The Executioner's Knife Part 31

The Bishop makes a gesture of impatience and withers the judge who had last spoken with a look of condemnation.

JOAN DARC--"Let me, then, be provided with a long dress; I shall put it on to go to chapel. But when I return to my prison I shall resume my man's clothes."

The judge consults the Bishop with his eye to ascertain whether the request of the accused shall be granted; the prelate answers with a negative sign of his head, and turns to Joan.

BISHOP CAUCHON--"So, then, you persist in keeping your masculine dress?"

JOAN DARC--"I am guarded by men; such dress is safer."

THE INQUISITOR OF THE FAITH--"Do you now wear and have you worn masculine garb voluntarily, absolutely of your own free will?"

JOAN DARC--"Yes; and I shall continue to do so."

Again silence ensues. The ecclesiastical judges feel triumphant over the answer made so categorically by the accused, a grave answer seeing that Bishop Cauchon says to the registrars:

BISHOP CAUCHON--"Have you entered the words of the said Joan?"

A REGISTRAR--"Yes, monseigneur."

BISHOP CAUCHON (to the accused)--"You have often spoken of St. Michael.

In what did you recognize that the form that appeared before you was that of the blessed archangel? Could not Satan a.s.sume the form of a good angel to lead you to evil?"

JOAN DARC--"I recognized St. Michael by the advice he gave me. It was the advice of an angel and not of Satan; it came from heaven, not from h.e.l.l."

A JUDGE--"What advice did he give?"

JOAN DARC--"His advice was that I conduct myself as a pious and honest girl; he said to me G.o.d would then inspire me, and would aid me to deliver France."

THE INQUISITOR OF THE FAITH--"So that you claim not only to have seen a supernatural apparition under the form of St. Michael with your bodily eyes, but you furthermore claim that the figure was actually that of that holy personage?"

JOAN DARC--"I affirm it, seeing that I heard it with my ears, seeing that I saw it with my eyes. There is no doubt in my mind concerning the archangel."

BISHOP CAUCHON (to the registrars)--"Enter that answer without omitting a syllable."

A REGISTRAR--"Yes, monseigneur."

Canon Loyseleur, whose face is carefully concealed under his hood, and who for greater security holds a handkerchief to the lower part of his countenance, rises and whispers in the ear of the Bishop; the latter strikes his forehead as if reminded by his accomplice that he had overlooked a matter of grave importance; the canon returns to his seat in the rear.

BISHOP CAUCHON--"Joan, when, after you were captured at Compiegne, you were taken to the Castle of Beaurevoir, you threw yourself out of one of the lower towers, did you not?"

JOAN DARC--"It is true."

BISHOP CAUCHON--"What was the reason of your action?"

JOAN DARC--"I heard it said in my prison that I had been sold to the English. I preferred the risk of killing myself to falling into their hands. I endeavored to escape by jumping down from the tower."

THE INQUISITOR--"Did you act by the advice of your voices?"

JOAN DARC--"No. They advised me to the contrary, saying: 'Take courage; G.o.d will come to your help; it is cowardly to flee danger.' But my fear of the English was stronger than the advice of my saints."

A JUDGE--"When you jumped out of the tower, had you the intention of killing yourself?"

JOAN DARC--"I wished to escape. When I jumped I commended my soul to G.o.d, hoping with His help to escape from the English."

THE INQUISITOR--"After your fall, did you renounce the Lord and His saints?"

JOAN DARC--"I never renounced either G.o.d or His saints."

A JUDGE--"Did you, at the moment of jumping down from the tower, invoke your saints?"

JOAN DARC--"Yes, I invoked them. Despite their having advised me against the move, I invoked through them the protection of G.o.d for Gaul, my own deliverance, and the salvation of my soul."

THE INQUISITOR--"Since you have been a prisoner in Rouen, have your voices promised you your deliverance?"

JOAN DARC--"Only an instant ago, they said to me: 'Accept everything meekly, bravely undergo your martyrdom. Have courage and patience. You will gain paradise!'"

THE INQUISITOR--"And do you expect to gain paradise?"

JOAN DARC (radiantly)--"I believe it as firmly as if I were there now.

G.o.d keeps my place."

BISHOP CAUCHON (excitedly, and looking at the judges)--"Here is an answer of much weight. Pride! Presumption!"

JOAN DARC (with a celestial smile)--"Indeed, I hold my belief in paradise as a great treasure. Hence my strength."

The radiancy of Joan's face illumines her beautiful features and imparts to them a divine expression. Her black eyes, s.h.i.+ning with the spark of inspiration, are raised heavenward. She looks through the window, contemplates the sky whose azure is for a moment visible through a rift in the clouds, and in the expansion of her celestial ravishment she seems detached from earth. But, alack! a puerile incident speedily recalls the poor prisoner to reality. A little bird flutters cheerily by the window and lightly touches the gla.s.s with its wing. At the sight of the little creature, free in s.p.a.ce, the heroine, instantaneously yielding to the painful feeling of awakened reality, drops headlong from the height of her radiantly towering hopes. She sighs, lowers her head, and tears roll from her eyes. These rapidly succeeding emotions prevent Joan from observing the joy of the ecclesiastical judges, busily entering on their tablets the last two enormities, which, coupled with so many others, are certain to take her to the pyre. The entries were: "The said Joan voluntarily risked suicide by throwing herself down from the tower of Beaurevoir"; "The said Joan has the sacrilegious audacity of saying and believing that she is as sure of paradise as if she were there now." But the task of the criminal ecclesiastics is not yet complete. The heroine is suddenly drawn from her own painful thoughts by the voice of the Bishop.

BISHOP CAUCHON--"Do you believe you are in mortal sin?"

JOAN DARC--"I refer all my actions to G.o.d."

THE INQUISITOR--"You, then, think it useless to confess, even if you are in a state of mortal sin?"

JOAN DARC--"I never have committed a mortal sin, at least not that I know of."

A JUDGE--"What do you know about it?"

JOAN DARC--"My voices would have reproached me for the sin. My saints would have abandoned me. Still, if I could, I would confess. One's conscience can not be too clear."

BISHOP CAUCHON--"And is it not a mortal sin to accept ransom for a man and yet have him executed?"

JOAN DARC (stupefied)--"Who has done that?"

BISHOP CAUCHON--"You!"

JOAN DARC (indignantly)--"Never!"

THE INQUISITOR--"What about Franquet of Arras?"