saddles. Not even the dangers that threatened us could keep us
awake.
This tenth night seemed longer than any of the others, and of
course it was the hardest, because we had been accumulating
fatigue from the beginning, and had more of it on hand now than at
any previous time. But we were not molested again. When the dull
dawn came at last we saw a river before us and we knew it was the
Loire; we entered the town of Gien, and knew we were in a
friendly land, with the hostiles all behind us. That was a glad
morning for us.
We were a worn and bedraggled and shabby-looking troop; and
still, as always, Joan was the freshest of us all, in both body and
spirits. We had averaged above thirteen leagues a night, by
tortuous and wretched roads. It was a remarkable march, and
shows what men can do when they have a leader with a
determined purpose and a resolution that never flags.
Chapter 5 We Pierce the Last Ambuscades
WE RESTED and otherwise refreshed ourselves two or three
hours at Gien, but by that time the news was abroad that the young
girl commissioned of God to deliver France was come; wherefore,
such a press of people flocked to our quarters to get sight of her
that it seemed best to seek a quieter place; so we pushed on and
halted at a small village called Fierbois.
We were now within six leagues of the King, who was a the Castle
of Chinon. Joan dictated a letter to him at once, and I wrote it. In it
she said she had come a hundred and fifty leagues to bring him
good news, and begged the privilege of delivering it in person. She
added that although she had never seen him she would know him
in any disguise and would point him out.
The two knights rode away at once with the letter. The troop slept
all the afternoon, and after supper we felt pretty fresh and fine,
especially our little group of young Domremians. We had the
comfortable tap-room of the village inn to ourselves, and for the
first time in ten unspeakably long days were exempt from bodings
and terrors and hardships and fatiguing labors. The Paladin was
suddenly become his ancient self again, and was swaggering up
and down, a very monument of self-complacency. No‰l
Rainguesson said:
“I think it is wonderful, the way he has brought us through.”
“Who?” asked Jean.
“Why, the Paladin.”
The Paladin seemed not to hear.
“What had he to do with it?” asked Pierre d’Arc.
“Everything. It was nothing but Joan’s confidence in his discretion
that enabled her to keep up her heart. She could depend on us and
on herself for valor, but discretion is the winning thing in war,
after all; discretion is the rarest and loftiest of qualities, and he has
got more of it than any other man in France–more of it, perhaps,
than any other sixty men in France.”
“Now you are getting ready to make a fool of yourself, No‰l
Rainguesson,” said the Paladin, “and you want to coil some of that
long tongue of yours around your neck and stick the end of it in
your ear, then you’ll be the less likely to get into trouble.”
“I didn’t know he had more discretion than other people,” said
Pierre, “for discretion argues brains, and he hasn’t any more brains
than the rest of us, in my opinion.”
“No, you are wrong there. Discretion hasn’t anything to do with
brains; brains are an obstruction to it, for it does not reason, it
feels. Perfect discretion means absence of brains. Discretion is a
quality of the heart–solely a quality of the heart; it acts upon us
through feeling. We know this because if it were an intellectual
quality it would only perceive a danger, for instance, where a
danger exists; whereas–”
“Hear him twaddle–the damned idiot!” muttered the Paladin.
“–whereas, it being purely a quality of the heart, and proceeding
by feeling, not reason, its reach is correspondingly wider and
sublimer, enabling it to perceive and avoid dangers that haven’t
any existence at all; as, for instance, that night in the fog, when the