Lie quiet, or you will get feverish again, and will not be able to fight for a
long tune. Then what would we do? We should be quite lost without our Gawaine to lead the battle for
us."
"I am but a man of straw, Arthur," he said. "I am but an ill-passioned bully, and I canna kill him."
"People who say they are no good are always the good ones. Let's change the subject and talk about
something pleasant. England, for instance."
"We shall never see England again."
"Nonsense! We shall see England just in the spring. Why, it is almost spring now. The snow-drops will
have been out for ages, and I dare say Guenever will have some crocuses already. She is good at
gardening."
"Guenever was kind to me."
"My Gwen is kind to everybody," said the old man proudly. "I wonder what she is doing now? Going to
bed, I suppose. Or perhaps she is sitting up late, having a talk with your brother. It would be nice to
think that they were talking about us at this minute, perhaps saying admiring things about Gawaine's
prowess: or Gwen might be saying that she wished her old man would come home."
Gawaine moved restlessly on the bed.
"I have a mind to gang home," he muttered. "If Lancelot hates clan Orkney, as Mordred says, why does
he spare the laird of it? Mayhap he did kill Gareth by mischance."