But as they stood there Tristram woke, and when he saw the queen he turned away his head, while tears ran from his eyes. It happened that the queen had with her a little brachet, which Tristram had given her when she first came to Cornwall, and which always remembered and loved its old master.
When this little creature came near the sick man, she leaped upon him and licked his cheeks and hands, and whined about him, showing great joy and excitement.
"The dog is wiser than us all," cried Dame Bragwaine. "She knows her master. They spoke falsely who said he was dead. It is Sir Tristram."
But Isolde fell to the ground in a swoon, and lay there long insensible. When at length she recovered, she said,--
"My dear lord and knight, I thank God deeply that you still live, for the story of your death had nearly caused mine. Your life is in dread danger, for when King Mark knows you he will either banish or destroy you. Therefore I beg you to fly from this court and seek that of King Arthur where you are beloved. This you may trust, that at all times, early and late, my love for you will keep fresh in my heart."
"I pray you leave me, Isolde," answered the knight. "It is not well that you should be seen here. Fear not that I will forget what you have said."
Then the queen departed, but do what she would the brachet would not follow her, but kept with the sick knight. Soon afterwards King Mark visited him, and to his surprise the brachet sat upon the prostrate man and bayed at the king.
"I can tell you," answered a knight. "That dog was Sir Tristram's before it was the queen's. The brachet is wiser than us all. It knows its master."
"That I cannot believe," said the king. "Tell me your name, my good man."
"My name is Tristram of Lyonesse," answered the knight. "I am in your power. Do with me what you will."
The king looked at him long and strangely, with anger in his eyes.
"Truly," he said, "you had better have died while you were about it. It would have saved me the need of dealing with you as you deserve."
Then he returned to the castle, and called his barons hastily to council, sternly demanding that the penalty of death should be adjudged against the knight. Happily for Tristram, the barons would not consent to this, and proposed instead that the accused knight should be banished.
