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inlife lay elsewhere, in the service of her Lord. But he refused to believe her and would not leave her alone, until she told her brothers about him. They were not so kind to him as she had been. He didn’t come back any more after that, and when he didn’t she half wished he would. Joan could be like that – contrary. “I so want to be like other girls, Belami,” she told him one evening, “but I know it cannot be. I did like him, and now I have hurt him too. Why is it that I must hurt everyone I like?”
    It was shortly after that the news came through that the city of Orléans was being besieged by the English. It was the worst news they could have heard, for everyone knew that once Orléans fell to the English there was nothing left to stop them sweeping south and east, enveloping the whole country. “Cursed English Godoms. They are well named, these English. May God damn them tohell,” said Joan’s father. “Within a year, less maybe, they will have swallowed up all of France. We have to stop them at Orléans. It is now or never.” As he spoke he lifted his eyes and looked straight at Joan, his faith in her unspoken but absolute. At that moment Joan knew that he believed her, and believed in her, and her heart soared. She told Belami about it later: “If Father believes in me, then I can do it, I know I can.”
    They returned two weeks later to find Domrémy in ruins. The church had been burnt to the ground – only the altar was left standing. A few houses had survived the destruction, including Joan’s, but that was little enough consolation. Every barn had been either ransacked or burnt. They could rebuild, as they had before; but with their granaries empty, the winter ahead would be long, and hard to endure for both man and beast. Many would not live tosee the spring, and they knew it. That first evening back home the family sat around their fire scarcely speaking. Joan’s mother stared blankly into the flames. “How long?” she said. “How long must we endure this? Why does God not protect us? Do we not pray for it? Do we not beg? What would He have us do?”
    “Fight, Mother,” said Joan. “He would have us fight, and we shall. Believe me, Mother, we shall. It will not be long now, Mother.” Her family looked at her and every one of them knew then that she was speaking the truth.
    No one mocked Joan, not any more. When the villagers saw her going off through Oaky Wood towards the chapel of Notre Dame, her white sparrow flying above her head, they knew she was about her work and left her be. There were a few who did not believe her claim, who stillostracised her, who still thought it too fantastical, too impossible. But even those wanted to believe her.
    On Christmas morning she was walking with Hauviette to Mass in the ruins of the church. “I shall not be here next Christmas, Hauviette,” she said, taking her hand.
    “I know,” replied Hauviette. “I shall think of you every day, until you come back.” But Joan knew she would never be coming back, that this was the last time she would walk with Hauviette, her last Christmas at home.
    By the time Uncle Durand came for her in the snows of New Year’s Day, the family realised these would be their last days all together; but no one had said as much. As for Belami, he buried himself deep in a hole in the thatch up near the chimney, kept himself warm, and waited for the day of Joan’s departure.
    Uncle Durand stayed only two nights – he wanted to get home to Aunt Joan. There was deep snow the morning they left, and the world was silent about them. It was early. No one in the house was up. She told Uncle Durand she wanted no goodbyes. They would just go. She knew now, though it was still unspoken, that she left with her father’s blessing, and her mother’s too, and that was all that mattered to her. She wanted no tears, no clinging embraces. Leaving would be hard enough without that.
    Belami fed hungrily from the pile of breadcrumbs in