On the 13th of September the army, sad and spiritless, turned its face toward the Loire, and marched—­without music!  Yes, one noted that detail.  It was a funeral march; that is what it was.  A long, dreary funeral march, with never a shout or a cheer; friends looking on in tears, all the way, enemies laughing.  We reached Gien at last—­that place whence we had set out on our splendid march toward Rheims less than three months before, with flags flying, bands playing, the victory-flush of Patay glowing in our faces, and the massed multitudes shouting and praising and giving us godspeed.  There was a dull rain falling now, the day was dark, the heavens mourned, the spectators were few, we had no welcome but the welcome of silence, and pity, and tears.

Then the King disbanded that noble army of heroes; it furled its flags, it stored its arms:  the disgrace of France was complete.  La Tremouille wore the victor’s crown; Joan of Arc, the unconquerable, was conquered.

  41 The Maid Will March No More

Yes, it was as I have said:  Joan had Paris and France in her grip, and the Hundred Years’ War under her heel, and the King made her open her fist and take away her foot.

Now followed about eight months of drifting about with the King and his council, and his gay and showy and dancing and flirting and hawking and frolicking and serenading and dissipating court—­drifting from town to town and from castle to castle—­a life which was pleasant to us of the personal staff, but not to Joan.  However, she only saw it, she didn’t live it.  The King did his sincerest best to make her happy, and showed a most kind and constant anxiety in this matter.

All others had to go loaded with the chains of an exacting court etiquette, but she was free, she was privileged.  So that she paid her duty to the King once a day and passed the pleasant word, nothing further was required of her.  Naturally, then, she made herself a hermit, and grieved the weary days through in her own apartments, with her thoughts and devotions for company, and the planning of now forever unrealizable military combinations for entertainment.  In fancy she moved bodies of men from this and that and the other point, so calculating the distances to be covered, the time required for each body, and the nature of the country to be traversed, as to have them appear in sight of each other on a given day or at a given hour and concentrate for battle.  It was her only game, her only relief from her burden of sorrow and inaction.  She played it hour after hour, as others play chess; and lost herself in it, and so got repose for her mind and healing for her heart.

She never complained, of course.  It was not her way.  She was the sort that endure in silence.

But—­she was a caged eagle just the same, and pined for the free air and the alpine heights and the fierce joys of the storm.

France was full of rovers—­disbanded soldiers ready for anything that might turn up.  Several times, at intervals, when Joan’s dull captivity grew too heavy to bear, she was allowed to gather a troop of cavalry and make a health-restoring dash against the enemy.  These things were a bath to her spirits.