BOOK III TRIAL AND MARTYRDOM

1 The Maid in Chains

I CANNOT bear to dwell at great length upon the shameful history of

the summer and winter following the capture. For a while I was not much

troubled, for I was expecting every day to hear that Joan had been put

to ransom, and that the King--no, not the King, but grateful France--had

come eagerly forward to pay it. By the laws of war she could not

be denied the privilege of ransom. She was not a rebel; she was a

legitimately constituted soldier, head of the armies of France by

her King's appointment, and guilty of no crime known to military law;

therefore she could not be detained upon any pretext, if ransom were

proffered.

But day after day dragged by and no ransom was offered! It seems

incredible, but it is true. Was that reptile Tremouille busy at the

King's ear? All we know is, that the King was silent, and made no offer

and no effort in behalf of this poor girl who had done so much for him.

But, unhappily, there was alacrity enough in another quarter. The news

of the capture reached Paris the day after it happened, and the glad

English and Burgundians deafened the world all the day and all the night

with the clamor of their joy-bells and the thankful thunder of their

artillery, and the next day the Vicar-General of the Inquisition sent a

message to the Duke of Burgundy requiring the delivery of the prisoner

into the hands of the Church to be tried as an idolater.

The English had seen their opportunity, and it was the English power

that was really acting, not the Church. The Church was being used as a

blind, a disguise; and for a forcible reason: the Church was not only

able to take the life of Joan of Arc, but to blight her influence and

the valor-breeding inspiration of her name, whereas the English

power could but kill her body; that would not diminish or destroy the

influence of her name; it would magnify it and make it permanent. Joan

of Arc was the only power in France that the English did not despise,

the only power in France that they considered formidable. If the Church

could be brought to take her life, or to proclaim her an idolater, a

heretic, a witch, sent from Satan, not from heaven, it was believed that

the English supremacy could be at once reinstated.

The Duke of Burgundy listened--but waited. He could not doubt that the

French King or the French people would come forward presently and pay a

higher price than the English. He kept Joan a close prisoner in a

strong fortress, and continued to wait, week after week. He was a French

prince, and was at heart ashamed to sell her to the English. Yet with

all his waiting no offer came to him from the French side.

One day Joan played a cunning trick on her jailer, and not only slipped

out of her prison, but locked him up in it. But as she fled away she was

seen by a sentinel, and was caught and brought back.

Then she was sent to Beaurevoir, a stronger castle. This was early in

August, and she had been in captivity more than two months now. Here she

was shut up in the top of a tower which was sixty feet high. She ate her

heart there for another long stretch--about three months and a half.

And she was aware, all these weary five months of captivity, that the

English, under cover of the Church, were dickering for her as one would

dicker for a horse or a slave, and that France was silent, the King

silent, all her friends the same. Yes, it was pitiful.

And yet when she heard at last that Compiegne was being closely besieged

and likely to be captured, and that the enemy had declared that no

inhabitant of it should escape massacre, not even children of seven

years of age, she was in a fever at once to fly to our rescue. So she

tore her bedclothes to strips and tied them together and descended

this frail rope in the night, and it broke, and she fell and was badly

bruised, and remained three days insensible, meantime neither eating nor

drinking.

And now came relief to us, led by the Count of Vendome, and Compiegne

was saved and the siege raised. This was a disaster to the Duke of

Burgundy. He had to save money now. It was a good time for a new bid to

be made for Joan of Arc. The English at once sent a French bishop--that

forever infamous Pierre Cauchon of Beauvais. He was partly promised

the Archbishopric of Rouen, which was vacant, if he should succeed. He

claimed the right to preside over Joan's ecclesiastical trial because

the battle-ground where she was taken was within his diocese. By the

military usage of the time the ransom of a royal prince was 10,000

livres of gold, which is 61,125 francs--a fixed sum, you see. It must be

accepted when offered; it could not be refused.

Cauchon brought the offer of this very sum from the English--a royal

prince's ransom for the poor little peasant-girl of Domremy. It shows

in a striking way the English idea of her formidable importance. It was

accepted. For that sum Joan of Arc, the Savior of France, was sold; sold

to her enemies; to the enemies of her country; enemies who had lashed

and thrashed and thumped and trounced France for a century and made

holiday sport of it; enemies who had forgotten, years and years ago,

what a Frenchman's face was like, so used were they to seeing nothing

but his back; enemies whom she had whipped, whom she had cowed, whom she

had taught to respect French valor, new-born in her nation by the breath

of her spirit; enemies who hungered for her life as being the only

puissance able to stand between English triumph and French degradation.

Sold to a French priest by a French prince, with the French King and the

French nation standing thankless by and saying nothing.

And she--what did she say? Nothing. Not a reproach passed her lips. She

was too great for that--she was Joan of Arc; and when that is said, all

is said.

As a soldier, her record was spotless. She could not be called to

account for anything under that head. A subterfuge must be found, and,

as we have seen, was found. She must be tried by priests for crimes

against religion. If none could be discovered, some must be invented.

Let the miscreant Cauchon alone to contrive those.

Rouen was chosen as the scene of the trial. It was in the heart of the

English power; its population had been under English dominion so many

generations that they were hardly French now, save in language. The

place was strongly garrisoned. Joan was taken there near the end of

December, 1430, and flung into a dungeon. Yes, and clothed in chains,

that free spirit!

Still France made no move. How do I account for this? I think there is

only one way. You will remember that whenever Joan was not at the front,

the French held back and ventured nothing; that whenever she led, they

swept everything before them, so long as they could see her white

armor or her banner; that every time she fell wounded or was reported

killed--as at Compiegne--they broke in panic and fled like sheep. I

argue from this that they had undergone no real transformation as yet;

that at bottom they were still under the spell of a timorousness born of

generations of unsuccess, and a lack of confidence in each other and

in their leaders born of old and bitter experience in the way of

treacheries of all sorts--for their kings had been treacherous to their

great vassals and to their generals, and these in turn were treacherous

to the head of the state and to each other. The soldiery found that

they could depend utterly on Joan, and upon her alone. With her gone,

everything was gone. She was the sun that melted the frozen torrents and

set them boiling; with that sun removed, they froze again, and the army

and all France became what they had been before, mere dead corpses--that

and nothing more; incapable of thought, hope, ambition, or motion.

2 Joan Sold to the English

MY WOUND gave me a great deal of trouble clear into the first part of

October; then the fresher weather renewed my life and strength. All this

time there were reports drifting about that the King was going to ransom

Joan. I believed these, for I was young and had not yet found out the

littleness and meanness of our poor human race, which brags about itself

so much, and thinks it is better and higher than the other animals.

In October I was well enough to go out with two sorties, and in the

second one, on the 23d, I was wounded again. My luck had turned,

you see. On the night of the 25th the besiegers decamped, and in the

disorder and confusion one of their prisoners escaped and got safe into

Compiegne, and hobbled into my room as pallid and pathetic an object as

you would wish to see.

“What? Alive? Noel Rainguesson!”

It was indeed he. It was a most joyful meeting, that you will easily

know; and also as sad as it was joyful. We could not speak Joan's name.

One's voice would have broken down. We knew who was meant when she was

mentioned; we could say “she” and “her,” but we could not speak the

name.

We talked of the personal staff. Old D'Aulon, wounded and a prisoner,

was still with Joan and serving her, by permission of the Duke of

Burgundy. Joan was being treated with respect due to her rank and to her

character as a prisoner of war taken in honorable conflict. And this was

continued--as we learned later--until she fell into the hands of that

bastard of Satan, Pierre Cauchon, Bishop of Beauvais.

Noel was full of noble and affectionate praises and appreciations of our

old boastful big Standard-Bearer, now gone silent forever, his real and

imaginary battles all fought, his work done, his life honorably closed

and completed.

“And think of his luck!” burst out Noel, with his eyes full of tears.

“Always the pet child of luck!

“See how it followed him and stayed by him, from his first step all

through, in the field or out of it; always a splendid figure in the

public eye, courted and envied everywhere; always having a chance to do

fine things and always doing them; in the beginning called the Paladin

in joke, and called it afterward in earnest because he magnificently

made the title good; and at last--supremest luck of all--died in the

field! died with his harness on; died faithful to his charge, the

Standard in his hand; died--oh, think of it--with the approving eye of

Joan of Arc upon him!

“He drained the cup of glory to the last drop, and went jubilant to his

peace, blessedly spared all part in the disaster which was to follow.

What luck, what luck! And we? What was our sin that we are still here,

we who have also earned our place with the happy dead?”

And presently he said:

“They tore the sacred Standard from his dead hand and carried it away,

their most precious prize after its captured owner. But they haven't it

now. A month ago we put our lives upon the risk--our two good knights,

my fellow-prisoners, and I--and stole it, and got it smuggled by

trusty hands to Orleans, and there it is now, safe for all time in the

Treasury.”

I was glad and grateful to learn that. I have seen it often since, when

I have gone to Orleans on the 8th of May to be the petted old guest of

the city and hold the first place of honor at the banquets and in the

processions--I mean since Joan's brothers passed from this life. It will

still be there, sacredly guarded by French love, a thousand years from

now--yes, as long as any shred of it hangs together. (1) Two or three

weeks after this talk came the tremendous news like a thunder-clap, and

we were aghast--Joan of Arc sold to the English!

Not for a moment had we ever dreamed of such a thing. We were young, you

see, and did not know the human race, as I have said before. We had been

so proud of our country, so sure of her nobleness, her magnanimity,

her gratitude. We had expected little of the King, but of France we

had expected everything. Everybody knew that in various towns patriot

priests had been marching in procession urging the people to sacrifice

money, property, everything, and buy the freedom of their heaven-sent

deliverer. That the money would be raised we had not thought of

doubting.

But it was all over now, all over. It was a bitter time for us. The

heavens seemed hung with black; all cheer went out from our hearts.

Was this comrade here at my bedside really Noel Rainguesson, that

light-hearted creature whose whole life was but one long joke, and who

used up more breath in laughter than in keeping his body alive? No, no;

that Noel I was to see no more. This one's heart was broken. He moved

grieving about, and absently, like one in a dream; the stream of his

laughter was dried at its source.

Well, that was best. It was my own mood. We were company for each other.

He nursed me patiently through the dull long weeks, and at last, in

January, I was strong enough to go about again. Then he said:

“Shall we go now?”

“Yes.”

There was no need to explain. Our hearts were in Rouen; we would carry

our bodies there. All that we cared for in this life was shut up in that

fortress. We could not help her, but it would be some solace to us to be

near her, to breathe the air that she breathed, and look daily upon the

stone walls that hid her. What if we should be made prisoners there?

Well, we could but do our best, and let luck and fate decide what should

happen.

And so we started. We could not realize the change which had come upon

the country. We seemed able to choose our own route and go whenever we

pleased, unchallenged and unmolested. When Joan of Arc was in the field

there was a sort of panic of fear everywhere; but now that she was out

of the way, fear had vanished. Nobody was troubled about you or afraid

of you, nobody was curious about you or your business, everybody was

indifferent.

We presently saw that we could take to the Seine, and not weary

ourselves out with land travel.

So we did it, and were carried in a boat to within a league of Rouen.

Then we got ashore; not on the hilly side, but on the other, where it

is as level as a floor. Nobody could enter or leave the city without

explaining himself. It was because they feared attempts at a rescue of

Joan.

We had no trouble. We stopped in the plain with a family of peasants and

stayed a week, helping them with their work for board and lodging, and

making friends of them. We got clothes like theirs, and wore them.

When we had worked our way through their reserves and gotten their

confidence, we found that they secretly harbored French hearts in their

bodies. Then we came out frankly and told them everything, and found

them ready to do anything they could to help us.

Our plan was soon made, and was quite simple. It was to help them drive

a flock of sheep to the market of the city. One morning early we made

the venture in a melancholy drizzle of rain, and passed through the

frowning gates unmolested. Our friends had friends living over a humble

wine shop in a quaint tall building situated in one of the narrow lanes

that run down from the cathedral to the river, and with these they

bestowed us; and the next day they smuggled our own proper clothing and

other belongings to us. The family that lodged us--the Pieroons--were

French in sympathy, and we needed to have no secrets from them.

(1) It remained there three hundred and sixty years, and then was

destroyed in a public bonfire, together with two swords, a plumed cap,

several suits of state apparel, and other relics of the Maid, by a mob

in the time of the Revolution. Nothing which the hand of Joan of Arc is

known to have touched now remains in existence except a few preciously

guarded military and state papers which she signed, her pen being guided

by a clerk or her secretary, Louis de Conte. A boulder exists from which

she is known to have mounted her horse when she was once setting out

upon a campaign. Up to a quarter of a century ago there was a single

hair from her head still in existence. It was drawn through the wax of

a seal attached to the parchment of a state document. It was

surreptitiously snipped out, seal and all, by some vandal relic-hunter,

and carried off. Doubtless it still exists, but only the thief knows

where. -- TRANSLATOR.

3 Weaving the Net About Her

IT WAS necessary for me to have some way to gain bread for Noel and

myself; and when the Pierrons found that I knew how to write, the

applied to their confessor in my behalf, and he got a place for me with

a good priest named Manchon, who was to be the chief recorder in the

Great Trial of Joan of Arc now approaching. It was a strange position

for me--clerk to the recorder--and dangerous if my sympathies and the

late employment should be found out. But there was not much danger.

Manchon was at bottom friendly to Joan and would not betray me; and

my name would not, for I had discarded my surname and retained only my

given one, like a person of low degree.

I attended Manchon constantly straight along, out of January and into

February, and was often in the citadel with him--in the very fortress

where Joan was imprisoned, though not in the dungeon where she was

confined, and so did not see her, of course.

Manchon told me everything that had been happening before my coming.

Ever since the purchase of Joan, Cauchon had been busy packing his jury

for the destruction of the Maid--weeks and weeks he had spent in this

bad industry. The University of Paris had sent him a number of learned

and able and trusty ecclesiastics of the stripe he wanted; and he had

scraped together a clergyman of like stripe and great fame here and

there and yonder, until he was able to construct a formidable court

numbering half a hundred distinguished names. French names they were,

but their interests and sympathies were English.

A great officer of the Inquisition was also sent from Paris for the

accused must be tried by the forms of the Inquisition; but this was a

brave and righteous man, and he said squarely that this court had no

power to try the case, wherefore he refused to act; and the same honest

talk was uttered by two or three others.

The Inquisitor was right. The case as here resurrected against Joan had

already been tried long ago at Poitiers, and decided in her favor. Yes,

and by a higher tribunal than this one, for at the head of it was an

Archbishop--he of Rheims--Cauchon's own metropolitan. So here, you see,

a lower court was impudently preparing to try and redecide a cause which

had already been decided by its superior, a court of higher authority.

Imagine it! No, the case could not properly be tried again. Cauchon

could not properly preside in this new court, for more than one reason:

Rouen was not in his diocese; Joan had not been arrested in her

domicile, which was still Domremy; and finally this proposed judge was

the prisoner's outspoken enemy, and therefore he was incompetent to

try her. Yet all these large difficulties were gotten rid of. The

territorial Chapter of Rouen finally granted territorial letters to

Cauchon--though only after a struggle and under compulsion. Force was

also applied to the Inquisitor, and he was obliged to submit.

So then, the little English King, by his representative, formally

delivered Joan into the hands of the court, but with this reservation:

if the court failed to condemn her, he was to have her back again! Ah,

dear, what chance was there for that forsaken and friendless child?

Friendless, indeed--it is the right word. For she was in a black

dungeon, with half a dozen brutal common soldiers keeping guard night

and day in the room where her cage was--for she was in a cage; an iron

cage, and chained to her bed by neck and hands and feet. Never a person

near her whom she had ever seen before; never a woman at all. Yes, this

was, indeed, friendlessness.

Now it was a vassal of Jean de Luxembourg who captured Joan and

Compiegne, and it was Jean who sold her to the Duke of Burgundy. Yet

this very De Luxembourg was shameless enough to go and show his face to

Joan in her cage. He came with two English earls, Warwick and Stafford.

He was a poor reptile. He told her he would get her set free if she

would promise not to fight the English any more. She had been in that

cage a long time now, but not long enough to break her spirit. She

retorted scornfully:

“Name of God, you but mock me. I know that you have neither the power

nor the will to do it.”

He insisted. Then the pride and dignity of the soldier rose in Joan, and

she lifted her chained hands and let them fall with a clash, saying:

“See these! They know more than you, and can prophesy better. I know

that the English are going to kill me, for they think that when I am

dead they can get the Kingdom of France. It is not so.

“Though there were a hundred thousand of them they would never get it.”

This defiance infuriated Stafford, and he--now think of it--he a free,

strong man, she a chained and helpless girl--he drew his dagger and

flung himself at her to stab her. But Warwick seized him and held him

back. Warwick was wise. Take her life in that way? Send her to Heaven

stainless and undisgraced? It would make her the idol of France, and the

whole nation would rise and march to victory and emancipation under the

inspiration of her spirit. No, she must be saved for another fate than

that.

Well, the time was approaching for the Great Trial. For more than two

months Cauchon had been raking and scraping everywhere for any odds and

ends of evidence or suspicion or conjecture that might be usable against

Joan, and carefully suppressing all evidence that came to hand in her

favor. He had limitless ways and means and powers at his disposal for

preparing and strengthening the case for the prosecution, and he used

them all.

But Joan had no one to prepare her case for her, and she was shut up in

those stone walls and had no friend to appeal to for help. And as for

witnesses, she could not call a single one in her defense; they were

all far away, under the French flag, and this was an English court; they

would have been seized and hanged if they had shown their faces at the

gates of Rouen. No, the prisoner must be the sole witness--witness for

the prosecution, witness for the defense; and with a verdict of death

resolved upon before the doors were opened for the court's first

sitting.

When she learned that the court was made up of ecclesiastics in the

interest of the English, she begged that in fairness an equal number of

priests of the French party should be added to these.

Cauchon scoffed at her message, and would not even deign to answer it.

By the law of the Church--she being a minor under twenty-one--it was her

right to have counsel to conduct her case, advise her how to answer

when questioned, and protect her from falling into traps set by cunning

devices of the prosecution. She probably did not know that this was her

right, and that she could demand it and require it, for there was none

to tell her that; but she begged for this help, at any rate. Cauchon

refused it. She urged and implored, pleading her youth and her ignorance

of the complexities and intricacies of the law and of legal procedure.

Cauchon refused again, and said she must get along with her case as best

she might by herself. Ah, his heart was a stone.

Cauchon prepared the proces verbal. I will simplify that by calling it

the Bill of Particulars. It was a detailed list of the charges against

her, and formed the basis of the trial. Charges? It was a list of

suspicions and public rumors--those were the words used. It was merely

charged that she was suspected of having been guilty of heresies,

witchcraft, and other such offenses against religion.

Now by the law of the Church, a trial of that sort could not be begun

until a searching inquiry had been made into the history and character

of the accused, and it was essential that the result of this inquiry be

added to the proces verbal and form a part of it. You remember that that

was the first thing they did before the trial at Poitiers. They did it

again now. An ecclesiastic was sent to Domremy. There and all about

the neighborhood he made an exhaustive search into Joan's history

and character, and came back with his verdict. It was very clear. The

searcher reported that he found Joan's character to be in every way what

he “would like his own sister's character to be.” Just about the

same report that was brought back to Poitiers, you see. Joan's was a

character which could endure the minutest examination.

This verdict was a strong point for Joan, you will say. Yes, it would

have been if it could have seen the light; but Cauchon was awake, and it

disappeared from the proces verbal before the trial. People were prudent

enough not to inquire what became of it.

One would imagine that Cauchon was ready to begin the trial by this

time. But no, he devised one more scheme for poor Joan's destruction,

and it promised to be a deadly one.

One of the great personages picked out and sent down by the University

of Paris was an ecclesiastic named Nicolas Loyseleur. He was tall,

handsome, grave, of smooth, soft speech and courteous and winning

manners. There was no seeming of treachery or hypocrisy about him,

yet he was full of both. He was admitted to Joan's prison by night,

disguised as a cobbler; he pretended to be from her own country; he

professed to be secretly a patriot; he revealed the fact that he was

a priest. She was filled with gladness to see one from the hills and

plains that were so dear to her; happier still to look upon a priest and

disburden her heart in confession, for the offices of the Church were

the bread of life, the breath of her nostrils to her, and she had been

long forced to pine for them in vain. She opened her whole innocent

heart to this creature, and in return he gave her advice concerning her

trial which could have destroyed her if her deep native wisdom had not

protected her against following it.

You will ask, what value could this scheme have, since the secrets of

the confessional are sacred and cannot be revealed? True--but suppose

another person should overhear them? That person is not bound to keep

the secret. Well, that is what happened. Cauchon had previously caused

a hole to be bored through the wall; and he stood with his ear to that

hole and heard all. It is pitiful to think of these things. One wonders

how they could treat that poor child so. She had not done them any harm.

4 All Ready to Condemn

ON TUESDAY, the 20th of February, while I sat at my master's work in the

evening, he came in, looking sad, and said it had been decided to begin

the trial at eight o'clock the next morning, and I must get ready to

assist him.

Of course I had been expecting such news every day for many days; but no

matter, the shock of it almost took my breath away and set me trembling

like a leaf. I suppose that without knowing it I had been half imagining

that at the last moment something would happen, something that would

stop this fatal trial; maybe that La Hire would burst in at the gates

with his hellions at his back; maybe that God would have pity and

stretch forth His mighty hand. But now--now there was no hope.

The trial was to begin in the chapel of the fortress and would be

public. So I went sorrowing away and told Noel, so that he might be

there early and secure a place. It would give him a chance to look again

upon the face which we so revered and which was so precious to us.

All the way, both going and coming, I plowed through chattering and

rejoicing multitudes of English soldiery and English-hearted French

citizens. There was no talk but of the coming event. Many times I heard

the remark, accompanied by a pitiless laugh:

“The fat Bishop has got things as he wants them at last, and says he

will lead the vile witch a merry dance and a short one.”

But here and there I glimpsed compassion and distress in a face, and

it was not always a French one. English soldiers feared Joan, but they

admired her for her great deeds and her unconquerable spirit.

In the morning Manchon and I went early, yet as we approached the

vast fortress we found crowds of men already there and still others

gathering. The chapel was already full and the way barred against

further admissions of unofficial persons. We took our appointed places.

Throned on high sat the president, Cauchon, Bishop of Beauvais, in

his grand robes, and before him in rows sat his robed court--fifty

distinguished ecclesiastics, men of high degree in the Church, of

clear-cut intellectual faces, men of deep learning, veteran adepts in

strategy and casuistry, practised setters of traps for ignorant minds

and unwary feet. When I looked around upon this army of masters of

legal fence, gathered here to find just one verdict and no other,

and remembered that Joan must fight for her good name and her life

single-handed against them, I asked myself what chance an ignorant poor

country-girl of nineteen could have in such an unequal conflict; and

my heart sank down low, very low. When I looked again at that obese

president, puffing and wheezing there, his great belly distending and

receding with each breath, and noted his three chins, fold above fold,

and his knobby and knotty face, and his purple and splotchy complexion,

and his repulsive cauliflower nose, and his cold and malignant eyes--a

brute, every detail of him--my heart sank lower still. And when I noted

that all were afraid of this man, and shrank and fidgeted in their seats

when his eye smote theirs, my last poor ray of hope dissolved away and

wholly disappeared.

There was one unoccupied seat in this place, and only one. It was over

against the wall, in view of every one. It was a little wooden bench

without a back, and it stood apart and solitary on a sort of dais. Tall

men-at-arms in morion, breastplate, and steel gauntlets stood as stiff

as their own halberds on each side of this dais, but no other creature

was near by it. A pathetic little bench to me it was, for I knew whom it

was for; and the sight of it carried my mind back to the great court at

Poitiers, where Joan sat upon one like it and calmly fought her cunning

fight with the astonished doctors of the Church and Parliament, and

rose from it victorious and applauded by all, and went forth to fill the

world with the glory of her name.

What a dainty little figure she was, and how gentle and innocent, how

winning and beautiful in the fresh bloom of her seventeen years! Those

were grand days. And so recent--for she was just nineteen now--and how

much she had seen since, and what wonders she had accomplished!

But now--oh, all was changed now. She had been languishing in dungeons,

away from light and air and the cheer of friendly faces, for nearly

three-quarters of a year--she, born child of the sun, natural comrade of

the birds and of all happy free creatures. She would be weary now, and

worn with this long captivity, her forces impaired; despondent, perhaps,

as knowing there was no hope. Yes, all was changed.

All this time there had been a muffled hum of conversation, and rustling

of robes and scraping of feet on the floor, a combination of dull noises

which filled all the place. Suddenly:

“Produce the accused!”

It made me catch my breath. My heart began to thump like a hammer. But

there was silence now--silence absolute. All those noises ceased, and

it was as if they had never been. Not a sound; the stillness grew

oppressive; it was like a weight upon one. All faces were turned toward

the door; and one could properly expect that, for most of the people

there suddenly realized, no doubt, that they were about to see, in

actual flesh and blood, what had been to them before only an embodied

prodigy, a word, a phrase, a world-girdling Name.

The stillness continued. Then, far down the stone-paved corridors, one

heard a vague slow sound approaching: clank... clink... clank--Joan of

Arc, Deliverer of France, in chains!

My head swam; all things whirled and spun about me. Ah, I was realizing,

too.

5 Fifty Experts Against a Novice

I GIVE you my honor now that I am not going to distort or discolor the

facts of this miserable trial. No, I will give them to you honestly,

detail by detail, just as Manchon and I set them down daily in the

official record of the court, and just as one may read them in the

printed histories.

There will be only this difference: that in talking familiarly with you,

I shall use my right to comment upon the proceedings and explain them as

I go along, so that you can understand them better; also, I shall throw

in trifles which came under our eyes and have a certain interest for you

and me, but were not important enough to go into the official record.

(1) To take up my story now where I left off. We heard the clanking of

Joan's chains down the corridors; she was approaching.

Presently she appeared; a thrill swept the house, and one heard deep

breaths drawn. Two guardsmen followed her at a short distance to the

rear. Her head was bowed a little, and she moved slowly, she being weak

and her irons heavy. She had on men's attire--all black; a soft woolen

stuff, intensely black, funereally black, not a speck of relieving color

in it from her throat to the floor. A wide collar of this same black

stuff lay in radiating folds upon her shoulders and breast; the sleeves

of her doublet were full, down to the elbows, and tight thence to her

manacled wrists; below the doublet, tight black hose down to the chains

on her ankles.

Half-way to her bench she stopped, just where a wide shaft of light fell

slanting from a window, and slowly lifted her face. Another thrill!--it

was totally colorless, white as snow; a face of gleaming snow set in

vivid contrast upon that slender statue of somber unmitigated black. It

was smooth and pure and girlish, beautiful beyond belief, infinitely

sad and sweet. But, dear, dear! when the challenge of those untamed

eyes fell upon that judge, and the droop vanished from her form and

it straightened up soldierly and noble, my heart leaped for joy; and I

said, all is well, all is well--they have not broken her, they have not

conquered her, she is Joan of Arc still! Yes, it was plain to me now

that there was one spirit there which this dreaded judge could not quell

nor make afraid.

She moved to her place and mounted the dais and seated herself upon her

bench, gathering her chains into her lap and nestling her little white

hands there. Then she waited in tranquil dignity, the only person there

who seemed unmoved and unexcited. A bronzed and brawny English soldier,

standing at martial ease in the front rank of the citizen spectators,

did now most gallantly and respectfully put up his great hand and give

her the military salute; and she, smiling friendly, put up hers and

returned it; whereat there was a sympathetic little break of applause,

which the judge sternly silence.

Now the memorable inquisition called in history the Great Trial began.

Fifty experts against a novice, and no one to help the novice!

The judge summarized the circumstances of the case and the public

reports and suspicions upon which it was based; then he required Joan to

kneel and make oath that she would answer with exact truthfulness to all

questions asked her.

Joan's mind was not asleep. It suspected that dangerous possibilities

might lie hidden under this apparently fair and reasonable demand.

She answered with the simplicity which so often spoiled the enemy's

best-laid plans in the trial at Poitiers, and said:

“No; for I do not know what you are going to ask me; you might ask of me

things which I would not tell you.”

This incensed the Court, and brought out a brisk flurry of angry

exclamations. Joan was not disturbed. Cauchon raised his voice and began

to speak in the midst of this noise, but he was so angry that he could

hardly get his words out. He said:

“With the divine assistance of our Lord we require you to expedite these

proceedings for the welfare of your conscience. Swear, with your hands

upon the Gospels, that you will answer true to the questions which shall

be asked you!” and he brought down his fat hand with a crash upon his

official table.

Joan said, with composure:

“As concerning my father and mother, and the faith, and what things

I have done since my coming into France, I will gladly answer; but as

regards the revelations which I have received from God, my Voices have

forbidden me to confide them to any save my King--”

Here there was another angry outburst of threats and expletives, and

much movement and confusion; so she had to stop, and wait for the noise

to subside; then her waxen face flushed a little and she straightened

up and fixed her eye on the judge, and finished her sentence in a voice

that had the old ring to it:

--“and I will never reveal these things though you cut my head off!”

Well, maybe you know what a deliberative body of Frenchmen is like. The

judge and half the court were on their feet in a moment, and all shaking

their fists at the prisoner, and all storming and vituperating at once,

so that you could hardly hear yourself think. They kept this up several

minutes; and because Joan sat untroubled and indifferent they grew

madder and noisier all the time. Once she said, with a fleeting trace of

the old-time mischief in her eye and manner:

“Prithee, speak one at a time, fair lords, then I will answer all of

you.”

At the end of three whole hours of furious debating over the oath,

the situation had not changed a jot. The Bishop was still requiring an

unmodified oath, Joan was refusing for the twentieth time to take any

except the one which she had herself proposed. There was a physical

change apparent, but it was confined to the court and judge; they

were hoarse, droopy, exhausted by their long frenzy, and had a sort of

haggard look in their faces, poor men, whereas Joan was still placid and

reposeful and did not seem noticeably tired.

The noise quieted down; there was a waiting pause of some moments'

duration. Then the judge surrendered to the prisoner, and with

bitterness in his voice told her to take the oath after her own fashion.

Joan sunk at once to her knees; and as she laid her hands upon the

Gospels, that big English soldier set free his mind:

“By God, if she were but English, she were not in this place another

half a second!”

It was the soldier in him responding to the soldier in her. But what

a stinging rebuke it was, what an arraignment of French character and

French royalty! Would that he could have uttered just that one phrase

in the hearing of Orleans! I know that that grateful city, that adoring

city, would have risen to the last man and the last woman, and marched

upon Rouen. Some speeches--speeches that shame a man and humble

him--burn themselves into the memory and remain there. That one is

burned into mine.

After Joan had made oath, Cauchon asked her her name, and where she was

born, and some questions about her family; also what her age was. She

answered these. Then he asked her how much education she had.

“I have learned from my mother the Pater Noster, the Ave Maria, and the

Belief. All that I know was taught me by my mother.”

Questions of this unessential sort dribbled on for a considerable time.

Everybody was tired out by now, except Joan. The tribunal prepared to

rise. At this point Cauchon forbade Joan to try to escape from prison,

upon pain of being held guilty of the crime of heresy--singular logic!

She answered simply:

“I am not bound by this proposition. If I could escape I would not

reproach myself, for I have given no promise, and I shall not.”

Then she complained of the burden of her chains, and asked that they

might be removed, for she was strongly guarded in that dungeon and there

was no need of them. But the Bishop refused, and reminded her that she

had broken out of prison twice before. Joan of Arc was too proud to

insist. She only said, as she rose to go with the guard:

“It is true, I have wanted to escape, and I do want to escape.” Then she

added, in a way that would touch the pity of anybody, I think, “It is

the right of every prisoner.”

And so she went from the place in the midst of an impressive stillness,

which made the sharper and more distressful to me the clank of those

pathetic chains.

What presence of mind she had! One could never surprise her out of it.

She saw Noel and me there when she first took her seat on the bench,

and we flushed to the forehead with excitement and emotion, but her face

showed nothing, betrayed nothing. Her eyes sought us fifty times that

day, but they passed on and there was never any ray of recognition in

them. Another would have started upon seeing us, and then--why, then

there could have been trouble for us, of course.

We walked slowly home together, each busy with his own grief and saying

not a word.

(1) He kept his word. His account of the Great Trial will be found to

be in strict and detailed accordance with the sworn facts of history.

--TRANSLATOR.

6 The Maid Baffles Her Persecutors

THAT NIGHT Manchon told me that all through the day's proceedings

Cauchon had had some clerks concealed in the embrasure of a window who

were to make a special report garbling Joan's answers and twisting them

from their right meaning. Ah, that was surely the cruelest man and the

most shameless that has lived in this world. But his scheme failed.

Those clerks had human hearts in them, and their base work revolted

them, and they turned to and boldly made a straight report, whereupon

Cauchon cursed them and ordered them out of his presence with a threat

of drowning, which was his favorite and most frequent menace. The matter

had gotten abroad and was making great and unpleasant talk, and Cauchon

would not try to repeat this shabby game right away. It comforted me to

hear that.

When we arrived at the citadel next morning, we found that a change

had been made. The chapel had been found too small. The court had now

removed to a noble chamber situated at the end of the great hall of the

castle. The number of judges was increased to sixty-two--one ignorant

girl against such odds, and none to help her.

The prisoner was brought in. She was as white as ever, but she was

looking no whit worse than she looked when she had first appeared the

day before. Isn't it a strange thing? Yesterday she had sat five hours

on that backless bench with her chains in her lap, baited, badgered,

persecuted by that unholy crew, without even the refreshment of a cup of

water--for she was never offered anything, and if I have made you know

her by this time you will know without my telling you that she was not a

person likely to ask favors of those people. And she had spent the night

caged in her wintry dungeon with her chains upon her; yet here she was,

as I say, collected, unworn, and ready for the conflict; yes, and

the only person there who showed no signs of the wear and worry of

yesterday. And her eyes--ah, you should have seen them and broken your

hearts. Have you seen that veiled deep glow, that pathetic hurt dignity,

that unsubdued and unsubduable spirit that burns and smolders in the eye

of a caged eagle and makes you feel mean and shabby under the burden of

its mute reproach? Her eyes were like that. How capable they were, and

how wonderful! Yes, at all times and in all circumstances they could

express as by print every shade of the wide range of her moods. In

them were hidden floods of gay sunshine, the softest and peacefulest

twilights, and devastating storms and lightnings. Not in this world have

there been others that were comparable to them. Such is my opinion, and

none that had the privilege to see them would say otherwise than this

which I have said concerning them.

The seance began. And how did it begin, should you think? Exactly as it

began before--with that same tedious thing which had been settled once,

after so much wrangling. The Bishop opened thus:

“You are required now, to take the oath pure and simple, to answer truly

all questions asked you.”

Joan replied placidly:

“I have made oath yesterday, my lord; let that suffice.”

The Bishop insisted and insisted, with rising temper; Joan but shook her

head and remained silent. At last she said:

“I made oath yesterday; it is sufficient.” Then she sighed and said, “Of

a truth, you do burden me too much.”

The Bishop still insisted, still commanded, but he could not move her.

At last he gave it up and turned her over for the day's inquest to an

old hand at tricks and traps and deceptive plausibilities--Beaupere, a

doctor of theology. Now notice the form of this sleek strategist's first

remark--flung out in an easy, offhand way that would have thrown any

unwatchful person off his guard:

“Now, Joan, the matter is very simple; just speak up and frankly and

truly answer the questions which I am going to ask you, as you have

sworn to do.”

It was a failure. Joan was not asleep. She saw the artifice. She said:

“No. You could ask me things which I could not tell you--and would not.”

Then, reflecting upon how profane and out of character it was for these

ministers of God to be prying into matters which had proceeded from His

hands under the awful seal of His secrecy, she added, with a warning

note in her tone, “If you were well informed concerning me you would

wish me out of your hands. I have done nothing but by revelation.”

Beaupere changed his attack, and began an approach from another quarter.

He would slip upon her, you see, under cover of innocent and unimportant

questions.

“Did you learn any trade at home?”

“Yes, to sew and to spin.” Then the invincible soldier, victor of Patay,

conqueror of the lion Talbot, deliverer of Orleans, restorer of a king's

crown, commander-in-chief of a nation's armies, straightened

herself proudly up, gave her head a little toss, and said with naive

complacency, “And when it comes to that, I am not afraid to be matched

against any woman in Rouen!”

The crowd of spectators broke out with applause--which pleased Joan--and

there was many a friendly and petting smile to be seen. But Cauchon

stormed at the people and warned them to keep still and mind their

manners.

Beaupere asked other questions. Then:

“Had you other occupations at home?”

“Yes. I helped my mother in the household work and went to the pastures

with the sheep and the cattle.”

Her voice trembled a little, but one could hardly notice it. As for me,

it brought those old enchanted days flooding back to me, and I could not

see what I was writing for a little while.

Beaupere cautiously edged along up with other questions toward the

forbidden ground, and finally repeated a question which she had refused

to answer a little while back--as to whether she had received the

Eucharist in those days at other festivals than that of Easter. Joan

merely said:

“Passez outre.” Or, as one might say, “Pass on to matters which you are

privileged to pry into.”

I heard a member of the court say to a neighbor:

“As a rule, witnesses are but dull creatures, and an easy prey--yes, and

easily embarrassed, easily frightened--but truly one can neither scare

this child nor find her dozing.”

Presently the house pricked up its ears and began to listen eagerly,

for Beaupere began to touch upon Joan's Voices, a matter of consuming

interest and curiosity to everybody. His purpose was to trick her into

heedless sayings that could indicate that the Voices had sometimes given

her evil advice--hence that they had come from Satan, you see. To have

dealing with the devil--well, that would send her to the stake in brief

order, and that was the deliberate end and aim of this trial.

“When did you first hear these Voices?”

“I was thirteen when I first heard a Voice coming from God to help me to

live well. I was frightened. It came at midday, in my father's garden in

the summer.”

“Had you been fasting?”

“Yes.”

“The day before?”

“No.”

“From what direction did it come?”

“From the right--from toward the church.”

“Did it come with a bright light?”

“Oh, indeed yes. It was brilliant. When I came into France I often heard

the Voices very loud.”

“What did the Voice sound like?”

“It was a noble Voice, and I thought it was sent to me from God. The

third time I heard it I recognized it as being an angel's.”

“You could understand it?”

“Quite easily. It was always clear.”

“What advice did it give you as to the salvation of your soul?”

“It told me to live rightly, and be regular in attendance upon the

services of the Church. And it told me that I must go to France.”

“In what species of form did the Voice appear?”

Joan looked suspiciously at he priest a moment, then said, tranquilly:

“As to that, I will not tell you.”

“Did the Voice seek you often?”

“Yes. Twice or three times a week, saying, 'Leave your village and go to

France.'”

“Did you father know about your departure?”

“No. The Voice said, 'Go to France'; therefore I could not abide at home

any longer.”

“What else did it say?”

“That I should raise the siege of Orleans.”

“Was that all?”

“No, I was to go to Vaucouleurs, and Robert de Baudricourt would give

me soldiers to go with me to France; and I answered, saying that I was a

poor girl who did not know how to ride, neither how to fight.”

Then she told how she was balked and interrupted at Vaucouleurs, but

finally got her soldiers, and began her march.

“How were you dressed?”

The court of Poitiers had distinctly decided and decreed that as God had

appointed her to do a man's work, it was meet and no scandal to religion

that she should dress as a man; but no matter, this court was ready to

use any and all weapons against Joan, even broken and discredited ones,

and much was going to be made of this one before this trial should end.

“I wore a man's dress, also a sword which Robert de Baudricourt gave me,

but no other weapon.”

“Who was it that advised you to wear the dress of a man?”

Joan was suspicious again. She would not answer.

The question was repeated.

She refused again.

“Answer. It is a command!”

“Passez outre,” was all she said.

So Beaupere gave up the matter for the present.

“What did Baudricourt say to you when you left?”

“He made them that were to go with me promise to take charge of me, and

to me he said, 'Go, and let happen what may!'” (Advienne que pourra!)

After a good deal of questioning upon other matters she was asked again

about her attire. She said it was necessary for her to dress as a man.

“Did your Voice advise it?”

Joan merely answered placidly:

“I believe my Voice gave me good advice.”

It was all that could be got out of her, so the questions wandered to

other matters, and finally to her first meeting with the King at

Chinon. She said she chose out the King, who was unknown to her, by the

revelation of her Voices. All that happened at that time was gone over.

Finally:

“Do you still hear those Voices?”

“They come to me every day.”

“What do you ask of them?”

“I have never asked of them any recompense but the salvation of my

soul.”

“Did the Voice always urge you to follow the army?”

He is creeping upon her again. She answered:

“It required me to remain behind at St. Denis. I would have obeyed if I

had been free, but I was helpless by my wound, and the knights carried

me away by force.”

“When were you wounded?”

“I was wounded in the moat before Paris, in the assault.”

The next question reveals what Beaupere had been leading up to:

“Was it a feast-day?”

You see? The suggestion that a voice coming from God would hardly advise

or permit the violation, by war and bloodshed, of a sacred day.

Joan was troubled a moment, then she answered yes, it was a feast-day.

“Now, then, tell the this: did you hold it right to make the attack on

such a day?”

This was a shot which might make the first breach in a wall which had

suffered no damage thus far. There was immediate silence in the court

and intense expectancy noticeable all about. But Joan disappointed the

house. She merely made a slight little motion with her hand, as when one

brushes away a fly, and said with reposeful indifference:

“Passez outre.”

Smiles danced for a moment in some of the sternest faces there,

and several men even laughed outright. The trap had been long and

laboriously prepared; it fell, and was empty.

The court rose. It had sat for hours, and was cruelly fatigued. Most

of the time had been taken up with apparently idle and purposeless

inquiries about the Chinon events, the exiled Duke of Orleans, Joan's

first proclamation, and so on, but all this seemingly random stuff

had really been sown thick with hidden traps. But Joan had fortunately

escaped them all, some by the protecting luck which attends upon

ignorance and innocence, some by happy accident, the others by force of

her best and surest helper, the clear vision and lightning intuitions of

her extraordinary mind.

Now, then, this daily baiting and badgering of this friendless girl, a

captive in chains, was to continue a long, long time--dignified sport,

a kennel of mastiffs and bloodhounds harassing a kitten!--and I may as

well tell you, upon sworn testimony, what it was like from the first

day to the last. When poor Joan had been in her grave a quarter of

a century, the Pope called together that great court which was to

re-examine her history, and whose just verdict cleared her illustrious

name from every spot and stain, and laid upon the verdict and conduct

of our Rouen tribunal the blight of its everlasting execrations. Manchon

and several of the judges who had been members of our court were among

the witnesses who appeared before that Tribunal of Rehabilitation.

Recalling these miserable proceedings which I have been telling you

about, Manchon testified thus:--here you have it, all in fair print in

the unofficial history:

When Joan spoke of her apparitions she was interrupted at almost every

word. They wearied her with long and multiplied interrogatories upon

all sorts of things. Almost every day the interrogatories of the morning

lasted three or four hours; then from these morning interrogatories they

extracted the particularly difficult and subtle points, and these served

as material for the afternoon interrogatories, which lasted two or three

hours. Moment by moment they skipped from one subject to another; yet

in spite of this she always responded with an astonishing wisdom and

memory. She often corrected the judges, saying, “But I have already

answered that once before--ask the recorder,” referring them to me.

And here is the testimony of one of Joan's judges. Remember, these

witnesses are not talking about two or three days, they are talking

about a tedious long procession of days:

They asked her profound questions, but she extricated herself quite

well. Sometimes the questioners changed suddenly and passed on to

another subject to see if she would not contradict herself. They

burdened her with long interrogatories of two or three hours, from which

the judges themselves went forth fatigued. From the snares with which

she was beset the expertest man in the world could not have extricated

himself but with difficulty. She gave her responses with great prudence;

indeed to such a degree that during three weeks I believed she was

inspired.

Ah, had she a mind such as I have described? You see what these priests

say under oath--picked men, men chosen for their places in that terrible

court on account of their learning, their experience, their keen and

practised intellects, and their strong bias against the prisoner. They

make that poor country-girl out the match, and more than the match, of

the sixty-two trained adepts. Isn't it so? They from the University of

Paris, she from the sheepfold and the cow-stable!

Ah, yes, she was great, she was wonderful. It took six thousand years

to produce her; her like will not be seen in the earth again in fifty

thousand. Such is my opinion.

7 Craft That Was in Vain

THE THIRD meeting of the court was in that same spacious chamber, next

day, 24th of February.

How did it begin? In just the same old way. When the preparations were

ended, the robed sixty-two massed in their chairs and the guards and

order-keepers distributed to their stations, Cauchon spoke from his

throne and commanded Joan to lay her hands upon the Gospels and swear to

tell the truth concerning everything asked her!

Joan's eyes kindled, and she rose; rose and stood, fine and noble, and

faced toward the Bishop and said:

“Take care what you do, my lord, you who are my judge, for you take a

terrible responsibility on yourself and you presume too far.”

It made a great stir, and Cauchon burst out upon her with an awful

threat--the threat of instant condemnation unless she obeyed. That

made the very bones of my body turn cold, and I saw cheeks about me

blanch--for it meant fire and the stake! But Joan, still standing,

answered him back, proud and undismayed:

“Not all the clergy in Paris and Rouen could condemn me, lacking the

right!”

This made a great tumult, and part of it was applause from the

spectators. Joan resumed her seat.

The Bishop still insisted. Joan said:

“I have already made oath. It is enough.”

The Bishop shouted:

“In refusing to swear, you place yourself under suspicion!”

“Let be. I have sworn already. It is enough.”

The Bishop continued to insist. Joan answered that “she would tell what

she knew--but not all that she knew.”

The Bishop plagued her straight along, till at last she said, in a weary

tone:

“I came from God; I have nothing more to do here. Return me to God, from

whom I came.”

It was piteous to hear; it was the same as saying, “You only want my

life; take it and let me be at peace.”

The Bishop stormed out again:

“Once more I command you to--”

Joan cut in with a nonchalant “Passez outre,” and Cauchon retired from

the struggle; but he retired with some credit this time, for he offered

a compromise, and Joan, always clear-headed, saw protection for herself

in it and promptly and willingly accepted it. She was to swear to tell

the truth “as touching the matters et down in the proces verbal.” They

could not sail her outside of definite limits, now; her course was

over a charted sea, henceforth. The Bishop had granted more than he had

intended, and more than he would honestly try to abide by.

By command, Beaupere resumed his examination of the accused. It being

Lent, there might be a chance to catch her neglecting some detail of

her religious duties. I could have told him he would fail there. Why,

religion was her life!

“Since when have you eaten or drunk?”

If the least thing had passed her lips in the nature of sustenance,

neither her youth nor the fact that she was being half starved in her

prison could save her from dangerous suspicion of contempt for the

commandments of the Church.

“I have done neither since yesterday at noon.”

The priest shifted to the Voices again.

“When have you heard your Voice?”

“Yesterday and to-day.”

“At what time?”

“Yesterday it was in the morning.”

“What were you doing then?”

“I was asleep and it woke me.”

“By touching your arm?”

“No, without touching me.”

“Did you thank it? Did you kneel?”

He had Satan in his mind, you see; and was hoping, perhaps, that by and

by it could be shown that she had rendered homage to the arch enemy of

God and man.

“Yes, I thanked it; and knelt in my bed where I was chained, and joined

my hands and begged it to implore God's help for me so that I might have

light and instruction as touching the answers I should give here.”

“Then what did the Voice say?”

“It told me to answer boldly, and God would help me.” Then she turned

toward Cauchon and said, “You say that you are my judge; now I tell you

again, take care what you do, for in truth I am sent of God and you are

putting yourself in great danger.”

Beaupere asked her if the Voice's counsels were not fickle and variable.

“No. It never contradicts itself. This very day it has told me again to

answer boldly.”

“Has it forbidden you to answer only part of what is asked you?”

“I will tell you nothing as to that. I have revelations touching the

King my master, and those I will not tell you.” Then she was stirred by

a great emotion, and the tears sprang to her eyes and she spoke out as

with strong conviction, saying:

“I believe wholly--as wholly as I believe the Christian faith and that

God has redeemed us from the fires of hell, that God speaks to me by

that Voice!”

Being questioned further concerning the Voice, she said she was not at

liberty to tell all she knew.

“Do you think God would be displeased at your telling the whole truth?”

“The Voice has commanded me to tell the King certain things, and not

you--and some very lately--even last night; things which I would he

knew. He would be more easy at his dinner.”

“Why doesn't the Voice speak to the King itself, as it did when you were

with him? Would it not if you asked it?”

“I do not know if it be the wish of God.” She was pensive a moment or

two, busy with her thoughts and far away, no doubt; then she added a

remark in which Beaupere, always watchful, always alert, detected a

possible opening--a chance to set a trap. Do you think he jumped at

it instantly, betraying the joy he had in his mind, as a young hand at

craft and artifice would do?

No, oh, no, you could not tell that he had noticed the remark at all. He

slid indifferently away from it at once, and began to ask idle questions

about other things, so as to slip around and spring on it from behind,

so to speak: tedious and empty questions as to whether the Voice had

told her she would escape from this prison; and if it had furnished

answers to be used by her in to-day's seance; if it was accompanied with

a glory of light; if it had eyes, etc. That risky remark of Joan's was

this:

“Without the Grace of God I could do nothing.”

The court saw the priest's game, and watched his play with a cruel

eagerness. Poor Joan was grown dreamy and absent; possibly she was

tired. Her life was in imminent danger, and she did not suspect it. The

time was ripe now, and Beaupere quietly and stealthily sprang his trap:

“Are you in a state of Grace?”

Ah, we had two or three honorable brave men in that pack of judges; and

Jean Lefevre was one of them. He sprang to his feet and cried out:

“It is a terrible question! The accused is not obliged to answer it!”

Cauchon's face flushed black with anger to see this plank flung to the

perishing child, and he shouted:

“Silence! and take your seat. The accused will answer the question!”

There was no hope, no way out of the dilemma; for whether she said yes

or whether she said no, it would be all the same--a disastrous answer,

for the Scriptures had said one cannot know this thing. Think what hard

hearts they were to set this fatal snare for that ignorant young girl

and be proud of such work and happy in it. It was a miserable moment for

me while we waited; it seemed a year. All the house showed excitement;

and mainly it was glad excitement. Joan looked out upon these hungering

faces with innocent, untroubled eyes, and then humbly and gently she

brought out that immortal answer which brushed the formidable snare away

as it had been but a cobweb:

“If I be not in a state of Grace, I pray God place me in it; if I be in

it, I pray God keep me so.”

Ah, you will never see an effect like that; no, not while you live. For

a space there was the silence of the grave. Men looked wondering into

each other's faces, and some were awed and crossed themselves; and I

heard Lefevre mutter:

“It was beyond the wisdom of man to devise that answer. Whence comes

this child's amazing inspirations?”

Beaupere presently took up his work again, but the humiliation of his

defeat weighed upon him, and he made but a rambling and dreary business

of it, he not being able to put any heart in it.

He asked Joan a thousand questions about her childhood and about the oak

wood, and the fairies, and the children's games and romps under our dear

Arbre Fee Bourlemont, and this stirring up of old memories broke her

voice and made her cry a little, but she bore up as well as she could,

and answered everything.

Then the priest finished by touching again upon the matter of her

apparel--a matter which was never to be lost sight of in this still-hunt

for this innocent creature's life, but kept always hanging over her, a

menace charged with mournful possibilities:

“Would you like a woman's dress?”

“Indeed yes, if I may go out from this prison--but here, no.”

8 Joan Tells of Her Visions

THE COURT met next on Monday the 27th. Would you believe it? The Bishop

ignored the contract limiting the examination to matters set down in

the proces verbal and again commanded Joan to take the oath without

reservations. She said:

“You should be content I have sworn enough.”

She stood her ground, and Cauchon had to yield.

The examination was resumed, concerning Joan's Voices.

“You have said that you recognized them as being the voices of angels

the third time that you heard them. What angels were they?”

“St. Catherine and St. Marguerite.”

“How did you know that it was those two saints? How could you tell the

one from the other?”

“I know it was they; and I know how to distinguish them.”

“By what sign?”

“By their manner of saluting me. I have been these seven years under

their direction, and I knew who they were because they told me.”

“Whose was the first Voice that came to you when you were thirteen years

old?”

“It was the Voice of St. Michael. I saw him before my eyes; and he was

not alone, but attended by a cloud of angels.”

“Did you see the archangel and the attendant angels in the body, or in

the spirit?”

“I saw them with the eyes of my body, just as I see you; and when they

went away I cried because they did not take me with them.”

It made me see that awful shadow again that fell dazzling white upon her

that day under l'Arbre Fee de Bourlemont, and it made me shiver again,

though it was so long ago. It was really not very long gone by, but it

seemed so, because so much had happened since.

“In what shape and form did St. Michael appear?”

“As to that, I have not received permission to speak.”

“What did the archangel say to you that first time?”

“I cannot answer you to-day.”

Meaning, I think, that she would have to get permission of her Voices

first.

Presently, after some more questions as to the revelations which had

been conveyed through her to the King, she complained of the unnecessity

of all this, and said:

“I will say again, as I have said before many times in these sittings,

that I answered all questions of this sort before the court at Poitiers,

and I would that you wold bring here the record of that court and read

from that. Prithee, send for that book.”

There was no answer. It was a subject that had to be got around and put

aside. That book had wisely been gotten out of the way, for it contained

things which would be very awkward here.

Among them was a decision that Joan's mission was from God, whereas it

was the intention of this inferior court to show that it was from the

devil; also a decision permitting Joan to wear male attire, whereas it

was the purpose of this court to make the male attire do hurtful work

against her.

“How was it that you were moved to come into France--by your own

desire?”

“Yes, and by command of God. But that it was His will I would not have

come. I would sooner have had my body torn in sunder by horses than

come, lacking that.”

Beaupere shifted once more to the matter of the male attire, now, and

proceeded to make a solemn talk about it. That tried Joan's patience;

and presently she interrupted and said:

“It is a trifling thing and of no consequence. And I did not put it on

by counsel of any man, but by command of God.”

“Robert de Baudricourt did not order you to wear it?”

“No.”

“Did you think you did well in taking the dress of a man?”

“I did well to do whatsoever thing God commanded me to do.”

“But in this particular case do you think you did well in taking the

dress of a man?”

“I have done nothing but by command of God.”

Beaupere made various attempts to lead her into contradictions

of herself; also to put her words and acts in disaccord with the

Scriptures. But it was lost time. He did not succeed. He returned to her

visions, the light which shone about them, her relations with the King,

and so on.

“Was there an angel above the King's head the first time you saw him?”

“By the Blessed Mary!--”

She forced her impatience down, and finished her sentence with

tranquillity: “If there was one I did not see it.”

“Was there light?”

“There were more than three thousand soldiers there, and five hundred

torches, without taking account of spiritual light.”

“What made the King believe in the revelations which you brought him?”

“He had signs; also the counsel of the clergy.”

“What revelations were made to the King?”

“You will not get that out of me this year.”

Presently she added: “During three weeks I was questioned by the clergy

at Chinon and Poitiers. The King had a sign before he would believe; and

the clergy were of opinion that my acts were good and not evil.”

The subject was dropped now for a while, and Beaupere took up the matter

of the miraculous sword of Fierbois to see if he could not find a chance

there to fix the crime of sorcery upon Joan.

“How did you know that there was an ancient sword buried in the ground

under the rear of the altar of the church of St. Catherine of Fierbois?”

Joan had no concealments to make as to this:

“I knew the sword was there because my Voices told me so; and I sent to

ask that it be given to me to carry in the wars. It seemed to me that it

was not very deep in the ground. The clergy of the church caused it to

be sought for and dug up; and they polished it, and the rust fell easily

off from it.”

“Were you wearing it when you were taken in battle at Compiegne?”

“No. But I wore it constantly until I left St. Denis after the attack

upon Paris.”

This sword, so mysteriously discovered and so long and so constantly

victorious, was suspected of being under the protection of enchantment.

“Was that sword blest? What blessing had been invoked upon it?”

“None. I loved it because it was found in the church of St. Catherine,

for I loved that church very dearly.”

She loved it because it had been built in honor of one of her angels.

“Didn't you lay it upon the altar, to the end that it might be lucky?”

(The altar of St. Denis.) “No.”

“Didn't you pray that it might be made lucky?”

“Truly it were no harm to wish that my harness might be fortunate.”

“Then it was not that sword which you wore in the field of Compiegne?

What sword did you wear there?”

“The sword of the Burgundian Franquet d'Arras, whom I took prisoner in

the engagement at Lagny. I kept it because it was a good war-sword--good

to lay on stout thumps and blows with.”

She said that quite simply; and the contrast between her delicate

little self and the grim soldier words which she dropped with such easy

familiarity from her lips made many spectators smile.

“What is become of the other sword? Where is it now?”

“Is that in the proces verbal?”

Beaupere did not answer.

“Which do you love best, your banner or your sword?”

Her eye lighted gladly at the mention of her banner, and she cried out:

“I love my banner best--oh, forty times more than the sword! Sometimes

I carried it myself when I charged the enemy, to avoid killing any one.”

Then she added, naively, and with again that curious contrast between

her girlish little personality and her subject, “I have never killed

anyone.”

It made a great many smile; and no wonder, when you consider what a

gentle and innocent little thing she looked. One could hardly believe

she had ever even seen men slaughtered, she look so little fitted for

such things.

“In the final assault at Orleans did you tell your soldiers that the

arrows shot by the enemy and the stones discharged from their catapults

would not strike any one but you?”

“No. And the proof is, that more than a hundred of my men were struck.

I told them to have no doubts and no fears; that they would raise the

siege. I was wounded in the neck by an arrow in the assault upon the

bastille that commanded the bridge, but St. Catherine comforted me and I

was cured in fifteen days without having to quit the saddle and leave my

work.”

“Did you know that you were going to be wounded?”

“Yes; and I had told it to the King beforehand. I had it from my

Voices.”

“When you took Jargeau, why did you not put its commandant to ransom?”

“I offered him leave to go out unhurt from the place, with all his

garrison; and if he would not I would take it by storm.”

“And you did, I believe.”

“Yes.”

“Had your Voices counseled you to take it by storm?”

“As to that, I do not remember.”

Thus closed a weary long sitting, without result. Every device that

could be contrived to trap Joan into wrong thinking, wrong doing, or

disloyalty to the Church, or sinfulness as a little child at home or

later, had been tried, and none of them had succeeded. She had come

unscathed through the ordeal.

Was the court discouraged? No. Naturally it was very much surprised,

very much astonished, to find its work baffling and difficult instead

of simple and easy, but it had powerful allies in the shape of hunger,

cold, fatigue, persecution, deception, and treachery; and opposed to

this array nothing but a defenseless and ignorant girl who must some

time or other surrender to bodily and mental exhaustion or get caught in

one of the thousand traps set for her.

And had the court made no progress during these seemingly resultless

sittings? Yes. It had been feeling its way, groping here, groping there,

and had found one or two vague trails which might freshen by and by and

lead to something. The male attire, for instance, and the visions and

Voices. Of course no one doubted that she had seen supernatural beings

and been spoken to and advised by them. And of course no one doubted

that by supernatural help miracles had been done by Joan, such as

choosing out the King in a crowd when she had never seen him before, and

her discovery of the sword buried under the altar. It would have been

foolish to doubt these things, for we all know that the air is full of

devils and angels that are visible to traffickers in magic on the one

hand and to the stainlessly holy on the other; but what many and perhaps

most did doubt was, that Joan's visions, Voices, and miracles came from

God. It was hoped that in time they could be proven to have been of

satanic origin. Therefore, as you see, the court's persistent fashion

of coming back to that subject every little while and spooking around it

and prying into it was not to pass the time--it had a strictly business

end in view.

9 Her Sure Deliverance Foretold

THE NEXT sitting opened on Thursday the first of March. Fifty-eight

judges present--the others resting.

As usual, Joan was required to take an oath without reservations. She

showed no temper this time. She considered herself well buttressed by

the proces verbal compromise which Cauchon was so anxious to repudiate

and creep out of; so she merely refused, distinctly and decidedly; and

added, in a spirit of fairness and candor:

“But as to matters set down in the proces verbal, I will freely tell the

whole truth--yes, as freely and fully as if I were before the Pope.”

Here was a chance! We had two or three Popes, then; only one of them

could be the true Pope, of course. Everybody judiciously shirked the

question of which was the true Pope and refrained from naming him, it

being clearly dangerous to go into particulars in this matter. Here was

an opportunity to trick an unadvised girl into bringing herself into

peril, and the unfair judge lost no time in taking advantage of it. He

asked, in a plausibly indolent and absent way:

“Which one do you consider to be the true Pope?”

The house took an attitude of deep attention, and so waited to hear the

answer and see the prey walk into the trap. But when the answer came it

covered the judge with confusion, and you could see many people covertly

chuckling. For Joan asked in a voice and manner which almost deceived

even me, so innocent it seemed:

“Are there two?”

One of the ablest priests in that body and one of the best swearers

there, spoke right out so that half the house heard him, and said:

“By God, it was a master stroke!”

As soon as the judge was better of his embarrassment he came back to the

charge, but was prudent and passed by Joan's question:

“Is it true that you received a letter from the Count of Armagnac asking

you which of the three Popes he ought to obey?”

“Yes, and answered it.”

Copies of both letters were produced and read. Joan said that hers had

not been quite strictly copied. She said she had received the Count's

letter when she was just mounting her horse; and added:

“So, in dictating a word or two of reply I said I would try to answer

him from Paris or somewhere where I could be at rest.”

She was asked again which Pope she had considered the right one.

“I was not able to instruct the Count of Armagnac as to which one he

ought to obey”; then she added, with a frank fearlessness which sounded

fresh and wholesome in that den of trimmers and shufflers, “but as for

me, I hold that we are bound to obey our Lord the Pope who is at Rome.”

The matter was dropped. They produced and read a copy of Joan's first

effort at dictating--her proclamation summoning the English to retire

from the siege of Orleans and vacate France--truly a great and fine

production for an unpractised girl of seventeen.

“Do you acknowledge as your own the document which has just been read?”

“Yes, except that there are errors in it--words which make me give

myself too much importance.” I saw what was coming; I was troubled and

ashamed. “For instance, I did not say 'Deliver up to the Maid' (rendez

au la Pucelle); I said 'Deliver up to the King' (rendez au Roi); and I

did not call myself 'Commander-in-Chief' (chef de guerre). All those are

words which my secretary substituted; or mayhap he misheard me or forgot

what I said.”

She did not look at me when she said it: she spared me that

embarrassment. I hadn't misheard her at all, and hadn't forgotten.

I changed her language purposely, for she was Commander-in-Chief and

entitled to call herself so, and it was becoming and proper, too; and

who was going to surrender anything to the King?--at that time a stick,

a cipher? If any surrendering was done, it would be to the noble Maid of

Vaucouleurs, already famed and formidable though she had not yet struck

a blow.

Ah, there would have been a fine and disagreeable episode (for me)

there, if that pitiless court had discovered that the very scribbler of

that piece of dictation, secretary to Joan of Arc, was present--and

not only present, but helping build the record; and not only that, but

destined at a far distant day to testify against lies and perversions

smuggled into it by Cauchon and deliver them over to eternal infamy!

“Do you acknowledge that you dictated this proclamation?”

“I do.”

“Have you repented of it? Do you retract it?”

Ah, then she was indignant!

“No! Not even these chains”--and she shook them--“not even these chains

can chill the hopes that I uttered there. And more!”--she rose, and

stood a moment with a divine strange light kindling in her face, then

her words burst forth as in a flood--“I warn you now that before seven

years a disaster will smite the English, oh, many fold greater than the

fall of Orleans! and--”

“Silence! Sit down!”

“--and then, soon after, they will lose all France!”

Now consider these things. The French armies no longer existed. The

French cause was standing still, our King was standing still, there was

no hint that by and by the Constable Richemont would come forward and

take up the great work of Joan of Arc and finish it. In face of all

this, Joan made that prophecy--made it with perfect confidence--and it

came true. For within five years Paris fell--1436--and our King marched

into it flying the victor's flag. So the first part of the prophecy was

then fulfilled--in fact, almost the entire prophecy; for, with Paris in

our hands, the fulfilment of the rest of it was assured.

Twenty years later all France was ours excepting a single town--Calais.

Now that will remind you of an earlier prophecy of Joan's. At the time

that she wanted to take Paris and could have done it with ease if our

King had but consented, she said that that was the golden time; that,

with Paris ours, all France would be ours in six months. But if this

golden opportunity to recover France was wasted, said she, “I give you

twenty years to do it in.”

She was right. After Paris fell, in 1436, the rest of the work had to be

done city by city, castle by castle, and it took twenty years to finish

it.

Yes, it was the first day of March, 1431, there in the court, that she

stood in the view of everybody and uttered that strange and incredible

prediction. Now and then, in this world, somebody's prophecy turns

up correct, but when you come to look into it there is sure to be

considerable room for suspicion that the prophecy was made after the

fact. But here the matter is different. There in that court Joan's

prophecy was set down in the official record at the hour and moment of

its utterance, years before the fulfilment, and there you may read it to

this day.