“My uncle is very good to me,” Joan said.  “I sent and asked him to come and persuade my mother to let him take me home with him to tend his wife, who is not well.  It is arranged, and we go at dawn to-morrow.  From his house I shall go soon to Vaucouleurs, and wait and strive until my prayer is granted.  Who were the two cavaliers who sat to your left at the governor’s table that day?”

“One was the Sieur Jean de Novelonpont de Metz, the other the Sieur Bertrand de Poulengy.”

“Good metal—­good metal, both.  I marked them for men of mine. . . .  What is it I see in your face?  Doubt?”

I was teaching myself to speak the truth to her, not trimming it or polishing it; so I said: 

“They considered you out of your head, and said so.  It is true they pitied you for being in such misfortune, but still they held you to be mad.”

This did not seem to trouble her in any way or wound her.  She only said: 

“The wise change their minds when they perceive that they have been in error.  These will.  They will march with me.  I shall see them presently. . . .  You seem to doubt again?  Do you doubt?”

“N-no.  Not now.  I was remembering that it was a year ago, and that they did not belong here, but only chanced to stop a day on their journey.”

“They will come again.  But as to matters now in hand; I came to leave with you some instructions.  You will follow me in a few days.  Order your affairs, for you will be absent long.”

“Will Jean and Pierre go with me?”

“No; they would refuse now, but presently they will come, and with them they will bring my parents’ blessing, and likewise their consent that I take up my mission.  I shall be stronger, then—­stronger for that; for lack of it I am weak now.”  She paused a little while, and the tears gathered in her eyes; then she went on:  “I would say good-by to Little Mengette.  Bring her outside the village at dawn; she must go with me a little of the way—­”

“And Haumette?”

She broke down and began to cry, saying: 

“No, oh, no—­she is too dear to me, I could not bear it, knowing I should never look upon her face again.”

Next morning I brought Mengette, and we four walked along the road in the cold dawn till the village was far behind; then the two girls said their good-bys, clinging about each other’s neck, and pouring out their grief in loving words and tears, a pitiful sight to see.  And Joan took one long look back upon the distant village, and the Fairy Tree, and the oak forest, and the flowery plain, and the river, as if she was trying to print these scenes on her memory so that they would abide there always and not fade, for she knew she would not see them any more in this life; then she turned, and went from us, sobbing bitterly.  It was her birthday and mine.  She was seventeen years old.

Chapter 2 The Governor Speeds Joan