"
"He gave her to his lepers. From these lepers I myself conquered her
with my own hand; and henceforth she is altogether mine. She cannot
pass from me nor I from her."
Ogrin sat down; but at his feet Iseult, her head upon the knees of
that man of God, wept silently. The hermit told her and re-told her
the words of his holy book, but still while she wept she shook her
head, and refused the faith he offered.
"Ah me," said Ogrin then, "what comfort can one give the dead? Do
penance, Tristan, for a man who lives in sin without repenting is a
man quite dead."
"Oh no," said Tristan, "I live and I do no penance. We will go back
into the high wood which comforts and wards us all round about. Come
with me, Iseult, my friend."
Iseult rose up; they held each other's hands. They passed into the
high grass and the underwood: the trees hid them with their branches.
They disappeared beyond the leaves.
The summer passed and the winter came: the two lovers lived, all
hidden in the hollow of a rock, and on the frozen earth the cold
crisped their couch with dead leaves. In the strength of their love
neither one nor the other felt these mortal things. But when the open
skies had come back with the springtime, they built a hut of green
branches under the great trees.
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