Seven waxen candles burned at her head, and seven others at her feet, and
the flames of the candles spread and wavered as the cold wind blew upon
them. And the hair of her head (as black as those raven feathers that Sir
Percival had beheld lying upon the snow) moved like threads of black silk
as the wind blew in through the window--but the Lady Yvette moved not nor
stirred, but lay like a statue of marble all clad in white.
Then at the first Sir Percival stood very still at the door-way as though
he had of a sudden been turned into stone. Then he went forward and stood
beside the couch and held his hands very tightly together and gazed at the
Lady Yvette where she lay. So he stood for a long while, and he wist not
why it was that he felt like as though he had been turned into a stone,
without such grief at his heart as he had thought to feel thereat. (For
indeed, his spirit was altogether broken though he knew it not.)
[Sidenote: Of the grief of Sir Percival] Then he spake unto that still
figure, and he said: "Dear lady, is it thus I find thee after all this long
endeavor of mine? Yet from Paradise, haply, thou mayst perceive all that I
have accomplished in thy behalf.
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