theirs. Then he dismissed her with gracious words, bending low
over her hand and kissing it. Always–from all companies, high or
low–she went forth richer in honor and esteem than when she
came.
And the King did another handsome thing by Joan, for he sent us
back to Courdray Castle torch-lighted and in state, under escort of
his own troop–his guard of honor–the only soldiers he had; and
finely equipped and bedizened they were, too, though they hadn’t
seen the color of their wages since they were children, as a body
might say. The wonders which Joan had been performing before
the King had been carried all around by this time, so the road was
so packed with people who wanted to get a sight of her that we
could hardly dig through; and as for talking together, we couldn’t,
all attempts at talk being drowned in the storm of shoutings and
huzzas that broke out all along as we passed, and kept abreast of us
like a wave the whole way.
Chapter 7 Our Paladin in His Glory
WE WERE doomed to suffer tedious waits and delays, and we
settled ourselves down to our fate and bore it with a dreary
patience, counting the slow hours and the dull days and hoping for
a turn when God should please to send it. The Paladin was the only
exception–that is to say, he was the only one who was happy and
had no heavy times. This was partly owing to the satisfaction he
got out of his clothes. He bought them at second hand–a Spanish
cavalier’s complete suit, wide-brimmed hat with flowing plumes,
lace collar and cuffs, faded velvet doublet and trunks, short cloak
hung from the shoulder, funnel-topped buskins, long rapier, and all
that–a graceful and picturesque costume, and the Paladin’s great
frame was the right place to hang it for effect. He wore it when off
duty; and when he swaggered by with one hand resting on the hilt
of his rapier, and twirling his new mustache with the other,
everybody stopped to look and admire; and well they might, for he
was a fine and stately contrast to the small French gentlemen of
the day squeezed into the trivial French costume of the time.
He was king bee of the little village that snuggled under the shelter
of the frowning towers and bastions of Courdray Castle, and
acknowledged lord of the tap-room of the inn. When he opened his
mouth there, he got a hearing. Those simple artisans and peasants
listened with deep and wondering interest; for he was a traveler
and had seen the world–all of it that lay between Chinon and
Domremy, at any rate–and that was a wide stretch more of it than
they might ever hope to see; and he had been in battle, and knew
how to paint its shock and struggle, its perils and surprised, with
an art that was all his own. He was cock of that walk, hero of that
hostelry; he drew custom as honey draws flies; so he was the pet of
the innkeeper, and of his wife and daughter, and they were his
obliged and willing servants.
Most people who have the narrative gift–that great and rare
endowment–have with it the defect of telling their choice things
over the same way every time, and this injures them and causes
them to sound stale and wearisome after several repetitions; but it
was not so with the Paladin, whose art was of a finer sort; it was
more stirring and interesting to hear him tell about a battle the
tenth time than it was the first time, because he did not tell it twice
the same way, but always made a new battle of it and a better one,
with more casualties on the enemy’s side each time, and more
general wreck and disaster all around, and more widows and
orphans and suffering in the neighborhood where it happened. He
could not tell his battles apart himself, except by their names; and
by the time he had told one of then ten times it had grown so that
there wasn’t room enough in France for it any more, but was