by Ali Alizadeh
A heated quarrel in English. Feet march out, a presence stays in the cell.
Joan. Look at me.
The voice of the Earl of Warwick. She slowly slides her fingers off her eyes. The tall knight, in his nightgown.
Let me see your face.
She hoists her hurting face. He observes, shouts furiously at listeners outside the cell, and walks out. Leaves the torch, where it was dropped by one of the guards, on the floor. So relieved that she’s alone again, but why is the door left open? Touches her lips. Yes, swollen. A few dark drops dot the collar of her gown. Her left hand aches terribly. Did she break the guard’s nose? It should not at all be surprising. She was the chief of war of French forces at one time. Personally captured an enemy knight in hand-to-hand combat. Was it at the skirmish near Paris or at the siege of Melun?
She can’t remember. Feels less fearful, even with the door still open. It would be an exaggeration to say there’s a smile on her face. A maidservant trudges in, with a bucket. Sits on the floor next to Jeanne, her eyes very wide. Obviously wishes to speak to the prisoner but knows she’s not allowed. Wets the hem of her apron in the bucket and wipes the bleeding parts of Jeanne’s face. She has no ointment but the water’s coolness soothes. The old woman’s eyebrows quiver. Perhaps she’ll cry. But the earl is now back inside the cell. He dismisses the servant. She hurries out. The earl picks up the torch, stares at Jeanne momentarily. What is his intention? Does he feel sorry? Does he too hate her, she who was once the most dangerous enemy of his country?
He exits and locks the door. She remains very stiff but breathes calmly. Makes sure to stay awake until the black screen of her window is broken by dawn’s pale streaks. Subtly sleepy when matin bells toll. Daylight and blessed safety. She weeps slowly. Her mind eases. It wanders, leaves the unkind place.
3
She had the loveliest golden hair, Marguerite, her smiling friend, the neighbour’s daughter.
Their village, Domrémy. A gentle river, the Meuse, roams between the hillocks and meadows. Grey rabbits and orange squirrels hop between pine trees in the wooded hills. One should see it during spring. Then the hedges behind her house near the oak forest, decked with so many blossoms, glow in the early morning when the girls go to draw water from the well.
In spring they celebrate the Rogation Sunday feast and it is so lovely when farmers return from ploughing rye and barley, and they dance in reels, and the whole village celebrates on top of the hill, past the cottages and farms, around the great beech tree. It is called Our Lady’s Tree, but some call it the Fairies’ Tree. They say it must be at least five hundred years old. Its heavy, entangled branches form an amazing canopy, and children dance, play hide-and-seek under the tree, and at Lent girls pick lilies-of-the-valley and camellias for wreaths to hang on its branches.
Jeannette and Marguerite love early spring the most, and the smell of the jasmine that grows by the paddocks behind the virgin spring. Some of the nuns at the Hermitage of Blessed Mary of Bermont say the spring has healing powers. The girls have even seen a leper and a blind monk come all the way from Nancy to drink its water. But Jeannette and Marguerite do not really believe in that sort of thing, and they do not believe that at night fairies can be seen dancing under the Fairies’ Tree.
People can be very naïve, Mama has always told Jeannette. Her mother has told her so much about so many things. Mama says Jeannette was born on the night of Epiphany, when, she says, hundreds of years ago some wise men recognised baby Jesus, the child, as the son of God in the Holy Land. But one of Jeannette’s godmothers, Madame Agnes, says the girl was born on the day called Le Jour des Rois, Day of the Kings, an ancient celebration when the rich baked a cake for the beggars and the last beggar to receive a piece was called the Bean King. Mama does not like Madame Agnes’s fairytales. She says they are witchy and pagan.
Jeannette goes to the church with Mama for mass every Sunday and then goes down the valley with Marguerite to pick blossoms to weave garlands for the images of the saints in their church. Jeannette loves the wooden statue of Saint Catherine. She was a pagan princess from a place called Egypt and became a Christian hundreds of years ago, but her cruel father forced her to marry a spiteful pagan general. The righteous princess rejected the unjust imposition, so she was martyred by her people. Her beautiful effigy at Domrémy’s church features a very long sword to show that the saint was martyred by beheading. Jeannette and Marguerite always cry when they hear this story.
Papa and Jeannette’s brothers say that women can be too religious, but Mama always tells them to mind their own business. Women and girls bake bread in the village oven together, spin wool, and Mama tells Jeannette time and again: Ah Jeannette, have I told you about my pilgrimage to Rome? There I presented our Holy Father with our famous local cuisine, our quiche. They call me Isabelle Romée, because I’ve been to the Holy City.
Mama always tells Jeannette what to do and she gives Jeannette lunch to take with her when it is the girl’s turn to graze their beasts. Sometimes Papa takes Jeannette to help with sowing the seeds, digging furrows between the rows of grapes, even ploughing the fields. But she is usually given a distaff and told to drive the animals. One cannot imagine how very boring being a shepherdess is, having to watch the dimwitted sheep stuff their mouths with grass for the whole day. So she loves hearing the vesper bells at the end of the day, it is such a magnificent music the sound of the bell chiming from the village belfry.
Jeannette and Marguerite love Saint Jean the Baptist’s Eve, when everyone in the village brings a twig or a bundle of sticks for the great bonfire lit every year at the end of spring. They light the fire near the Fairies’ Tree, and they dance in a circle around the huge flame, boys and girls holding hands. Madame Agnes says this was once a pagan festival called Midsummer, before Christianity, and as the fire is dying down the youth continue to dance around it, singing: This is Saint Jean’s Night; the great occasion; when lovers delight; and burn with passion; oh look! The moon has risen.
It is so much fun, and as the blaze is subsiding they take turns jumping over the fire. Children think their parents’ crops will grow as high as they leap. Marguerite tells Jeannette jumping over the fire will make them have lots of babies when they are women, and they giggle.
Afterwards they walk the fields and strew the ashes of the fire to banish bad omens.
4
Everyone knows that things change, and we know that childhood ends.
It is night-time and they are at the oak forest. Jeannette and Marguerite are on their way to the Hermitage of Bermont. A soft scarf adorns Jeannette’s waist, on top of her usual rustic dress. Mama says it is Saint Catherine’s tresses, Marguerite’s mother calls it maiden’s girdle. Mama has informed her: No longer a child, not yet a lady, you’ve reached the age of discretion. Jeannette and Marguerite are to receive a special sacrament alongside other pubescent girls. Marguerite’s clogged feet bounce over the muddy bumps along fallen branches. Her voice, a bright chirp.
All over the valley, by ourselves, Jeannette! They shall let us go to all the dances and frolics after this.
Jeannette has a more sombre voice.
We already go to the dances, Marguerite.
Real dances, Jeannette, not family games and feasts. Dances with boys.
I don’t wish to dance with boys.
But I wish to have a beautiful wedding one day, Jeannette, and lots and lots of blessed children. Wouldn’t you love to hold and kiss your own babe?
Jeannette slows her pace, speaks with urgency, and with fear.
I love dancing with you and spinning wool with you, Marguerite.
You’re my sister and my most favoured friend.
What’s wrong, Jeannette? Why are you so upset?
Jeannette stops walking. Marguerite is so pretty, and in this moonlit evening her uncovered golden mane shines with a pallid glow. Jeannette’s own head is wrapped in a very white scarf. She looks away from her friend to hide her sadness. She lifts her ey
es to the sky.
Look at the full moon, Marguerite!
A brilliant, cool disk of light like a heavenly silver coin. The sky is clear and Jeannette will not shift her gaze from the brightness, burning like a divine torch in the night’s cave of darkness. She has never really noticed this amazing celestial presence above the forest. It must be a holy thing, she knows it.
I wish to rest awhile, Marguerite.
We’ll be late for the ceremony.
We still have time.
They walk out of the forest and leave the path to the hermitage. Jeannette climbs a boulder overlooking the Fairies’ Tree, and from there the moon is so breathtaking. It immerses the world in its magical light, and Jeannette closes her eyes.
How very strange that she can somehow sense things beyond her body. She suddenly sees the dew settling on the leaves and petals of lilies and camellias. She feels the soil’s moisture being absorbed by the roots of hollies and cedars. She smells the aroma of the jasmine and roses that have not bloomed. She can taste the sweetness of wild berries and apples that have not ripened. Her fingers tingle and touch the ivy creeping up the oaks. And the immense moon is a vast heart, its vitality and desire filling the universe. Jeannette opens her eyes.
Marguerite. Where are you?
It feels scary, to be there, all alone. And when one is so alone, so singular, doesn’t one speak to oneself? Jeanne remembers, in her cell. I remember that night, my first vision. I was feeling lost like a stranger. In the valley where I had lived since birth. I was so small in the presence of the moon’s greatness. I wasn’t myself any longer, I was changing.
The white circle seems larger, expanding. Is she under a spell, or feverish, or losing her mind? Is the moon about to devour the young girl? Is she drowning in heavenly luminescence? Will future historians really know what is happening to her? The moon was now the shape of an infinitely huge person’s face. I’m sure of it. Jeanne’s not misremembering. Jeannette sees a colossal face before her, a ghost, or a fairy, or a monster, whose eyes are a hundred stars, whose smile is the entire horizon. She is now on her knees, terrified, nearly breathless.
Marguerite!
Brightness above the thing’s head, a burning crown of thorns, a halo, or horns of fire. And a gigantic sword. Can one be sure? Is it a sword and not a trident? She cannot believe what her eyes communicate. She forces them closed. She cannot believe how horrified she feels. She collapses.
Mama becomes angry like never before when she finds out that Jeannette was absent from the initiation rite at the Hermitage of Bermont. She breaks a wooden ladle over Jeannette’s back, and then starts hitting her with a broom: You, useless girl. Wayward girl. Shameful girl. After all I’ve done for you. Thankfully, Papa intervenes and protects his daughter. Jeannette of course will not tell them about what she saw – or what she thinks she saw – in the woods. Mama would think that her daughter was possessed by the Devil. But what was it? Could it have been an angel? Or one of the fairies that Madame Agnes always talks about?
Jeannette cries for many days and weeks, and now beautiful Marguerite, who has been confirmed in the eyes of the community as a young maid, a pucelle, is attending the village dances without her parents, with her new best friend Isabelette. She mostly avoids Jeannette, but one morning they cross paths at the well.
Good day, Jeannette.
Marguerite speaks with ease, almost joyful.
You fill yours first, good sister. Are you well, Jeannette? I haven’t seen you for so many weeks.
Jeannette’s fists squeeze the handle of her pail.
Marguerite…
Jeannette?
Jeannette’s dark eyes dart beneath tensed eyebrows.
Why did you leave me there in the woods that night, Marguerite?
Marguerite smiles, with affection.
I lost you, Jeannette! You ran ahead to look at the moon, and I lost sight of you.
You don’t come to our house to spin wool anymore. Why don’t you and I pray together anymore, Marguerite?
Marguerite flicks back her lustrous hair. It resembles sunlight shimmering on the surface of the virgin spring. She becomes serious.
Please don’t look at me in that manner, sister Jeannette.
In what manner, Marguerite?
Look, Jeannette. I don’t know what you wish from me.
Jeannette’s forehead creases beyond her age.
I want you to be my friend again, Marguerite. Why do you favour Isabelette so much?
I don’t favour her, Jeannette. She enjoys dancing, talking about things that I enjoy talking about.
What things, Marguerite?
The dazzling girl looks away, frowning. She is clearly frustrated.
Boys, Jeannette. Our future husbands. Men we’ll one day share our lives with. Are you at all favoured towards them? Are you, Jeannette?
I favour being friends with you, Marguerite.
Jeannette drops her wooden pail. I fought back tears. She would love to put her arms around Marguerite, for a sisterly embrace, but the other recoils and steps away.
I have to go now, sister Jeannette. Good day to you.
Jeannette does not know why everyone suddenly hates her, or why she has so many pimples on her pale face. And then the shock of blood between her legs. She starts attending church more frequently, and starts to revere the statue of Saint Catherine passionately. She places flowers, bread and wool at the altar, fasts every Friday and says Pater Noster, Ave Maria and Credo louder than most during Sunday mass. She confesses to the priest every month, and soon, every week. When the church is empty, she kneels on the altar floor in the weak light of the votive candles and begs Saint Catherine to guide her out of the darkness of sadness and solitude.
And the serene statue remains silent and looks on, with no voice emanating from the wooden figure. Yet.
5
But not all humans become subjects to truth, and not all of us change like this.
It is daytime and she is spinning wool with her mother. They hear the church bells. A surprise at this time, and the Darc women stop the wheels and yield their spindles. They join the others in the church’s courtyard. An armed newcomer, trotting his black horse in a circle of dust. The villagers gather around him. The horseman announces haughtily that he is a squire at the service of Sir Robert de Baudricourt, the captain of a nearby fortress. Jacques Darc, Jeannette’s father, asks the squire what he wants in their village. The squire proclaims: Protection levy, good people.
Some anxious, most uncomprehending, the villagers seek to know: protection against what, or whom? They have always kept up with paying the seigniorial dues to the agents of the landlords, the duchesses and the dukes. Obviously irked with the country folk’s naïvety, the squire dismounts, removes his feathered cap.
Have you not heard, good people? Do you not know about the war?
In their russet tunics and shapeless dresses the villagers listen, faces tanned, hands blistered. A great war has broken out in the west. The ruthless English and the savage men of the treasonous Duke of Burgundy are destroying France. The duke has bribed and bewitched Queen Isabeau. She has signed a treaty with the murderous English, giving their cruel king her own daughter for wife and denying her son Crown Prince Charles, the true heir, his rightful position as God’s chosen ruler of the realm.
Villagers were mystified, are now flustered. Jeannette’s father, stocky and large-headed, shouts.
We have seen no warring parties in these parts, good squire.
The squire crosses his arms, dramatises the tedium of repeating the same facts and performance to one village after another. He speaks sharply, rapidly.
English dogs plunder villages, rape womenfolk, steal livestock. We in this part of the duchy of Bar are loyal to the true heir and we will be attacked by the dogs and Burgundians. The days of peace and complacency have passed. We must protect our fields and our homes and our womenfolk and our children from the enemy. Bands of marauders have already ravaged parts of thi
s land. Nuns have been violated, wells have been poisoned. I have seen with my own eyes a heap of corpses in the ruins of what was once a tranquil village, a village very similar to yours.
The villagers murmur plunder, English, poison. They gather in the church to collect their coins. Some young men decide to join the squire and the peasant levy of the garrison of Sir Robert de Baudricourt, loyal servant of Crown Prince Charles. One of the volunteers is Marguerite’s fiancé, Collot. He is the son of a rather affluent gamekeeper, handsome enough to be marriageable, and Marguerite has been introducing him, blissfully, to all and sundry in the village for months. He kisses the girl, with her theatrical tears, before riding out to fight for what he calls our homeland.
But that does not make the region safe. A week later the villagers hear a shepherd’s howl: Burgundians! Jacques Darc, now appointed dean of the village, spends much of the village’s funds to lease a derelict castle called Château de l’Ile. He orders Jeannette to join her brothers in driving their flocks to the castle and sheltering them there.
On the way the boys and their friends call Jeannette terrible things, pimple-face, unnatural wench, village idiot. One of them has overheard her talk to herself, like a dimwit. But he’d only heard me talk to the beautiful effigy of Saint Catherine. He squeals, runs, and smacks Jeannette on the rear. I can still hear their voices. (And I know you too were bullied, my love, but back then I thought I was the only one and it was so many years before I found you.)
Most other girls are by now either engaged like Marguerite or married and pregnant. Unmarried boys of the village have regular brawls with the boys of Maxey, the village across the river, armed with clubs and stones. The people of Maxey are loyal to the Burgundians and hate the true heir. Beaten, bleeding, the boys of Domrémy return from their scuffles to curse, fight each other, and torment girls like Jeannette.