A man was sent off to Fierbois. He rummaged around and exhumed the sword ― it was rusty, but in excellent condition.

In all this business, in which were mingled politics, the preparations for a military campaign and Christian magic, Gilles served as an expert and diligent liegeman. He was a man and he was a professional. He followed Jeanne, as the body obeys the soul, as she herself obeyed her ‘voices’. On certain evenings, when the curfew had silenced the camp and they found themselves alone together, they talked. Gilles - like Jeanne, like most men and women of that time ― lived on the confines of the natural and the supernatural. But his experience and personal inclination had shown him more devils and evil spirits than saints and guardian angels.

‘Like you, I believe that we live surrounded by angels and saints,’ he said to her one night. ‘I also believe that there is never a shortage of devils and evil fairies trying to make us stumble on to the road to wickedness. But I’ve heard you say, Jeanne, that they speak to you and that all you have done was inspired by the supernatural voices you heard.’

‘As far as devils and evil fairies are concerned,’ she replied, ‘I have met none to this day. But who knows what the future may bring!’

Brought up in the damp gloom of a fortress, Gilles found it difficult to imagine her peasant childhood, exposed to all weathers.

‘But in the copses and root-entangled caves that lie deep in the hillsides,’ he went on, ‘you know, you who have tended animals, you must know that there are dwarfs and lemures who cast spells on people.’ Jeanne did remember.

‘Quite close to the town of Domrémy where I was born, there is a tree known as the Ladies’ Tree. It’s a great beech tree, centuries old. In the spring it is as beautiful as a lily and its branches reach down to the ground. Some people call it the Fairies’ Tree. In the shade of its branches is a spring. Those who are sick with fever drink the water of that spring and are cured. In the month of Mary, the girls and boys of Domrémy decorate the branches of the Ladies’ Tree with garlands. They lay a cloth beside the spring and eat together. Then they play and dance. I did that with my friends, but I never saw or heard tell of dwarfs or any other creature of the Devil.’

Gilles was dazzled by such sweet innocence, but he remained unconvinced.

‘And yet the Devil and his court exist. I sometimes feel them brush past me and they whisper obscure things in my ears that I can’t understand and that I am afraid I will understand one day. You, too, hear voices.’

‘Yes, I was thirteen the first time. A voice came to me about noon, in summer, in my father’s garden. I heard a voice that came from the direction of the church. I was very afraid at first. But then I realized that it was an angel’s voice, St Michael’s to be precise. He told me that St Catherine and St Margaret would come and see me and that I was to do as they told me and that I was to believe that their orders came from God.’

‘What did those voices tell you to do?’

‘Above all, they told me to be a good child and that God would help me. Then they told me of the pitiful state in which the kingdom of France found itself and that I ought to go and help my King.’

‘Did you say anything to your parish priest about these visions?’

‘No, only to Robert de Baudricourt, captain of the city of Vaucouleurs, and also to my King. My voices didn’t tell me to keep what they said to myself, but I was very afraid to reveal my plan for fear of the Burgundians, and also lest my father prevent me making my journey.’

‘How did you leave Domrémy without arousing suspicion?’

‘I went to my uncle’s. He is Durand Laxart, a notable of Durey-le-Petit, a short distance from Vaucouleurs. I told him that I wanted to go to France to see the Dauphin and to have him crowned, since it was written that France would be lost by a woman1 and saved by a virgin. It was Durand who took me to the Sire de Baudricourt.’

‘And what did Captain Baudricourt say to your Uncle Durand?’

‘That Robert told my uncle to give me a good thrashing and take me back home.’

‘Which is what he did.’

‘Which is what he did.