To an outsider, a person kicking a vending machine is seen as an angry violent person. However, to the person kicking the vending machine, their late bus, their angry boss, missed deadlines, and lost wallet all make his actions justified.
As readers, we are the outsiders looking onto the Knight of the Cart as he goes on his journey. When he made his decision to take shelter on the condition to lay with a girl despite having his own girl, many would judge him for his actions because he is making the decision to be unfaithful to his girl. However, I believe that this may be one of the situations where his past experiences and knowledge makes his decision unavoidable to him as he literally does state “he saw he had no choice”(pg 219), however to an outsider, it simply looks crazy and bad. He has a quest and in order to fulfill it, he needs to be able to continue on traveling day after day. As a knight in the medieval ages, he may have knowledge that the girl’s offer would be one of the only offers he could get or that he would definitely need to take this girl’s offer because he would not be able to go on any further without shelter for the night. As a knight, he felt obligated to go throughout this journey and this shelter offered is the only way for him to complete his quest.
Many call the Knight of the Cart for his success in saving the girl but I would say that the Knight of the Cart is a hero for a different reason. I think the Knight of the Cart is a hero because he was willing to give up one the biggest aspects of his life, love, in order to be able to fulfill his duty as a knight and complete his quest that his queen assigned him.