Sparrow by Michael Morpurgo Read Free Book Online

Vaucouleurs. This time Robert de Beaudricourt will listen. You see if he won’t. I shall make him.”
    Yet it was not as straightforward as Joan had hoped or imagined. It took many days beforethe snows melted and they could set out for Vaucouleurs. Even when they finally got there, Robert de Beaudricourt refused to see her. But she would not be put off. Soon everyone in the castle, in the town, knew of the peasant girl in the red skirt from Domrémy. They knew what she had come for, too, and why she waited all day and every day in the castle courtyard. For Joan, and for Uncle Durand, and for Belami too, it was a long cold vigil. Belami was frozen, even out of the wind in the nooks of the castle walls. But numb as he was, he knew he had to keep his wits about him. There were hungry, keen-eyed sparrowhawks all around, and Belami was just what they were looking for – a well-fed sparrow, with his mind on other things.
    It wasn’t until their third visit to the castle that at last someone came out to see them, but it was not Robert de Beaudricourt. It was his friendBertrand de Poulengy, who had met Joan the year before, and had never forgotten her.
    “It’s no use your waiting, Joan,” he told her. “He won’t see you. He thinks you’re out of your tiny mind. His words, not mine.”
    “And what do you think, Bertrand?” Joan asked.
    He looked down at her, and it was a while before he replied. “As a matter of fact I don’t agree with him. Don’t ask me why, but I believe you. Besides, as I see it, we’ve nothing to lose by believing you, except France. And we’re fast losing that as it is.”
    “Then talk to Robert, tell him.”
    “I have, Joan. I’ve done little else since I first met you. But he’s captain here, and he just won’t listen.”
    “And I won’t go away.”
    “I know it,” Bertrand replied. “I can think of only one possible way out of this. I have a friend, a goodfriend, a soldier like me, who would stop at nothing to drive the Godoms away – his name is Jean de Metz. If you could first persuade Jean, then Robert would listen to him – I know he would. I have already told him all about you; but he’s a down-to-earth sort, sceptical, to say the least. He thinks I’ve lost my head over you.”
    Joan laughed at that. “So when can I meet this Jean de Metz?”
    “Not here. Not now. Robert would be bound to find out and he hates conspiracies. Let me bring him to you, Joan, in town, somewhere quiet where we can talk.”
    So it was arranged, and a week later in Vaucouleurs at the house of Henri and Catherine Le Royer, good and trusted friends of Uncle Durand, Joan met Jean de Metz for the first time. She was sitting there spinning with Catherine when he came intothe room, a towering bear of a man. He waved everyone at once from the room so that he was left alone with Joan – but they were not quite alone. Unseen, and unmoving in the shadows, Belami sat perched high on top of the cupboard, watching, listening.
    “So you’re this Joan, are you? You’re Bertrand’s little friend?” Joan ignored him, and went on with her spinning, not at all daunted. “Do you know who I am, girl?” he roared.
    Joan looked him full in the face and spoke very softly. “You are Jean de Metz, and you have a very loud voice, but not loud enough, it seems, to frighten the Godoms out of France. If you want the Godoms out of France, as I do, as God does, then you must do what I say. When you leave this room you must take me to that stubborn dolt, Robert de Beaudricourt, and you must persuadehim to send me to the Dauphin. I tell you, Jean, before mid-Lent I have to be on my way to the Dauphin at Chinon. There is no one in the world, Jean, neither King, nor Duke, nor any other, who can regain the kingdom of France for the Dauphin. There is no help for this kingdom but me. I should much prefer to stay home where I belong and spin beside my mother in Domrémy. But I must go and do what must be done, since God