So spake Isabeau, but Jeanne made no reply. As she passed through the door she heard her mother say:
“She is as good as married, Jacques. She is too shy, too gentle to protest against it. She will do whatever the bishop decides without question.”
“Be not too sure of that,” spoke La Rousse before Jacques could reply. “These gentle maids have a way of turning at times, and Jeanne doth not lack spirit.”
“She hath ever been obedient, and will be now,” said Jacques confidently. “Save for this wild fancy of going to the Dauphin she hath ever been most dutiful.”
“Sometimes the gentlest maid will turn if pressed too hard,” repeated La Rousse.
And this was exactly what was happening. Jeanne was filled with sorrow that her parents should uphold Colin in trying to force her into an unwelcome marriage. For a brief time despair gripped her, for it was foreign to her nature and training to protest against those in authority over her, and should the judge sustain Colin it would mean the end of her mission. And then her soul rose up against it.
“I will not be forced into this marriage,” she decided suddenly. “I will go to Toul, and tell messire, the bishop, the truth of the matter. I will go.”
“Go, Daughter of God, and fear naught,” came the sweet tones of “Her Voices.” “Fear naught, for we will aid thee.”
Before the morning broke Jeanne rose to prepare for her journey. She knew that at this time the great gates of the archway leading into the courtyard of the inn would be closed, but there was a door, a small one used privately by La Rousse, that opened directly into the street. It was at the back of the inn, and unobserved Jeanne reached it, and passed out. It was ten leagues from Neufchâteau to Toul, and thirty miles was a long journey for a young girl to undertake alone and on foot. Also the distance lay back through the district over 127 which Antoine de Vergy’s men had swept with fire and sword. Roving bands of armed men might be encountered, but Jeanne’s gentle nature had attained the courage of desperation. She feared the marriage more than aught else, and were the action not protested there would be no evading it. So, upheld by the knowledge that her saints were with her, and an innocence that was heroic, she made the journey. In perfect safety she came at last in the dusk of the evening to Toul in Lorraine, footsore and weary, but with a heart serene and peaceful.