There was in these parts a robber chief on the Burgundian side named
Franquet d'Arras. The Maid had been sent, as she said, to help the poor
who were oppressed by these brigands. Hearing that Franquet, with three
or four hundred men-at-arms, was near Lagny-sur-Marne, the Maid rode out
to seek him with four hundred French and Scots. The fight is described
in one way by Monstrelet, in another by Cagny and Joan herself.
Monstrelet, being a Burgundian writer, says that Franquet made a gallant
resistance till he was overwhelmed by numbers, as the Maid called out
the garrison of Lagny. Cagny says that Franquet's force was greater than
that of the Maid who took him. However this may be, Franquet was a
knight, and so should have been kept prisoner till he paid his ransom.
Monstrelet tells us that Joan had his head cut off. She herself told
her judges that Franquet confessed to being a traitor, robber, and
murderer; that the magistrates of Senlis and Lagny claimed him as a
criminal; that she tried to exchange him for a prisoner of her own
party, but that her man died, that Franquet had a fair trial, and that
then she allowed justice to take its course. She was asked if she paid
money to the captor of Franquet.
'I am not treasurer of France, to pay such moneys,' she answered
haughtily.
Probably Franquet deserved to die, but a trial by his enemies was not
likely to be a fair trial.
At Lagny the Maid left a gentler memory. She was very fond of children,
and had a girl's love of babies. A boy of three days old was dying or
seemed dead, and the girls of Lagny carried it to the statue of Our Lady
in their church, and there prayed over it. For three days, ever since
its birth, the baby had lain in a trance without sign of life, so that
they dared not christen it. 'It was black as my doublet,' said Joan at
her trial, where she wore mourning. Joan knelt with the other girls and
prayed; colour came back into the child's face, it gasped thrice, was
baptised, then died, and was buried in holy ground. So Joan said at her
trial. She claimed no share in this good fortune, and never pretended
that she worked miracles.