One would have thought that to priests and clergy a
greater grace and power of understanding would have been
vouchsafed; but so far from this, they always held her in doubt and
suspicion, and were her secret foes from first to last.
I made it my task to see her safely home; and as we went, I asked:
"Was it an offence to you, fair Maid, that he should thus seek to
test and try you?"
"Not an offence to me, Seigneur," she answered gently, "but he
should not have had need to do it. For he did hear my confession on
Friday. Therefore he should have known better. It is no offence to
me, save inasmuch as it doth seem a slighting of my Lord."
The people flocked around her as she passed through the streets. It
was wonderful how the common townsfolk believed in her. Already she
was spoken of as a deliverer and a saviour of her country. Nay,
more, her gentleness and sweetness so won upon the hearts of those
who came in contact with her, that mothers prayed of her to come
and visit their sick children, or to speak words of comfort to
those in pain and suffering; and such was the comfort and strength
she brought with her, that there were whispers of miraculous cures
being performed by her.
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