Sparrow (6 page)

Joan longed to be gone with the army to
Orléans; but, like Robert de Beaudricourt before him, the Dauphin began to lose his nerve after his first flush of enthusiasm. His marshals complained bitterly at the prospect of having a peasant girl leading their army. Only the great Marshall La Hire was firm in his support. “We have not done so well without God’s help,” he said. “If she is from God – and she may be – then let’s have God on our side. We need Him.” The bishops too sowed new doubts about her in his mind, and the doubts preyed on him. He sent countless bishops and learned clerics up to her tower to interview her; and he sent ladies to examine her purity, to make quite sure which she was, girl or boy. The Dauphin himself accompanied her to Poitiers where she had to endure long days of interrogation before more bishops and more learned clerics. Joan bore it all stoically, though on occasion her patience wore
very thin. They would ask her such silly questions, and she was always inclined to give as good as she got.

“Do you believe in God?” one asked her.

“Yes,” she snapped back, “and better than you.”

“Can you give us some proof that you are sent by God as you say you are?”

“By God’s name,” she replied. “I have not come to Poitiers to perform miracles. Lead me to Orléans, and I will show you the miracle for which I am sent.”

In the end it was not her answers that convinced the Dauphin, but the crowds that clamoured after her wherever she went. Just to ride alongside her through the people dispelled any lingering doubts he might have had. He could see for himself how fervent was their faith in her, how she had renewed their spirits and their hope. She was hailed everywhere as the God-sent saviour of France. So,
at long last, and to Joan’s great joy, he gave the word that she was to have all she needed, that no more obstacles should be put in her way, that the army should be made ready to march on Orléans.

More new joys awaited her, and unexpected ones, too. Knowing how said it made her to be away from her family, how she missed them, the Duc d’Alençon had sent for her brothers, Pierre and Jean, without telling her. They arrived one day at Chinon and the Duc d’Alençon led them at once to her tower. When all the tears and hugging were over, Pierre noticed Belami perched by the fire warming himself.

“You haven’t still got that infernal bird, have you?” he said.

“Yes,” said Joan, “and my skirt too.” And she threw her cloak about her shoulders. “See? They’re all I have left of home – but now, God be thanked,
I have you as well. And Father, Mother – are they angry with me for leaving you all so suddenly and without asking, without even saying goodbye?”

“No Joan, not any more,” said Jean. “They are proud of you, so proud, as we are.”

Wherever she went now her brothers rode with her, along with the Duc d’Alençon, Jean de Metz, Bertrand, and Richard the Archer as her bodyguard. She also had two heralds who went ahead of her, and, of course, young Louis who never let her out of his sight.

The Duc d’Alençon arranged for the best armourer in Tours to make her a suit of armour. She wanted it plain, she insisted, with no arms emblazoned. And so it was done. He had a lance made for her, too, and a battleaxe. The armourer wanted to make her a sword as well, but she refused.

“My old sword from Vaucouleurs I shall give to
my page, Louis. He has often asked for it so that he can protect me,” she told him. “My new sword, the sword I shall take into battle, was forged in heaven.” The armourer may have been amazed at this, but such was his faith in her, he did not for one moment doubt her. “So you need not make me a sword. But you can fetch it for me, if you will. Go to Fierbois, to the chapel of the blessed St Catherine. Tell the priests – they will know me for I was there not long ago – tell them to dig down into the ground behind the altar. There they will find a sword. It will be engraved with five crosses. It may well be a little bit rusty, but the rust will come away easily enough.”

So he went, and sure enough, just as she had predicted, that was exactly where the priests found it. When the armourer had cleaned it up, he brought it back to her at Chinon with two
scabbards, one of crimson velvet – a present from the people of Tours – and another in a cloth of gold that he had made himself.

“Too fancy. Both of them are too fancy,” she said to Louis when the armourer had gone. “I shall have a leather one made like all the other soldiers.”

The ladies at Chinon made her a standard to her own design: white for purity, with fleur de lys, and two angels embroidered on it, and ‘Jhesus Maria’ in large letters, for this was her motto, her battle cry. It was now the battle cry throughout the French army as they set out at long last on the march to Orléans, with Joan at their head and Belami riding high and happy on the point of her standard.

Joan slept every night in her chain armour, to get used to it. She ate with her soldiers and prayed with her soldiers too. Priests went ahead of them singing
Non Nobis
and the
Te Deum
. She let it be
known that because her army was fighting in the name of God there would be no swearing, no looting, no womanising. She would have none of it. Even amongst all the great nobles and dukes and marshals – including Marshal La Hire himself who was not known for his gentility – she would not tolerate bad language and most certainly no blasphemy. She was fierce in this and would brook no argument about it from them nor from anyone else. Indeed, as they were all soon to discover, this seemingly sweet-natured, simple country girl, once roused, could be fearsome in her anger.

It very soon became clear to Joan that some of the marshals of the army were treating her as little more than a sort of mascot, a lucky talisman. They murmured amongst themselves about the indignity of having to accept Joan as an equal. To them she was merely an illiterate, ignorant peasant girl, unfit
to be a soldier, and untried in any campaign. It was more than many of them could stomach. She might be useful for raising the morale of the soldiers, they felt, but that was all. So they told her nothing of their plans, and did not consult her on strategy, but instead humoured her gently, conforming to her wishes that there should be no crude soldier talk, no pillaging, and in particular no women. Grudgingly they accepted all she had decreed. Joan was the only woman in the five-thousand-strong French army that marched from Blois towards Orléans, along the south bank of the Loire river that rain-soaked April. With them went thousands of cattle and sheep and pigs and wagonloads of provisions, all for the relief of the besieged people of Orléans.

There was a rainbow over Orléans when she first saw it. The roofs of the city shone across the river under the distant sunshine. But as she stood there on the river bank, she was not completely happy. She sent for La Hire and the other marshals at once. “There is the river between us and the English,” she said, quite unable to hide her anger and her disappointment. “Tell me, how are we to fight the English if we are here and they are there? Why did you not tell me how things were?” La Hire tried to explain that it was safer to approach
from the south, that the English were stronger to the north of the city, that they would wait for the Governor of Orléans, the Bastard of Orléans, as he was called, to come across with his boats, then the army could cross. It would be safer that way, he said.

“Safe!” she blazed. “In God’s name, are we here for our safety? I am no one’s poodle, La Hire. I am the envoy not just of the Dauphin, but of God. Remember that. Never forget it.” And she stormed off leaving him lost for words. All he could do was marvel at her. “When he comes,” he whispered under his breath, “my friend the Bastard of Orléans is in for a hell of a surprise, I think.” Fully fifty paces away by now Joan whirled around pointing her sword at him. “Yes, indeed he is. And you mind your language, La Hire!”

That afternoon the Bastard of Orléans came
across the river to greet Joan. Her reputation, her fame, had gone before her. Like everyone else in Orléans he had been longing to meet this miraculous peasant girl who seemed to be rallying an entire nation, who had come to lift the siege of his city. But it was not quite the meeting he had been expecting.

“I suppose,” said Joan eyeing him darkly. “I suppose you must be the one they call the Bastard of Orléans. You’re the one who hatched up with La Hire and the marshals this silly notion of coming south along the river to avoid a fight with the English. Are you frightened of them too?”

No one in all his life had ever dared accuse the Bastard of Orléans of cowardice, until now. He should have been furious with indignation, but instead found himself being conciliatory.

“We thought it wisest, Joan, not to be caught
out in the open by the English, with all the beasts and the baggage. We thought it more important to first supply the city – the people are in dire need of what you bring. Then we can march the army in afterwards. After that we can sally out to fight the English whenever we like.”

Joan could see the sense in it and calmed at once. “Well you thought wrong not to tell me,” she told them all. “That’s all. Remember that I bring you the finest help that ever was brought to a city, since it is the help of the King of Heaven himself. We shall cross now right away. I am eager to see it, to see the people.”

But the marshals looked at once another in some consternation. “What is it?” said Joan. “What now?”

“That was just what we had in mind, Joan,” said the Bastard, “but there is a problem. The wind. We need a fair wind to bring the boats upstream,
and I’m afraid the wind is entirely in the wrong quarter. We need it to change. It could be some days.”

“Days! You should know,” said Joan quietly, “that I don’t much like to wait, not when I am about God’s work.”

With that she walked away from them down the river where she fell on her knees and prayed. Belami flew off to be with her. He was fluttering over her, trying to decide where best to land, when the wind gusted suddenly and changed direction, buffeting him out over the river. Joan opened her eyes, breathed the wind in deep, crossed herself and stood up. She turned round. La Hire, the Bastard of Orléans, the Duc d’Alençon, her brothers, were on their knees. Indeed, the entire army was on its knees, wondering at the miracle they had just witnessed. “Well,” she said, “you have your wind.
So, no more excuses. I want to eat my supper in Orléans tonight.”

Belami settled on her shoulder. “Ah Belami,” she said. “If only we could all fly like you. Then we’d have no need of boats or wind, would we? That would be something, wouldn’t it?” She laughed out loud as she read the thoughts in their heads. “No, no my friends, I cannot sprout wings. Come on, off your knees. There’ll be time enough for praying in Orléans.”

So the boats sailed across the Loire that afternoon and Joan was ferried across, along with all the beasts and the provisions, and the French army. By nightfall they were at the gates of the city.

From their forts the English looked on, too few, too surprised to do much about it, except hurl a few obscenities, and fire off a few cannons. But Joan and the French were well out of range of both.
Belami was in Orléans before Joan. He could not resist flying on ahead. Below him he could see the streets packed with people, the entire city lit by their torches. After a while he flew back to be with Joan, to perch in pride of place on the point of her standard as she rode in through the city gates and was at once enveloped by adoring crowds. But Belami very nearly came to grief. A torch touched a nearby banner and it burst instantly into flames, singeing Belami’s tail feathers. Joan was too busy putting out the flames to notice his discomfort. He did try to tell her, but in all the clamour he could not make himself heard. Once in her lodgings, she seemed to have little time for him. Instead he went and complained to Louis who fed him and stroked him. “She has not forgotten you, Belami,” said Louis. “She has a great work to do, and she must be about it. You understand that, don’t you,
Belami?” Belami understood it perfectly, but he did not like it, not with his feathers all singed.

The room was full of people. La Hire was there at her table as she ate her supper – some bread dunked in red wine, her favourite. So was Jean de Metz and Bertrand de Poulengy, the Duc d’Alençon, her two brothers and the Bastard of Orléans. It was the Bastard and La Hire who were doing most of the talking, arguing between them as to whether or not they should go to Blois for reinforcements before attacking the English. “Go for your reinforcements, if you like. But not yet,” said Joan. “I want no blood spilt until I have given the English a chance to retire from their forts.”

“But Joan,” said the Duc d’Alençon, “we have already sent a letter to the English. And what did you have back but insults? I tell you, they will not leave unless we make them leave. I know these
English. They won’t go just because you ask them to. For God’s sake, let’s be at them.”

“My fair duke,” said Joan, “your wife was right, you are a hot-head. But I tell you, I will spill no blood, English or French, unless I have to. My Lord in Heaven says I must do what has to be done, so far as I can, without bloodshed. So, my lord, I shall write another letter. Take this down and have it sent.” She thought for a moment and then began to dictate. “Talbot, Glasdale, and all you English dukes and soldiers. You see I have come to Orléans as I said I would. I urge you now, before it is too late, to give up the siege and go home to England where you belong. If you do not I shall be forced to attack you in your forts and drive you out. Go, Godoms, in God’s name, go.”

The next morning one of Joan’s heralds was dispatched to the English under a flag of truce. All
day she waited, and still the herald did not return. Joan, becoming more agitated by the minute, paced her room alone. Only Belami was with her. “Why do they not reply, Belami?” she said. “Don’t they know I mean what I say? Do they think I am frightened? Do they know me so well? For I am frightened, Belami, but not of fighting, nor of dying either, nor of being wounded. I know that one day soon I shall be wounded – here above my left breast, I know it. My voices have told me so. But it’s none of these things that frighten me. My voices tell me I must be a soldier, that I must lead my soldiers and fight alongside them. Until now I had not thought of it, Belami. If we fight, then there will come a time when I face my first Englishman sword in hand and I shall have to kill him. I don’t know if I can do it, Belami, not look him in the eyes and drive my sword into his flesh.
That is what frightens me. Please God they will surrender their forts and just march away. Please God. Where
is
my herald? Where is he?” But by evening the herald still had not returned, so she determined to deliver her message herself.

D’Alençon tried to stop her, so did her brothers. She would listen to no one. She would have one last try, she said, and forbade any of them to come with her. Alone she strode out over the bridge towards the Tourelles, the strongest of the ring of English forts that surrounded the town. “You English,” she called out. “I call upon you in God’s name to give yourselves up and save your lives.” But the rest of her appeal was drowned out by a chorus of jeering and whistling.

“Cow girl!” they cried. “Whore! Witch! Go back to your pigs. We’ll burn you to a crisp. Roast whore!”

Joan was not so much angry with them, as hurt,
hurt to the quick that they had spoken to her as they did. “I have done all I can and they will not listen,” she said to the Duc d’Alençon and La Hire, as they walked together sadly up through the town, the crowds thronging about her everywhere. “Very well, La Hire,” she said. “Send to Blois for reinforcements. Make your new plans. They want war. They shall have war.”

But even then, as they waited for the reinforcements to arrive, Joan did not give up her attempts at peaceful persuasion. The English lobbed cannon balls into the city, and still she tried. Every day for three days she went to the walls of the Tourelles and asked the English in the name of God to go. They refused even to send back her herald, but kept him prisoner. On the fourth morning the lookouts saw in the distance the flags and lances of the army from Blois. Joan took five hundred men
and led them out under the noses of the English to escort the army in. Belami flew out over the fort over the heads of the Englishmen who could only look on awestruck as the soldiers from Blois streamed in through the city gates, drums beating, pennants flying. There was no more jeering amongst them, and only a silence, the silence of fear. Belami flew back to Joan. “Maybe, Belami,” she said, “maybe once they see all this, once they see how many we are, how strong, how high our spirits are, maybe now they will leave.”

But they did not. On the contrary, news soon came that Sir John Fastolf was on his way with hundreds of English. On hearing that, Joan was furious. “Well then, on their own heads be it. Let them come.”

Joan was exhausted. She went upstairs to lie down in her room for an hour or two. Sleep
came only slowly. There was such a hubbub in the streets below. The city streets were crammed with soldiers, and her house was always besieged by adoring well-wishers. There was little peace. She did drift away into sleep, but only for a few short moments.

She woke with a jolt and sat up. “They are fighting, Belami. I know they are. There’s blood being spilt, French blood. Someone has ordered an attack. And they have not woken me. Don’t they know they cannot do it without me?” She armed herself quickly. She was already mounted in the street, when she discovered she had left her standard behind in her room. She sent Louis back up for it, and he handed it down to her out of the window. Then, with her brothers, the Duc d’Alençon and Richard the Archer with her, she clattered through the city, sparks flying from the horses’ hooves. She
knew exactly where the battle was, where she would be needed.

It was just as well she arrived at the Bastille St Loup when she did. Repulsed twice, already the French were gathering once again to attack the fort, but they had lost heart. They could see the English high and impregnable on their ramparts, their cannons firing, their arrows raining down on the French. So heavy was the fire that the French could only huddle under their shields. Then they saw Joan riding forward through their ranks, her standard fluttering above her head. It was the spur they needed. With a mighty cheer of “Jhesus Maria” they rushed the walls, threw their ladders up against them, and then were everywhere upon the English with such a sudden and unexpected ferocity that within an hour of her coming the fort was overwhelmed.

It did not matter that there were ten other forts around the city still in English hands. What mattered was that after months and months of siege the first of them had been taken. Joan ordered that all prisoners should be spared, the wounded of both sides cared for, and that there should be no looting.

That night in Orléans the bells rang out for a great victory. Joy was everywhere, everywhere that is except in Joan’s room. She lay on her bed and wept, wept for the dead, English and French alike, and went to confession. She had not killed. She had not even drawn her sword for fear she might, but she knew well enough she had caused over a hundred English to be killed.

Much against the wishes of La Hire and the marshals, Joan forbade all fighting the next day for it was a holy day, Ascension Day. She went to Mass and then sent her last message to the English. She
commanded Richard the Archer to fire it into the English camp. Belami followed him to the city walls, and then the arrow to where it fell. So he was there when it was brought to Talbot, the English commander.

“It is from the cow girl,” he said, and then read it out loud. “Listen to this. ‘You, men of England, you Godoms, who have no right to be here in this Kingdom of France, the King of Heaven commands you through me, Joan, to abandon your forts and go back where you belong. If you fail to retreat, I will do with all of you what I did to the English in the Bastille du Loup. I am writing to you for the last time.’ And she signs herself ‘Jhesus Maria, Joan the Maid’.” He screwed the letter up, hurled it to the ground and stamped it into the mud. “Who does she think she is?” he cried. “And who does she think we are to run away? I’ll see her burn first!”

Later that evening Joan had her answer. A figure appeared on the ramparts of the Tourelles for the whole city to see. It was unmistakably an effigy of Joan, and there was a notice hung around her neck: ‘The Whore of Domrémy!’ And then, to whooping cheers from the fort, they set fire to it, and pushed it out over the ramparts.

As Joan watched, the tears welled into her eyes. “Yesterday,” she said, “we took one of their forts. Tomorrow we shall take two more, the Bastille de St Jean de Blanc and the Bastille des Augustins. We shall cross the river and come round behind them.” She knew this was not the strategy the marshals had in mind, but she overruled them. “I may know nothing of military matters,” she said, “but remember, I have the hand of God to guide me.”