For a moment there was silence in the garden which sparkled with light and colors. The peacocks moved noiselessly over the grass, the glossy leaves and fragrant flowers of the tall shrubs hung motionless against the deep blue of the heavens. Finally, Charles raised his right hand in a gesture of avowal. It seemed to him that he had never made a more significant promise.
Balades, chançons et complaintes
Soot pour moy mises en oubly,
Car ennuy et pensees maintes
M’oot tenu long temps endormy.
Non pour tant, pour passer soussy,
Essaier vueil se je sauroye
Rimer, ainsi que je souloye.
Au meins j’en feray mon povoir,
Combien que je congnois et sçay
Que mon langage trouveray
Tout enroillie de Nonchaloir.
Ballads, chanons and laments
Are put away from me and forgotten,
For ennui and crowded thoughts
Have long held me asleep.
But yet, to pass the lonely time
I should like to try and see
If I can rhyme as I once did,
Although I know, I realize
That I shall find my phrases
All rusted over with Nonchaloir.
…
…
Amoureux ont parolles paintes
Et langage frois et joly;
Plaisance dont ilz soot accointes
Parle pour eux; en ce party
J’ay este, or n’est plus ainsi;
Alors de beau parler trouvoye
A bon marchie tant que vouloye;
Si ay despendu mon savoir,
Et s’un peu espargnie en ay,
Il est, quant vendra a l’essay,
Tout enroillie de Nonchaloir.
Lovers paint with words
And fresh charming language;
They know Pleasure very well,
It speaks for them; I was once
One of them but am no more;
Then sweet talk was cheap for me,
I had all I wanted;
And so I speot my wit,
And if I have saved a little
It proves when put to the test
All rusted over with Nonchaloir.
Mon jubile faire devoye,
Mais on diroit que me rendroye
Sans coup ferir, car Bon Espoir
M’a dit que renouvelleray;
Pour ce, mon cueur fourbir feray
Tout enroillie de Nonchaloir.
I should celebrate my jubilee
But they would say I surrendered
Without striking a blow, for Good Hope
Has told me that I shall be renewed;
So my heart shall be refurbished
That is all rusted over with Nonchaloir.
During the early part of the summer the King received the English legation at Montils. For the first time in years the court set aside its characteristic sobriety: fetes, banquets and tournaments added luster to the visit of the English lords. King René and his wife arrived; they brought their daughter Marguerite with them, a pretty girl of fifteen. Suffolk, charmed in spite of himself by the King’s bride, raised scarcely any objections when the French disagreed with Henry VI and his government about the terms of the peace treaty. The King of France was willing to give up Guyenne and Normandy as fiefs, but insisted on retaining sovereignty over these lands. After long discussions, over which Charles presided, a temporary solution was finally reached by which neither side had to give up an inch: an armistice was signed, to last for two years. Charles took advantage of this opportunity to discuss with Suffolk his own obligations to England: payment terms were set up. At the same time Charles and Suffolk signed a document which laid out the conditions, in minute detail, for the release of Jean d’Angoulême.
Although the embassy returned to London immediately after the discussions, Charles’ work was not over by any means. The King, now that the hostilities with England were part of the past, intended to devote his time to the total annihilation of the marauding bands of mercenaries who still roamed the countryside; accordingly he instructed Charles to take charge of all negotiations and preparations for the marriage by proxy of young Marguerite of Anjou. Charles discharged this duty as conscientiously as possible, although he had no interest in that sort of activity. He felt very tired; the incessant travel to Paris and those places where the King made successive stops, was beginning to weigh heavily upon him. He was not involved only in diplomacy. He made use of his journeys through his own cities and landed estates to get the administration of his possessions in order.
Above all, he left no stone unturned to gather together the amount needed as an advance deposit on his brother’s ransom. Whatever he managed to collect, either as a loan or a gift, he sent in installments to Suffolk’s bankers, who would attend to further arrangements. Finally, in the spring of 1445, he received the news which he had eagerly awaited for so long: the guaranteed sum of 150,000 ecus was now complete, thanks partly to regular contributions from Dunois. Jean d’Angoulême was about to cross the Straits of Calais.
Charles would have liked nothing better than to go at once to Calais to welcome his brother, but because of the nuptials of Marguerite of Anjou, he had to go instead to Nancy. King René had chosen the capital of his province of Lorraine as the scene of the festivities. He spared neither trouble nor expense to make his daughter’s wedding the pinnacle of the art of courtly living.
From all parts of the country, princes and nobles streamed to Nancy to witness all the spectacles and to see the bride, in a dress strewn with silver daisies, being led by Suffolk to the altar where she swore loyalty to her lord and husband, Henry VI, King of England, in joy and sorrow, in sickness and in health, until death should them part.
All day long the great bells of the cathedral of Nancy pealed, and the people, beside themselves with joy at the conclusion of a hundred years of war and upheaval, could not stop cheering the young Queen of England, wishing her a long life, praising and honoring her as though it were she herself who had created the peace. After the festivities the court returned to the castle of Châlons, where the King had chosen to take up residence. Charles d’Orléans and his wife, following the example of most of the nobles gathered in Nancy, accompanied the royal cortege — not so much to attend the tournaments and contests to be held at Châlons, but rather at long last to greet Jean d’Angoulême who had sent word that he intended first of all to pay his respects at court.
Charles d’Orléans was one of the few noblemen who preferred the cool, quiet rooms of the castle to remaining outdoors in the tennis courts, the meadows and the hunting fields. He chose to spend his time in the library; the King had a fine collection of books, chiefly chronicles and histories. While Charles sat comfortably reading — so he whiled away the days until his brother’s arrival — his young wife Marie sought and found, in the company of the courtiers, all the amusement and variety that her heart desired.
Among the knights who had come to Châlons in the hope of winning glory in passages at arms, was a young man named Jacques de Lalaing, who had had the benefit of being brought up at the court of Cleves. He had been a playmate of Marie’s older brothers. Often, when she was a child, she had looked on while the boys were exercising, running or trying to break in their horses. When Jacques de Lalaing came forward to greet her at the court of Châlons, she was moved, almost frightened, to recognize this knightly figure as a vision from her childhood; the man who approached her in the splendor of his youth and fame — he was already considered to be an invincible champion at single combats and tournaments — seemed to her to be the Swan Knight of the legend, the hero whom she had once hoped would come to her over the Rhine. During the following days, Marie tended more and more to curse the fate that had allowed her only now to meet de Lalaing.