CHAPTER XXII
For this cause, to know the certainty what was your name, and of what kin ye were come. And then she let fetch tofore him Linet, the damosel that had ridden with him many wildsome ways. Then was Sir Gareth more gladder than he was tofore. And then they troth-plight each other to love, and never to fail whiles their life lasteth. And so they burnt both in love, that they were accorded to abate their lusts secretly. And there Dame Liones counselled Sir Gareth to sleep in none other place but in the hall. And there she promised him to come to his bed a little afore midnight. This counsel was not so privily kept but it was understood; for they were but young both, and tender of age, and had not used none such crafts tofore. Wherefore the damosel Linet was a little displeased, and she thought her sister Dame Liones was a little over-hasty, that she might not abide the time of her marriage; and for saving their worship, she thought to abate their hot lusts. And so she let ordain by her subtle crafts that they had not their intents neither with other, as in their delights, until they were married. And so it passed on. At after-supper was made clean avoidance, that every lord and lady should go unto his rest. But Sir Gareth said plainly he would go no farther than the hall, for in such places, he said, was convenient for an errant-knight to take his rest in; and so there were ordained great couches, and thereon feather beds, and there laid him down to sleep; and within a while came Dame Liones, wrapped in a mantle furred with ermine, and laid her down beside Sir Gareth. And therewithal he began to kiss her. And then he looked afore him, and there he perceived and saw come an armed knight, with many lights about him; and this knight had a long gysarme in his hand, and made grim countenance to smite him. When Sir Gareth saw him come in that wise, he leapt out of his bed, and gat in his hand his sword, and leapt straight toward that knight. And when the knight saw Sir Gareth come so fiercely upon him, he smote him with a foyne through the thick of the thigh that the wound
