In a Dark Wood Wandering (72 page)

The chamber with the flowered tapestry is peopled with silent figures: they glide without sound, almost without motion, past the woman who is sunken, heavily and clumsily, into her wheelchair: Valentine with her sad smile, the young pale Isabelle, Louis toying with his gloves, Burgundy and Margaretha, cold and judging, Bourbon and Berry, two very old men, mistrustful beneath their displays of courtliness, Jean of Burgundy with his cold eyes, the dead crown princes, thin, pale youths bowed under their heavy purple, and last of all Charles, her husband, his eyes distended in madness. It is a procession which comes and goes incessantly, a procession of mists. They do not speak to her, these quiet passersby, they do not greet her, they do not look at her. Without touching the ground they fly past her, by day, by night. They carry a faint odor of dust and decay, of the far distant past. But the Queen does not talk about this, not even to her confessor, who visits her weekly.

From letters sent secretly by Dunois, Bastard of Orléans, to Charles, Duke of Orléans in the years 1428, 1429 and 1430.

“… we are now virtually bankrupt, Monseigneur my brother; I have little hope that fortune will smile on us in the near future. In more than fifteen years, we have not been in so bad a situation as this, and you know very well what that means. God grant that the King—for here we consider him our lawful king although he has not been crowned at Reims—will realize this and throw off his cursed irresolution. We have suffered many misfortunes because of his inability to act. It is his curse that he allows himself to be led blindly by his favorites; as long as these lords are loyal, everything goes reasonably well; but God help us when traitors predominate, and there are many of them, Monseigneur—that is why the military operations creep along; we mount no organized opposition. A skirmish here or there, nothing more; and whatever the valiant lads—especially our Scottish troops—manage to win, is immediately lost by us again because our cause has no leader. Bedford has at most
20,000 men at arms and these are spread out here and there over the occupied territories. In '24 he defeated our troops at Verneuil with an army of 5,000 men at most; it was a second Agincourt, thanks to the stupidity of the King's favorites. This is Bedford's greatest strength—that he has sharp insight, that he holds the reins firmly in his hands and through his air of self-assurance convinces friend and foe alike of England's superiority. But anyone who uses his intelligence must have seen long ago that all this is bluff, even though it is a massive bluff. We know that in England itself everything is going wrong. If I may believe the rumors, something is brewing in the government; the danger of civil war grows every day. Furthermore, no one can pretend that Burgundy has fraternal feelings toward England—on the contrary, the bonds between the two parties are so fragile that they threaten to snap at any moment.

“… What I have long expected has happened: the English lie before Orléans under the command of William de la Pole, Earl of Suffolk. They have occupied the Tourelles fort near the bridge over the Loire and have built a great number of fortifications and ditches to the south, west and northwest of the city. If they should succeed in taking Orléans, we are lost; the English will then rule the whole region of the Loire—Touraine, Berry and the Midi.

“Although we can at the moment supply men and provisions without too much difficulty, it does not appear that the city will be able to hold out. I have been captain of the garrison here for a few months now; there are surely as many defenders as there are attackers, but the fellows inside Orléans are listless and discouraged. They have no hope for a better future, they do not believe in an ultimate victory. The populace is desperate and fearful, exhausted by long years of war. This public temper, my lord brother, will destroy us all—unless there is a miracle.”

Dunois, Bastard of Orléans, did not believe in miracles; at any rate he did not believe that irresolution, timidity and stupidity could be miraculously transformed into courage, strength of mind and insight. He had, since he had served as captain of the army of the “King of Bourges”, learned how to give directions in the face of the King's almost morbid impotence. He knew that this man, with his badly tainted heredity, would never put forth the vigorous effort to make himself worthy of the Crown of France. Authority was in fact
divided between the King's mother-in-law, the energetic, ambitious Duchess d'Anjou, and the King's favorites, who were for the most part impoverished knights from the southern provinces, eager for their own profit. These parties did not share mutual interests; they were divided, perpetually involved in disputes and intrigues. While the English—without undue strain on their resources—drew an ever-tightening noose around the heart of France, while roaming bands of every description tormented and harassed the people, the bankrupt court at Bourges concerned itself only with petty scuffles for precedence and favors.

Dunois deliberately kept aloof from the poisonous atmosphere; when, however, his duty called him to Bourges, he armed himself with a stiff silence. He chose the company of captains like la Hire and de Broussart, men calloused and coarsened by continuous battle, unlettered and crude, but trustworthy and as hard upon themselves as upon their men. Dunois had fought side by side with these seasoned warriors against the English; at the defeats of Cravant, Ivry, Verneuil and at Montargis, the single victory, achieved with great effort. The years had passed for Dunois in a long series of sieges and battles, here and there bypassing all towns and castles near the front line, skirmishing, retreating, raiding. But what was the result of all this effort? It seemed to him that he and his comrades were like the men in the legend who attempted to build a dam of sand against the oncoming flood; his work was never completed. As soon as he turned his back the sea ate its way through his defenses again. On the ramparts of Orléans Dunois was overcome with despair. He knew that not more than 5,000 English were camped below the city, that their ranks were constantly being eroded by sickness and desertion. But still he could not persuade the people of Orléans to make any belligerent sallies against the enemy. In essence they were indifferent; they did not care whether the English took the city or not. Indeed, many believed that it would be better for them to surrender as soon as possible.

In February, 1429, Dunois learned that an English convoy was approaching the besieged city from Paris with wagons filled with salted fish for fast days. He decided to risk an attack on the convoy on its route. Messengers rode at full speed to Blois to instruct the Count de Clermont, who was stationed there with his men, to fall upon the English as they approached the city. As a result of Clermont's
dawdling—he seemed to suffer from the same unfortunate Bourbon family traits as his father and grandfather before him—the enterprise justifiably failed: the French were decisively defeated, although they far outnumbered the enemy. This defeat, known as the Battle of the Herrings, had a most deleterious effect upon the morale of the troops holding Orléans.

In a final attempt to shake the King from his lethargy, Dunois sent the young captain la Hire to the castle of Chinon. La Hire found the King, timid and distracted as usual, hidden in one of the small rooms reached only through secret doors. He was distressed to hear about the debacle, but he did not know what to say, and still less what to do.

La Hire returned to Orléans bitter and angry; with a string of violent curses—no one knew them better than he—he gave an account of his visit.

“We have to allow ourselves to be butchered here, Bastard,” he growled at last. “In the future the King and the fools and villains who cluster around him like lice on a sore head can do the dirty work themselves … unless he wants to try the peasant maid from Lorraine first—in Chinon that's all they talk about now. A courier came from Captain de Baudricourt in Vaucouleurs … It seems a young girl goes about there with a plan to drive the English out of France and to bring the King to Reims and the King, God keep him well, had nothing better to do than to listen to that sort of drivel. There you have all my news, Bastard.”

Dunois, who sat at the table signing vouchers for the payment of wages—a final measure to keep the men satisfied—did not reply at once. He answered, without raising his eyes from the paper, only when la Hire, still cursing under his breath, was preparing to leave the room.

“Let the King divert himself in his own way, la Hire. A child who is occupied in play is no trouble. We shall do our duty, and that is enough.”

Dunois spent the following days inquiring in his own way about the girl from Lorraine. He found to his amazement that the people of the city and the countryside knew already in detail about everything she had done. Stories had spread across the Loire, from Dom-remy and Vaucouleurs, the district where Jeanne—for that was her name—lived. She was the daughter of a peasant, people said, a sturdy
well-behaved maid who tended her father's sheep. But now she had heard voices, from God's Holy Self, or so she thought, which commanded her to free France and crown the King. Despite the protests of her parents and kinfolk, she had gone to Vaucouleurs to Captain de Baudricourt, the King's representative, to ask for safe conduct. Strange stories stubbornly circulated in hamlet and city. An old prophecy, once popular in the Lorraine borderland and now half-forgotten, was revived: a young virgin would one day appear from an oak forest to save the Kingdom. Wasn't there a grove of oaks behind Jeanne's father's property, the remnant of a vast prehistoric forest?

Dunois listened without comment to these tales; he was amused by the gullibility of the people who were ready, on the strength of an old prophecy, to see in this girl from Domremy the long-awaited Maid who would bring salvation. What did interest and surprise him was Jeanne's courage in holding fast to her convictions in the presence of the captain at Vaucouleurs, and even face to face with the Duke of Lorraine himself. What induced these men to listen to her, to support her proposals? He perceived that, without apparently being aware of it, she had a strange power which revived hope and the expectation of great events. And upon what was this enthusiasm based? On vague rumors, a simple tale which traveled from city to city—that a peasant maid was convinced that she had been sent by God to save the Kingdom. Dunois could not deny that the deep desire in the country for peace and freedom played a considerable part in the affair; nevertheless, day by day it became clearer to him that Jeanne the Maid, as she was now called everywhere, must possess to a considerable degree what he had for years wanted for the King, the commanders of the army and even, secretly, for himself: the ability to re-animate the masses who had lapsed into despair and deep apathy.

From Orléans, he followed events attentively: he heard how Jeanne, dressed like a man and accompanied by a few horsemen, had traveled to Chinon in a long day's journey across the ravaged, impoverished land through partially hostile territory; how she had remained serene and cheerful while her companions wavered, how she had shown herself sure of her mission at all times. This was impressive enough; Dunois was even more impressed to learn that she had not been taken in by an unchivalrous joke that the King
had tried to play on her: she had barely glanced at the disguised courtier who sat on the throne, but had pointed out immediately the man whom she persisted in calling the “Dauphin,” because he had not yet been crowned at Reims. Her dignified, unassuming behavior had made an impression on the King, but he was even more fascinated by the private conversation he had with her. Neither he nor she told anyone what was said there, but from that time on no one dared openly doubt her words in the King's presence. The favorites wisely kept their suspicions to themselves; it was impossible to resist the growing excitement.

When finally a college of clergymen had, at the King's request, carefully questioned Jeanne about matters of belief and given an unqualified judgment in her favor, Dunois considered this an answer and, in a letter to the King, urged that the Maid be sent to Orléans at the head of a contingent of auxiliary troops and a convoy of provisions. At the beginning of April, he received the news from Chinon: the King had entrusted Jeanne with the command, as he was requested to do.

Around noon of the twenty-ninth of April, 1429, Dunois, together with la Hire and a number of horsemen, crossed the Loire to the village of Checy to greet the Maid who was advancing from Blois to Orléans along the left bank of the river. It was a clear, warm day; the broad river sparkled in the sunlight. Dunois rode bareheaded. As usual he said little; la Hire, who rode beside him, was more talkative. The captain could not accept the idea that a woman could be expected to perform feats which even experienced soldiers had been unable to accomplish. He was ready to assume that the girl was more brave and devout than most people; otherwise he found the whole affair to be little more than a farce. Dunois listened, now and then turning his head to watch the flat-bottomed barges advance over the river; later in the day they would reach Orléans with the provisions which were their cargo. Once he stood up in his stirrups and shaded his eyes with his hand. The English reinforcements could clearly be seen, encamped on the other side of the river beyond Jargeau opposite Orléans.

In Chécy it appeared that the entire population had left the city to greet Jeanne the Maid, who was coming from the north. When
Dunois and his men rode out of the gates, they found the full force of auxiliary and commissariat troops standing and waiting for them in the fields.

“By my faith, a vanguard of priests!” La Hire roared with laughter.

Indeed, the front lines of Jeanne's army seemed to consist of nothing but friars, led by an Augustine monk who carried a banner depicting the crucified Christ. Dunois paid no attention to la Hire's curses and jeers; he ran his eyes swiftly over the ranks. A white banner was moving toward him, painted with gold lilies and brightly-colored figures. The troops parted to make way for a small procession: a horseman in a white breastplate on a black horse, followed by two shieldbearers and a few armored knights with their grooms and pages. Dunois dismounted and walked to meet them. He saw that the rider in the white cuirass holding the banner was Jeanne. She reined in her horse and looked down upon him with grave bright eyes.