The Nonexistent Knight

Sister Theodora describes the “cell” where she writes, which is situated above the kitchen of the convent. As she wrote the end of the previous chapter, she could imagine the clanging pots and pans to be the clashing swords of the battlefield. When she smells the kitchen, she imagines the mess tent of an army. Next, she imagines the conversation between Raimbaut and Agilulf. Raimbaut is desperate to tell Agilulf what happened the previous day. He wants to become a knight and he hopes to achieve glory on the battlefield, becoming a paladin. The true work of a paladin, Agilulf counsels him, is not only glory. Raimbaut asks whether he can follow Agilulf to learn how to be a paladin. Agilulf invites Raimbaut to help him carry out an inspection of the kitchens. Since the army is on the move, he explains, rationing out the food is important work. He takes Raimbaut to inspect the kitchens then sends him to make a report on everyone eating in the camp.

When Raimbaut returns, he tells Agilulf that many itinerant wanderers have entered the mess hall. They each claim to have a different name but, to Raimbaut, they look exactly alike. They all want soup. When Raimbaut takes Agilulf to one of these wanderers, however, the man is quite clearly Gurduloo. Agilulf compliments Raimbaut for having uncovered a problem with the rationing system. He is happy to be reunited with Gurduloo, who he still believes to be his squire. Gurduloo is given the remaining soup from the cooking cauldron. He enters the soup and emerges with soup “all over him from head to toe” (52). Gurduloo acts like everything around him is now soup and he scoops at empty air with a spoon. Agilulf announces to Gurduloo that, as his squire, Gurduloo must help “bury the baptized flesh of [their] brethren” (53) from the previous day’s battle.

Agilulf leads Raimbaut and Gurduloo to the battlefield. Carrion birds pick at the dead. The three men each grab a dead body and drag it to a burial site. Looking at the dead man in his arms, Agilulf envies the man’s corporeal body. Gurduloo looks at the body he carries and envies the way the body will now nourish the earth by rotting. Raimbaut studies his own dead man and resolves to live his life to the fullest before his own inevitable death. Gurduloo begins to dig a grave. He encourages his dead body to help but this fails. Once the grave is dug, Gurduloo lays inside and tries to bury himself. Agilulf intervenes before Gurduloo suffocates to death. The trio departs. Agilulf issues instructions, telling Gurduloo to chop wood. Raimbaut quizzes Agilulf about Bradamante. Agilulf ignores Raimbaut; instead, he begins to teach Raimbaut the best way to chop down a tree.

Sister Theodora would like to write about “the passion of love” (58). As with war, however, she says she is inexperienced and naïve. She turns instead to the story of Bradamante, whose love of order drove her to become a knight. She abhors the other knights, who are lazy and oafish. In her eyes, they lack honor. Though she loves order and rules, Bradamante is personally disorganized. She was a princess who grew up in a castle; she never needed to clean for herself. Nevertheless, her armor is always gleaming, and she is proud of the way her shiny armor distinguishes her from her lazy male peers. When she meets a knight with similar values, she occasionally falls in love. When they succumb to their passions, however, she loses her love for them.

Bradamante is practicing her archery when Raimbaut spots her. He challenges her to a contest with the bow and arrow. Sister Theodora wonders whether any woman can ever really exist in the same way that a young man who is deeply in love believes that she exists. Bradamante is dismissive of Raimbaut’s chances in any competition. Should he even hit the target, she mocks, he would only do so by chance. Agilulf happens to be passing at this moment. Bradamante stops the nonexistent knight and asks him to give an archery demonstration to young Raimbaut. Nonchalantly, Agilulf takes Bradamante’s bow, fires the arrow into the target, and walks away without saying anything. Bradamante wonders aloud about this nonexistent knight, who is “so exact and perfect” (63) in every act.

A group of knights is watching the scene from a distance. They joke that Bradamante has fallen in love with the nonexistent knight. Raimbaut overhears their words. A knight explains that Bradamante must have had her fill of normal men. Now, she has fallen in love with “man who doesn’t exist at all” (63). The knights swap jokes about this unlikely pairing until Bradamante turns on them, chasing them away with her whip. Choosing not to talk to either Agilulf or Bradamante, Raimbaut approaches a fellow young knight named Torrismund, the younger son of the Duke of Cornwall. Raimbaut explains to Torrismund how he flickers back and forth between feeling as though he belongs in this place and feeling as though he is completely distant. Torrismund has no faith in their war or their code. Their battles, their chivalric honor, and even the name that they have all mean nothing to him. The war will continue forever, he believes, even though everyone has forgotten why they are fighting. Raimbaut cannot agree, as he still remembers the way in which Bradamante saved him. He is more determined than ever to win her love. The nihilistic Torrismund suggests that only the Knights of the Holy Grail, an order of knights who live in the forests of Scotland, have the power to restore his faith in the world.