and enemies.
Among the prisoners were a number of priests, and Joan took these
under her protection and saved their lives. It was urged that they
were most probably combatants in disguise, but she said:
“As to that, how can any tell? They wear the livery of God, and if
even one of these wears it rightfully, surely it were better that all
the guilty should escape than that we have upon our hands the
blood of that innocent man. I will lodge them where I lodge, and
feed them, and sent them away in safety.”
We marched back to the city with our crop of cannon and
prisoners on view and our banners displayed. Here was the first
substantial bit of war-work the imprisoned people had seen in the
seven months that the siege had endured, the first chance they had
had to rejoice over a French exploit. You may guess that they
made good use of it. They and the bells went mad. Joan was their
darling now, and the press of people struggling and shouldering
each other to get a glimpse of her was so great that we could
hardly push our way through the streets at all. Her new name had
gone all about, and was on everybody’s lips. The Holy Maid of
Vaucouleurs was a forgotten title; the city had claimed her for its
own, and she was the MAID OF ORLEANS now. It is a happiness
to me to remember that I heard that name the first time it was ever
uttered. Between that first utterance and the last time it will be
uttered on this earth–ah, think how many moldering ages will lie
in that gap!
The Boucher family welcomed her back as if she had been a child
of the house, and saved frm death against all hope or probability.
They chided her for going into the battle and exposing herself to
danger during all those hours. They could not realize that she had
meant to carry her warriorship so far, and asked her if it had really
been her purpose to go right into the turmoil of the fight, or hadn’t
she got swept into it by accident and the rush of the troops? They
begged her to be more careful another time. It was good advice,
maybe, but it fell upon pretty unfruitful soil.
Chapter 19 We Burst In Upon Ghosts
BEING WORN out with the long fight, we all slept the rest of the
afternoon away and two or three hours into the night. Then we got
up refreshed, and had supper. As for me, I could have been willing
to let the matter of the ghost drop; and the others were of a like
mind, no doubt, for they talked diligently of the battle and said
nothing of that other thing. And indeed it was fine and stirring to
hear the Paladin rehearse his deeds and see him pile his dead,
fifteen here, eighteen there, and thirty-five yonder; but this only
postponed the trouble; it could not do more. He could not go on
forever; when he had carried the bastille by assault and eaten up
the garrison there was nothing for it but to stop, unless Catherine
Boucher would give him a new start and have it all done over
again–as we hoped she would, this time–but she was otherwise
minded. As soon as there was a good opening and a fair chance,
she brought up her unwelcome subject, and we faced it the best we
could.
We followed her and her parents to the haunted room at eleven
o’clock, with candles, and also with torches to place in the sockets
on the walls. It was a big house, with very thick walls, and this
room was in a remote part of it which had been left unoccupied for
nobody knew how many years, because of its evil repute.
This was a large room, like a salon, and had a big table in it of
enduring oak and well preserved; but the chair were worm-eaten
and the tapestry on the walls was rotten and discolored by age. The
dusty cobwebs under the ceiling had the look of not having had