He was a dark man. When he lifted his head he had brilliant dark eyes. What strange couplings, she thought. To produce him and Gilles and Fat Georges. All in one family.
Jehanne noticed de Boussac, d’Illiers and others had politely dismounted, even Gilles. For Richemont was Constable of France. Jehanne prepared to do the same as the others, but Alençon made a preventive gesture of his hand. She obeyed him. She thought how he’d certainly got more command in his manner. But he often commanded maniac things, such as no sentries. Was this another maniac command?
Richemont: I hear you were thinking of fighting me, Jehanne?
He grinned. All his officers chuckled as if they were trying to convey see, no guile!
Jehanne: I’ve never been able to bring in armies on my side.
He laughed. His peers peered.
Richemont: It’s just political. I want to join my king now Fastolf’s on top of us …
Bastard: I don’t think there’s much advantage to having you with us, Monsieur.
Richemont pretended to think this too was a good tease.
Richemont: I’ve had good days in the field. As much as anyone.
Jehanne: They tell me you’re a great witch-burner.
She received tangentially a little of the anger that was certainly there.
Richemont: There’ve been witches in the king’s court – de Giac for one. The king might need me at court to protect him from witches.
Bastard: We don’t seem to have had trouble with witches since you left last year.
Richemont: It takes a special eye.
Alençon: It seems it does.
Bastard: This rumour about Fastolf …
Little Richemont squinted over his left shoulder towards the forest.
Richemont: I haven’t seen any sign of its being true.
Alençon: You can keep guard at the bridge on the south bank.
Richemont: That’s not worthwhile employment. For a constable. For troops like these …
Bastard: If you don’t want it you can go away.
Richemont tolerated the insult and spent the day on the south bank.
Maître Jean the Gunner had been sent down from Orleans. All morning his bombardment ate away at the towers of Beaugency. The militia and knights, sitting in the sun on roofs and in the vegetable gardens, could tell how afraid the English and the people in Beaugency were. Soon a sort of fever would slit the walls.
In the afternoon the militia began working on the ditch outside the walled town. But a rumour grew up that Talbot would be giving up the town that night, and it seemed such a reasonable thing for the English to do that everyone sat down again in the dazzling afternoon and watched Maître Jean and his men. There were artillery barges in the river too, and in the little tributary flowing north-west called the Ru. If they did no damage they were good for scaring people and nice to behold if they belonged to your friends. In fact, there was enough light for gunners and spectators till nine o’clock.
At midnight, Monsieur Richard Gethyn, commander-in-name of Beaugency, sent two heralds to say he would give the town up, the castle and the bridge, and ride away to Meung, where the township was still in Goddam hands. The English would take with them their horse and harness and private property up to the value of one mark and no more. They would also swear not to take part in operations for another ten days. Monsieur Richard Gethyn himself and General Matt Gough would be kept as hostages.
No one slept. Everyone stayed up to watch the Beaugency garrison ride away and to whistle and call them names.
They hadn’t been half an hour gone when one of Poton’s scouts rode up to d’Alençon’s camp in a townhouse close to Beaugency walls to say he’d sighted Fastolf about five miles north of Patay. Talbot and the Beaugency English were on a line to join him. He had a convoy of hundreds of wagons and had been marching all night, as if he knew Beaugency was in a dance of fear.
Somehow, Richemont was there, amongst de Boussac, Gilles, d’Alençon, the Bastard, as soon as the news had been given.
Jehanne: A lot of people don’t want you here. But it looks as if it’s just as well.
D’Alençon looked at her reproachfully beneath a high brilliant moon. Richemont took her to one side.
Richemont: I’m very interested, did your Voices warn you Fastolf was here?
Jehanne: No.
Richemont: Why, do you think, not?
Jehanne: Poton had scouts out. There wasn’t any need for special counsel.
Richemont: You call it that? Special counsel?
Jehanne: Yes.
Richemont: How fetching.
The French knights rode off immediately to the north. Through the forests they came to the high plain above Beaugency. Behind them the moon-dazzle lit up the pit which was the valley of the great river. Where the plain descended to the north they could see the English coming south along the Paris road. Jehanne saw first light on their pennants. She had ridden up to a hill la Hire watched from.
La Hire: That’s them, Jehanne. All fitted out. Ready to fight. What do you say?
Jehanne: I don’t think they’re as happy as they look.
La Hire: Neither do I.
They laughed at each other.
Jehanne: Is it going to be very quick?
La Hire: If we hit them properly.
Their laughter was moist in the pristine air, the laughter of captains. It was a creation day, not a death day.
La Hire kept his cavalry on that hill and the Bastard lined out his militia either side of the Paris road and all the way up to a forest on the west. Knights and mercenaries stood between and behind the militia companies. The English stopped a mile and a half up the road and formed up similarly. La Hire wanted to go against them then.
La Hire: If we hit them now …
D’Alençon said there weren’t enough French in position.
La Hire: But they’ll dig in, they’ll make a wall of pointed stakes.
Alençon: So will we.
Time burned up under the sun. Incredibly the dawn led quickly to mid-morning, mid-morning fell into afternoon, as if through a hole in the day. On the hill some of la Hire’s men went to sleep.
The French army lined the ridges and put stakes in front of themselves and dug traps for horses. A mile north the English did the same.
Jehanne, tired, could not sleep. She had a bilious feeling of things not going as briskly as they ought to.
La Hire instructed her.
La Hire: For Fastolf it’s just like the battle of the Herrings again. See, he’s got wagons. He hasn’t left them strung out on the road, he spreads them over the country for his men to shelter behind. It’s already too late to deal with him.
D’Alençon again rode up for their counsel.
Alençon: What do you say, Jehanne?
Jehanne: See you’ve got your spurs on.
Alençon: For running away?
Jehanne: For chasing them. I think you ought to go against them now.
La Hire: It’s the same as Rouvray, ask the Bastard. We can’t move now.
Jehanne: This would finish them, wouldn’t it? Down here, I mean? Not in Paris or Normandy, not yet. But it’d finish them here.
Alençon: Yes.
Jehanne: And it’s certain they’re going to be finished … So …
La Hire: You can’t argue like that. This is Rouvray all over. Except we’re not doing anything rash this time. This is loggerheads.
De Boussac: I don’t think even the Scots will charge that line. Remembering Rouvray.
They heard the girl snorting in her annoying way.
Jehanne: Whatever’s not finished today has to be done tomorrow.
Two English heralds with dragon flags rode up the hill in late afternoon to offer single combat on behalf of two English knights.
D’Alençon and the Bastard knew that wouldn’t settle anything. They composed an answer. For today, get to bed and rest, because it’s getting late. Tomorrow, God willing, we’ll come to closer quarters
.
At night Minguet tried to wrap her in her flag so that she could sleep snugly, but she wanted to walk, being drunk with exhaustion. All over the hill knights slept in little encampments with their squires and pages.
She could see the glow of English fires foreshortened by the chassis of the wagons. But the fires died as she looked, three or four vanished at a time. It was a dark fresh night. She thought for no particular reason how supremely the old oak in Boischenu would stand on such a night, remembering or not remembering St John’s Gospel. She heard someone speak behind her and turned. It was the Constable. His face had a jaundiced radiance in the night.
Richemont: I said, you met the king in Chinon?
Jehanne: That’s right, Monsieur.
Richemont: With it’s three great towers – remember them?
Jehanne: The Tower of St George?
Richemont: The Middle Tower.
Jehanne: The Coudray. I stayed in la Coudray with people called …
But the name of her host and hostess did not come easily to her. Richemont suggested it.
Richemont: The du Belliers?
Jehanne: Yes, that was their name.
Richemont: I was lord of Chinon. Of all those towers. Of those hills.
Jehanne: It must have made you very happy. I remember Chinon better than any place I’ve visited.
Richemont: The king cancelled my rights in Chinon. A misunderstanding …
Jehanne: Oh?
Richemont: Last year.
Jehanne: I’m sure his reasons were good.
Richemont: I don’t deny that for a second. His reasons were excellent. It’s always like that at court though. Misunderstandings. People tell the king things. About one. It might happen to you.
Jehanne: I suppose so.
Richemont: I don’t want Chinon back. But I want to be welcome wherever the king is.
Jehanne: Yes.
Richemont: Will you speak to him for me? If I take an oath of fidelity in front of you? How about that?
Jehanne: What oath of fidelity?
Richemont: I swear by the spirits of the upper and lower air …
She thought: he’s witch-hunting. The night before battle he wants me to join him in invoking suspect spirits.
Jehanne: They’re not the spirits you invoke. Not for swearing faith to a king.
He jumped towards her and took her by the shoulders.
Richemont: I adjure you in the name of God the Father and his only begotten son Jesus Christ, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus …
She trembled.
Jehanne: Are you trying to cure me of devils?
Richemont: Why? Do you suffer from them?
Jehanne: No.
Richemont: Ah!
Jehanne: Do you really want me to talk to the king for you?
The yellow face wagged in the dark.
Richemont: Yes. I want to be taken back to the king’s breast. I led a revolt, if you want to know. You see, devils enter all of us. I gathered a league of lords. The Counts of Clermont and Pardiac were with me. They repented early and the king accepted their repentance. I repent now. I swear …
Jehanne: I don’t think you ought to swear any more.
Richemont: Do you always obey your Voices?
Jehanne: What else can I do?
Richemont: To be faithful to Voices is the beginning of virtue. Sleep tight.
He walked away blowing his nose into his moleskin glove. Jehanne considered if the madness, the confused talk, the begging for her intercession with Charles, was only assumed. If he wanted to arouse strange admissions in her. To protect his king from her witcheries. As he’d protected him once from de Giac’s. There were always prizes for performing such services.
Minguet had made her a comfortable bed out of her saddle and a palliasse. When she lay down the radiant Voices reassured her: the king’s victory, great victory in the morning. So much Goddam death. The priests must absolve all the English in the morning, they must absolve them where they stand. They won’t stand long.
First light on Saturday showed the wagons were gone from behind the palisades. La Hire galloped up the road and found three sick English boys in a tent. They told him their colleagues had crept away late in the night north towards Janville.
What were the Voices doing to her?
But la Hire was delighted. We’ll catch them, he said, if we saddle up now. We’ll catch them moving.
There was a smell of field breakfasts – herbs, bacon – in the morning while Alençon gave his orders. Poton could scout ahead with a hundred or so horsemen. Then the Bastard and de Boussac with an experienced vanguard, all of them survivors of Rouvray and Verneuil, up to all the worst things Goddams could do. Then la Hire appointed by d’Alençon to lead the main army.
La Hire: On two conditions, my lord duke.
Alençon: What are they?
La Hire: Richemont’s companies are allowed to ride with me.
Alençon: It doesn’t please me. But I can’t argue today. What else?
La Hire: The girl’s done everything she can, she can’t be of much use on a day like this, she can be a great nuisance. You can permit erratic behaviour in front of a walled town. If it goes wrong you pull back. But that doesn’t work in the open field.
Alençon: You remember Rouvray.
La Hire: By Holy Christ I do.
So Alençon had to talk Jehanne round to riding with the rearguard. First, she was precious. Second, many fine men were riding there that day – Gilles and a grandson of du Guesclin. Third, the rear-guard might have to save the battle if the front lines were routed. Fourth, Richemont had obeyed him and she ought to. If people didn’t co-operate they wouldn’t catch the English on the run. And so on.
It was agreed.
That morning the French army rode twelve miles. There wasn’t any cloud in the sky, Jehanne could feel sweat running between her breasts and her shoulder scar itched wildly.
The plain was screened by lines of forest. Behind such a screen Poton’s scouts might run up against the English rear-guard.
Thirst. Even Gilles did not converse. The birds stopped singing before ten o’clock.
Jehanne: What’s that spire over there?
Gilles: A village called St Sigismond, dear lady.
Jehanne: Why doesn’t anyone ask the people here if they saw Goddams today?
Gilles: If there’s anyone there, Poton’s already asked them. Maybe it’s a dead village.
Jehanne: The spire ahead?
Gilles: I don’t know. St Peravy I suppose.
He looked at the sun.
Gilles: If it’s midday – bells aren’t ringing anywhere.
They had no sense that the forests and tracks ahead were full of la Hire and his thousands, and in the haze of noon dead villages kept silence. Where were births, marriages, deaths solemnized in all that countryside?
Towards two o’clock they could see rising ground a few miles away, a square tower called Lignerolles above the tree-tops. Gilles, who had travelled on this road often enough, said they couldn’t see because the land lay deceptively, a mile or two beyond Lignerolles was a nice little town called Patay.
At that moment, Poton’s horsemen were on the edge of the hollow in front of Lignerolles. It revealed itself without warning, a pit of forest in front of them. From Poton’s left a stag jumped into the road, splendid, roan, a stallion creature. On its front hoofs it propped in front of Poton’s horse and went leaping down into the hollow. Poton’s horsemen stayed halted there, the lovely animal had imposed a hiatus on them.
Forty seconds passed. Below them they heard an outburst of Hurrahs. A Scot with Poton translated in a lowered voice.
Scot: They’re saying hurrah don’t let him get away, what a big bastard damn good shot. I get the right forequarter I spotted him, like hell you did, Jimmie spotted him before you even turned your head.
Poton sent messengers back to Alençon and the Bastard and did not move. Within minutes la Hire rode up with thousands of knights a
nd troopers. They spread themselves across the crest of the hollow, padded their horses hoofs, and edged down into the woods below them. La Hire believed they would come out into an open place where the English waited.
What had meanwhile happened with the English that noon was this: an English scout had reported the French army were coming up the Paris road at a good pace. Talbot’s men hadn’t slept the night before and mustn’t be caught moving. That was the English strength of eighty years’ standing: never to be caught moving. The deceased clever King Hal had practised it.
Talbot made his vanguard stop under the slope of Lignerolles. They made a screen of wagons, and the woods were behind them. He spoke to them briefly.
Talbot: This is a better position than the great Harry had at Agincourt. This is also as far as that Armagnac whore will ever get.
But some of them later said there must have been something lacking in the air they breathed, they knew it wasn’t going to be the way Talbot promised.
Talbot told Fastolf to get the main army too up behind the wagons at Lignerolles. To give them a chance to get there he himself picked five hundred of his best archers to screen them. They were all good men, old soldiers, they knew the English drill that had won Gravelles and Verneuil. They knew how to retreat in an orderly way, section by section. They had wagon-loads of stakes with them and cut others in the woods. They were expecting the French about four and would make fools of the heavy cavalry a few times. Then they would move back to the main army, keeping to the quickset hedges that lined the road and putting up flights of arrows from behind them if the French pursued.
In all the English army these were the men who were sure about the result, who weren’t convinced that the English method had lost its virtue.
They had a ditch dug for their screen of stakes. The stakes lay around in piles of fresh brown soil. An hour and a half early la Hire’s terrible armoured men appeared amongst the last fronds of the wood in front of them.
It seemed that no one spoke. The English archers looked with keen interest on the weapons, the edges of steel, that la Hire’s knights held. They could have been saying those are the instruments of our death, I wonder where they came from.
The stag hung bleeding from a triangle of stakes behind the English. It looked almost as if this were the just and holy thing they would die defending.
Blood Red, Sister Rose Page 33
