The Executioner's Knife Part 25

BISHOP CAUCHON--"Our canon law admits a qualification in avowals concerning supernatural matters. Thus the tribunal would find itself prevented from pa.s.sing sentence upon the Maid, if by some mishap, instead of her declaring affirmatively: 'I have heard the voices,' she were to say: 'I believe I heard the voices.' The doubtful form would cause the princ.i.p.al charge to fall. Now, then, I fear that whether guided by the instinct of self-preservation, or whether properly indoctrinated in advance, Joan may give her answers such a form as to perfidiously raise an unsurmountable obstacle in our way. Do you understand me?"

CANON LOYSELEUR--"Perfectly, monseigneur. But how shall we manage it that instead of saying: 'I believe I heard the voices,' Joan shall say: 'I have heard the voices'?"

BISHOP CAUCHON--"Nothing is simpler. All we need is to have a councilor, in whom Joan may have full confidence, dictate to her certain answers that will be certain to lead to her condemnation."

CANON LOYSELEUR--"Monseigneur, the girl is of extraordinary intelligence and is gifted with exceptional sound judgment. That is her reputation.

How can we expect her to repose blind confidence in an unknown adviser?"

BISHOP CAUCHON--"My son in Christ, what is your name?"

CANON LOYSELEUR--"My name is Nicolas Loyseleur."[112]

BISHOP CAUCHON--"I believe the name is truly predestined."

CANON LOYSELEUR--"Predestined?"

BISHOP CAUCHON (laughing)--"Without a doubt. What is the way that the skilful fowler practices the piping of birds in order to attract the mistrusting partridge? He skilfully imitates the bird's chirping, and the latter believing one of his kind near, flies in the direction of the deceitful voice and falls into the snare. Now, then, my worthy canon, the apostle St. Peter was a fisher of men, you shall be a decoyer of women--to the greater glory of our order."

CANON LOYSELEUR (after a moment's reflection)--"I vaguely perceive your thought, monseigneur."

BISHOP CAUCHON--"The Maid will arrive towards morning in Rouen. Her cell, her irons are ready. Well, then, it is necessary that when she enters her cell in the morning, she find you there. You must be a companion in her misery, and presently her confidant."

CANON LOYSELEUR--"I, monseigneur! Such a mission for me!"

BISHOP CAUCHON--"You--in chains, hands and feet. You will moan. You will sigh at the cruelty of the English, at the severity with which I, a bishop, allow a poor priest to be treated whose only crime is that he remained faithful to the King of France. That is the outline of your role."

CANON LOYSELEUR (smiling)--"Our divine master said: 'Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's, and unto G.o.d what is G.o.d's.'"

BISHOP CAUCHON--"What is the application of that quotation! It is out of all connection."

CANON LOYSELEUR--"Let us render to the Inquisition what belongs to the Inquisition. The method that you propose is skilful, I admit. But it has been practiced before upon the great Albigensian heretics as is attested by the following seventh decretal of the inquisitorial law: 'Let none approach the heretic, except, from time to time, one or two faithful persons, who cautiously, and as if greatly moved by pity for him, shall give him advice,' etc., etc."[113]

BISHOP CAUCHON--"Well! Just because the method has often been successfully put in practice by the Inquisition it is sure to succeed again! I do not mean to plume myself upon having invented it. It goes without saying that being Joan's fowler you are also to be among her judges. To the end that you may enjoy the results of your skilful chirping, I reserved a place for you on the tribunal. You will sit in your robes with your cowl wholly over your head; it will conceal your face. Joan will not be able to recognize you. Informer and judge--it is agreed."

CANON LOYSELEUR--"It will be all the more necessary, seeing that, thanks to my quality of priest, it will be easy for me to induce the girl to confess. In that case, you realize the tremendous advantage that may be gained over her, through her sincerely made avowals before the sacred tribunal of penitence."

BISHOP CAUCHON (transported with joy)--"Canon! Canon! The Regent of England and the Cardinal of Winchester will worthily reward your zeal.

You shall be bishop; I, archbishop."

CANON LOYSELEUR--"My reward is in myself, monseigneur. What I do, I do, as you said, to the greater glory of our Church, and above all to its great profit. I feel outraged at the sight of a stupid mob attributing supernatural powers and divine relations to this peasant girl, who, according to canonical law, has none of the qualities for such celestial commerce. I feel for Joan the hatred, vigorous and legitimate, that the captains, her rivals, pursue her with. 'What is the use,' they justly said, 'of being born n.o.ble? What is the use of growing old in the harness, if it is enough for a cowherdess to come and our ill.u.s.trious houses are eclipsed?' You tax Charles VII with ingrat.i.tude, monseigneur.

You are wrong. By showing himself ungrateful, he a.s.serts his royal dignity. His conduct is politic when he repudiates the services of the Maid. Charles VII could not intervene in Joan's behalf without thereby making the admission, disgraceful to his Majesty--'A va.s.sal has rendered the crown to a descendant of the Frankish Kings.' England, the Church, the knighthood of France, Charles VII and his council--all are interested in having the Maid burned alive. And she shall be roasted, even if I should myself have to light the pyre!"

BISHOP CAUCHON (laughing)--"That is too much zeal, canon! In her infinite mercy, our holy mother the Church sends people to the pyre but never herself burns them with her maternal hands. Execution is the province of the secular arm. Thanks to your spiritual aid, it will be done that way with Joan. She shall be roasted as a relapsed heretic, and the Church will have shown herself full of clemency to the very end. Our triumph will have results of an importance that you do not dream of.

Joan will become even in the eyes of her partisans the most despicable of creatures. We shall burn her body and we shall stain her name and fame for now and evermore."

CANON LOYSELEUR--"How, monseigneur? I do not quite grasp your meaning."

BISHOP CAUCHON--"I shall prove to you to-morrow what I am now saying.

In the meantime we must also see what advantage we can draw from the otherwise annoying chast.i.ty of the she-devil. Because, may G.o.d pardon me, she is still a virgin. But it is growing late. Go and take a few hours of rest. To-morrow early you must be all sorrow, moans and sighs, with irons to your hands and feet and lying upon straw in the cell of Joan."

The canon departs; the Bishop remains alone. He busies himself with the preparation of the process and the drawing up of a series of questions based upon the actions and words of Joan the Maid.

CHAPTER II.

IN THE DUNGEON.

It is still night. A lamp feebly lights a dark subterraneous cell in the old donjon of the Castle of Rouen. The cell is a semi-circular cave. Its greenish walls ooze with the moisture of winter. A narrow window, furnished with an enormous iron bar is cut in a stone wall six feet thick. Opposite the airhole and under a vaulted pa.s.sage is a ma.s.sive door studded with iron and pierced with a grated wicket always kept open. A wooden box filled with straw lies to the left of the door; a long chain that is soldered in the wall and the other end of which is fastened to a heavy iron belt, now open, lies on the straw. At one end of the box, that is to serve as a bed, rises a beam so contrived as to hold fast the feet of the girl prisoner that is soon to be conveyed thither. A trunk, a stool, a table, the sorrowful furniture of a prisoner's cell, are barely distinguishable by the light of the lamp.

Opposite this straw bed is another, furnished exactly like the first. On it lies Canon Loyseleur, in chains. He has just said a few words to the jailer John, an English soldier in burly middle age, who wears an old fur coat, and whose low and savage face is bloated by excessive indulgence in wine and strong liquors. His thick long beard, unkempt like his hair, falls down upon his chest. A cutla.s.s hangs at his side.

Presently another man of hang-dog looks pushes open the door and says to John:

"Come, quick. Here is the witch!"

The jailer goes out precipitately, makes a sign of intelligence to the canon and carries the lamp out. The canon stretches himself on the straw and pretends to sleep. The door is double locked on the outside. The weak light of approaching dawn, so pale in those winter days, filters through the airhole of the cell, yet leaves the interior in substantial darkness. The bed occupied by the canon lies completely in the shadow.

The scene is about to begin.

Again the heavy door grates on its hinges. Joan Darc enters preceded by John. He casts a savage look upon her. Two other jailers, also armed, follow their chief. One of them has a hammer and shears in his hands, the other carries on his shoulder a small box containing some clothes that belong to the prisoner. Joan is hardly recognizable. Since her prolonged sojourn in a succession of prisons, the fresh color of the child of the fields or of the martial maid always living in the open has disappeared. Her beautiful face, now furrowed with suffering and worn with sorrow, is of a sickly hue. A bitter smile contracts her lips. Her appearance is sad yet proud. Her black eyes seem enlarged through the hollowness of her cheeks. She wears a woman's felt hat, a brown tunic and tight hose fastened with hooks to her shirt. The laces of her leather shoes are hidden under two large iron rings held together by a chain that is hardly long enough to allow her to walk. Close manacles hold her hands together. Her clothes, worn out and tattered by her journey, are ripped at the elbows and allow glimpses of a coa.r.s.e shirt.

The English soldiers charged to guard the heroine have received orders not to lose sight of her night or day, and to sleep in her room during the few halts that were made. As her chast.i.ty would not allow her to undress in their presence, she has not removed her clothes for a whole month.

John orders his aides to unchain the prisoner and to fasten her firmly to the straw bed. They approach her with an insolence that is not unmixed with fear. In their eyes she is a witch. They are always in fear of some sorcery. Nevertheless they first place around her waist the heavy iron belt, lock it, and give the key to John. The length of the chain, that is fastened at the other end to the wall, barely allows her to sit down or stretch herself out upon the litter. Being thus secured to her new fastenings, one of the jailers begins to remove her traveling irons. With a hammer he strikes a chisel which he applied to the jointure of the manacles and these drop from Joan's sore wrists. With a sigh of relief she stretches out her aching and swollen arms. Her feet are then unchained, to be immediately secured in the rings at the end of the chain that is fastened to the beam at the foot of the litter, on which, worn out with fatigue and broken with sadness, the martial maid drops in a sitting posture and covers her face with her hands.

John orders his men out and casts a knowing look at Canon Loyseleur. The latter has not yet been noticed by the prisoner, as he crouches in a corner that lies wholly in the dark. The jailer goes out and locks the door. Through the wicket the iron casques of the two sentinels, posted on the outside, are seen pa.s.sing and repa.s.sing. Invisible in the thick darkness, which the feeble light that filters through the airhole is unable to dispel, the canon holds his breath and observes Joan. With her face in her hands, she remains profoundly absorbed in her own thoughts--painful, heartrending thoughts. She indulges in no false hopes. Charles VII has abandoned her to her executioners. For some time she had known the egotism, cowardice and ingrat.i.tude of the prince.

Twice she had wished to leave him to his fate, indignant and shocked at his cowardice. But out of patriotism she had resigned herself to cover him with her glory, knowing that in the eyes of the people France was personified in the King. This notwithstanding, the heroine at first expected that the prince would endeavor to save her. He owed everything to her, only from him could she expect some degree of pity. Enlightened by so many evidences on the envy and hatred that the captains pursued her with, she in no way counted with help from that quarter; after so many attempts at infamous treason, they had finally succeeded in delivering her to the English before Compiegne. For a moment, in the innocence of her heart, she expected aid from the charity of the clergy, the bishops who at Poitiers declared that Charles VII could with a safe conscience accept the unexpected aid that she brought him in the name of G.o.d. She hoped for the intervention of the ecclesiastics who were so anxious to admit her, to communion and to confession, who sang her praises, and who, with all the pomp of the church, celebrated the feast of the 8th of May, a commemorative anniversary of the raising of the siege of Orleans, a religious solemnity ordered by the bishop of the diocese, which comprised an imposing procession of the clergy, who marched at the head of the councilmen, holding wax candles in their hands, and made its pious stations at the several spots that had been the theater of the glorious deeds of the Maid.

But Joan now no longer indulged in false hopes. The clergy, like the King, abandoned her to her executioners. Other priests of Christ would judge and condemn her. The English who brought her in chains often told her on the route: "You are going to be burned, witch! We have priests in Rouen who will send you to the pyre!"

Convinced by these words that she need expect neither mercy nor justice from the ecclesiastical tribunal before which she was about to be arraigned, and overpowered by the bitter disillusionment, the recollections of which stabbed her heart without souring her angelic spirit, Joan asked herself in a perplexity of doubt, why did the Lord forsake her, her the instrument of His divine will? Her who was ever obedient to the saintly voices that she heard so distinctly, and that since her captivity still repeated to her: "Go, daughter of G.o.d! Fear not--submit meekly to your martyrdom. You have fulfilled your duty--heaven is with you!"

And yet heaven delivered her to the English, her implacable enemies!

And yet the priests of the Lord were impatient, it was told her on all hands, to sentence her to the flames!

These contradictions profoundly troubled the prisoner. Often she was overcome with sadness, whenever she thought of her uncompleted mission--the soil of Gaul was not yet completely delivered from the foreign rule!

Such are the thoughts of Joan at this hour when, with her face hidden in her hands, she sits on the straw of her cell, and is yet ignorant of the presence of Canon Loyseleur. Suddenly the girl trembles with surprise, almost fright. From the midst of the darkness at the opposite side she hears a compa.s.sionate voice addressing her, and the following dialogue ensues:

CANON LOYSELEUR--"Raise your head, virgin! The Lord will not forsake you! He watches over you!"

JOAN DARC--"Who is speaking to me?"

CANON LOYSELEUR (rising on the straw)--"Who speaks to you? A poor old priest--a good Christian and royalist--a victim to his loyalty, to his faith, and to his King--crimes that the English do not pardon. For more than a year have I lived chained in this dungeon, and have asked but one favor of my Creator--to be recalled to Him! Alack! I have suffered so much! But I forget my sufferings since I am permitted to behold the holy maid, the virgin inspired by heaven, vanquisher of the English, deliverer of Gaul! May her name be glorified!"

JOAN DARC (tenderly)--"Not so loud, my Father! You might be heard. I fear not for myself, but I fear for your sake the anger of the jailers."

CANON LOYSELEUR (with exaltation and a ringing voice)--"What can the English, whom I abhor, these enemies of our beloved country, do to me? I pray G.o.d to send me martyrdom, if He thinks me worthy of such a glorious aureola!"